“While NASA’s programs are very popular and highly visible, we really don’t spend much on our space agency. In 2022, the U.S. treasury took in revenues of $4.9 trillion and then charged up another $1.4 trillion so it could spend a whopping $6.3 trillion. Of that largesse NASA received an historically generous appropriation of $24 billion. Still, that was just 0.35% of federal spending.”
Take a look at the image above. Can you determine where this image originated? Take a guess and then check your answer by going to the “Where is This? The Answer Sheet” page.
Image (Credit): Artist’s rendering of Voyager 2. (NASA)
After two weeks with no word, Voyager 2 is back to communicating with us as it continues its journey beyond our solar system. The whole incident started when NASA sent a bad command, but all is well.
Voyager 2 first left Earth back in August 1977 and exited the solar system in December 2018. Like Voyager 1, which is also outside the solar system now, Voyager 2 had the initial task of studying the planets. Voyager 2 focused on Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune. It has shown it was capable of much more as it dragged the human race to the bleeding edge of space.
You can read all about Voyager 2’s accomplishments at this NASA site, including:
Voyager 2 is the only spacecraft to study all four of the solar system’s giant planets at close range.
Voyager 2 discovered a 14th moon at Jupiter.
Voyager 2 was the first human-made object to fly past Uranus.
At Uranus, Voyager 2 discovered 10 new moons and two new rings.
Voyager 2 was the first human-made object to fly by Neptune.
At Neptune, Voyager 2 discovered five moons, four rings, and a “Great Dark Spot.”
An impressive list of accomplishments, and the spacecraft is still ticking as it goes into the great unknown.
We need to keep these achievements in mind as we battle over this year’s NASA budget. We also need to remember that there was supposed to be four Voyager-like spacecraft rather than two, but budget cuts nixed the second set. Meaning we can still get some great things done even if we don’t have the budget to fund every piece of a grand vision.
Image (Credit): Artist’s rendering of the Phoenix Mars Lander on the surface of Mars. (NASA/JPL-Calech/University of Arizona)
On this day in 2007, NASA launched the Phoenix Mars Lander from Cape Canaveral towards the Red Planet. The lander had two key objectives: (1) to study the history of water in the Martian arctic and (2) to search for evidence of a habitable zone and assess the biological potential of the ice-soil boundary.
The lander set down on Mars on May 25, 2008 and continued with its mission until November of that same year. The lander performed numerous tests on the Martian surface, confirmed the presence of water, and even discovered water ice right below where it landed. The lander also found perchlorate in the soil, which could be a source of oxygen for future missions.
The mission ended when the Martian winter diminished the sunlight needed to run the solar panels. The Phoenix Mars Lander did not survive the winter, but it successfully accomplished its mission.
Image (Credit): Phoenix Mars Lander mission patch. (NASA)
Image (Credit): JWST image showing the formation of a pair of new stars. (NASA, ESA, CSA. Image Processing: Joseph DePasquale (STScI))
This week’s image is from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). It shows the formation of new stars 1,470 light-years away that will take millions of years to form.
Here is a partial description of what you are seeing from NASA (visit the link for the full desciption):
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has captured the “antics” of a pair of actively forming young stars, known as Herbig-Haro 46/47, in high-resolution near-infrared light. To find them, trace the bright pink and red diffraction spikes until you hit the center: The stars are within the orange-white splotch. They are buried deeply in a disk of gas and dust that feeds their growth as they continue to gain mass. The disk is not visible, but its shadow can be seen in the two dark, conical regions surrounding the central stars.
The most striking details are the two-sided lobes that fan out from the actively forming central stars, represented in fiery orange. Much of this material was shot out from those stars as they repeatedly ingest and eject the gas and dust that immediately surround them over thousands of years.
When material from more recent ejections runs into older material, it changes the shape of these lobes. This activity is like a large fountain being turned on and off in rapid, but random succession, leading to billowing patterns in the pool below it. Some jets send out more material and others launch at faster speeds. Why? It’s likely related to how much material fell onto the stars at a particular point in time.
Our Awesome Universe 