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Astronomy News
Two
Planets Beyond Pluto?
– January 15, 2015 – Are there more planets in our solar system?
According to the latest news, research by scientists in Spain and the UK
suggest that there may be as many as two planets beyond the orbit of Pluto.
To learn more about this possibility, see the EarthSky.org news report
at:
https://earthsky.org/space/two-or-more-planets-beyond-pluto
Scientist Have Discovered an Unusual ‘Monster’ Galaxy From the Early Universe
– February 6, 2020 –
Scientists report that they have discovered an unusual galaxy they call XMM-2599
that existed about 12 billion years ago when the universe was young.
It was a very large galaxy that formed stars at a very high rate and had
about 300 billion of them and then died out.
For more information on this discovery, see the USA Today news article
at:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/02/06/scientists-discover-galaxy-early-universe/4669768002/
The
Milky Way’s Satellites Help Reveal Link Between Dark Matter Halos and Galaxy
Formation – April 6,
2020 – To begin with, our Earth orbits the Sun, the moon orbits us here on Earth
and our Milky Way galaxy has satellite galaxies.
But with a new study involving dark matter, it is believed that the Milky
Way which as present is known to have about 60 satellite galaxies might have an
additional 150 or more “very faint satellite galaxies awaiting discovery”.
To learn more about the possibility of many more satellite galaxies
existing, see the Science Daily.com news article at:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/04/200406140110.htm
Discovery Alert: A New Giant, Directly Imaged
– May 14, 2020 – Astronomers have discovered and directly
imaged an object that might be what they call a brown dwarf orbiting a young Sun
-like star some 300 light-years away.
A brown dwarf is an object that is too massive to be called a planet but
is not massive enough to be a star and does not have nuclear fusion going on in
its core. To read more about this
discovery, see the NASA Exoplanet Exploration news article at:
https://exoplanets.nasa.gov/news/1642/discovery-alert-a-new-giant-directly-imaged
Are
Planets with Oceans Common in the Galaxy?
It’s Likely, NASA Scientists Find
– June 18, 2020 – In our solar system, there are a
couple of moons that are known to have water – Jupiter’s moon Europa and
Saturn’s moon Enceladus. But what
about planets orbiting other stars?
Research done by planetary scientist Lynnae Quick of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight
Center and her associates learned that “More than a quarter of the exoplanets
they studied could be ocean worlds, with a majority possibly harboring oceans
beneath layers of surface ice, similar to Europa and Enceladus.”
To read more about this study, see the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
News release at:
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2020/are-planets-with-oceans-common-in-the-galaxy-it-s-likely-nasa-scientists-find
Discovery Alert: New Planet – a Heavyweight, but Habitable?
– March 23, 2020 – Astronomers
have discovered a planet known as GJ 1061d that is the outermost planet of a
three planet system orbiting a red dwarf star located about 12 light-years from
Earth. The planet is said to be 1.7 times as massive as Earth and receives an
amount of energy from its star that is somewhere between what our Earth and Mars
receives from our sun. Scientists
believe that if this planet is rocky and has a suitable atmosphere, it could
have water on its surface. For more information on this discovery, see the NASA
Exoplanet Exploration news article at:
https://exoplanet.nasa.gov/news/1631/discovery-alert-new-planet-a-heavyweight-but-habitable/
Alternating Earths –
May 1, 2020 – Our planet Earth has gone through several different stages of
development over a period of several billion years.
Our present Earth of course is rich in life but scientists believe that
an early Earth could have supported life as well. Going on further in planetary
research, exoplanets could also support life depending on the gases in their
atmospheres. To read more about this
research, see the Astrobiology Magazine.com news article at:
https://www.astrobio.net/biosphere/alternative-earths/
Airborne
Dust Could Signify Increased Habitability of Distant Planets
– June 10, 2020 – Dust in the
atmosphere of a planet – how important is that?
According to recent research, planets that have a certain abundance of
dust in their atmosphere could be habitable at greater distances from the star
they orbit therefore increasing the number of habitable planets possible in the
universe. To read more about the
habitability of distant exo-planets, see the Astrobiology Magazine.com news
article at:
https://www.astrobio.net/also-in-news/airborne-dust-could-signify-increased-habitability-of-distant-planets/
As Many
as Six Billion Earth-like Planets in our Galaxy, according to New Estimates
– June 16, 2020 – How
many Earth-like planets might there be in our galaxy?
According to a news report from the University of British Columbia,
astronomers there using information obtained from NASA’s Kepler mission have
estimated that for every five Sun-like stars (yellow stars – spectral type G),
there may be one Earth-like planet out there.
