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  </channel><item rdf:about="https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1215379405960351750">
    <title>Twitter</title>
    <dc:date>2020-01-11T10:21:01+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1215379405960351750</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[RT @NewLeibniz: #math #physics #astronomy This year's honorable mention for seriously attempting to win a Darwin Award and not quit… ]]></description>
<dc:subject>astronomy physics math</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://twitter.com/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:73f73b655efd/</dc:identifier>
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<item rdf:about="https://bgr.com/2019/03/28/spinning-asteroid-debris-6478-gault/">
    <title>NASA’s Hubble spotted an asteroid spinning so fast it’s self-destructing</title>
    <dc:date>2019-03-31T00:48:53+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>https://bgr.com/2019/03/28/spinning-asteroid-debris-6478-gault/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[As NASA explains in a new blog post, the asteroid is a relatively large asteroid measuring roughly 2.5 miles across. It’s far from Earth, sitting some 214 million miles from the Sun, and it’s gradually coming apart as it spins. The asteroid completes a full rotation approximately every two hours, which is fast enough to cause it to fling its own material off into space.

It’s definitely a cool sight, but the fact that the asteroid is slowly eroding is actually a boon for scientists who study such space rocks. As it sheds its material, researchers can study the trails it leaves behind to learn more about the makeup of the rock itself.

“We didn’t have to go to Gault,” Olivier Hainaut of the European Southern Observatory in Germany said in a statement. “We just had to look at the image of the streamers, and we can see all of the dust grains well-sorted by size. All the large grains (about the size of sand particles) are close to the object and the smallest grains (about the size of flour grains) are the farthest away because they are being pushed fastest by pressure from sunlight.”

As for why the rock is spinning, scientists think they have a pretty good idea. It’s a phenomenon known as the YORP effect, and it’s all thanks to the Sun. When sunlight strikes the asteroid and heats its surface it radiates some of that energy back into space, causing the asteroid to turn slightly. As the rock turns, the Sun’s rays continue to heat it Sun-facing side, giving it more rotational momentum and eventually resulting in a rapidly spinning asteroid.]]></description>
<dc:subject>nasa space science research astronomy</dc:subject>
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<item rdf:about="https://www.sciencenews.org/article/cosmic-superlens-gives-telescopes-boost">
    <title>Cosmic superlens gives telescopes a boost</title>
    <dc:date>2015-06-07T19:48:47+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>https://www.sciencenews.org/article/cosmic-superlens-gives-telescopes-boost</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Abell 2744 (below) is a galaxy cluster whose tremendous mass — equivalent to 2 quadrillion suns — turns it into a gravitational lens that bends and magnifies light from distant objects. This effect allows astronomers to peer farther into space than any telescope can do alone. By studying images of far-flung galaxies revealed by Abell 2744, researchers created a map (above) that charts how the cosmic lens manipulates light from the far side of the universe.

The map spans just over 3 million light-years on a side. Areas in red magnify light most strongly, up to 30 times; blue regions introduce less amplification. Gray contours trace the directions along which images of remote galaxies are elongated. Since the lensing ability depends on the cluster’s mass, the map also charts the distribution of stars, gas and invisible dark matter, physicist Xin Wang of the University of California, Santa Barbara and colleagues report online April 9 at arXiv.org.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science physics research astronomy</dc:subject>
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<item rdf:about="http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2015/02/10/google-gives-lick-observatory-1-million/">
    <title>Google gives Lick Observatory $1 million</title>
    <dc:date>2015-02-13T04:58:29+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2015/02/10/google-gives-lick-observatory-1-million/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Google Inc. has given $1 million to the University of California’s Lick Observatory in what astronomers hope is the first of many private gifts to support an invaluable teaching and research resource for the state.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science research astronomy google business</dc:subject>
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<item rdf:about="http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2014/11/14/uranus-might-be-full-of-surprises/">
    <title>Uranus might be full of surprises</title>
    <dc:date>2014-11-24T07:06:25+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2014/11/14/uranus-might-be-full-of-surprises/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Karkoshchka believes that Uranus’s southern hemisphere rotates in a way never before seen in gas giants. A gas planet’s thick atmosphere, filled with clouds, typically shows the same rate of rotation at the top and bottom. But on Uranus, it seems, the southern hemisphere is cycling much more quickly than up north — as much as 15 percent faster.

“The unusual rotation of high southern latitudes of Uranus is probably due to an unusual feature in the interior of Uranus,” Karkoshcka said in a statement. “While the nature of the feature and its interaction with the atmosphere are not yet known, the fact that I found this unusual rotation offers new possibilities to learn about the interior of a giant planet.”

Data on gas giants in general are few and far between, so anything that Karkoshcka can glean about Uranus’s core would help scientists understand the other planets like it.

“Most of the more than a thousand planets discovered around other stars are similar in size to Uranus,” Karkoschka said. “They are too far for us to be able to measure their rotational profiles for the foreseeable future, but with an improved knowledge about Uranus, we might be better able to draw conclusions about their interior structure.”

The coolest thing about the work is that it relies on old images. Voyager-2 is long past Uranus these days, but Karkoshchka has shown that its old photos are worth another visit.]]></description>
<dc:subject>astronomy science research</dc:subject>
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<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-30034060">
    <title>BBC News - Rosetta: Battery will limit life of Philae comet lander</title>
    <dc:date>2014-11-14T01:26:57+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-30034060</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[After a historic but awkward comet landing, the robot probe Philae is now stable and sending pictures - but there are concerns about its battery life.

The lander bounced twice, initially about 1km back out into space, before settling in the shadow of a cliff, 1km from its intended target site.

It may now be problematic to get enough sunlight to charge its battery systems.

Launched in 2004, the European Space Agency (Esa) mission hopes to learn about the origins of our Solar System.

It has already sent back the first images ever taken from the crumbling, fractured terrain of a comet.

Philae got to the icy 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on the back of Esa's Rosetta satellite after a 10-year, 6.4 billion-km (4bn-mile) journey, which reached its climax on Wednesday with a seven-hour drop to the surface.

After showing an image that indicates Philae's presumed location - on the far side of a large crater that was earlier considered but then rejected as a landing site - the head of the lander team, Stephan Ulamec, said: "We could be somewhere in the rim of this crater, which could explain this bizarre… orientation that you have seen."]]></description>
<dc:subject>rosetta science research astronomy space</dc:subject>
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<item rdf:about="https://twitter.com/pillownaut/status/532575727875416064">
    <title>Heather Archuletta on Twitter: &quot;#ESA #Rosetta #Philae #Comet #Comets #CometLanding Why is it so important to study comets? THIS IS WHY. http://t.co/d1D6phaJHB&quot;</title>
    <dc:date>2014-11-13T03:03:26+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>https://twitter.com/pillownaut/status/532575727875416064</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><dc:subject>science astronomy comet research rosetta esa</dc:subject>
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<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-30026398#&quot;">
    <title>BBC News - Rosetta: Waiting game after comet lander glitch</title>
    <dc:date>2014-11-13T03:02:04+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-30026398#&quot;</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[A European robot probe has made the first, historic landing on a comet, but its status is uncertain after harpoons failed to anchor it to the surface.

Officials said the craft may have lifted off the comet after touchdown before returning to the surface.

Lander project manager Stephan Ulamec said: "Maybe we didn't just land once, we landed twice."

The European Space Agency's director general described the landing as "a big step for human civilisation".

Further analysis is needed to fully understand the status of the probe, known as Philae.

However, Dr Ulamec told the BBC that at last radio contact with the probe, he believed it to be in a stable configuration.

"This is the indication right now," he explained. "We really have to wait until tomorrow morning and then we will know a lot more."

The "first" landing on Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko was confirmed at about 16:05 GMT.

There were cheers and hugs at the European Space Agency (Esa) mission control in Darmstadt, Germany, after the signal came through.

Director general Jean-Jacques Dordain described it as "a great great day, not only for Esa, but... I think for the world".]]></description>
<dc:subject>science astronomy ESA</dc:subject>
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<item rdf:about="http://www.wired.com/2014/11/rosetta-philae-attempt-comet-landing/?mbid=social_twitter">
    <title>Tomorrow, a Spacecraft Will Try to Land on a Comet for the First Time Ever | WIRED</title>
    <dc:date>2014-11-11T20:56:03+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.wired.com/2014/11/rosetta-philae-attempt-comet-landing/?mbid=social_twitter</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Needless to say, landing on a comet is hard. Both Rosetta and 67P are hurtling through space at about 40,000 miles per hour, 300 million miles away.

Spacecraft previously have landed only on seven other places in the universe: the moon, Mars, Venus, Saturn’s moon Titan, and two asteroids. Although not quite a landing, NASA’s Deep Impact mission purposefully smashed an impactor into comet Tempel 1 in 2005 to study the resulting cloud of debris. The plan for Philae, of course, is to land in one piece and explore the comet intact.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science ESA research comet astronomy</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:6897e54b151b/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:ESA"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:comet"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-29932609">
    <title>BBC News - Planet formation captured in photo</title>
    <dc:date>2014-11-07T01:39:37+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-29932609</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[The clearest ever image of planets forming around an infant star has been taken by the Alma radio telescope.

In a vast disc of dust and gas, dark rings are clearly visible: gaps in the cloud, swept clear by brand new planets in orbit.

The sun-like star at the centre, HL Tau, is less than a million years old and is 450 light years from Earth in the constellation Taurus.

The image was made possible by Alma's new high-resolution capabilities.

Because the process of planet formation takes place in the midst of such a huge dust cloud, it can't be observed using visible light.

Alma, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array, has snapped the impressive new image using much longer wavelengths, which it detects by comparing the signal from multiple antennas up to 15km apart.

To test out its latest high-resolution capability, only in operation since September, Alma scientists pointed the antennas at HL Tau. They found themselves looking at a "protoplanetary disc" in more detail than ever before.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science astronomy</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:12ff46738121/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/09/22/maven_arrives_spacecraft_now_in_orbit_around_mars.html">
    <title>MAVEN arrives: Spacecraft now in orbit around Mars.</title>
    <dc:date>2014-09-22T18:42:15+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/09/22/maven_arrives_spacecraft_now_in_orbit_around_mars.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Mars has acquired a new moon: the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution, or MAVEN, spacecraft entered orbit around the planet at 02:26 UTC Monday morning.

Man, I never get tired of writing a sentence like that.

