Space Exploration
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The new rocket design looks a lot like the Apollo era rockets that took American astronauts to the moon, but NASA said the new rocket is much more powerful than any other rocket they've made before and in conjunction with the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle, already in development, it could set up astronauts for deep space exploration. The SLS will be NASA's first exploration-class vehicle since the Saturn V took astronauts to the moon. "We're investing in technologies to live and work in space, and it sets the stage for visiting asteroids and Mars," NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said at a news conference. "Will it be tough times going forward?
NASA Unveils Next Generation 'Monster' Space Rocket : The Two-Way : NPR
Newly Discovered Planet: Hot, Muggy And (Maybe) Liveable : The Two-Way : NPR
That's how The Associated Press describes the way scientists are describing "HD 85512 b ... a newly discovered planet about 35 light-years from Earth in the constellation Vela." It's the second planet outside our solar system that seems to be orbiting in "the habitable zone" around its star, according to the European Southern Observatory, which today announced the discovery of HD 85512 b and more than 50 other plants around other stars. In that habitable zone, "water may be present in liquid form if conditions are right," the ESC adds.
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Astronauts' tracks, trash seen in new moon photos - Yahoo! News
Black Holes
NOTE: This section is about stellar-mass black holes. For information about black holes that measure in the billions of solar masses , see Active Galaxies & Quasars . There are many popular myths concerning black holes , many of them perpetuated by Hollywood. Television and movies have portrayed them as time-traveling tunnels to another dimension, cosmic vacuum cleaners sucking up everything in sight, and so on. It can be said that black holes are really just the evolutionary end point of massive stars .
It’s the twentieth anniversary of the famous “ pale blue dot ” photo – Earth as seen from Voyager 1 while on the edge of our solar system (approximately 3,762,136,324 miles from home). Sagan’s words are always worth remembering: Look again at that dot. That’s here. That’s home.
Pale Blue Dot « a simple prop
Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun. It has the third-largest planetary radius and fourth-largest planetary mass in the Solar System. It is named after the ancient Greek deity of the sky Uranus (Ancient Greek: Οὐρανός), the father of Cronus (Saturn) and grandfather of Zeus (Jupiter). Though it is visible to the naked eye like the five classical planets, it was never recognized as a planet by ancient observers because of its dimness and slow orbit. Sir William Herschel announced its discovery on March 13, 1781, expanding the known boundaries of the Solar System for the first time in modern history.
BBC Solar System – Uranus orbits the Sun tilted on its side
The Juno spacecraft will, for the first time, see below Jupiter's dense clouds. Voyager 1 and 2 took advantage of a rare planetary alignment to conduct a historic tour of the outer solar system and build enough velocity to...
Solar System Exploration
Diamond Planet Discovered By Astronomers (VIDEO)
The nursery song "twinkle twinkle, little star" might have a whole new meaning now that astronomers have found a planet they believe to be made almost entirely of diamonds. Scientists say the planet exists about 4,000 light years away from Earth, and is probably the remnants of a once-large dead star, Reuters reports . (Scroll down for video.)
Summary & comments by Dan Eden for Viewzone "This first full-sky map of Sagittarius shows its extensive interaction with the Milky Way," Majewski said. "Both stars and star clusters now in the outer parts of the Milky Way have been 'stolen' from Sagittarius as the gravitational forces of the Milky Way nibbled away at its dwarf companion.
Scientists Now Know: We're From Sagittarius Dwarf Galaxy!
The Unsolved Mystery of Saturn's Hexagon -4 Times the Size of Earth
"Cassini is indebted to Voyager for its many fascinating discoveries and for pavingthe way for Cassini," says Linda Spilker, Cassini project scientist at JPL, who started her career working on Voyager from 1977 to 1989. "On Cassini, we still compare our data to Voyager's and proudly build on Voyager's heritage." But the Voyager Mission left a few mysteries that Cassini has not yet solved.
Cassini Solstice Mission: Enceladus
Enceladus [en-SELL-ah-dus] is one of the brightest objects in our solar system. Covered in water ice that reflects sunlight like freshly fallen snow, Enceladus reflects almost 100 percent of the sunlight that strikes it. Because Enceladus reflects so much sunlight, the surface temperature is extremely cold, about -201° C (-330° F). About as wide as Arizona, Enceladus is quite similar in size to Mimas but has a smoother, brighter surface. Unlike Mimas, Enceladus displays at least five different types of terrain.Enceladus
Craters and smooth plains Enceladus has the highest albedo (>0.9) of any body in the solar system. Its surface is dominated by fresh, clean ice. At least five different types of terrain have been identified on Enceladus. In addition to craters there are smooth plains and extensive linear cracks and ridges. At least some of the surface is relatively young , probably less than 100 million years.The new discovery was made during the Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn , a collaboration of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. Launched in 1997, the mission spacecraft arrived at the Saturn system in 2004 and has been touring the giant ringed planet and its vast moon system ever since. The plumes shooting water vapor and tiny grains of ice into space were originally discovered emanating from Enceladus -- one of 19 known moons of Saturn -- by the Cassini spacecraft in 2005. The plumes were originating from the so-called "tiger stripe" surface fractures at the moon's south pole and apparently have created the material for the faint E Ring that traces the orbit of Enceladus around Saturn. During three of Cassini's passes through the plume in 2008 and 2009, the Cosmic Dust Analyser, or CDA, on board measured the composition of freshly ejected plume grains.