Space

Soft Landing on the Moon an Extraordinary Challenge

Chinese Chang’e 3 spacecraft on Dec. 14, 2013 became the first probe to soft land on the Moon since the Soviet Union's Luna 24 in 1976. ...

Blog Post - Tomasz Nowakowski - Apr 1 2015 - 3:43pm

Fading AGN, The Ghosts Of Quasars Past

A set of enigmatic quasar ghosts mark the graves of these objects that flickered to life and then faded. 8 unusual looped structures orbit their host galaxies and glow in a bright and eerie goblin-green hue. The ethereal wisps in these images were illumina ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 2 2015 - 1:29pm

Supernova Crime Scene- The White Dwarf Did It

Astronomers have determined the pre-explosion mass of a white dwarf star that blew up thousands of years ago and the measurement strongly suggests the explosion involved only a single white dwarf, ruling out a well-established alternative scenario involvin ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 2 2015 - 6:09pm

The Blood Moon Tetrad- Where The Bible Meets Science

If you are a star gazer, you just got to see a Blood Moon eclipse and if you were thinking that also happened a short while ago, you are not wrong. The latest Blood Moon eclipse is part of a series of four that started on April 14th-15th, 2014 and then aga ...

Article - Hank Campbell - Apr 4 2015 - 1:08pm

Complex Organic Molecules Discovered Around Star MWC 480

Are the building blocks of life universal? Astronomers have detected the presence of complex organic molecules, the building blocks of life, in a protoplanetary disc surrounding a young star named MWC 480. That means the conditions that spawned the Earth a ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 8 2015 - 12:00pm

Magnetic Activity Bands And Year-Long Cycles On The Sun

Our sun is constantly changing. It goes through cycles of activity- swinging between times of relative calm and times when frequent explosions on its surface can fling light, particles and energy out into space. This activity cycle peaks approximately eve ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 9 2015 - 12:07pm

What If The Universe Isn't Accelerating The Way We Think?

How fast the universe has been expanding since the Big Bang is something of a puzzling question. It wasn't that long enough that we didn't know it was accelerating at all, and a new study finds the acceleration of the expansion of the universe mi ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 10 2015 - 6:25pm

HD 189733b: Infernal Exoplanet With 500 MPH, 3000 Degree Winds

Not all exoplanets are going to be habitable, many will be just the opposite. Astronomers have measured the temperature of the atmosphere of an exoplanet with unequaled precision and determined we won't be vacationing there any time soon. By crossing ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 11 2015 - 10:46am

An Interview with Veteran NASA Astronaut Brian Duffy

Space is always on the mind of a veteran NASA astronaut Brian Duffy. The key figure in an aerospace company Orbital ATK and a Space Shuttle commander is extremely keen on flying to space again. The enthusiasm emanating from him for the future journeys bey ...

Blog Post - Tomasz Nowakowski - Apr 12 2015 - 8:54am

Methane Storms And Titan's Dune Direction Mystery

Titan, Saturn's largest moon, is one of the most Earthlike places in the solar system.  It has a thick, hazy atmosphere and surface rivers, mountains, lakes and dunes, which is why the Cassini-Huygens is studying it. But sometimes new data bring new ...

Article - News Staff - Apr 13 2015 - 5:10pm