Touching The Sun, Mission To Alpha Centauri, For Whom The Signals CHIME

This blog was hurriedly assembled to mark the launch of the historic Parker Solar Probe

Delayed lift-off ...

24 hours later 

The probe finally launches  aboard Delta IV Heavy

Today saw the re-scheduled* launch of the Parker Solar Probe, as it now bravely heads for the sun on a one - way mission to gather new information about our mighty star .
It is hoped that a working knowledge of the mysterious 'solar wind' can be gained - not least an understanding of why the temperature four million miles away is approximately 200 times hotter than the surface temperature of  the sun itself (a mere 5700 degrees C).
The mission is a vindication of scientist Eugene Parker, who first proposed the idea of the solar wind many decades ago (in the 1950s), but was refuted - until 1962, when the Mariner 2 craft reported a strong solar wind on its journey to Venus.
The solar wind extends beyond the end of our solar system , and was only recently breached by Voyager 1, which became the first human-built craft to enter interstellar space in 2012...
 The Parker Solar Probe will be the closest ever human - made object to the sun, dwarfing the previous record of approx 28 million miles.
Four million miles may seem like a considerable distance from the heat of the sun, but don't forget that the nearest planet, Mercury, is an average of 35 million miles away , and still gets daytime surface temperatures of 450 degrees celsius...
The Parker Solar Probe will become the fastest moving human built object ever, when it reaches a blistering (literally) 430,000 miles an hour at its fastest and closest approach to Sol in December 2024  , aided by a gravity 'slingshot' from Venus.
Part of its payload is a list of over one million names of people who applied to 'travel' - being superstitious, I thought it smacked of 'solar sacrifice', so my name is only on a boarding pass on the Insight craft...

Artist impression of the Parker Solar Probe                 image: NASA

In Other News...

 A meteorite that dates from a mere 2.5 million years after the ' Big Bang' has potentially changed the understanding of the formation of volcanic rock throughout the galaxy.

NASA has chosen the nine astronauts who will fly the next crewed missions to launch to the I.S.S. beginning next year. It feels like the next logical step, as all eyes look to the stars - well, Mars. Personally, I think it more likely that we are practicing for the eventual mining of asteroids, an untapped market worth an estimated three trillion dollars.; but then, I'm just an old cynic...

Staying with NASA, plans are afoot to send a mission to an exoplanet by way of marking the hundredth anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission, which landed the first humans on the moon.
The exoplanet candidate for this mission is part of the Alpha Centauri system, a mere four light years from here.
Hopefully, by the anniversary date of 2069, the small technical hitches (speed of light travel, deceleration, etc) will have been eradicated. The idea was mooted at a conference by Anthony Freeman of JPL, who then said the plans were " Nebulous" (laughter emoji)

                                                       Andre Renard / Dunlap Institute, CHIME

In other news, a brand new radio telescope in British Columbia, Canada has detected an FRB (180725A ) emanating from some 3 billion light years away.  The amount of energy required to send a radio signal over such a distance is phenomenal; one source equated it with moving a load weighing a million tons - okay, that means it's probably a couple of black holes colliding, or a pulsar, but even so...
What also makes this FRB so unique is that it has a low frequency of 580 mhz, rather than the standard 700 mhz. Exactly what this implies, I'm not sure, but I hope that the aliens using the signal as a carrier beam are friendly...
On this note, I repair to my safe room, and take my medications...
Until next time, I hope all is well in your corner of the multi-verse !


* These things happen - flocks of birds, meteors, Godzilla, that sort of thing

Water On Mars, Resurrected Roundworms , And A Fiery Fate For Parker

There's been a blistering heatwave in the U.K. recently, so the discovery of a body of water that's ice cold (-68c) is a great relief - unfortunately, however, it's buried beneath the South Pole of Mars.
The logistics involved in travelling 34 million miles to get there, then drilling down through over a kilometre of ice are challenging, but already hordes of excited people are jumping for joy  - liquid water on Mars !
Not that I want to rain on the parade, but the other unknown is just how much water there is - it may be a large, shallow, puddle...
Closer to home, but staying with the idea of frozen discoveries, scientists have re-awakened nematodes from a 40, 000 year slumber in Siberian permafrost.

                   Revived roundworm !                                                          Doklady Biological Sciences

Attempts are already underway to discover the mechanism that allows the ancient nematodes to ' de-activate' for so long. The feat itself is impressive (previous record for re-animation* is thirty years )

and has implications for cryogenic freezing and possibly generational travel.
Speaking of spacecraft*, the ISS has a live 'webcam' feed, as part of an ongoing experiment . I find it quite relaxing to watch, almost like meditation...

Recent activity in the heavens included the 'blood moon' , the longest lunar eclipse of this century, lasting over an hour and forty minutes, and by all accounts from around the world, pretty special (he says through gritted teeth) - yes, our long run of clear skies in the u.k. was briefly ended by cloud cover , just in time for this once-in-a-lifetime occasion.
Sighs, shrugs

The 'blood' moon, visible from most places - except here.

From the moon to the Sun, we learn of the new date for the Parker Solar Probe (now scheduled for launch sometime around August 11th 2018). The ' touching the sun' hype is a tad wrong, given that the probe will get no closer than four million miles or so - but don't forget that part of the Parker Probes purpose is to solve the mystery of 'coronal heating', attempting to find out why the outlying coronal area is 200 times hotter than the surface of the sun itself . When I read of the coronal temperature ( 2 million degrees Farenheit ), I just thought - good luck, little probe...


