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    Category Astronomy/Space

    Data from GRAIL spacecraft suggest Moon may have large Lava Tubes

    December 19, 2016, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    moon

    With a roof 2 m thick, lava tubes a kilometer or more in width can remain stable  according to computer modelling, supporting inferences from GRAIL observations. Credit: CC0 Public Domain

    A team of researchers with Purdue University has found evidence from lunar-mapping spacecraft that the moon may have large lava tubes that could conceivably be used to house astronauts and supplies. In their paper published in the journal Icarus, the team describes their study of data from NASA’s Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) twin spacecraft and outline the evidence for large lava tubes.

    Prior research here on Earth has shown that lava flowing across a surface can form a shell of sorts as it cools, and when the shell collapses, a hollowed-out underground space remains—geologists call ...

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    Hubble ‘Cranes’ in for a closer look at a galaxy

    December 18, 2016, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Hubble 'cranes' in for a closer look at a galaxy

    IC 5201 sits over 40 million light-years away from us. As with two thirds of all the spirals we see in the universe — including the Milky Way, the galaxy has a bar of stars slicing through its center. Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA

    In 1900, astronomer Joseph Lunt made a discovery: Peering through a telescope at Cape Town Observatory, the British-South African scientist spotted this beautiful sight in the southern constellation of Grus (The Crane): a barred spiral galaxy now named IC 5201.

    Over a century later, the galaxy is still of interest to astronomers. For this image, the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope used its Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) to produce a beautiful and intricate image of the galaxy...

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    Ceres: Water Ice in Eternal Polar Night

    December 17, 2016, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    #Image1: View of the North Pole: The colours show the varying height of Ceres' landscape. The numbers refer to ten craters where the Framing Cameras built in Göttingen at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research have discovered water ice. © Nature Astronomy #Image2: Crater No. 1, whose interior has a large region in permanent darkness (a). In the weak scattered light, the framing cameras can make out bright deposits of ice (b). Crater No. 2 with its dark region is shown in Figures (c) to (e). The ice shown in (d) extends into the region with direct illumination (e). © Nature Astronomy

    #Image1: View of the North Pole: The colours show the varying height of Ceres’ landscape. The numbers refer to ten craters where the Framing Cameras built in Göttingen at the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research have discovered water ice. © Nature Astronomy
    #Image2: Crater No. 1, whose interior has a large region in permanent darkness (a). In the weak scattered light, the framing cameras can make out bright deposits of ice (b). Crater No. 2 with its dark region is shown in Figures (c) to (e). The ice shown in (d) extends into the region with direct illumination (e). © Nature Astronomy

    The American Dawn space probe has been orbiting the asteroid Ceres between Mars and Jupiter since March 2015...

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    Microlensing Study suggests most common Outer Planets likely Neptune-mass

    December 17, 2016, Categories  Astronomy/Space

    Neptune-mass exoplanets like the one shown in this artist's rendering may be the most common in the icy regions of planetary systems. Beyond a certain distance from a young star, water and other substances remain frozen, leading to an abundant population of icy objects that can collide and form the cores of new planets. In the foreground, an icy body left over from this period drifts past the planet. Credit: NASA/Goddard/Francis Reddy

    Neptune-mass exoplanets like the one shown in this artist’s rendering may be the most common in the icy regions of planetary systems. Beyond a certain distance from a young star, water and other substances remain frozen, leading to an abundant population of icy objects that can collide and form the cores of new planets. In the foreground, an icy body left over from this period drifts past the planet. Credit: NASA/Goddard/Francis Reddy

    A new statistical study of planets found by gravitational microlensing suggests that Neptune-mass worlds are likely the most common type of planet to form in the icy outer realms of planetary systems...

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