MAVEN spent just over 10 months plying the vacuum of interplanetary space after its launch in November of 2013. As it approached Mars, it fired its engines for a total of just over a half hour, changing velocity enough to transfer from a heliocentric orbit into one about Mars. The scale of such an accomplishment is hard to overstate; it’s an incredible achievement, and one we’ve done over and again.]]></description>
<dc:subject>mars space science MAVEN nasa research astronomy physics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:ac8eb9d3a99f/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:MAVEN"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:nasa"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:physics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="https://twitter.com/astro_reid/status/501326597216296960">
    <title>Twitter / astro_reid: 3 second shutter exposure at ...</title>
    <dc:date>2014-08-19T02:42:24+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>https://twitter.com/astro_reid/status/501326597216296960</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[3 second shutter exposure at night shows how crazy our #atmosphere really is. ]]></description>
<dc:subject>science space astronomy photography</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:a8d1cccfedc7/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:photography"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.nasa.gov/jpl/msl/curiosity-20140805/">
    <title>NASA Mars Curiosity Rover: Two Years and Counting on Red Planet | NASA</title>
    <dc:date>2014-08-07T06:00:06+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.nasa.gov/jpl/msl/curiosity-20140805/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[During its first year of operations, the Curiosity rover fulfilled its major science goal of determining whether Mars ever offered environmental conditions favorable for microbial life. Clay-bearing sedimentary rocks on the crater floor in an area called Yellowknife Bay yielded evidence of a lakebed environment billions of years ago that offered fresh water, all of the key elemental ingredients for life, and a chemical source of energy for microbes, if any existed there.
"Before landing, we expected that we would need to drive much farther before answering that habitability question," said Curiosity Project Scientist John Grotzinger of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena. "We were able to take advantage of landing very close to an ancient streambed and lake. Now we want to learn more about how environmental conditions on Mars evolved, and we know where to go to do that."]]></description>
<dc:subject>science mars astronomy technology nasa space research</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:09f576b258d4/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:mars"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:technology"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:nasa"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-28659783#&quot;">
    <title>BBC News - Europe's Rosetta probe goes into orbit around comet 67P</title>
    <dc:date>2014-08-06T23:46:57+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-28659783#&quot;</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Europe's Rosetta probe has arrived at a comet after a 10-year chase.

In a first for space history, the spacecraft was manoeuvred alongside a speeding body to begin mapping its surface in detail.

The spacecraft fired its thrusters for six and a half minutes to finally catch up with comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko.

"We're at the comet!" said Sylvain Lodiot of the European Space Agency (Esa) operations centre in Germany.

"After 10 years, five months and four days travelling towards our destination, looping around the Sun five times and clocking up 6.4 billion km, we are delighted to announce finally 'we are here'," said Jean-Jacques Dordain, director general of Esa.]]></description>
<dc:subject>space science astronomy asteroid</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:9a1d076f2872/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:asteroid"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-28659783">
    <title>BBC News - Europe's Rosetta probe goes into orbit around comet 67P</title>
    <dc:date>2014-08-06T19:56:43+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-28659783</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Europe's Rosetta probe has arrived at a comet after a 10-year chase.

In a first for space history, the spacecraft was manoeuvred alongside a speeding body to begin mapping its surface in detail.

The spacecraft fired its thrusters for six and a half minutes to finally catch up with comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko.

"We're at the comet!" said Sylvain Lodiot of the European Space Agency (Esa) operations centre in Germany.

"After 10 years, five months and four days travelling towards our destination, looping around the Sun five times and clocking up 6.4 billion km, we are delighted to announce finally 'we are here'," said Jean-Jacques Dordain, director general of Esa.

]]></description>
<dc:subject>science space astronomy</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:6a24ef38ce9c/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/07/02/gravitational_waves_orbiting_white_dwarfs_provide_good_test_of_einstein.html">
    <title>Gravitational waves: Orbiting white dwarfs provide good test of Einstein's idea.</title>
    <dc:date>2014-07-02T17:22:02+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/07/02/gravitational_waves_orbiting_white_dwarfs_provide_good_test_of_einstein.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[What’s not to love about this story? We have an invisible star, a misleadingly aligned star, a ridiculously rapid orbital period due to the mighty force of gravity, a weird effect that has only been seen indirectly but is known to exist, a subtle and patient effect that will eventually doom those stars, and a potential space mission using incredibly advanced technology to see it.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science physics astronomy space research</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:c72e58c796e9/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:physics"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/30/beta_pic_b_astronomers_determine_the_length_of_an_exoplanets_day.html">
    <title>Beta Pic b: Astronomers determine the length of an exoplanets day.</title>
    <dc:date>2014-05-01T01:35:08+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/04/30/beta_pic_b_astronomers_determine_the_length_of_an_exoplanets_day.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[For the first time, astronomers have determined how fast an exoplanet is spinning. To save you the dramatic tension, I’ll tell you right off the bat: 25 kilometers per second, or about 28,000 mph. That’s fast. With some reasonable assumptions, that means the planet has a day that’s about eight hours long, a third of an Earth day, which is pretty amazing given that the planet is 10 times the mass of Jupiter!]]></description>
<dc:subject>science astronomy research</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:613b8ec0cc0a/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/mysteries_of_the_universe/2014/02/pluto_new_horizons_mission_the_dwarf_planet_explains_the_history_of_our.html">
    <title>Pluto Is About to Make a Stunning Comeback</title>
    <dc:date>2014-02-06T06:47:08+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/mysteries_of_the_universe/2014/02/pluto_new_horizons_mission_the_dwarf_planet_explains_the_history_of_our.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[It’s time to stop throwing pity parties for Pluto. The beloved not-quite-planet is about to become the star of our solar system. I’ll go out on a limb and predict that in July 2015, the up-close photos of Pluto we’ll get from a NASA spacecraft will be the most popular astronomical images of a generation. Screensavers, posters, live TV, Twitpics, you name it—Pluto will be everywhere. After all, we’ve been wondering what it looks like for decades.

But even now—and this is what most people don’t realize about Pluto—we owe that little iceball a ton of respect. It led the way to a brand-new view of what our solar system is really made of. Here’s the answer in advance: Almost all of the worlds circling our sun are like Pluto. There are thousands of them. Pluto’s orbit, which used to seem weird, also showed us the violent history of how the big planets—the ones that get all the glory—got to where they are now. Its idiosyncrasies gave us the first, and best, clues about the history of our little nook of the Milky Way.

In other words, Pluto rules, regardless of what we humans deign to call it.]]></description>
<dc:subject>pluto space science astronomy research</dc:subject>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:e35ac2ba9177/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/11/new-earth-eyeing-cameras-getting-a-lift-to-space-station-today/">
    <title>New Earth-eyeing cameras getting a lift to space station today</title>
    <dc:date>2013-11-25T19:32:53+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/11/new-earth-eyeing-cameras-getting-a-lift-to-space-station-today/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Easy access to satellite imagery through things like Google Earth was revolutionary in many ways. But at the risk of being incredibly greedy, wouldn’t it be nice if you could see pictures that were no more than a few days old? That’s the idea behind the UrtheCast project—they’re putting a pair of cameras on the International Space Station that will feed fresh pictures back to Earth, accessible through the UrtheCast website.

One camera will sweep the Earth’s surface as the ISS passes overhead, capturing five-meter resolution images along the way (between 51°N and 51°S latitude). The other will actually shoot video at one-meter resolution and can be pointed at areas of interest. To some extent, this will be freely accessible, but UrtheCast is also marketing specialized imagery to corporate and government entities.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science astronomy research InternationalSpaceStation space technology</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:22bae2f7bbaa/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:InternationalSpaceStation"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:technology"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/11/06/chelyabinsk_asteroid_impact_small_rocks_may_hit_us_more_often_than_thought.html">
    <title>Chelyabinsk-sized Asteroid Impacts May Happen More Often Than Previously Thought</title>
    <dc:date>2013-11-07T07:03:00+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/11/06/chelyabinsk_asteroid_impact_small_rocks_may_hit_us_more_often_than_thought.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Two new studies of the Chelyabinsk event have just been released (here and here), and they both came to some very interesting conclusions. One is that the asteroid itself was probably a single rock that had previously undergone some stress in space — most likely a collision with another asteroid — that caused it to have fractures inside. The second is that impacts in this size range may happen more often than previously thought. It’s not like the sky is falling (in other words, don’t panic! — see “What, Me Worry?” below), but it may mean we need to be even more aware of what’s going on in the heavens above us.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science astronomy nasa research asteroid</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:e07b495836be/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:nasa"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:asteroid"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/11/new-kepler-analysis-finds-many-earth-like-planets-total-3500-exoplanets/">
    <title>New Kepler analysis finds many Earth-like planets; total 3,500 exoplanets</title>
    <dc:date>2013-11-05T05:48:12+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/11/new-kepler-analysis-finds-many-earth-like-planets-total-3500-exoplanets/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Although NASA’s Kepler probe has entered a semi-retirement, discoveries from the data it collected continue. Scientists are currently gathered to discuss these results, and they held a press conference today to announce the latest haul. As of today, the Kepler team is adding 833 new exoplanet candidates to its existing haul, bringing the total up to over 3,500. So far, 90 percent of the candidates that have been checked have turned out to be real. The number of planets in the habitable zone has gone up to over 100.

In conjunction with the press conference, PNAS is releasing a paper that performs an independent analysis of Sun-like stars. This finds that over 20 percent of these host a planet less than two times the size of Earth’s radius. Within Kepler’s field of view, 10 of them receive an amount of light similar to that reaching Earth.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science astronomy physics nasa research</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:6902a30c516e/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:physics"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:nasa"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://blogs.nature.com/news/2013/10/student-projects-interrupted-by-us-shutdown.html">
    <title>Student projects interrupted by US shutdown : Nature News Blog</title>
    <dc:date>2013-10-07T18:19:29+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://blogs.nature.com/news/2013/10/student-projects-interrupted-by-us-shutdown.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[It was to have been an exciting three-month research visit. Siddharth Hegde, a PhD student at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, Germany, had lined up a trip to NASA’s Ames Research Center near San Francisco, California. Hegde is an astronomer who models atmospheres on extrasolar planets, and he was planning to study the optical properties of extremophiles — organisms that thrive in extreme environments — during his sojourn.

But then the US government shutdown hit. Hegde, who had carefully nurtured and grown his extremophiles, had to pack up his things and walk out of the Ames lab. Without someone there to oversee the cells and feed them regularly, the extremophile cultures are now dying. (The seed cultures, gathered from hostile environments such as the Atacama and Mojave deserts, remain safe in deep freeze.)