G
Thanks to you for being there, thanks to Glenn for the heads up on nematodes, and cheery bye , but hopefully not so long this time till next - did I tell you about my creative endeavours, no ?
Another time, then...

* Tardigrades were used ...I'm wary of the term ' re-animation', actually...I blame Herbert West...
* Tenuous link , but times are hard...

Dark Matter, Majorana, Quipu and Naked Sand

Apparently a galaxy has been found without any dark matter
Normally this would be a cause for concern, but as dark matter has never been empirically proven to exist, I think we'll just have to collectively shake our heads in bewilderment.
'Dark Matter' is possibly a marketing opportunity according to this piece - interesting article, but the overuse of the phrase 'sort of ' makes me sad.
Still, it's a step up from ' kinda '...if you know worra mean...

Perhaps I'm psychic...or a jinx, as no sooner did I mention * the pending launch of the James Webb Space Telescope, than it was put back to 2020.
The JWST has a long history of delays, going way back to 2005, but let's not be negative.
Sadly though, the delay will impact on other projects

Similarly, the Parker Solar Probe hit a couple of delays (it is also the only NASA craft named after a living person) but is now on target for a launch window between May and July 2018 : if you're quick, you can include your own name, sending it to the sun - not sure of the symbolism here - thousands of sun sacrifices at the same time, hmmm

Mayan sacrifices to the sun revisited ?

If you would prefer a hands- on role with NASA, now is the time - I'd apply, but not being a U.S. citizen means no, sadly...

There will be a bout of synchronised satellite flying in 2020, as ESA send proba 3 to record the suns corona closer than ever before.
The proba series of missions were designed to be low cost, small satellite projects-
Long ago, proba 1 was a satellite used for aerial photography, such as this shot of the Giza pyramid complex in Egypt.
Which brings us to the news that algorithms intended to reveal nudity are turning up images of sand dunes...perhaps it is more evidence that the science behind AI is not really fit for purpose; another frustration for Microsoft who are trying to make progress in what they see as a triptych of science offering great potential  - AI, Augmented Reality, and Quantum Computing.

Sand nudes , as they say...

They are currently working with an elusive particle - Majorana Fermion, in an attempt to corner the market in 'quantum supremacy' which is a long shot given that they have yet to produce an actual quantum computer ( D-wave have allegedly already done this, although their computers are very limited in ability).
Majorana Fermion is unique, in that it contains its its own anti-particle , as well as retaining memory of where it's been, and Microsoft hope to use it for braiding - the best analogy I can think of is the use of knots to contain information as practiced in many cultures - particularly the Andean Quipu system which was in use until it was eradicated by the Spanish conquistadors.

Quipu in the Larco Museum collection

Another analogy would be the DNA helix structure which contains the encrypted passcode to everything living... either way, good luck to Microsoft in their quantum endeavours. I'm only surprised that neither Jeff Bezos nor Elon Musk are involved in the race for ' quantum supremacy'...

IN OTHER NEWS...

It appears that the ' alien megastructure star' is at it again , with further dips in luminosity.

As I write this micro-blog post, we await the re-entry of the Chinese space station Tiangong 1 - debris is expected to fall between New Zealand and the U.S. - sometime on Monday 2nd April.
Previous debris falls included the 77 tonne Skylab in 1979...**

**UPDATE- Tiangong 1 burned up harmlessly somewhere overhead,,,



This link contains some stunning processed images of the Gale crater on Mars, thanks to Sean Dorán

 TTFN,

G

Happy April Fools Day, Easter, Eostre !


*23rd March blogpost

Tilted Worlds, Tilted Beds, Little Green Men, And Solar Probes

Uranus - natural colour

First planet to be discovered by telescope, Uranus is a strange world.
Tilted at almost ninety degrees, it rolls around the sun like a big frozen ball
An ice giant like Neptune, it exhibits quirks which imply that unknown processes are at work. deep within.
The best images which we have date from 1986 when Voyager 2 flew by, yet no probe / lander is proposed until 2030, by which time, we'll be well established on Mars- there are already six explorers / orbiters on Mars,  (and some publicity boosts in the form of popular films) *
It has been suggested that we could inhabit lava tubes on Mars, at least at first...hmmm, what could possibly go wrong?

NASA are already looking into ways to reduce journey time to Mars - with some innovative proposals on the table .
Various tests are underway for the human response to space travel ; recently subjects emerged from eight months of isolation and bed tests are underway for a sixty day period, with subjects being tilted downwards for that whole time.
It's a busy time, but there is room for more, with a serious discussion asking why we don't have at least one orbiter around each world in our solar system.
I just wonder when we will reach the ultimate military / space crossover point - i.e. when one of our orbiters gets shot down by disgruntled extraterrestrials who don't want their world to be streamed live...

Artists impression  The binary asteroid 288P. Credit: ESA/Hubble, L. Calçada, CC BY 4.0

Regardless of the planets of our solar system, let's not forget that NASA are sending a mission to the sun.
Set for launch in 2018, the Parker Solar Probe will endure blistering temperatures of 1200 degrees centigrade: if that sounds rather trifling for a solar temperature, don't forget that the probe will be some 3million miles from the sun...hopefully, it will survive long enough to transmit its discoveries on this one-way mission.


Australia are set to have their own space agency - and why not ?
After all, there's plenty of wilderness for launches and landings.
Then again, large untamed spaces are  a rarity these days, and I wondered why we can't avoid the
monstrous amount of fuel wasted in reaching escape velocity from Earth.




* Okay, so the old little green men / alien invaders trope is hardly flattering but no publicity is bad publicity. Besides, with our robot Mars explorers, we are the alien invaders...