Universe Today: “Across the Universe” Day for NASA and Beatles Fans

Written by Nancy Atkinson

NASA will use its Deep Space Network to transmit a song across the universe. And fittingly, the song is “Across the Universe” by the Beatles. On Feb. 4 at 7 pm EST, the song will be beamed towards the North Star, Polaris, located 431 light years away from Earth, and will travel across the universe at 186,000 miles per second. Former Beatle Paul McCartney thinks this is a great idea. "Send my love to the aliens,” he said in a message to NASA. If there are any beings near Polaris, they’ll hear the song in about 431 years.

The song’s transmission will commemorate the 40th anniversary of the day The Beatles recorded the song, as well as the 50th anniversary of both NASA's founding and the beginning days of the Beatles. Two other anniversaries also are being honored: The launch 50 years ago this week of Explorer 1, the first U.S. satellite, and the founding 45 years ago of the Deep Space Network, an international network of antennas that supports missions to explore the universe.

Feb. 4 has been declared "Across The Universe Day" by Beatles fans to commemorate the anniversaries. As part of the celebration, the public around the world has been invited to participate in the event by simultaneously playing the song at the same time as the transmission by NASA.

John Lennon's widow, Yoko Ono, characterized the song's transmission as a significant event. "I see that this is the beginning of the new age in which we will communicate with billions of planets across the universe," she said.

Even though radio and television signals on Earth “leak” out into space all the time, hopefully NASA can use this event to generate enthusiasm and promote awareness of its history, as well as its plans for future missions. Additionally, this is a chance for the public to learn more about the Deep Space Network, NASA’s incredibly reliable system of radio antennas that is critical in supporting lunar and planetary exploration. The DSN is used for tracking of spacecraft, sending telemetry and commands, and for deep space navigation. Learn more about the DSN here.

Original News Source: NASA Press Release

Universe Today: Mercury is Less Like the Moon than Previously Believed

Written by Fraser Cain

With Mercury fading in MESSENGER's rear view mirror, scientists are just starting to pore through the torrent of images sent back. And as you can probably guess, the new mysteries are piling up fast and furious. The planet is much less like the Moon than scientists previously thought.

MESSENGER made its closest approach to Mercury on January 14, passing just a few hundred kilometres above its surface. During the flyby it captured a total of 1,213 images.

One of the most unique features discovered by MESSENGER has been dubbed "The Spider" by scientists. And that's what it looks like. The feature has a central crater surrounded by more than a hundred narrow, flat-floored troughs (called graben) radiating away.

Unlike the Moon, Mercury has huge cliffs or scarps, which can snake hundreds of kilometres across the planet's surface. They trace the lines of old volcanic faults, from when the planet was still geologically active.

Because of its small size and high density, Mercury has a surprisingly large pull of gravity. Astronauts walking around its surface would experience 38% of the Earth's gravity. This higher gravity means that the impact craters look different. Material doesn't splash out from the impact craters so far, and there are many more secondary crater chains.

“We have seen new craters along the terminator on the side of the planet viewed by Mariner 10 where the illumination of the MESSENGER images revealed very subtle features. Technological advances that have been incorporated in MESSENGER are effectively revealing an entirely new planet from what we saw over 30 years ago,” said Science Team Co-Investigator Robert Strom, professor emeritus at the University of Arizona and the only member of both the MESSENGER and Mariner 10 science teams.

MESSENGER wasn't just taking pictures. It also had a suite of scientific instruments measuring many features of the planet. Perhaps the most puzzling of these is its magnetic field. Even though Mercury cooled down and solidified eons ago, it still has an magnetic field. This was first detected by Mariner 10, and MESSENGER confirmed it.

This is just the beginning. MESSENGER will return to Mercury on October 6, 2008 to make a second flyby, and then a third on September 29, 2009. The spacecraft make its final return to the planet on March 18, 2011 when it'll begin a year-long orbital mission.

Original Source: MESSENGER News Release

Universe Today: ‘Suits and Ties’ Collaborate on Successful Space Station Repair

Written by Nancy Atkinson

At the end of Wednesday’s successful spacewalk to change out a faulty motor on one of the International Space Station’s solar array positioning devices, the astronauts outside the ISS and flight controllers in Houston were congratulating each other on the group effort it took to pull off this particularly tricky and potentially dangerous repair job.

“You guys looked really good to us. Thanks for making it look so easy,” Mission Control in Houston radioed up to the spacewalkers after their seven-hour and 10 minutes EVA.

“Yeah,” said ISS astronaut Dan Tani. “And we didn’t even have to put on a tie.”

This spacewalk really was a collaboration between the “suits and ties” at NASA. The suits – spacesuits, that is – were worn by astronauts Tani and Peggy Whitson. The ties were sported by the engineers and astronauts in Mission Control who planned the repair and guided the spacewalkers during the entire EVA.

Tani and Whitson were thanking one tie-wearing astronaut in particular. Tom Marshburn had practiced the choreography of the spacewalk in the Neutral Buoyancy Lab in Houston, and shared his insights with the spacewalkers. Usually astronauts get to practice their own EVA’s in the enormous pool that contains a mock-up of the ISS. But the Bearing Motor Roll Ring Module on the starboard solar array quit working in December when Whitson and Tani were already on board the station. So the plan and nuances of the EVA were tested in the pool by Marshburn and former ISS resident Suni Williams and relayed up to Tani and Whitson.

The spacewalk was especially hazardous because of the risk of electrical shock from 160 volts of electricity that flows through the arrays. For safety, Whitson and Tani waited until the International Space Station was on the dark side of Earth, giving them only 33 minute increments to complete their tasks. Whitson had to squeeze inside the station's truss girder to swap out the 250 pound (113 kilograms) garbage can-sized motor.

The new motor successfully performed a 360-degree test spin during the spacewalk. It's power-generating capabilities were tested successfully as well.

"Yay, it works!" exclaimed Whitson as she and Tani watched the solar wing turn. "Excellent, outstanding…isn't that cool?"

The successful repair means the station should be able to generate enough power to support the new modules that will be brought on the next shuttle missions, the European Columbus science lab, and the Japanese Kibo labratory.

"Given the complexity of this spacewalk and the risks that we had to manage … we are exceptionally pleased with how things went," flight director Kwatsi Alibaruho said after the EVA.

In addition to the motor repair, Whitson and Tani also performed another inspection of the station's starboard Solar Alpha Rotary Joint, a 10-ft wide gear that keeps the solar wings pointing toward the sun The SARJ is not working and is contaminated with metal shavings. The spacewalkers evaluated damage from the debris and collected samples from areas previously unseen.

Alibaruho said the new debris samples will help determine what repairs will be done, perhaps later this year. NASA hopes to launch up to five shuttle flights to the ISS this year.

Wednesday's EVA was the final planned spacewalk of the Expedition 16 mission and the 101st dedicated to space station assembly and maintenance. The spacewalk also marked the sixth career EVA's for both Whitson and Tani.

