Eye Spy A Planet: Our Solar System

Hubble's Universe Unfiltered (Episode 7): Eye Spy A Planet (Part 1/2) - Our Solar System.

Up until the 1990s, we only knew of the planets in our own solar system. Since then, we have discovered over 300 planets orbiting other stars (extrasolar planets, exoplanets). However, most of these planets were found when scientists observed the effect of the planet's gravity upon their host stars.

Astronomers could not show the world what we wanted most: a visible light picture of a planet around a star like the Sun. That situation changed in November 2008 with a discovery by the Hubble Space Telescope. Join us for the story that begins a new era in our knowledge of planetary systems.

Hubble press release:

Hubble Directly Observes Planet Orbiting Fomalhaut
http://hubblesite.org/newscenter/arch...

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Notes

- Note that Hubble's discovery of Fomalhaut b is billed as the "first visible-light snapshot of a planet orbiting another star." It is important to note that the first direct detection of a planet will likely turn out to be the planet known as 2M1207 b. However, the host, 2M1207, is not a full-fledged star, but a brown dwarf (see below). In addition, pictures of three planets around HR 8799, released the same day as the Fomalhaut discovery, were taken in the infrared.

- Let me clarify about 2M1207. It has less than 3% the mass of our Sun, roughly 25 times the mass of Jupiter. That mass places it in the brown dwarf category: large enough to ignite deuterium fusion in its core (thus not a planet), but not large enough for hydrogen fusion (thus not a star). Brown dwarfs glow faintly at formation and then spend the rest of their lives cooling and fading away. Brown dwarfs are generally thought to be those objects with between 15 and 70 times the mass of Jupiter.

- I wanted to make a joke that what the Hubble image of Fomalhaut looked most like is the "Eye of Sauron" from the "Lord of the Rings" movies. However, New Line Cinema did not respond to my requests for permission, and my producer would not let me use the image in the podcast. That joke is one reason why the episode is called "Eye Spy."

- A betting astronomer might have chosen Beta Pictoris as the first star around which a planet would have been seen. We have been getting intriguing evidence that planets should be there for more than a decade. However, since the disk in the Beta Pic system is roughly perpendicular to our line of sight, any planets will travel in front of and behind the star from our point of view. Hence, we could only observe them well during parts of their orbits. Face-on systems, like HR 8799, are much more favorable for direct images.

- If confirmed, the Beta Pictoris planet would indicate that giant planets can form quickly. Beta Pictoris is about 12 million years old. We believe that giant planets must form within the first 10 or so million years of a developing system, as winds and radiation from newborn stars should remove the gas from the system on that timescale. A giant planet needs to accrete some of that gas during its formation, and thus must form in millions of years. In contrast, it is thought that Earth may take as much as a couple hundred million years to form.

• http://hubblesite.org/

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Hubble's Universe Unfiltered is a collection of video podcasts. Each episode offers an in-depth explanation of the latest news story or image from the Hubble Space Telescope, presented by astronomer Frank Summers.

• http://hubblesite.org/explore_astrono...

Hubble 20 Years of Space-Shattering Discoveries

NASA's tribute to the Hubble Space Telescope on its 20th anniversary in space. This beautiful video surveys the incredible accomplishments of this revolutionary instrument: everybody's favorite telescope.

Webb Space Telescope: Finding Earth-like Planets

James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), Part 2/2 - Finding earth-like (extrasolar) planets.

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is a large, infrared-optimized space telescope, scheduled for launch in 2014. JWST will find the first galaxies that formed in the early Universe, connecting the Big Bang to our own Milky Way Galaxy. JWST will peer through dusty clouds to see stars forming planetary systems, connecting the Milky Way to our own Solar System. JWST's instruments will be designed to work primarily in the infrared range of the electromagnetic spectrum, with some capability in the visible range.

JWST will have a large mirror, 6.5 meters (21.3 feet) in diameter and a sunshield the size of a tennis court. Both the mirror and sunshade won't fit onto the rocket fully open, so both will fold up and open once JWST is in outer space. JWST will reside in an orbit about 1.5 million km (1 million miles) from the Earth.

• http://www.jwst.nasa.gov/

Webb Space Telescope - The Next Great Observatory

James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), Part 1/2 - The Next Great Observatory.

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is a large, infrared-optimized space telescope, scheduled for launch in 2014. JWST will find the first galaxies that formed in the early Universe, connecting the Big Bang to our own Milky Way Galaxy. JWST will peer through dusty clouds to see stars forming planetary systems, connecting the Milky Way to our own Solar System. JWST's instruments will be designed to work primarily in the infrared range of the electromagnetic spectrum, with some capability in the visible range.

JWST will have a large mirror, 6.5 meters (21.3 feet) in diameter and a sunshield the size of a tennis court. Both the mirror and sunshade won't fit onto the rocket fully open, so both will fold up and open once JWST is in outer space. JWST will reside in an orbit about 1.5 million km (1 million miles) from the Earth.

• http://www.jwst.nasa.gov/
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Extremely Large Telescope - A Home For The E-ELT

ESOCast 16: E-ELT Site Chosen.

