Human DNA On Mars, Electronic Dinosaurs On Earth, And Listening Plants

Amsat Oscar 7  the satellite that fell silent for twenty years

NASA bid a final farewell to Opportunity rover on Mars on 13 Feb.
Since being engulfed in a dust storm, the rover has been out of contact
Sad as it is, the Opportunity lasted 14 years, far longer than its original 90 day remit, and is the longest surviving robot explorer on another world (Curiosity is a mere baby, at only seven years).
Besides, it might suddenly re-awaken, much like the satellite which fell silent for twenty years.
Exploration of Mars continues with Curiosity, Insight, and the incoming ESA rover, now named in honour of Rosalind Franklin, whose contribution to the discovery of human dna is now linked to another world...

'Photo 51' which led to the 3D modelling of DNA

Closer to home, Chang'e  became the first mission to land on the 'dark side of the moon' (no Floyd gags here) Equipped with experiments including a biosphere , it will certainly provide a wealth of new discoveries .
The Chang'e biosphere contains cotton, yeast, fruit-flies, potato and other organics -there have been edible romaine lettuce and cucumbers grown on the International Space Station, but these will be the first things grown on another world.
Speaking of plants, a new study aims to prove that plants can hear . There is a realm of study in the field of plant intelligence that is often maligned or sidelined ( talking to the trees, etc). Disparate articles exist, but are often to be found on the fringes - the idea of 'mushroom intelligence' is very quickly absorbed into talk of 'magic' mushrooms, faerie circles and such-like, which tends to discourage any serious examination of the facts ( although the very popular book Supernature did much to redress the balance in the Seventies ) My belief is that there is no smoke without fire - you only have to witness the reaction of certain mimosa to being touched, and you can see clear evidence of plant intelligence.

The interface between humans and computers creeps closer as Neuralink aims to narrow the divide between the two...
Whilst I love dystopian sci-fi, ever since my early encounters with fantastical films ( Forbidden Planet, The Time Machine and Godzilla , mainly), I am heartened to hear of the redundancy of robots in hotels...perhaps I'm just getting old, but yay for humanity resisting the relentless advances of a sea of silicon-based electronica... speaking of which, large deposits of rare earth minerals have been discovered , off the coast of Japan.

Rare Earth elements discovered off the coast of Japan

This has implications for the proposed mining of asteroids (not such a necessity for a few centuries) , and eases the anxiety felt by 'phone zombies'. I try to avoid politics in this blog, but the recent embargo placed by China on the export of rare minerals is weakened by  this discovery - although the Chang'e rover on the moon is probably tasked with locating new fields of potential...





A new theory from Canada tells us that we have an anti- universe stretching the other way from the big bang...which leads me to wonder how ancient peoples felt about their timeline counting down to zero, before rising again at some point.. .hmmm




In closing, I apologise for the ludicrously long delay in this blog post - I am blaming the chaos in my neurology caused by my wretched condition ( P.P.M.S.), diagnosed in 2014, it seeks to disable me both physically and mentally, but I refuse to be shutdown by my own brain. This blog was begun as a form of mental exercise to keep the vile condition at bay.
I find it increasingly tricky, but I shall persevere...
Anyway, thanks for reading, and , until next time
TTFN   G Alias Me


                             
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Heavens Above - Flybys, Marsquakes and Icy Craters

As a seasonal gift, NASA have made a downloadable  wrapping paper available - just the thing for that scale model of a Saturn V rocket...

Enough seasonal frivolity , what lurks in the Heavens Above ?
Like a stone skimming across the surface of a lake, the recent flyby of asteroid 2003 SD220 was a reminder of the vulnerability of our little home in space. It has already been pointed out that the one-mile long space-rock is a potential planet killer. Christened the 'hippo' asteroid by someone in JPL...I'm just surprised that it has not yet been likened to Oumuamua , or declared an alien scout ship...

