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At the edge of the sun, a large prominence and a small prominence began to shift, turn and fall apart in less than one day (May 8-9, 2017). Prominences are notoriously unstable. Competing magnetic forces pulled the plasma back and forth until they dissipated. This image was taken in a wavelength of extreme ultraviolet light.
Credit: Solar Dynamics Observatory, NASA Image Date: May 9, 2017 Release Date: May 12, 2017
May 12, 2017: On May 12, Peggy Whitson and Jack Fischer conducted a spacewalk outside the International Space Station. This was the 200th spacewalk in support of station assembly and maintenance. Prior to the outing, during their pre-breathe activities in the airlock, the spacewalkers had to share Whitson’s service and cooling umbilical (SCU), due to an issue with the SCU connected to Fischer’s suit. That device provides electricity, cooling and communications during the pre-breathe phase of a spacewalk. Despite a late start, the pair completed the primary task of replacing an avionics box that supplies electricity and data connections to the science experiments on the orbital laboratory. It was Whitson’s ninth spacewalk and the first for Fischer.
Also, Exploration Mission-1 Announcement, Future Space Station Crew Previews Mission, Humans to Mars Summit 2017, James Webb Space Telescope at JSC, and Martian New Year in Mars, PA!
Credit: NASA Duration: 4 minutes, 28 seconds Release Date: May 12, 2017
May 12, 2017: By day, satellite images of Iceland highlight the nation’s diverse landscape. Sunlight illuminates the smooth, rounded ice caps and the seasonal snow of the interior areas. Snow-capped ridges mark the glacier-carved coastlines.
But the view at night offers an entirely different perspective of the Nordic island nation. This image shows Iceland’s nighttime lights as observed in 2016; it comes from a new global composite map that provides the clearest-yet views of the patterns of human settlements across Earth. The composite was built by selecting the best cloud-free images acquired with the day/night band of the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on the Suomi NPP satellite.
Images of night lights are useful for showing how and where humans populate the planet. In this image, you can see how the Icelandic landscape influences where people live. The island’s interior—the so-called central highlands—is rugged. Compared to coastal areas, the interior is high in elevation, sparsely vegetated, and cold. It is sprinkled with volcanoes, icecaps, and hot springs. People visit the area, but you won’t see many signs of permanent settlement.
In contrast, areas closer to the island’s perimeter are well lit. Reykjavík stands out as the large, bright area in the southwest. That makes sense, given that it is the country’s capital and largest city. In 2014, the city’s population was 184,000 people—almost half of Iceland’s population. The other half live in smaller urban areas located primarily near the coast.
The coast is not only more hospitable; it provides access to ocean resources, particularly fishing. Some of those fishing villages are found on Snæfellsnes, a peninsula in western Iceland that appears well lit. Lights along the peninsula might also be farms and summer homes, and they appear in relatively high density because of the narrow coastal area.
Lights elsewhere could have their roots in agriculture. Towns primarily in the south, such as Flúðir and Hveragerði, make use of geothermal energy to heat greenhouses for growing vegetables and flowers. Artificial lights in these greenhouses can stay on well into the night, particularly during the dark winter months.
