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

Rendezvous with Ultima Thule, Rogue Satellites, Underwater Explorers, And Sabotage In Space

SUBSEA:  Nautilus explorer                image : NASA

NASA are using an underwater robot to examine signs of life around a volcanic vent off the coast of Hawaii . Known as the SUBSEA project, it is a test for similar probing on Enceladus , one of the most likely places to harbour* life beyond Earth. It's exciting stuff, much more ' hands on' than previous NASA proposal ' ELF', which rather delicately proposes to search for amino acids and methane traces in the plumes of water at the Souh pole of Enceladus. The heat is on, though, with  billionaire Yuri Milner proposing a commercial explorer to launch much sooner - after all, the prize for first place may be a place in the history books, for the discovery of life on other worlds...

The hole in the Soyuz ferry- ship MS 09

The world of space is normally free of espionage (except in film and scienti - fictions),but recent news  has set conspiracy theorists into overdrive - there is a tiny hole in the hull of the Soyuz capsule docked at the I.S.S.  Is it sabotage by a political enemy? Damage from a micro-meteorite ? A warning shot fired by an invading force of microscopic aliens ? My personal feelings are that there is a very embarrased maintenance person somewhere, (who realises that using chewing gum to cover the hole might have been the better option) , but I'm just glad that we don't have a trigger - happy 'space - force' up there...ahem.

Speaking of objects orbiting the Earth, the Aeolus satellite is now in place, and has begun taking critical readings to increase our accuracy when reporting stormy weather - to do this, the satellite fires an ultraviolet laser beam earthwards ( full details in the link ) . Currently, the satellite is in ' test' mode, so no advance warnings or news on the current barrage of typhoons / hurricanes, sadly.

Typhoon Mangkhut                                       image ©2018 EUMETSAT

Meanwhile, there is allegedly a rogue satellite conducting odd manoeuvres overhead, causing concern to both France and the USA . Perhaps we are heading for an active ' ...space situational awareness', to use the new gobbledy-gook.

Further out in space...(the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, to be precise),
the Dawn explorer is now swooping down to give us closer images (24 miles high instead of 240) of
the intriguing dwarf planet Ceres, the largest body in the asteroid belt.

Much closer shot of the salts around Occator on CERES                      image NASA/ JPL/Caltech/MPS/DLR/IDA

Speaking of objects floating in space, the Japanese craft Hayabusa 2 is preparing to release its 'hopping rovers' for touchdown on asteroid Ryugu on the 21st September 2018
Also, the first image of ' Ultima Thule '  has been taken by New Horizons in advance of its New Years Day flypast 2019 . Formerly known as MU69, the kuiper belt object was renamed in a public vote , although the highest ranked suggestion was 'mjolnir' ** - Thor's hammer.

Thors hammer won the public vote, but Tiramisu ranked highly, too

The decay of the Higgs Boson particle into 'bottom quarks' has been observed which confirms the model of  standard physics, and leads us closer to the elusive world of quantum physics. Just reading the article has given me a headache, but I'm sure it is perfectly rational to someone ...similarly, the news that entanglement of 18 qbits has been achieved, which strikes me as a very important development, but my pea-brain closes down when expressions like 'Hilbert Space' are used. If you are at all interested in the idea of the quantum multi-verse, then you may like this piece on how the brain allegedly visualises in 11 dimensions...



Thanks For Reading My Waffle !

G

* See what I did there ? Feeble, I know, but times are hard
** Sorry, my keypad won't let me add the umlaut Alt 0246

Why Not Ceres ?

Ceres 

I was conflicted about making this post for many reasons, mainly because I don't do mid-week posts, but here we are.
I decided to write this in advance of the proposed N.A.S.A. news release on 22nd Feb - not to ' rain on their parade' , but rather, to enhance the experience.
After all, the proverbial cat is out of the bag already, and I think the leak emanates from somewhere in Europe (details of the whole thing here ).
Personally, I'm disappointed, as it overshadows the quite astonishing news that organic matter has been found on the planetoid , Ceres.
Remember the Dawn explorer , and my previous excitement over the mysterious bright patches which turned out to be forms of salt from subsurface waters ?
Yes ?
Well. not those.
Apparently these organic materials are in an area surrounding a particular crater.
This is not the place to embark on fanciful theorising; but why should organic matter exist in one particular area ?
If the material is from a subsurface body of water, why is there no trace in other areas ?
I'm already letting my feverish monkey - brain get excited by a myriad of possibilities , but this, to me, is a perfect reason to explore further.
Ceres is the largest body in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, and I would argue that it warrants closer investigation - if the only concern is cost, it would surely be a fraction of any Mars expedition.
The previous link is a fanciful Bloomberg piece of speculation, but the idea is there.
Let's just concentrate on exploration rather than the plundering of minerals - after all , the assumption that it's there for the taking smacks of colonial era greed and ignorance - but we're better than that, right ?