Don't panic ! This was three years ago...recent flyby was only 1.8 million miles

...speaking of which, as we pass the shortest day of the year and head for Yuletide, we anticipate the New Years day encounter with ' Ultima Thule', the Kuiper belt object targeted by New Horizons since its Pluto flypast in 2015
As well as being the most distant flyby in our history, this is generating intrigue , due to anomalies regarding its lack of reflectivity - and (inevitably) the internet has arisen to the occasion with talk of it being an alien communications beacon, and other speculation born of fantastical fictions...
On the subject of distant neighbours in our solar system, a far flung contender has been discovered, with an orbit varying from 25 billion kilometers (from the sun) to a mere 3 billion, bringing it closer than Neptune. Not really big enough to be the ninth planet though...a place occupied by Pluto, IMO

This week saw the first firing of thrusters on the ESA/ Jaxa Beppi-Colombo mission to Mercury ...not a dramatic event  but a significant one, it allows tiny course corrections on its seven-year long journey ( the equivalent of being pulled by 250 ants, apparently) , so this is a very gentle journey, aiming to gather lots of science whilst approaching and orbiting Mercury in 2025.

Seismometer being placed on Mars       ESA

If you are impatient for science, don't forget that Insight just placed its Seismometer on Mars , and will begin relaying results of 'marsquakes' by the end of January 2019.

Korolev Crater   

The Mars Express Hi-Res Camera has recently imaged a crater filled with water ice, which is a permanent feature, a 'cold trap', with a depth of over a mile', and is comparable in volume to the Great Bear Lake in Canada (it says here...)

In a broader sense, though, the excitement of possible biological life on Mars is tempered by the Mars Trace Gas Orbiter, which has found no methane in the Mars atmosphere*...( personally, I think the subterranean martians must have a very advanced extractor fan - ahem )

* This appears to contradict earlier findings , so is not a definite statement


Here is a link to an animation detailing how to make a Dyson Sphere (well, you never know when you'll need to harness the power of the sun). As one commenter said, You Tube has come a long way from its early days of ' how-to-films' about making play-do...


On that note, have a very festive seasonal, and I'll see you on the other side !

TTFN


G

Mars Welcomes Careful Explorers, Rovers On The Dark Side Of The Moon, And Asteroid Missions

Launched in August, the amazing Parker Solar Probe has already traveled twice as close to the sun as the previous Helios probe, and is now sending close - up views of the sun, whilst peeking from behind its heat shield. However, most of the images will be downloaded  next year, as the sun is now between us and the probe...
As well as taking unique images from such close proximity, it has also broken speed records , travelling at 375,000 kmh . The Parker Solar Probe will eventually break both those records again, hopefully attaining a speed of 160 km/s, and a distance of 6 million kilometres from the sun during the mission
Whilst thinking of the Parker mission, I suddenly had a recollection of how to pass a hand through the flames of a fire (quick, or get burned * )...a piece of childhood enacted beside a bonfire being used to toast marshmallows...ahem

* A very unscientific explanation for how a fast-moving object near a flame can escape the ' heat- transfer', which causes the burn.

Insight goes teal...

After  a text-book landing, Mars now has a new robot resident. As the dust settles and the solar panels unfurl, we have begun to receive data from Insight . It will be a few months before all experiments are active..in the meantime, here is a first - the ambient winds of Mars , recorded by microphone on the Insight lander, on December 1 . I was oddly entranced by the recording - it may not be dynamic, but - it's the gentle wind on another world...

Esa Mars rover scheduled for 2020

 The ExoMars Orbiter is being used to relay signals data to Earth from the latest arrival - don't forget that this is a static mission, and the joint European / Russian  'rover' will launch in 2020, aiming for an equatorial region of Mars, which holds great potential for samples of ancient or even current life - fingers crossed that this new European initiative does not go the way of ill-fated Schiaparelli lander .
Also launching in 2020, the planned NASA rover, based on the design of Curiosity, will target the Jezero Crater, which also has great potential for the discovery of ancient, or even current life.
With the inclusion of Curiosity, Insight, and the Chinese orbiter / rover scheduled for 2020,  that would give us five active** ground-based probes on Mars: looks like the race is on for the first discovery of alien life on Mars. May the best rover win...

** Not including Opportunity, presumed MIA, following planetary dust- storm

Osiris - Rex has arrived at asteroid Bennu
The whole sample return mission will take another 5 years, and is already pipped at the post by the Japanese Hayabusa2 mission , with its ' hopping' robots which were deployed some time ago ...in a gesture of magnaminity, the Director of Hayabusa2 graciously sent a message of congratulations

3-D Ryugu !             Image Jaxa ?

