JUNO Orbiter Mated to Mightiest Atlas rocket for Aug. 5 Blastoff to Jupiter

Hoisting Solar Powered Juno atop most powerful Atlas Rocket
At Space Launch Complex 41, a crane is lowered over the nose of the Atlas payload fairing enclosing the Juno spacecraft in preparation for its lift to the top of the Atlas rocket stacked in the Vertical Integration Facility. Juno is scheduled to launch Aug. 5 aboard the most powerful ever United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. The solar-powered spacecraft will orbit Jupiter's poles 33 times to find out more about the gas giant's origins, structure, atmosphere and magnetosphere and investigate the existence of a solid planetary core. Credit: NASA/Cory Huston

In less than one week’s time, NASA’s $1.1 Billion Juno probe will blast off on the most powerful Atlas V rocket ever built and embark on a five year cruise to Jupiter where it will seek to elucidate the mysteries of the birth and evolution of our solar system’s largest planet and how that knowledge applies to the remaining planets.

The stage was set for Juno’s liftoff on August 5 at 11:34 a.m. after the solar-powered spacecraft was mated atop the Atlas V rocket at Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral and firmly bolted in place at 10:42 a.m. EDT on July 27.

“We’re about to start our journey to Jupiter to unlock the secrets of the early solar system,” said Scott Bolton, the mission’s principal investigator from the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. “After eight years of development, the spacecraft is ready for its important mission.”

Inside the Vertical Integration Facility at Space Launch Complex 41, the Juno spacecraft, enclosed in an Atlas payload fairing, is in position on top of its Atlas launch vehicle. The spacecraft was prepared for launch in the Astrotech Space Operations' payload processing facility in Titusville, Fla. Credit: NASA/Cory Huston

The launch window for Juno extends from Aug. 5 through Aug. 26. The launch time on Aug. 5 opens at 11:34 a.m. EDT and closes at 12:43 p.m. EDT. Juno is the second mission in NASA’s New Frontiers program.

JUNO’s three giant solar panels will unfurl about five minutes after payload separation following the launch, said Jan Chodas, Juno’s project manager at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif.

The probe will cartwheel through space during its five year trek to Jupiter.

Upon arrival in July 2016, JUNO will fire its braking rockets and go into polar orbit and circle Jupiter 33 times over about one year. The goal is to find out more about the planets origins, interior structure and atmosphere, observe the aurora, map the intense magnetic field and investigate the existence of a solid planetary core.

Hoisting Juno inside the payload fairing at Space Launch Complex 41. Credit: NASA/Cory Huston

“Juno will become the first polar orbiting spacecraft at Jupiter. Not only are we over the poles, but we’re getting closer to Jupiter in our orbit than any other spacecraft has gone,” Bolton elaborated at a briefing for reporters at the Kennedy Space Center. “We’re only 5,000 kilometers above the cloud tops and so we’re skimming right over those cloud tops and we’re actually dipping down beneath the radiation belts, which is a very important thing for us. Because those radiation belts at Jupiter are the most hazardous region in the entire solar system other than going right to the sun itself.”

“Jupiter probably formed first. It’s the largest of all the planets and in fact it’s got more material in it than all the rest of the solar system combined. If I took everything in the solar system except the sun, it could all fit inside Jupiter. So we want to know the recipe.”

Watch for my continuing updates and on-site launch coverage of Juno, only the 2nd probe from Earth to ever orbit Jupiter. Galileo was the first.

Tagged as: Atlas V, Juno mission, Jupiter, radiation, solar power, Solar System, Space Exploration

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Voorwerpje… And Away!

UGC 7342 in H-Alpha - Credit: Galaxy Zoo

It’s 28 pages long and it has been submitted to the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. It’s filled with exciting new discoveries. What is it? Try the Galaxy Zoo’s latest findings… the Great Voorwerpje Round-up!

“Eighteen thousand candidate active galactic nuclei. One hundred ninety-nine Zooites. A hundred fifty-four possible galaxies with clouds, of which 49 became targets for spectra. And finally, nineteen certified Voorwerpjes – giant clouds of gas ionized by a central active nucleus, like Hanny’s Voorwerp but smaller (and sometimes not all that much smaller) and dimmer.” says Bill Keel. “Of these clouds, many (including the largest) are new discoveries.”

The Galaxy Zoo has been on the hunt and what they’ve found has proved to be very exciting to the team. Says Keel: “About half of these have gas too highly ionized too far from the nucleus to account for by the nucleus we see (even including far-infrared results to tell how much radiation is being absorbed by dust), so they may be additional, less dramatic instances of the AGN fading over time spans of 100,000 years or so. This large fraction suggests that at least Seyfert nuclei may constantly be brightening and fading over times of a few hundred thousands years (a time span about which we’ve previously had almost no information).”

Their images include those taken with filters that isolate [O III] or Ha emission – even subtracting ordinary starlight. In one such image of UGC 7342, they could trace gas out to twice the estimated size of the Milky Way! This could mean the presence of an AGN. “Starlight doesn’t have enough far-ultraviolet or X-rays to make gas that highly ionized, but an active galactic nucleus does. Furthermore, the ratios of these lines let us estimate how intense this radiation is when it reaches a cloud.” comments Keel. “Even though UGC 7342 is pretty chewed up because of an interaction with at least one companion, the gas motions aren’t as chaotic as they might be – the gas isn’t orbiting retrograde or anything.”

Their research is shedding new light on Voorwerpje mysteries – giving consistencies to ionized clouds located in galaxies which are interacting or merging – and accounting for tidal disturbances. Preliminary findings also show a symmetry as well, where around 50% of the galaxies studied show two ionized clouds on opposite sides.

“Of course, we want to know more. Answers tend to multiply questions. Hubble observations are scheduled, and (with a little luck) X-ray measurements with ESA’s XMM-Newton observatory. We’ve managed to interest some of the people at ASTRON in the Netherlands in using the Westerbork array to examine the cold hydrogen around these galaxies.” says Keel. “In addition, we’re doing new observations of various samples of active and “nonactive” galaxies to look for fainter, and maybe older, gas clouds. Special thanks to everyone who participated in this project, either through the targeted hunt or the complementary forum search for clouds in galaxies not listed as AGN. Stay tuned!”