With a galaxy that may have as many as 400 billion stars with seven
percent of them being the G-type like our Sun, that would mean close to 6
billion stars that may have planets much like our Earth including the
possibility of life present. For
complete report, see the Science Daily.com news article at:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/06/200616100831.htm
Young
Giant Planet Offers Clues to Formation of Exotic Worlds
– June 22, 2020 – You may have
heard of large Jupiter-sized planets orbiting very close to their parent star in
other solar systems. They are called
hot Jupiters. Scientists studying these planets would like to know more about
these type of exo-planets such as did they form close to their star or did they
form much farther out and then migrate inward?
If they do migrate inward, would that reveal anything about the history
of the planets in our solar system?
To read more about these type of planets and about a particular “hot Jupiter”
planet known as HIP 67522b that orbits a young star only about 17 million years
old, go to:
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7683
Hubble
Pins Down Weird Exoplanet With Far-Flung Orbit
– December 11, 2020 – A massive
Jupiter-like exoplanet is orbiting a double star system located some 336
light-years from Earth has an orbit that takes it outside the system’s
circumstellar debris disk. “This is
the first time that astronomers have been able to measure the motion of a
massive Jupiter-like planet that is orbiting very far away from its host stars
and visible debris disk.” To read
more about this discovery, read the Astrobiology Magazine article at:
https://www.astrobio.net/also-in-news/hubble-pins-down-weird-exoplanet-with-far-flung-orbit/
NASA’s
TESS Discovers New Worlds in a River of Young Stars
– February 12, 2021 – An
international team of astronomers using NASA’s TESS (Transiting Exoplanet Survey
Satellite) have discovered three planets orbiting a star similar to our sun but
much younger called TOI 451. The
planetary system is located some 400 light-years from Earth and images of this
system were actually taken in late 2018 and follow-up studies were done later
using NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope and a number of ground-based facilities.
To read the complete story of this discovery, see the NASA News report
at:
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2021/nasa-s-tess-discovers-new-worlds-in-a-river-of-young-stars/
The
Milky Way May be Swarming with Planets with Oceans and Continents Like Here on
Earth – February 22,
2021 – When we are looking for life on other planets, these planets must have
water. It has been thought that the
Earth obtained its water by perhaps a watery asteroid hitting it by accident.
However, new research at the GLOBE Institute at the University of
Copenhagen has shown that “water may be present during the very formation of a
planet. According to the study’s
calculations, this is true for both Earth, Venus and Mars.”
If these planets in our solar system could have formed with water
present, perhaps many other planets in other systems could have been formed with
water present as well. To read the
complete report on this study, see the Science Daily.com news article at:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/02/210222192839.htm
News from Jupiter
What Has
The Juno Spacecraft Seen During Its Historic Mission to Jupiter? 2011-2020
– April 2, 2020 – The
Juno mission launched to Jupiter in 2011 has provided us with an interesting
insight into the workings of this giant planet.
To see the program, go to:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5_xVp89GAy0
Potential Plumes on Europa Could Come From Water in the Crust
– November 13,2020 – We have heard about plumes of water erupting from Jupiter’s
icy moon Europa. But now new
research says that plumes of water vapor shooting upwards into space may be
coming from or within the icy crust of the moon itself.
For complete report on this story, see the NASA/JPL News report at:
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7785
News from Mars
4-Billion-Year Old Nitrogen-Containing Organic Molecules Discovered in Martian
Meteorites – May
1,2020 – Scientists studying Martian meteorites, which were blasted into space
from the red planet and landed here on Earth, have found something rather
interesting about them – they have organic compounds containing nitrogen.
This is the material for life and suggests that an early Mars could have
had proper conditions for life. To
read more about this discovery, see the Astrobiology Magazine news article at:
https://www.astrobio.net/also-in-news/4-billion-year-old-nitrogen-containing-organic-molecules-discovered-in-martian-meteorites/
Planetwide Storms May Have Filled Lakes, Rivers on Ancient Mars
– August 25, 2020 – New research
on the planet Mars – this from the University of Texas at Austin is helping
scientists to learn more about the ancient climate on Mars by finding out how
much rainfall and snowmelt filled lake beds and river valleys billions of years
ago. For more information on this
study, see the Astrobiology Magazine news article at:
https://www.astrobio.net/also-in-news/planetwide-storms-may-have-filled-lakes-rivers-on-ancient-mars/
3 Things We’ve Learned From NASA’s Mars InSight – December 16, 2020 – NASA’s Mars InSight lander came down on the Martian surface a little more than 2 years ago, November 26, 2018 to be exact, and since then scientists have learned a few things about the red planet. They have learned that there are “Mars Quakes” that occur frequently, that winds on Mars can affect InSights sensitive seismometer in that it creates a literal noise that covers up the quakes so they aren’t being heard and the third thing learned is that surface waves which are created by quakes appear to be missing. To read more about these findings, see the NASA/JPL News release at: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7802
News from Mercury
Mercury’s Scorching Daytime Heat May Help it Make its Own Ice at Caps
– March 13, 2020 – A report
from the Georgia Institute of Technology says that even though the planet
Mercury, the closest planet to the Sun, is very warm at the surface, there could
be a process where the heat there “combining with the minus 200-degree Celsius
cold in nooks of polar craters” help to create some of the ice at the planet’s
polar caps. For complete report on this study, read the Science Daily.com news
article at:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/03/200313155329.htm
News from Saturn
Data
From NASA’s Cassini May Explain Saturn’s Atmospheric Mystery
– April 6, 2020 – It is known
that the upper layers of the atmospheres of the big gas giant planets – Saturn,
Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune are hot.
