Universe Today (Page 414)

Starlink’s Satellites Will be Orbiting at a Much Lower Altitude, Reducing the Risks of Space Junk SpaceX recently got FCC approval and is moving ahead with the deployment of its proposed internet satellite constellation. The post Starlink’s Satellites Will be Orbiting at a Much Lower Altitude, Reducing the Risks of Space Junk appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

16 Years of Hubble Images Come Together in this one Picture Containing 265,000 Galaxies The Hubble Legacy Field, the result of 16 years of observations and the most detailed image of our Universe, has been released! The post 16 Years of Hubble Images Come Together in this one Picture Containing 265,000 Galaxies appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

The Global Dust Storm that Ended Opportunity Helped Teach us how Mars Lost its Water The enduring, and maybe endearing, mystery around Mars is what happened to its water? We can say with near-certainty now, thanks to the squad of Mars rovers and orbiters, that Mars was once much wetter. In fact that planet may have had an ocean that covered a third of the surface. But what happened to … Continue reading “The Global Dust Storm that Ended Opportunity Helped Teach us how Mars Lost its Water” The post The Global Dust Storm that Ended Opportunity Helped Teach us how Mars Lost its WaterRead More →

Blue Origin’s New Shepard Flies Again, a Week Before Their Mysterious Announcement Today’s breed of billionaire space entrepreneurs likes to keep us guessing, don’t they? Mr. Elon Musk is famous for announcing partial plans on Twitter, then leaving us to cajole the details out of him. Now, Jim Bezos, Amazon founder and Blue Origin visionary, is making us guess what an upcoming mysterious announcement might mean, all … Continue reading “Blue Origin’s New Shepard Flies Again, a Week Before Their Mysterious Announcement” The post Blue Origin’s New Shepard Flies Again, a Week Before Their Mysterious Announcement appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go toRead More →

When the Impact that Created the Moon Happened, the early Earth was still a ball of magma A new study has illustrated how the impact between a proto-Earth and a Mars-sized object could have led the Moon to be composed primarily of the same material as Earth. The post When the Impact that Created the Moon Happened, the early Earth was still a ball of magma appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Dark Matter Detector Finds the Rarest Event Ever Seen in the Universe The XENON experiment recently made a breakthrough in their hunt for dark matter, observing the most rare decay process in the Universe that involves neutrinos. The post Dark Matter Detector Finds the Rarest Event Ever Seen in the Universe appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

It Looks Like LIGO/Virgo Have Detected a Black Hole Eating a Neutron Star. For the First Time Ever A new signal detected by LIGO/Virgo may be the so-called ‘holy grail’ of astrophysics: the merger of a neutron star and a black hole. They’ve discovered pairs of black holes merging, and pairs of neutron stars merging, but until now, not a neutron star-black hole pair. “I think we’re opening a window on the universe.” … Continue reading “It Looks Like LIGO/Virgo Have Detected a Black Hole Eating a Neutron Star. For the First Time Ever” The post It Looks Like LIGO/Virgo Have Detected a Black HoleRead More →

Keep an Eye Out for the Eta Aquarid Meteors This Weekend Never heard of the Eta Aquarid meteors? 2019 offers a good chance to check out this normally obscure meteor shower. 2019: The Prospects This year offers an especially good chance to spy these fast-moving meteors. First off, the peak for this shower arrives on the morning of Monday, May 6th less than 40 hours after … Continue reading “Keep an Eye Out for the Eta Aquarid Meteors This Weekend” The post Keep an Eye Out for the Eta Aquarid Meteors This Weekend appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

The World’s Space Agencies are Responding to a Hypothetical Asteroid Impact. You Can Watch it all Unfold Online. Remember when Orson Welles’ 1938 radio show called “The War of the Worlds” fooled people into thinking that Earth was actually being invaded? That was fun. Now, the ESA (European Space Agency) is tempting fate by live-tweeting the hypothetical approach of the hypothetical asteroid 2019PDC and hypothetically planning a hypothetical response to this hypothetically destructive … Continue reading “The World’s Space Agencies are Responding to a Hypothetical Asteroid Impact. You Can Watch it all Unfold Online.” The post The World’s Space Agencies are Responding to a HypotheticalRead More →

Weekly Space Hangout: May 1, 2019 – Dr. Mark Showalter of SETI Hosts: Fraser Cain (universetoday.com / @fcain) Dr. Kimberly Cartier (KimberlyCartier.org / @AstroKimCartier ) Dr. Morgan Rehnberg (MorganRehnberg.com / @MorganRehnberg & ChartYourWorld.org) Dr. Paul M. Sutter (pmsutter.com / @PaulMattSutter) Dr. Mark Showalter, Senior Research Scientist and Fellow at the SETI Institute, is one of four Planetary Scientists who, in 2013, discovered a tiny, mysterious moon around … Continue reading “Weekly Space Hangout: May 1, 2019 – Dr. Mark Showalter of SETI” The post Weekly Space Hangout: May 1, 2019 – Dr. Mark Showalter of SETI appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go toRead More →

