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☆ Explainer: What to expect during the green comet's encounter with Earth
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( Joey Roulette | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

Nicknamed "dirty snowballs" by astronomers, comets are balls of ice, dust and rocks that typically hail from the ring of icy material called the Oort cloud at our solar system's outer edge. One known comet actually originated outside the solar system - 2I/Borisov. Comets are composed of a solid core of rock, ice and dust and are blanketed by a thin and gassy atmosphere of more ice and dust, called a coma. Its greenish, emerald hue reflects the comet's chemical composition - it is the result of a clash between sunlight and carbon-based molecules in the comet's coma. NASA plans to observe the comet with its James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), which could provide clues about the solar system's formation.

☆ One year after volcanic blast, many of Tonga's reefs lay silent
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-15 | by ( Gloria Dickie | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +5 min

Coral reefs were turned to rubble and many fish perished or migrated away. Following the eruption, the Tongan government said it would seek $240 million for recovery, including improving food security. SILENT REEFSThe vast majority of Tongan territory is ocean, with its exclusive economic zone extending across nearly 700,000 square kilometres (270,271 square miles) of water. It is likely volcanic ash smothered many reefs, depriving fish of feeding areas and spawning beds. While volcanic eruptions on land eject mostly ash and sulfur dioxide, underwater volcanos jettison far more water.

☆ UN says ozone layer slowly healing, hole to mend by 2066
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-09 | by ( The Associated Press | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +4 min

Earth’s protective ozone layer is slowly but noticeably healing at a pace that would fully mend the hole over Antarctica in about 43 years, a new United Nations report says. “In the upper stratosphere and in the ozone hole we see things getting better,” said Paul Newman, co-chair of the scientific assessment. Natural weather patterns in the Antarctic also affect ozone hole levels, which peak in the fall. A third generation of those chemicals, called HFC, was banned a few years ago not because it would eat at the ozone layer but because it is a heat-trapping greenhouse gas. The report also warned that efforts to artificially cool the planet by putting aerosols into the atmosphere to reflect the sunlight would thin the ozone layer by as much as 20% in Antarctica.

☆ On Pluto you could throw a baseball over the Great Pyramid of Giza, a scientist's animation reveals
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-27 | by ( Morgan Mcfall-Johnsen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

An astronomer's animation reveals how far the average person could throw a ball on different worlds. On Pluto, your baseball could clear the Great Pyramid of Giza. Watch a ball throw on each planet in our solar system, plus Pluto and the moon, below. At just two-thirds the diameter of our moon, Pluto has such weak gravity that your baseball could clear the 455-foot-tall Great Pyramid of Giza — with room to spare. The video plays out in "real time," showing how long each ball throw would take, O'Donoghue said.

☆ Webb telescope spies clouds beneath haze of Saturn moon Titan
▼ + stars: | 2022-12-01 | by ( Ashley Strickland | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

CNN —The James Webb Space Telescope has spied clouds on one of the solar system’s most intriguing moons. Titan’s atmosphere is made of nitrogen and methane, which gives it a fuzzy, orange appearance. Astronomers compared Webb (left) and Keck images of Titan to see how clouds evolved. The data, which is still being analyzed, was able to see deeper into Titan’s atmosphere and surface than the Cassini spacecraft, which orbited Saturn and its moons for 13 years. The cloud observations were a long time coming.

☆ James Webb Space Telescope: No evidence linking namesake to firings of LGBTQ staff
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-18 | by ( Scottie Andrew | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +5 min

CNN —Despite numerous calls from astronomers to rename its powerful new telescope, NASA officials stood by the naming of the James Webb Space Telescope before its launch. With the telescope nearly a year into its stint in space, the agency has released its chief historian’s investigation into the namesake of the telescope. Earlier this summer, Dr. Jane Rigby, the operations project scientist for the James Webb Space Telescope, tweeted that “a transformative telescope should have a name that stands for discovery and inclusion.”Officials at NASA have refused to rename it, though, citing an investigation into Webb’s career. The James Webb Space Telescope is the most powerful telescope ever built. NASA Goddard Space Flight CenterNo evidence links Webb to any action that followed those discussions, Odom said.

☆ Webb telescope finds two of the most distant galaxies ever observed
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-17 | by ( Ashley Strickland | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

CNN —The James Webb Space Telescope has spied one of the earliest galaxies formed after the big bang, about 350 million years after the universe began. Webb’s capability to look deeper into the universe than other telescopes is revealing previously hidden aspects of the universe, including astonishingly distant galaxies such as these two finds. Two distant galaxies were observed by the James Webb Space Telescope. Just a few hundred million years after the big bang, there were already lots of galaxies. Detection of light invisible to the human eyeThe new findings about the two galaxies might mean there are other bright galaxies waiting to be found in the distant universe.