On 26 April 2010, the ESO Council selected Cerro Armazones as the site for the planned 42-metre European Extremely Large Telescope. Cerro Armazones is an isolated mountain at 3060 metres altitude in the central part of Chile's Atacama Desert, some 130 kilometres south of the town of Antofagasta and about 20 kilometres away from Cerro Paranal, home of ESOs Very Large Telescope.

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"This is an important milestone that allows us to finalise the baseline design of this very ambitious project, which will vastly advance astronomical knowledge," says Tim de Zeeuw, ESOs Director General. "I thank the site selection team for the tremendous work they have done over the past few years."

ESOs next step is to build a European extremely large optical/infrared telescope (E-ELT) with a primary mirror 42 metres in diameter. The E-ELT will be "the worlds biggest eye on the sky" — the only such telescope in the world. ESO is drawing up detailed construction plans together with the community. The E-ELT will address many of the most pressing unsolved questions in astronomy, and may, eventually, revolutionise our perception of the Universe, much as Galileo's telescope did 400 years ago. The final go-ahead for construction is expected at the end of 2010, with the start of operations planned for 2018.

The decision on the E-ELT site was taken by the ESO Council, which is the governing body of the Organisation composed of representatives of ESOs fourteen Member States, and is based on an extensive comparative meteorological investigation, which lasted several years. The majority of the data collected during the site selection campaigns will be made public in the course of the year 2010.

http://www.eso.org/public/news/eso1018/

20 Years - Happy Birthday, Hubble!

20 years ago, on the 24 April 1990, the Space Shuttle Discovery launched the Hubble Space Telescope, a joint NASA-ESA mission. Its discoveries have resulted in, quite probably, the most significant advances in astronomy since Galileo's telescope.

It has provided the world's scientists with profound and unforeseen insights into the Universe, with hundreds of thousands of images of astounding beauty. The space telescope has greatly increased the publics curiosity and fascination for the mysteries of the Universe and our place in it.

Starry-eyed Hubble celebrates 20 years of awe and discovery

The most prolific space observatory will zoom past its 20-year milestone this weekend. On 24 April 1990, the Space Shuttle and its crew released the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope into Earth orbit. What followed is one of the most remarkable sagas of the space age.

Hubbles unprecedented capabilities have made it one of the most powerful science instruments ever conceived, and certainly the one most embraced by the public. Hubbles discoveries have revolutionised nearly all areas of astronomy, from planetary science to cosmology. And its pictures are unmistakably out of this world.

At times, Hubbles starry odyssey has played out like a space soap opera: with broken equipment, a bleary-eyed primary mirror and even a Space Shuttle rescue/repair mission cancellation. But the ingenuity and dedication of Hubble scientists, engineers and NASA and ESA astronauts have allowed the observatory to rebound time and time again. Its crisp vision continues to challenge scientists with exciting new surprises and to enthral the public with ever-more evocative colour images.

NASA, ESA and the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) are celebrating Hubbles journey of exploration with a stunning new picture. Another exciting part of the anniversary will be the launch of the revamped European website for Hubble, spacetelescope.org. ESA will also be sponsoring the Hubble Pop Culture Contest that calls for fans to search for examples of the observatorys presence in everyday life.

To date, Hubble has looked at over 30 000 celestial targets and amassed over half a million pictures in its archive. The last heroic servicing mission by astronauts to Hubble in May 2009 made the telescope 100 times more powerful than when it was launched.

In addition to its irreplaceable scientific importance, Hubble brings cosmic wonders into millions of homes and schools every day. For the past 20 years the public have become co-explorers with this wondrous observatory.

• http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMP3VF098G_...

Starry-eyed Hubble Celebrates 20 Years Of Awe And Discovery

Hubblecast 36: "Gifts from the sky - Honouring 20 years of Hubble Space Telescope".

The best recognised, longest-lived and most prolific space observatory zooms past a milestone of 20 years of operation. On 24 April 1990, the Space Shuttle and crew of STS-31 were launched to deploy the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope into a low-Earth orbit. What followed was one of the most remarkable sagas of the space age.

Hubbles unprecedented capabilities have made it one of the most powerful science instruments ever conceived by humans, and certainly the one most embraced by the public. Hubbles discoveries have revolutionised nearly all areas of current astronomical research, from planetary science to cosmology. And, its pictures are unmistakably out of this world.

At times Hubbles starry odyssey has played out like a space soap opera: with broken equipment, a bleary-eyed primary mirror and even a Space Shuttle rescue/repair mission cancellation. But the ingenuity and dedication of Hubble scientists, engineers, and NASA and ESA astronauts have allowed the observatory to rebound time and time again. Its crisp vision continues to challenge scientists with exciting new surprises and to enthral the public with ever more evocative colour images.

NASA, ESA and the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) are celebrating Hubbles journey of exploration with a stunning new picture. Another exciting component of the anniversary will be the launch of the revamped European website for Hubble ( http://www.spacetelescope.org/ ). ESA will also be sponsoring the Hubble Pop Culture Contest that calls for fans to search for examples of the observatorys presence in everyday life ( http://www.spacetelescope.org/project... ).

The brand new Hubble anniversary image highlights a small portion of one of the largest observable regions of starbirth in the galaxy, the Carina Nebula. Towers of cool hydrogen laced with dust rise from the wall of the nebula. The scene is reminiscent of Hubbles classic Pillars of Creation photo from 1995, but even more striking in appearance. The image captures the top of a pillar of gas and dust, three light-years tall, which is being eaten away by the brilliant light from nearby bright stars. The pillar is also being pushed apart from within, as infant stars buried inside it fire off jets of gas that can be seen streaming from towering peaks like arrows sailing through the air.