Image Credit: NASA Earth Observatory images by Joshua Stevens, using Suomi NPP VIIRS data from Miguel Román, NASA GSFC Caption Credit: Kathryn Hansen with image interpretation provided by Throstur Thorsteinsson, University of Iceland Instrument(s): Suomi NPP - VIIRS Release Date: May 12, 2017
Student Rockets Blast Off During Annual 2017 #StudentLaunch Challenge
Fifty middle and high school, college and university teams from 23 states launched their student-built rockets at Bragg Farms in Toney, Alabama, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
Student Rockets Blast Off During Annual 2017 #StudentLaunch Challenge
Fifty middle and high school, college and university teams from 23 states launched their student-built rockets at Bragg Farms in Toney, Alabama, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
Student Rockets Blast Off During Annual 2017 #StudentLaunch Challenge
Fifty middle and high school, college and university teams from 23 states launched their student-built rockets at Bragg Farms in Toney, Alabama, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
Student Rockets Blast Off During Annual 2017 #StudentLaunch Challenge
Fifty middle and high school, college and university teams from 23 states launched their student-built rockets at Bragg Farms in Toney, Alabama, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
Student Rockets Blast Off During Annual 2017 #StudentLaunch Challenge
Fifty middle and high school, college and university teams from 23 states launched their student-built rockets at Bragg Farms in Toney, Alabama, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
Student Rockets Blast Off During Annual 2017 #StudentLaunch Challenge Fifty middle and high school, college and university teams from 23 states launched their student-built rockets at Bragg Farms in Toney, Alabama, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. Credit: NASA/MSFC Image Date: April 8, 2017
Student Rockets Blast Off During Annual 2017 #StudentLaunch Challenge
Fifty middle and high school, college and university teams from 23 states launched their student-built rockets at Bragg Farms in Toney, Alabama, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
Student Rockets Blast Off During Annual 2017 #StudentLaunch Challenge
Fifty middle and high school, college and university teams from 23 states launched their student-built rockets at Bragg Farms in Toney, Alabama, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
Student Rockets Blast Off During Annual 2017 #StudentLaunch Challenge
Fifty middle and high school, college and university teams from 23 states launched their student-built rockets at Bragg Farms in Toney, Alabama, near NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
May 12, 2017: In this 229th edition of "Earth from Space", Sentinel-2 takes us over the border of the U.S. states Utah and Colorado—presented by Kelsea Brennan-Wessels from the ESA Web-TV virtual studios.
Credit: European Space Agency (ESA) Duration: 2 minutes, 31 seconds Release Date: May 12, 2017
May 10, 2017: NASA helped the town of Mars, Pennsylvania ring in the Martian New Year, May 5-6. Citizens of the town, just north of Pittsburgh, invited the agency to help celebrate Mars New Year, which happens about every two Earth years. Activities included two days of science, technology, engineering, arts and mathematics or (STEAM) activities, to encourage young people to pursue careers in these fields of study, which are critical to NASA's journey to Mars. Website: www.MarsNewYear.com
Credit: NASA Duration: 2 minutes Release Date: May 10, 2017
"Color mosaic of pancam images acquired by NASA's Opportunity rover on May 10, 2017 (mission sol 4726). Opportunity is at the head of 'Perseverance Valley,' located on the rim of Endeavour Crater. This view is made from raw uncalibrated images and has been color-adjusted to approximately the type of color you'd see on Mars. Note: The right side of the image was a bit overexposed in the raw images so that is why it seems a bit lighter there."
ESA Astronaut Thomas Pesquet of France: "Sardinia and its little sister Corsica"
"La Sardaigne et la Corse - une photo dont je suis plutôt fier"
Sardinia is the second largest island in the Mediterranean Sea (after Sicily and before Cyprus) and an autonomous region of Italy. It is located in the Western Mediterranean, just south of the French island of Corsica. (Source: Wikipedia)
Corsica is an island in the Mediterranean Sea and one of the 13 regions of France. It is located west of the Italian Peninsula, southeast of the French mainland, and north of the Italian island of Sardinia. A single chain of mountains make up two-thirds of the island. (Source: Wikipedia)
In this photo, the James Webb Space Telescope has just arrived at Ellington Field, in Houston, Texas from Joint Base Andrews in Maryland. The telescope was safely ensconced in a special transporter case (called the Space Telescope Transporter for Air, Road, and Sea, or STTARS) which attaches to a truck. Webb telescope was first driven from NASA Goddard to Andrews, and then put in a C-5 cargo plane. The plane flew to Ellington, and then the telescope was transported by truck to NASA's Johnson Space Center for an end-to-end cryogenic test. Webb will undergo 100 days in a freezer (the huge test Chamber A), which mimics the extremely cold temperature at which the telescope will operate in space. Light will be passed through the telescope to ensure its optics are correctly aligned.