Regardless, N.A.S.A. will probably tell us of the three Earth-like worlds orbiting a red dwarf  some 40 light years away; and that is genuinely exciting, especially when the chance of extraterrestrial life is introduced , but even with our best speculative technology, it would take us 60 years in a craft with an immense lightsail to get there, and only then if we could upscale the technology to make it a manned mission, rather than a postage stamp - sized craft.

Just to conclude, this post is my response to the imminent N.A.S.A. announcement - I think they are missing a point closer to home .
Ceres is on a par with Europa, Titan and Enceladus in the ongoing search for life.


Thank you for reading this far - normal service will be resumed in a few days !

From The Great Attractor To The Fountains of Enceladus

This is the closest thing to a cosmic xmas wreath, so...merry festive !

Apparently dark shadows in craters on Ceres conceal frozen water ice, something which the Dawn explorer is looking into (no pun intended) - the famous  highly reflective white patches are salt , and the craters conceal what could be ice water from which the salt has come; more evidence of a briny, subsurface ocean .
Given the sheer amount of subsumed salt on the surface, I'd wager it wasn't far beneath the surface.
It's almost a given that our solar system is full of worlds with hidden oceans.

A recent trend seems to be the coupling of serious information with crude humour , and the headline of this article continues the tradition.
Anyway, Uranus exhibits unusual rotation in the southern latitudes , rotating some 15% faster than the rest of the gas giant.
This seems to be the result of an unusual object deep inside the planet.
Very little is known about the gas giants , so this, along with the current Juno explorer , could help greatly increase our knowledge.

Scientists have measured the smallest sliver of time ever , so brief (850 zaptoseconds*) , that they can see an electron emerge from an atom which got me thinking ; how can they create a ' sliver ' of time?
Can they therefore stop time ?

A new Antarctic exploration has begun with an attempt to drill  down deep and uncover the oldest ice on Earth, yielding evidence from millions of years ago.
From the microscopic to the macrocosmic - the discovery of galactic infrastructure
(we are part of a supercluster called Laniakea) means that we  are potentially the tiny building blocks of an even greater universe .
This has implcations for many things, including our understanding of time; speaking of which, go see  Arrival...

Enceladus water plumes     image NASA / Cassini

The next journeys to Saturns moons Enceladus and Titan, will be to find evidence of life.
Nasa have an explorer lined up called Enceladus Life Finder, or ELF, to be funny.
Not to be outdone, ESA will be exploring with a craft named E2T , which isn't quite so snappy, but it will be amazing to see two flybys intent on uncovering evidence of life.
The focus will be on the jets of water seen emitting from the southern polar area of Enceladus. Coupled with a low altitude camera survey of the surface, it is hoped that enough information will be gleaned to establish for once and for all the possibility that even microbial life does or did exist in those subsurface oceans.

Meanwhile, on Mars...

Slightly closer to home - well, Mars anyway, is on target for the 2020 Exomars thing, with the addition of a drill capable of taking samples from a depth of two metres below the surface in the ongoing search for biosignatures...

High above the Earth...

...even closer to home is the ISS, and NASA are mooting a new form of parachute braking system to enable two way journeys of science payloads.
Plans are already afoot for a new space station, with the mooted NASA / Roskosmos collaboration scheduled for 2024 . By this time, such operations should be quite commercialised , and a joint exploration of Mars is also planned - to which end, the new Orion is being put through its paces.

Out there, somewhere...

Apparently,the Great Attractor is our destiny .
Whats going to happen is a secret though-
It's 200 million light years away, so we won't be getting spoilers for a long time.
No one knows what the great attractor is, except that it has the mass of 200 billion suns, and is drawing us inexorably towards it
So it's pretty irresistible
Pun was not intended

I am posting this as we approach the end of  2016, for better or worse.
Personally, I think it's for the better, as this year has been relentless and miserable .
I do intend to write a couple more blogposts by the end of this year, but they may be more 'Earthbound' than recent posts.
I'm scratching my head though - perhaps I should just get a new blog.
Decisions, eh ?