To date, Hubble has looked at over 30 000 celestial targets and amassed over half a million pictures in its archive. The last heroic astronaut-servicing mission to Hubble in May 2009 made the telescope 100 times more powerful than when it was launched. In addition to its irreplaceable scientific importance, Hubble brings cosmic wonders into millions of homes and schools every day. For the past 20 years the public has become co-explorers with this wondrous observatory.

• http://www.spacetelescope.org/news/he...

Hubble 20th Anniversary in Space

The famous Dr. J. stages an awards ceremony for the Hubble Space Telescope. He summarizes Hubble's major achievements and its central role in a revolution in our understanding of the universe.

Feeding our Future - Ernährung auf der Erde und im Weltraum

Feeding our Future (1) - Ernährung auf der Erde und im Weltraum.

"Feeding our Future" User Guide (PDF)
• English: http://esamultimedia.esa.int/multimed...
• Deutsch: http://esamultimedia.esa.int/multimed...

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Die Europäische Weltraumorganisation (ESA) ist Europas Tor zum All. Ihre Mission ist es, die Entwicklung europäischer Aktivitäten im Weltraum zu gestalten und dafür zu sorgen, dass Investitionen in Weltraumtechnologien den Bürgern Europas weiterhin zugute kommen.

Die ESA zählt 18 Mitgliedsstaaten; das Ziel der ESA-Projekte besteht in der Vertiefung unserer Kenntnisse über die Erde, den erdnahen Weltraum, das Sonnensystem und das Universum sowie in der Entwicklung satellitengestützter Technologien und der Förderung der europäischen Industrie.

Außerdem arbeitet die ESA eng mit anderen Organisationen außerhalb Europas zusammen, um den Nutzen, den der Weltraum für uns birgt, der gesamten Menschheit zuteil kommen zu lassen.

Die Internationale Raumstation (ISS) ist das umfassendste internationale Gemeinschaftsprogramm, das je zu wissenschaftlichen und technologischen Zwecken durchgeführt wurde. Zehn der ESA-Mitgliedsstaaten sowie Kanada, Japan, Russland und die USA sind daran beteiligt.

Die ISS ist eine einzigartige Umgebung für die Durchführung von Langzeitforschungen unter Bedingungen der Schwerelosigkeit, die unsere Kenntnisse über verschiedene wissenschaftliche Disziplinen - einschließlich die menschliche Physiologie, Physik und das Klima auf der Erde - erweitern sowie ein Fundament für die weitere Erforschung unseres Sonnensystems in der Zukunft bilden können.

• http://esamultimedia.esa.int/multimed...

Lebensmittel und Ernährung sind ein grundlegender Bestandteil unseres Alltags. Und das nicht nur, weil wir Energie und Nährstoffe zum Überleben brauchen, sondern auch, weil unsere Kultur und unser Lebensstil entscheidend durch unsere Nahrung geprägt sind.

Ein lateinisches Sprichwort besagt: "mens sana in corpore sano" (ein gesunder Geist in einem gesunden Körper). Diese Redewendung ist heute umso bedeutungsvoller, da sich aus ihr folgern lässt, wie wichtig Lebensmittel und Ernährung für ein gesundes Leben sind - insbesondere für die jüngere Generation.

Das Programm "Speiseplan für unsere Zukunft - Ernährung auf der Erde und im Weltraum" beleuchtet das Thema Ernährung aus einer besonders inspirierenden Perspektive - der Raumfahrt. Um den Anforderungen des Lebens im Weltraum gewachsen zu sein, müssen sich die Astronauten an Bord der Internationalen Raumstation stets bei guter Gesundheit halten. Langzeitraumflüge sind nur mit fortschrittlichen Technologien aus den unterschiedlichsten Bereichen möglich.

Dazu gehören Lebenserhaltungssysteme für Astronauten. Europa beteiligt sich intensiv an der Forschung und Entwicklung von Lebenserhaltungssystemen, bei der ein wichtiger Schwerpunkt auf der Lebensmitteltechnologie liegt. Eine der nächsten Fragen wird also lauten: "Was gibt es auf dem Mond zum Abendessen?"

Der Weltraum - wie auch die Ernährung - stellt aufgrund der damit verbundenen naturwissenschaftlichen, technologischen, kulturellen und emotionalen Werte ein interdisziplinäres Thema dar.

Neben ihren anderen Missionen hat es sich die ESA-Abteilung für bemannte Raumfahrt zur Aufgabe gemacht, unserer Jugend die Faszination der Weltraumforschung und der bemannten Raumfahrt zu vermitteln. Bildung ist eines der ideellen Ziele unseres Programms, mit denen wir uns für die Schaffung einer wissensbasierten Gesellschaft in Europa stark machen.

• http://www.esa.int
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Look out for the ISS!

"Look out for the ISS!" with Jane Houston Jones at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California.

Have you ever seen the International Space Station pass overhead? It's easy if you know when and where to look.

The ISS orbits Earth about 15 times per day. With your unaided eyes it looks like bright star moving across the sky, but it doesn't blink like an airplane.

