Space Stories: Dragon Delays, Odd Black Holes, and Surprising Martian Warmth

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): SpaceX Dragon capsule. (SpaceX)

Here are some recent space-related stories of interest.

—Space.com: “SpaceX, NASA Delay Next Astronaut Launch to ISS Due To Leak on Dragon Spacecraft”

SpaceX’s next astronaut mission to the International Space Station won’t launch on Sept. 12 after all. That flight, known as Crew-13, has been delayed due to an oxidizer leak in the propulsion system of SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft, NASA announced on Saturday (Aug. 29). Joint NASA and SpaceX teams are performing additional tests and data review and will complete any necessary rework prior to launch,” NASA officials wrote in an update on Saturday. “A new target date will be announced once available.”

—Earth.com: “Giant Black Holes Appeared Too soon After the Big Bang, and Astronomers May Know Why“

Nearly every large galaxy keeps a giant black hole at its center. Some of those giants already weighed a billion Suns when the universe was less than 700 million years old. Astronomers have struggled for decades to explain how anything grew that heavy that fast. A new study built on James Webb Space Telescope observations suggests one possible answer. The researchers describe a young black hole wrapped in gas so dense that the whole object shines like a single enormous star. Astronomers call objects like it black hole stars. The light from this one has been traveling for 13 billion years, since a moment just 660 million years after the Big Bang, and no earlier example has been found.

—Caltech: “Thermal Anomaly Discovered Below Mars’s South Pole“

Based on gravitational measurements that give clues to the Red Planet’s interior structure, Mars’s interior southern hemisphere is around 200 to 400 degrees Celsius warmer than the northern half of the planet and partially molten. The surprising finding adds additional context to Martian history and the periods of time in which it may have hosted conditions favorable for life. The research was led by Caltech alumnus Alexander Berne (PhD ’26), who is now a postdoctoral associate at the University of Arizona. The findings are reported in a paper appearing in the journal Nature on August 27.

Note: Here is the podcast version of this post.

Pic of the Week: Galaxy M83

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Galaxy M83 shown in both X-ray and Optical Light. (X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO; Optical: NASA/ESA/AURA/STScI, Hubble Heritage Team, W. Blair (STScI/Johns Hopkins University) and R. O’Connell (University of Virginia); Image Processing: NASA/CXC/SAO/A. Jubett, L. Frattare and P. Edmonds)

This week’s image is from the Chandra X-ray Observatory. It shows galaxy Messier 83 (M83), which is located approximately 15 million light-years from Earth. It is part of a study analyzing Chandra data from 2000 to 2014.

NASA provides more information on a recent study involving supernova remnants being studied by astronomers:

In the composite image, Messier 83, or M83, is shown to have a spiral structure, viewed straight on. At the center is a brilliant white and yellow pool of light. From that light, spiral arms of hot pink cloud corkscrew out in wide, sweeping arches. The galaxy is covered in a faint grey haze, and flecked with red, green, blue, white, and yellow dots.

Over a 14-year period from 2000 to 2014, astronomers pointed NASA’s X-ray observatory at the M83 galaxy. They discovered that about half of the X-ray sources believed to be supernova remnants, the aftermath of stellar explosions, were exhibiting dramatic changes in brightness. This result was entirely unexpected.

Those changes in brightness are highlighted in the timelapse videos. In each video, a series of static images flashes by, focused on one of the two X-ray sources once believed to be supernova remnants. In the videos, the X-ray sources appear as bright blue blobs with glowing cores. But in each image, taken months or years apart, the shapes change, as does the intensity of the blue color, and the brightness of the core. By presenting the substantively different images of the same objects one after another in quick succession, short timelapse videos are created.

The most likely explanation for the changes in brightness is that the team has uncovered a population of stellar survivors, stars that lived through an orbiting partner’s destruction in a supernova explosion. Material is being pulled from the surviving star onto the black hole or neutron star that formed in the supernova, a process known to cause rapid changes in X-ray brightness.

Go to the NASA link for images of two supernova remnants within galaxy M83.

Space Stories: A Peruvian Solar Observatory, NASA Rocket Traffic, and a Reborn Back Hole

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Aerial view of the fortress at Chankillo. (Servicio Aerofotográfico Nacional, Lima)

Here are some recent space-related stories of interest.