Friday, May 12th, 2017 marks the 200th spacewalk at the station for assembly and maintenance. To celebrate, here is a look back at a view taken during Extravehicular Activity (EVA) 1 on December 8, 1998. Astronauts James H. Newman (left) and Jerry L. Ross work between Zarya and Unity (foreground) during the first of three scheduled spacewalks on the STS-88 mission. Newman is tethered to the module, while Ross is anchored at the feet to a mobile foot restraint mounted on the end of the remote manipulator system (RMS) arm.
Zarya (FGB) provided electrical power, storage, propulsion, and guidance to the International Space Station (ISS) during the initial stage of assembly. With the launch and assembly in orbit of other modules with more specialized functionality, Zarya is now primarily used for storage, both inside the pressurized section and in the externally mounted fuel tanks. The Zarya is a descendant of the TKS spacecraft designed for the Russian Salyut program. The name Zarya, which means sunrise, was given to the FGB because it signified the dawn of a new era of international cooperation in space. Although it was built by a Russian company, it is owned by the United States. (Source: Wikipedia)
Credit: NASA's Johnson Space Center Image Date: December 8, 1998
Friday, May 12th, 2017 marks the 200th spacewalk at the station for assembly and maintenance. To celebrate, here is a look back at a view taken during Extravehicular Activity (EVA) 1 on December 8, 1998. NASA Astronaut Jerry L. Ross takes a picture during a 7-hour, 21 minute spacewalk. Astronauts Ross and James H. Newman went on to mate 40 cables and connectors running 76 feet from the Zarya control module to Unity, with the 35-ton complex towering over Endeavour's cargo bay. The photo was taken with an electronic still camera (ESC) at 00:35:05 GMT, Dec. 8.
Zarya (FGB) provided electrical power, storage, propulsion, and guidance to the International Space Station (ISS) during the initial stage of assembly. With the launch and assembly in orbit of other modules with more specialized functionality, Zarya is now primarily used for storage, both inside the pressurized section and in the externally mounted fuel tanks. The Zarya is a descendant of the TKS spacecraft designed for the Russian Salyut program. The name Zarya, which means sunrise, was given to the FGB because it signified the dawn of a new era of international cooperation in space. Although it was built by a Russian company, it is owned by the United States. (Source: Wikipedia)
Credit: NASA's Johnson Space Center Image Date: December 8, 1998
Friday, May 12th, 2017 marks the 200th spacewalk at the station for assembly and maintenance. To celebrate, here is a look back at a view taken during Extravehicular Activity (EVA) 1 on December 7, 1998. Astronaut James H. Newman, waves at camera as he holds onto one of the hand rails on the Unity connecting module during the early stages of a 7-hour, 21-minute spacewalk. Astronauts Newman and Jerry L. Ross, both mission specialists, went on to mate 40 cables and connectors running 76 feet from the Zarya control module to Unity, with the 35-ton complex towering over Endeavour's cargo bay. This photo was taken with an electronic still camera (ESC) at 23:37:40 GMT, Dec. 7.
Zarya (FGB) provided electrical power, storage, propulsion, and guidance to the International Space Station (ISS) during the initial stage of assembly. With the launch and assembly in orbit of other modules with more specialized functionality, Zarya is now primarily used for storage, both inside the pressurized section and in the externally mounted fuel tanks. The Zarya is a descendant of the TKS spacecraft designed for the Russian Salyut program. The name Zarya, which means sunrise, was given to the FGB because it signified the dawn of a new era of international cooperation in space. Although it was built by a Russian company, it is owned by the United States. (Source: Wikipedia)
Credit: NASA's Johnson Space Center Image Date: December 7, 1998
U.S. Astronaut Jack Fischer: "My 1st real Moon pic—Lady Luna sure is pretty from up here, but she’s difficult to take a picture of...I’ll keep trying."
