Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted February 22, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted February 22, 2021 On 19/02/2021 at 18:32, nudge said: If you want to take photos, binoculars won't be great, I'm afraid. A decent camera for nightsky will set you back quite a bi I think I will go with a camera, as the wife said with bino's "You go looking out the flat windows with binoculars, neighbours might think you are a bloody peeping tom," Quote
Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted February 22, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted February 22, 2021 Quote How do we calculate distances to other galaxies? There are a few different methods, but one of the most common is the standard candle’ method. This relies on the fact that if we know how bright an object in space really is (its ‘intrinsic’ brightness), then we can estimate its distance from how bright it appears to us from Earth (its ‘apparent’ brightness). A ‘Cepheid variable’ is one type of standard candle. Cepheid variables are a type of star that have a consistent relationship between their intrinsic brightness and how fast they pulsate – so you can watch one, and if it pulsates at x speed, you know its intrinsic brightness is y. Measuring the intrinsic brightness of a Cepheid variable, or other kinds of standard candles such as supernovae, allows astronomers to calculate the distance to the standard candle’s home galaxy. For the most distant galaxies, standard candles are too faint to be useful, so astronomers often use the ‘Hubble-Lemaître’ law, which shows that the further a galaxy is from Earth, the faster it is moving away from us. This is just a consequence of the fact that the Universe is expanding. Astronomers first measure the speed of the galaxy by analysing the shift in the galaxy’s light towards the red end of its light spectrum (its ‘redshift’), and once its speed is known, they can work out its distance. Read more: Do all galaxies spin in the same direction? Are there any stars between galaxies? Do galaxies have life cycles? If the Universe is expanding, why is the Andromeda galaxy on course to collide with the Milky Way? https://www.sciencefocus.com/space/how-do-we-calculate-distances-to-other-galaxies/ Quote
nudge Posted February 22, 2021 Posted February 22, 2021 1 hour ago, CaaC (John) said: I think I will go with a camera, as the wife said with bino's "You go looking out the flat windows with binoculars, neighbours might think you are a bloody peeping tom," She's got a point there What kind of camera are you thinking about? Quote
Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted February 22, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted February 22, 2021 5 minutes ago, nudge said: She's got a point there What kind of camera are you thinking about? Not too expensive but a decent one with a zoom lens on it, really want one that I can download the photos taken onto this laptop. Quote
Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted February 24, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted February 24, 2021 (edited) Quote Cosmic neutrino blast Tidal disruption event gives birth to travelling neutrino. VIDEO & FULL REPORT Edited February 24, 2021 by CaaC (John) Quote
Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted February 25, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted February 25, 2021 MARY JACKSON Quote
nudge Posted February 26, 2021 Posted February 26, 2021 My latest image, and probably my proudest one so far... Rosette Nebula in SHO. Taken with a 50cm F3.6 Reflector, total observation time of 2 hours. Processed with DeepSkyStacker + PS. 3 Quote
Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted February 26, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted February 26, 2021 2 hours ago, nudge said: My latest image, and probably my proudest one so far... Rosette Nebula in SHO. Taken with a 50cm F3.6 Reflector, total observation time of 2 hours. Processed with DeepSkyStacker + PS. Keep these photos coming, please, I love looking for them and capturing them on the star map. 1 Quote
Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted February 27, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted February 27, 2021 Quote Cosmos Briefing: Building Australia’s Space Industry Experts discuss Australia’s future in space. Australia’s Space Agency is young, but that doesn’t mean we should be underestimated in space: that’s the message from yesterday’s Cosmos Briefing. Aude Vignelles, Chief Technology Officer at Australian Space Agency; Adam Gilmour, CEO of Queensland-based Gilmour Space Technologies; and Cassandra Steer, a lecturer and researcher in space law at the Australian National University, discussed the evolving industry. The session was hosted by the Royal Institution of Australia’s lead scientist, Alan Duffy. Vignelli's says that “In Australia, we’ve been working in space for a long time. “Remember the role we had during the landing on the moon: our communication capability