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Honolulu HI (SPX) Jan 12, 2021
"They should have sent a poet," says Ellie Arroway in the film Contact as, suspended in outer space, she gazes upon a spiral galaxy. Almost all of the planets discovered to date (including the solar system planets) are confined to the plane of the Milky Way, unable to glimpse such a sweeping vista of our galaxy. However, astronomers at the University of Hawai?i Institute for Astronomy (IfA) usin
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Honolulu HI (SPX) Jan 12, 2021
A team of astronomers led by University of Hawai?i Institute for Astronomy (IfA) graduate student Travis Berger has shown that an intriguing class of Neptune-sized planets shrinks over billions of years. From centuries of studying the planets within our solar system, astronomers have wondered how planets form and evolve to become the ones we observe them today. One of the most surprising f
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Riverside CA (SPX) Jan 12, 2021
Scientists aren't usually able to measure the size of gigantic planets, like Jupiter or Saturn, which are far from the stars they orbit. But a UC Riverside-led team has done it. The planet is roughly five times heavier than Jupiter, hence its nickname GOT 'EM-1b, which stands for Giant Outer Transiting Exoplanet Mass. Though it is nearly 1,300 light years away from Earth, GOT 'EM-1b, or Ke
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Orlando FL (SPX) Jan 12, 2021
Data from Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico has been used to help detect the first possible hints of low-frequency disturbances in the curvature of space-time. The results were presented at the 237th meeting of the American Astronomical Society, which was held virtually, and are published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. Arecibo Observatory is managed by the University of Central Flo
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Tucson AZ (SPX) Jan 11, 2021
NASA has selected the University of Arizona to lead one of its four inaugural Astrophysics Pioneers missions. With a $20 million cost cap, the Aspera mission will study galaxy evolution with a space telescope barely larger than a mini fridge. The telescope will allow researchers to observe galaxy processes that have remained hidden from view until now.
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SAN FRANCISCO – NOAA’s National Satellite, Data and Information Service is recommending flying three satellites over the United States in the satellite constellation that will follow the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite R Series (GOES-R).

In addition, to operating satellites in orbits similar to those of the current GOES East and GOES West satellites, NOAA recommends placing a third spacecraft over the center of the United States, Pam Sullivan, GOES-R system program director, said Jan.

Researchers find Mars has a Chandler wobble

Sunday, 10 January 2021 17:50
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Mars
Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

A combined team of researchers from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology and the Royal Observatory of Belgium, has found evidence that Mars has a Chandler wobble. In their paper published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, the group describes their study of decades of data from Mars probes and what it showed them.

Approximately a century ago, astronomer Seth Carlo Chandler discovered that imperfectly round objects (such as planets) sometimes spin off their axis for periods of time. The phenomenon has come to be known as the Chandler wobble, and has been documented for planet Earth, which veers from its axis for distances up to 30 feet in a pattern that repeats approximately every 433 days. Researchers have suggested that other planets likely have a Chandler wobble, but until now, it has never been observed because measuring it on the planet scale requires over many years. In this new effort, the researchers obtained the right kind of data from that orbited Mars over many years: The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, the Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Odyssey.

Coronal holes during the solar maximum

Sunday, 10 January 2021 16:28
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Coronal holes during the solar maximum
An ultraviolet image of the Sun showing a coronal hole - a dark region, seen here at the north pole of the Sun with NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory. Coronal holes are regions where the weakened magnetic field allows for a stronger solar wind to emerge. Astronomers have found correlations between coronal holes near the Sun's equator and the eleven and twenty-two year solar cycles.
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Experts from across NASA will discuss topics ranging from black holes to exploding stars to planets beyond our solar system at the 237th meeting of the American Astronomical Society (AAS).

Intelsat orders two satellites from Airbus

Sunday, 10 January 2021 11:58
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Intelsat Airbus OneSat

WASHINGTON — Intelsat has ordered two geostationary communications satellites from Airbus Defence and Space that will support the satellite operator’s aviation connectivity business.

The companies announced Jan. 8 the order of two spacecraft from Airbus’ OneSat family of fully reconfigurable geostationary satellites.

Cosmic neon lights

Sunday, 10 January 2021 10:00
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Cosmic neon lights Image: Cosmic neon lights
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Circular L-band (navigation) and hexagonal (SAR) antenna

The end of 2020 marked a notable milestone for Europe’s Galileo First Generation, as the programme chalked up its 500th ESA Engineering Board.

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Houston TX (SPX) Jan 11, 2021
By capsule, helicopter, boat, plane, and car, space station science experiments are about to make a first of a kind journey back to researchers on Earth. On Jan. 11, the SpaceX cargo Dragon spacecraft carrying out the company's 21st commercial resupply services (CRS-21) mission for NASA undocks from the International Space Station, heading for splashdown off
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Beijing (XNA) Jan 11, 2021
The lander and rover of the Chang'e-4 probe have resumed work for the 26th lunar day on the far side of the moon. The lander woke up at 3:13 a.m. on Friday (Beijing time), and the rover Yutu-2, or Jade Rabbit-2, woke up at 10:29 a.m. on Thursday, according to the Lunar Exploration and Space Program Center of the China National Space Administration. Landing on the moon on Jan. 3, 2019
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Hampton VA (SPX) Jan 11, 2021
This little black camera looks like something out of a spy movie - the kind of device one might use to snap discrete photos of confidential documents. It's about half the size of a computer mouse. But the only spying this camera - four of them, actually - will do is for NASA researchers wondering what happens under a spacecraft as it lands on the Moon. It's a tiny technology wi
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