To find out when a pass will be visible, check on the web for sighting opportunities. NASA's Human Spaceflight website has a great tool to help you find local sighting dates and times.

• http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/...

Martian Craters Woven In Plaid

Stunning new sequence from the Hi-Rise camera aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, set to bagpipe electronica. From U of Arizona and NASA-JPL.

Charting The Milky Way Galaxy

Science@ESA Vodcast (Episode 6, Part 1): Charting the Milky Way - Mapping the Galaxy - from Hipparcos to Gaia.

In this sixth episode of the Science@ESA vodcast series Rebecca Barnes discovers the motions of the stars, learns how astronomers measure their distances and looks at the new European mission that will really get to grips with our place in the Universe.

ESA Hipparcos Mission

Hipparcos, a European mission, pinpointed the positions of more than one hundred thousand stars to high precision, and more than one million stars to lesser precision. Hipparcos turned slowly on its axis and repeatedly scanned right around the sky at different angles. It measured angles between widely separated stars, and recorded their brightness, which were often variable from one visit to the next. Each star selected for study was visited about 100 times over four years.

• http://www.esa.int/esaSC/120366_index...
• http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/area...

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ESA Gaia Mission

Gaia is a mission that will conduct a census of one thousand million stars in our Galaxy. It will monitor each of its target stars about 70 times over a five-year period, precisely charting their positions, distances, movements, and changes in brightness. It is expected to discover hundreds of thousands of new celestial objects, such as extra-solar planets and failed stars called brown dwarfs. Within our own Solar System, Gaia should also identify tens of thousands of asteroids.

Additional scientific benefits include detection and characterisation of tens of thousands of extra-solar planetary systems, a comprehensive survey of objects ranging from huge numbers of minor bodies in our Solar System, through galaxies in the nearby Universe, to about 500 000 distant quasars. It will also provide stringent new tests of Albert Einsteins general relativity theory.

• http://www.esa.int/esaSC/120377_index...
• http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/area...
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Saturn Struck By Lightning

Saturn Cassini mission team members from NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab recount their observations of lightning bolts flashing in the outer regions of Saturn's atmosphere.

The Bottom Of The World: Exploring Earth's Lowest Places

Californa Academy of Sciences (Calacademy): The Bottom Of The World: Exploring Earth's Lowest Places.

Why go up when you can go down? Botanist Jim Malusa travels to the lowest places on the planet, on bicycle. From Lac Assal in Africa to Lake Eyre in Australia to Death Valley, he finds dry deserts, but also oases of life - birds, plants, and even people.

The California Academy of Sciences is a world-class scientific and cultural institution based in San Francisco. The Academy recently opened a new facility in Golden Gate Park, a 400,000 square foot structure that houses an aquarium, a planetarium a natural history museum and a 4-story rainforest all under one roof.

The new facility is also home to the Academy's staff of world-class scientists, an education department that provides a wide range of student and teacher services, and an extensive science library with over 26 million specimens and artifacts.

• http://www.calacademy.org/

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Extreme locations on Earth:
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extremes...

Facts Of Evolution: The Molecules Of Life

Molecular evolution is the process of evolution at the scale of DNA, RNA, and proteins. Molecular evolution emerged as a scientific field in the 1960s as researchers from molecular biology, evolutionary biology and population genetics sought to understand recent discoveries on the structure and function of nucleic acids and protein.

Some of the key topics that spurred development of the field have been the evolution of enzyme function, the use of nucleic acid divergence as a "molecular clock" to study species divergence, and the origin of non-functional or junk DNA. Recent advances in genomics, including whole-genome sequencing, high-throughput protein characterization, and bioinformatics have led to a dramatic increase in studies on the topic. In the 2000s, some of the active topics have been the role of gene duplication in the emergence of novel gene function, the extent of adaptive molecular evolution versus neutral drift, and the identification of molecular changes responsible for various human characteristics especially those pertaining to infection, disease, and cognition.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Molecula...
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Mars HiRISE 3-D: The Red Isle & New Amazing Flyovers

HiRISE - High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment: The Red Isle & New Amazing Flyovers.

The High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment Camera is a camera on board the NASA Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.

The 65 kg, $40 million (USD) HiRISE camera was built under the direction of the University of Arizona's Lunar and Planetary Laboratory by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. It consists of a 0.5 meter reflecting telescope, the largest of any deep space mission, which allows it to take pictures with resolutions up to 0.3 m, resolving objects about a meter across, or the size of a beachball.

The HiRISE camera is designed to view surface features of Mars in greater detail than has previously been possible. This allows for the study of the age of Martian features, looking for landing sites for future Mars landers, and in general, seeing the Martian surface in far greater detail than has previously been done from orbit.

By doing so, it is allowing better studies of Martian channels and valleys, volcanic landforms, possible former lakes and oceans, and other surface landforms as they exist on the Martian surface.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HiRISE

The Stuff Of Legend

Hubblecast 35: The Stuff Of Legend.

Gearing up for the 20th anniversary of the legendary space observatory, Dr. J takes a look at the story of the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. Born of an ambitious idea, it took decades for Hubble to become a reality. The project was complex and often faced huge setbacks but, ultimately, the powerful telescope took to the skies aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery on 24 April 1990.

