Space Quote: A Nasty Hit to Our Ozone Layer from 1.9 Billion Light-Years Away

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Image (Credit): A supernova emitting gamma rays. (NASA/Dana Berry/Skyworks Digital)

“The ozone was partially depleted — was destroyed temporarily.”

–Statement by Pietro Ubertini, an astronomer at the National Institute of Astrophysics in Rome, regarding supernova gamma rays that hit the Earth’s upper atmosphere in October 2022. The supernova explosion was 1.9 billion light-years away. You can read the paper on this event in Nature. An earlier paper stated that a gamma ray burst may have caused the Ordovician mass extinction about 440 million years ago, which killed off about two-thirds of all species.

Space Quote: Russia Moves Past Moon Crash and Readies for a New Space Station

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Image (Credit): View of the International Space Station from  a Crew Dragon spacecraft. (NASA)

“Mistakes are mistakes. It is a shame for all of us. This is space exploration and everyone understands that. It is experience that we can use in the future.”

-Statement by Russia’s President Putin, as reported by Reuters, addressing the Luna-25 crash on the Moon in August. He added that the lunar missions will continue. He also said Russia also hopes to have its first segment of a new space station in operation by 2027, stating, “As the resources of the International Space Station run out, we need not just one segment, but the entire station to be brought into service.”

Space Quote: The 8 Billion-Year-Old Signal

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Image (Credit): The Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) radio telescope in Western Australia, which detected the 8 billion-year-old signal. (https://www.icrar.org/)

“We were lucky to be looking at that little spot in the sky for that one millisecond after the eight billion years the pulse had travelled to catch it.”

-Statement by Ryan Shannon, an astrophysicist at Australia’s Swinburne University and co-author of a study describing the signal that was received June 10th last year, as quoted by CBS News. The same article noted that “The pulse was so powerful that — in under a millisecond — it released as much energy as the sun emits over 30 years.”

Space Quote: Rich Bounty from the Asteroid Bennu Sample

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Image (Credit): Outside view of the OSIRIS-REx sample collector. You an see sample material from asteroid Bennu on the middle right. (NASA/Erika Blumenfeld & Joseph Aebersold)

“As we peer into the ancient secrets preserved within the dust and rocks of asteroid Bennu, we are unlocking a time capsule that offers us profound insights into the origins of our solar system…The bounty of carbon-rich material and the abundant presence of water-bearing clay minerals are just the tip of the cosmic iceberg. These discoveries, made possible through years of dedicated collaboration and cutting-edge science, propel us on a journey to understand not only our celestial neighborhood but also the potential for life’s beginnings. With each revelation from Bennu, we draw closer to unraveling the mysteries of our cosmic heritage.”

–Statement by Dante Lauretta, OSIRIS-REx principal investigator, regarding the recently-arrived sample collected from asteroid Bennu. NASA and its partners are expected to study the sample for the next two years to learn more about the asteroid and our solar system.

Space Quote: Astronomers Have a New Term – JuMBOs

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Image (Credit): Image of Jupiter taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. (Amy A. Simon/NASA/European Space Agency)

“We find them down as small as one Jupiter mass, even half a Jupiter mass, floating freely, not attached to a star…Physics says you can’t even make objects that small. We wanted to see, can we break physics? And I think we have, which is good.”

–Statement by Mark McCaughrean, a senior adviser for science and exploration at the European Space Agency, regarding Jupiter Mass Binary Objects (JuMBO). These objects were spotted by the James Webb Space Telescope in the Orion Nebula. They may be a new astronomical body as they do not fit into the normal star or planet category.