“To go from seed culture to see them grow takes some time,” says Hegde. “Some of these organisms were taking a long time to grow, and if all of these die then I have to start again and wait another month.”

Time is precious because Hegde, an Indian citizen, has a three-month US visa. When that expires at the end of November, he will have to go back to Germany and re-apply if he wants to return — even as other work there requires his attention. “It’s not a question of money right now,” he says. “It’s time. There is no substitute for time.”

For now Hegde is hunkered down at his uncle’s house in northern California, logging into his German research projects and trying to get some work done remotely on those. But he cannot help but think about the organisms languishing in the lab nearby. “The whole field of astrobiology is so hot right now,” he says. “If I don’t finish my work, then that work is lost. Someone else will do it and someone else will get the credit for it.”

Even so, Hegde knows it could be worse. Some of his friends, who are also visiting students at Ames, got kicked out of their NASA dormitory-style housing and struggled to find places to stay, in an unfamiliar city and on short notice, when the dorms closed down. And Hegde’s adviser at Ames, astrobiologist Lynn Rothschild, has found herself at loose ends trying to advise a student team she had mentored for months before the shutdown. Those students, from Stanford and Brown universities, work at the Ames centre in the summer developing a synthetic biology project.

The team competed last weekend in the International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) contest in Toronto, Canada, but Rothschild was technically barred from communicating with them. They did, however, advance to the next round of the iGEM competition.]]></description>
<dc:subject>nasa shutdown government usa congress politics science research astrobiology biology astronomy</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:2d7d04826fa9/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:shutdown"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:government"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:usa"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:congress"/>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astrobiology"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:biology"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="https://www.sciencenews.org/article/gold-seen-neutron-star-collision-debris">
    <title>Gold seen in neutron star collision debris | Science News</title>
    <dc:date>2013-10-07T16:57:20+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>https://www.sciencenews.org/article/gold-seen-neutron-star-collision-debris</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Images snapped by the Hubble Space Telescope suggest that gold may have been generated by a violent neutron star collision that also yielded lead, platinum, uranium and other heavy elements.

The stellar smashup was detected on June 3, when NASA’s Swift satellite observed a gamma-ray burst 3.9 billion light-years away. Astrophysicists believe that a crash between two neutron stars, the dense, neutron-rich cores left over after massive stars explode, released the 0.2-second flash of energy.

Images snapped by the Hubble Space Telescope nine days later saw evidence for a bounty of heavy elements amounting to about 1 percent of the sun’s mass and including several moon masses of gold, says Edo Berger of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Mass. Given the amount of gold and the fact that these collisions probably happen once every 10,000 or 100,000 years in any given galaxy, such crashes could account for all of the gold in the universe, he says.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science astronomy physics research astrophysics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:ecfebb306da5/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:physics"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astrophysics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/10/07/asteroid_munroe_xkcd_creator_gets_an_asteroid_named_after_him.html">
    <title>xkcd Gets Rocked. Like, Asteroid Rocked.</title>
    <dc:date>2013-10-07T16:46:25+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/10/07/asteroid_munroe_xkcd_creator_gets_an_asteroid_named_after_him.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[I would like to formally welcome my pal Randall Munroe to the club. The asteroid club, that is: The creator of the web comic xkcd just got an asteroid named after him.

Asteroid 4942 Munroe (nee 1987 DU6) orbits the Sun on the inner edge of the main asteroid belt—it’s no threat to Earth— about 330 million kilometers (200 million miles) out. It’s too small to measure its size directly at that distance, but judging from its brightness it’s very roughly 10 km across at most.

Appropriately, it’s an X-type asteroid, which just refers to some features seen in its spectrum (the light from the asteroid broken up into thousands of individual colors, which can give clues to its composition). It has a fairly typical orbit, though is somewhat more elliptical and tilted with respect to Earth’s orbit:]]></description>
<dc:subject>science xkcd humor asteroid astronomy</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:4fff4d1d05cd/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:xkcd"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:humor"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:asteroid"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/07/moon-ex-iloa-telescope/">
    <title>The Private Plan to Put a Telescope on the Moon - Wired Science</title>
    <dc:date>2013-07-19T00:37:59+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2013/07/moon-ex-iloa-telescope/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Two private companies are teaming up to attempt the first-ever mission to the moon’s south pole in order to place a telescope atop a lunar mountain.

This plan is being spearheaded by the International Lunar Observatory Association (ILOA), a non-profit aiming to build a scientific and commercial base on the moon, with help from the startup Moon Express, which hopes to become a Space Age version of FedEx in the coming decade.

The companies want to put a 2-meter radio antenna along with a smaller optical telescope on a lunar peak, most likely the 5-km-high rim of a crater called Malapert. From this position, both telescopes could view the center of our Milky Way galaxy with unprecedented clarity because they wouldn’t be subjected to our atmosphere’s hazy interference. The moon would also block them from radio and other electromagnetic noise created by modern civilization. Astronomers have long proposed putting similar telescopes on the moon’s far side – which faces permanently away from our planet – because the pictures could exceed anything produced by the best terrestrial or even space-based instruments.

But far-side telescopes would need to be controlled with costly satellite relays. Located at the lunar south pole, Malapert crater provides the advantage of “a direct line of access to Earth,” said entrepreneur Steve Durst, founder and director of ILOA.


Furthermore, a “day” on the moon is a month-long affair; with two weeks of searing day temperatures rising above 120 degrees Celsius followed by two weeks of night temperatures the plunge below -170 degrees Celsius. Engineering an observatory for such swings would be a challenge. Because of its location at the pole, Malapert gets showered with sunlight for 90 percent of the lunar rotation period and enjoys a relatively stable and balmy temperature averaging around -50 degrees Celsius. The sunny spot would be perfect for solar panels collecting energy, said Durst, averting the need for a nuclear power source.

Because of this, Durst believes the lunar poles are the most obvious locations for eventual human settlement, a future he would like to help get started. “What drives us is the desire to see humanity as a multi-world species,” he said, echoing similar sentiments made by other private spaceflight entrepreneurs like Elon Musk.

The lunar south pole is also a potentially resource-rich area. Moon Express, which is providing the lander, mission architecture, and engineering expertise for ILOA’s telescope, is interested in one day extracting valuable metals, minerals, and water from the moon. The resources could be sold back on Earth while the water could be used by astronauts at an eventual lunar base.

During the mission, Moon Express wants to send a small rover across the lunar surface to do some initial prospecting and see what exists there, said entrepreneur Bob Richards, the company’s CEO.

But pulling off this never-before-done mission, which still has a fair number of unknowns, will require a good deal of work. Though it has done some initial testing, ILOA is looking to land its telescope array on the moon as early as 2016. Though he likes the optimism, Richards thinks that schedule might be a little aggressive. Hitting such a target would require a good deal of money and engineering talent, he said, adding that Moon Express hopes to pull off the mission no later than 2018.

The companies estimate the mission would cost on the order of $100 million. Durst said he thinks that national space agencies or astronomical centers might be interested in helping foot the bill, though his company hasn’t yet done much fundraising because “we haven’t had a demonstrable need for significant funds.” With the announcement of the ILOA telescope, he hopes to provide a goal to go to investors with in seeking funding.

Still, Moon Express has yet to land a single probe on the lunar surface, hoping to accomplish its first touchdown in 2015 in order to win the $20 million Google Lunar X-Prize. That initial mission is planning to carry a precursor instrument, the ILO-X, a shoebox-sized telescope to test the ILOA’s software and hardware on the moon. Perhaps once that has been pulled off, both companies will be in a better position to assess the timeframe and costs of their next mission.]]></description>
<dc:subject>space science research moon astronomy</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:85f56901549c/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:moon"/>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23318301">
    <title>BBC News - Nasa's Hubble telescope discovers new Neptune moon</title>
    <dc:date>2013-07-16T00:19:14+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23318301</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[The Hubble space telescope has discovered a new moon orbiting Neptune, Nasa has confirmed.

Designated S/2004 N 1, this is the 14th known moon to circle the giant planet.

It also appears to be the smallest moon in the Neptunian system, measuring just 20 km (12 miles) across, completing one revolution around Neptune every 23 hours.

US astronomer Mark Showalter spotted the tiny dot while studying segments of rings around Neptune.

Nasa said the moon was roughly 100 million times dimmer than the faintest star visible to the naked eye.

It is so small that the Voyager spacecraft failed to spot it in 1989 when it passed close by Neptune and surveyed the planet's system of moons and rings.

Mr Showalter's method of discovery involved tracking the movement of a white fleck appearing over and over again in more than 150 photographs taken of Neptune by Hubble between 2004 and 2009.

"The moons and arcs orbit very quickly, so we had to devise a way to follow their motion in order to bring out the details of the system," Mr Showalter explained.

"It's the same reason a sports photographer tracks a running athlete - the athlete stays in focus, but the background blurs."]]></description>
<dc:subject>hubble space science astronomy Neptune nasa research</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:83fcdc816d43/</dc:identifier>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="https://secure.flickr.com/photos/24662369@N07/9265051556#">
    <title>NASA Hubble Finds a True Blue Planet | Flickr - Photo Sharing!</title>
    <dc:date>2013-07-13T03:59:14+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>https://secure.flickr.com/photos/24662369@N07/9265051556#</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[This illustration shows HD 189733b, a huge gas giant that orbits very close to its host star HD 189733. The planet's atmosphere is scorching with a temperature of over 1000 degrees Celsius, and it rains glass, sideways, in howling 7000 kilometre-per-hour winds. At a distance of 63 light-years from us, this turbulent alien world is one of the nearest exoplanets to Earth that can be seen crossing the face of its star. By observing this planet before, during, and after it disappeared behind its host star during orbit, astronomers were able to deduce that HD 189733b is a deep, azure blue — reminiscent of Earth's colour as seen from space.]]></description>
<dc:subject>nasa science astronomy space research</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:ea8071860887/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2345679/Photographer-Ron-Miller-creates-incredible-pictures-look-like-planets-closer.html">
    <title>Photographer Ron Miller creates incredible pictures of what it would look like if planets were closer | Mail Online</title>
    <dc:date>2013-06-25T01:13:00+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2345679/Photographer-Ron-Miller-creates-incredible-pictures-look-like-planets-closer.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[An astronomical artist has created eye-opening illustrations imagining what the night sky would look like if the moon was replaced by the other planets in the solar system.

Ron Miller, a former art director for NASA, used digital trickery to superimpose scale drawings of Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune over the same landscape, highlighting the sheer size of the planets.

The incredible drawings imagine each planet to be 233,812 miles from Earth - the same distance at which the moon orbits.