☆ Astronauts' stunning photos from the International Space Station show Earth's triumphs and tragedies in 2022
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-05 | by ( Morgan Mcfall-Johnsen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: 1 min

"At the beginning of the war, the whole country went dark at night," German astronaut Matthias Maurer said in May, adding, "People actually only recognized Kyiv." Kyiv, Ukraine, as seen by satellite in January 2022, left, and March 2022, right. NASA Earth Observatory/Joshua Stevens/Black Marble data courtesy of Ranjay Shrestha/NASA Goddard Space Flight CenterThat's what he told German broadcaster ARD's "Morgenmagazin" program, according to a translation in Newsweek. "Then you could also see the impacts in the first days of the war. In Kyiv, you could see lightning at night," as well as the "rockets that hit," he added, according to Newsweek.

☆ A lunar eclipse will bring a blood red moon on Election Day — the last one for 3 years
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-04 | by ( Morgan Mcfall-Johnsen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

That paints the full moon red, raising a blood moon into the skies on Election Day morning. The next total lunar eclipse won't happen until 2025. It's a total lunar eclipse, often called a "blood moon," and there won't be another one until 2025. The blue light from the sun scatters away, and longer-wavelength red, orange, and yellow light pass through, turning our moon red. Then wait until March 14, 2025, for the next total lunar eclipse.

☆ Fact Check-The Earth is not covered by a dome or ‘firmament’
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-31 | by ( Reuters Fact Check | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +7 min

Users on social media are saying people on Earth are living under a dome, also called a “firmament,” without providing evidence to support the claim. But the video’s examples offer no proof of humans living under a dome or firmament, while there is ample evidence that no dome exists. “Rocket hitting the flat earth dome”, reads the title of one of the YouTube clips. SIXTY YEARS OF SPACEFLIGHTExperts pointed out that if there were a dome that covered the Earth, astronauts would have encountered it by now. A video provides no evidence that the Earth is under a dome or “firmament”.

☆ NASA's James Webb Space Telescope just snapped the clearest image of Neptune's rings in 33 years
▼ + stars: | 2022-09-21 | by ( Paola Rosa-Aquino | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

New infrared images from the James Webb Space Telescope show detailed views Neptune's rings. Neptune's rings taken in infrared by the James Webb Space Telescope, right. On the left is a composite of two images of Neptune's rings taken by Voyager 2. Thomas Zurbuchen, associate administrator of NASA's Science Mission Directorate, wrote about Webb's Neptune images on Twitter Wednesday. The James Webb Space Telescope's Near-Infrared Camera image of Neptune and its rings.

☆ The James Webb Space Telescope is astronomy's shiny new toy, but the Hubble Space Telescope isn't old news — it's at its scientific peak
▼ + stars: | 2022-08-28 | by ( Paola Rosa-Aquino | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

Since its launch in 1990, the Hubble Space Telescope has made revolutionary achievements in astronomy. The new James Webb Space Telescope is popular, but Hubble has skills, like capturing visible and ultraviolet light, that Webb doesn't. "The Webb Space Telescope is good news for astronomy, and good news for the Hubble Space Telescope as well, since Webb and Hubble enhance and complement each other's unique capabilities," Jennifer Wiseman, senior project scientist for the Hubble Space Telescope at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, told Insider. A globular cluster NGC 6540 in the constellation Sagittarius, which was captured by the Hubble Space Telescope. A deep field image from the Hubble space telescope, left, and a deep field image from the James Webb Space Telescope, right.

☆ Telescopul Hubble s-a defectat: unul din computerele de la bord, din anii 80, dă erori; Anunțul NASA
▼ + stars: | 2021-06-18 | by ( ) www.jurnal.md time to read: +1 min

Sursa foto: ProfimediaTelescopul Hubble s-a defectat: unul din computerele de la bord, din anii 80, dă erori; Anunțul NASANASA încearcă să repare telescopul spațial Hubble, probabil cel mai cunoscut instrument de observare a spațiului cosmic, care s-a defectat din cauza unei probleme apărute la un computer de la bordul acestuia, datând din anii 1980. Telescopul spațial Hubble, care în 2020 a marcat 30 de ani de orbită, a fost oprit duminică, după apariția unor probleme la unul dintre computerele telescopului, datând din anii 1980. Echipa de operațiuni a telescopului suspectează că problema ar putea fi cauzată de un modul de memorie degradat. Duminică, computerul principal al telescopului a încetat să mai primească semnale de la un alt computer și a trimis un mesaj de eroare către sistemul de control de pe Pământ, transmite Digi24. La începutul activității sale, oamenii de știință au descoperit o eroare la sistemul de control al direcționării observatorului și probleme cu forma oglinzii sale principale.

Persons: Hubble Organizations: Hubble, Goddard Space Flight

☆ The December solstice is here. Here's how it works and why it starts winter and summer at the same time.
▼ + stars: | 2018-12-21 | by ( Marianne Guenot | Shayanne Gal | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

The 2022 winter solstice happens on Wednesday 21 December at 4:48 p.m. It is the winter solstice in the northern hemisphere but the summer solstice in the southern. This is due to Earth's tilted axis as it orbits around the sun. How the December solstice worksThe winter solstice is the point when the sun will stay closest to the horizon all day. At that point, the sun's most direct rays reach the Tropic of Cancer, summer starts for the northern hemisphere, and winter begins for those south of the equator.

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