Space News & Blog Articles

On December 25th, 2021, the James Webb Space Telescope launched from Cape Canaveral bound for space. After many years of delays, retesting, and cost overruns, the next-generation observatory made it to orbit without any hiccups or complications. What followed was several weeks of deployment as Webb unfolded its arms, sunshield, primary mirror (consisting of eighteen gold-coated beryllium segments), and secondary mirror. By late January, the space telescope had flown to the Sun-Earth L2 Lagrange Point, where it will remain for the entirety of its mission.

When Galileo pointed his telescope at Jupiter 400 years ago, he saw three blobs of light around the giant planet, which he at first thought were fixed stars. He kept looking, and eventually, he spotted a fourth blob and noticed the blobs were moving. Galileo’s discovery of objects orbiting something other than Earth—which we call the Galilean moons in his honour—struck a blow to the Ptolemaic (geocentric) worldview of the time.

One look at the Planetary Decadal Survey for 2023 – 2032, and you will see some bold and cutting-edge mission proposals for the coming decade. Examples include a Uranus Orbiter and Probe (UOP) that would study Uranus’ interior, atmosphere, magnetosphere, satellites, and rings; and an Enceladus orbiter and surface lander to study the active plumes emanating from Enceladus’ southern polar region. Not to be outdone, China is also considering a nuclear-powered Neptune Explorer to explore the ice giant, its largest moon (Triton), and its other satellites and rings.

It’s comforting to know that there are people who are literally paid to watch the night sky to ensure that at least we’ll be informed if an asteroid will hit the Earth. Technology and near-Earth surveys have become advanced enough that the likelihood of a planet-killer-sized asteroid coming out of nowhere, as is so prevalent in modern media depictions, is extremely unlikely. Even smaller ones, which would only wipe out a city or part of a continent, get enough attention to tell if they pose a threat or not. And in advance of Asteroid Day 2022, which happened on June 30th, ESA is proud to announce they were able to remove one of the most threatening asteroids from their potential impact list.

For everybody waiting with bated breath for Tuesday’s release of the first James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) images, NASA’s doing a bit of a tease. They’re releasing one image a day early on Monday afternoon. And, the announcer will be the President of the United States, Mr. Joseph R. Biden. Joining him will be NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, who will conduct this one-of-a-kind White House astronomy briefing. It’s all part of the buildup to the big reveals on Tuesday.

The story of our solar system’s origin is pretty well known. It goes like this: the Sun began as a protostar in its “solar nebula” over 4.5 billion years ago. Over the course of several million years, the planets emerged from this nebula and it dissipated away. Of course, the devil is in the details. For example, exactly how long did the protoplanetary disk that gave birth to the planets last? A recent paper submitted to the Journal of Geophysical Research takes a closer look at the planetary birth crèche. In particular, it shows how the magnetism of meteorites helps tell the story.

Researchers at Penn State University have studied a new technique that could use a star’s ability to focus and magnify communications which could be passing through our own solar system, and has been accepted for publication in The Astronomical Journal and was part of a graduate course at Penn State covering the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI. The study describes our Sun as potentially acting as a kind of node as part of an interstellar communication network involving probes or relays near our Sun, acting like cellular telephone towers in space.

Here’s a hypothetical situation. Imagine we got visited by aliens who came from another star system. Not to conquer us or to share their secrets. Instead, imagine they just came as tourists visiting our Solar System. Now, here’s a question. What should we show them as our best tourist attraction?

In this week’s breaking space news: CAPSTONE mission was lost and found again, James Webb gets another stunning image, Mars plane can follow Ingenuity, a mystery of first quasars possibly solved, incredibly fast star discovered and more.

The James Webb Space Telescope will provide unprecedented views and science about our Universe, and the first full-color images and first spectra from the new telescope will be revealed on July 12. But now NASA has done something a little unprecedented, too: they’ve given all of us who are anticipating these images a list of the cosmic targets we’ll be seeing next week.