Image: Supermassive black holes are generally stationary objects, sitting at the centers of most galaxies. However, using data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and other telescopes, astronomers recently hunted down what could be a supermassive black hole that may be on the move. | May 11, 2017: This possible renegade black hole, which contains about 160 million times the mass of our Sun, is located in an elliptical galaxy about 3.9 billion light years from Earth. Astronomers are interested in these moving supermassive black holes because they may reveal more about the properties of these enigmatic objects. This black hole may have “recoiled,” in the terminology used by scientists, when two smaller supermassive black holes collided and merged to form an even larger one. At the same time, this collision would have generated gravitational waves that emitted more strongly in one direction than others. This newly formed black hole could have received a kick in the opposite direction of those stronger gravitational waves. This kick would have pushed the black hole out of the galaxy’s center, as depicted in the artist’s illustration. The strength of the kick depends on the rate and direction of spin of the two smaller black holes before they merge. Therefore, information about these important but elusive properties can be obtained by studying the speed of recoiling black holes. Astronomers found this recoiling black hole candidate by sifting through X-ray and optical data for thousands of galaxies. First, they used Chandra observations to select galaxies that contain a bright X-ray source and were observed as part of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS). Bright X-ray emission is a common feature of supermassive black holes that are rapidly growing. Next, the researchers looked to see if Hubble Space Telescope observations of these X-ray bright galaxies revealed two peaks near their center in the optical image. These two peaks might show that a pair of supermassive black holes is present or that a recoiling black hole has moved away from the cluster of stars in the center of the galaxy. If those criteria were met, then the astronomers examined the SDSS spectra, which show how the amount of optical light varies with wavelength. If the researchers found telltale signatures in the spectra indicative of the presence of a supermassive black hole, they followed up with an even closer examination of those galaxies. After all of this searching, a good candidate for a recoiling black hole was discovered. The left image in the inset is from the Hubble data, which shows two bright points near the middle of the galaxy. One of them is located at the center of the galaxy and the other is located about 3,000 light years away from the center. The latter source shows the properties of a growing supermassive black hole and its position matches that of a bright X-ray source detected with Chandra (right image in inset). Using data from the SDSS and the Keck telescope in Hawaii, the team determined that the growing black hole located near, but visibly offset from, the center of the galaxy has a velocity that is different from the galaxy. These properties suggest that this source may be a recoiling supermassive black hole. The host galaxy of the possible recoiling black hole also shows some evidence of disturbance in its outer regions, which is an indication that a merger between two galaxies occurred in the relatively recent past. Since supermassive black hole mergers are thought to occur when their host galaxies merge, this information supports the idea of a recoiling black hole in the system. Moreover, stars are forming at a high rate in the galaxy, at several hundred times the mass of the Sun per year. This agrees with computer simulations, which predict that star formation rates may be enhanced for merging galaxies particularly those containing recoiling black holes. Another possible explanation for the data is that two supermassive black holes are located in the center of the galaxy but one of them is not producing detectable radiation because it is growing too slowly. The researchers favor the recoiling black hole explanation, but more data are needed to strengthen their case. A paper describing these results was recently accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal and is available online. The first author is Dongchan Kim from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory in Charlottesville, Virginia. NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, manages the Chandra program for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts, controls Chandra's science and flight operations. Image Credit: Illustration: CXC/M. Weiss X-ray: NASA/CXC/NRAO/D.-C. Kim; Optical: NASA/STScI Release Date: May 11, 2017
Image: The atmosphere of the distant “warm Neptune” HAT-P-26b, illustrated here, is unexpectedly primitive, composed primarily of hydrogen and helium. By combining observations from NASA’s Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes, researchers determined that, unlike Neptune and Uranus, the exoplanet has relatively low metallicity, an indication of the how rich the planet is in all elements heavier than hydrogen and helium.
May 11, 2017: A study combining observations from NASA’s Hubble and Spitzer space telescopes reveals that the distant planet HAT-P-26b has a primitive atmosphere composed almost entirely of hydrogen and helium. Located about 437 light years away, HAT-P-26b orbits a star roughly twice as old as the sun.
The analysis is one of the most detailed studies to date of a “warm Neptune,” or a planet that is Neptune-sized and close to its star. The researchers determined that HAT-P-26b’s atmosphere is relatively clear of clouds and has a strong water signature, although the planet is not a water world. This is the best measurement of water to date on an exoplanet of this size.