China has launched Chang 'e-4 , first ever mission to land a rover on the 'dark side' of the moon , with a view to exploration and collection of soil samples for a future return mission to Earth.

Yuri Milner is aiming to  search for life in the oceans of the Saturnian moon Enceladus , and NASA have contributed to the project- I hope that we see more of this kind of cross-over, with private initiatives  and public bodies co-operating on mutual goals. It's a win-win, with more exploration happening faster...

Enceladus  Image                  NASA/ JPL/ Caltech

BACK ON EARTH...

Apparently the decline of giant herbivores in prehistory was not linked to human predators , but was in tandem with a decrease in forest / jungle environments and the resultant expansion of grasslands- so don't feel angry about early hominids: their discovery of tool-making and slow-cooking was not to blame for the extinction of large mammals. 

Liquid Rock, Stars, Space Rocks and Rock Stars

My ' boarding pass', enroute to Mars. Happy landings ...

Farewell to the historic Dawn - a probe which  became the first in our history to visit two different bodies in the asteroid belt, returning a wealth of information to increase our understanding of the early formation of the universe.
Dawn ceased communication with the Deep Space Network on October 31st , and it is believed that the craft ran out of  the fuel , hydrazine .
Dawn will remain in orbit around Ceres for a few decades.
It feels odd, but even as I write this, I'm aware that Dawn is already history; it launched in 2007: since then, in terms of ground - breaking, we've landed craft on a comet , hopping(!) rovers on an asteroid, had multiple take-off and landings of re-usable rockets , used a 'skycrane' to land another explorer on Mars ( and inserted the Mars Orbiter ) , had an up close flypast of Pluto and its moon, Charon, gathered info from Saturn and its moons, and Voyager 1 became the first craft to enter interstellar space. (I'm sure there are many more, and I apologise for any omissions) Every one of these was a 'ground-breaking' achievement, and I am both amazed and humbled by it all.
Go, humanity !

A large impact crater has been discovered beneath the Greenland ice sheet, dating back at least 12000 years.
Speaking of comets, the comet which helped eradicate the dinosaurs from Earth has been shown to have liquified huge amounts of rock , albeit briefly; still on the subject of space rocks, Oumuamua is heading away from us now, but NASA have learned even more about this perplexing 'traveller' from beyond. Buried amidst the excited chatter of how its 'albedo' gives us an estimate of its size, was the quiet revelation that it changed speed and direction.
This was apparently due to outgassing , but that relies on Oumuamua being an icy body, rather than a rocky one - Hmm - I'm almost tempted to see what the ' fringe' elements think - but even Harvard scientists believe that it may be an alien probe...


The ongoing search for alien life is being hampered by the demand for GPUs being used for cryptocurrency mining. Personally, I'd say the problem is also being exacerbated by the new demand for VR graphics. One of my pet theories is that portals to our multiverse exist in these burgeoning virtual spaces, so perhaps it's advantageous (or did I just play too much  Half - Life..? )

Before VR, there was humble anaglyph 3-D, and this new volume of images, lovingly prepared by none other than Queen guitarist, and Professor of Astrophysics, Brian May, adds a new dimension to a slew of images from the moon missions.

One of the oldest stars in the universe is hiding in a distant corner of our own Milky Way . At 13.5 billion years old, it is a remnant from just after the 'Big Bang' ( okay, .22 billion years after, but that's close)

Stunning image of the Jovian clouds from Juno


I was entranced by the image of swirling gaseous cloud -tops of Jupiter, my feverish imagination wondering how it would feel to travel into such a broiling mass - of course, it would probably be anti-climactic, as Jupiter has no solid rocky core, so the curious onlooker would find themselves eventually back in space, possibly with a battered sign attached to the windshield / viewport, saying ' Thank You for driving carefully through our Jovian funk '
Speaking of large clouds in our corner of space, the Mars Explorer has been observing a curious cloud in the equatorial region of the ' Red Planet '; which brings us neatly to the pending arrival of Insight on Mars, on the 26th of  November . I will be watching with crossed fingers, as my avatar will be aboard...

Designed to measure seismic activity , Insight will be a static lander, which has already attracted much online speculation ; apparently the designated landing site is close to a crashed ufo , and a walled city...

