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Nasa: Moon's Crust Being Pulled Apart - In Places | Stuff.co.nz
Scientists believed the geologic activity occurred less than 50 million years ago - recent compared to the moon's age of more than 4.5 billion years. The new find was spotted on high-resolution images from Nasa's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LOR) spacecraft. The images showed small, narrow trenches much longer than they were wide, indicating the lunar crust was being pulled apart in some locations. "We think the moon is in a general state of global contraction because of cooling of a still hot interior," Thomas Watters, of the Centre for Earth and Planetary Studies at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum, said. "The graben tell us forces acting to shrink the moon were overcome in places by forces acting to pull it apart.
Supernova Blast: Giant Star Eta Carinae to Explode Any Day - TIME
When the sun finally dies some 5 billion years from now, the end will come quietly, the conclusion of a long, uneventful life. Our star will, in a sense, go flabby , swelling first, releasing its outer layers into space and finally shrinking into the stellar corpse known as a white dwarf. Things will play out quite differently for a supermassive star like Eta Carinae, which lies 7,500 light-years from Earth. Weighing at least a hundred times as much as our sun, it will go out more like an adolescent suicide bomber, blazing through its nuclear fuel in a mere couple of million years and exploding as a supernova , a blast so violent that its flash will briefly outshine the entire Milky Way.
The video, originally shot back in July at TAM 2011 Las Vegas , is of a panel featuring Bill Nye, astronomers Neil DeGrasse Tyson & Pamela Gay, and theoretical physicist Lawrence Krauss—and the entire discussion is moderated by Bad Astronomy ‘s Phil Plait. The subjects raised are consequential, the discussions thought provoking, and the opinions of the panelists refreshingly diverse (and often conflicting).
The future of space with Bill Nye, Neil deGrasse Tyson, Pamela Gay, and Lawrence Krauss discuss our future in space | Geekation: where geeks go
Discovered: The first habitable 'Earth-like' planet - The Week
An artist's conception of Kepler-22b, a planet 600 light years away from Earth, and the first confirmed planet outside our solar system that could conceivably harbor life as we know it. Photo: NASA/Ames/JPL-Caltech SEE ALL 111 PHOTOS Say hello to " Earth 2.0. " NASA's planet-hunting Kepler spacecraft has discovered an alien world that might just support life as we know it. Here's what you need to know about Earth's new celestial cousin, Kepler-22b: What exactly is the Kepler mission?
This week presents a rare opportunity to see all the major planets of the solar system in a single night. Just after sunset tonight (Dec. 21) the two brightest planets will be shining, weather permitting. Venus, the brightest, rides low in the southwest just above the setting sun. Jupiter, the second brightest planet, is high in the south.
Rare Sight! See All 7 Planets in the Night Sky This Week | Solar System Planets & Skywatching Tips | How to Spot Planets in Night Sky | Space.com
SpaceX
Whenever someone proposes to do something that has never been done before, there will always be skeptics. So when I started SpaceX, it was not surprising when people said we wouldn’t succeed. But now that we’ve successfully proven Falcon 1, Falcon 9 and Dragon, there’s been a steady stream of misinformation and doubt expressed about SpaceX’s actual launch costs and prices.
Dr. Brad Carter, Senior Lecturer of Physics at the University of Southern Queensland, outlined the scenario to news.com.au . Betelgeuse, one of the night sky’s brightest stars, is losing mass, indicating it is collapsing. It could run out of fuel and go super-nova at any time. When that happens, for at least a few weeks, we’d see a second sun, Carter says. There may also be no night during that timeframe.
Two Suns? Twin Stars Could Be Visible From Earth By 2012
Dark alien planet discovered by NASA | MNN - Mother Nature Network
An alien world blacker than coal, the darkest planet known, has been discovered in the galaxy. The world in question is a giant the size of Jupiter known as TrES-2b. NASA's Kepler spacecraft detected it lurking around the yellow sun-like star GSC 03549-02811 some 750 lightyears away in the direction of the constellation Draco. The researchers found this gas giant reflects less than 1 percent of the sunlight falling on it, making it darker than any planet or moon seen up to now. [ The Strangest Alien Planets ]
Astronomer discovers 18 giant alien planets the size of Jupiter orbiting massive dying stars outside our own solar system | Mail Online
A patient astronomer has discovered 18 massive new alien planets orbiting dying giant stars outside our solar system. It is a finding that could help scientists better understand the origins of our own sun and the planets that orbit it. This is the second-largest batch of such planets ever found -- and increases the number of known alien bodies orbiting massive stars by 50 percent.
These two infrared images were taken by the Spitzer Space Telescope in 2004 and 2009. They show a faint object moving through space together with a white dwarf. The brown dwarf, named WD 0806-661 B, is the coldest companion object to be directly imaged outside our solar system. Credit: Kevin Luhman, Penn State University, October 2011 19 October 2011 — The photo of a nearby star and its orbiting companion -- whose temperature is like a hot summer day in Arizona -- will be presented by Penn State Associate Professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics Kevin Luhman during the Signposts of Planets conference at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center on 20 October 2011.
Record-Breaking Photo Reveals a Planet-sized Object as Cool as the Earth — Eberly College of Science
Gravity Probe B - Special & General Relativity Questions and Answers
No. Experiments continue to show that there is no 'space' that stands apart from space-time itself...no arena in which matter, energy and gravity operate which is not affected by matter, energy and gravity. General relativity tells us that what we call space is just another feature of the gravitational field of the universe, so space and space-time can and do not exist apart from the matter and energy that creates the gravitational field. This is not speculation, but sound observation. Return to the Special & General Relativity Questions and Answers page. All answers are provided by Dr.An SUV Heads to Mars - The Top 10 Everything of 2011 - TIME
NASA / JPL / Reuters Think the existing Mars rovers or the lunar dune buggies from the Apollo days were fun? Wait till Curiosity — an SUV-size rover that left Cape Canaveral in November — arrives on Mars on Aug. 6. The rover will be the biggest, most capable machine on the Red Planet by far, and it will get there in an improbable way — plunging through the Martian atmosphere, slowing itself down with parachutes and air resistance and then being lowered by cables from a hovering propulsion shell. A first act like that will be hard to follow, but the second act — at least two years of Martian exploration — will probably be more than up to the job.Japan announced last week that its Akari infrared space telescope was switched off after five years of scanning the sky in search of star-forming dust clouds, ancient galaxies in the distant universe, and asteroids within the solar system. The Akari mission succumbed to trouble in its power generation system, which first appeared in May and ended the satellite's scientific observations in June. The observatory stopped receiving electricity on the night side of its orbit around Earth, an indication its batteries were not charging sufficiently. The craft remained powered in sunlight.