Until soon, take care !





* Apparently its very short. I trust New Scientist not to prank me.

Robotic Stingrays, Vanishing Explorers and Virtual Hunters

This time around, we have a number of  truly strange developments , so we'll begin with something that is almost mundane - it appears that peas can gamble 

Reality trumps fiction as we move casually into the world of living / artificial hybrids, with news of a
robot stingray made from cells taken from a rat.
Making use of low energy propulsion , the robot stingray has odd implications for the future.
They could be used for  aquatic exploration , but also for the underwater exploration of other worlds.
Our solar system is teeming with possible subsurface oceans, so a swimming robotic explorer would be highly prized.
It really ought to have a seriously good camera , too.
Then of course, there is the problem of having nowhere to keep samples - perhaps a tiny backpack ?
which brings us conveniently to the new craze for ' Pokemon Go', an app that strangely enough, is drawing people together, in a bizarre new form of bonding over the hunt for cartoon characters in virtuality

Already, pleas have gone out that people should not play 'Pokemon Go' whilst driving ...
The downside is that this ' alternate reality ' intersects with our own in some potentially dangerous tangents.
Aside from the potential for death by road accident / drowning, it also gives the app massive control of the users online information, so compromised security is a hefty price to pay for your Pikachu...

The teensy Cozmo...          pic Anki

On a similar level, the tiny robot Cozmo is a cute and very capable package, a rover with the power of facial recognition and the ability to take remote control of your room lights and probably other stuff.
So insiduous AI exists, but in packages that may be overlooked as trivial .
Perfect disguise, really...

STOP PRESS !

News just in tells of an encounter between a robot security guard and child in a security mall, resulting in mild bruising for the human child.
Still, the robot uprising has to start somewhere, so why not in a shopping mall in the USA ?
It was good enough for George Romeros zombies...

Meanwhile, somewhere above Mars...

New theories emerge regarding the origins of Mars' moons Phobos and Deimos . I include the link here, but to condense the piece, it suggests that the pair of moons were created following a humungous impact on Mars , long long ago. 

Amidst the frenzy of excitement (well, as frenzied as scientists get) surrounding the potential for life in the subsurface oceans of Enceladus, Europa, Ganymede and Ceres, we have another contender.
 Saturns moon Titan, neglected and unloved, steps up to the plate with new revelations that life could exist there.
Yes, it's an inhospitable deep frozen rocky moon, but apparently the right chemicals are in place for freaky non-waterbased lifeforms.
The mind boggles.

The last thing seen by Hitomi, the ll-fated  Japanese black hole explorer came as a disappointment to me.

Hitomi - final view was the Perseus cluster     pic JAXA

It shows the Perseus cluster , some 249 million light years away, so yes, impressive - but from the wording of the report , it sounded a tad more ominous...perhaps just an image of giant eyeballs...

Meanwhile, further out...

340 light years away - so close, then in universal terms - a planet has been found that defies explanation , as it has three suns.
Take that, Tatooine !
Such a world would almost certainly attract lots of holiday agents - all that guaranteed sunshine !
Endless romantic sunsets !
Infact, it would probaby never get dark...

Gas Giants, Helium Balloons and the Arrow of Time

Apparently the hole in the ozone layer is healing, after the virtually global ban on CFCs was introduced some thirty years ago, so yay!
We did something right...
I think the end of the Eighties trend for ' big hair ' probably made a difference, too...

pic: Mary Sue.com

More Good News...

In Tanzania, they have discovered a huge underground source of Helium, so clowns making balloon animals  and stoners talking in funny voices can rejoice !
Seriously though - Helium occurs in abundance throughout the universe, but sadly it is lacking on Earth,  generally only occuring as a byproduct of radioactive decay...so the discovery of a secret stash is good news!

In other news...

Scientists have discovered a new nucleus that points to a certain place in space, which indicates that time is linear, only ever moving forward.
So, no time travel, then.
I find this oddly deflating (certainly for fans of Back To The Future) , but don't forget - it may only be true in our universe!
Which leads me to wonder whether time even exists in other universes.