Look back through the decades with this the first of two special Hubble 20th anniversary Hubblecasts. And stay tuned for the next anniversary Hubblecast.

Hubble is neither the first telescope in space, nor will it be the last, but it is the only one that can be serviced by astronauts and this unique, intimate relationship between human and machine, combined with the observatory's storied history makes Hubble the stuff of legend. This year, we celebrate 20 years of Hubble in orbit.

Our fascination with the starry skies can be traced back to the earliest human civilisations. In antiquity, the Greeks and Romans were so taken with the heavens that they lent the names of their gods to the planets of the Solar System. Much later, our fascination with the skies was fuelled by the invention of the telescope and, much later still, this led to the development of space telescopes.

In the early 20th century, scientists began to seriously think of the possibility of telescopes in space. In 1923 Hermann Oberth, who was of Romanian and German descent, and is widely considered to be the father of space telescopes, wrote a book, 'Die Rakete zu den Planetenräumen', putting the idea into print for the first time.

After World War II, technology that was developed for defence was being considered for space exploration and, in 1946, the American astronomer Lyman Spitzer wrote a paper extolling the advantages of a space telescope. One of those advantages is, of course, to be free of the blurring influence of the Earths atmosphere.

It wasnt until the late 1960s that Spitzers dream started to become a reality in the form of the Large Space Telescope, Hubbles first given name. But the dream -- what seemed like a natural follow-on to the success of previous orbiting observatories and the US Apollo missions -- was to suffer a lengthy interruption.

The 1970s were a decade of challenges for the US government, which oversees NASAs budget. The Vietnam war continued through the middle of the decade and, on top of that, a crippling oil crisis had grave effects on the economy.

Spitzer, who was a distinguished scientist and motivated lobbyist, campaigned tirelessly for his dream telescope in the 1970s, but budget issues continued to hamper him and his fellow space telescope visionaries. Finally, an idea to collaborate internationally brought the dream one step closer to reality.

The European Space Agency stepped in the late 1970s as another 'parent' to the troubled telescope, providing not only funding, but people power and literal power in the form of the solar cells -- the lifeblood of this solar-powered observatory. ESA also built one of the observatorys first generation instruments, the Faint Object Camera (FOC).

In 1983, the Large Space Telescope was christened the Hubble Space Telescope after the celebrated astronomer Edwin P. Hubble. But even with proper funding and an official name, the project still faced many uphill battles. Contractors who were building the mirror and the spacecraft were going over budget and missing deadlines.

This pushed the launch date further and further back and, finally, all seemed to be ready in early 1986 for an autumn departure. Then, tragically, the seven-member crew of the Space Shuttle Challenger was lost in an explosion just after launch on the 28th of January 1986.

After the shocking Challenger disaster NASA halted all shuttle missions from 1986 through the fall of 1988 until a lengthy review could be conducted and astronaut safety assured. During the grounding of the shuttle programme, engineers continued to work on Hubble in its temporary home -- a cleanroom.

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Travelling through time and space with our host Doctor J a.k.a. Dr. Joe Liske ...

Hubblecast features news and Images from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.

Dr. J is the young enthusiastic host of the Hubblecast. He is a German astronomer at the European Organization for Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere (ESO). His scientific interests are in cosmology, particularly on galaxy evolution and quasars. Dr. J's real name is Joe Liske and he has a PhD in astronomy.

• http://www.spacetelescope.org

Science Bytes - Episode 16

Episode 16 - Stockholm Syndrome

NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX)

The Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) is an orbiting space telescope observing galaxies in ultraviolet light across 10 billion years of cosmic history. A Pegasus rocket launched GALEX into orbit in 2003. Although originally planned as a 29-month mission, the NASA Senior Review Panel in 2006 recommended that the mission lifetime be extended.


GALEXs observations are telling scientists how galaxies, the basic structures of our Universe, evolve and change. Additionally, GALEX observations are investigating the causes of star formation during a period when most of the stars and elements we see today had their origins.

Led by the California Institute of Technology, GALEX is conducting several first-of-a-kind sky surveys, including an extra-galactic (beyond our galaxy) ultraviolet all-sky survey. During its mission GALEX will produce the first comprehensive map of a Universe of galaxies under construction, bringing us closer to understanding how galaxies like our own Milky Way were formed.

GALEX is also identifying celestial objects for further study by ongoing and future missions and GALEX data now populates a large, unprecedented archive available to the entire astronomical community and to the general public.

Scientists would like to understand when the stars that we see today and the chemical elements that make up our Milky Way galaxy were formed. With its ultraviolet observations, GALEX is filling in one of the key pieces of this puzzle.

• http://www.galex.caltech.edu/

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The Galaxy Evolution Explorer (GALEX) is an orbiting ultraviolet space telescope launched on April 28, 2003. A Pegasus rocket placed the craft into a nearly circular orbit at an altitude of 697 kilometres (433 mi) and an inclination to the Earth's equator of 29 degrees.

The first observation was dedicated to the crew of the Space Shuttle Columbia and images the sky in the constellation Hercules, taken on May 21, 2003. This region was selected because it had been directly overhead the shuttle at the time of its last contact with the NASA Mission Control Center.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GALEX

Compassion, It's Not Just For Humans

Night And Day On An Alien World

The Hidden Universe of the Spitzer Space Telescope (Episode 4): Night And Day On An Alien World.