—Discover Magazine: “The Earliest-Known Astronomical Observatory in the Americas May Offer New Insights“

There was a time when Stonehenge was believed to be a kind of “Neolithic computer.” Archaeology has since corrected that misconception. Today, the evidence points strongly in another direction: to an arid hill in the Casma Valley on Peru’s northern coast, about 200 miles north of Lima. There stands Chankillo, a complex built around 250 B.C.E., considered the earliest known solar observatory in the Americas and the clearest known example of a monument designed to track the sun’s position throughout the entire year, according to a study in Science. Modest in appearance and largely absent from tourist posters and classic postcards, Chankillo has renewed attention as archaeologists report preliminary findings from ongoing excavations.

—CBS News: “NASA Juggling Piloted Moon Mission and Space Station Crew Replacement Flight“

With a space station medical evacuation safely completed, NASA is focused on two challenging missions proceeding in parallel: launching four astronauts on a flight around the moon, at the same time as the agency is planning to send four replacement astronauts to the International Space Station...The Artemis 2 mission and Crew 12’s planned space station flight present a unique challenge for NASA. The agency has not managed two piloted spacecraft at the same time since a pair of two-man Gemini capsules tested rendezvous procedures in low-Earth orbit in 1965. The agency has never flown a deep space mission amid another launch to Earth orbit.

—Royal Astronomical Society: “‘Reborn’ Black Hole Spotted ‘Erupting like Cosmic Volcano’“

One of the most vivid portraits of “reborn” black hole activity – likened to the eruption of a “cosmic volcano” spreading almost one million light-years across space – has been captured in a gigantic radio galaxy. The dramatic scene was uncovered when astronomers spotted the supermassive black hole at the heart of J1007+3540 restarting its jet emission after nearly 100 million years of silence.

Note: Please ignore the previous posting for today about the Apollo 17 mission. It’s a good story, but I will need to retell it at another time (that is, on December 19th).

Space Stories: A Dead Galaxy, Newly Discovered Cloud-9, and Preparing for Artemis II

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): GS-10578, also called Pablo’s Galaxy. (JADES Collaboration)

Here are some recent space-related stories of interest.

—innovation News Network: “Astronomers Discover Ancient “Dead Galaxy” Starved by its Supermassive Black Hole“

Using observations from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) and the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA), researchers found that a growing supermassive black hole can slowly starve a galaxy rather than destroy it outright. The galaxy, catalogued as GS-10578 and nicknamed Pablo’s Galaxy, existed just three billion years after the Big Bang. Despite this early stage in cosmic history, it is enormous – around 200 billion times the mass of the Sun. Most of its stars formed between 12.5 and 11.5 billion years ago, indicating a rapid burst of star formation before the galaxy suddenly shut down.

—CNN: “‘Cloud-9’ is a Newly Discovered Celestial Object. It Could Help Solve a Cosmic Mystery“

Astronomers may have discovered a previously unknown type of astronomical object, nicknamed “Cloud-9,” that could shed light on dark matter, one of the biggest mysteries in the universe. …Cloud-9 is thought to be a dark matter cloud that could be a remnant of galaxy formation from the early days of the universe, according to new research published Monday in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

—Space.com: “NASA to Roll Out Rocket for Artemis 2 Moon Mission on Jan. 17“

The first crewed moon mission in more than 50 years remains on track to launch as soon as Feb. 6. NASA announced on Friday evening (Jan. 9) that it plans to roll the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft that will fly the Artemis 2 moon mission out to the pad for prelaunch checks on Jan. 17, weather and technical readiness permitting.

Pandora and Friends Start New Missions

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): An artist’s rendering of NASA’s Pandora mission. (NASA)

Earlier today, NASA’s Pandora mission got its start aboard a SpaceX rocket launched from California’s Vandenberg Space Force Base.

The Pandora satellite, once fully operational, will view exoplanet atmospheres and their host stars to learn more about these exotic worlds. In its first year, the satellite will focus on approximately 20 known exoplanets. This NASA video describes the process.

The 716-pound Pandora satellite is much smaller than the 14,300-pound James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). Of course, the JWST has a much larger mission that expands over a much longer time period.

If you are looking for something small, you might be interested in the two CubeSats launched with Pandora. One is called the Star-Planet Activity Research CubeSat (SPARCS), which will study coronal mass ejections on small stars, while the second is named the Black Hole Coded Aperture Telescope (BlackCAT) with the mission of observing X-ray flares from active galaxies with supermassive black holes as well as gamma-ray bursts.

It was a successful Sunday for NASA and space enthusiasts everywhere.