The sun just did something weird and 3 other space stories you may … – Yahoo News
Space is very big and quite often, very weird. Last week, an image captured by NASA's Reconnaissance Orbiter looked just like a bear, and "The Green Comet" reached its closest point to Earth in 50,000 years. This week we’ve got a whole new set of developments. Here’s what you may have missed.
Starting off, this week saw some big tests for the future of spaceflight. After what’s become an almost routine Falcon 9 satellite launch on Tuesday, SpaceX fired up all but two stages of the 33-stage booster rocket Thursday meant for its long-awaited Starship spacecraft in Texas. If all continues to go well, SpaceX says the first Starship launch could happen as early as March.
Over in Hancock County, Miss., NASA conducted tests of a new rocket engine it hopes will power future flights to the moon, and at the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) succeeded in launching its Small Satellite Launch Vehicle (SSLV) into orbit.
Footage of a “massive polar vortex” recorded by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory on Feb. 2, went viral this week, and scientists aren’t exactly sure what’s going on.
Talk about Polar Vortex! Material from a northern prominence just broke away from the main filament & is now circulating in a massive polar vortex around the north pole of our Star. Implications for understanding the Sun's atmospheric dynamics above 55° here cannot be overstated! pic.twitter.com/1SKhunaXvP
— Dr. Tamitha Skov (@TamithaSkov) February 2, 2023
The vortex formed after a giant plasma filament located at 55 degrees latitude broke off from the sun’s surface. While this is the first time we’ve observed anything quite like this, the National Center for Atmospheric Research says increased solar activity at that particular location is a common feature of the 11-year solar cycle, during which the sun builds up to “solar maximum,” flips its polarity, then resets to “solar minimum.” However, the scientific community doesn’t know why it happens or how it affects the reversal of the sun’s magnetic field. The sun is projected to reach its next solar maximum in 2024, so it’s entirely possible we’ll see more strange solar phenomena between now and then.
Astronomers discovered a potentially habitable exoplanet orbiting a star in the Cygnus constellation, 31.2 light-years away. The planet, Wolf 1069b, is just a little larger and about 25% heavier than Earth and appears to have a rocky surface. Its presence in the so-called “habitable zone” of its solar system — not too hot and not too cold — suggests that there could also be liquid water on its surface, and an atmosphere.
But that’s where Wolf 1069b’s similarities to Earth end. Wolf 1069b is tidally locked to its sun, so one side of the planet is always day, and the other half is always night. It’s also much closer to its host star, a red dwarf, which is much smaller and much cooler than our own. Without an atmosphere, the surface temperature is estimated to swing between 55 degrees on the bright side and a frigid minus 140 degrees on the dark side. However, if Wolf 1069b does indeed have an atmosphere to trap in heat, the average surface temperature could sit at around 40 degrees. Still, the evidence to suggest that Wolf 1069b could sustain life is there, even if it may not be a great place to visit.
Finally, this week brought to light the puzzling discovery of a ring around Quaoar, a dwarf planet about half the size of Pluto sitting in the Kuiper Belt beyond Neptune. Rings usually form when objects enter orbit around a celestial body within what’s known as the Roche limit, the distance within which gravitational forces cause objects to disintegrate. However, Quaoar’s ring appears to orbit outside that limit, at a distance where orbiting objects should clump together to form a moon. So how did Quaoar’s ring form? The short answer is: Nobody knows.
Japanese astronomer Daichi Fujii captured the telltale flash of a meteorite impacting the moon, causing a brief flash on our celestial neighbor's nightside.
The sand dunes of Mars come in a wide range of shapes and sizes, but a new image shows sand dunes that are surprisingly near-perfect circles.
Russia’s Soyuz MS-24 crew capsule could launch to the International Space Station sooner than planned to replace a potentially unsafe spacecraft slated to return three astronauts back to Earth, Russian media reported. Upsettingly, the potentially unsafe spacecraft is MS-23, a replacement craft sent to the ISS to replace the damaged MS-22.
The phenomenon is scientifically known as "postmortem fetal extrusion."
Although the virus was frozen for thousands of years, it was infectious — and scientists worry deadlier viruses could still be alive in permafrost.
Relativity Space is still targeting this weekend for the second attempt at launching the world's first 3D-printed rocket from Cape Canaveral.
A supermassive black hole may have been kicked out of its galaxy after two other black holes moved in. Its shock wave seems to be birthing new stars.
NASA said that its uncrewed Artemis I flight test proved successful last year, but also highlighted some unforeseen issues to work on during a Thursday update.
Eating other humans isn't an efficient source of calories, especially post-apocalypse, says a researcher who tallied how much meat a person contains.
Japan’s H3 rocket failed to reach orbit on Monday, so instead of celebrating the debut of a flagship launch vehicle, Japan’s space agency is scrambling to understand what went wrong and what it means for Japanese space policy going forward. There’s also a backlash afoot, with a former astronaut rightly asking why a $2o0 million satellite was included in the test mission.
A team of astronauts that launched from Florida’s Space Coast last year is spending their final days in orbit before heading home.
The success of the artificial intelligence (AI) software ChatGPT has been the biggest win for the technology sector so far this year after a disappointing 2022. Tech giants and startups alike are racing to replicate the AI platform, which witnessed meteoric success overnight, and billionaire tech genius Elon Musk is no exception. But the Twitter CEO has made some controversial statements regarding artificial intelligence over the years. AI Is The Greatest Threat To Humanity Some might not be awa
Archaeologists in Sudan have uncovered the remains of a temple dating to 2,700 years ago.
They witness a rarely-seen moment while carrying out research on the RRS Sir David Attenborough.
I got back from my first term at Oxford and asked where my childhood bull terrier was. ‘He’s in the garden,’ said my family, collapsing with collective mirth. I looked: he wasn’t. As you’ve doubtless realised, he was in the garden – only six feet under. They’d been distraught about this at the time, deciding not to inform me so it didn’t ruin my college introduction. Only now they were over it, and found the whole thing darkly hilarious.
Rats living in New York City's sewer system can catch the virus that causes COVID-19. Could they incubate new variants and spread them to people?
Say cheese: a newly deployed Starlink V2 satellite unknowingly posed for an orbital snapshot captured by a satellite imaging company. The photo revealed the new look of the miniature satellites in action, which SpaceX is hoping will increase the broadband capacity of its internet constellation.
A spate of whale strandings along the Mid-Atlantic coast of the United States has inspired claims on social media that offshore wind farms are to blame. This is misleading; scientists and environmental groups say there is no evidence linking the facilities to the deaths, and that other important factors include ocean warming, habitat changes and vessel encounters."Did you know that Democrat Green policies seem to be killing beloved Dolphins & Whales with dangerous offshore wind turbine construct
UVA researchers find an unrecognized mechanism of health and lifespan extension.
What goes up must come down, and that includes all of the satellites, rocket stages, and junk that humans have launched into space. A group of scientists is sounding the alarm about how that growing cloud of debris orbiting Earth may cause us trouble in the future, and are championing a global approach to governing Earth’s orbit.