Mars has Manganese   pic MSS /  NASA

Recent discovery of oxygen whch was once plentiful in the Martian atmosphere paints a picture of a more Earth-like world , especially with its evidence of ancient oceans and lakes.
Speaking of oceans , it seems there may be one beneath the surface of Pluto, following visual cues from New Horizons data ...and vying for recognition in the possible ' water-world' stakes is another dwarf planet, namely Ceres.

Soon to be at a gas giant near you...

Speaking of long distance travel ( do you like the smooth flow of links here?) , after launching way back in 2011, Juno finally arrives at Jupiter on Monday July 4th 2016 ( auspicious date for some ), to begin a survey of  the atmosphere of the gas giant, helping us better understand the mysterious world .
It's a pretty extreme and turbulent ride ahead for the little explorer, so fingers crossed...

Finally, another piece of good news is that funding has been secured for further missions for New Horizons and Dawn , as well as other craft involved in exploration of space .
Positive steps into the unknown !

The Midnight Rambler and a Cloud called Smith.

There is a cloud called Smith, and it's heading this way at 700,000 miles an hour from the distant outer edge of our galaxy.
It's a gas cloud full of cosmic chemicals, the stuff of stars.
Don't worry though, it's not due to collide with us for another 30 million years, so panic over.
I think I'll be tidying the shed that day.
By all accounts, it will be quite a sight, though, as it could give birth to up to two million stars.
I love these giant space numbers - they remind me of how insignificant I really am, in the greater scheme of things.
Enough navel gazing - the cloud was discovered by Gail Smith , hence the name.

Jupiter image ©NASA / JPL

Apparently the ancient Babylonians used algebra to plot the passage of Jupiter across the night sky, taking its origins (calculus) back some 1500 years.
My personal caution is that we are approaching 'ancient astronauts' territory here, and will next hear of the alien race who bequeathed this knowledge - puts me in mind of the claims regarding the Dogon tribe of Mali.

Remaining on the subject of possible alien interlopers, we are advised that there will be further pictures of the mysterious lights / salts in the craters of Ceres.
The Dawn mission is currently taking images from a new lower orbit of 240 miles. Images thus far look great, but the relevant ones are conspicuous by their absence.

Moscow viewed from ISS  pic ESA / 

Only last night, I saw a photo taken over Moscow which looked not unlike the Occator region - pareidolia possibly, but even so.
I'm still quietly excited.

Occator lights, Ceres   pic NASA / JPL / Caltech

There now follows a close up image of comet 67P Churyumov - Gerasimenko on which the lander Philae has apparently died a cold and lonely death, but will be joined in September when mothership Rosetta finally sets down to become one with the now famous hunk of icy rock as it continues its journey through space.
the comet was originally from the Kuiper belt, until a brush with Jupiter in 1959 knocked it out of it's orbit **, and Jupiter is where we came in, so...

Close up of comet 67P Churyumov - Gerasimenko           23 Jan 2016  ©ESA

* 'they' = the government, obv.
** which makes the comet a 'centaur' technically, as it's a hybrid.

FYI, this post was edited on Feb 5th 2016 to remove my 'midnight ramble' which frankly adds nothing to the post. Thank you all.

By the way, if anyone is wondering about my name change - it's to avoid being labelled a bot on social media - so the initials still mean 'Alias Me', ok ? Thank you !

Newsflash! Ceres Resolved ...Or Not

False colour image to heighten drama...    ©NASA/JPL/Caltech

This is just a fast post to tie in with the official news from NASA that reveals the bright lights on Ceres are - salt.
Far be it for me to question  NASA , but is that it ?
I'm sure I saw another release that said it was a mixture of a salt (magnesium sulfate) and dirty ice thrown above ground by a collision - or multiple collisions.

In a nutshell, Ceres could provide a new source of  health-giving spa waters...

The assertion is that it derives from some form of subsurface ocean (quite a common theme in our moons and smaller worlds , these days).
Estimates say that Ceres is approximately 25% water, most of which is locked in as subsurface ice, allegedly.
There seems to be a lot of discussion about the incredible refractive index (let's not forget that some of these areas are 6 miles across and glowing...)

So there we have it, and thank you for resolving the mystery, NASA.
Of course, this is not a full and defintive answer...

130 'spots' have been identified...

From the lights of Ceres to the plains of Pluto

Ceres Occator crater - closest view yet...

