Space and Planets

Stop number 1 for the new space probe, Deep Impact, is the planet Earth. The probe was supposed to hit comet Tempel 1 for study of the comet's interior, it is being sent to a backup target, comet Hartley 2. While it is waiting for that comet, it is being used to search for extrasolar planets. The date with the comet is November 2010. So what is it looking for on Earth? Haven't we put enough satellites into orbit that study the Earth? Not only that, but how many shuttle flights have studied the Earth? NASA states that they were studying the reflectivity of the Earth and wanted to know exactly how a planet of water with continents scattered about would look in different wavelengths. It is hard to imagine that this is the first time that question has ever come up and also hard to understand why any other satellite could not have accomplished this instead of interrupting the search for other planets? Was there something that NASA was not telling us? NASA now says it wants the satellite to take polar views of Earth.

Well it looks like even tiny stars can have planets. A star that is in the constellation Aquila is the smallest star known to have any planets. The star is only small by star standards, as it is about one twelfth the mass of our own sun. Ironically the planet itself is a gas giant. It is over six times the mass of Jupiter. Another interesting fact is that it is located in about the same position from its sun as Jupiter is from ours. One astronomer commented, "It's possible this star also has inner rocky planets. And since more than seven out of 10 stars are small like this one, this could mean planets are more common than we thought." For all you digital camera fans out there, here is an interesting fact. The photos were taken using the Mt. Palomar Observatory's 5 meter Hale telescope with a 16 megapixel charge-coupled device. Some cameras available to us have more megapixel sensitivity. My how technology has advanced.

NASA is now stating that evidence is growing for past life on Mars and that microbes might exist now. How do they come to this conclusion? They are basing it on the finding of the Mars Rovers. The more diverse minerals that are found, the more they feel that life once existed. They are trying to narrow down the most promising areas for further study. Notice how nothing is said about any of the strange structures in the Cydonia region. I can't help but feel we are being led on when I read news like this since NASA has never mentioned what is in that region except to say that the photo of the face on Mars was a light trick and released a tampered with new face photo that shows only a mound of dirt or stone. New rovers are being planned for Mars and the Curiosity Rover will carry over ten times the amount of scientific payload as the other rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, which are now on Mars. The Curiosity Rover is far larger than any rover so far, being about the size of a full sized automobile and reaching to the height of a man at the top of its camera. One scientist has stated, "There is encouraging new MRO evidence that makes the pursuit of present day life very worthwhile," One last word on the subject, did you ever wonder if we put other rovers on Mars and the public wasn't told and maybe these rovers are in the Cydonia region?

SETI, Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence, now possesses the third largest computer in the world. It is being used to search for alien life. The thing is that the computer is not what we think of a computer as, it is a network of perhaps hundreds of thousands of home computers that are allowing SETI to use them when they are idle. This is accomplished by running a SETI screen saver that crunches data that has been returned by the radio telescopes. Together all these computers are very powerful and as computers become more efficient and get more cores and faster processors, the more powerful the SETI network becomes. So far the most interesting signal that SETI ever received was the famous WOW signal. This is one that seemed to be intelligent, coming from outer space. It impressed the scientists so much that one of them wrote “WOW” next to it on the printout. The problem with this signal was that it was a one shot deal. SETI could not acquire it again and therefore it remains a mystery. SETI has been searching the heavens since May 17, 1999. Almost all the data comes from the giant Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. This telescope can receive over one billion channels at a time.

Well we have a mystery on our hands, or should I say that NASA has it. The Chandra X-ray Observatory recently discovered an X-ray source that existed about three billion years after the big bang, but it is located ten billion light years away. What does all this mean? Well it looks to me that this source had to travel over three times the speed of light to get where it is, if you believe that everything was compressed in one spot then exploded. One thing that I have a question about is exactly where was this super atom supposed to have been located? It is hard to get an answer to this, but scientists have an idea. Does this mean that either Einstein was wrong about breaking the speed of light or the Big Bang theory is wrong or both are wrong? If we really examine the theory of the Big Bang we notice that the heat generated just before the Big Bang would be so hot that no atoms could have existed. We are also told that everything was squeezed into something the size of a grain of sand. There are a lot of problems here. Anyway the X-ray source is now just a ghost image and astronomers feel that it is some kind of clue to how things were billions of years ago in the universe. They believe that a huge black hole created this X-ray source and is long dead.

Left: Lake Baikal
Right: Closeup of Ice Circle
Photo Source: NASA

There has been a lot of talk lately about strange ice circles that have been appearing on the surface of Lake Baikal in Siberia. Lake Baikai is frozen. The ice circles were seen by astronauts aboard the ISS or International Space Station. At least that pile of money sucking junk is good for something, looking out the windows. The ice circles have puzzled scientists since their discovery, but now it seems that the mystery is solved. Here is the conclusion that the scientific community has come to. They state that methane gas rising to the surface of the lake probably caused the circles. They say that the methane causes a rising mass of warm water to swirls.

Charles F. Bolden Jr.
Photo Source: NASA

I guess we all know by now that President Obama has picked a former astronaut to be the head of NASA. I know that I was very happy with his choice. Who could better understand this agency than a former astronaut? Oh he might not understand the financing and such, but he will have people that will advise him on these things, much as the President has his advisors. The man is Charles F. Bolden Jr. and was instrumental in launching the Hubble Space Telescope. Mike Griffin the former administrator stated, "The president could not have made a better choice,". He went on to say that Bolder was not only an accomplished pilot and astronaut, but also an old friend.