Apparently, a crashed ufo on Mars...        pic: NASA

Mysterious Mercury , Moving LaunchPads, Foraging On Mars And Fake Suns

Bepi Colombo selfie  (with insulation , because - cold)    ESA

On October 20th, the Ariane V rocket containing Bepi - Colombo blasted off on its mission to  unravel the mysteries of Mercury.  The next day, we received a selfie from space...

I don't know about you, but the vast, dark expanse of space gives me odd feelings (shivers, decides to add photoshopped stars...)


It is hoped that the strange world closest to the sun will reveal more of itself to the joint ESA / Jaxa mission , helping us to understand its mysteries, like why it has such a large iron core and a surface composed of highly flammable sulphur, without being already burned away...
The  mission will make great use of gravity assists from Venus and Earth - but in this case, the aim is to slow down, not speed up - the tremendous pull of gravity near the sun would otherwise send the mission to a high-speed fiery death.
At this point I thought I'd make a scurrilous comparison to holding marshmallows too close to a bonfire -
but that would be silly, wouldn't it ?
Despite the lengthy travel time , the mission should greatly increase our understanding of Mercury.


Meanwhile, back on Mars 


Deafening silence from the Opportunity rover which was encased during the vast dust storm that swept across Mars earlier this year.
Attempts are being made to listen for any signal from the stricken rover - ironically, seasonal winds on Mars which begin in November,  may blow dust away from those delicate solar panels, so it's time to cross fingers and hope.
The original remit for Opportunity and its sister rover ,Spirit *, was to last 90 days - the years of time we've had since then (2004) has been a bonus
There is also evidence of electrified dust - devils on Mars, which are credited with the mysterious cleaning of solar panels on the rovers...
 Personally, I'm stunned that in our solar system we now have a world peopled entirely by robotic explorers...

                                    Pinpointing collection sites on Mars              NASA/JPL

The future sample collecting mission scheduled for 2020 is narrowing down the potential sites to a couple which may provide the biosignatures hoped for.
In terms of astrophysics, I am a luddite , but it seems unnecessarily complex that three missions are required to collect and return the samples to Earth.
It's frustrating like the Mercury mission which will take seven years to arrive...
Correction, I am not a ' luddite' - just impatient.

In the meantime, don't forget that the Insight mission is next to land on Mars , ( November 26th) complete with robotic 'grabber' arm (officially, it's the Instrument Deployment Arm)
Insight is designed to stay put , taking delicate seismic and other measurements.

Soon to be launched from a jet is the Icon, an orbiting device designed to monitor the interaction of Earth and Space, weather - wise. The actual launch will be from a  ' Stargazer' jet, the only 'moving' launchpad of its type**.

Stargazer L101 with Pegasus              NASA

Meanwhile, in the upper atmosphere...

It appears that ambitious plans are afoot to launch a giant 'fake sun' into space.
The satellite would act as a mirror, reflecting the suns light onto an area covering some 80 km .
Lack of available information on this ambitious plan makes me wonder whether it is just an internet nonsense - but there has been a precedent ; back in 1993 , the Russian project Znamya 2  briefly cast a light upon Europe before burning up on re-entry.

Znamya 2 mirrored sunlight back  to Earth          MIR/ CSS

'Till Next We Meet


G

* Just a brief vid of Opportunity trying to free itself from a sand trap back in 2010

  ** I almost said 'the only moving launchpad ..in the world', but of course  -

Gateway To Hell, Giant Meteorite, Vacuum Decay, Bring Back Pluto !

Scattered across the ancient Mediterranean were alleged gateways to hell, according to Roman fables.  One such gateway remains at Hierapolis  in Turkey - Hooray ! We can throw the evil-doers (mostly high-ranking government officials) into the fiery pit from whence they came..but wait - it appears that toxic gas was responsible for the fate of sacrifices....

Ploutonion, named after the god Pluto...

Speaking of Pluto, New Horizons recently made a course correction, putting it on target for its rendezvous with Kuiper Belt object MU69 - 'Ultima Thule',  on Jan 1, 2019

Voyager 2 is nearing the beginning of interstellar space, following Voyager 1 , which left our solar system 6 years ago, and is now the farthest spacecraft from Earth, at 13 billion miles distant.

enamel pin available    Pin Alchemy @GreggB4

In the never - ending search for the elusive planet X , they have discovered an extremely distant object...personally, I just want Pluto re-instated as a planet. It's a lot closer - and we've 'been' there...just because it has an elliptical orbit is no reason to expel it from our solar system ! 

