Aerospace

Voyager 1 Has Entered Interstellar Space, Maybe

There is no 'you are now exiting the solar system' sign at the entrance to interstellar space, so when, and perhaps if, Voyager 1 left the solar system remains a mystery- but a team says it has definitely happened by now. Voyager 1, carrying wit ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 19 2013 - 10:03am

Space Slinky- 13 Years Of Superheated Gas From A Supermassive Black Hole

Astronomers have assembled images from more than 13 years of superheated gas- 5,000 light-years long- as it is ejected from a supermassive black hole. Even in such a cosmically short time frame, it gives us a better understanding of how black holes shape ...

Article - News Staff - Aug 23 2013 - 10:15am

SpaceX's Brazenly Illegal Rocket Launch

Hot off of revolutionizing ground-based transportation with the electric car company Tesla and proposing to revolutionize slightly-above-the-ground-based transportation with the Jetsons-esque Hyperloop, eccentric billionaire genius Elon Musk (of PayPal fam ...

Article - Robert Cooper - Aug 29 2013 - 3:54pm

Space Laser: Not Just For World Domination Anymore

The Lunar Laser Communication Demonstration (LLCD) on the Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE) is going to show that two-way laser communication beyond Earth is possible, broadening the possibility of transmitting huge amounts of data. I ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 1 2013 - 10:30am

Curiosity Rover Finds Water In First Sample Of Mars Surface

The first scoop of soil analyzed by the analytical suite in the belly of NASA's Curiosity rover reveals that fine materials on the surface of the planet contain several percent water by weight.  ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 26 2013 - 5:27pm

Cassini Finds Propylene, A Household Plastic Ingredient, On Titan

Propylene, a chemical used to make food-storage containers, car bumpers and other consumer products, has been detected on Saturn's moon Titan, the first definitive detection of the plastic ingredient on any moon or planet besides ours. The propylene ...

Article - News Staff - Sep 30 2013 - 5:56pm

Sky Survey Captures Key Details Of Cosmic Explosions With GRB130702A And IPTF13bxl

The intermediate Palomar Transient Factory (iPTF) was developed to help scientists learn more about the complex nature of celestial objects in the universe and began searching the skies for certain types of stars and related phenomena in February. ...

Article - News Staff - Oct 16 2013 - 3:59pm

The Sun Lets Loose A 200,000 Mile Long Canyon Of Fire

When we imagine the sun, we imagine fire, but that isn't really accurate. The sun is plasma; particles so hot that their electrons have boiled off, creating a charged gas that is interwoven with magnetic fields.  In late September, a 200,000 mile long ...

Article - News Staff - Oct 24 2013 - 5:55pm

GRB 130427A: Black Hole Birth Captured By RAPTOR

Los Alamos' RAPTOR (RAPid Telescopes for Optical Response) telescopes in New Mexico and Hawaii received a very bright cosmic birth announcement for a black hole on April 27th.  The RAPTOR (RAPid Telescopes for Optical Response) system is a network of ...

Article - News Staff - Nov 22 2013 - 9:52am

This Thanksgiving, A Solar Observing Fleet Will Watch Comet ISON's Journey Around The Sun- So Can You

 C/2012 S1, Comet ISON, began in the Oort cloud, almost a light year away and has traveled for over a million years. On Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 28, 2013, Comet ISON will sling shot around the sun- but what happens next is a mystery. Either it will break up ...

Article - News Staff - Nov 22 2013 - 5:17pm