So, there’s just one question for Dan Tani: Which is harder — donning a 280 lb spacesuit or tying a Windsor Knot?

Original News Source: NASA TV

Universe Today: 50 Years Ago: Explorer 1

Written by Nancy Atkinson

The launch of Sputnik in October 1957 changed the world overnight. And with the Soviet Union’s second successful launch of Sputnik 2 the following month, Americans were feeling a little left behind in the dust, especially after the US’s first satellite launch attempt with the Vanguard rocket exploded on the launchpad. But space pioneer Werner Von Braun, shown in this picture with JPL Director William Pickering and scientist James Van Allen, came through with his Jupiter C rocket that launched the US’s first satellite, Explorer 1, into space on January 31, 1958.

Explorer 1 was not all that big, with a length of 203 centimeters (80 inches), a diameter of 15.9 centimeters (6.25 inches), and a weight of 14 kilograms (30.8 pounds). But it did its job, which was, first and foremost, to reach orbit, and then return scientific information.

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory got the assignment of designing and building a scientific payload for the launch, which they accomplished in three months.

The primary science instrument on Explorer 1 was a cosmic ray detector designed to measure the radiation above the atmosphere. Dr. James Van Allen designed the experiment, which revealed a much lower cosmic ray count than expected. Van Allen theorized that the instrument may have been saturated by very strong radiation from a belt of charged particles trapped in space by Earth’s magnetic field. A subsequent launch by Explorer 3 two months later confirmed the existence of these radiation belts, which became known as the Van Allen Belts, in honor of their discoverer.

There were other scientific findings from Explorer 1 as well. Because of its symmetrical shape, Explorer 1 was used to help determine the upper atmospheric densities.

Two other instruments on board looked for micrometeorites in orbit, a micrometeorite detector and an acoustic microphone to detect the sound of an micrometeorite imipact. The micrometeorite detector was made of grid of electrical wires. A micrometeorite of about 10 microns would fracture a wire upon impact, destroy the electrical connection, and record the event. One or two of the wires were destroyed during launch. The equipment worked for about 60 days, but showed only one possible meteorite impact. Data from the acoustical sensor microphone were obtained only when an impact occurred while the satellite was over a ground recording station. However, over an 11-day period (February 1, 1958, to February 12, 1958), 145 impacts were recorded. The high impact rates on one portion of the orbit and the subsequent failures in the satellite's electronic system were attributed to a meteor shower.

The batteries ran out on Explorer 1 on May 23, 1958 when the last signal was recorded. The US’s first satellite burned up in re-entry of the atmosphere in March of 1970.

Original News Source: JPL

Universe Today: Carnival of Space #39

Written by Fraser Cain

We've got another first-time host for the Carnival of Space this week: Sean Welton and his website, Visual Astronomy. So please take a moment, visit his site, and enjoy the space articles prepared for your education and entertainment. Thanks Sean!

Click here to read the Carnival of Space #39

And if you're interested in looking back, here's an archive to all the past carnivals of space. If you've got a space-related blog, you should really join the carnival. Just email an entry to carnivalofspace@gmail.com, and the next host will link to it. It will help get awareness out there about your writing, help you meet others in the space community - and community is what blogging is all about. And if you really want to help out, let me know if you can be a host, and I'll schedule you into the calendar.

Finally, if you run a space-related blog, please post a link to the Carnival of Space. Help us get the word out.

Universe Today :The Environmental Impact of a Return to the Moon

Written by Fraser Cain

There are many ways space exploration can affect our environment right here on Earth: toxic chemicals used to manufacture the rocket, carbon dioxide pumped into the atmosphere and the energy used to manufacture the equipment and vehicles, just to name a few. For the next era in space exploration, the Constellation Program, NASA has released a 500-page document detailing its effect on the environment.

Back in September 2006, NASA solicited feedback from the public about their plans for the Constellation Program. They were looking for environmental issues and concerns that the people might have. The agency released a draft of their reply to these concerns in August 2007.

The document released Wednesday, is called the Final Constellation Programmatic Environmental Statement (PEIS), and it addresses the comments made to the draft version of the document.

The document explores each NASA centre across the United States, what parts of the Constellation Program it will work on, and the environmental impact the centre might have. This part of the document is fascinating to show how the whole program will come together - where each part will be built.

• Risks to the public associated with launch and Earth atmospheric entry
• Environmental impacts of the use of solid rocket fuels on the ozone layer and impacts associated with the deposition of combustion products near the launch area
• Impacts on local animal species (e.g., sea turtles and manatees) associated with construction and launch activities in the John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC) area
• Noise impacts associated with launch events
• The relationship between the Constellation Program and the Space Shuttle Program, including how the socioeconomic impacts of the Space Shuttle retirement and the Constellation Program overlap.

Perhaps more interesting than the things they considered where the issues that the document won't consider. For example, the document expressly refuses to study the environmental impact on outer space itself, such as orbital debris. It also doesn't consider any military aspects associated with the program and the environmental impact of that. (If the Constellation Program helps launch orbital space lasers, and they're used to zap sea turtle habitats, that's not NASA's problem.)

Although they put in their questions, several submitters won't get an answer. For example, the document won't address how the Kennedy Space Center could manage its light pollution, monitor bird strikes, or raise awareness of metals in the environment. And the environmental impact on the Moon is right out of the question.

Anyway, if you're interested in this topic… and who wouldn't be, you can access the whole document online.

Original Source: NASA

Universe Today : Will Earth Survive When the Sun Becomes a Red Giant?

Written by Fraser Cain

Billions of years in the future, when our Sun bloats up into a red giant, it will expand to consume the Earth's orbit. But wait, you say, the Earth travels the Earth's orbit… what's going to happen to our beloved planet? Will it be gobbled up like poor Mercury and Venus?

Astronomers have been puzzling this question for decades. When the sun becomes a red giant, the simple calculation would put its equator out past Mars. All of the inner planets would be consumed.

However, as the Sun reaches this late stage in its stellar evolution, it loses a tremendous amount of mass through powerful stellar winds. As it grows, it loses mass, causing the planets to spiral outwards. So the question is, will the expanding Sun overtake the planets spiraling outwards, or will Earth (and maybe even Venus) escape its grasp.

K.-P Schroder and Robert Cannon Smith are two researchers trying to get to the bottom of this question. They've run the calculations with the most current models of stellar evolution, and published a research paper entitled, Distant Future of the Sun and Earth Revisted. It has been accepted for publication in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

According to Schroder and Smith, when the Sun becomes a red giant star 7.59 billion years, it will start to lose mass quickly. By the time it reaches its largest radius, 256 times its current size, it will be down to only 67% of its current mass.

When the Sun does begin to bloat up, it will go quickly, sweeping through the inner Solar System in just 5 million years. It will then enter its relatively brief (130 million year) helium-burning phase. It will expand past the orbit of Mercury, and then Venus. By the time it approaches the Earth, it will be losing 4.9 x 10²⁰ tonnes of mass every year (8% the mass of the Earth).