You can bet we will…

Original Story Source: Zooniverse Blog.

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Astronomy Without A Telescope – The Unlikeliness Of Being

The search for extraterrestrial intelligence could be a waste of time according to a recent statistical analysis of the likelihood of life arising spontaneously on habitable-zone exoplanets out there in the wider universe (and when have predictive statistics ever got it wrong?). Credit: SETI Institute.

History has proved time and again that mathematical modelling is no substitute for a telescope (or other data collection device). Nonetheless, some theoreticians have recently put forward a statistical analysis which suggests that life is probably very rare in the universe – despite the apparent prevalence of habitable-zone exoplanets, being found by the Kepler mission and other exoplanet search techniques.

You would be right to be skeptical, given the Bayesian analysis undertaken is based on our singular experience of abiogenesis – being the origin of life from non-life, here on Earth. Indeed, the seemingly rapid abiogenesis that occurred on Earth soon after its formation is suggested to be the clinching proof that abiogenesis on habitable-zone exoplanets must be rare. Hmm…

Bayes theorem provides a basis for estimating the likelihood that a prior assumption or hypothesis (e.g. that abiogenesis is common on habitable-zone exoplanets) is correct, using whatever evidence is available. Its usage is nicely demonstrated in solving the Monty Hall problem.

Go here for the detail, but in a nutshell:
There are three doors, one with a car behind it and the other two have goats. You announce which door you will pick – knowing that it carries a 1/3 probability of hiding the car. Then Monty Hall, who knows where the car is, opens another door to reveal a goat. So, now you know that door always had a zero probability of hiding the car. So, the likelihood of the remaining door hiding the car carries the remaining 2/3 probability of the system, since there was always an absolute 1/1 probability that the car was behind one of the three doors. So, it makes more sense for you to open that remaining door, instead of the first one you picked.

In this story, Monty Hall opening the door with a goat represents new data. It doesn’t allow you to definitively determine where the car is, but it does allow you to recalculate the likelihood of your prior hypothesis (that the car is behind the first door you picked) being correct.

Applying Bayesian analysis to the problem of abiogenesis on habitable-zone exoplanets is a bit of a stretch. Speigel and Turner argue that the evidence we have available to us – that life began quite soon after the Earth became habitable – contributes nothing to estimating the likelihood that life arises routinely on habitable-zone exoplanets.

We need to acknowledge the anthropic nature of the observation we are making. We are here after 3.5 billion years of evolution – which has given us the capacity to gather together the evidence that life began here 3.5 billion years ago, shortly after the Earth became habitable. But that is only because this is how things unfolded here on Earth. In the absence of more data, the apparent rapidity of abiogenesis here on Earth could just be a fluke.

Stromatolites - which were a fairly early form of life on Earth. Earth became inhabited by such early life shortly after it became habitable. This might seem suggestive that life is somewhat inevitable when the conditions are right. But a statistician is never going to buy such an argument when it's based on a single example.

This is a fair point, but a largely philosophical one. It informs the subsequent six pages of Spiegel and Turner’s Bayesian analysis, but it is not a conclusion of that analysis.

The authors seek to remind us that interviewing one person and finding that she or he likes baked beans does not allow us to conclude that most people like baked beans. Yes agree, but that’s just statistics – it’s not really Bayesian statistics.

If we are ever able to closely study an exoplanet that has been in a habitable state for 3.5 billion years and discover that either it has life, or that it does not – that will be equivalent to Monty Hall opening another door.

But for now, we might just be a fluke… or we might not be. We need more data.

Further reading: Spiegel and Turner. Life might be rare despite its early emergence on Earth: a Bayesian analysis of the probability of abiogenesis.

Tagged as: Bayesian analysis

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Earth’s First Trojan Asteroid Discovered

2010 TK7 is seen as a speck of light in the center of this image, which is the addition of three individual exposures taken with the MegaCam camera at CFHT. The telescope was tracking the motion of the asteroid, leading to the image of the stars to be trailed. With three exposures added, stars end up looking like a broken trail. Credit: C. Veillet, Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope.

The first known “Trojan” asteroid in Earth’s orbit has been discovered. A Trojan asteroid shares an orbit with a larger planet or moon, but does not collide with it because it orbits around one of two Lagrangian points. Trojans sharing an orbit with Earth have been predicted but never found until now. Astronomers analyzing data from the asteroid-hunting WISE telescope – which ceased operations in February 2011 – found the asteroid, named 2010 TK7, and followup observations with the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope on Mauna Kea in Hawaii confirmed the discovery and the object’s stealthy orbit.

In our solar system, we know of Trojans that share orbits with Neptune, Mars and Jupiter. Two of Saturn’s moons share orbits with Trojans. Astronomers have known that Earth Trojans would be difficult to find because they are relatively small and appear near the sun from Earth’s point of view.

But 2010 TK7 proves that Trojans associated to Earth can be found, and astronomers predict that since one has been found, perhaps they’ll find more, as we’ll learn more about their dynamics and characteristics of their population from this first one.

“These asteroids dwell mostly in the daylight, making them very hard to see,” said Martin Connors of Athabasca University in Canada, lead author of a new paper on the discovery in the July 28 issue of the journal Nature. “But we finally found one, because the object has an unusual orbit that takes it farther away from the sun than what is typical for Trojans. WISE was a game-changer, giving us a point of view difficult to have at Earth’s surface.”

The animation below shows the orbit of 2010 TK7 (green dots).

The asteroid is roughly 1,000 feet (300 meters) in diameter. It has an unusual orbit that traces a complex motion near the L4 point. However, the asteroid also moves above and below the plane. The object is about 50 million miles (80 million kilometers) from Earth. The asteroid’s orbit is well-defined and for at least the next 100 years, it will not come closer to Earth than 15 million miles (24 million kilometers).

“It’s as though Earth is playing follow the leader,” said Amy Mainzer, the principal investigator of WISE’s extended mission called NEOWISE that looked especially for Near Earth Object “Earth always is chasing this asteroid around.”

