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A mere 20 light-years away in the constellation Libra, red dwarf star Gliese 581 has received much scrutiny by astronomers in recent years.
Earthbound telescopes had detected the signatures of multiple planets orbiting the cool sun, two at least close to the system's habitable zone -- the region where an Earth-like planet can have liquid water on its surface. Now a team headed by Steven Vogt (UCO Lick), and Paul Butler (DTM Carnagie Inst.) has announced the detection of another planet, this one squarely in the system's habitable zone. Based on 11 years of data, their work offers a very compelling case for the first potentially habitable planet found around a very nearby star. Shown in this artist's illustration of the inner part of the exoplanetary system, the planet is designated Gliese 581g, but Vogt's more personal name is Zarmina's World, after his wife. The best fit to the data indicates the planet has a circular 37 day orbit, an orbital radius of only 0.15 AU, and a mass 3.1 times the Earth's. Modeling includes estimates of a planet radius of 1.5, and gravity at the planet's surface of 1.1 to 1.7 in Earth units.
Finding a habitable planet so close by suggests there are many others in our Milky Way galaxy.
The total number of stars in the Universe "is likely three times bigger than realized." Yale University astronomer Pieter van Dokkum says there are "possibly trillions of Earths orbiting these stars," dramatically increasing the possibility of finding alien civilizations.
"Rhea's oxygen appears to come from water ice on Rhea's surface when Saturn's magnetic field rotates over the moon and showers it with energetic particles trapped in the magnetic field," said Coates from UCL’s Mullard Space Science Laboratory
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Suggested by
Marc Rougier
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A team of scientists and engineers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory has brought the world one step closer to 'hearing' gravitational waves -- ripples in space and time predicted by Albert Einstein in the early 20th century.
Astronomy | Mike Brown is an astronomer, and in my opinion is mainly responsible for kick-starting the demotion of Pluto as a planet -- he and his team found Eris, an objec (Pluto still may be the biggest dwarf planet | Bad Astronomy http://goo.gl/fb/xwjIa)
Did you know Mt Everest wasn't the biggest mountain on earth or that the Earth had other natural satellites than the Moon ?
The first images from China's Chang'e-2 lunar probe were released Nov. 8. The photos show a lunar lava plain called Sinus Iridium (Bay of Rainbows), a
The unexpected discovery suggests a colossal event in our galaxy's past, releasing energy equivalent to 100,000 exploding stars. But scientists don't yet know what that event might have been. (: Huge gamma-ray bubbles found extending from Milky Way - Los Angeles Times http://ping.fm/nbuIq http://bit.ly/bhIV8Y)
Explanation: Constellations of lights sprawl across this night scene, but they don't belong in the skies of planet Earth. Instead, the view looks down from the International Space Station as it passed over the United States along the northern Gulf Coast on October 29. A Russian Soyuz spacecraft is docked in the foreground. Behind its extended solar panels, some 360 kilometers below, are the recognizable city lights of New Orleans. Looking east along the coast to the top of the frame finds Mobile, Alabama while Houston city lights stand out to the west, toward the bottom. North (left) of New Orleans, a line of lights tracing central US highway I55 connects to Jackson, Mississippi and Memphis, Tennessee. Of course, the lights follow the population centers, but not everyone lives on planet Earth all the time these days. November 2nd marked the first decade of continuous human presence in space on board the International Space Station.
Explanation: Why are these people shooting a powerful laser into the center of our Galaxy? Fortunately, this is not meant to be the first step in a Galactic war. Rather, astronomers at the Very Large Telescope (VLT) site in Chile are trying to measure the distortions of Earth's ever changing atmosphere. Constant imaging of high-altitude atoms excited by the laser -- which appear like an artificial star -- allow astronomers to instantly measure atmospheric blurring. This information is fed back to a VLT telescope mirror which is then slightly deformed to minimize this blurring. In this case, a VLT was observing our Galaxy's center, and so Earth's atmospheric blurring in that direction was needed. As for inter-galaxy warfare, when viewed from our Galaxy's center, no casualties are expected. In fact, the light from this powerful laser would combine with light from our Sun to together appear only as bright as a faint and distant star.
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Still a long way to find ET but well done marketing guys at NASA...NASA-funded astrobiology research has changed the fundamental knowledge about what comprises all known life on Earth.
Researchers conducting tests in the harsh environment of Mono Lake in California have discovered the first known microorganism on Earth able to thrive and reproduce using the toxic chemical arsenic. The microorganism substitutes arsenic for phosphorus in its cell components.
Habitable Exoplanet in our Lifetime? Long has the idea of a habitable extrasolar planet played on the minds of astrologists and involved scientists and,
a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away
In an age of compulsory PhDs, expensively equipped laboratories and a collaborative approach to research, astronomy is one of the few sciences still amenable to the interested amateur.
The Earth may have played a major role in shaping the lunar landscape, according to a new study. (The dark side of the Moon was molded by the Earth’s gravity. http://bbc.in/bTe8Mv #science #astronomy)
Just a few weeks after a father and his son sent an iPhone to space on a balloon, this miniature plane, with a 3-foot wingspan and composed entirely of paper, is launched into space and returns safely.
A study funded by the Aerospace Corporation and NASA states that the market for space tourism is expected to grow exponentially over the next decade, and focuses on possible impacts of soot and carbon dioxide from what could be as many as 1,000 sub-orbital flights per year.
This tool is THAT cool: - pick up the asteroid's size, density and crash angle - define where it lands and what type of surface it collides on
Watch the impact.
Call Bruce Willis.
Just like in the Muse song ?
Astronomy | Today is Carl Sagan's 75th birthday. It would be nice if he were still around to send him the greeting personally, but sadly, he died too young: in 1996 he succ (Carl Sagan remembered | Bad Astronomy | Discover Magazine http://bit.ly/9zMUq1)
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