Space Stories: Ancient Water, Nearby Black Hole, and a Lunar Time Zone

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Illustration showing gaseous water in the planet-forming disc around the star V883 Orionis. (European Southern Observatory)

Here are some recent stories of interest.

—European Southern Observatory: “Astronomers Find Missing Link for Water in the Solar System“

Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), astronomers have detected gaseous water in the planet-forming disc around the star V883 Orionis. This water carries a chemical signature that explains the journey of water from star-forming gas clouds to planets, and supports the idea that water on Earth is even older than our Sun.

“We can now trace the origins of water in our Solar System to before the formation of the Sun,” says John J. Tobin, an astronomer at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, USA and lead author of the study published today in Nature. 

—SciTech Daily: “Astronomers Uncover Black Hole Closer to Earth Than Ever Before“

Astronomers have discovered the closest black hole to Earth, the first unambiguous detection of a dormant stellar-mass black hole in the Milky Way. Its close proximity to Earth, a mere 1,600 light-years away, offers an intriguing target of study to advance understanding of the evolution of binary systems.

—New York Times: “The Moon May Get Its Own Time Zone“

What time is it on the moon? Since the dawn of the space age, the answer has been: It depends. For decades, lunar missions have operated on the time of the country that launched them. But with several lunar explorations heading for the launchpad, the European Space Agency has deemed the current system unsustainable. The solution, the agency said last week, is a lunar time zone.

Space Stories: SpaceX ISS Launch, Israeli Space Telescope, and Japanese Asteroid Results

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Artist’s rendering of Israel’s ULTRASAT space telescope. (Weizmann Institute of Science)

Here are some recent stories of interest.

—Reuters News: “SpaceX Ready to Retry Launching NASA’s Next Space Station Crew“

Elon Musk’s rocket company SpaceX was ready to try again at sending NASA’s next long-duration crew of the International Space Station to orbit on Thursday, about 72 hours after a first attempt was scrubbed due to a clogged filter in the launch system. Two NASA astronauts will be joined by a Russian cosmonaut and an astronaut from the United Arab Emirates for a six-month science mission made up of experiments ranging from human cell growth in space to controlling combustible materials in microgravity.

—NASA: “NASA to Launch Israel’s First Space Telescope“

NASA will launch Israel’s first space telescope mission, the Ultraviolet Transient Astronomy Satellite (ULTRASAT). ULTRASAT, an ultraviolet observatory with a large field of view, will investigate the secrets of short-duration events in the universe, such as supernova explosions and mergers of neutron stars. Led by the Israel Space Agency and Weizmann Institute of Science, ULTRASAT is planned for launch into geostationary orbit around Earth in early 2026. In addition to providing the launch service, NASA will also participate in the mission’s science program.

—Carnegie Science: “Organic Molecules Found on First Primitive Asteroid Sample Returned to Earth“

Approximately 20,000 organic molecules composed of carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, or sulfur were found in samples returned to Earth from the asteroid Ryugu by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Hayabusa2 mission, according to  new work published in two Science papers from an international team that included Carnegie’s George Cody, Jens Barosch, and Larry Nittler. Named after a Japanese folktale, Ryugu is a near-Earth object, half a mile across, shaped kind of like a spinning top that orbits the Sun every 16 months. Hayabusa2 was the first mission to bring material back to Earth from a primitive asteroid, offering unique insight into the building blocks from which our Solar System was formed and the possible origin of organic material that contributed to Earth’s habitability.

Space Stories: Stalled Martian Rover, Early Mega-Galaxies, and Soviet Space Debris

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Artist’s rendering of China’s Zhurong rover about to roll off the lander and drive onto Mars. (WEIBO)

Here are some recent stories of interest.

—SpaceNews: “NASA Mars Orbiter Reveals China’s Zhurong Rover Has Not Moved for Months“

Images from NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter reveal that China’s Zhurong rover remains stationary on the Red Planet as China remains silent on the status of its spacecraft. The High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera aboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) captured images of the rover on March 11, 2022, a second on Sept. 8, 2022 and finally Feb. 7, 2023. The images were published Feb. 21 by the HiRISE Operations Center.

—Los Angeles Times: “Space Telescope Spots Massive Galaxies Near Cosmic Dawn and Blows Astronomers’ Minds“

Astronomers have discovered what appear to be massive galaxies dating back to within 600 million years of the big bang, suggesting the early universe may have had a stellar fast-track that produced these “monsters.” While the new James Webb Space Telescope has spotted even older galaxies, dating to within a mere 300 million years of the beginning of the universe, it’s the size and maturity of these six apparent mega-galaxies that stunned scientists. They reported their findings Wednesday in the journal Nature.

