The Sky Tonight

November 08, 2014

Europe set to make space history with comet landing
Paris (AFP) Nov 08, 2014
One of the biggest gambles in space history comes to a climax on Wednesday when Europe attempts to make the first-ever landing on a comet. Speeding towards the Sun at 65,000 kilometres (40,600 miles) per hour, a lab called Philae will detach from its mothership Rosetta, heading for a deep-space rendezvous laden with risk. The 100-kilogram (220-pound) probe will seek out a minuscule landing site on the treacherous surface of an object darker than coal, half a billion kilometres (300 million miles ... read more

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From doomsday to fact: Science lifts veil on comets For millennia, the sight of a comet filled humans with awe or dread. ... more		Lockheed Martin partners for space debris research Lockheed Martin is co-operating the largest infrared telescope in the Western Hemisphere to study space debris and for other research studies. ... more		Rosetta Races Toward Comet Touchdown After sailing through space for more than 10 years, the European Space Agency's Rosetta spacecraft is now less than a week shy of landing a robotic probe on a comet. The mission's Philae (fee- ... more
				NASA's Hubble Surveys Debris-Strewn Exoplanetary Construction Yards Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have completed the largest and most sensitive visible-light imaging survey of dusty debris disks around other stars. These dusty disks, likely created ... more		Birth of planets revealed in concentric rings of comets, asteroids and dust Astronomers have captured the best image ever of planet formation around an infant star as part of the testing and verification process for the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array's (ALMA) ... more

Tempur-Pedic Mattress Comparison & Memory Foam Mattress Review

CERN discovery could be Higgs, could be another particle Scientists were quite excited when researchers last year announced they had observed the Higgs particle in the CERN particle accelerator known as the Large Hadron Collider. Prior to this discovery, the Higgs boson was a subatomic particle whose existence was predicated solely on theory, not direct evidence. ... more		Dark matter may be massive The physics community has spent three decades searching for and finding no evidence that dark matter is made of tiny exotic particles. Case Western Reserve University theoretical physicists suggest ... 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		Peering into Planetary Atmospheres Pluto is the foremost member of a large population of mysterious icy bodies - called Kuiper Belt Objects - that reside far beyond the orbit of Neptune. In the 1970s and 1980s, Voyagers 1 and 2 explo ... more
				How to Land on a Comet Generally speaking, space missions fall into one of three categories: difficult, more difficult, and ridiculously difficult. Flybys are difficult. A spaceship travels hundreds of millions of m ... more		UCLA astronomers solve puzzle about bizarre object at the center of our galaxy For years, astronomers have been puzzled by a bizarre object in the center of the Milky Way that was believed to be a hydrogen gas cloud headed toward our galaxy's enormous black hole. Having studie ... more

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

ESA space ferry moves ISS to avoid debris The International Space Station was threatened by space debris last week but ESA's Automated Transfer Vehicle saved the day by firing its thrusters to push the orbital outpost and its six occupants ... more		String field theory could be the foundation of quantum mechanics Two USC researchers have proposed a link between string field theory and quantum mechanics that could open the door to using string field theory - or a broader version of it, called M-theory - as th ... 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		Fireball lights up Japanese skies On the same night that at least two fireball events caught the attention of skywatchers in the United States, residents of western Japan spotted a bright green flash of light experts say was a burning chunk of asteroid intercepted by Earth's atmosphere. ... more
Fireball lit up the sky across Midwest and East Coast Monday night Dozens of skywatchers - including some armed with video cameras - reported seeing a bright fireball streak across the skyline on Monday evening. The American Meteor Society fielded more than 300 reports from across the Midwest and East Coast. ... more		China gears up for lunar mission after round-trip success The head of China's lunar probe program has called for a thorough analysis of data collected from the test lunar orbiter, which returned Saturday, to speed up work on Chang'e-5, the star of the 2017 ... more		NASA Team Advances Next-Generation 3D-Imaging Lidar Building, fixing, and refueling space-based assets or rendezvousing with a comet or asteroid will require a robotic vehicle and a super-precise, high-resolution 3-D imaging lidar that will generate ... more		Life Can Survive on Much Less Water Than You Might Think "Follow the water" has long been the mantra of our scientific search for alien life in the Solar System and beyond. We continue seeking conditions where water can remain liquid either on a world's s ... more

	Transitions between states of matter: It's more complicated, scientists find The seemingly simple process of phase changes--those transitions between states of matter--is more complex than previously known, according to research based at Princeton University, Peking Universi ... more		Disorder + disorder = more disorder? If you took the junk from the back of your closet and combined it with the dirty laundry already on your floor, you would have an even bigger mess. While this principle will likely always hold true ... 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 photons strongly coupled by glass fiber		Ultracold disappearing act		Plasma: Casimir and Yukawa mesons		Farewell 'J', hello Agilkia		To Agilkia... and beyond: Comet landing site is named
Solving the mystery of life by exploring Churyumov-Gerasimenko		Planetary Atmospheres a Key to Assessing Possibilities for Life		NASA-Funded Sounding Rocket to Gather 1,500 Sun Images in 5 Minutes		NASA Reveals Mysteries of 'Interstellar' Space		How a giant impact formed asteroid Vesta's 'belt'

China examines the three stages of lunar test run

VLTI detects exozodiacal light

Hubble Sees a Galaxy on the Edge

Sussex physicists find simple solution for quantum technology challenge

Planet-forming Lifeline Discovered in a Binary Star System

Griffith scientists propose existence and interaction of parallel worlds

Yale finds a planet that won't stick to a schedule

Hubble Sees 'Ghost Light' From Dead Galaxies

Laser experiments mimic cosmic explosions and planetary cores

Tremendously bright pulsar may be 1 of many

Richard Binzel on NASA's Asteroid Redirect Mission

Steering ESA satellites clear of space debris

Planet-forming lifeline discovered in a binary star system

Cassini Sees Sunny Seas on Titan

Physicists Closer to Understanding Balance of Matter, Antimatter

Can the wave function of an electron be divided and trapped?

Burning passion: Chinese rich pay sky-high meteorite prices

New insights into the physics of space weather

Here's Looking at You: Spooky Shadow Gives Jupiter a Giant Eye

NASA's LRO Spacecraft Captures Images of LADEE's Impact Crater

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