Asteroid 2010 TK7 is circled in green, in this single frame taken by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA

A handful of other asteroids also have orbits similar to Earth. Such objects could make excellent candidates for future robotic or human exploration. Asteroid 2010 TK7 is not a good target because it travels too far above and below the plane of Earth’s orbit, which would require large amounts of fuel to reach it.

“This observation illustrates why NASA’s NEO Observation program funded the mission enhancement to process data collected by WISE,” said Lindley Johnson, NEOWISE program executive at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “We believed there was great potential to find objects in near-Earth space that had not been seen before.”

The WISE telescope scanned the entire sky in infrared light from January 2010 to February 2011. The NEOWISE project observed more than 155,000 asteroids in the main belt between Mars and Jupiter, and more than 500 NEOs, discovering 132 that were previously unknown.

Sources: Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope, NASA

Tagged as: Asteroids, NEOWISE, trojan asteroids, wise telescope

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Amber Waves Of Energy

These jets, known as spicules, were captured in an SDO image on April 25, 2010. Combined with the energy from ripples in the magnetic field, they may contain enough energy to power the solar wind that streams from the sun toward Earth at 1.5 million miles per hour. Credit: NASA/SDO/AIA

Have you ever seen the hot summer wind blow across a ripening field of wheat? If so, you’re familiar with the rippling effect. Now imagine that same crop – only the stalks are 32,000 feet high and on the surface of the Sun. This cascading effect is called Alfven waves.

Thanks to NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), we’re now able to see the effect of Alfven waves, track their movements and see how much energy is being carried along. These new findings have enlightening solar researchers and may be the key to two other enigmatic solar occurrences – the intense heating of the corona to some 20 times hotter than the Sun’s surface and solar winds that blast up to 1.5 million miles per hour.

“SDO has amazing resolution so you can actually see individual waves,” says Scott McIntosh at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo. “Now we can see that instead of these waves having about 1000th the energy needed as we previously thought, it has the equivalent of about 1100W light bulb for every 11 square feet of the Sun’s surface, which is enough to heat the Sun’s atmosphere and drive the solar wind.”

Credit: NASA/SDO/AIA

As McIntosh points out in his July 28 Nature article, Alfven waves are pretty simple. Their movement undulates up and down the magnetic field lines similar to the way a vibration travels along a guitar string. The plasma field enveloping the Sun moves in harmony with the field lines. The SDO can “see” and track this movement. Although the scenario is much more complex, understanding the waves is key to understanding the nature of the Sun-Earth connection and other less clear cut questions such as what causes coronal heating and speeds of the solar wind.

“We know there are mechanisms that supply a huge reservoir of energy at the sun’s surface,” says space scientist Vladimir Airapetian at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. “This energy is pumped into magnetic field energy, carried up into the sun’s atmosphere and then released as heat.” But determining the details of this mechanism has long been debated. Airapetian points out that a study like this confirms Alfven waves may be part of that process, but that even with SDO we do not yet have the imaging resolution to prove it definitively.

Hannes Alfven first theorized the waves in 1942, but it wasn’t until 2007 that they were actually observed. This proved they could carry energy from the Sun’s surface to the atmosphere, but the energy was too weak to account for the corona’s high heat. This study says that those original numbers may have been underestimated. McIntosh, in collaboration with a team from Lockheed Martin, Norway’s University of Oslo, and Belgium’s Catholic University of Leuven, analyzed the great oscillations in movies from SDO’s Atmospheric Imagine Assembly (AIA) instrument captured on April 25, 2010. “Our code name for this research was ‘The Wiggles,’” says McIntosh. “Because the movies really look like the Sun was made of Jell-O wiggling back and forth everywhere. Clearly, these wiggles carry energy.”

The “wiggles” – known as spicules – were then modeled against Alfven waves and found to be a good match. Once pinpointed, the team could then could analyze the shape, speed, and energy of the waves. “The sinusoidal curves deviated outward at speeds of over 30 miles per second and repeated themselves every 150 to 550 seconds. These speeds mean the waves would be energetic enough to accelerate the fast solar wind and heat the quiet corona.” says the team. “The shortness of the repetition – known as the period of the wave – is also important. The shorter the period, the easier it is for the wave to release its energy into the coronal atmosphere, a crucial step in the process.”

According to preliminary data, the spicules leaped to coronal temperatures of at least 1.8 million degrees Fahrenheit. The pairing of Alfven waves and heat may just be what it takes to keep the corona at its current temperature… but not enough to cause radiation bursts. “Knowing there may be enough energy in the waves is only one half of the problem,” says Goddard’s Airapetian. “The next question is to find out what fraction of that energy is converted into heat. It could be all of it, or it could be 20 percent of it – so we need to know the details of that conversion.”

More study? You betcha’. And the SDO team is up to the task.

“We still don’t perfectly understand the process going on, but we’re getting better and better observations,” says McIntosh. “The next step is for people to improve the theories and models to really capture the essence of the physics that’s happening.”

Original Story Source: NASA SDO News.

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Fraser on the Caustic Soda Podcast

If you’re looking for another popcultury podcast to listen to, here’s a link to the most recent episode of the Caustic Soda Podcast, featuring me. They wanted to talk about comets, meteorites and asteroids, so they thought I’d somehow be able to elevate the conversation. Did I? You be the judge. Here’s a link to the episode. Thanks guys!

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Last Towback of a Flight Worthy Space Shuttle – Atlantis Post Touchdown Photo Album

Remember when there was a Space Shuttle
Atlantis flew the final flight of NASA’s Space Shuttle Era on the STS-135 mission and was the last flight worthy orbiter to be towed back from the Shuttle Landing Facility. Atlantis touched down on July 21, 2011 at the Kennedy Space Center. Credit: Ken Kremer

Space Shuttle Atlantis closed out NASA’s Space Shuttle Era with a safe touchdown on July 21, 2011 at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida at the conclusion of the STS-135 mission, the 135th and final shuttle mission.

I was extremely fortunate to be an eyewitness to history and one of the lucky few journalists permitted by NASA to follow along as Atlantis took her historic final journey back from wheels stop at Runway 15 at the Shuttle Landing Facility as a flight worthy orbiter.

A convoy of 25 specialized vehicles safe each orbiter after landing. Some four hours later, Atlantis was towed off the runway with a diesel powered tractor for about 2 miles along the tow way leading to the Orbiter Processing Facility which lies adjacent to the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) at KSC.