The indefatigable Dawn explorer is dropping (slowly, the Ion engines are fragile) to its closest point in orbit around the dwarf planet Ceres, and hopefully a final solution to the true nature of those baffling lights.
We are told it will be in place for mid-December, so anytime now
From an orbit of 915 miles, it will drop to 230 miles , hopefully providing us with a final definitive moment when we can collectively nod knowingly, saying -'So that's what it is, hmmm'.
I suspect we'll still be none the wiser, but even so, it is a truly fascinating thing.
And to think it's on our nearest dwarf planet.
The closer we get, the more I am convinced that they are subsurface, molten sources, probably of intense heat, too.
If you check out the other images of Ceres, you can see many examples of similar, brightly coloured ejecta around the cratered surface.
I think it's a natural phenomenon of some kind - if it is an alien city, it's the equivalent of putting on every light in the city and shouting ' Here we are! Come and get us!'.
Which would be foolish on a cosmic scale.
Of course it could be a double bluff, and they want us to explore what appears to be a dead city...


Whilst entertaining such wild ideas, scientists have apparently proven that our reality is not a hologram, so - yeah, sorry to all the Matrix-philes and existentialists out there, but apparently reality is not an illusion.
Well, not a holographic illusion.

Meanwhile, Pluto continues to surprise with the latest high definition image downloads from New Horizons...

I'm amazed that this is a strip of land on a planet over 3 billion miles away...


Back on Earth...

'Nudol', Russian anti-satellite system

Russia has successfully tested its first anti- satellite missile.
The image above allegedly came from a Russian site - I especially like the blending of the hardline military vehicle with fluffy clouds and golden crops.
Seems almost peaceful...
This is proof that we are in a new era of space war - or at least the paranoid defence of our satellite capabilities.
This article makes for sobering reading.
For myself, I tend to think of satellites as GPS and mapping and such things - of course it's far more than that. Many nations are dependent on satellite functionality - business, military, communications, weather - so this is the beginning of overhead powerplay...groan.
Okay, so it's not the beginning - the U.S. already have ASAT, their own missile system ready - it's just that Russia and China have entered the fray.

This being the case, I just hope that the joint US / Russian Venus mission goes ahead, along with the proposed ESA/ Roskosmos moon mission - just to remind us all that we can work together and do constructive, forward looking things...

In other revelations this week, it is mooted that there was no Big Bang, and infact the Universe has existed forever . Whether I find this cheering or depressing is uncertain at present - the illustration of the man blowing up the expanding balloon / universe says it all , I think.

  So the universe expands, like a balloon - but who's inflating it - and what's out there?

Tractor Beams and Space Junk

Did you know that we 'Earthlings' are surrounded by a 'bubble' of our own sounds / t.v. / radio transmissions?
Apparently it stretches 200 light years around us, which is pretty big, but on a cosmic scale, is tiny.
And yet no aliens have been in touch.
Perhaps they saw X Factor.

In Other News...
Scientists in the uk have successfully manipulated a physical object  using only sound waves.
Okay, so it's only a tiny bead, but it's a start.
Tractor Beams are real
The Future is now!

I was thinking of this the other day - the bewildering exponential curve of everything.
Is it me or is the curve of science and discoveries going through the (virtual) roof ?
In tihs blog, I tend to focus on a narrow band where my personal interests lie, which is mainly all things related to space travel and exploration.
In that field alone, we've seen some astonishing advances in this year - the first close up images from Pluto and its moons, ongoing examination of Mars by the Curiosity rover, now yielding details of ancient rock strata and riverbeds : we landed an explorer on a comet, whilst maintaining the benign presence of an orbiting mothership. Another explorer, (Cassini), which was tasked with mapping the moons of Saturn is now testing water plumes from Enceladus, Maven has just entered orbit around Mars, joining the Mars Express and Mars Reconnaisance Orbiter and moves are afoot to send initial human missions to Mars as well as further moon exploration  - a mooted joint venture between the ESA and Roscosmos.
'Dawn' is entering a lower orbit for final close passes of planetoid Ceres in December .
And meantime, one of our furthest explorers, New Horizons is heading for rendezvous with KBO 2014MU69
Keppler is searching for exoplanets in the 'habitable zone' of distant stars.
Voyagers one and two are heading into deep space.
It's busy out there...

  It's a busy solar system! No parking at any time...                     pic by Olaf Frohn . 