Enormous planet Jupiter, around 11 times the size of Earth, would dominate the skies while Mars would appear to be around twice the size of the moon.]]></description>
<dc:subject>photography science astronomy</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:6869e799f595/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:photography"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://what-if.xkcd.com/47/">
    <title>Alien Astronomers</title>
    <dc:date>2013-05-29T07:02:34+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://what-if.xkcd.com/47/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Contact popularized the idea of aliens listening in on our transmissions. Sadly, the odds are against it.
Here’s the problem: Space is big. Really big.[1]
You can work through the physics of interstellar radio attenuation, but the problem is captured pretty well by considering the economics of the situation: If your TV signals are getting to another star, you’re losing money. Powering a transmitter is expensive, and creatures on other stars aren’t buying the products in the TV commercials that pay your electricity bill.
The full picture is more complicated, but the bottom line is that as our technology has advanced, less of our radio traffic has been leaking out into space. We’re closing down the giant transmitting antennas and switching to cable and fiber and tightly-focused cell-tower networks.[2] 
While our TV signals may have been detectable—with great effort—for a while,[3] that window is closing. In the late 20th century, when we were using TV and radio to scream into the void at the top of our lungs, the signal probably faded to undetectability after a few light-years.[4] The potentially habitable exoplanets we’ve spotted so far are dozens of light-years away, so the odds are they aren’t currently repeating our catchphrases.
But TV and radio transmissions still weren’t Earth’s most powerful radio signal. They were outshone by the beams from early-warning radar.[4]
Early-warning radar, a product of the Cold War, consisted of a bunch of ground and airborne stations scattered around the Arctic. These stations swept the atmosphere with powerful radar beams 24/7, often bouncing them off the ionosphere, and people obsessively monitored the echos for any hints of enemy movement. (I wasn’t alive during most of this period, but from what I hear, the mood was a little tense.)
These radar transmissions leaked into space, and could probably be picked up by nearby exoplanets[5] if they happened to be listening when the beam swept over their part of the sky. But the same march of technological progress that made the TV broadcast towers obsolete has had the same effect on early-warning radar. Today’s systems—where they exist at all—are much quieter, and may eventually be replaced completely by new technology.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science astronomy physics light</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:62435cdb4745/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:physics"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:light"/>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22548886">
    <title>BBC News - Nasa's Kepler telescope hobbled by faulty wheel</title>
    <dc:date>2013-05-27T04:36:04+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-22548886</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[The planet-hunting space telescope Kepler has been hobbled by a broken wheel, say scientists at Nasa.

Two of four reaction wheels are now faulty. At least three are needed to orient the telescope correctly.

"I wouldn't call Kepler down and out just yet," said Nasa administrator John Grunsfeld, saying scientists were working on the problem.

Kepler was launched in 2009 and last month identified two distant planets that Nasa said could be habitable.

So far, the $600m (£395m) mission has identified 132 "exoplanets" outside our solar system, and another 2,700 possible candidates.]]></description>
<dc:subject>kepler nasa space astronomy science research</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:cbb49511a545/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:nasa"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-146">
    <title>NASA Invites the Public to Fly Along with Voyager - NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory</title>
    <dc:date>2013-04-25T23:04:22+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2013-146</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[A gauge on the Voyager home page, http://voyager.jpl.nasa.gov, tracks levels of two of the three key signs scientists believe will appear when the spacecraft leave our solar neighborhood and enter interstellar space. 

When the three signs are verified, scientists will know that one of the Voyagers has hurtled beyond the magnetic bubble the sun blows around itself, which is known as the heliosphere. 

The gauge indicates the level of fast-moving charged particles, mainly protons, originating from far outside the heliosphere, and the level of slower-moving charged particles, also mainly protons, from inside the heliosphere. If the level of outside particles jumps dramatically and the level of inside particles drops precipitously, and these two levels hold steady, that means one of the spacecraft is closing in on the edge of interstellar space. These data are updated every six hours. 

Scientists then need only see a change in the direction of the magnetic field to confirm that the spacecraft has sailed beyond the breath of the solar wind and finally arrived into the vast cosmic ocean between stars. The direction of the magnetic field, however, requires periodic instrument calibrations and complicated analyses. These analyses typically take a few months to return after the charged particle data are received on Earth. 

Voyager 1, the most distant human-made spacecraft, appears to have reached this last region before interstellar space, which scientists have called "the magnetic highway." Inside particles are zooming out and outside particles are zooming in. However, Voyager 1 has not yet seen a change in the direction of the magnetic field, so the consensus among the Voyager team is that it has not yet left the heliosphere. 

Voyager 2, the longest-operating spacecraft, but not as distant as Voyager 1, does not yet appear to have reached the magnetic highway, though it has recently seen some modest drops of the inside particle level. 

NASA's Eyes on the Solar System program, a Web-based, video-game-like tool to journey with NASA's spacecraft through the solar system, has added a Voyager module that takes viewers along for a ride with Voyager 1 as it explores the outer limits of the heliosphere. Time has been sped up to show one day per second. Rolls and other maneuvers are incorporated into the program, based on actual spacecraft navigation data. The charged particle data are also shown. Visit that module at: http://1.usa.gov/13uYqGP . ]]></description>
<dc:subject>voyager nasa space science research astronomy</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:896fd76fe481/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:nasa"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
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</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://what-if.xkcd.com/42/">
    <title>Longest Sunset</title>
    <dc:date>2013-04-24T01:51:07+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://what-if.xkcd.com/42/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[To get a long sunset, the strategy is simple: Wait for the date when the terminator will just barely reach your position. Sit in your car until the terminator reaches you, drive north to stay a little ahead of it for as long as you can (depending on the local road layout), then u-turn and drive back south fast enough that you can get past it to the safety of darkness. (These instructions also work for the other kind of Terminator.)
Surprisingly, this strategy works about equally well anywhere inside the Arctic Circle, so you can get this lengthy sunset on many roads across Finland and Norway. I ran a search for long-sunset driving paths using PyEphem and some GPS traces of Norwegian highways. I found that over a wide range of routes and driving speeds, the longest sunset was consistently about 95 minutes—an improvement of about 40 minutes over the Svalbard sit-in-one-place strategy.
But if you are stuck in Svalbard and want to make the sunset—or sunrise—last a little longer, you can always try spinning counterclockwise. It’s true that it will only add an immeasurably small fraction of a nanosecond. But depending on who you’re with ...]]></description>
<dc:subject>astronomy space science</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:fda2e096c6f9/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/02/27/spinning_black_hole_scientists_measure_supermassive_black_hole_rotating.html">
    <title>Spinning black hole: Scientists measure supermassive black hole rotating at nearly the speed of light.</title>
    <dc:date>2013-03-05T05:44:39+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/02/27/spinning_black_hole_scientists_measure_supermassive_black_hole_rotating.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Black holes grow by consuming matter, and in the centers of galaxies they can grow to huge size. In the gorgeous barred spiral galaxy NGC 1365 (shown below), there’s one lurking in the core that has about two million times as much mass as our Sun. Not only that, it is actively gobbling down matter, and that allows us to measure some interesting properties of this cosmic monster, including its spin. Astronomers observed NGC 1365’s black hole using the NuSTAR and XMM-Newton observatories, and were surprised to find out it’s spinning so fast that the outer edge is moving at very nearly the speed of light!]]></description>
<dc:subject>physics science astronomy space BlackHole gravity</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:e1cc12a5a0d5/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:BlackHole"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:gravity"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/whycassini/cassini20121218.html">
    <title>NASA - From Cassini for the Holidays: A Splendor Seldom Seen</title>
    <dc:date>2012-12-25T20:13:28+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/whycassini/cassini20121218.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Just in time for the holidays, NASA's Cassini spacecraft, in orbit around Saturn for more than eight years now, has delivered another glorious, backlit view of the planet Saturn and its rings.

On Oct. 17, 2012, during its 174th orbit around the gas giant, Cassini was deliberately positioned within Saturn's shadow, a perfect location from which to look in the direction of the sun and take a backlit view of the rings and the dark side of the planet. Looking back towards the sun is a geometry referred to by planetary scientists as "high solar phase;" near the center of your target's shadow is the highest phase possible. This is a very scientifically advantageous and coveted viewing position, as it can reveal details about both the rings and atmosphere that cannot be seen in lower solar phase.

The last time Cassini had such an unusual perspective on Saturn and its rings, at sufficient distance and with sufficient time to make a full system mosaic, occurred in September 2006, when it captured a mosaic, processed to look like natural color, entitled "In Saturn's Shadow." In that mosaic, planet Earth put in a special appearance, making "In Saturn's Shadow" one of the most popular Cassini images to date.

The mosaic being released today by the mission and the imaging team, in celebration of the 2012 holiday season, does not contain Earth; along with the sun, our planet is hidden behind Saturn. However, it was taken when Cassini was closer to Saturn and therefore shows more detail in the rings than the one taken in 2006.

The new processed mosaic, composed of 60 images taken in the violet, visible and near infrared part of the spectrum, can be found at http://www.nasa.gov/cassini , http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov and http://ciclops.org .

"Of all the many glorious images we have received from Saturn, none are more strikingly unusual than those taken from Saturn's shadow," said Carolyn Porco, Cassini's imaging team lead based at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the Cassini-Huygens mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. The Cassini orbiter and its two onboard cameras were designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The imaging team consists of scientists from the U.S., England, France and Germany. The imaging operations center is based at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colo.]]></description>
<dc:subject>saturn nasa space science photography astronomy</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:d3b316cadc21/</dc:identifier>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/11/high-res-curiosity-portrait/">
    <title>High-Res Curiosity Rover Self-Portrait Is Mind-Blowing | Wired Science | Wired.com</title>
    <dc:date>2012-11-15T08:47:34+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2012/11/high-res-curiosity-portrait/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Two days ago, we showed one of the best rover selfies ever, which came from amateur astronomer Stuart Atkinson, who stitched together raw images beamed back from Curiosity. But the pictures used there were only thumbnail versions of the high-res pics. The above image represents the full-sized 5,400-pixel-wide version generated from the complete set of photographs. The detail is so stunning you can zoom in on Curiosity’s “eye” at the top and see a reflection of Mars and the rover’s arm.

The image was taken by Curiosity’s MAHLI hand-held camera, which sits on the end of the rover’s extendable arm. MAHLI snapped 55 pictures from different locations. The different positions overlapped just enough so that the arm couldn’t be seen in the final result.