The STS-135 crew consisted of Shuttle Commander Chris Ferguson, Pilot Doug Hurley and Mission Specialists Sandra Magnus and Rex Walheim.

Check out my Towback Photo Album below, and prior album from wheels stop at the shuttle runway earlier in the day, here:

Atlantis towed nose first from runway 15 at the Shuttle Landing Facility at KSC.
Credit: Ken Kremer (kenkremer.com)

Atlantis towback from shuttle landing strip on July 21, 2011. Credit: Ken Kremer

Atlantis and post landing convoy vehicles. Credit: Ken Kremer

Impressionistic Atlantis. Credit: Ken Kremer

Convoy of 25 specialized vehicles tow Atlantis from the runway to the Orbiter Processing Facility.
Credit: Ken Kremer

Convoy crew waves to media. Credit: Ken Kremer

Convoy of 25 specialized vehicles tow Atlantis two miles along tow way from the runway to the Orbiter Processing Facility. Credit: Ken Kremer

Atlantis heads to the Orbiter Processing Facility adjacent to Vehicle Assembly Building at KSC.
Credit: Ken Kremer

Read my features about the Final Shuttle mission, STS-135:
Wheels Stop ! With Awesome Atlantis on the Shuttle Runway – Photo Gallery Part 1
Ghostly Landing of Atlantis Closes America’s Space Shuttle Era Forever
Love of Science Drives Last Shuttle Commander – Chris Ferguson Brings Science Museum to Orbit
Revolutionary Robotic Refueling Experiment Opens New Research Avenues at Space Station
Water Cannon Salute trumpets recovery of Last Shuttle Solid Rocket Boosters – Photo Album
Shuttle Atlantis Soars to Space One Last time: Photo Album
Atlantis Unveiled for Historic Final Flight amidst Stormy Weather
Counting down to the Last Shuttle; Stormy weather projected
Atlantis Crew Jets to Florida on Independence Day for Final Shuttle Blastoff
NASA Sets July 8 for Mandatory Space Shuttle Grand Finale
Final Shuttle Voyagers Conduct Countdown Practice at Florida Launch Pad
Final Payload for Final Shuttle Flight Delivered to the Launch Pad
Last Ever Shuttle Journeys out to the Launch Pad; Photo Gallery
Atlantis Goes Vertical for the Last Time
Atlantis Rolls to Vehicle Assembly Building with Final Space Shuttle Crew for July 8 Blastoff

Tagged as: chris ferguson, international space station, ISS, NASA, Space Shuttle, space shuttle atlantis, STS-135

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New Webb Telescope Technologies Already Helping Human Eyes

Image of the Scanning Shack Hartmann System (SSHS), a pair of large mirror test stations used to measure the mirror segments of the Webb telescope. As part of that SSHS program, several improvements were made to the wavefront sensor technology that now allow eye health instruments to be aligned more precisely. Credit: Abbott Medical Optics Inc.

Editor’s note: This NASA press release provides just one example of how developing technology for space missions often has practical, beneficial and sometimes unintended applications on Earth.

Even while construction of the James Webb Space Telescope is underway on the most advanced infrared vision of any space observatory, its technologies are already proving useful to human eye health here on Earth.

“The Webb telescope program has enabled a number of improvements in measurement technology for astronomy, mirror fabrication, and measurement of human eyes, diagnosis of ocular diseases and potentially improved surgery,” said Dr. Dan Neal, Research Fellow at Abbott Medical Optics Inc. in Albuquerque, N.M.

The Webb telescope will be the most scientifically powerful telescope NASA has ever built — 100 times more powerful than the Hubble Space Telescope. The Webb telescope will find the first galaxies that formed in the early universe, connecting the Big Bang to our own Milky Way Galaxy. It will also peer through dusty clouds to see stars and planets being born, connecting star formation in our own galaxy with the solar system.

“The advanced wavefront sensing technology developed for testing the Webb telescope’s 18 primary mirrors led to the new applications in other areas,” said Tony Hull of L3 Integrated Optical Systems Division-Tinsley Facility in Richmond, Calif., where the Webb’s mirrors were recently polished to accuracies of less than one millionth of an inch.

“Wavefront sensing” is used to measure shape of the mirrors during fabrication and control the optics once the telescope is in orbit.

Ophthalmologists routinely use wavefront technology to measure aberrations of the eye. Those measurements help with diagnosis, research, characterization and planning treatment of eye health issues.

“The technology also provides more accurate eye measurements for people about to undergo Laser Refractive Surgery,” Neal said. “To date 10-12 million eyes have been treated with Lasik procedures in the U.S. alone. As technology improves, so does the quality of these procedures.”

James Webb Space Telescope. Credit: NASA

A new “scanning and stitching” technology developed for the Webb telescope led to a number of innovative instrument concepts for more accurate measurement for contact lenses and intra-ocular lenses. Another benefit to eye health is that this technique can help “map” the topography of the eye more accurately.

Think of the surface of your eye as being as dented as the surface of the moon. Precise measurements of your eye’s surface are helpful when assessing eyes for contact lenses. The scanning and stitching technology improvements have enabled eye doctors to get much more detailed information about the shape and “topography” of your eye, and do it in seconds rather than hours. Four patents have been issued as result of innovations driven by the Webb telescope program. “These tools are now used to align and build the next generation of measuring devices for human eyes,” Neal said.

“The lasting impact of the Webb telescope may go beyond the vision of astronomers seeking to see the distant universe; the impact may be a better national technology base and better vision for people everywhere,” Hull said.

NASA’s Innovative Partnerships Program Office (IPPO) is making available wavefront sensing and adaptive optics technologies, procedures and lab equipment to private industry through its “Can you See it Now?” campaign. All of the technologies associated with the campaign are available for licensing and can be found at http://ipp.gsfc.nasa.gov/wavefront.