has been top-notch for quite a long time.” She also characterises the sector in Australia as “vibrant”. “There are areas where we are very mature and very experienced, there are other areas where we are developing this maturity.” She cites the country’s mining experience as an example of our competitive advantage. “Remote operation and robotics is an area of priority for us. And when you look at all the work that we are doing remotely in the mining industry, when everything is operated from Perth in the Pilbara region that is 2000 kilometres away, we have an expertise there. “Do we want to do everything? No, we need to pick up the areas where… we have, as I said, a competitive advantage.” Competitive advantages come from technicians with the right skills. Gilmour says engineering is key but there are a number of other skills needed for the space industry. “There’s a wide gamut of skills in our rocket company, but the bulk of them are engineers,” he says. “We need all kinds of engineers – electrical engineers, chemical engineers, civil engineers, for launch sites… We obviously have a decent-sized documentation team, which has legal expertise, we have a marketing team. On the actual manufacturing side, we need a lot of people that have welding skills, machining skills. “What I’d love to see is a greater engagement between companies like ours and universities, where we work on curriculum. “That’s a really valuable experience for companies like ours because otherwise, we’ve got to teach them as soon as they come in, it takes six to 12 months. And you know, if they’re failing, they’re failing on our dollar. And it’s more expensive.” Steer adds that space-oriented professionals from both STEM and non-STEM fields are going to become valuable. “There are two messages,” she says. “One is we need to have more people looking at STEM careers, more girls going into STEM, more indigenous kids going into STEM… But then, if you’re like me, not actually a very mathematically oriented person and you’re much more into the humanities, there are whole career trajectories there. And right now, I think something that the Australian government and decision-makers and policymakers need is a better understanding of space. So we actually need greater space literacy across the board.” Space is currently governed by international treaties, which Steer believes should inform domestic space law. “You have to think of [the international treaties] like a constitution,” she says. “So we have international law regulating states, but out of that we have the states, the countries, regulating individual companies as well as their own government activities.” Australia is the only country in the world to be a signatory to both the Moon Agreement, and the Artemis Accords. There is tension between these two charters: while the Moon Agreement specifies that countries can’t claim resources in space, the Artemis Accords claim that mining can occur in accordance with its provisions. Steer and Vignelles believe this is a valuable opportunity for Australia, both on a technical and a diplomatic level. “It puts us in a difficult position. But it also puts us in a really amazing position in terms of who Australia [is] going to be as a middle power in the 21st century,” says Steer. “Global relations are shifting. Middle powers like Australia have once again as they did decades ago, a really important role to play in terms of diplomacy… Australia actually has a really great opportunity to step up and try and influence the US and say: space is a global commons. We want part of this this competitive environment, we want to be part of the Artemis program. But we want to make sure that it adheres to the principles of our constitution for space, which is that it should be accessible for all, and it should be regulated internationally.” Vignelles agrees, believing this is “a fantastic opportunity to do things right”. While governments used to be the sole drivers of space exploration, the commercial space industry has boomed in the past decade. Steer says there is plenty of collaboration between government and business in the Australian space sector, but both have certain responsibilities. “We have a space agency with a pretty amazing mandate, which is to support industry,” she says. “It’s not to set up a government-owned civil space program, it’s to pour government money into the industry, and have that be Australia’s presence in space. That’s really exciting. And companies around the world are looking to Australia to see what’s happening for that reason. But we have to be careful. “We also want to be a responsible actor in space. And that requires thinking long term. “That’s a great opportunity for Australia to stand up and have a voice internationally on that and to demonstrate that by implementing those kinds of requirements into our domestic laws, while also making sure that doesn’t hinder the industry.” Gilmour says that the government has two key roles to play in encouraging small- and medium-sized enterprises in space technology: providing