SPACE
& SCIENCE NEWS: December 2004
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& science news > space & science news: December 2004: 1
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Cassini makes Titan return pass
(Dec 13, 2004)
The Cassini spacecraft has made one last flyby of Titan before it
despatches the Huygens probe for a rendezvous with the Saturnian moon.
It will give engineers a final chance to obtain detailed information
on the behaviour of the satellite's atmosphere This data will be essential
if Huygens is to have a fighting chance of surviving its 6km/s entry
into Titan's thick "air" on 14 January next year. The flyby will also
give scientists another peek at the mysterious moon.
Read
more. Source: BBC |
Spitzer, Hubble capture evolving planetary
systems
(Dec 12, 2004)
Two of NASA's Great Observatories, the Spitzer Space Telescope and
the Hubble Space Telescope, have provided astronomers an unprecedented
look at dusty planetary debris around stars the size of our sun. Spitzer
has discovered for the first time dusty discs around mature, sun-like
stars known to have planets. Hubble captured the most detailed image
ever of a brighter disc circling a much younger sun-like star. The
findings offer "snapshots" of the process by which our own solar system
evolved, from its dusty and chaotic beginnings to its more settled
present-day state.
Read
more. Source: Spaceflight Now / STScI |
Lonely whale's song remains a mystery
(Dec 11, 2004)
A lone whale with a voice unlike any other has been wandering the
Pacific for the past 12 years. Marine biologist Mary Ann Daher of
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, US, and her
colleagues used signals recorded by the US navy’s submarine-tracking
hydrophones to trace the movements of whales in the north Pacific.
The partially declassified records show that a lone whale singing
at around 52 hertz has cruised the ocean every autumn and winter since
1992. Its calls do not match those of any known species, although
they are clearly those of a baleen whale, a group that includes blue,
fin and humpback whales.
Read
more. Source: New Scientist |
Nuclear space explorer to solve riddles
of Neptune
(Dec 10, 2004)
A team of American engineers is studying the feasibility of a nuclear-powered
mission to Neptune and its icy moons, on the outer edges of the solar
system. A huge spacecraft driven by a compact nuclear reactor could
drop a series of probes into Neptune's atmosphere and help answer
questions about the birth of the solar system. The team, led by Boeing
and backed by NASA, has begun the 12-month study of what one scientist
calls "the ultimate in deep space exploration". Neptune is a gas giant,
the eighth - and, through an accident of planetary orbits sometimes
the most distant - of the nine planets.
Read
more. Source: The Guardian |
Frozen heavenly body hints at a warm heart
(Dec 9, 2004)
The outer solar system may not be a cemetery full of dead, frozen
bodies, suggest new observations of a large object called Quaoar.
The study, which says the large body could once have been “warm”,
supports theoretical predictions that "planetary" processes such as
volcanism can occur in objects at extreme distances from the Sun.
Quaoar is 1250 kilometres in diameter – about half the size
of Pluto – and is the largest known Kuiper-Belt Object (KBO).
These ice-and-rock bodies are left over from the formation of the
solar system and form a ring – the Kuiper Belt – beyond
Neptune's orbit. Scientists have found about 1000 KBOs so far, but
little is known about their composition because they are so distant
and faint. Now, observations with the 8-metre Subaru telescope in
Hawaii have revealed the spectral signature of crystalline water-ice
– and possibly ammonia – in sunlight reflected from Quaoar.
Read
more. Source: New Scientist |
Russian call for Mars volunteers
(Dec 8, 2004)
Russian scientists are selecting volunteers to be locked in a capsule
for 500 days to test plans for a trip to Mars. The mock mission is
designed to simulate the tough conditions of a space trip to the Red
Planet. A team of six men will be physically cut off from the outside
world to test equipment intended to make them self-sufficient for
long periods. Their capsule will consist of a bedroom, a kitchen and
a laboratory.
Read
more. Source: BBC |
'Brainwave' cap controls computer
(Dec 7, 2004)
A team of US researchers has shown that controlling devices with the
brain is a step closer. Four people, two of them partly paralysed
wheelchair users, successfully moved a computer cursor while wearing
a cap with 64 electrodes. Previous research has shown that monkeys
can control a computer with electrodes implanted into their brain.
The New York team reported their findings in the Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences.
Read
more. Source: BBC |
Hubble spots 'youngest galaxy'
(Dec 7, 2004)
The Hubble Space Telescope has spotted what may be the youngest galaxy
ever seen in the Universe. The spring chicken may be as young as 500
million years old - so recent that complex life had already arisen
on Earth by the time it started to bloom. Called I Zwicky 18, it has
provided astronomers with a rare glimpse into what the Universe's
first diminutive galaxies might have looked like. The finding is reported
in the latest issue of the Astrophysical Journal.
Read
more. Source: BBC |
Artificial cells take shape
(Dec 7, 2004)
Primitive cells similar to bacteria have been created by US researchers.
These synthetic cells are not truly alive, because they cannot replicate
or evolve. But they can churn out proteins for days, and could be
useful for drug production, as well as advancing the quest to build
artificial life from scratch. Vincent Noireaux and Albert Libchaber
of the Rockefeller University in New York have managed to package
up some of the molecular machinery of a cell inside an artificial,
bacterium-sized membrane. And they can perforate the membrane with
holes that allow nutrients and energy-rich molecules to get into the
cells from the surroundings.
Read
more. Source: Nature |
Star's pulse of radiation is strongest
ever
(Dec 6, 2004)
The brightest pulse of radiation ever seen has come from a pulsar
nearly 12,000 light years away. Lasting less than 15 billionths of
a second (15 nanoseconds), the burst was recorded by a massive radio
telescope at Tidbinbilla in Australia. Although the star was discovered
decades ago, it is only now that telescopes have become sensitive
enough to record such a fleeting phenomenon. At the point where the
pulse was emitted “the electromagnetic field strengths would be capable
of totally vaporising and ionising all known materials, shredding
them into hot plasma”, says Wayne Cannon of York University in Toronto,
Canada, though the pulse was harmless by the time it reached Earth.
Read
more. Source: New Scientist |
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