What can be seen are tire tracks, scoops in the Martian dust that Curiosity made, and the foothills of the 3-mile-high Mount Sharp in the background, which Curiosity will be driving up in the coming years. The rover will be investigating this area for signs of habitability in the Martian past or present. NASA will present new results about the Martian atmosphere at 10 a.m. Pacific/1 p.m. Eastern, which may include analysis of methane on Mars, a possible indicator of geologic or biological activity.]]></description>
<dc:subject>nasa mars space science astronomy photography</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:c90591dc1c6a/</dc:identifier>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2012-354">
    <title>Long-Lived Orbiter Resumes Work With Fresh Equipment - NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory</title>
    <dc:date>2012-11-12T22:45:44+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?release=2012-354</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[The NASA Mars Odyssey orbiter has resumed duty after switching to a set of redundant equipment, including a main computer, that had not be used since before the spacecraft's 2001 launch. 

Odyssey relayed data to Earth late Sunday that it received from NASA's Opportunity rover on Mars using the orbiter's fresh "B-side" radio for UHF (ultra-high frequency) communications. In plans for this week are relay opportunities for the newest Mars rover, Curiosity, and resumption of Odyssey's own scientific observations. 

"The side-swap has gone well. All the subsystems that we are using for the first time are performing as intended," said Odyssey Project Manager Gaylon McSmith of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 

Like many spacecraft, this orbiter carries a pair of redundant main computers, to have a backup available if one fails. Odyssey's A-side computer and B-side computer each have several other redundant subsystems linked to just that computer. 

Odyssey is already the longest-working spacecraft ever sent to Mars. The side swap was initiated last week in response to months of diagnostic data indicating that the A side's inertial measurement unit shows signs of wearing out. This gyroscope-containing mechanism senses changes in the spacecraft's orientation, providing important information for control of pointing the antenna, solar arrays and instruments. 

The diagnostics indicate that the A side's inertial measurement unit still has a few months or more of useful life. The reason for switching sides was to keep a fully functional A side available in case of any problem on the B side in coming years that can be dealt with by switching back to the A side temporarily for a few days or weeks. 

"It is testimony to the excellent design of this spacecraft and operation of this mission in partnership with Lockheed Martin that we have brand-new major components available to begin using after more than 11 years at Mars," McSmith said. ]]></description>
<dc:subject>science nasa mars research astronomy politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:466b0d449df7/</dc:identifier>
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<item rdf:about="http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2012/11/12/hubble_image_ngc_2623_cosmic_train_wreck_of_two_colliding_spiral_galaxies.html">
    <title>Hubble image NGC 2623: Cosmic train wreck of two colliding spiral galaxies.</title>
    <dc:date>2012-11-12T16:45:51+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2012/11/12/hubble_image_ngc_2623_cosmic_train_wreck_of_two_colliding_spiral_galaxies.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[The universe is a fairly amazing place, if you know where to look. The good news is, you can look pretty much anywhere and be amazed by what you see. The even better news is that some of the things you'll come upon will raise the hair on the back of your neck and grind your sense of scale to dust.

For proof, I present to you a Hubble Space Telescope image of the cosmic train wreck that is NGC 2623, a massive collision of galaxies taking place over a stretch of a million trillion kilometers of space:]]></description>
<dc:subject>hubble space astronomy politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:a0db73288119/</dc:identifier>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/11/us-space-diamond-planet-idUSBRE89A0PU20121011">
    <title>A diamond bigger than Earth?</title>
    <dc:date>2012-10-14T04:59:55+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/11/us-space-diamond-planet-idUSBRE89A0PU20121011</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Orbiting a star that is visible to the naked eye, astronomers have discovered a planet twice the size of our own made largely out of diamond.

The rocky planet, called ‘55 Cancri e’, orbits a sun-like star in the constellation of Cancer and is moving so fast that a year there lasts a mere 18 hours.

Discovered by a U.S.-Franco research team, its radius is twice that of Earth’s with a mass eight times greater. That would give it the same density as Earth, although previously observed diamond planets are reckoned to be a lot more dense. It is also incredibly hot, with temperatures on its surface reaching 3,900 degrees Fahrenheit (1,648 Celsius).

“The surface of this planet is likely covered in graphite and diamond rather than water and granite,” said Nikku Madhusudhan, the Yale researcher whose findings are due to be published in the journal Astrophysical Journal Letters.

The study - with Olivier Mousis at the Institut de Recherche en Astrophysique et Planetologie in Toulouse, France - estimates that at least a third of the planet’s mass, the equivalent of about three Earth masses, could be diamond.

]]></description>
<dc:subject>science astronomy space research politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:808d2c4e700e/</dc:identifier>
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<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-19495444">
    <title>BBC News - Dawn probe leaves Asteroid Vesta</title>
    <dc:date>2012-09-13T05:37:41+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-19495444</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[The US space agency's Dawn satellite has left the giant Asteroid Vesta after 13 months of study.

A signal from the probe confirming that it had escaped the gravitational bounds of the 530km-wide rock was received by Nasa on Wednesday.

The spacecraft's ion engine is now pushing it on to an even bigger target in the belt of asteroids between Mars and Jupiter - the dwarf planet Ceres.

Dawn is expected to reach this 950km-wide body in early 2015.

Before departing on its long cruise to the new destination, the probe trained its camera system on Vesta's northern pole.]]></description>
<dc:subject>usa space astronomy science research nasa politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:6d1cf8446910/</dc:identifier>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://io9.com/5927315/hubble-has-spotted-an-ancient-galaxy-that-shouldnt-exist">
    <title>Hubble has spotted an ancient galaxy that shouldn’t exist</title>
    <dc:date>2012-09-11T06:17:00+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://io9.com/5927315/hubble-has-spotted-an-ancient-galaxy-that-shouldnt-exist</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[This galaxy is so large, so fully-formed, astronomers say it shouldn’t exist at all. It’s called a “grand-design” spiral galaxy, and unlike most galaxies of its kind, this one is old. Like, really, really old. According to a new study conducted by researchers using NASA’s Hubble Telescope, it dates back roughly 10.7-billion years — and that makes it the most ancient spiral galaxy we’ve ever discovered.

“The vast majority of old galaxies look like train wrecks,” said UCLA astrophysicist Alice Shapley in a press release. “Our first thought was, why is this one so different, and so beautiful?”

Shapley is co-author of the paper describing the discovery, which is published in the latest issue of Nature. She and her colleagues had been using Hubble to investigate some of our Universe’s most distant cosmic entities, but the discovery of BX442 — which is what they’ve dubbed the newfound galaxy — came as a huge surprise.

“The fact that this galaxy exists is astounding,” said University of Toronto’s David Law, lead author of the study. “Current wisdom holds that such ‘grand-design’ spiral galaxies simply didn’t exist at such an early time in the history of the universe.”

The hallmark of a grand design galaxy is its well-formed spiral arms, but getting into this conformation takes time. When astronomers look at most galaxies as they appeared billions and billions of years ago, they look clumpy and irregular. A 10.7-billion-year-old entity, BX442 came into existence a mere 3-billion years after the Big Bang. That’s not a lot of time on a cosmic time scale, and yet BX442 looks surprisingly put together. So much so, in fact, that astronomers didn’t believe it at first, chalking their unusual observation up to the accidental alignment of two separate galaxies. But further investigations, conducted at the W.M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii, revealed BX442 to be the real thing.

So how does a galaxy that shouldn’t exist come to be? The researchers think the answer may have something to do with a companion dwarf galaxy looming near BX442 (in the image up top, it’s the separate circular cluster in the upper right). Simulations conducted by University of Arizona researcher Charlotte Christenson indicate that gravitation interactions between the two, which she says appear to be in the process of colliding, may have helped BX442 take shape.

The reason Stephen Hawking bet against the Higgs Boson is the same reason BX442 is the best kind of discovery; not only does this galaxy set a new benchmark by way of its cosmic seniority, it’s also super weird — weirder than what anyone thought was possible. In science, these are the finds that help us rework our understanding of nature, the discoveries that force us to step back from what we thought we knew, re-assess our preconceived notions, and bring forth a newer, more fully formed view of our Universe.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science research space astronomy politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:ab8f524ba003/</dc:identifier>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.npr.org/2012/09/05/160609488/after-35-years-voyager-nears-edge-of-solar-system">
    <title>After 35 Years, Voyager Nears Edge Of Solar System : NPR</title>
    <dc:date>2012-09-07T04:12:18+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.npr.org/2012/09/05/160609488/after-35-years-voyager-nears-edge-of-solar-system</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[The Voyager 1 spacecraft's 35th anniversary is proving to be unexpectedly exciting, as scientists gathered this week to examine new hints that the spacecraft is on the verge of leaving our solar system.

Voyager 1 is now more than 11 billion miles away from Earth. It blasted off in September 1977, on a mission to Jupiter and Saturn. But it also carried a Golden Record filled with music and the sounds of our planet, in case it encountered intelligent life as it moved out toward the stars.

Scientists have been eagerly waiting for Voyager 1 to become the first human-made object to leave the solar system. And in recent weeks, the spacecraft has sent back intriguing signs that it might be getting close, to the delight of researchers who have been working on it for decades.]]></description>
<dc:subject>voyager astronomy space science research nasa politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:9fcf2f360609/</dc:identifier>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2012/08/14/curisositys-looking-a-little-blue/">
    <title>Curiosity’s looking a little blue - Bad Astronomy - Discover Magazine</title>
    <dc:date>2012-08-15T04:57:32+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2012/08/14/curisositys-looking-a-little-blue/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[The colors have been enhanced in this image – which actually makes things very interesting. As I’ve pointed out before, most of Mars is covered in basalt, a blue-gray rock. When you hear about sand on Mars, it’s usually coarse-grained stuff made up of eroded basalt. However, there’s also much finer-grained dust which is high in iron oxide – rust – and it’s that which gives Mars its characteristic ruddy color.

That fine dust covers everything, making the planet red/orange/ochre. But there’s wind on Mars, and it can blow the dust around, revealing the grayer basalt underneath (like the dust devils do). And if there’s no natural wind, why, the thrusters from the rockets of a sky crane hovering over the surface as it lowers a one-ton rover to the ground will do just fine.]]></description>
<dc:subject>space science astronomy nasa mars politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:53226a592226/</dc:identifier>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17827347">
    <title>Plans for asteroid mining emerge</title>
    <dc:date>2012-04-25T05:18:32+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17827347</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Details have been emerging of the plan by billionaire entrepreneurs to mine asteroids for their resources.