But the habitable zone will be gone much sooner. Astronomers estimate that will expand past the Earth's orbit in just a billion years. The heating Sun will evaporate the Earth's oceans away, and then solar radiation will blast away the hydrogen from the water. The Earth will never have oceans again. It will eventually become molten again.

One interesting side benefit for the Solar System. Even though the Earth, at a mere 1.5 astronomical units, will no longer be within the Sun's habitable zone, much of the Solar System will be. The new habitable zone will stretch from 49.4 AU to 71.4 AU, well into the Kuiper Belt. The formerly icy worlds will melt, and liquid water will be present beyond the orbit of Pluto. Perhaps Eris will be the new homeworld.

Back to the question… will the Earth survive?

According to Schroder and Smith, the answer is no. Even though the Earth could expand to an orbit 50% larger than today's orbit, it won't get the chance. The expanding Sun will engulf the Earth just before it reaches the tip of the red giant phase. And the Sun would still have another 0.25 AU and 500,000 years to grow.

Once inside the Sun's atmosphere, the Earth will collide with particles of gas. Its orbit will decay, and it will spiral inward.

If the Earth were just a little further from the Sun, at 1.15 AU, it would be able to survive the expansion phase. Although it's science fiction, the authors suggest that future technologies could be used to speed up the Earth's spiraling outward from the Sun.

I'm not sure why, but thinking about this far future of the Earth gives an insight into human psychology. People are genuinely worried about a future billions of years away. Even though the Earth will be scorched much sooner, its oceans boiled away, and turned into a molten ball of rock, it's this early destruction by the Sun that feels so sad.

Original Source: Arxiv

Universe Today :Global Map of Iapetus

Written by Fraser Cain

Here's a cool global map of Saturn's moon Iapetus, stitched together from the various Cassini flybys. Cassini didn't see the entire moon, so the imaging team put in photographs from Voyager to cover the missing polar regions.

You can see its distinct equatorial ridge on the left-hand side of the image, and the mottled dark and light patches that give the moon its Yin-Yang look. The image scale is 803 km per pixel.

It's a little old, but check out this video of the most recent Cassini Iapetus flyby back in September 2007.

Original Source: NASA/JPL/SSI News Release

Space.com : Galactic Wi-fi?

By Seth Shostak SETI Institute posted: 31 January 2008 06:39 am ET

Incredibly, it's been only a bit more than a century since Oliver Heaviside consolidated the work of several 19th century physicists into the four compact mathematical formulations known as Maxwell's Equations. You may gleefully recall them from sophomore physics.

Aside from their display by the rabidly nerdy on pretentious t-shirts, the formulae have a splendid utility: they describe all electromagnetic radiation — in particular, light and radio. In the short time since their discovery, we have been able to milk these elegant equations to build crude spark transmitters, and eventually to develop the diminutive cell phones that allow you to blithely ring up your pals while comfortably seated in restaurants and movie theaters. We have exploited Maxwell's Equations like an old-growth forest, and many technical types aver that we know all there is to know about them.

Not true. And the fact that it's untrue may affect our thinking about SETI.

Today's SETI experiments generally look for what are politely termed "narrow-band signals." In other words, the receivers at the back ends of our radio telescopes search wide swaths of the spectrum looking for a signal that's at one spot on the dial — a signal that's very constrained in frequency. By putting all the transmitted power into this small bandwidth, the aliens can ensure that their signal will stand out like Yao Ming at a Munchkin picnic.

That makes sense — at least if the aliens want only to help us find their signal. But they might have other priorities. In particular, the history of earthly communication suggests that there is an inexorable pressure to increase the bit rate of any transmission channel. A half-decade ago, most readers accessed this web site with a simple dial-up phone line. Today, you're more likely to have some sort of wide-band service, which is to say, you're inhaling Internet bits at least ten times quicker than before.

More generally, in 150 years, we've gone from telegraph wires, capable of a few bits per second, to optical fibers that are billions of times speedier. The idea of "more bandwidth" is so compelling, the phrase has entered the lexicon of everyday speech — even among those who couldn't tell a hertz from a hub nut. Communication technology is always driven to send more bits — more information — per second.

Now consider the plight of aliens wishing to get in touch. Because the separation between one civilization and another is likely to be at least hundreds — and maybe thousands — of light-years, any interstellar pinging is effectively one-way. Back and forth conversations will take too long. So perhaps the aliens will opt to send, not the easiest-to-find signal, but a signal that says it all — a signal bristling with information. If you're going to stuff a message into a bottle, why not use onion-skin paper and write small?

The straightforward way to get more information down a radio channel is, as everyone knows, by using greater bandwidth. Nearly once a week someone sends me an e-mail pointing this out, saying that SETI should be looking for wide-band signals, not narrow-band ones. But there's a problem here. While sending a wide-band, information-rich signal between nearby stars is perfectly practical (assuming you're willing to pay the power bill), once the distance exceeds a thousand light-years or so the billowing hot gas that permeates interstellar space begins to wreak havoc and destruction on the transmission. A process of "dispersion" occurs, which works to slow the broadcast — but it slows different frequencies by different amounts. The result is to distort a wide-bandwidth signal in much the way that a highly reverberant hall would distort the music from an orchestra. A narrow-band signal (the acoustical analog is a simple flute note) would not be adversely affected.

So it seems that there may be difficulties in sending certain kinds of complex radio signals over significant distances in the Galaxy. Interstellar correspondence could be restricted to mere postcards, which would be a disappointment to aliens interested in heavy-duty data distribution.

However, some Swedish physicists are pointing out a possible scheme for beating this rap. In careful analyses of some of the subtle properties of Maxwell's Equations, Bo Thide and Jan Bergman at the Swedish Institute of Space Physics in Uppsala have explored a property of radio waves called orbital angular momentum. You can think of this orbital momentum as a twisting of the wave's electric and magnetic fields — a twisting that would show up if you were measuring the wave with an array of antennas. The technical details are intricate, but suffice it to say that the Swedish scientists are noting another way to send information in a radio signal — even a narrow-band radio signal — by encoding it in the orbital angular momentum.

It's as if they've found "subspace channels," a là Star Trek. Hidden highways down which additional bits can be moved. And there's reason to think that these momentum channels might be impervious to the interstellar jumbling that afflicts the usual types of wide-band signals when sent over great distances.

So it may be that our search for narrow-band signals is actually a very good SETI strategy, and not just an obvious one. While such monotonic messages may seem to be elementary and devoid of much information, they could be laden with additional, hidden complexity.

The investigation of new transmission modes by Thide and Bergman hints that if we do find a signal from ET, we may wish to reconfigure our radio telescopes to look for encoding of the message via such subtle effects as orbital angular momentum. A simple signal may only be a cipher for a more complex message, and there may be more things in heaven and earth than even Maxwell had dreamt of …

• VIDEO: Figure the Odds of E.T.!
• All About SETI
• GALLERY: Scenes from SETI@Arecibo

Space.com : Our Universe: Dark and Messy

By Dave Mosher Staff Writer posted: 07 January 2008 06:55 am ET

Our universe is a mess — a colossal "cosmic web" of galaxies strung into filaments and tendrils that are millions or billions of light-years long.