Earth’s upper atmosphere is hot as well but scientists explain this by pointing
out that this is because the Earth is close enough to the Sun for this to
happen. But what about the gas giant
planets such as Saturn which are much farther away?
The answer to this question is coming from a new analysis of data from
NASA’s Cassini spacecraft which orbited Saturn years ago. To learn about a
reasonable explanation for Saturn’s upper atmosphere being hot and maybe the
other gas giant planets as well, see the NASA/JPL News release at:
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7632
NASA
CubeSat Will Shine a Laser Light on the Moon’s Darkest Craters
– April 27, 2020 – Because water
will be an important resource for future astronauts landing on the moon, NASA is
talking about a new lunar mission called the Lunar Flashlight mission also
called CubeSat. This mission will
use a briefcase-sized spacecraft (Lunar Flashlight) that will use near-infrared
lasers to shine a light into shaded polar craters of the moon to look for water
ice. To read more about this
mission, see the NASA/JPL News release at:
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7647
Telescopes and Spacecraft Join Forces to Probe Deep into Jupiter’s Atmosphere
– May 7, 2020
Researchers are using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and the Gemini Observatory
in Hawaii to combine their multiwavelength observations with close up views
taken by NASA’s Juno spacecraft currently in operation around Jupiter to learn
more about the giant planet’s atmosphere and storm system.
To read more about this new approach to study Jupiter, see the NASA News
article at:
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2020/telescopes-and-spacecraft-join-forces-to-probe-deep-into-jupiters-atmosphere
Proposed
NASA Mission Would Visit Neptune’s Curious Moon Triton
– June 16, 2020 – A proposal for
a Discovery Program mission to send a spacecraft to Neptune’s largest moon
Triton is being studied. The mission
called Trident, if selected, aims to answer several questions about the moon
Triton such as what material repeatedly resurfaced the icy landscape and where
did it come from and how can this moon which is so far from the sun be so
active? To read more about this
mission proposal, see the NASA/JPL News release at:
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7680
VERITAS:
Exploring the Deep Truths of Venus
– July 8, 2020 – The planet Venus is called our “sister
planet” with the two planets orbiting the Sun next to each other and also being
similar in size but there are said to be many differences between the two.
So to learn more about our “sister planet” Venus, NASA is thinking of a
mission under its Discovery Program called VERITAS which is short for Venus
Emissivity, Radio Science, InSAR,Topography & Spectroscopy.
If approved and launched, this would be the first mission to Venus since
NASA’s Magellan spacecraft mission there ended in 1994.
To read more about this proposed mission to Venus, see the NASA/JPL News
release at:
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7689
NASA
Takes First Step to Allow Computers to Decide What to Tell Us in Search for Life
on Mars – July 11,
2020 – Something new in the search for life on other planets is now being
revealed. It is the use of onboard
computers on space probes that will be able to identify the geochemical
signatures of life from rock samples on Mars or any other rocky planet NASA
lands a probe on. For complete
report, see the Astrobiology Magazine news article at:
https://www.astrobio.net/also-in-news/nasa-takes-first-step-to-allow-computers-to-decide-what-to-tell-us-in-search-for-life-on-mars/
NASA
Announces New James Webb Space Telescope Target Launch Date
– July 16, 2020 – The James Webb
Space Telescope (JWST) was scheduled to be launched in March 2021 but due to the
coronavirus pandemic and some technical challenges, the launch date has been
postponed until October 31, 2021.
The launch site for the JWST will be in French Guiana and the scope itself will
be considered to be the world’s premier space science observatory when launched
into space. For more information on
this telescope launch, see the NASA Press Release at:
https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-announces-new-james-webb-space-telescope-target-launch-date/
NASA’s
New Mars Rover Will Use X-Rays to Hunt Fossils
– September 22, 2020 – NASA’s
Mars 2020 Perseverance Rover which was launched in July and is due to land on
Mars on February 18, 2021 has an x-ray spectrometer at the end of a robotic arm
that will be used to search for ancient microscopic life on the red planet.