The multi-million-dollar plan would use robotic spacecraft to squeeze chemical components of fuel and minerals such as platinum and gold out of the rocks.

The founders include film director and explorer James Cameron as well as Google’s chief executive Larry Page and its executive chairman Eric Schmidt.

They even aim to create a fuel depot in space by 2020.

However, several scientists have responded with scepticism, calling the plan daring, difficult and highly expensive.

They struggle to see how it could be cost-effective, even with platinum and gold worth nearly £35 per gram ($1,600 an ounce). An upcoming Nasa mission to return just 60g (two ounces) of material from an asteroid to Earth will cost about $1bn.

The inaugural step, to be achieved in the next 18 to 24 months, would be launching the first in a series of private telescopes that would search for asteroid targets rich in resources. The intention will be to open deep-space exploration to private industry.

Within five to 10 years, however, the company expects to progress from selling observation platforms in orbit around Earth to prospecting services. It plans to tap some of the thousands of asteroids that pass relatively close to Earth and extract their raw materials.

The company, known as Planetary Resources, is also backed by space tourism pioneer Eric Anderson, X-Prize founder Peter Diamandis, former US presidential candidate Ross Perot and veteran Nasa astronaut Tom Jones.

The founders of the venture are to give further details in a press conference on Tuesday.]]></description>
<dc:subject>astronomy space business mining politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://instapaper.com/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:5af8a0883a13/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:business"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:mining"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/08/12/moon-hoax-why-not-use-telescopes-to-look-at-the-landers/">
    <title>Moon hoax: why not use telescopes to look at the landers? | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine</title>
    <dc:date>2012-04-24T00:00:07+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2008/08/12/moon-hoax-why-not-use-telescopes-to-look-at-the-landers/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[That’s a pretty big surprise to most people. They’re used to seeing magnificent detail in Hubble images, stars in galaxies and wisps of gas in beautiful nebulae. But those objects are far, far larger than the Moon. Hubble’s resolution is 0.1 arcseconds no matter how far away an object is. Those wisps of gas appear to be finely resolved, but they’re billions of kilometers across. That’s a bit roomier than the lunar landers were.

So even if we built a colossal sports arena in Tycho crater, Hubble would barely see it at all. The landers, rovers, and other junk left on the lunar surface by the astronauts are totally invisible.

Using a bigger telescope won’t help much. You’d need a mirror 50 times bigger than Hubble’s to see the landers at all, and we don’t have a 100 meter telescope handy.

However, there are two tricks we can use here. One is to look not for the artifacts themselves, but for their shadows. At sunrise or sunset, the shadow from a lander might be long enough to detect, even if the lander itself is invisible. However, this is a very tricky observation and has to be timed just right (and the landscape itself may hide the shadow; crater rims, mountains, and natural dips and bumps might prevent sunlight from hitting the lander until the Sun is high in the sky, and that will shorten the shadows).

Plus, try to convince a committee in charge of hotly-contested and hugely over-subscribed telescopes to give you a night to try this and see how they react. Good luck ever getting an observation again.

The other method is obvious enough: go back to the Moon and take a look. Later this year we will be sending the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter to the Moon, and it will be able to resolve objects as small as 0.5 meters across (it’s far smaller than Hubble, but it’ll be a lot closer to the Moon). It will easily resolve the landers, and even the rovers.]]></description>
<dc:subject>moon science astronomy space politics</dc:subject>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:d39bb2954a3f/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:moon"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17675163">
    <title>Stardust recycling mystery solved</title>
    <dc:date>2012-04-12T06:09:11+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17675163</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[A long-standing mystery about how dying stars spew out the material of future planets is now solved, scientists say.

While stars like our Sun are known to eject much of their mass in their final years, it has remained unclear just how the dust is blown away.

Scientists reporting in Nature describe an astronomical study of extraordinary resolution to tackle the mystery.

They found dust grains of nearly a millionth of a metre across, big enough to be pushed out by dying stars’ light.

The team of astronomers from Australian and European universities took a look at three so-called red giant stars - stars that were once like our Sun is now, but that have exhausted their supply of hydrogen and grown to gargantuan proportions.

In a process that is an extreme case of the kind of solar wind that our own Sun experiences, such stars blow much of their mass away in the form of gas and grains of mineral material on their way to becoming white dwarfs.

Lead author of the study Barnaby Norris, of the University of Sydney, told BBC News that the stars were “the galaxy’s great recyclers” - the material that they spit out “goes on to make the next generation of stars and planets”.

]]></description>
<dc:subject>science astronomy space research politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://instapaper.com/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:85101cc28661/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/2012/03/31/deep-space-gps-from-pulsars/">
    <title>Deep Space GPS from Pulsars</title>
    <dc:date>2012-04-01T00:15:17+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/cosmicvariance/2012/03/31/deep-space-gps-from-pulsars/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[What Werner Becker of the Max-Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Garching has realized (and announced yesterday at the UK-Germany National Astronomy Meeting in Manchester), is that the universe comes equipped with its own set of exquisite clocks – pulsars – the timing of which can, in principle, be used to guide spacecraft in a similar way to how GPS is used here on Earth. Of course, it isn’t quite as simple as all that.

A significant obstacle to making this work today is that detecting signals from the pulsars requires X-ray detectors that are compact enough to be easily carried on spacecraft. However, it turns out the relevant technology is also needed by the next generation of X-ray telescopes, and should be ready in twenty years or so. Perhaps one day our spacecraft will map their routes through the cosmos thanks to yet another spinoff from basic research.]]></description>
<dc:subject>space astronomy pulsar politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://instapaper.com/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:83666e4eccf8/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:pulsar"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17532470">
    <title>Super-Earths 'in the billions'</title>
    <dc:date>2012-03-29T03:35:26+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17532470</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[There could be many billions of planets not much bigger than Earth circling faint stars in our galaxy, says an international team of astronomers.

The estimate for the number of “super-Earths” is based on detections already made and then extrapolated to include the Milky Way’s population of so-called red dwarf stars.

The team works with the high-precision Harps instrument .]]></description>
<dc:subject>astronomy space research politics</dc:subject>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:ebb00007f65c/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_2204.html">
    <title>Hubble Sees Glittering Jewels of Messier 9</title>
    <dc:date>2012-03-25T22:04:16+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/imagegallery/image_feature_2204.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[The Hubble Space Telescope has produced the most detailed image so far of Messier 9, a globular star cluster located close to the center of the galaxy. This ball of stars is too faint to see with the naked eye, yet Hubble can see over 250,000 individual stars shining in it.

Messier 9, pictured here, is a globular cluster, a roughly spherical swarm of stars that lies around 25,000 light-years from Earth, near the center of the Milky Way, so close that the gravitational forces from the galactic center pull it slightly out of shape.

Globular clusters are thought to harbor some of the oldest stars in our galaxy, born when the universe was just a small fraction of its current age. As well as being far older than the sun — around twice its age — the stars of Messier 9 also have a markedly different composition, and are enriched with far fewer heavier elements than the sun.

In particular, the elements crucial to life on Earth, like oxygen and carbon, and the iron that makes up our planet’s core, are very scarce in Messier 9 and clusters like it. This is because the universe’s heavier elements were gradually formed in the cores of stars, and in supernova explosions. When the stars of Messier 9 formed, there were far smaller quantities of these elements in existence.

As well as showing the individual stars, Hubble’s image clearly shows the different colors of the stars. A star’s color is directly related to its temperature — counter-intuitively, perhaps, the redder it is, the cooler it is; and the bluer it is, the hotter. The wide range of stellar temperatures here is clearly displayed by the broad palette of colors visible in this image.]]></description>
<dc:subject>space science astronomy Hubble Messier9 politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://instapaper.com/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:c63b09a471a5/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:Messier9"/>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/122923-spacex-ceo-claims-he-can-send-you-on-a-round-trip-to-mars-for-500k">
    <title>SpaceX CEO claims he can send you on a round-trip to Mars for $500K (extremetech.com)</title>
    <dc:date>2012-03-25T21:50:56+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/122923-spacex-ceo-claims-he-can-send-you-on-a-round-trip-to-mars-for-500k</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Your dream of visiting the Red Planet may soon come true if the claim made by Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, actually comes to fruition. The commercial space travel entrepreneur told the BBC in an interview that he’s figured out how to send a person on a round-trip journey to Mars and back, and that it could be ready in as little as ten years. The best part? Musk says that the “average person” could afford the trip since it will only cost $500,000. I’m not sure which average person he means, but you can bet I am going to be getting a second job for the next ten years to try to make it!

Known for its Dragon spacecraft that has been awarded the contract to make resupply trips to the International Space Station, SpaceX certainly seems capable of dreaming up a low-cost method of visiting Mars. The principle behind all of its vehicles is total re-usability; every single system must be able to be serviced and pressed back into operation. This is to cut down on the already astronomical cost of space flight (pun intended), making it more affordable for private companies to conduct missions into the heavens. The company’s main goal is to eliminate the equipment cost for space travel, leaving fuel as the only financial burden.]]></description>
<dc:subject>space mars astronomy SpaceX politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://instapaper.com/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:5e4b48d09b23/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:mars"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:SpaceX"/>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/17482477">
    <title>30 million mph warp speed planets</title>
    <dc:date>2012-03-24T20:43:55+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/17482477</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Scientists reckon that ‘warp speed’ planets could be flying through the galaxy at speeds of up to 30 million miles per hour.

Computer simulations have shown how the huge gravitational pull of black holes can tear planets from their orbits and ‘sling’ them across space.

The planets would typically move at about seven to 10 million mph - but could travel at up to 30 million mph.

That’s more than 450 times faster than the Earth moves around the Sun.

This theory comes from new research at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Massachusetts in the US.

Astronomers know already that this can happen to stars - the first of these was spotted seven years ago, heading out of the Milky Way at 1.5 million mph.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science research astronomy politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://instapaper.com/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:99afc4bf8852/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
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</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17470151">
    <title>Hints of ice at Mercury's poles</title>
    <dc:date>2012-03-22T06:00:45+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17470151</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[A Nasa spacecraft has found further tantalising evidence for the existence of water ice at Mercury’s poles.

Though temperatures here can soar above 400C, some craters at Mercury’s poles are permanently in shadow, making them cold enough for water to stay frozen.

Previous work has revealed patches near Mercury’s poles that strongly reflect radar - a characteristic of ice.

Now, the Messenger probe has shown that these “radar bright” patches line up precisely with the shadowed craters .

