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    Category Astronomy/Space

    Astronomers Detect ‘Galactic Space Laser’

    April 8, 2022, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Artist’s impression of a hydroxyl maser. Inside a galaxy merger are hydroxyl molecules, composed of one atom of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen. When one molecule absorbs a photon at 18cm wavelength, it emits two photons of the same wavelength. When molecular gas is very dense, typically when two galaxies merge, this emission gets very bright and can be detected by radio telescopes such as the MeerKAT. © IDIA/LADUMA using data from NASA/StSci/SKAO/MolView

    A powerful radio-wave laser, called a ‘megamaser’, has been observed by the MeerKAT telescope in South Africa. The record-breaking find is the most distant megamaser of its kind ever detected, at about five billion light years from Earth.

    The light from the megamaser has travelled 58 thousand billion billion (58 followed by 21 z...

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    Citizen Scientists help Map Ridge Networks on Mars

    April 7, 2022, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Map of polygonal ridge networks (black dots) identified in mapping area (dashed black outline), covering approximately a fifth of Mars’ total surface area. The Mars Perseverance rover landing site is shown in purple. Background: Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter Elevation Map. Credit: NASA/JPL/GSFC.

    Over the last two decades, scientists have discovered unusual ridge networks on Mars using images from spacecraft orbiting the Red Planet. How and why the ridges formed and what clues they may provide about the history of Mars has remained unknown.

    A team of scientists, led by Aditya Khuller of Arizona State University’s School of Earth and Space Exploration and Laura Kerber of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, set out to learn more about these ridges by mapping a large area of Mars with th...

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    ‘Ears’ for Rover Perseverance’s Exploration of Mars

    April 6, 2022, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Courtesy of NASA/Southwest Research Institute/JPL-Caltech/Malin Space Science Systems/Kevin M. Gill/Italian Space Agency/Italian National Institute for Astrophysics/Björn Jónsson/ULiège/Bertrand Bonfond/Vincent Hue NASA’s Juno spacecraft flew through the intense beam of electrons traveling from Ganymede, Jupiter’s largest moon, to its auroral footprint on the gas giant. SwRI scientists used the resulting data to connect the particle population traveling along the beam with associated auroral emissions to unveil the mysterious processes creating the shimmering lights.

    For two decades, Roger Wiens has built instruments to give humans eyes and a nose on Mars — and now he’s helping add ears as well...

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    Hubble finds a Protoplanet that could Upend Planet Formation Models

    April 6, 2022, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Researchers were able to directly image newly forming exoplanet AB Aurigae b over a 13-year span using Hubble’s Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) and its Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrograph (NICMOS). In the top right, Hubble’s NICMOS image captured in 2007 shows AB Aurigae b in a due south position compared to its host star, which is covered by the instrument’s coronagraph. The image captured in 2021 by STIS shows the protoplanet has moved in a counterclockwise motion over time.
    Credits: Science: NASA, ESA, Thayne Currie (Subaru Telescope, Eureka Scientific Inc.); Image Processing: Thayne Currie (Subaru Telescope, Eureka Scientific Inc.), Alyssa Pagan (STScI)

    NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope has directly photographed evidence of a Jupiter-like protoplanet for...

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