It's as clear as day and night ... but on an exotic alien world! Astronomers have for the first time measured the temperatures varying across the surface of an exoplanet -- a planet beyond our solar system.

This is the Hidden Universe of the Spitzer Space Telescope, exploring the mysteries of infrared astronomy with your host Dr. Robert Hurt.

Planets orbiting other sun-like stars are notoriously difficult to observe; theyre so distant that no telescope is yet powerful enough to photograph them directly. Their feeble light is blurred into the glare of the stars they orbit.Nonetheless, since 1995 astronomers have discovered over 200 extrasolar planets by observing the effects they have on their parent stars. These include gravitationally-induced wobbles, and even faint dimmings of the starlight when the planets pass in front.

The infrared eye of the Spitzer Space Telescope has already proven to be an exciting tool for learning more about these alien worlds.

In 2005, astronomers Drake Deming and Dave Charbineau announced the first detection of light from two extrasolar planets, seen as they went into eclipse behind their stars.

Now, astronomers Joe Harrington, of the University of Central Florida, and Brad Hanson, of UCLA, have taken this one step further. They have actually measured differences between the day and night sides of such a world.

This remarkable result marks the first time any kind of variation has been seen across the surface of a planet outside our solar system. For now only imaginative artists can provide pictures of what they could look like. But until the day we can take real snapshots, astronomers will continue to find clever ways to explore this growing catalog of alien worlds.

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The Spitzer Space Telescope is the final mission in NASA'€™s Great Observatories Program - a family of four space-based observatories, each observing the Universe in a different kind of light.

• http://spitzer.caltech.edu/

A Spectacular View Of M66 (Leo Triplet)

Hubblecast 34: "Hubble snaps heavyweight of the Leo Triplet".

Hubble has snapped a spectacular view of M66, the largest "player" of the Leo Triplet, and a galaxy with an unusual anatomy: it displays asymmetric spiral arms and an apparently displaced core. The peculiar anatomy is most likely caused by the gravitational pull of the other two members of the trio.

The Leo Triplet (also known as the M66 Group) is a small group of galaxies about 35 million light-years away in the constellation Leo. This galaxy group consists of the spiral galaxies M65, the M66, and the NGC 3628.

The M96 Group is located physically near the Leo Triplet. These two groups may actually be separate parts of a much larger group, and some group identification algorithms actually identify the Leo Triplet at part of the M96 Group.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leo_Triplet

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Travelling through time and space with our host Doctor J a.k.a. Dr. Joe Liske ...

Hubblecast features news and Images from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope.

Dr. J is the young enthusiastic host of the Hubblecast. He is a German astronomer at the European Organization for Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere (ESO). His scientific interests are in cosmology, particularly on galaxy evolution and quasars. Dr. J's real name is Joe Liske and he has a PhD in astronomy.

• http://www.spacetelescope.org

High Speed Explosions

A comparison of the fuel-air flame speeds in butane/air and hydrogen air mixtures.

The mixtures in each case are near stoichiometry.

Hydocarbons-air mixtures are typically what cars run on, just with octane-air rather than butane air. You can run rockets on liquid hydrocarbons/liquid oxygen, indeed the heavy lift section of the saturn V rocket ran on liquids oxygen (LOX) and kerosene (a moderately long chain hydrocarbon). While per unit volume of gasious combustion this actually produces more energy than the hydrogen-air mixture, the nature of that energy (spread over more molecules, with a lower temperature) means that its not a good a propellant as hydrogen-air.

Hydrogen-air mixture have ferocious combustion speeds, over a vast composition range. As the energy of the reaction goes almost exclusively into the water molecules produces (which are very stream), it makes an excellent rocket propellant. Naturally most of the gas in these bottles is the nitrogen that makes up 4/5 of our atmosphere. If it were simply a H2/O2 mixture the explosion would be about 2-3x as big. Rockets run on liquidized fuel. As a rule of thumb, there is about a 1000 fold increase in density on liquefaction.
This is the mixture the shuttle uses, and it uses some 4000 liters of it per second!
That's the equivalent of burning some 4 million of these bottles per second!

Shuttle Launch courtesy of Nasa.

For those who want to know the camera is Exilim EX-FC100 which does 1000 frames per second slow motion video (about 1/30th speed). Can't tell you much more about it that it seems to work okay, and like all digital cameras it gets great reviews:- the reason I can't tell you much about it is that I made this video the same day I got the camera.... just wanted something interesting to try it out on! :-)

The Ice Mission

ESA's Earth Explorer CryoSat mission is dedicated to precise monitoring of the changes in the thickness of marine ice floating in the polar oceans and variations in the thickness of the vast ice sheets that overlie Greenland and Antarctica.

With the effects of a changing climate fast becoming apparent, particularly in the polar regions, it is increasingly important to understand exactly how Earths ice fields are responding. Diminishing ice cover is frequently cited as an early casualty of global warming and since ice, in turn, plays an important role regulating climate and sea level, the consequences of change are far reaching.

For some years now, satellites such as ESAs Envisat have been mapping the extent of ice cover. As stated in the Climate Change 2007 Synthesis Report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, "Satellite data since 1978 show that annual average Arctic sea-ice extent has shrunk by 2.7% per decade." However, this is only part of the picture.