Although this web's basic structure is resolved, astronomers say understanding it in more detail requires new observatories, better computing and a lot of luck.

"When you look into a large telescope, the reality of the cosmic web hits you in the face because you can see how galaxies are organized," said Rodrigo Ibata, an astronomer at the Observatoire Astronomique de Strasbourg in France. "We have clear evidence for the cosmic web's existence, but there is still so much we don't know about it."

Ibata explained that the cosmic web filaments are held together by dark matter, unseen stuff that makes up 85 percent of all mass in the universe.

"It's intrinsically tough to study something you can't see, so dark matter makes understanding the cosmic web an exceedingly difficult challenge," Ibata told SPACE.com.

Ibata and other astronomers detail some of the cosmic web's mysteries last week in the journal Science.

Intergalactic highway

The cosmic web is thought to funnel galaxies, gas and dark matter around the universe, something like a chaotic intergalactic highway. Ibata said he's looking to our own celestial neighborhood for effects of this network.

"We think cosmic web tendrils feed directly into galaxies, dump matter onto them and build them up," Ibata said.

Ibata hopes new star data gathered by the European Space Agency's GAIA spacecraft, set to launch in 2011, will help gather evidence of such activity near the Milky Way.

"It's going to make things very interesting over the coming years," he said of GAIA, which will finely measure the distances and movements of more than a billion local stars. Such data could reveal where — and what — cosmic web tendrils might be spilling into our neck of the celestial woods.

"The environment within these tendrils could be one of the most important factors in galaxy formation," Ibata said.

To use mountains of data that GAIA and other observatories are expected to deliver in the future, however, Ibata said computer technology will have to catch up. "If we were to get such data now, we wouldn't be able to efficiently process it," he said.

Simulating the universe

Claude-Andre Faucher-Giguere, a graduate student in astrophysics at Harvard University, agrees.

"We need powerful computers to deal with raw astronomy data," Faucher-Giguere said. "But another aspect is that once it's processed, we need to be able to learn something from it."

Faucher-Giguere said computer simulations help with the task by giving astronomers grounds for comparison. If a simulation fits a set of observations, it helps astronomers pick the best theoretical track to explain what they see.

Our current big-picture view of the universe is based mostly on optical light, Faucher-Giguere said, but new observatories will look deep into the cosmos in wavelengths such as infrared and radio.

"We'll need new, better simulations to make sense of data we haven't yet learned how to analyze," he said. "We need to be prepared or else we won't know what we're looking at."

Faucher-Giguere expects astronomers to increasingly team up with computer-savvy theoreticians to extract the latest knowledge about our universe in an efficient way.

"Astronomy is driven by new observations," he said, "but to make use of these new windows onto the universe, we really have to keep up with the theoretical work."

• VIDEO: Dark Matter Ring Discovered
• The Top 10 Strangest Things in Space
• Greatest Mysteries: Where is the Rest of the Universe?

ESA : N° 1-2008: Overview of ESA communication activities in 2008 relevant to the media

Press conferences, exhibitions, launches, political rendezvous and much more ... the list of the main communication activities that ESA will be involved in this year is a long one, but not an exhaustive one. You should pencil these dates into your diaries.


January

14
ESA’s Director General, Jean-Jacques Dordain, meets the press at ESA Headquarters in Paris, France to give a status report on ongoing activities and an overview of upcoming events.

17
Opening of the new Santa Maria Tracking Station to follow Ariane 5 launches, Azores Islands, Portugal.

18
Contract signing for ESA’s Mercury mission, BepiColombo, at EADS Astrium, Friedrichshafen, Germany.

2nd half
STS-120/Esperia Post-Flight Tour by ESA astronaut Paolo Nespoli. Tour of various sites in Italy.

tbd
Space shuttle mission STS-122/Columbus. With ESA astronauts Leopold Eyharts and Hans Schlegel on board.

February


5 - 6
Future Launcher Preparatory Programme workshop at ESA/ESTEC research and technology centre, Noordwijk, Netherlands.

7
Inauguration of the European Space Astronomy Centre (ESA/ESAC) near Madrid, Spain.

12
Kick-off of the “International Year of Planet Earth” at ESA Headquarters and UNESCO Headquarters, Paris.

2nd half
Launch of ESA’s first Automated Transfer Vehicle “Jules Verne” to the ISS onboard an Ariane 5, from CSG Kourou, French Guiana. Several local events will be organised at ESA sites across Europe.

tbd
A few days after launch, the “Jules Verne” docks with the International Space Station. Events at ATV Control Centre in Toulouse and at ESA HQ Paris and other ESA sites across Europe.

tbd
Zefiro 23 engine firing test for the future Vega launcher at “Salto di Quirra” test range, Sardinia, Italy.

tbd
GOCE Earth observation mission: media day at ESA/ESTEC research and technology centre, Noordwijk.

tbd
Workshop on satellite communication applications at ESA/ESTEC research and technology centre.

March


tbd
Opening of new ESA/ESTEC laboratory building at Noordwijk.

tbd
“Open Day” at ESA/ESRIN Earth observation centre in Frascati (Rome), Italy as part of Italian Science Week.

April


tbd
Launch of GIOVE-B satellite for the Galileo system onboard a Russian Soyuz, from Baikonur, Kazakhstan. Events in several ESA centres in Europe.

tbd
Start of ESA’s astronaut selection campaign.

tbd
Launch of Chandrayaan-1 lunar mission onboard an Indian PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle), from Satish Dhawan Space Centre, India (by Indian Space Agency ISRO).

tbd
40th anniversary of ESA's ground station at Redu, Belgium.

May


14-16 (tbc)
GMES conference: “Briging the gap”, Portrose, Slovenia

15
Launch of ESA’s GOCE satellite (Earth gravity field) onboard a Rockot launcher, from Plesetsk, Russia.

tbd
40th anniversary of the Guiana Space Centre, Europe’s Spaceport (CSG), in Kourou, French Guiana.

tbd
Conference on the Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) programme, Prague, Czech Republic.

27 May - 1 June
ILA2008 international aerospace fair in Berlin, Germany. Joint ESA / DLR / BDLI pavilion in "International space village".

end
Post-flight tour for ESA astronauts Hans Schlegel (Germany) and Léopold Eyharts (France) in the context of ILA2008, Berlin.

July


31
Launch of ESA’s Herschel-Planck spacecraft onboard an Ariane 5, from CSG, Kourou. Launch coverage at several ESA establishments across Europe.

August


tbd
“ Night of Exploration” in Copenhagen, Denmark. ESA space show/public event, with space experts and scientists.

