The Sky Tonight

June 13, 2013

How Do We Know It's Really Microgravity?
Cleveland OH (SPX) Jun 13, 2013
When you see astronauts floating around the International Space Station and hear they are in microgravity, what does that really mean? We know that the astronauts appear weightless, but the space station and all of its contents, including the astronauts, actually still are under the influence of Earth's gravitational pull. This is because the station remains in orbit around our planet. Both station and astronauts are actually falling around Earth. A great way to visualize how orbits work is to pla ... read more

Previous Issues

Jun 12

Jun 11

Jun 10

Jun 07

Jun 06

A Hubble View of NGC 1579: The Trifid of the North Unlike the venomous fictional plants that share its name, the Trifid of the North, otherwise known as the Northern Trifid or NGC 1579, poses no threat to your vision. The nebula's moniker is i ... more		NGC 6334: A Mini Starburst Region? Stars are known to form in dense clouds of gas and dust, but why do some regions show prodigious rates of star formation, while others barely produce any young stars at all? Many of the richest site ... more		Sun-Grazing Comet Flies Deep Into Solar Corona On December 15-16, 2011, a Sun-grazing comet, designated Lovejoy (C/2011 W3), passed deep within the hot solar atmosphere - the corona - effectively probing a region that could never be visited by s ... more
				Tiny Submersible Could Search for Life in Europa's Ocean One of the first visitors to Jupiter's icy moon of Europa could be a tiny submarine barely larger than two soda cans. The small craft might help strike the right balance between cost and capability ... more		Simple theory may explain mysterious dark matter Most of the matter in the universe may be made out of particles that possess an unusual, donut-shaped electromagnetic field called an anapole. This proposal, which endows dark matter particles ... more

CubeSats, SmallSats and MicroSats

Stellar brightness points to new class of stars An intriguing stellar cluster located 7,000 light years from Earth has prompted astronomers to create a new class of stars with "pulsating" brightness, the European Southern Observatory (ESO) said on Wednesday. ... more		Young star suggests our sun was a feisty toddler If you had a time machine that could take you anywhere in the past, what time would you choose? Most people would probably pick the era of the dinosaurs in hopes of spotting a T. rex. But many astro ... more		Maintaining US space dominance requires rapid and reliable delivery of new systems Shield or Spark? The U.S. Golden Dome and the New Missile Arms Race Starcloud partners with Mission Space to protect orbital datacenters with real time space weather intelligence		UCI scientists size up universe's most lightweight dwarf galaxy The least massive galaxy in the known universe has been measured by UC Irvine scientists, clocking in at just 1,000 or so stars with a bit of dark matter holding them together. The findings, m ... more
				Space Storm Could Black Out US East Coast for Two Years Severe space "weather" can knock out satellite communications and GPS systems, expose space tourists and astronauts to dangerous levels of radiation, and even cause massive blackouts on Earth that c ... more		Galaxy in its death throes may hold clues to birth of dwarf systems A bright dwarf galaxy relatively close to Earth's Milky Way and trailing fireballs is the first clear example of a galaxy in the act of dying, scientists argue in new research. The work gives ... more

Solar systems for home and business installations

Tempur-Pedic Mattress Comparison & Memory Foam Mattress Review

Sun-Grazing Comet Flies Deep Into Solar Corona On December 15-16, 2011, a Sun-grazing comet, designated Lovejoy (C/2011 W3), passed deep within the hot solar atmosphere - the corona - effectively probing a region that could never be visited by s ... more		IAU Approves New Names for Ten Major Fault Scarps on Mercury The International Astronomical Union (IAU) recently approved a proposal from the MESSENGER Science Team to assign names to 10 rupes, the long cliff-like escarpments that formed over major faults alo ... more		Vast reserves, but little to drink: Tajikistan's water struggles Year after northern Nigeria floods, survivors left high and dry Africa's path to low-carbon food security		The Dance of the Atoms Lone people standing in a ballroom don't tend to move a lot. It's only when they find a suitable dance partner that rapid motion sets in. Atoms on iron-oxide surfaces behave in a similar way: Only w ... more
				Study: Moving business software to cloud promises big energy savings Moving software applications used by 86 million U.S. workers to the cloud could save enough electricity annually to power Los Angeles for a year, a study found. ... more		International Team On Keck Observatory Strengthens Big Bang Theory An international team of scientists using the most powerful telescope on Earth has discovered that the moments just after the Big Bang happened more like the theory predicts, eliminating a significa ... more