Bring Pluto Back Into The Fold...

A news report asks whether the JWST could spot alien life - the answer is possibly, but first they have to actually get the damn thing into space. Currently looking at a 2021 launch, it is running 14 years behind schedule - at this rate, you'd have a better chance taking pictures from the porthole of a Space X cruiser...

Speaking of the JWST, it appears that its predecessor is hobbling through space with stabiliser problems- down to one gyro from four...fingers crossed for the Hubble telescope, our 'eye-in-the-sky' since 1990

click here for more                 NASA/JPL/ University of Arizona

In other news we may have evidence of the first exomoon , which is great, but the current fad for deducing where something is by defining where it's NOT strikes me as possibly counter - productive*...discuss

A giant meteorite used as a doorstop in a rural farmhouse ? Sounds like the start of a science fiction...

Speaking of quantum computers, which we were not, or perhaps we were - here is a good / straight forward guide to that world of bizarreness

Another way to feel small and insignificant is to read this report on hypervelocity stars racing through our milky way...and the icing on the cake has to be this apocalyptic theory of vacuum decay ...honestly, what's the point ?

In a parting wave of cheerful news, the Ukraine has just announced plans to build a solar energy station...in Chernobyl.
If I were being crass, I'd say that every cloud has a silver lining.

Cheery Bye !


G

* I parallel this with our Anti-Social 'social' media culture, where a person is judged for what they didn't do- Person:  You didn't 'like' that anti-government joke
                 Me      :   I worry about 'humanising' the monsters.
                 Person:    So you're a nazi sympathiser, then ?
                 Me      :    WTF

Hopping Bots, Killer Bots, Art Around The Moon, and a Base In Space

Dynamic image by Rover 1A  Hopping   ( no photoshop !)          JAXA 

This weekends big news has to be the landing of Japans hopping modules on Ryugu, an asteroid some 158 million miles from Earth.
That's worthy of a momentary pause for reflection.
At 7 inches wide and 2.8 inches tall, the little ' hopper' modules really will be like specks of dust on  the asteroid surface...but these electronic specks will gather a wealth of information on what appears to be a rocky remnant from when our solar system was formed
Using the weak gravity of the asteroid, the robots will be able to change position by hopping - although it appears that the surface is far more rugged than first thought - so fingers crossed for safety - the previous Hayabusa mission accidentally deployed the first MINERVA  module into the depths of space, missing its target.

In a previous blog-post , I mentioned the relatively new field of autonomous weapons ( i.e. robots)*. Far from being the stuff of sci-fi, the European Parliament has just passed legislation outlawing such things.
A previous UN resolution was halted, with some saying that ' The benefits of autonomous weapons should be explored...'
Call me old fashioned but I can't see any benefits to being killed by an army of robots.
The only benefits to autonomous weapons that I can think of, are instances where they can be used to create controlled explosions to clear areas of rockfall, etc, during natural disasters


Rumours abound that Jeff Bezos is embarking on a new space venture, possibly in the field of commercial satellite launches  - I wonder if it's anything to do with ...

Artist rendition of ' Marsbase Alpha' with BFR

Elon Musk has unveiled a vision for a Mars Base which looks pretty nifty, although I worry about the long hike from the BFR to the transit terminal...and I bet the luggage still gets lost in transit...

Whether Messrs Musk and  Bezos are at loggerheads in their plans for cosmic exploration  is immaterial - it's all good, if it advances the cause - to which end, the announcement of the first passenger for the SpaceX orbit around the moon is good news; Yusaku Maezawa intends to take a group of creatives from different fields, with a view to creating multimedia art of the journey - which strikes me as very positive, and philanthropic of Mr Maezawa .
After such a life-affirming thing, I almost feel guilty for saying that the downside of this is that the rocket has not yet been built for the journey...still, 2023 is enough time to take the BFR from a CGI render, to moon-orbiting reality !








* I included drones initially, but they are not really autonomous, being remotely controlled ...unless they were remotely controlled by robots, which is just too scary...