funding for research and development in getting technologies into space, and being an early customer for those businesses. He also says that the defence force hasn’t been heavily involved in the Australian space industry, but it is beginning to become interested. “They definitely want access to space, they want sovereign capability, they want sovereign satellites. And so I think that in the years ahead, they’re going to be much more involved in the commercial space industry because the commercial space industry will provide them with the services they want for the defence needs.” Vignelles agrees with this: “To me, when you do space, you talk to defence.” The Australian Space Agency is now two years old. What can we expect in the next two years? “I’ve been in Australia for 20 years and wondering why we didn’t have a space agency. So I dreamed of a space agency, we have one now,” says Vignelles. She believes satellite manufacturing is the next big focus for the space agency. Steer believes space education will be critical over the next two years, as well as “being regional leaders” in international space law. Gilmour’s answer is simple: “An Australian satellite, launched on an Australian launch vehicle, from an Australian launch site.” “And we’re trying to do that next year!” https://cosmosmagazine.com/space/exploration/cosmos-briefing-building-australias-space-industry/ Quote
Administrator Stan Posted February 27, 2021 Administrator Posted February 27, 2021 Just went for a walk and noticed the extremely bright and low moon. Apparently a phenomenon called 'the snow moon'. It really does look superb. Beautiful. Quote
Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted February 28, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted February 28, 2021 Quote How can I see the Pleiades star cluster? See this cluster of stars between October to April. The Pleiades, or Seven Sisters, is the most well-known star cluster in the night sky. It’s what’s known as an ‘open cluster’, which is a group of stars that form from the same huge cloud of dust and gas. As the cloud collapses under gravity, temperatures rise and stars begin to take shape, becoming loosely bound by their mutual gravitational attraction. The Pleiades contains some 3,000 stars, all less than 100 million years old, making them mere babies compared to our Sun’s 4.6 billion years. The cluster’s name possibly comes from the Ancient Greek word plein, meaning ‘to sail’, because the first appearance of the cluster in the dawn sky each year heralded the start of the sailing season. It’s thought that the name Pleiades was later used in Greek mythology for the seven daughters of the titan Atlas and the sea-nymph Pleione In the night sky, the Pleiades sits within the constellation of Taurus. It’s actually possible to see up to 14 of the stars with the naked eye in areas with no light pollution. You can see the Pleiades between October and April, but the best month to look for it is November, when it can be seen for the entire night. To find the Pleiades, first, locate the three stars in Orion’s Belt. During November, look above the eastern horizon from around 10 pm. Draw an imaginary line going through the belt from left to right, and continue this line through Orion’s bow. This will direct you to the brightest star in Taurus: Aldebaran. Past Aldebaran, in the same direction, is the Pleiades. It’s easily recognisable because the positions of its five brightest stars make it look like a tiny version of the Plough. Once you’ve found it, grab a pair of binoculars if you have one, and take a closer look to reveal more of the cluster’s stars. https://www.sciencefocus.com/space/how-can-i-see-the-pleiades-star-cluster/ Quote
Administrator Stan Posted March 1, 2021 Administrator Posted March 1, 2021 Something to look out for in the clear night skies in next few days Quote
Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted March 1, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted March 1, 2021 53 minutes ago, Stan said: Something to look out for in the clear night skies in next few days Hopefully, not had one clear night here for ages so keeping my fingers crossed Quote
nudge Posted March 1, 2021 Posted March 1, 2021 Orion Nebula, one of the brightest nebulae in the night sky and the closest massive star formation region to Earth. 18 images, 30 min exposure each (9 hours in total). 1 Quote
Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted March 2, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted March 2, 2021 Quote Meteorites maybe just north of Cheltenham The hunt is on for meteorite fragments that are likely to have fallen to Earth over England on Sunday night. Many people across Northern Europe saw a fireball in the sky shortly before 22:00 GMT, and the streak of light was also caught on special cameras. Scientists think some pieces will have survived the intense heat of atmospheric entry and hit the ground. A computer model that analysed the camera data suggests the probable site of impact is just north of Cheltenham. "We can track the fireball really well, but the 'black magic' starts when it goes dark - when the light goes out and it still has another 10-20km to reach the ground," explained Dr Ashley King from the UK Fireball Alliance (UKFAll) and London's Natural History Museum (NHM). "Strong winds can blow the object off course of where you think it's going to land, and that's what we're working on now. But, yes, somewhere north of Cheltenham, out towards Stow-on-the-Wold," he told BBC News. FULL REPORT Quote
Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted March 2, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted March 2, 2021 Quote 'Incredible' findings prove the existence of space plasma hurricanes Scientists say they have confirmed the existence of space hurricanes, with a 600 mile-wide mass spotted above the North Pole. Researchers led by China's Shandong University used satellite data to identify the space hurricane, finding it was not a whirling pattern of air but of plasma - ionised gas. The mass was raining electrons instead of water and it lasted nearly eight hours before it broke down. Professor Mike Lockwood, a space scientist at the University of Reading, said the hurricanes could be a universal phenomena at planets and moons with magnetic fields and plasma. He said: "Until now, it was uncertain that space plasma hurricanes even existed, so to prove this with such a striking observation is incredible. "Tropical storms are associated with huge amounts of energy, and these space hurricanes must be created by unusually large and rapid transfer of solar wind energy and charged particles into the Earth's upper atmosphere. "Plasma and magnetic fields in the atmosphere of planets exist throughout the universe, so the findings suggest space hurricanes should be a widespread phenomena." The space hurricane, which occurred during a period of low geomagnetic activity, was found to share many features with hurricanes in the Earth's lower atmosphere - a quiet centre, spiral arms and widespread circulation. They would be expected to lead to space weather effects such as increased satellite drag, disturbances in high-frequency radio communications and increased errors in over-the-horizon radar location, satellite navigation and communication systems. The findings were published in Nature Communications. https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/techandscience/incredible-findings-prove-existence-of-space-plasma-hurricanes/ar-BB1e8bBu?li=AAnZ9Ug Quote
nudge Posted March 3, 2021 Posted March 3, 2021 Starship SN10 test flight in less than 3 minutes. Quote
nudge Posted March 3, 2021 Posted March 3, 2021 Well that was anticlimactic... Aborted due to an issue at engine startup. Quote
nudge Posted March 3, 2021 Posted March 3, 2021 Third time's a charm... They managed to land Short version for the lazy: Granted, the landing was not perfect, as there was a methane leak and the rocket exploded on the pad after a while - apparently the landing gear/landing legs didn't work perfectly, with a slight tilt damaging the methane lines. 1 Quote
Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted March 4, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted March 4, 2021 Quote Prof Avi Loeb: Could ‘Oumuamua be our first recorded brush with alien technology? Was the strange interstellar object that passed by Earth in 2017 our first ever recorded brush with alien technology? Harvard University’s Prof Avi Loeb tell us why he believes it could’ve been. In 2017, the Pan-STARRS telescope in Hawaii spotted an interstellar object passing by Earth for the first time. Shortly after, Harvard’s Prof Avi Loeb was met with a backlash from the scientific community for suggesting it could be of alien origin. Now, several years on he has written a book, Extraterrestrial: The First Sign of Intelligent Life Beyond Earth, outlining why we still can’t out rule the possibility, and why scientists should always keep an open mind. How do we know that ‘Oumuamua wasn’t just a regular comet? Astronomers suspected that it must be a comet because most of the objects in the Solar System are at the periphery have ice on the surface. The ice would warm up by the sunlight hitting it, and then it will end up in vapour and shrouded with dust. So, we end up with this cometary tail surrounding these icy rocks and most of the objects lost by other stars would come from the periphery because of passing stars tear them away from their parent star. So, the first suggestion was it must be a comet. And the only problem was that it didn’t look like a comet. It didn’t have a cometary tail. There was no gas surrounding it. And in fact, the Spitzer Space Telescope looked very sensitively around it and couldn’t find any carbon-based molecules or dust. So, it’s not a comet. What other theories have been proposed about its origin? One was that it may be a hydrogen iceberg, a chunk of frozen hydrogen. So, then the hydrogen evaporates from the just like a comet, but hydrogen is transparent so you can’t see the cometary tail. That