To read more about this search for ancient life on Mars, see the NASA/JPL
News release at:
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7751
NASA
Confirms New SIMPLEx Mission Small Satellite to Blaze Trails Studying Lunar
Surface – December 2,
2020 – A new mission to the Moon called the Lunar Trailblazer designed to detect
and map water on the lunar surface in order to investigate how its form,
abundance, and location relate to geology has now received to go-ahead to
proceed with the next phase of its development.
For complete report on this new mission to study the Moon, see the
NASA/JPL News release at:
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7794
A New
NASA Space Telescope, SPHEREx, is Moving Ahead
– January 5, 2021 – NASA has a
new space telescope in the works.
It’s called the Spectro-Photometer for the History of the Universe, Epoch of
Reionization and Ices Explorer or SPHEREx for short.
This new space telescope is designed to map the entire sky to study the
rapid expansion of the universe after the big bang, the composition of young
planetary systems, and the history of galaxies.
The launching of this telescope is expected to take place between June
2024 and April 2025. To read the
complete story on this new mission, see the NASA/JPL News report at:
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7805
NASA
Extends Exploration for Two Planetary Science Missions
– January 8, 2021 – Two space
missions currently in progress – the Juno mission to Jupiter and the InSight
mission to Mars have been under review by an independent panel and both missions
have been deemed to be providing some good scientific knowledge about the
planets they are studying and therefore will be extended.
The Juno mission to Jupiter will be extended through September 2025 and
the InSight mission to Mars through December 2022.
To read more about these mission extensions, see the NASA/JPL News
release at:
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=7807
NASA’s Dragonfly Mission Will Seek Clues About Titan’s Habitability – January 29, 2021 – A future mission is being planned by NASA to learn more about Saturn’s largest moon Titan which is actually larger than the planet Mercury. It is called the Dragonfly mission and its goal is to find clues about this moon ‘s habitability and gain more knowledge of its chemistry. The Dragonfly craft will carry several instruments to measure various processes on Titan including chemical, meteorological and geological processes. To read more about this interesting mission, see the Astrobiology Magazine article at: https://www.astrobio.net/missions/nasas-dragonfly-mission-will-seek-clues-about-titans-habitability/
1. Euclid Mission - a European Space Agency mission with important contributions from NASA. The mission is designed to investigate the cosmic mysteries of dark matter and dark energy. This mission has passed its design review and construction will soon begin. Launch date for this mission will be sometime in 2022. For more information on this mission, go to: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/euclid/
2. The James Webb Space Telescope mission will be an infrared telescope that will have a 6.5 meter primary mirror and will study the universe in great detail. The telescope is a collaboration between NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA). The telescope will be launched from French Guiana sometime in 2021. For more information on this telescope, visit the JWST website at: https://jwst.nasa.gov/index.html
3. Europa Clipper - a NASA mission to conduct a detailed reconnaissance of Jupiter's icy moon Europa and investigate whether this moon could harbor conditions suitable for life to exist. NASA is planning for the Europa Clipper to be ready for launch as early as 2023 and supports a launch readiness date by 2025. For more information on this mission, go to: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/europa-clipper/
4. The Wide Field InfraRed Survey Telescope (WFIRST) is a NASA observatory which will study and provide answers to questions about such things as dark energy, exoplanets,and infrared astrophysics. The telescope will have a primary mirror that will be 2.4 meters in diameter and will have two instruments - a Wide Field Instrument and Coronagraph Instrument. This mission is NASA-led and is managed by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center and is due to be launched in 2025 on a 5 year mission. To learn morfe about this mission, go to: https://wwwjpl.nasa.gov/missions/wide-field-infrared-telescope-wfirst/
Possible New Missions to Orbit the Outer Planets
In the December issue of Astronomy Magazine, there was an article about why we should return to Pluto with an orbiter craft to help gain more knowledge about this world. Currently, researchers are said to be planning a spacecraft to do just that. It is a good idea since an orbiter would be able to study this world in greater detail amd also observe changes that might take place over time. This is somthing that a quick flyby mission such as New Horizons in 2015 could not do. Also, what about the ice giant planets Uranus and Neptune? Perhaps sending an orbiter mission to those planets may result in us gaining much more knowledge about how these outer planets function. Lets hope that in the future we shall see orbitrer missions travel to the outer planets to do much detailed research about these worlds and further our understanding of them.
Space Observatories
The space-based observatories listed below are either operating at present, or just completed its mission as in the case of the Spitzer Space Telescope or as in the case of the James Webb Space Telescope which will be launched into space in 2021. To learn more about these space observatories, visit their websites listed below.
2. Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope
10. SOHO - Solar & Heliospheric Observatory