The Sky Tonight

March 11, 2015

Comet mission in bid to contact dormant Philae probe
Paris (AFP) March 11, 2015
Ground controllers will open a communications line Thursday with a robot lab perched on a comet zipping through space, hoping for signs it is alive, the European Space Agency (ESA) said Wednesday. The 100-kilogramme (220-pound) probe Philae landed on Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko on November 12 after a 10-year trek piggybacking on its mother ship, the orbiter Rosetta. But the landing did not go smoothly. Philae bounced twice off the comet's hard surface before settling at an angle in the shado ... read more

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Rocky grains stir theories of life on Saturn moon Grains of rock spewed into deep space suggest a small moon of Saturn has hydrothermal vents, boosting theories it may harbour microbial life, scientists said Wednesday. ... more		Milky Way isn't a flat disk, it's corrugated According to a new study by a team of international astronomers, the Milky Way's galactic disk resembles the undulating ripples seen after a pebble is tossed into a pond. In other words, it's not flat - it's corrugated, like a steel roof. ... more		Latest MESSENGER data includes new targeted mosaics of Mercury NASA's Planetary Data System (PDS) has released data collected from the MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) mission during its 37th through 42nd months in orbit ... more
				China Gets One Step Closer to Completing its Ambitious Lunar Mission China successfully tested unmanned docking on the lunar orbit this week to determine whether key technology planned to be used in its Chang'e-5 mission to the Moon was working, according to the Stat ... more		Carina Nebula survey reveals details of star formation A new Rice University-led survey of one of the most active star-forming regions in the galactic neighborhood is helping astronomers better understand the processes that may have contributed to the f ... more

Human 2 Mars Conference Mat 5-7 2015 - Washington DC

Nuclear Decommissioning Conference Europe May 2015

Electrons in slow motion A process that is too fast to be measured and analysed. Yet a group of international scientists did not lose heart and conceived a sort of highly sophisticated moviola film-editing system, which all ... more		'Habitable' planet GJ 581d previously dismissed as noise probably does exist The planet candidate was spotted using a spectrometer which measures the 'wobble', small changes in the wavelength of light emitted by a star, caused as a planet orbits it. In 2014 researchers revis ... more		EU states to hold talks on 'drone wall' to protect bloc Denmark military intel fails to identify source of drone flights Lithuania eases rules on shooting down drones		Dawn: We Have Arrived at Ceres Since its discovery in 1801, Ceres has been known as a planet, then as an asteroid, and later as a dwarf planet. Now, after a journey of 3.1 billion miles (4.9 billion kilometers) and 7.5 years, Daw ... more
				Breakthrough in particle control creates special half-vortex rotation A breakthrough in the control of a type of particle known as the polariton has created a highly specialised form of rotation. Researchers at the Universities of Strathclyde and Pittsburgh, and ... more		Scientists: Nearby Earth-like planet isn't just 'noise' Astronomers are having a war of words across the Atlantic over the existence - or not - of the first exoplanet ever discovered in a star's habitable zone, the nearby GJ581d. ... more

Exorings on the Horizon Astronomers from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and the University of Antioquia (Medellin-Colombia), have devised a novel method for identifying rings around extrasolar planets (exo ... more		Ceres' mysterious existence has long puzzled scientists In less than two days, NASA will provide the closest ever view of a dwarf planet in between Mars and Jupiter that has mesmerized, puzzled and tantalized astronomers for more than two centuries. ... more		NASA ISRO radar satellite beams first Earth images from space Morocco High Atlas whistle language strives for survival China warns Papua New Guinea over Australian defence deal		Fastest Star in Our Galaxy Propelled by a Thermonuclear Supernova A team of astronomers, including University of Hawaii at Manoa astronomer Eugene Magnier, used the 10-meter Keck II and Pan-STARRS1 telescopes in Hawaii to find a star that breaks the galactic speed ... more
Planet 'Reared' by Four Parent Stars Growing up as a planet with more than one parent star has its challenges. Though the planets in our solar system circle just one star - our sun - other more distant planets, called exoplanets, can b ... more		CU students probe magnetic reconnection with MMS tools The University of Colorado Boulder will serve as the Science Operations Center for a NASA mission launching this month to better understand the physical processes of geomagnetic storms, solar flares ... more		First scientific publication from data collected at NSLS-II Just weeks after the National Synchrotron Light Source II (NSLS-II), a U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science User Facility at Brookhaven National Laboratory, achieved first light, a team of sc ... more		Subaru Telescope Observes Rapid Changes in a Comet's Plasma Tail Images from a December 2013 observation of the comet C/2013 R1 (Lovejoy) (Note 1) reveal clear details about rapidly changing activity in that comet's plasma tail. To get this image, astronomers use ... more

	NASA's Chandra Observatory Finds Cosmic Showers Halt Galaxy Growth Using NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, astronomers have found that the growth of galaxies containing supermassive black holes can be slowed down by a phenomenon referred to as cosmic precipitation. ... more		Bright lights on dwarf planet perplex NASA as probe nears The discovery of another bright light on the dwarf planet Ceres has NASA scientists perplexed as the US Dawn probe prepares to enter the orbit of the largest object in the asteroid belt and possibly resolve the mystery. ... more

JUNO begins decade-long mission to probe neutrino mysteries

SFL Missions to Deliver Spacecraft Buses for HawkEye 360 RF Signal Detection Expansion

Voyager debuts first space based multi cloud region to advance orbital data processing

Pennies reveal new insights on the nature of randomness		Galactic 'rain' could be key to star formation		Comet flyby: OSIRIS catches glimpse of Rosetta's shadow		NASA space probe 'Dawn' enters orbit of dwarf planet		Far from home: Wayward cluster is both tiny and distant
UGR scientists provide new data on the nature of dark matter		An explosive quartet		Why isn't the universe as bright as it should be?		Astronomers see star explode 4 times		ESA experts assess risk from exploded satellite

The first ever photograph of light as a particle and a wave

OSIRIS-REx Mission Completes System Integration Review

OSIRIS catches glimpse of Rosetta's shadow

NASA-Funded Study Finds Two Solar Wind Jets in the Heliosphere

Taiwan snubs Alibaba funding pledge

Could Ionized Gas Do A Better Job of Sterilizing Spacecraft

An Old-Looking Galaxy in a Young Universe

Debris Fills Orbit as US Satellite Explodes

Living on the Edge: Stars Found Far from Galaxy Center

Astronomers Find Dust in the Early Universe

ALMA and VLT Probe Surprisingly Dusty and Evolved Galaxy

NASA Spacecraft Nears Historic Dwarf Planet Arrival

US Military Satellite Explodes, Sending Chunks of Debris Into Orbit

How Would The World Change If We Found Extraterrestrial Life

Core work: Iron vapor gives clues to formation of Earth and moon

U.S. weather satellite explodes into 43 pieces

Forbidden quantum leaps possible with high-res spectroscopy

What Big Bang? Universe May Have Had No Beginning at All

'Bright Spot' on Ceres Has Dimmer Companion

The sun has more impact on the climate in cool periods

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