Messenger is only the second spacecraft - after Mariner 10 in the 1970s - to have visited the innermost planet. Until Messenger arrived, large swathes of Mercury’s surface had never been mapped.]]></description>
<dc:subject>Mercury space science water astronomy research politics</dc:subject>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:6eba727848d9/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:Mercury"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:water"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
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</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2012/03/21/the-sun-is-1392684-65-km-across/">
    <title>The Sun is 1,392,684 /- 65 km across!</title>
    <dc:date>2012-03-22T00:51:13+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2012/03/21/the-sun-is-1392684-65-km-across/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[A team of scientists did exactly this , using SOHO, which is a solar observing and solar-orbiting satellite. Because it’s in space, it doesn’t suffer from the problems of peering through a murky, dancing atmosphere. They were able to measure the timing of Mercury’s passage of the Sun to an accuracy of 3 seconds in 2003 and 1 second in 2006. They had to take into account a large number of effects (the Sun’s limb is darker than the center, which affects timing; they had to accurately measure the position of Mercury; they had to account for problems internal to SOHO like focus and the way it changes across the detector; and, of course, correct for the fact that Mercury cut a chord across the Sun and didn’t go straight across the diameter — but that only took knowledge of Mercury’s orbit and some trig) but when they did, they got the most accurate measure of the Sun’s diameter ever made: 1,392,684  /- 65 km , or 865,374  /- 40 miles .]]></description>
<dc:subject>space science astronomy research politics</dc:subject>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:b13478b8c6ab/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17248776">
    <title>Mercury has been 'dynamic world'</title>
    <dc:date>2012-03-21T23:32:56+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17248776</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[
The planet Mercury was once an active and dynamic planet, according to new evidence from a Nasa spacecraft.

Data from the American Messenger probe shows that impact craters on the planet’s surface were distorted by some geological process after they formed.

The findings, reported in Science magazine, challenge long-held views about the closest world to the Sun.

Another study looking at Mercury’s gravity field shows that the planet has an unusual internal structure.

As well as being published in the journal Science, the research has also been presented here at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in The Woodlands, Texas.

“Many scientists believed that Mercury was much like the Moon - that it cooled off very early in Solar System history, and has been a dead planet throughout most of its evolution,” said Maria Zuber, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

“Now, we’re finding compelling evidence for unusual dynamics within the planet, indicating that Mercury was apparently active for a long time.”

Dr Zuber and her colleagues used laser measurements from Messenger to map out a large number of impact craters, and found that many had tilted over time.

This suggests that geological processes within the planet have re-shaped Mercury’s terrain after the craters were created.

Observations of Caloris Basin, the planet’s largest impact feature, show that portions of the crater floor stand higher than its rim, suggesting that forces within Mercury’s interior pushed the surface up after the initial collision event.

The researchers also identified an area of lowlands near Mercury’s north pole that could have migrated there over the course of the planet’s evolution. A process called polar wander can cause geological features to shift around on a planet’s surface.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science Mercury NASA space astronomy politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://instapaper.com/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:6a520ad12989/</dc:identifier>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:Mercury"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:NASA"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2012/03/the-sky-just-swelled-to-contain-over-560-million-objects-from-the-new-wise-mission-catalog.ars">
    <title>The sky just swelled to contain over 560 million objects from the new WISE mission catalog</title>
    <dc:date>2012-03-17T22:47:21+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://arstechnica.com/science/news/2012/03/the-sky-just-swelled-to-contain-over-560-million-objects-from-the-new-wise-mission-catalog.ars</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Our view of the Universe just grew quite a bit more detailed as NASA JPL released the compendium of results from the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer orbital telescope. WISE was launched into a 525 km orbit on December 14, 2009 and gathered data until the WISE team ran out of funding on February 17, 2011.

With hardware over 1,000 times more sensitive than prior infrared space surveys, WISE surveyed 99 percent of the sky at 4 different wavelengths. Over 15 terabytes of data and 2.7 million images revealed 560 million stars, galaxies, comets, asteroids, and various other objects too cool or red-shifted to show up in anything but the infrared. Astronomers saw Y-dwarfs for the first time, which are nearly-invisible brown dwarf stars too cool to see outside the infrared. The first Earth trojan asteroid also revealed itself to WISE—it scouts Earth’s orbit 60 degrees ahead of us around the Sun.

Our view of the solar system also grew quite a bit more detailed, as WISE identified or confirmed over 90 precent of the Near Earth Asteroids. One thing WISE was not able to do was see very much in the Kuiper belt; that task and many others remain for the James Webb Space Telescope now scheduled to be launched in 2018. The JWST will be several times more sensitive yet.

UC Berkeley has published many WISE images as they become available, and Cal Tech hosts JPL’s WISE website .]]></description>
<dc:subject>WISE NASA research science astronomy space politics</dc:subject>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:f81d57f547a0/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:WISE"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:NASA"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
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	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
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</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17295337">
    <title>Strong solar storm to hit Earth</title>
    <dc:date>2012-03-08T03:37:02+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17295337</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[A strong solar storm is expected to hit Earth shortly, and experts warn it could disrupt power grids, satellite navigations systems and plane routes.

The storm - the largest in five years - will unleash a torrent of charged particles between 06:00 GMT and 10:00 GMT, US weather specialists say.

They say it was triggered by a pair of massive solar flares earlier this week.

It means there is a good chance of seeing the northern lights at higher latitudes, if the skies are clear.

The effects will be most intense in polar regions, and aircraft may be advised to change their routings to avoid these areas.]]></description>
<dc:subject>Nasa solar science physics astronomy politics</dc:subject>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:30333eecbc2d/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:Nasa"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:solar"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:physics"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/17192758">
    <title>Venus spinning more slowly</title>
    <dc:date>2012-02-29T03:51:07+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/17192758</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Venus is spinning more slowly and astronomers don’t know why.

In the 1990s, they worked out one Venetian day - the time for the planet to spin round once - lasted 243.018 Earth days.

But now, the European Space Agency’s Venus Express orbiter shows Venus’ spin is getting even slower and a day on Venus is now six and a half minutes longer.

Scientists aren’t sure why.

One cause could be Venus’ thick atmosphere and high winds pushing against the planet’s spin.

The news is important for future missions to the planet. Scientists use this data to plan missions to the planet and choose the best spot to land a rover.

The new speed means some features on Venus will be 20 kilometres away from they were expected to be.]]></description>
<dc:subject>venus space science astronomy politics</dc:subject>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:5f322195b0ee/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:venus"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17117030">
    <title>Distant 'waterworld' is confirmed</title>
    <dc:date>2012-02-22T06:02:41+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17117030</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Astronomers have confirmed the existence of a new class of planet: a waterworld with a thick, steamy atmosphere.

The exoplanet GJ 1214b is a so-called “Super Earth” - bigger than our planet, but smaller than gas giants such as Jupiter.

Observations using the Hubble telescope now seem to confirm that a large fraction of its mass is water.

The planet’s high temperatures suggest exotic materials might exist there.]]></description>
<dc:subject>space science research astronomy politics</dc:subject>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:ae599625f5b0/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-16268950">
    <title>First Earth-sized planets spotted</title>
    <dc:date>2011-12-28T22:30:24+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-16268950</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Astronomers have detected the first Earth-sized planets, which are orbiting a star similar to our own Sun.

In the distant past they may have been able to support life and one of them may have had conditions similar to our own planet - a so-called Earth-twin - according to the research team.

They have described their findings as the most important planets ever discovered outside our Solar System.

Details of the discovery are outlined in Nature journal.]]></description>
<dc:subject>research science astronomy politics</dc:subject>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:46e8ccf14662/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/10/28/a-city-block-sized-asteroid-will-swing-by-earth-on-november-8/">
    <title>A city-block-sized asteroid will swing by Earth on November 8 | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine</title>
    <dc:date>2011-10-29T18:45:01+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/10/28/a-city-block-sized-asteroid-will-swing-by-earth-on-november-8/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[On November 8, an asteroid 400 meters across will pass by the Earth, missing us by the very comfortable margin of about 320,000 kilometers (200,000 miles). Named 2005 YU55, it’s been known for some time that this pass will occur, and astronomers are jumping on the chance to observe it.

First off, it’s no danger to Earth right now. It’s what’s called a Potentially Hazardous Asteroid because its orbit intersects ours, but observations have shown it won’t be a danger to Earth for at least a century, and probably much more. There’s been some scare-mongering about it over the past few months, but as usual that’s all baloney. This rock will pass us safely, sailing on into the night.

But given that this is close in astronomical terms, astronomers will be observing it carefully. There are plans to use NASA’s Deep Space Network of radio telescopes, as well as the Arecibo ‘scope in Puerto Rico (which was used to make the image above back in April 2010). They’ll be able to see features on this rock as small as two meters across, which means we’ll actually get some interesting images of it, I hope. I’ll post those as soon as I see ‘em (which will be after November 8). ]]></description>
<dc:subject>science astronomy research space asteroid politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:892705799f11/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:asteroid"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15445688">
    <title>First-known supernova laid bare</title>
    <dc:date>2011-10-26T06:23:13+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15445688</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[A mystery surrounding the first recorded supernova - seen by Chinese astronomers in 185AD - has been solved.

The supernova RCW 86 lit up the sky for eight months, documented at the time as a “guest star”.

In more recent times, astronomers have wondered how it grew so large, so fast.

Space telescope observations now suggest that before exploding, a wind of material from the star blew a cavity around it, into which the supernova could expand much more quickly.

The supernova, about 8,000 light-years away, is huge - if the infrared light it emits could be seen by our eyes, it would appear to be as large in the sky as the full Moon.