September


5
Steins Observation by ESA’s comet-chaser Rosetta. Event at ESA’s Operations Centre, ESOC / Darmstadt, Germany.

16-18
GMES conference “The operational phase”, Lille, France

29 Sept. - 3 Oct.
IAC - International Astronautical Congress - in Glasgow, UK.

30 (tbc)
5th ESA/EC joint Space Council in Brussels, Belgium.

tbd
"Ciencia Viva" space exhibition in Lisbon, Portugal.

October


tbd
Launch of ESA’s SMOS (Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity) mission onboard a Rockot, from Plesetsk, Russia.

tbc
Launch of ESA’s Proba-2 microsatellite, together with SMOS, onboard a Rockot, from Plesetsk.

November


25 - 26
ESA Council meeting at ministerial level in The Hague, Netherlands.

December


tbd
Announcement of initial findings of Herschel-Planck mission.

tbd
Maiden flight of ESA’s new small launcher Vega, from CSG, Kourou.

tbd
Inauguration of "Looking for Life" exhibition at NEMO science centre, Amsterdam, Netherlands.


Dates of certain events, especially launches, depend on various factors, such as readiness of the spacecraft and/or launcher. In the calendar of activities, they remain tabled as 'to be determined' (tbd) or 'to be confirmed' (tbc). Definite dates are confirmed by Arianespace (for Ariane launches), Starsem (for Soyuz launches), Eurockot (for Rockot launches) and NASA (for Space Shuttle launches).

Bad Astronomy : Asteroid to miss Earth January 29

This is interesting: an asteroid named 2007 TU24 will pass roughly 560,000 kilometers (330,000 miles) from the Earth on January 29, 2008. That’s close enough to be interesting, but far enough not to worry about it. Funny coincidence: that’s almost the same time 2007 WD5 will pass very close to Mars. The odds of a Mars impact are still not zero, but there is no chance at all of TU24 hitting us.

I don’t usually track such news, but I actually found out about this at Digg.com, where some folks were digging up a misleading video about the asteroid. The video wasn’t hugely popular, but it’s had a few thousand viewings which isn’t bad. But I have some beefs with it, and I think they point to some misconceptions people have about asteroids.

First, though, the video is a bait-and-switch to talk about how Ron Paul isn’t getting press. OK, feh. My thoughts on Paul are pretty clear, and I’ve seen little to change my mind.

But the science too is misleading. The first thing the video author shows is the well-known asteroid Ida, claiming it’s TU24, which is incorrect.

Then he shows how close it will pass, with a grossly misleading graphic of the Earth and Moon sitting right next to each other, making it look like this asteroid will just barely miss us. Make no mistake: this is a pretty close pass for an asteroid, but it has no chance at all of hitting us, so it’s no big deal. Looking at the list of recent and upcoming close approaches by asteroids, you can see this one is on the nearest for a while, but there are many other near misses… stress the word "miss".

In the description, he also says

It will be 1.37 Lunar Distances from earth on January 29, 2008. Let’s hope they’re right. Gauging trajectory on something coming right at you isn’t easy.

Nope, it’s not heading right for us. It’s heading to a point in space where the Earth will be on January 29. Actually, it’s headed to a point in space more than half a million kilometers from where the Earth will be at that time. Either way, that spot in space is currently more than 60 million kilometers (40 million miles) away from us right now; a fair ways off. So actually, getting the orbit is just a matter of getting good observations, like it usually is.

Asteroids are a real threat, and need to be taken seriously. This video — and they way I see the media treat the threat in general — in my opinion, make matters somewhat worse. Perhaps I’m hammering this particular video a little hard, but to me it represents a whole class of misleading coverage of asteroids. And c’mon, if you want to make a point, just make it. (Mis)Using astronomy this way isn’t helping any.

Universe Today : New Solar Cycle Begins With New Year…

Written by Tammy Plotner

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), a new solar cycle is about to begin. The original forecast for Solar Cycle 24 was slated for March 2008, but the action is already under way as the first magnetically reversed sunspot of the new 11-year cycle has already appeared in the Sun's northern hemisphere! Will it be strong or will it be weak? Time will tell… But if you live in a high latitude northern area? Be on alert tonight!

Last April an international panel of solar experts forecast that Solar Cycle 24 would start in March 2008, plus or minus six months. Upcoming solar storms definitely lay ahead, but neither the NOAA Space Environment Center in coordination with an international panel of solar experts predict a record-breaker. The most recent activity forecast was predicted for March with the peak occurring in late 2011 or mid-2012—up to a year later than expected. While original forecasts put the beginning activity a last Fall, the delay has simply left the experts guessing.

During a solar cycle, the frequency of sunspots rises and falls and spotting new activity may mean that the action is just heating up. These areas of intense magnetic activity on the Sun, can affect Earth by disrupting electrical grids, airline and military communications, GPS signals and even cell phones. During periods of intense sunspot activity, known as solar storms, highly charged radiation from the Sun may head toward Earth…

"Our growing dependence on highly sophisticated, space-based technologies means we are far more vulnerable to space weather today than in the past," said NOAA Administrator Conrad C. Lautenbacher, Jr.

What does that mean for the Blue Planet's inhabitants? There's nothing to fear… except perhaps that it might be cloudy! Increased activity is a wonderful time to begin studying sunspots for yourself and to keep a eye out for aurora activity. Solar cycle intensity is measured in maximum number of sunspots—dark blotches on the sun that mark areas of heightened magnetic activity. The more sunspots there are, the more likely it is that major solar storms will occur.

"By giving a long-term outlook, we're advancing a new field—space climate—that's still in its infancy," said retired Air Force Brig. Gen. David L. Johnson, director of the NOAA National Weather Service. "Issuing a cycle prediction of the onset this far in advance lies on the very edge of what we know about the Sun."

NOAA, an agency of the U.S. Commerce Department, is celebrating 200 years of science and service to the nation and the world. The NOAA Space Environment Center also is the world warning agency of the International Space Environment Service, a consortium of 11 member nations that generate a first alert of solar activity and its affects on Earth and you, too, can check out the information here! Stay tuned as "Universe Today" brings you guidelines on how you can solar observe and when you can possibly expect aurora in your area! As it stands, a high-speed solar wind stream is already buffeting Earth's magnetic field and this could spark a geomagnetic storm. For high latitude observers, this means you may see the aurora tonight!!

Universe Today : Former Astronaut Herrington Resigns from Rocketplane

Written by Nancy Atkinson

Former NASA astronaut John Herrington has resigned from the commercial space company Rocketplane Global, Inc. Herrington left NASA in 2005 to join Rocketplane as vice president and director of flight operations. He was slated to pilot the company’s passenger-carrying suborbital XP spaceplane. His resignation was effective on December 21, 2007.

Herrington said he plans to continue working in the commercial space industry, because he believes “commercial space is the next great adventure in aerospace." Herrington will also continue as a motivational speaker to both industry and educational institutions, and as an advisor to the University of Colorado’s National Institute for Space, Science and Security Centers. In addition, he’ll also work with the Chickasaw Nation, of which he is a member.