would explain why we don’t see it. But I wrote the paper after that with my colleague showing that a hydrogen iceberg would evaporate very quickly as a result of absorbing starlight along its journey. And it’s not at all clear that it can be produced in the first place in molecular clouds. We demonstrated that as well. So that doesn’t seem likely. And then there was a suggestion that maybe it’s a collection of dust particles held together in a loose configuration, just a very porous material, like a cloud of dust, 100 times less dense than air. My issue with that is when it gets close to the Sun, like ‘Oumuamua was, it would be heated by hundreds of degrees and a cloud of dust that is 100 times less dense than air would not have the material strength, in my view, to sustain this heating. And then the third possibility suggested was maybe it’s very elongated because it’s shrapnel, it’s a piece of debris of something bigger that got disrupted when it passed close to a star. The problem with that scenario is that you end up with shrapnel, which is elongated usually because of the gravitational tidal force, and the object was most likely pancake-shaped, not cigar-shaped. Also, the chance of it coming close to a star is very small. So, I said to myself look, after two years, that’s the best that the community could come up with as an alternative to it being artificial? In my view, it being artificial is more likely and there is no clear evidence that it’s not artificial So, what was it? Now, the object was tumbling every eight hours and showed variations in its brightness by a factor of 10 or more. Since we are looking at the reflected sunlight from the object this implied that the area it occupies in the sky varied by a factor of 10 as it was tumbling. Think about a piece of paper that is razor-thin. The chance of you seeing it edge-on is very small. The factor of change is quite extreme and it means that the object was at least 10 times longer than it was wide projected on the sky. And that’s what led to this cartoon version of the object looking like a cigar, even though we didn’t really have an image of it because it was too small for our telescopes to resolve. But actually, the best fit to the variation in the light was that of a pancake-shaped object. So, it was a flat object. And then it exhibited an extra push away from the Sun, which could not be due to the evaporation of gas like you have in a rocket. So, the only way to explain it in my mind was that it was due to a reflection of sunlight. But for that to be effective, you needed the object to be very thin, sort of like a sail that you find on a boat where the wind pushes it, except here it’s the sunlight pushing it. But nature doesn’t make lightsails. They are artificial if real. What is a lightsail? So light is made of particles in principle that are called photons. And you can think of them as billiard balls bouncing and when they bounce off a mirror, they just give a little push. The idea of a light sail is to take advantage of that push. So, for example, you could make the sail sufficiently thin, such that the reflection of light gives it enough push to move it forward. And of course, sunlight is not very powerful, but in principle, if you have a very powerful laser beam, you can reach very high speeds. Of course, in the case of ‘Oumuamua, it was not moving that fast and it’s quite possible that it was completely dysfunctional because it was tumbling. And what would you expect from a piece of equipment floating in space for billions of years? Think about New Horizons, Voyager One and Voyager Two, when they become a billion years old. They would not be functional anymore. So, there should be a lot of trash in space that is not working anymore. Were you surprised at the reaction the idea has received from the scientific community? People are opposed to the mere idea of having the option of it being artificial on the table. That’s in my mind strange. I left a seminar room where there was a talk about ‘Oumuamua and a colleague of mine that has worked on rocks in the Solar System for decades said “‘Oumuamua is weird I wish it never existed”. To me, it was appalling. How can scientists say that? Because, you know, when you’re faced with anomalies that take you out of your comfort zone, it’s actually a very good thing because it means that you’re learning something new. If you want to stay in your comfort zone, then just don’t look, just stay ignorant. You can enjoy life. You can eat good food. You can speak with friends. Just ignore all the facts around you. Many people do that, by the way. But as a scientist, you have an obligation to follow the evidence and see where it leads you. And if you are denying that privilege, you are not true to your obligation. And that’s the problem I have with the scientific community. What would you like to happen next? So, here is my point. Let’s deploy cameras in around the orbit of the Earth, around the Sun. Lots of them, so that when the next interstellar object is spotted, one of the cameras will