—Newsweek: “Russian Rocket Crashes Back Into Russia After 42 Years“

A decades-old Soviet era piece of space junk has crashed back to Earth after over 40 years in orbit, improbably crash landing back in its home country, Russia. The abandoned Soviet Vostok-2M Blok E rocket stage, weighing more than 3,000 pounds, “made an uncontrolled reentry over Novaya Zemlya at 1016 UTC Feb 20 after 42.7 years in orbit,” tweeted Jonathan McDowell, an astrophysicist and group leader at the Chandra X-ray Center Science Data Systems.

Space Stories: Black Holes & Dark Energy, New Forms of Ice, and Dark Dwarf Galaxies

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Ship from the Disney film The Black Hole. (Disney)

Here are some recent stories of interest.

—University of Hawaii: “First Observational Evidence Linking Black Holes to Dark Energy“

Searching through existing data spanning 9 billion years, a team of researchers led by scientists at University of Hawaiʻi at Mānoa has uncovered the first evidence of “cosmological coupling” –a newly predicted phenomenon in Einstein’s theory of gravity, possible only when black holes are placed inside an evolving universe.

UH Mānoa astrophysicists Duncan Farrah, a faculty member at the Institute for Astronomy and the Department of Physics and Astronomy, and Kevin Croker, a professor of physics and astronomy led this ambitious study, combining Hawaiʻi’s expertise in galaxy evolution and gravity theory with the observation and analysis experience of researchers across nine countries to provide the first insight into what might exist inside real black holes.

—Astronomy.com: “Scientists Create New Form of Ice that Might Exist on Ocean Moons“

Chemists have discovered a new form of ice, and their work may have major consequences for our understanding of the outer solar system. We usually encounter three forms of water on the surface of Earth: solid, liquid, and vapor. On our planet, solid ice mainly comes in one variety, where water molecules arrange themselves into an orderly and repeated crystalline structure. But scientists have discovered 19 other varieties of water-ice that may appear throughout the universe.

—Phys.org: “Chinese Astronomers Discover an Isolated Dark Dwarf Galaxy“

Using the Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope (FAST), Chinese astronomers have detected a new galaxy, which received designation FAST J0139+4328. The newfound galaxy is isolated, has a relatively low stellar mass, and is dominated by dark matter. The discovery was detailed in a paper published February 6 on the arXiv pre-print server.

Space Stories: Jovian Moons, Charon’s Canyons, and a New Space Telescope

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Jupiter as seen by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. (NASA, ESA, A. Simon (Goddard Space Flight Center), and M.H. Wong (University of California, Berkeley)

Here are some recent stories of interest.

—Live Science: “Jupiter Officially has the Most Moons in the Solar System, Discovery of 12 New Satellites Confirms“

Jupiter was already the king of the solar system, and new discoveries give the massive planet another way to reign supreme: It now has the most moons. Twelve new moons discovered orbiting Jupiter have been confirmed, bumping the count from 80 to 92, and knocking Saturn — which has 83 moons — down a peg. 

—Phys.org: “Models Explain Canyons on Pluto’s Large Moon Charon“

In 2015, when NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft encountered the Pluto-Charon system, the Southwest Research Institute-led science team discovered interesting, geologically active objects instead of the inert icy orbs previously envisioned. An SwRI scientist has revisited the data to explore the source of cryovolcanic flows and an obvious belt of fractures on Pluto’s large moon Charon. These new models suggest that when the moon’s internal ocean froze, it may have formed the deep, elongated depressions along its girth but was less likely to lead to cryovolcanoes erupting with ice, water and other materials in its northern hemisphere.

—Big Think: “NASA’s Habitable Worlds Observatory to Finally Answer the Epic Question: “Are we Alone?”“

…perhaps the biggest question of all — that of “Are we alone in the Universe?” — remains a mystery. While the current generation of ground-based and space-based telescopes can take us far into the Universe, this is a question that’s currently beyond our reach. To get there, we’ll need to directly image Earth-like exoplanets: planets with sizes and temperatures similar to Earth, but that orbit Sun-like stars, not the more common red dwarf stars like Proxima Centauri or TRAPPIST-1. Those capabilities are precisely what NASA is aiming for with its newly announced flagship mission: the Habitable Worlds Observatory. It’s an ambitious project but one that’s well worth it. After all, finding out we’re not alone in the Universe would quite possibly be the biggest revolution in all of science history.