A Day in Astronomy: The Death of Percival Lowell

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Image (Credit): Percival Lowell’s mausoleum just steps away from the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, AZ. (Atlas Obscura)

On this day in 1916, American astronomer Percival Lowell died at the age of 61 in Flagstaff, AZ. He will forever be remembered for his incorrect theory concerning canals on Mars as well as his better theory about a ninth planet, which contributed to the discovery of Pluto 14 years by Clyde Tombaugh, who was working at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff.

Some interesting facts about Mr. Lowell’s life includes:

  • After graduating from Harvard with a degree in mathematics yet spent six years running a cotton mill;
  • He traveled extensively to Asia and wrote numerous books about the region;
  • He was a dedicated pacifist; and
  • His greatest contribution to astronomy related to the preferred placement of observatories.

Mr. Lowell was far from the mark when he said this about Mars:

Speculation has been singularly fruitful as to what these markings on our next to nearest neighbor in space may mean. Each astronomer holds a different pet theory on the subject, and pooh-poohs those of all the others. Nevertheless, the most self-evident explanation from the markings themselves is probably the true one; namely, that in them we are looking upon the result of the work of some sort of intelligent beings. . . . The amazing blue network on Mars hints that one planet besides our own is actually inhabited now.

Yet it is too early to say he was also dreaming when he made this comment:

Now when we think that each of these stars is probably the centre of a solar system grander than our own, we cannot seriously take ourselves to be the only minds in it all.

Space Stories: Damaged Space Antenna, Dark Matter as Weighty Matter, and a Stable Ocean on Enceladus

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Credit: Image by Clker-Free-Vector-Images from Pixabay

Here are some recent space-related stories of interest.

—SpaceNews.com: “Key Antenna in NASA’s Deep Space Network Damaged“

One of the largest antennas in NASA’s Deep Space Network was damaged in September and may be out of service for an extended period, further straining the system. NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory confirmed Nov. 10 that the 70-meter antenna at the Deep Space Network (DSN) site in Goldstone, California, has been offline since Sept. 16, with no timetable for its return to service.

—University of Geneva: “Dark Matter Does Not Defy Gravity, Study Suggests“

Does dark matter follow the same laws as ordinary matter? The mystery of this invisible and hypothetical component of our universe—which neither emits nor reflects light—remains unsolved. A team involving members from the University of Geneva (UNIGE) set out to determine whether, on a cosmological scale, this matter behaves like ordinary matter or whether other forces come into play. Their findings, published in Nature Communications, suggest a similar behavior, while leaving open the possibility of an as-yet-unknown interaction. This breakthrough sheds a little more light on the properties of this elusive matter, which is five times more abundant than ordinary matter.

—University of Oxford: “Saturn’s Icy Moon May Host a Stable Ocean Fit for Life, New Study Finds“

A new study led by researchers from Oxford University and Southwest Research Institute and the Planetary Science Institute in Tucson, Arizona has provided the first evidence of significant heat flow at Enceladus’ north pole, overturning previous assumptions that heat loss was confined to its active south pole. This finding confirms that the icy moon is emitting far more heat than would be expected if it were simply a passive body, strengthening the case that it could support life.

Pic of the Week: Dead Comet From Halloween Past

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Image (Credit): Asteroid 2015 TB145 as captured by the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico on October 30, 2015. (NAIC-Arecibo/NSF)

This spooky image of a dead comet was captured 10 years ago, but it still serves this purpose this time of year. It passed the Earth on Halloween evening that year at a distance of about 302,000 miles.

Here is more from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory:

Scientists observing asteroid 2015 TB145 with NASA’s Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF) on Mauna Kea, Hawaii, have determined that the celestial object is more than likely a dead comet that has shed its volatiles after numerous passes around the sun.

The belated comet has also been observed by optical and radar observatories around the world, providing even more data, including our first close-up views of its surface…

The first radar images of the dead comet were generated by the National Science Foundation’s 305-meter (1,000-foot) Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. The radar images from Arecibo indicate the object is spherical in shape and approximately 2,000 feet (600 meters) in diameter and completes a rotation about once every five hours.

“The IRTF data may indicate that the object might be a dead comet, but in the Arecibo images it appears to have donned a skull costume for its Halloween flyby,” said Kelly Fast, IRTF program scientist at NASA Headquarters and acting program manager for NASA’s NEO Observations Program.

Pic of the Week: The Sculptor Galaxy

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Image (Credit): The Sculptor Galaxy. (ESO/VLT)

This week’s image is from the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) Very Large Telescope (VLT) in northern Chile. It shows the Sculptor Galaxy, which is about 11 million light-years away.

Here is a description of what you are seeing:

This image shows a detailed, thousand-colour image of the Sculptor Galaxy captured with the MUSE instrument at ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT). Regions of pink light are spread throughout this whole galactic snapshot, which come from ionised hydrogen in star-forming regions. These areas have been overlaid on a map of already formed stars in Sculptor to create the mix of pinks and blues seen here...

To create this map of the Sculptor Galaxy, which is 11 million light-years away and is also known as NGC 253, the researchers observed it for over 50 hours with the Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) instrument on ESO’s VLT. The team had to stitch together over 100 exposures to cover an area of the galaxy about 65 000 light-years wide.

According to co-author Kathryn Kreckel from Heidelberg University, Germany, this makes the map a potent tool: “We can zoom in to study individual regions where stars form at nearly the scale of individual stars, but we can also zoom out to study the galaxy as a whole.”

Russia Has One Less Space Asset

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Earlier photo of the RT-70 radio telescope. (PickPic)

The Urania newspaper Euromaiden Press recently noted the success of its navy in taking out Russian assets, including:

  • the Utios-T radar system;
  • the RT-70 radio telescope;
  • the GLONASS satellite navigation system in its dome;
  • the coastal radar station MR-10M1 “Mys” M1; and
  • the 96L6-AP radar of the S-400 missile system.

One of those items is not like the others, that being the Yevpatoria RT-70 radio telescope.

This Soviet-era radio telescope was one of the largest in the world, assisted with the study of Mars and Venus, and was used for messaging extraterrestrial intelligence, also known as METI.

Now it is rubble due to the ongoing war between Ukraine and Russia (the destroyed radio telescope is located in Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory).

We saw World War II introduce the power of rocket technology that sent us around the solar system, and now we are watching another war show how all that we have built can quickly crumble.