The Sky Tonight

October 28, 2014

Third of Four Planned Maneuvers Extends Messenger Orbital Operations
Laurel MD (SPX) Oct 28, 2014
Messenger mission controllers at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Md., conducted the third of four maneuvers to raise the spacecraft's minimum altitude sufficiently to extend orbital operations and delay the probe's inevitable impact onto Mercury's surface until early next spring. The first of the four maneuvers, completed on June 17, raised Messenger's altitude at closest approach from 115 kilometers (71.4 miles) to 156.4 kilometers (97.2 miles) above the planet' ... read more

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Churyumov-Gerasimenko Scrambling Its Jets This image of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, taken by Rosetta's Optical, Spectroscopic, and Infrared Remote Imaging System (OSIRIS) on Sept. 20, from a distance of 4.5 miles (7.2 kilometers), show ... more		NASA Team Proposes to Use Laser to Track Orbital Debris As participation in space exploration grows worldwide, so does the impact of orbital debris - man-made "space junk" that poses significant hazards to live spacecraft and astronauts should they cross ... more		Hubble Views the Whirling Disk of NGC 4526 This neat little galaxy is known as NGC 4526. Its dark lanes of dust and bright diffuse glow make the galaxy appear to hang like a halo in the emptiness of space in this image from the NASA/ESA Hubb ... more
				Time-lapse imagery shows fireball exploded from white dwarf star The fireball of a nova explosion from a white dwarf star has been captured by astronomers in remarkable detail - the first time such an cosmic event has been recorded in action. ... more		Sunspot continues to shoot out solar flares It's no longer just the largest sunspot in more than 20 years; it's the sunspot that just won't quit. The solar region, known as Active Region 12192 (or AR 2192), has been ripping off solar flares for more than a week now, and has shown no signs of slowing down. ... more

Tempur-Pedic Mattress Comparison & Memory Foam Mattress Review

First time-lapse images of exploding fireball from a 'nova' star Astronomers at the University of Sydney are part of a team that has taken images of the thermonuclear fireball from a 'nova star' for the first time tracking the explosion as it expands. The researc ... more		From the mouths of young fireballs The first images of a nova during its early fireball stage - when it ejects material, and gases expand and cool - show that this activity is more complicated than predicted. That is the conclu ... more		India signs $7 bn deal for 97 domestically made fighter jets France doubles down on threat to build future fighter jet alone US approves $1.2 bn missile sale to Germany		Georgia State astronomers image the exploding fireball stage of a nova Astronomers at Georgia State University's Center for High Angular Resolution Astronomy (CHARA) have observed the expanding thermonuclear fireball from a nova that erupted last year in the constellat ... more
				With comet film, ESA boldy goes into sci-fi Belying its austere reputation for pure science and the search for fact, the European Space Agency (ESA) is branching out - into fantasy film-making. ... more		European Scientists Discover Smell of a Comet Scientists at the European Space Agency have discovered the smell of a comet: rotten eggs, urine and formaldehyde. In their blog the scientists commented, "If you could smell the comet, you wo ... more

Startup in the Land of the Rising Sun; A Japanese Solar Venture - by Bradley L. Bartz

Close Encounters: Comet Siding Spring Seen Next to Mars NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has produced a unique composite image of comet Siding Spring as it made its never-before-seen close passage of a comet by Mars. Siding Spring, officially designat ... more		MAVEN Ultraviolet Image of Comet Siding Spring's Hydrogen Coma NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) spacecraft obtained this ultraviolet image of hydrogen surrounding comet Siding Spring on Friday, Oct. 17, two days before the comet's closest a ... more		Simulations of Exoplanet Formation May Help Inform Search for Extraterrestrial Life Ancient hot springs reveal how microbes thrived before Earth gained oxygen Framework proposed to study planetary scale impact of life		Illusions in the Cosmic Clouds Pareidolia is the psychological phenomenon where people see recognizable shapes in clouds, rock formations, or otherwise unrelated objects or data. There are many examples of this phenomenon on Eart ... more
Lucky Star Escapes Black Hole With Minor Damage Astronomers have gotten the closest look yet at what happens when a black hole takes a bite out of a star-and the star lives to tell the tale. We may think of black holes as swallowing entire ... more		Cooling with molecules An international team of scientists have become the first ever researchers to successfully reach temperatures below minus 272.15 degrees Celsius - only just above absolute zero - using magnetic mole ... more		Galactic wheel of life shines in infrared It might look like a spoked wheel or even a "Chakram" weapon wielded by warriors like "Xena," from the fictional TV show, but this ringed galaxy is actually a vast place of stellar life. A newly rel ... more		New window on the early universe Using two world-class supercomputers, the researchers were able to demonstrate the effectiveness of their approach by simulating the formation of a massive galaxy at the dawn of cosmic time. The ALM ... more

	NASA opens library of cosmic audio to the public American space agency NASA has made available to the public over 60 audio samples recorded on various manned and unmanned space missions. ... more		Largest sunspot in 20 years facing planet Earth Sunspot region AR2192 on the solar surface is currently both massive and active, scientists with NASA say. So big, in fact, that the sunspot is visible - with a properly protected eye - from the Earth's surface. ... more

Uranium enrichment: Why Iran refuses to step back

Redwire to Deliver Solar Array Wings for Axiom Station's First Module

Germany's Merz rejects claims he is slowing green shift

Two families of comets found around nearby star		Organic molecules in Titan's atmosphere are intriguingly skewed		New evidence for an exotic, predicted superconducting state		'Cloud' lifts Microsoft earnings above expectations		NASA uses ultra-black nano-coating for solar coronagraph
New lunar mission to test Chang'e-5 technology		Next Chinese mission to moon will return to Earth		NASA-led study sees Titan glowing at dusk and dawn		Suomi team ward off recent space debris threat		NASA's Fermi Satellite Finds Hints of Starquakes in Magnetar 'Storm'

Partial solar eclipse to cast a shadow over the sun Thursday

POLARBEAR detects B-modes in the cosmic microwave background

Cosmic rays threaten future deep-space astronaut missions

POLARBEAR seeks cosmic answers in microwave polarization

Big Black Holes Can Block New Stars

Mars Orbiter Image Shows Comet Nucleus is Small

Hubble Finds Extremely Distant Galaxy through Cosmic Magnifying Glass

In a first, astronomers map comets around another star

Mars Odyssey Orbiter Watches Comet Fly Near

Seeking 'absolute zero', copper cube gets chillingly close

'Twisted rope' clue to dangerous solar storms

Hubble uses gravity lense to find extremely distant galaxy

Sunset Solar Eclipse

Storms to obscure peaking meteor shower in the Northeast

1980s aircraft helps quantum technology take flight

Rare 'baby rattle' molecules reveal new quantum properties of H2O and H2

MAVEN Studies Passing Comet and Its Effects

Cosmic jets of young stars formed by magnetic fields

Curious signal hints at dark matter

Probing the past

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