A Strange Ice Feature Wraps Halfway Around Titan For people interested in all things beyond Earth, the words methane and Titan go hand in hand. After all, Titan is the only other world in our Solar System where liquid flows over the surface. While trying to understand Titan’s methane cycle, scientists have discovered something else: a bizarre methane ice feature that wraps halfway … Continue reading “A Strange Ice Feature Wraps Halfway Around Titan” The post A Strange Ice Feature Wraps Halfway Around Titan appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Rapidly Spinning Black Hole is Spitting Out Blobs of Plasma Black holes, those beguiling singularities that sit on the precipice of the known and the unknown, keep surprising us with their behaviour. As organizations like the Event Horizon Telescope have made clear, there’s a lot we don’t know about the holes, and worse than that, we don’t even know how much we don’t know. Now … Continue reading “Rapidly Spinning Black Hole is Spitting Out Blobs of Plasma” The post Rapidly Spinning Black Hole is Spitting Out Blobs of Plasma appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Friday’s SpaceX Dragon Launch CRS-17 to Light Up the U.S. East Coast Ever seen a rocket launch before? Catching one is easier than you might think. You just need to be looking in the right direction at the right time, and have clear skies. If you happen to be watching from the U.S. south eastern seaboard, you just might catch the spectacular dawn launch of a SpaceX Falcon-9 rocket with Dragon on the CRS-17 (also known as SpX-17) mission headed to the International Space Station before dawn on the morning of Wednesday, May 1st. The post Friday’s SpaceX Dragon Launch CRS-17 to Light Up theRead More →

Carnival of Space #609 Welcome to the 609th Carnival of Space! The Carnival is a community of space science and astronomy writers and bloggers, who submit their best work each week for your benefit. We have a fantastic roundup today so now, on to this week’s worth of stories! Universe Today: The World’s Biggest Aircraft – the Rocket-Launching Stratolaunch … Continue reading “Carnival of Space #609” The post Carnival of Space #609 appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Messier 84 – the NGC Elliptical Galaxy Welcome back to Messier Monday! Today, we continue in our tribute to our dear friend, Tammy Plotner, by looking at the Southern Pinwheel Galaxy – also known as Messier 83! During the 18th century, famed French astronomer Charles Messier noticed the presence of several “nebulous objects”  while surveying the night sky. Originally mistaking these objects … Continue reading “Messier 84 – the NGC Elliptical Galaxy” The post Messier 84 – the NGC Elliptical Galaxy appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Here’s the Video of Hayabusa2 Bombing Asteroid Ryugu Japan’s recently shared a video of the crater their Hayabusa2 spacecraft created on the surface of Ryugu. The post Here’s the Video of Hayabusa2 Bombing Asteroid Ryugu appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

InSight Just Detected its First “Marsquake” The InSight lander recently detected the strongest seismic signal yet, thanks to its Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure (SEIS) instrument. The post InSight Just Detected its First “Marsquake” appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

As Expected, the Newly Upgraded LIGO is Finding a Black Hole Merger Every Week The LIGO detector is back online after months of upgrades, and has made two new detections already! The post As Expected, the Newly Upgraded LIGO is Finding a Black Hole Merger Every Week appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Astronomers Catch a Superflare From a Puny Star Astronomers recently spied a massive flare on a tiny diminutive star, a powerful, radiation spewing event that you wouldn’t want to witness up close. The post Astronomers Catch a Superflare From a Puny Star appeared first on Universe Today. Universe Today Go to SourceRead More →

Weekly Space Hangout: Apr 24, 2019 – Nathaniel Putzig and Gareth Morgan of the Shallow Radar (SHARAD) Sounder Team on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) Hosts: Fraser Cain (universetoday.com / @fcain) Dr. Kimberly Cartier (KimberlyCartier.org / @AstroKimCartier ) Dr. Morgan Rehnberg (MorganRehnberg.com / @MorganRehnberg & ChartYourWorld.org) Dr. Paul M. Sutter (pmsutter.com / @PaulMattSutter) Dr. Nathaniel Putzig (Than) is a Senior Scientist with the Planetary Science Institute (PSI), and he serves as the US Team Leader for the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter … Continue reading “Weekly Space Hangout: Apr 24, 2019 – Nathaniel Putzig and Gareth Morgan of the Shallow Radar (SHARAD) Sounder Team on the MarsRead More →