The discovery of an atmosphere with this composition on this exoplanet has implications for how scientists think about the birth and development of planetary systems. Compared to Neptune and Uranus, the planets in our solar system with about the same mass, HAT-P-26b likely formed either closer to its host star or later in the development of its planetary system, or both.
“Astronomers have just begun to investigate the atmospheres of these distant Neptune-mass planets, and almost right away, we found an example that goes against the trend in our solar system,” said Hannah Wakeford, a postdoctoral researcher at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, and lead author of the study published in the May 12, 2017, issue of Science. “This kind of unexpected result is why I really love exploring the atmospheres of alien planets.”
To study HAT-P-26b’s atmosphere, the researchers used data from transits— occasions when the planet passed in front of its host star. During a transit, a fraction of the starlight gets filtered through the planet’s atmosphere, which absorbs some wavelengths of light but not others. By looking at how the signatures of the starlight change as a result of this filtering, researchers can work backward to figure out the chemical composition of the atmosphere.
In this case, the team pooled data from four transits measured by Hubble and two seen by Spitzer. Together, those observations covered a wide range of wavelengths from yellow light through the near-infrared region.
“To have so much information about a warm Neptune is still rare, so analyzing these data sets simultaneously is an achievement in and of itself,” said co-author Tiffany Kataria of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
Because the study provided a precise measurement of water, the researchers were able to use the water signature to estimate HAT-P-26b’s metallicity. Astronomers calculate the metallicity, an indication of how rich the planet is in all elements heavier than hydrogen and helium, because it gives them clues about how a planet formed.
To compare planets by their metallicities, scientists use the sun as a point of reference, almost like describing how much caffeine beverages have by comparing them to a cup of coffee. Jupiter has a metallicity about 2 to 5 times that of the sun. For Saturn, it’s about 10 times as much as the sun. These relatively low values mean that the two gas giants are made almost entirely of hydrogen and helium.
The ice giants Neptune and Uranus are smaller than the gas giants but richer in the heavier elements, with metallicities of about 100 times that of the sun. So, for the four outer planets in our solar system, the trend is that the metallicities are lower for the bigger planets.
Scientists think this happened because, as the solar system was taking shape, Neptune and Uranus formed in a region toward the outskirts of the enormous disk of dust, gas and debris that swirled around the immature sun. Summing up the complicated process of planetary formation in a nutshell: Neptune and Uranus would have been bombarded with a lot of icy debris that was rich in heavier elements. Jupiter and Saturn, which formed in a warmer part of the disk, would have encountered less of the icy debris.
Two planets beyond our solar system also fit this trend. One is the Neptune-mass planet HAT-P-11b. The other is WASP-43b, a gas giant twice as massive as Jupiter.
But Wakeford and her colleagues found that HAT-P-26b bucks the trend. They determined its metallicity is only about 4.8 times that of the sun, much closer to the value for Jupiter than for Neptune.
“This analysis shows that there is a lot more diversity in the atmospheres of these exoplanets than we were expecting, which is providing insight into how planets can form and evolve differently than in our solar system,” said David K. Sing of the University of Exeter and the second author of the paper. “I would say that has been a theme in the studies of exoplanets: Researchers keep finding surprising diversity.”
The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and ESA (European Space Agency). NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., in Washington.
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, manages the Spitzer Space Telescope for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Science operations are conducted at the Spitzer Science Center at Caltech in Pasadena. Spacecraft operations are based at Lockheed Martin Space Systems Company, Littleton, Colorado. Data are archived at the Infrared Science Archive housed at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at Caltech. Caltech manages JPL for NASA.
NASA Apollo 15 Command Module Pilot Al Worden took this photo of a Crescent Earth rising beyond the Moon's barren horizon on August 4th, 1971. Composite of two images: AS15-97-13266 and AS15-97-13272
Apollo 15 was the ninth manned mission in the United States' Apollo program, the fourth to land on the Moon, and the eighth successful manned mission. It was the first of what were termed "J missions", long stays on the Moon, with a greater focus on science than had been possible on previous missions. It was also the first mission on which the Lunar Roving Vehicle was used. (Source: Wikipedia)
Credit: NASA's Johnson Space Center Image Date: August 4, 1971