Tagged as: James Webb Space Telescope, Technology

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Peace In The Light… An Orion Sunset

NGC 2023 - Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA

Here the stellar winds are carving out a cavity in a vast reflection nebula. It’s an area of Orion that many of us have seen before – but not like the Hubble Space Telescope reveals it. Located right next door to the famous Horsehead Nebula, NGC 2023 can be glimpsed in a telescope as a tiny patch of light that closely resembles its more famous cousin – the Orion Nebula. Spanning approximately four light years across and located some 1500 light-years from Earth, this awesome visage conjures up a peaceful picture of the setting Sun.

However, there’s no sun slipping beyond a horizon in NGC 2023. Hidden inside is a hot, newborn star illuminating the dusty cloud of gas which is its womb. Radiation pressure runs rampant from this massive young B-type star hidden just outside the edge of this image – its winds blowing the material away from it and forming the fanciful shapes we see. Caught in the act are young proto-stars awaiting their turn to be born.

Unlike our Earthly clouds, the clouds we see here are 5000 times denser than the interstellar medium. It is here where weird green clumps could be Herbig-Haro objects – the product of high-speed gases impacting the diaphanous material and creating shockwaves. Their lives are short – lasting only a few thousand years – but what an image they create! If only they could sing…

“I can’t light no more of your darkness… All my pictures seem to fade to black and white…I’m growing tired and time stands still before me… Frozen here on the ladder of my life.”

Original Story Source: Hubble News Photo Release.

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Chandra Captures Enticing Evidence Of Black Hole’s Bondi Radius

The galaxy NGC 3115 is shown here in a composite image of data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope (VLT). Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Univ. of Alabama/K.Wong et al, Optical: ESO/VLT

Those who are interested in black holes are familiar with the event horizon, but the Chandra X-Ray Observatory is giving us an even more detailed look into the structure surrounding these enigmas by imaging the inflowing hot gases. Galaxy NGC 3115 contains a supermassive black hole at its heart and for the first time astronomers have evidence of a critical threshold known as the “Bondi radius”.

Located approximately 32 million light years from the Solar System in the constellation of Sextans, NGC 3115 is a prime candidate for study. Contained in its nucleus is a billion-solar-mass black hole which is stripping away hot gases from nearby stars which can be imaged in X-ray. “The Chandra data are shown in blue and the optical data from the VLT are colored gold. The point sources in the X-ray image are mostly binary stars containing gas that is being pulled from a star to a stellar-mass black hole or a neutron star. The inset features the central portion of the Chandra image, with the black hole located in the middle.” says the team. “No point source is seen at the position of the black hole, but instead a plateau of X-ray emission coming from both hot gas and the combined X-ray emission from unresolved binary stars is found.”

In order to see the machination of the black hole at work, the Chandra team eradicated the signal given off by the binary stars, separating it from the super-heated gas flow. By observing the gas at varying distances the team could then pinpoint a threshold where the gas first becomes impacted by the supermassive black hole’s gravity and begins moving towards the center. This point is known as the Bondi radius.

“As gas flows toward a black hole it becomes squeezed, making it hotter and brighter, a signature now confirmed by the X-ray observations. The researchers found the rise in gas temperature begins at about 700 light years from the black hole, giving the location of the Bondi radius.” says the Chandra team. “This suggests that the black hole in the center of NGC 3115 has a mass of about two billion times that of the Sun, supporting previous results from optical observations. This would make NGC 3115 the nearest billion-solar-mass black hole to Earth.”

Original Story Source: Chandra News Further Reading: Resolving the Bondi Accretion Flow toward the Supermassive Black Hole of NGC 3115 with Chandra.

Tagged as: billion-solar-mass black hole, Black Holes, Bondi radius, event horizon, NGC 3115, Physics, super-massive black holes

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A Space Shuttle On the Sun, One Last Time

Atlantis crosses the face of the Sun July 21st 2011 at 08:27:48 UT, just 21 minutes before the shuttle's deorbit burn to return to Earth. Credit: Thierry Legault.

If you’re like me, you were probably wondering if photographer Thierry Legault would have the opportunity to photograph space shuttle Atlantis in orbit during the final mission of the shuttle program. Regular UT readers will recall that Legault has taken several amazing images of the space shuttle and International Space Station from the ground with his specialized equipment, with many spectacular views of the spacecraft transiting across the face of the Sun or the Moon. It took a mad dash across Europe, but he was successful in chasing down the shuttle, capturing it crossing the face of the Sun several times, and once — just in the nick of time (above) — just minutes before the Atlantis’ final deorbit burn.

“I went to Czech Republik, then Germany and now I’m in Netherlands, on my way back to Paris,” Legault said in a note he sent to Universe Today. “The last transit has been taken Thursday morning, just 21 minutes before the deorbit burn, therefore there are chances that is the last image of a space shuttle in orbit.”

Earlier in the mission, he was able to catch the ISS and shuttle just 50 minutes after Atlantis undocked from the station, so his images capture historic moments of the final shuttle mission.

In addition, this stunning view shows Atlantis docked to the ISS:

Atlantis during the STS-135 mission docked to the International Space Station, July 15, 2011. Credit: Thierry Legault.

Legault said this solar transit of Atlantis docked to the ISS was taken on July 15th from France (Caen, Normandy). Transit duration: 0.7s. ISS distance to observer: 520 km. Speed in orbit: 7.5km/s (27000 km/h or 17000 mph).

Atlantis appears on four images as it crossed the Sun, in this composite image. Credit: Thierry Legault. Click for larger version

Four images of Atlantis crossing the face of the Sun taken on July 21st 2011 at 08:27:48 UT, and combined into one image. The images were taken just 21 minutes before Atlantis’ deorbit burn, from the area of Emden, NW Germany. Transit duration: 0.9s. Distance to observer: 566 km. Speed in orbit: 7.8 km/s.

A Calsky image below shows the last miles of Atlantis in orbit with the transit site in Europe, the deorbit burn position and the landing site in Florida. Image courtesy Thierry Legault.

Atlantis and the ISS side by side, 50 minutes after undocking. Credit: Theirry Legault. Click for larger version, and full version of the Sun's face.

Solar transit taken on July 19th at 7:17 UT from Czech Republik (North of Praha), showing Atlantis and the ISS side by side, 50 minutes after undocking. Transit duration: 1s. ISS distance to observer: 676 km.

Many thanks to Thierry Legault for sharing his images with Universe Today, and taking us along on the ride of his travels across Europe to capture the final space shuttle mission in a way that only he can!