"I was fortunate during my tenure at Rocketplane to work with an incredibly talented group of professionals,” said Herrington. “My decision to leave was a difficult one.”

Rocketplane has had its troubles recently, with several top officials leaving the company, including former company president Randy Brinkley.

But in an interview in October, Herrington was optimistic about Rocketplane’s future. “If we can be successful, then hopefully we can make spaceflight more routine, then more people can experience what a unique environment it is,” he said. “And if we can be successful doing both then we provide a market to the consumer that’s looking for high adventure.”

Rocketplane’s company structure consists of the parent corporation Rocketplane Limited, under which are two separate entities: Rocketplane Kistler which is developing a reusable two-stage orbital unmanned spacecraft called the K-1 while Rocketplane Global is building the XP.

In August 2006 Rocketplane Kistler (RpK) won a contract with NASA for the COTS (Commercial Orbital Transportation Services) program, to bring cargo and eventually crew to the ISS. But in October of 2007, NASA terminated its agreement with RpK, citing the company’s failure to meet financial and design review milestones per the agreement. Rocketplane had threatened to sue NASA over the termination of the contract, but several sources now indicate that the commercial space company will not file a lawsuit against NASA.

Herrington said that while working at both NASA and Rocketplane was a dream come true, he spent a lot of time away from home, which took a toll on his family. “There’s an aura associated with being an astronaut, but the reality is that it’s a lot of hard work,” he said. “When the thrill wears off, you stick your head in the books and you spend a lot of time learning what you need to know and then performing in a hostile environment. But it was a dream I had as a kid, and when you fulfill a dream like that it’s a phenomenal feeling.”

Original News Source: Chickasaw Nation Press Release

Universe Today : Shuttle Launch Date Still Uncertain

Written by Nancy Atkinson

NASA officials are hoping that the repairs to space shuttle Atlantis’ fuel sensor system will be completed in time for a January 24 launch date for the STS-122 mission to the International Space Station. But in a January 3rd press briefing, John Shannon, deputy manager of the shuttle program told reporters that a February 2nd or 7th launch date is more probable given the testing and the work required.

"There's no way we're going to be earlier than Jan. 24," Shannon said. "I would say it is a stretch to think we would make the 24th, that would require the weather to cooperate out at the Kennedy Space Center, it would require no hitches in any of the testing.”

A suspect connector in the engine cutoff (ECO) fuel sensor system was removed from the shuttle’s external tank and is being tested at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. If the tests there don’t replicate the false readings that occurred during two launch attempts in early December, another on-pad fueling test might be required to collect additional data. If so, the launch could be delayed to Feb. 2 at the earliest.

A fueling test performed on December 18 isolated the problem to the 1 ½ -by 3 inch connector called a pass-through connector, located both inside and outside the tank. The wires for all four ECO sensors pass through the same connector. From the data of that test, engineers believe the problem lies in gaps between pins and sockets on the external side of the pass-through connector when the system is chilled to cryogenic temperatures, as when the tank is filled with liquid hydrogen and oxygen.

"It's a difficult problem," Shannon said. "I'm not making excuses here, but at liquid hydrogen temperatures is the only time it shows up so you have to set up a test that uses liquid hydrogen. We're very interested. This is the first time we've removed the hardware from a vehicle and had the opportunity to test it without disturbing it before hand. So it will be interesting to find out."

Engineers are now working on installing new connectors to the tank.

"All of those changes, it's fairly simple, it's a fairly elegant change and we feel very confident that if the problem is where we think it is, between the external connector and the feed through, that this will solve that," Shannon said. "Now, if you look at the schedule, we're going to have new external connectors and feed-through assemblies at KSC this weekend and we're going to proceed with installing that on external tank Number 125, which is the one Atlantis is currently mated to. We expect that work to be done by next Thursday.”

"But I asked the team to go ahead and protect that date (Jan. 24) as the earliest date that we could possibly go," Shannon continued. "I think it is much more likely that we'll be ready to go somewhere in the February 2 to February 7 timeframe, given we don't have any additional findings as we go through our testing."

Another timing issue to deal with is the scheduled Feb. 7 launch of a Russian Progress supply ship to the ISS. Joint U.S.-Russian space station flight rules don’t allow a Progress docking during a shuttle visit. If the Russians won’t change their launch date, Atlantis would have to take off by Jan. 27 or the flight would slip to sometime around Feb. 9 in order to get the Progress docked before the shuttle arrives.

Also, NASA originally planned to launch the shuttle Endeavour on the next mission to the ISS on Feb. 14. But the Atlantis delay will force a subsequent delay for Endeavour. Shannon said that NASA typically needs five weeks between launches to get ready for the next flight.

Original News Source: NASA News Audio

Universe Today : Organic Molecules Found Outside our Solar System

Written by Nicholos Wethington

Organic molecules are thought by scientists to be instrumental in kickstarting life as we know it on Earth. Within our Solar System they can be found in comets, and they cause the redness of the clouds of Saturn's moon Titan. New observations of a planet-forming disk around a star 220 light-years from Earth reveal for the first time that these molecules exist elsewhere in the Universe.

Astronomers at the Carnegie Institute have detected the presence of organic molecules in the dusty disk surrounding HR 4796A, an eight-million year-old star in the constellation Centaurus. Using Hubble's Near-Infrared Multi-Object Spectrometer they analyzed the light coming from the disk and found that its red color is due to large organic carbon molecules called tholins. The analysis ruled out other causes of the red light, such as iron oxide.

“Until recently it’s been hard to know what makes up the dust in a disk from scattered light, so to find tholins this way represents a great leap in our understanding,” said John Debes of the Carnegie Institute's Department of Terrestrial Magnetism, one of the authors of the study.

Just as in our early Solar System, the disk of dust is in the process of forming planets. The collision of small bodies like asteroids and comets creates the dust in the disk, and the organic molecules present on these objects could then be scattered on any planets orbiting the star. This discovery makes it clear that it is possible for organic molecules to exist in the early stages of planet formation, paving the way for the possible development of life later on.

Organic molecules are thought to be essential to the development biological organisms because they are made up of carbon, the building block of life on Earth. The discovery of these molecules elsewhere in the Universe does not mean that life exists there yet – or even that it will in the future – but it does increase the tantalizing prospect of life forming outside our Solar System.

The study was published in the current Astrophysical Journal Letters by John Debes and Alycia Weinberger of the Carnegie Institution’s Department of Terrestrial Magnetism with Glenn Schneider of the University of Arizona.

Source: Carnegie Institute Press Release

Universe Today : Podcast: The Large Hadron Collider and the Search for the Higgs-Boson

Written by Astronomy Cast

When it was first developed, the standard model predicted a collection of particles, and thanks to more and more powerful colliders, physicsists have been able to find them all except one: the Higgs-Boson. It's an important one because it should explain how objects have mass. The European Large Hadron Collider should have the power and sensitivity to find the Higgs-Boson.