Planning Accelerates For Pluto Encounter

'Vulcan' wins Pluto moon name vote

Public to vote on names for Pluto moons

Tiny Submersible Could Search for Life in Europa's Ocean

Solving a 3.5 Billion-Year-Old Mystery

Infrared Photosynthesis: A Potential Power Source for Alien Life in Sunless Places

Kepler Stars and Planets are Bigger than Previously Thought

Astronomers gear up to discover Earth-like planets

Stars Don't Obliterate Their Planets (Very Often)

Mars Rover Opportunity Trekking Toward More Layers

SciTechTalk: Mars rover readies for 'road trip' on the Red Planet

First woman in space ready for 'one-way flight to Mars'

	Spain receives ever more solar radiation Solar radiation in Spain has increased by 2.3% every decade since the 1980s, according to a study by researchers from the University of Girona and the Federal Institute of Technology (ETH) in Zurich ... more		Cat's Paw Nebula 'littered' with baby stars Most skygazers recognize the Orion Nebula, one of the closest stellar nurseries to Earth. Although it makes for great views in backyard telescopes, the Orion Nebula is far from the most prolific sta ... more		LADEE Arrives at Wallops for Moon Mission The NASA Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE) arrived today at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility to begin final processing for its trip to the moon later this year. LADEE is a r ... more		Astronomers Discover Light Echo From Supernova Astronomers have discovered light echoing off material surrounding a recent supernova explosion, SN 2009ig. The dust and gas that are reflecting the light are so close to the eruption center that it ... more

China sends 11th group of internet satellites into orbit for global constellation

NASA ISRO radar satellite beams first Earth images from space

NRL coronagraph on NOAA SWFO L1 will enhance space weather forecasts

Infrared Photosynthesis: A Potential Power Source for Alien Life in Sunless Places		ALMA discovers comet factory		Spitzer Sees Milky Way's Blooming Countryside		Black Holes Abundant Among The Earliest Stars		Kepler Stars and Planets are Bigger than Previously Thought
Radar Movies Highlight Asteroid 1998 QE2 and Its Moon		Solving a 3.5 Billion-Year-Old Mystery		Astronomers gear up to discover Earth-like planets		'Dust trap' around distant star may solve planet formation mystery		Chile observatory discovers 'comet factory'

2011 Draconid meteor shower deposited a ton of meteoritic material on Earth

Stars Don't Obliterate Their Planets (Very Often)

2,500-year-old tombs in China suggest sun-worshiping culture

Magnetic monopoles erase data

Stellar Winds May Electrify Exoplanets

New Camera At WIYN Images An Asteroid With A Long Tail

NASA's IRIS Mission to Launch in June

Heart of LISA Pathfinder Mission Tested

Penn State controlled satellite captures best ultraviolet maps of two galaxies

Little Scope Discovers Metal-Poor Cousin of Famous Planet

Life on Earth shockingly comes from out of this world

Cassini sees precursors to aerosol 'snow' on Titan

Hubble Maps 3-D Structure Of Ejected Material Around Erupting Star

Hubble telescope spots bizarre asteroid sporting comet-like tail

Scientists capture first images of molecules before and after reaction

Earth's Milky Way neighborhood gets more respect

Rare Stellar Alignment Offers Opportunity To Hunt For Planets

Sunrise 2: A Journey To The Active Sun

Leicester Astronomers Help in Discovery of Neutron Star Slowdown

"Population Census" of Galaxies Buried in Dust

Free Newsletters - Space - Defense - Environment - Energy

Buy Advertising

Media Advertising Kit

Editorial & Other Enquiries

Privacy statement

The contents herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2013 - SpaceDaily. AFP and UPI Wire Stories are copyright Agence France-Presse and United Press International. ESA Portal Reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement, agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by SpaceDaily on any web page published or hosted by SpaceDaily. Privacy statement