In order to understand fully how climate change is affecting these remote but sensitive regions, there remains an urgent need to determine exactly how the thickness of the ice, both on land and floating in the sea, is changing. By addressing this challenge, the data delivered by the CryoSat mission will complete the picture and lead to a better understanding of the role ice plays in the Earth system.

The CryoSat-2 satellite replaces the original CryoSat, which was lost owing to a launch failure in October 2005. Following the loss, the mission was judged to be even more important than when it was first selected for development, and the decision to rebuild was taken. Almost exactly four years to the day after that decision, the new CryoSat-2, with a number of improvements, was ready for launch.

From an altitude of just over 700 km and reaching latitudes of 88°, the CryoSat-2 satellite will monitor precise changes in the thickness of the polar ice sheets and floating sea ice. CryoSats original objective was to determine if there was a trend towards diminishing ice cover. There now seems little doubt that there are indeed trends the challenge now is to characterise them.

http://www.esa.int/esaLP/LPcryosat.html

Evolution of Eusociality in Bees (Haplodiploidy)

I discuss the evolution of the peculiar social structure seen in hymanopterids.
This video is a bit technical, and is targeted at people with some background in biology. Regardless, its an interesting little FYI.

Sword Of Orion

The Hidden Universe of the Spitzer Space Telescope (Episode 3): A Stellar Census of the Sword of Orion.

This is the Hidden Universe of the Spitzer Space Telescope, exploring the mysteries of infrared astronomy with your host Dr. Robert Hurt.

New images of the Orion Nebula show thousands of nascent solar systems. The Spitzer images have unsheathed the Sword of Orion and led astronomers to a treasure trove of baby stars within.

'The Hidden Universe' video series showcases some of the most exciting discoveries in infrared astronomy from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope. Looking beyond the visible spectrum of light, Spitzer can see a whole new universe of dust and stars hidden from our Earth-bound eyes.

Orion, the hunter, is one of the best-known constellations in the sky. Hanging beneath its distinctive three belt stars is a glowing patch known as the Sword of Orion, or M42.

At a distance of about 1,300 light years, this nearby stellar nursery is easily visible to the naked eye. But for astronomers studying the Sword of Orion, visible light alone just doesnt cut it. We see only the small patches where young stars heat the surrounding gas and make it glow.

The bulk of the Orion cloud complex is a mostly dark swath of dust and gas containing the mass of about 100,000 Suns and spanning 250 light years. The infrared eye of the Spitzer Space Telescope can see this dust directly and identify the vast population of infant stars buried within.

Spitzer can find young stars by detecting the infrared glow from their surrounding dusty disks. The very youngest stars are gobbling up material from their disks and growing larger. Later, the left-over disks around adolescent stars can provide the resources for building planets.

• http://www.spitzer.caltech.edu/

Elizabeth Pisani: Sex, drugs and HIV -- let's get rational

http://www.ted.com Armed with bracing logic, wit and her "public-health nerd" glasses, Elizabeth Pisani reveals the myriad of inconsistencies in today's political systems that prevent our dollars from effectively fighting the spread of HIV. Her research with at-risk populations -- from junkies in prison to sex workers on the street in Cambodia -- demonstrates the sometimes counter-intuitive measures that could stall the spread of this devastating disease.

TEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes. Featured speakers have included Al Gore on climate change, Philippe Starck on design, Jill Bolte Taylor on observing her own stroke, Nicholas Negroponte on One Laptop per Child, Jane Goodall on chimpanzees, Bill Gates on malaria and mosquitoes, Pattie Maes on the "Sixth Sense" wearable tech, and "Lost" producer JJ Abrams on the allure of mystery. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and TEDTalks cover these topics as well as science, business, development and the arts. Closed captions and translated subtitles in a variety of languages are now available on TED.com, at http://www.ted.com/translate. Watch a highlight reel of the Top 10 TEDTalks at http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/top10

Flying Heavy Metal Episode Five: Watch This Space

Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden presents the history of jet travel from his perspective as a Boeing 757 pilot for the UK airline Astraeus. A total of five episodes include historical footage from manufacturer's archives, including a test pilot completing an unauthorized barrel roll in the Boeing 707. Also discusses the development of the de Havilland Comet, the 747 and the A380, including interviews with key members of the development teams (who may be unaware they are chatting with the lead singer of Iron Maiden).

Episode Five: Watch This Space

Part One:


Part Two:


Part Three:

Flying Heavy Metal Episode Four: Safer Skies

Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden presents the history of jet travel from his perspective as a Boeing 757 pilot for the UK airline Astraeus. A total of five episodes include historical footage from manufacturer's archives, including a test pilot completing an unauthorized barrel roll in the Boeing 707. Also discusses the development of the de Havilland Comet, the 747 and the A380, including interviews with key members of the development teams (who may be unaware they are chatting with the lead singer of Iron Maiden).

Episode 4: Safer Skies

Part One:


Part Two:


Part Three:

Flying Heavy Metal Episode Three: Size Matters

Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden presents the history of jet travel from his perspective as a Boeing 757 pilot for the UK airline Astraeus. A total of five episodes include historical footage from manufacturer's archives, including a test pilot completing an unauthorized barrel roll in the Boeing 707. Also discusses the development of the de Havilland Comet, the 747 and the A380, including interviews with key members of the development teams (who may be unaware they are chatting with the lead singer of Iron Maiden).