Click here to download the episode

The Large Hadron Collider and the Search for the Higgs-Boson - Show notes and transcript

Or subscribe to: astronomycast.com/podcast.xml with your podcatching software.

Universe Today : Meteor Shower Throws Over 100 Meteors per Hour

Written by Nancy Houser

With over 100 meteors per hour, the Quadrantid Meteor Shower is one of the latest mergers between Google and NASA, a major asset to space research due to their successful combination of ideas and plans. This peak shower began around 0200 UTC on Friday morning, January 4th, with the jet owned by the founders of Mountain View-based Google flying amongst big science players, such as the SETI research team.

To see this spectacular sight and to partake in a scientific mission, Google carried a team of NASA scientists and their high-technology instruments on board the Google owned Gulfstream V jet, which left the Mineta San Jose International Airport on Thursday late afternoon about 4:30 p.m. Plans were made for a ten-hour flight over the Arctic, returning to home base when the meteor shower mission was accomplished with the resulting data.

The GOOG Google.com Stock Message Board is full of the things that Google has been doing to improve the world—a real biggie was to develop a cheaper solar, wind power for Earth—excellent idea from a company whose corporate motto is to “do not be evil.” That plan involved the creation of a research group to develop energy sources that was a cheaper renewable alternative which focuses on solar, wind and any other forms of power through the Renewable Energy “Cheaper Than Coal” project. And of course, lowering Google's power bill was top of the list before anyone else as a huge incentive.

Last September, as most are aware of, NASA and Google had launched a $2.6 million dollar agreement to let the Google co-founders house their aircraft at Moffett Field while NASA was to be allowed to use it for their science work, such as that of the Quadrantid Meteor Shower. Other prospective plans for Google are to hand out $30 million dollars to any company that successfully comes up with a plan to bring people to the moon. Another plan is to fund a space race through Google's Lunar X Prize competition.

Original Source: NASA News Release

Universe Today : Book Review: Our Changing Planet

Written by Mark Mortimer

A butterfly's flapping wings may alter the weather a thousand kilometres away. This marvel of chaos also symbolizes Earth's many interconnections. Such connections appear again and again in the book Our Changing Planet – The View From Space edited by M. King, C. Parkinson, K. Partington and R. Williams. Its collection of essays and vibrant depictions allow a reader to grasp meaning from random variability and arrive at a comprehension about the system that supports our lives on Earth.

The space age brought two great assets to weather forecasting; the satellite and computers. These tools allowed us to detect trends and relationships. For example, cold air over the Pacific Ocean during the spring time may lead to overly dry conditions along the west coast of the Americas. And, at a smaller scale, we see cities causing heat islands that effect their immediate climates. Through this experience, we can take current conditions and extrapolate them into the future. The goal is thus to ameliorate conditions, like tsunamis, that may be disadvantageous to human existence. However, this is a new field, so making predictions beyond a year, or perhaps a decade, still come with a great deal of uncertainty.

Nevertheless, we can make connections, and this book gives the reader an appreciation of what's been done with our knowledge and where we might be going. The four editors; King, Parkinson, Partington and Williams have included within their book over 60 independent essays so as to provide a perspective of the dynamics of Earth. Most of these are weather related, though selections on plate tectonics, glaciers and vegetation show how weather affects and is affected by so much. For example, aerosols from ship's exhaust cause a plume that satellites can detect well after the ship's moved on. As well, Ebola outbreaks have a direct association with the end of rainy seasons. Also included within the book are little tidbits of information. An average hurricane will condense 20,000 million tons of water a day. And, over 1% of global total emission of man-made sulphur dioxide come from a few smelters at Noril'sk in north central Siberia. As these demonstrate, there's little that can hide from today's satellite technology, and this book readily shows this to great avail.

Yet, this book particularly shines through its illustrations. The book is physically of an overly large format. With this, the editors provide broad, expansive colour images, usually from satellites. For instance, a dramatic two page spread shows the mighty Lambert Glacier flowing out to the ocean. However, the book's true bread and butter are the many GIS themed maps. Whether showing net primary productivity on a global scale or tsunami wave heights in the Indian Ocean, the reader is given simple yet informative visual pictures of the data. By providing a series of these maps, all annotated with dates, the reader can then easily grasp how our planet's features change over time and how they effect all of Earth's residents.

With the illustrations and their associated essays, the reader will see that the Earth changes. But, this isn't news to anyone. And, this is a weakness of the book. The editors have omitted the inclusion of a common theme to drive the reader through the book. General interest and appreciation of great illustrations will start the reader into the book, but it may not be enough to keep them going. There's an implicit understanding throughout the text that any change will affect humans. But, as people cover the globe, this comes as no surprise. Thus, the editors have missed an opportunity to build upon the knowledge. Especially, they've shied away from trying to combine trends seen from the individual case studies. It is apparent that the editors have gotten essays from very knowledgeable writers, but the writers appear to have worked mostly in isolation. Hence, aside from a general theme of a changing Earth, the essays have little that relate to each.

Nevertheless, this book makes for a great reference. In particular, it epitomizes the value of geographical information systems (GIS). With only rudimentary geographical knowledge, any reader can appreciate ebbs and flows across our globe. And, by the very nature of satellites, the reader will quickly forget about national boundaries and appreciate the inter-connected nature of our existence. However, this book keeps science within easy reach, more for the student or general reader than a researcher. Thus, though a wonderful reference either for data or for themes, this book is a starting point and a typical reader will be looking elsewhere to build upon the presentations.

With the Earth spinning by at well over 1600 kilometres an hour, many things get tossed and turned about. Add to this the effects of the occasional volcano and some very active residents, and, changes will abound. Such becomes readily apparent in the book Our Changing Planet – The View From Space edited by M. King, C. Parkinson, K. Partington and R. Williams. Through glowing illustrations and bright essays within it, our Earth becomes much more complete and more precious.

Read more reviews or purchase a copy online from Amazon.com

Science magazine : A Baby Planet's First Steps?

Baby fat.
This artist's impression shows a very young and still-forming massive planet just discovered orbiting its parent star.

Credit: Johny Setiawan

By Phil Berardelli
ScienceNOW Daily News
2 January 2008

Astronomers think they have found the first "baby" exoplanet--a world so young it could provide insight into the earliest stages of planet formation.

Over the past decade and a half, astronomers have identified 270 planets orbiting stars beyond our solar system (ScienceNOW, 10 January 2007). Using ever-more-powerful telescopes, they have also detected hundreds of nascent stars surrounded by clouds of gas and dust. Astronomers have presumed that these protoplanetary disks, as they're called, coalesce into rocks, asteroids, and eventually planets, but so far direct evidence has been lacking.

Now a team from the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, Germany, claims to have landed the proof. After scanning disks surrounding about 200 stars, the researchers detected a periodic wobble in the motion of TW Hydrae, located about 180 light-years away in the constellation Hydra. The wobble means that something with significant gravity is tugging at the still-forming star on a regular basis. Further analysis suggested a planet with about 10 times the mass of Jupiter tightly orbiting its parent star about every 4 days.

