Aug 02, 2016 New images reveal a celestial body similar to the Solar System’s other rocky denizens. The Kuiper Belt theory was developed by Kenneth Edgeworth, an astronomer from Ireland, and also (separately) by American astronomer Gerard Kuiper in 1951. The first Kuiper Belt Object (KBO) was discovered in…
Aug 1, 2016 Long time passing…. The Dawn mission was launched on September 27, 2007. It first entered orbit around the asteroid Vesta on July 17, 2011, departing on September 5, 2012 toward Ceres. Dawn arrived at Ceres on Friday, March 6, 2015. According to a recent press release,…
Jul 29, 2016 Mars stinks. “The devil, he’s about this big. He had a red suit on and a widow’s peak, and then a pointed tail, and like a sulfur reek. Yes, it was him alright, I swear.” — Frank Zappa If it were possible to stand on Mars…
Jul 28, 2016 How can superheated gas create a jet almost 1500 light-years long? According to a recent press release, collimated jets are normally considered to result from matter falling into the putative gravity field of a black hole. As stellar matter orbits closer to the black hole, it…
Jul 27, 2016 The Milky Way’s central bulge reveals more detailed structures. Plasma can be defined as any substance containing charged particles: electrically charged dust, neon lights, lightning, planetary magnetospheres, the so-called “solar wind”, stars, and even galaxies are matter in the plasma state. It is important to realize…
Jul 26, 2016 Near-infinite density is not logical in three-dimensional space. A special press conference was called on November 15, 2010 in order to announce the discovery of “the youngest black hole ever detected.” The object (SN1979C) was identified by bright X-ray emissions that have not varied in output…
Jul 25, 2016 Dark matter detection failed again. It was once thought that burned-out stars or large planets exert “dark” forces on galactic structures. Those invisible influences were called MAssive Compact Halo Objects (MACHOs). However, years of investigation found nothing. This led researchers to acknowledge that MACHOs are not…
Jul 21, 2016 Curiosity is analyzing “dark dunes” on Mars. Recently, the Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) known as “Curiosity” arrived at a vast dune field in Gale Crater. Curiosity was launched on November 26, 2011 on a two-year mission. However, in December 2012 its sojourn on Mars was extended indefinitely….
Jul 20, 2016 Pluto’s frigid environment continues to surprise investigators. Note: The Picture of the Day will be on a short break until Monday, July 25th. Clyde W. Tombaugh discovered Pluto on February 18, 1930. Percival Lowell thought there ought to be another celestial body beyond Neptune because something…
Jul 19, 2016 Radio signals from deep space? Redshift is the method astronomers use to measure the distance to remote objects in space. Parallax measurements enable them to determine the distances for nearby stars, but past a few light-years the angles are too small and cannot be resolved. Using…
