Mars' changing habitability recorded by ancient dune fields in Gale crater
Thursday, 22 April 2021 13:49
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Understanding whether Mars was once able to support life has been a major driving force for Mars research over the past 50 years. To decipher the planet's ancient climate and habitability, researchers look to the rock record—a physical record of ancient surface processes which reflect the environment and the prevailing climate at the time the rocks were deposited.
In a new paper published in JGR: Planets, researchers on the NASA-JPL Mars Science Laboratory mission used the Curiosity rover to add another piece to the puzzle of Mars' ancient past by investigating a unit of rocks within Gale crater.
They found evidence of an ancient dune field preserved as a layer of rocks in Gale crater, which overlies rock layers that were deposited in a large lake. The rock remnants of the dune field are known today as the Stimson formation.
The findings help scientists understand surface and atmospheric processes—such as the direction the wind blew sand to form dunes—and potentially how Mars' climate evolved from an environment that potentially harbored microbial life, to an uninhabitable one.
Crew Dragon countdown to the launchpad
Thursday, 22 April 2021 13:24 Write a comment
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Crew Dragon countdown to the launchpad Crew Dragon rendezvous and docking with the International Space Station
Thursday, 22 April 2021 13:24 Write a comment
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Crew Dragon rendezvous and docking with the International Space Station Crew Dragon countdown to liftoff
Thursday, 22 April 2021 13:24 Write a comment
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Crew Dragon countdown to liftoff Crew Dragon liftoff to orbit
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Crew Dragon liftoff to orbit Catch comet R4 ATLAS as it nears Earth
Thursday, 22 April 2021 12:43 Write a comment
Looking to do some springtime astronomy? With temperatures warming up in the northern hemisphere in April through May, galaxy season is upon us. At dusk, the area in the Bowl of Virgo asterism rising in the east is rife with clusters of galaxies that spill over into the adjacent constellations of Coma Berenices and Boötes…
But this May, keep an eye out for a fuzzball interloper that is not a galaxy: Comet C/2020 R4 ATLAS.
Discovered on the night of September 12, 2020, by the prolific automated Asteroid Terrestrial Impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) sky survey based in Haleakala (ALTAS-HKO) and Mauna Loa (ATLAS-MLO) Hawaii, R4 ATLAS has proven to be an over-achiever. In fact, it was never initially predicted to top +10th magnitude… until a surprise outburst in late December 2020 shot it up 100-fold in brightness, from +18th to +13th magnitude. As of writing this, it sits at about +8th magnitude "with a bullet," and may top out +7th magnitude this week.
OQ Technology secures launches for propriety satellites as connected device market ramps up
Thursday, 22 April 2021 11:47 Write a comment
TAMPA, Fla. — OQ Technology, a Luxembourg space startup created to connect internet of things (IoT) devices to 5G technology, has signed a multi-launch deal with rideshare specialist Spaceflight to loft its own small satellites.
NASA's Webb Telescope to study young exoplanets on the edge
Thursday, 22 April 2021 11:25
Op-ed | Space is Vital for Earth Day
Thursday, 22 April 2021 11:00 Write a comment
Space is vital to the mission and spirit of Earth Day. One might even say that Space is really all about Earth. From Space, we monitor forests, deserts and regions under stress in order to better protect them.
ESA astronaut André Kuipers on sheltering from space debris
Thursday, 22 April 2021 10:35 Write a comment
André Kuipers is one of a handful of astronauts who has had to 'shelter-in-place' from a piece of marauding space debris.
NASA emphasizes good relationship with Roscosmos as Russia mulls exiting ISS
Thursday, 22 April 2021 10:27 Write a comment
KENNEDY SPACE CENTER, Fla. — NASA’s acting head says the agency’s relationship with Russia remains good despite comments by Russian officials in recent days that the country could abandon the International Space Station as soon as 2025.
Yuri Borisov, Russian deputy prime minister, said on Russian television April 18 that Russia could withdraw from the ISS partnership in 2025.
China Orbiting 400 Satellites, Heading for 1,000 by 2030, US Space Command Chief Says
Thursday, 22 April 2021 07:03 Write a comment
China now has 400 satellites in orbit, second only in number to the United States and it is projected to have at least one thousand of them deployed by the end of this decade, Space Command chief Army General James Dickinson said in congressional testimony on Tuesday.
"Back in 2010 they had 70 satellites in orbit: Today they have 400," Dickinson told the US Senate Armed Services Committee. The End of Space Access
Thursday, 22 April 2021 07:03 Write a comment
Many recent articles have expressed concern about the growing amount of junk floating around Earth in low orbits. Ultimately, the mass and distribution of junk and active satellites will exceed the capacity of space to safely contain the debris generated by the addition of more than an estimated 50,000 new satellites planned for deployment in the next few years. If and when this limit is reached Can a new type of glacier on Mars aid future astronauts
Thursday, 22 April 2021 07:03 Write a comment
On April 21, 1908, near Earth's North Pole, the Arctic explorer Frederick Albert Cook scrawled in his diary a memorable phrase: "We were the only pulsating creatures in a dead world of ice." These words may soon take on new significance for humankind in another dead world of hidden ice, submerged beneath the red sand of its frigid deserts. This dead world is Mars, and the desert is the planet's Hide and Seek - How NASA's Lucy Mission Team Discovered Eurybates' Satellite
Thursday, 22 April 2021 07:03 Write a comment
On Jan. 9, 2020, NASA's Lucy mission officially announced that it would be visiting not seven, but eight asteroids. As it turns out, Eurybates, one of the asteroids along Lucy's path, has a small satellite.
Though searching for satellites is one of the mission's central goals, finding these tiny worlds before Lucy is launched gives the team the opportunity to investigate their orbits and p