Episode 3: Size Matters
Part One:


Part Two:


Part Three:

Flying Heavy Metal Episode Two: Jet Set

Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden presents the history of jet travel from his perspective as a Boeing 757 pilot for the UK airline Astraeus. A total of five episodes include historical footage from manufacturer's archives, including a test pilot completing an unauthorized barrel roll in the Boeing 707. Also discusses the development of the de Havilland Comet, the 747 and the A380, including interviews with key members of the development teams (who may be unaware they are chatting with the lead singer of Iron Maiden).

Episode 2: Jet Set
Part One:


Part Two:


Part Three:

Flying Heavy Metal Episode One: Jet Race

Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden presents the history of jet travel from his perspective as a Boeing 757 pilot for the UK airline Astraeus. A total of five episodes include historical footage from manufacturer's archives, including a test pilot completing an unauthorized barrel roll in the Boeing 707. Also discusses the development of the de Havilland Comet, the 747 and the A380, including interviews with key members of the development teams (who may be unaware they are chatting with the lead singer of Iron Maiden).

Episode 1: Jet Race

Part One:


Part Two:


Part Three:

The Cambrian Explosion

Here's a brief description of the Cambrian Explosion from The Atheist Experience. They summed it up pretty well, though. ^__^

The Cambrian explosion or Cambrian radiation was the relatively rapid appearance, over a period of many million years, of most major groups of complex animals around 530 million years ago, as found in the fossil record.

This was accompanied by a major diversification of other organisms, including animals, phytoplankton, and calcimicrobes.

Before about 580 million years ago, most organisms were simple, composed of individual cells occasionally organized into colonies. Over the following 70 or 80 million years the rate of evolution accelerated by an order of magnitude (as defined in terms of the extinction and origination rate of species) and the diversity of life began to resemble todays.

The Cambrian explosion has generated extensive scientific debate. The seemingly rapid appearance of fossils in the Primordial Strata was noted as early as the mid 19th century, and Charles Darwin saw it as one of the main objections that could be made against his theory of evolution by natural selection.

The long-running puzzlement about the appearance of the Cambrian fauna, seemingly abruptly and from nowhere, centers on three key points: whether there really was a mass diversification of complex organisms over a relatively short period of time during the early Cambrian; what might have caused such rapid change; and what it would imply about the origin and evolution of animals.

Interpretation is difficult due to a limited supply of evidence, based mainly on an incomplete fossil record and chemical signatures left in Cambrian rocks.

• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cambrian...

Birth And Death Of The Universe

Hubble Space Telescope - 15 Years of Discovery (Episode 8): Birth And Death Of The Universe.

In the 15 years that the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has orbited Earth, it has taken three-quarters of a million photographs of the cosmos.

In many ways Hubble is the most successful scientific project in the World, and this event is not likely to go unnoticed. The European Space Agency, ESA, has decided to celebrate this anniversary with the production of a Hubble 15th Anniversary movie called "Hubble - 15 Years Of Discovery".

The movie covers all aspects of the Hubble Space Telescope project: a journey through the history, the trouble and the scientific successes of Hubble.

This portrait of one of the biggest scientific projects of all time contains large amounts of previously unpublished footage in uncompromised quality.

With the beautiful backdrop of Hubbles visual image treasures running as a red line through the movie, the light and dreaming style tells the most interesting stories about our fascinating Universe and about the change of vision that Hubble has brought us.

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The Hubble Space Telescope (HST), named after Edwin Powell Hubble (1889-1953) who was one of the great pioneers of modern astronomy, is a collaboration between ESA and NASA. It is a long-term, space-based observatory. The observations are carried out in visible, infrared and ultraviolet light.

In many ways Hubble has revolutionised modern astronomy, not only by being an efficient tool for making new discoveries, but also by driving astronomical research in general.

During 15 years of viewing the sky, Hubble has taken more than 700000 exposures of more than 22 000 celestial objects. The spacecraft itself has whirled around Earth nearly 88 000 times, travelling more than 4000 million kilometres.

The orbiting observatory generates enough data every day - about 15 gigabytes - to fill more than three DVDs, and in total it has produced 23 terabytes of data, equal to the amount of text in 23 million novels.

Over 3900 astronomers from all over the world have used the telescope, and compiled a long list of scientific achievements, published in more than 4000 papers, such as:

- calculating the precise age of the Universe to be 13 700 million years old);
- confirming the existence of a strange form of energy called dark energy;
- detecting small proto-galaxies that emitted their light when the Universe was less than a 1000 million years old;
- proving the existence of super-massive black holes;
- seeing a comet hitting Jupiter; and
- showing that the process of forming planetary systems is common throughout the galaxy.

http://www.esa.int
http://www.spacetelescope.org
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Dust Storms And Climate Change

Is the dust storm that swept through Sydney a sign of climate change?

Science in Action strives to make science accessible for everyone and discuss its relevance in our everyday lives. We bring you science news through media screens and live chats on the museum floor, this Science Today website, podcasts, and monthly Nightlife programming.

We gather and disseminate content through our partners, local programs, other media and Academy staff. And you. Please feel free to comment and let us know what's important to you in the science world.

• http://www.calacademy.org/
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