In his book, Endurance, astronaut Scott Kelly described the arduous task of readjusting to life on Earth after spending a year in space. As part of NASA’s Twins Study, Kelly lived and worked aboard the International Space Station (ISS) while his identical twin (astronaut Mark Kelly) remained on Earth. While the results of this study revealed how prolonged exposure to microgravity could lead to all manner of physiological changes, the long and painful recovery Kelly described in his book painted a much more personal and candid picture.

At the edge of known space are quasars. They are powerful cosmic engines capable of creating intense beams of light across billions of light years. And they are powered by supermassive black holes (SMBHs). Most galaxies have a SMBH, including our own galaxy, but for quasars to be so powerful their SMBHs must have become very large very quickly. We’re still learning just how they formed. We’ve long thought their formation involved a special set of circumstances, but a new study shows that early quasars could have formed purely from cold dark gas.

A ‘throwaway’ engineering image from the James Webb Space Telescope’s commissioning phase has turned out to be a stunningly deep view of the cosmos. It rivals the deepest of Hubble Deep Field images in revealing previously unseen distant galaxies.

According to the ESA’s Space Debris Office (SDO), there are about 31,630 debris objects in orbit that are regularly tracked by space surveillance networks. However, this only accounts for the larger objects and doesn’t include the (literally) millions of tiny bits of “space junk” that pollute Low Earth Orbit (LEO). According to the SDO, this includes an estimated 36,500 objects greater than 10 cm in diameter (~4 inches), 1 million space debris objects measuring between 1 cm to 10 cm (0.4 to 4 inches), and 130 million space debris objects measuring between 1 mm to 1 cm.

We look forward to this every year! The Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition showcases and recognizes some of the most stunning views of the night sky and astronomical objects. The shortlisted images from this year’s competition have now been released, and they include awe-inspiring scenes of the Milky Way, colliding galaxies, stellar nurseries, planets, nebula and the always photogenic Moon.

Two Lego designers with a history of space-themed projects have teamed up for a new proposed set: China’s Long March CZ-5 and Tianwen-1 Mission. The set is currently gathering supporters on the LEGO Ideas website. If it gets enough support, LEGO will review it and possibly create it.

There’s a population of stars in the heart of our galaxy whipping around Sagittarius A* (the Milky Way’s central supermassive black hole). Astronomers just found the closest, fastest one (so far). It’s called S4716 and it orbits Sag A* once every four years. That makes it officially the fastest star moving at the heart of our galaxy. To give you some perspective, the Sun moves around the center of the galaxy at a much more leisurely pace once every 230 million years.

In 1687, Sir Isaac Newton published his magnum opus, Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica, which effectively synthesized his theories on motion, velocity, and universal gravitation. In terms of the latter, Newton offered a means for calculating the force of gravity and predicting the orbits of the planets. Since then, astronomers have discovered that the Solar System is merely one small point of light that orbits the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. On occasion, other stars will pass close to the Solar System, which can cause a dramatic shakeup that can kick objects out of their orbits.

The search for life—even ancient life—on Mars is trickier than we thought. In a recent study published in the journal Astrobiology, researchers have determined that NASA’s Mars Perseverance (Percy) Rover will have to dig two meters (6.6 feet) beneath the Martian surface in order to find traces of ancient life. This is because the surface of Mars is constantly bombarded with extreme levels of solar radiation that scientists hypothesize would quickly degrade small molecules such as amino acids. The reason for this extreme level of radiation is due to the absence of a magnetic field, which scientists believe was stripped away billions of years ago when the planet’s liquid outer core ceased to produce the dynamo that created the field.

Physicists say they’ve found evidence in data from Europe’s Large Hadron Collider for three never-before-seen combinations of quarks, just as the world’s largest particle-smasher is beginning a new round of high-energy experiments.

The success of the Mars Ingenuity helicopter has encouraged engineers to consider and reconsider all options for remote aerial observations of the Red Planet.  Additional methods for birds-eye views of Mars would not only provide higher resolution data on the landscapes where rovers can’t go — such as canyons and volcanoes — but also could include studying atmospheric and climate processes that current orbiters and rovers aren’t outfitted to observe.