See more at Thierry Legault’s website.

Tagged as: Atlantis, Space Shuttle, Space Station, STS-135, Thierry Legault

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Mars Science Lab Rover Will Land in Gale Crater

This computer-generated view based on multiple orbital observations shows Mars' Gale crater as if seen from an aircraft northwest of the crater. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU/UA

Its official: the Mars Science Laboratory rover, Curiosity, will be landing Gale Crater on Mars. Scientists announced the final decision at a special event at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum Friday morning. Comparing the terrain to an enticing bowl of layered Neopolitan ice cream, the rover will land at the foot of a layered mountain inside Gale Crater.

“The science at Gale is going to be amazing and it will be a beautiful place to visit,” said Dawn Sumner, a geologist with the MSL team.

MSL is scheduled to launch in November 2011 from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida and land in August 2012. Curiosity is twice as long and more than five times as heavy as previous as the Mars Exploration rovers Spirit and Opportunity. The rover will study whether the landing region at Gale crater had favorable environmental conditions for supporting microbial life and for preserving clues about whether life ever existed.

News had leaked out a few weeks ago that Gale was the favored site, but scientists today explained what made Gale stand out among the four final candidates, which each offered their own delicious “flavor,” making the decision a difficult one.

NASA has selected Gale crater as the landing site for the Mars Science Laboratory mission. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU

“When it comes down to four landing sites, it comes down to what feels right,” said John Grotzinger, Mars Science Laboratory project scientist. “We as a science team, as a community, we got together and in the end we picked the one that felt best. Why? Here, we’ve got mountain of rocks, taller than Mount Whitney. It looks like Hawaii; it’s not a tall spire, but a broad mound. So we can actually climb up this mountain with the rover. That alone justifies sending the spacecraft there. It turns out, though, the most attractive science sites are at the base of the mountain. We can address the principle goals of the things the Mars community would like answers to.”

NASA’s strategy for Mars has been to “follow the water,” since we know that wherever there is water on Earth, there is life. Scientists are hedging their bets on Mars that wherever liquid water once flowed would be the best places to look for evidence of past habitability.

Gale has that going for it.

Gale Crater stratigraphy. Iimage courtesy Matt Golombek.

The portion of the crater where Curiosity will land has an alluvial fan likely formed by water-carried sediments. The layers at the base of the mountain contain clays and sulfates, both known to form in water.
“It’s a huge crater sitting in a very low-elevation position on Mars, and we all know that water runs downhill,” Grotzinger said. “In terms of the total vertical profile exposed and the low elevation, Gale offers attractions similar to Mars’ famous Valles Marineris, the largest canyon in the solar system.”
The scientists emphasized that MSL is not a life detection mission, as it can’t look for fossils. But it can detect organic carbon, which can tell the early environmental story of Mars, found the sediments within rocks.

Gale Crater crater spans 154 kilometers (96 miles) in diameter and is about the combined area of Connecticut and Rhode Island. The mound in the center rises 5 km (3 miles) hight and the Layering in the mound suggests it is the surviving remnant of an extensive sequence of deposits.

The crater is named for Australian astronomer Walter F. Gale.

About the size of a Mini-Cooper, Curiosity has 17 cameras and a full color video camera. The mission should offer incredible vistas that will likely wow the public, beginning with the landing, as Curiosity will take a full color, high definition movie as it descends on the “Sky Crane” landing system.

Anyone else ready for this mission to get going?

Tagged as: Curiosity Rover, Mars, Mars Science Laboratory, Missions

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ULA Delta IV Thunders Off Pad With GPS IIF-2 Satellite

Delta IV Medium rocket thunders off of Cape Canaveral Air Force Stations Launch Complex 37B. Credit:: Alan Walters (awaltersphoto.com) for Universe Today.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – The U.S. Air Force launched the GPS IIF-2 satellite into orbit Saturday (July 16) on a mission to enhance the country’s constellation of Global Positioning System satellites. The satellite was launched atop a Delta IV Medium 4, 2 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station’s Launch Complex 37B at 2:41 a.m. EDT. The Delta IV had been scheduled to launch two days prior but slipped one day due to a technical issue with the satellite and a second day when technicians were prevented from rolling the Mobile Service Tower or MST back because of weather.

The early-morning launch lit up the skies for miles around Florida's Space Coast and saw the second of twelve planned IIF satellites placed into orbit. Photo Credit: Jason Rhian

This morning’s launch

The rocket was provided by United Launch Alliance (ULA) and the company oversaw the liftoff. This configuration of the Delta IV Medium has two solid rocket boosters which are provided by Utah’s Alliant Techsystems (ATK). The boosters are required to provide the extra boost required to send the spacecraft into the correct orbit.

A United Launch Alliance Delta IV Medium rocket thunders off of Cape Canaveral Air Force Station's Launch Complex 37B. Photo Credit: Jason Rhian

Weather was the biggest concern for the launch, but when the clock reached zero the launch vehicle thundered off of the pad in a spectacle of sound and light. The weather turned out to be a non-issue with mostly clear moonlit skies and almost no breeze. Lightning could still be seen lighting up the Florida sky off in the distance – but the summer light show only served as a backdrop for the launch.

“This is an exciting time for ULA, we are happy to have launched our 52nd mission,” said United Launch Alliance Spokesman Chris Chavez. “We’re happy to support the U.S. Air Force along with our customer and partner Boeing – it was a great launch and a great morning.”

The pulse-line production method can be seen in this picture provided by Boeing. The satellite is moved through its various stations in a similar fashion as to how aircraft are produced. Photo Credit: Boeing

The satellite

Boeing is the prime contractor that provided the U.S. Air Force with the GPS satellite. The GPS IIF system is expected to provide next-generation performance to the GPS constellation of satellites. These abilities are considered to be vital to U.S. national security as well as maintaining the GPS constellation’s availability for civil, commercial and military requirements. The IIF is expected to provide enhanced capability and better performance.

The first GPS IIF satellite was launched in 2010. It is hoped that the pulse-line production method that is employed by Boeing will ensure that the IIF fleet is placed on orbit on schedule. This production method is very similar to how airplanes are developed. The process is named because satellites are moved from one work station to the next in a steady rhythm – similar to a pulse.