The findings, published in the Astrophysical Journal, combine existing data from the Chandra X-ray telescope and the XMM-Newton Observatory with recent images from the US space agency Nasa’s Spitzer and Wide-field Infrared Survey (Wise) telescopes.]]></description>
<dc:subject>astronomy science physics supernova politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://instapaper.com/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:f51199c555e9/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:physics"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:supernova"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap111025.html">
    <title>APOD: 2011 October 25 - IC 1805: The Heart Nebula in HDR</title>
    <dc:date>2011-10-26T05:19:06+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap111025.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[What powers the Heart Nebula? The large emission nebula dubbed IC 1805 looks, in whole, like a human heart. The nebula glows brightly in red light emitted by its most prominent element: hydrogen. The red glow and the larger shape are all created by a small group of stars near the nebula's center. A close up in high dynamic range (HDR) spanning about 30 light years contains many of these stars is shown above. This open cluster of stars contains a few bright stars nearly 50 times the mass of our Sun, many dim stars only a fraction of the mass of our Sun, and an absent microquasar that was expelled millions of years ago. The Heart Nebula is located about 7,500 light years away toward the constellation of Cassiopeia. ]]></description>
<dc:subject>space astronomy photography politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:4eeeaffddeca/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:photography"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/10/17/reflecting-on-the-iss/">
    <title>Reflecting on the ISS | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine</title>
    <dc:date>2011-10-17T22:17:15+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/10/17/reflecting-on-the-iss/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Randy Halverson is an astrophotographer who takes gorgeous pictures of the sky and puts them together into amazing time lapse videos (see Related Posts below for links to his work). On Google+ this morning he posted a picture he took last night, and it’s simply stunning: the International Space Station rising into the Milky Way, with both reflected on a lake’s still waters:]]></description>
<dc:subject>InternationalSpaceStation space astronomy photography science politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:1fa07b07a344/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:InternationalSpaceStation"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:photography"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap111011.html">
    <title>APOD: 2011 October 11 - NGC 7635: The Bubble Nebula</title>
    <dc:date>2011-10-11T21:28:20+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap111011.html</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[It's the bubble versus the cloud. NGC 7635, the Bubble Nebula, is being pushed out by the stellar wind of massive central star BD+602522. Next door, though, lives a giant molecular cloud, visible to the right. At this place in space, an irresistible force meets an immovable object in an interesting way. The cloud is able to contain the expansion of the bubble gas, but gets blasted by the hot radiation from the bubble's central star. The radiation heats up dense regions of the molecular cloud causing it to glow. The Bubble Nebula, pictured above in scientifically mapped colors to bring up contrast, is about 10 light-years across and part of a much larger complex of stars and shells. The Bubble Nebula can be seen with a small telescope towards the constellation of the Queen of Aethiopia (Cassiopeia). ]]></description>
<dc:subject>space science photography astronomy politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:18d851eab1ad/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:photography"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15203281">
    <title>Venus surprises with ozone layer</title>
    <dc:date>2011-10-10T23:43:36+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15203281</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Scientists have discovered that Venus has an ozone layer.

The thin layer, which is hundred of times less dense than the Earth’s, was discovered by the European Space Agency’s Venus Express craft, researchers report in the journal Icarus.

Until now, ozone layers have only been detected in the atmospheres of Earth and Mars.

The find could help astronomers refine their hunt for life on other planets.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science research astronomy NASA space Venus politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://instapaper.com/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:d8be83ee3b8f/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:research"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:NASA"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:Venus"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15203788">
    <title>BBC News - Crab Pulsar's high-energy beam surprises astronomers</title>
    <dc:date>2011-10-06T23:08:24+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15203788</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[Astronomers have spotted gamma ray emissions coming from the Crab Pulsar at far higher energies than expected.

This challenges notions of how these powerful electromagnetic rays - like light, but far more energetic - are formed, researchers suggest in Science.

They found emissions at more than 100 gigaelectronvolts - 100 billion times more energetic than visible light.

The Crab Nebula that hosts the pulsar continues to amaze astronomers, despite being one of the most studied objects.

The remnant of a supernova that lit up the skies on Earth in 1054, it has been taken in modern times to be a constant source of light - so constant that telescopes were trained on it for calibrations.

But earlier this year, the Crab was spotted emitting gamma-ray flares that have confounded astronomers.

Within the nebula lies the Crab Pulsar - a tiny, rapidly spinning neutron star that sprays highly energetic electromagnetic rays out at its poles like a lighthouse beam, sweeping past the Earth 30 times a second.

The pulsar's enormous magnetic field is known to gather up particles and accelerate them - in a process much like particle accelerators here on Earth.

As those particles move in curved paths, they emit the gamma rays that we can measure. ]]></description>
<dc:subject>astronomy CrabNebula puslar energy light science research politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:1bfa67628359/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:CrabNebula"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:puslar"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:energy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:light"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
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</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15113388">
    <title>'Hollows' mark Mercury's surface</title>
    <dc:date>2011-10-03T04:18:03+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15113388</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[In among a raft of papers published in this week’s edition of the journal Science, researchers reveal strange hollows that pock Mercury’s surface.

Irregular in shape, these depressions seem to form in the bright deposits that have been excavated where meteorites have impacted the surface.

The Messenger team cannot be sure what has caused them, but on Mars similar features are also known to exist.

In the case of the Red Planet, they are probably a consequence of evaporating carbon dioxide ice.

As the ice is driven off in the warmth of the Sun, it leaves a hole in the ground that produces a kind “Swiss cheese” terrain.

On Mercury, there is no carbon dioxide ice, so it would have to be some other kind of volatile material in play.

“It could be that there is some component in Mercury rocks that is unstable when it is exposed to the environment at the surface,” said David Blewett of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland.]]></description>
<dc:subject>mercury space astronomy science politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://instapaper.com/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:9b343ca19922/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:mercury"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/09/29/new-study-13-of-sun-like-stars-might-have-terrestrial-planets-in-their-habitable-zones/">
    <title>New study: 1/3 of Sun-like stars might have terrestrial planets in their habitable zones</title>
    <dc:date>2011-10-02T08:18:42+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/09/29/new-study-13-of-sun-like-stars-might-have-terrestrial-planets-in-their-habitable-zones/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[A paper has been accepted for publication in a science journal (PDF) where the author has analyzed data from NASA’s Kepler planet-finding observatory, trying to figure out how many Earth-sized planets there might be in the galaxy orbiting their stars in their habitable zones; that is, at the right distance so that the star warms the planet enough to have liquid water. In the paper, he estimates that on average 34% (+/-14%) of Sun-like stars have terrestrial planets in that Goldilocks zone.]]></description>
<dc:subject>science space astronomy planet politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://instapaper.com/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:0ba921c2070c/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:planet"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/09/27/for-your-viewing-pleasure-active-region-1302/">
    <title>For your viewing pleasure: Active Region 1302 | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine</title>
    <dc:date>2011-09-28T04:10:06+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/09/27/for-your-viewing-pleasure-active-region-1302/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[It’s hard to imagine just how enormous this cluster is. So to help, I cropped out the big spot on the left and put the Earth to scale next to it.

So yeah. That’s our whole planet.

Sunspots are big.

In fact, these guys are so big I tried to get a picture myself using binoculars, projecting the image onto a white board. Unfortunately, I couldn’t get my set up to work well and all the pictures were out of focus. You might want to try it yourself, but be warned: the bright Sun can damage optics, so you might fry your binocs. Also, of course: NEVER LOOK AT THE SUN. Not with your eyes, not through a telescope, not through binoculars. There are ways to do that, but it takes specialized equipment, and it’s not worth the risk if you don’t know what you’re doing. The Stanford Solar Center has some advice about all this.]]></description>
<dc:subject>sun space science astronomy politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:748b5afa5bc6/</dc:identifier>
<taxo:topics><rdf:Bag>	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:sun"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:space"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:science"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:astronomy"/>
	<rdf:li rdf:resource="https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/t:politics"/>
</rdf:Bag></taxo:topics>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14940885">
    <title>BBC News - Nasa's Kepler telescope finds planet orbiting two suns</title>
    <dc:date>2011-09-19T01:36:21+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14940885</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[A planet orbiting two suns - the first confirmed alien world of its kind - has been found by Nasa's Kepler telescope, the US space agency announced.

It may resemble the planet Tatooine from the film Star Wars, but scientists say Luke Skywalker, or anyone at all, is unlikely to be living there.

Named Kepler-16b, it is thought to be an uninhabitable cold gas giant, like Saturn.

The newly detected body lies some 200 light years from Earth.

Though there have been hints in the past that planets circling double stars might exist - "circumbinary planets", as they are known - scientists say this is the first confirmation.

It means when the day ends on Kepler-16b, there is a double sunset, they say.
]]></description>
<dc:subject>astronomy science nasa KeplerTelescope telescope politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:1c0353910ee0/</dc:identifier>
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<item rdf:about="http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/09/13/soyuz-rocket-flaw-found/">
    <title>Soyuz rocket flaw found? | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine</title>
    <dc:date>2011-09-14T02:11:37+00:00</dc:date>
    <link>http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/09/13/soyuz-rocket-flaw-found/</link>
    <dc:creator>jtyost2</dc:creator><description><![CDATA[That’s the immediate issue. However, this rocket failure is a bit more problematic. The flaw appears to have happened in the manufacturing process, and that’s the sticky point. If it were something procedural setting up for launch (tanking up the rocket, for example), that’s a relatively easy fix. If it were some malfunction in the machinery used to make the rocket (again, possible to find and fix in general), the flaw would’ve turned up more often. That leaves something that happened by accident, and that’s not terribly reassuring. How do you know when a problem like that is mitigated? What was the exact circumstance that led to the pipe being faulty?

Until the Russians can figure that out, implement a fix, and make sure that problem is eliminated — and that other similar mistakes are prevented — it’s too risky to allow astronauts to fly on board the rocket. And that, currently, is the only way to get humans up to the space station. The only other rocket currently capable of getting up there is the Space X Falcon 9, which has not yet proven its reliability, and in any case has not been cleared by NASA to carry humans (the Space X Dragon capsule could theoretically do that, but needs to pass a set of strict regulations to be (pardon the expression) street legal).

I’ll note the Wall Street Journal is reporting that with the flaw being found, Soyuz flights could resume as early as October. Interestingly, the WSJ article reports that NASA is optimistic, while the NYT article says the Russian commission that investigated the crash is more cautious. The WSJ also says NASA may have a statement out this week, so we’ll see. I don’t see any mention of this on the NASA site (an ISS telecon will be held on Tuesday, September 20), but I’ll keep my eyes open.

Also note that three of the six astronauts on the ISS will be coming home in a Soyuz capsule on Thursday, September 15th (note the capsules are unrelated to the rocket that failed). They plan to undock and make the de-orbit burn at 03:06 UT Thursday (23:06 Eastern US time Wednesday night) and land in Kazakhstan 04:01 a.m. UT. That will leave three astronauts on the ISS; they will either have to come home to Earth by mid-November due to the limited fuel lifetime of their return capsule, or have a new capsule put in place. And that won’t be possible until flights resume.]]></description>
<dc:subject>soyuz russia space science nasa astronomy safety politics</dc:subject>
<dc:source>https://pinboard.in/</dc:source>
<dc:identifier>https://pinboard.in/u:jtyost2/b:aa92bab88f2c/</dc:identifier>
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