be close enough to take a close-up photo. And that’s what I really want. When I go to the kitchen and find an ant, I get alarmed because I know that there should be many more ants out there. The same should be true about ‘Oumuamua. We found one after a few years of surveying the sky with pan-STARRS. If we continue to survey a few more years, we’ll find another one. And then there is the Vera Rubin observatory [currently being built in Chile] that will come into play in less than three years. It will have much greater sensitivity and could find an ‘Oumuamua-type object every month. So, we will have a lot of opportunities to check if I’m right or wrong. I don’t understand why even if you’re conservative and you say it’s never aliens. Why have a prejudice to start with? Let’s just let’s just take a photograph. Maybe one out of a few would be a plastic bottle on the beach. You know, most of the time on the beach we find the rock and every now and then a plastic bottle that tells us there is a civilisation out there. https://www.sciencefocus.com/books/prof-avi-loeb-could-oumuamua-be-our-first-recorded-brush-with-alien-technology/ Quote
Subscriber CaaC (John)+ Posted March 4, 2021 Author Subscriber Posted March 4, 2021 Quote Asteroid holds water and organic matter essential for life, first-ever sample shows FRAMES - 1/3 Water and organic matter found on the surface of an asteroid could explain how life formed on Earth, the first-ever sample reveals. Researchers from Royal Holloway, University of London, analysed a single “grain” from the asteroid, known as ‘Itokawa’, and discovered it had evolved chemically over time. Their findings, published today in the journal Scientific Reports, reveal “complex details” of the asteroid’s history and could help explain the evolution pathway of Earth, they said. Samples were taken from the asteroid returned from the inner Solar System by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's first Hayabusa mission in 2010. A team of international researchers then analysed a single grain of the sample, nicknamed ‘Amazon’, and discovered both unheated and heat organic matter. “The organic matter that has been heated indicates that the asteroid had been heated to over 600°C in the past,” said Dr Queenie Chan from the Department of Earth Sciences at Royal Holloway. “The presence of unheated organic matter very close to it means that the infall of primitive organics arrived on the surface of Itokawa after the asteroid had cooled down.” Itokawa has been constantly evolving over billions of years, the findings suggest, by taking in water and organic materials from foreign extra-terrestrial material - similar to earth. The asteroid would have undergone extreme heating, dehydration and “shattering” due to catastrophic impact, the researchers said. That impact is likely to have taken place “rather recently”, 1.3 to 1.4billion years ago, they added. Despite this, Itokawa reformed from the shattered fragments and “rehydrated itself” with water from carbon-rich meteorites or infall of dust. Itokawa is an S-type asteroid, similar to most of Earth’s meteorites, and these latest findings reveal they contain “raw ingredients of life”. The findings also change previous views that the origins of life on Earth, which focused on C-type, carbon-rich asteroids. “Studying ‘Amazon’ has allowed us to better understand how the asteroid constantly evolved by incorporating newly-arrived exogenous water and organic compounds,” Dr Chan said. “These findings are really exciting as they reveal complex details of an asteroid’s history and how its evolution pathway is so similar to that of the prebiotic Earth. “The success of this mission and the analysis of the sample that returned to Earth has since paved the way for a more detailed analysis of carbonaceous material returned by missions such as JAXA’s Hayabusa2 and NASA’s OSIRIS-Rex missions. "Both of these missions have identified exogenous materials on the target asteroids Ryugu and Bennu, respectively. Our findings suggest that mixing of materials is a common process in our solar system.” https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/techandscience/asteroid-holds-water-and-organic-matter-essential-for-life-first-ever-sample-shows/ar-BB1eeGoW?li=AAnZ9Ug#image=1 Quote
nudge Posted March 4, 2021 Posted March 4, 2021 4 hours ago, CaaC (John) said: Prof Avi Loeb: Could ‘Oumuamua be our first recorded brush with alien technology? Was the strange interstellar object that passed by Earth in 2017 our first ever recorded brush with alien technology? Harvard University’s Prof Avi Loeb tell us why he believes it could’ve been. Actually got his book, will give it a go once I'm done with most of the books in my current reading queue. Alien technology sounds a bit far fetched, but Oumuamua is indeed a very strange object. Quote
nudge Posted March 4, 2021 Posted March 4, 2021 Anyone up for a trip to a Moon on the Starship, all expenses paid? @CaaC (John) @Bluewolf @Mel81x @Stan 1 1 1 Quote
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