The GPS IIF-2 satellite will be utilized for both for civilian and military purposes. A new civilian L5 signal will assist with search and rescue missions, while the military will benefit from the satellite’s resistance to jamming. The satellite also has a reprogrammable processor that can receive uploads on-orbit. GPS IIF-2 has a design life of 12 years and it is hoped that it will provide long-term service will keeping operating costs low.

“The enhancements that the GPS IIF-2 satellite has should strengthen the constellation for many years to come,” said Boeing Spokesperson Angie Yoshimura.

Launch Complex 37B smolders after bearing the fury of the Delta IV Medium with its GPS payload. Photo Credit: Jason Rhian

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Awesome Aurora Photographed by Shuttle/ISS Crews

A panoramic view of Earth taken from the ISS, with shuttle Atlantis docked to the station. Aurora Australis or the Southern Lights can be seen on Earth's horizon and a number of stars also are visible. Credit: NASA

The STS-135 crew of space shuttle Atlantis and the Expedition 28 crew of the International Space Station were treated with great views of the Aurora Australis. Here’s one shot the crews photographed, showing a panoramic view of the station/shuttle complex along with several different astronomical beauties! The aurora shows up brightly, but what else is in the image? Looking closely –and southern hemisphere observers might recognize some objects better — but do you see the globular cluster Omega Centauri, the Coalsack Nebula and the Southern Cross? Anyone see anything else?

See below for another great aurora shot from the ISS, where the green glow shows up even better:

The Southern Lights or Aurora Australis as seen from the space station and space shuttle. Credit: NASA

These images were taken on Thursday during one of the “night” passes for the station/shuttle. The astronauts mentioned the aurora during media interviews on Friday. “We saw an incredible Southern Lights aurora,” said STS-135 pilot Doug Hurley. “It was the best one I’ve seen in my two spaceflights. It was just unbelievable, the view out the cupola.”

See larger views on NASA’s mission gallery page.

Tagged as: Astrophotos, Aurora Australis, Expedition 28, Space Shuttle, Space Station, STS-135

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Two Days of Tweetness: Witnessing a Shuttle Launch

Space Tweeps Unite! NASA Tweetup participants gather at the launch clock on Friday, July 8, 2011. © NASA HQ Photo

It’s been over a week since the NASA Tweetup and I’m still thinking about it. For good reason, of course… it was awesome.

Over the course of two days I saw a capsule that had been to space and back, talked with five astronauts (one currently in orbit!), toured Kennedy Space Center, met a muppet, touched a piece of the Moon, made dozens of new friends and, of course, watched, heard and felt the launch of the last space shuttle to leave Earth. (And managed to talk my way into a delicious barbecue sandwich inside the Vehicle Assembly Building.) All with less than six hours of sleep.

Not too shabby.

Tweeting in the Twent

I have to say, I was very impressed with the organization by the people at NASA. From directions to getting our badges to the lovingly air-conditioned, internet-supplied and somewhat rainproof Tweetup tent (or “twent”, as it’s called) to the guest speakers and tours of Kennedy Space Center, they all did a fantastic job at making the 150 Tweetup participants (er, “tweeps”… yes, there’s a definite lingo here) feel like genuine VIPs. We had access to places that most people don’t get to see, and got to watch Atlantis launch from a location reserved for members of the press. The twent was located on the edge of the press lawn, just to the right of the big countdown clock and between the Lockheed-Martin and Boeing tents. Seeing the shuttle on the pad was as easy as stepping outside the twent and looking across the pond… we were literally closer than all the major media representatives! (And I believe we were visited first by Elmo.)

Atlantis ignites! © Jason Major

What’s it like to watch a shuttle launch from the press site? In a word: amazing!!! (Really, what did you think??) When the smoke and steam started billowing up from the pad, a gasp was heard from all present, followed by a cheer and then the simultaneous clicking of hundreds of cameras. This, of course, was only audible until the sound of the shuttle’s rockets crossed the 3.1 miles between the pad and the press site and quickly filled the air with a growing rumble that culminated in a deep, flapping roar that you could feel as much as hear. It was all I could do to keep my hands steady to take photos – luckily I had pre-focused and set my camera so all I had to do was adjust zoom and keep the shutter going. Every now and then I made sure I looked at what was happening with my own eyes as I didn’t want to experience the launch only through the viewfinder of a camera. Still, the actual launch happened so quickly and the shuttle passed through the clouds so soon, I only got a couple of glimpses of it as it soared upwards. But the memories of it are burned in my mind.

And, of course, I do have lots of photos.

I opted for photos rather than video because I wanted something I could print at a decent size, perhaps even on photo canvas, and I figured there’d be plenty of videos out there of the launch anyway. (And there are.)

I did shoot some video during the Tweetup, of the chat between Elmo and astronauts Mike Massimino and Doug Wheelock in the twent, of the inside of the Vehicle Assembly Building and of the retraction of the Rotating Service Structure from the shuttle – during which we were lucky enough to be in the adjacent viewing lawn!

Me talking with Doug Wheelock. Credit: Patty Cleveland @scienceesl

I’m not sure how to sum up the Tweetup as a cohesive story, other than that it was an experience like I’ve never had before. Being around so many other people who share one’s excitement about spaceflight and astronomy and who are all fixated on one event taking place is quite a feeling. Meeting astronauts in person is an awesome experience as well. Col. Wheelock was especially gracious to all of us, giving a first-hand account of his time aboard the space shuttle and International Space Station and informing us of what happens in the minutes before, during and after a launch, and was more than happy to take time to sign autographs and pose for photos. I got a photo with him, got his signature in my autograph book and even let him use my back as a signing table! He seemed like a genuinely nice guy, who loves what he does, and was a pleasure to meet. I also got a chance to talk with Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, who was also very nice, as well as Garrett Reisman (who now works for SpaceX developing rockets), Mike Massimino (briefly) and Expedition 29 astronaut Ron Garan via iPhone while he passed overhead aboard the ISS! Very cool.