More striking, the team reports in the 3 January issue of Nature, the data suggest that the planet's age is less than 10 million years--only about a tenth as old as any other extrasolar planet found so far. "Before this discovery, it was not clear what the real time scale of planet formation was," says astronomer and lead author Johny Setiawan. But the detection of this young planet around TW Hydrae suggests a much faster process than scientists had thought, and it "shows us that what we call protoplanetary disks are indeed protoplanetary," he says.

Perhaps, but the object may not be a planet at all, says planetary scientist Jack Lissauer of NASA's Ames Research Center at Moffett Field, California. He's not convinced by the data regarding the size of the object, and if it ends up being just a little larger than the German team estimates--say, 13 times the size of Jupiter--it could instead be a starlike body known as a brown dwarf.

Whether or not the object is a planet, the finding "demonstrates that it is now possible to observe planets orbiting very young stars," says planetary scientist Joseph Harrington of the University of Central Florida in Orlando. And that, he adds, will help researchers to "test current hypotheses about planet formation."

Related sites

More about known exoplanets

More about protoplanetary disks

Universe Today : SETI@home Needs You!

Written by Nancy Atkinson

If your New Year’s resolutions include trying something new, expanding your horizons, or doing something to benefit humanity, this is for you: SETI@home needs more volunteers to help crunch data in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI). And the easy part is that your desktop computer does all the work.

SETI uses radio telescopes to listen for narrow band-width radio signals from space. Since these signals don’t occur naturally, a detection of such a signal would indicate technology from an extraterrestrial source.

The SETI project at the University of California-Berkley gets data from world's largest radio telescope in Arecibo, Puerto Rico, which has recently been updated with seven new and more sensitive receivers. The improved frequency coverage for the telescope is now generating 500 times more data for the SETI project than before, and more volunteers are needed to handle the increase in data.

According to project scientist Eric Korpela, the new data amounts to 300 gigabytes per day, or 100 terabytes (100,000 gigabytes) per year, about the amount of data stored in the U.S. Library of Congress. "That's why we need all the volunteers," he said. "Everyone has a chance to be part of the largest public participation science project in history."

The SETI@home premise is simple but brilliant: Instead of using a monstrously huge and expensive supercomputer to analyze all the data, it uses lots of small computers, all working simultaneously on different parts of the analysis. Participants download a special screensaver for their home computers, and when the computer is idle, the screensaver kicks in to grab data from UC Berkley, analyze the data and send back a report. SETI@home was launched in May of 1999.

The SETI@home software has now been upgraded to deal with all the new data generated by the updated Arecibo telescope. The telescope can now record radio signals from seven regions of the sky simultaneously instead of just one. It also has greater sensitivity and 40 times more frequency coverage.

So, if the phrase “to search out new life and new civilizations” inspires you, here’s your chance to be part of the largest community of dedicated users of any internet computing project. Currently SETI@home has 170,000 individuals donating time on 320,000 computers.

"Earthlings are just getting started looking at the frequencies in the sky; we're looking only at the cosmically brightest sources, hoping we are scanning the right radio channels," said project chief scientist Dan Werthimer. "The good news is, we're entering an era when we will be able to scan billions of channels. Arecibo is now optimized for this kind of search, so if there are signals out there, we or our volunteers will find them."

Check out SETI@home here.
Original News Source: UC Berkley Press Release

Universe Today : Carnival of Space #35

Written by Fraser Cain

We took a bit of a break over the holidays, but we're back with the Carnival of Space #35. This week it's over at the Music of the Spheres. And there's a second bonus edition with a few entries that I somehow let slip through the cracks.

Should we reach out to extraterrestrials, or just keep our mouths shut? Is Asteroid 2007 WD5 going to hit Mars later this month? These topics and more are covered in a collection of space and astronomy stories, so check them out.

And if you're interested in looking back, here's an archive to all the past carnivals of space. If you've got a space-related blog, you should really join the carnival. Just email an entry to carnivalofspace@gmail.com, and the next host will link to it. It will help get awareness out there about your writing, help you meet others in the space community - and community is what blogging is all about. And if you really want to help out, let me know if you can be a host, and I'll schedule you into the calendar.

Universe Today : The Moon Meets Antares On January 5

Written by Tammy Plotner

Although no one likes to get up early, it will be worth it on the morning of January 5. For dedicated SkyWatchers, you'll enjoy the pleasing view of Venus and the last phases of the waning Moon… But look closely, because you'll see brilliant red Antares is also joining the show! Whenever a bright star like Antares is so close to the lunar limb, chances are an occultation event is about to happen for some area of the Earth. Would you like to learn more? A photographic and scientific opportunity awaits you!

Less than half a degree away from the lighted edge of the crescent Moon, Antares will make a picturesque scene for many of us that only nature can create. For a few lucky viewers in the south-western portion of South America, this could be an occultation event! If you've ever wondered about occultations, then it's time to learn more about what an occultation is, when it happens, how to view it, record and report.

Several times a year the natural progress of the Moon against the progress of the starry background means a chance to see the lunar disk occult (or cover up) a bright star or planet. If the object is bright enough, you can watch this happen with only your eyes, but even binoculars or a small telescope will greatly improve the view. What a pleasure it is to see a star simply disappear behind the Moon's limb! But it's not just the Moon that occults stars - so do asteroids. Occultations happen anytime one celestial body passes in front of another - a type of eclipse. For those of you who enjoy doing a little bit of science, there's a whole lot more to do… and contributions you can make!

Thanks to great folks at the International Occultation Timing Association (IOTA), you can learn how to predict, time, record and submit your observations by downloading the free ebook: "Chasing the Shadow: The IOTA Occultation Observer's Manual - The Complete Guide to Observing Lunar, Grazing and Asteroid Occultations" available here! It's the only book of its kind that shows observers how to get started in occultations and what equipment to use. Whether you are a novice observer, or an advanced observer with a video system, you can assist in the search for asteroidal moons, help discover new double stars and help determine the size of the Sun during solar eclipses.

Let the beauty of the morning on January 5 inspire you! During the month of January you'll be treated to great things like an occultation of the Pleiades stars on January 18 in northern North America and Northern Asia. On January 19 in southern Africa you'll see Beta Tauri disappear. If you live in Alaska, January 20 means an occultation of Mars. For southern observers in Australia and New Zealand, be sure to check out the Moon and Regulus on January 24. To get times and locations, all you have to do is check with IOTA. If watching a asteroid pass in front of a star takes your fancy, then stop by here where you can get multitudes of information for events in your area!

In the meantime, get your cameras and fingers ready. We'd like to share in your success! See if you can capture the view on the morning of January 5 and post it here. Even if you're not able to photograph the event, we'd love to hear your reports and impressions. Watch the "Universe Today" in future months as we bring you more!