Atlantis on the pad before dawn, July 8 2011. © Jason Major

Ultimately luck was on our side on Friday, as Atlantis launched despite a 70% chance that the weather would not cooperate. The day before brought torrential rain and thunderstorms and the word around the site was that it wasn’t looking good for launch, but NASA seemed extra-determined to make the final flight of the shuttle program happen on time. For some reason, once I saw Atlantis lit up by those powerful spotlights early Friday morning, glowing in the distance like a holy temple of space travel – which, in a way, it was – I had a feeling it was going to take off that day. Which it did, thankfully, only two minutes later than planned at 11:29 am.

(See above for what that was like.)

Yeah.

Here’s some other random thoughts I have regarding the Two Days of Tweetness:

They don’t mess around with security at Kennedy Space Center. They know what’s going on, everywhere, as well as what time it is. If tweeps aren’t allowed in the gate until 5am, they aren’t going to let you in at 4:35am. And don’t speed in KSC. They will pull you over.The VAB is HUGE. Way huge. Picture the biggest building you have ever been in. It’s bigger than that.

I watched a spaceship take off.When you watch the shuttle launch, it’s a dramatic, powerful event that blows your mind. Then you remember that there’s four humans riding on it, and your mind is blown even more.Kennedy Space Center is a place where they build spaceships in giant buildings surrounded by moats filled with alligators. If that’s not science fiction I don’t know what is.If you want good prices on NASA mission patches and t-shirts visit the gift shop at the Air Force Space and Missile History Museum. Same stuff, way cheaper. Tell Mary Ann I said hi.The Saturn V rocket is the biggest rocket you have ever seen. (Which makes sense, because it’s the biggest rocket ever made.)You can say you’re going to Tweet a launch, but in reality you won’t be Tweeting much because there’s no cellular service during a launch. Totally clogged up.Manatees live in the pond between the press site and the launch pad. That’s cool.Bring bug spray.And sunscreen.When people say to bring bug spray and sunscreen, do it.And when the sign says don’t drink the water on site for any reason, don’t drink the water. This goes for brewed coffee too. (It’s a long story.)The NASA cafeteria is a great place for a deli sandwich, but you better know what you want. The ladies there aren’t fooling around.There’s a lot more waiting than launching at a shuttle launch. And don’t trust the clock… NASA time is not real time. When it says there’s three hours to launch that really means seven hours to launch. Plan accordingly.Of course, there won’t be any more shuttle launches, so that’s a moot point.

Regardless of it being the end of the shuttle program, KSC is an awesome place to visit. I am honestly shocked that this is the first time I have ever been there, considering all the times I have been in Florida. But then again I have never been a guest of NASA like I was during the Tweetup – it’s definitely a different experience that way! Still I’d go back in a second as there’s still a lot I didn’t get a chance to see. Until then, I’ll be replaying the events of last week over and over in my mind… until then and for the rest of my life, I’m sure. Thanks to everyone at NASA who made this possible, and thanks to the great tweeps I met while I was there! We’re now part of a special group of people who shared a historic event, it’s true, but we’re also very excited to share it with as many people as we can.

Because it really was just that cool.

STS-135 Atlantis launched at 11:29 am on July 8, 2011. I was there. © Jason Major

See more photos from the STS-135 Tweetup in the Flickr group here.

_______________________

Jason Major is a graphic designer, photo enthusiast and space blogger. Visit his website Lights in the Dark and follow him on Twitter @JPMajor or on Facebook for the most up-to-date astronomy awesomeness!

Tagged as: Atlantis, KSC, Launch, NASA, shuttle, STS-135, Tweetup, Twitter

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Answer Now Posted for This Week’s Where In The Universe Challenge

Still wondering what this is — or just needing a confirmation that you were correct in your guesses? Find the answer to this week’s WITU challenge back on the original post! And check back next week for another test of your visual knowledge of the cosmos.

Tagged as: Where In the Universe?

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Measuring Mercury’s Craters

Images of craters obtained by MDIS from orbit. Left: A simple, bowl-shaped crater 4.1 km in diameter crater located at 78.8?N, 346.3?E. Solar illumination is from the south. Right: A complex crater 51.5 km in diameter located at 2.3?N, 121.4?E. Illumination is from the east. Shadows cast on a crater interior can be used to estimate the depth of a crater floor below the surrounding rim.

Getting to know a planet well is getting to know its surface features. Through measuring impact craters, planetary scientists are able to disclose information such as the origin and evolution of Mercury’s surface. We know it’s a matter of numbers, but just exactly how is it done when you can’t physically be there?

Size, shape and structure of craters is the common bond that most solar system bodies share. By understanding the physics of how they were made, researchers are able to draw conclusions through modeling. Their laboratory impact experiments and numerical simulations make judging crater qualities doable on a planetary scale. To further refine their results, it is then compared against known data for new, as well as eroded, craters. This information then gives us a clearer idea of surface properties, such as mineral deposits, soil composition, ice deposits, proportions and more. Checking out shapes and sizes on Mercury with observations obtained by the MESSENGER spacecraft are just the beginning.

Why is a Mercury crater investigation so important? Maybe because its surface gravitational acceleration (3.7 m/s2) is nearly identical to that at Mars. In this case, gravity plays an important role as the “transition diameter” is affected. According to the study, “Simple craters tend to be bowl shaped, whereas complex craters have terraced walls and can contain a central peak. If gravity were the dominant factor controlling the transition diameter, one would expect that this diameter would be similar on Mercury and Mars.” These transition diameters observed on Mercury are important because they give us clues to the Martian crust. Their differences could mean a weaker surface due to near-surface water ice.

An example complex crater on Mercury, ~ 55 km in diameter and centered near 63.5°N, -139?E, that has been imaged by MDIS (left) and profiled by MLA (right). A slightly larger complex crater lies along the MLA profile to the south.

The Mercury Laser Altimeter (MLA) and the Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS) are hard at work providing the photo data needed to study cratering. We’re now able to get an inside look at central peaks, walls, floors and slopes. In addition, we’re getting a concise measurement of diameters. As with the Moon, researchers can make assessments as to depth by measuring the shadows. While MLA cannot always be used for these types of measurements, these fresh insights are furthering our understanding of crater properties – both on Mercury and across all holey bodies in our solar system.

Original News Source: Messenger News.

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