Then there's the ISS
As well as an endless band of satellites in a ring around us.
And space junk.
Officially known as 'Orbital Debris'.
At the last count 50,000 pieces orbiting planet Earth, ranging from tiny flecks of paint to objects the size of a family car

Speaking of which - did you know that an unknown object will fall to Earth on Friday 13th November ?
Unlucky for some.
Apparently it's hollow space junk, and whilst this is fairly common, this one is being monitored for reasons unknown.
It has even been given a classification : WT1190F (or WTF in popular parlance).
The 'WTF' is accurate really, as they actually don't know what it is - cue spooky music - (theremin)
Theories range from an alien vessel to the Biblical millstone cast into the sea by God, thus fulfilling Revelation 13- ahem.
Anyway, they are pretty sure it will land in the Indian Ocean, approximately 5 km south of Sri Lanka - and woe betide any local fisherman in that triangulation.

            Landing area of WT1190F  (approx 5 km)                      Pic © Bill Gray   Project Pluto

In the Wake of Water

So NASA 'found' water on Mars.
It means different things to different people, but for many of the scientists involved, it's not really 'news', I imagine - more a confirmation of generally accepted reality.
The only real  change in more populist perception is the move from bounteous surface water then (approx. 500,000 years ago) to seasonal trickles of water now.
Still, it raises the collective profile, and creates a buzz in the wake of the Pluto flyby, keeping the realm of space in the public eye, and hopefully generating further funding for exploration.

I learned a new technical term , as well - Recurring Slope Linae - RSL - lines which indicate (in this case) water flow on Martian slopes.

How will this news affect future Mars exploration ?

 It means that NASA will be honouring the 'Outer Space Treaty' of 1967, by choosing exploration sites well away from all evidence of water, and landers being free of contaminants as far as possible - after all, we don't want to follow the historic example of human colonists who wiped out native species by inadvertently introducing disease .


For some, the announcement merely means that yes, we should colonise Mars .
However, this conjures images of a wild frontier, with pioneering types staking claims to land in the ' Gold Rush of 2020 '.
Except there may not be gold as such.
There is certainly a wealth of citrine, olivine and feldspar.
It may be the case that claims have already been lodged with some Intergalactic Mining Body.
Which may lead to unpleasant scenes on Mars.
With angry locals staging sitdown protests, and suchlike.

This is also an extrapolation too far - that there are 'locals'.
Since H.G.Wells wrote 'The War Of The Worlds' in 1897, we've seen them (Martians) as undesirable interlopers, invaders intent on usurping our world, little green men with a penchant for invasion and genocide.
The initial invasion was almost parochial, with the Martians invading Woking, Surrey, in England.
Personally, I think it was evocative of the fears inherent as a new century approached - perhaps even a psychic window into the looming dark clouds of war - World War One was only a few years away.
Of course, the Hollywood interpretation is more global.
The latest remake of the 'War Of The Worlds' movie involves Mr Tom Cruise (who knows a few things about invading aliens).
The amount of sci-fi centred on encounters with Mars is vast, the most recent entry being 'The Martian', in which Matt Damon grows potatoes on the red planet.
It has fared well, considering the monumental thumbs down which greeted the recent John Carter movie. Eleven books of source material and three screenplay writers - yes, it's a mess.
Even the mythical Santa Claus had a battle with joyless martians, a film that lives forever in the minds of those unfortunate enough to see it...
Anyway, enough of the glib, potted reviews -

In terms of invading aliens , to coin a phrase - the shoe is on the other foot , and we are now the invaders.
We must tread carefully (literally).

In conclusion, we have 'Recurring Slope Lineae' in abundance on Mars - but we also see RSL on Ceres.
Many of its craters exhibit RSL , particularly on sunlight facing slopes
My question is this;
if the dark RSL on Mars are flowing water, what then, are the light - coloured streaks on Ceres' crater walls ?

The recent image below shows an odd hexagon-shaped crater, and mystery light - coloured streaks on the upper-left walls...click for larger view.

Hexagonal (!) crater on Ceres

I'm not even going to wonder how we have a hexagonal crater - instead, I offer a link to brand new and wonderful images of Ceres , and I say thanks to the tireless efforts of E Lakdawalla, and all at The Planetary Society.

Alien Finds On Distant Worlds.

In the news this week, we learn that scientists are preparing to awaken the mollivirus, a super-virus discovered in 30,000 year old Permafrost in Siberia.
Apparently they will first check that it will not affect humans or animals.
So that's alright, then.
Seriously though - if that's the case, why bother waking it up anyway?
Have they never heard the phrase 'Let Sleeping Dogs Lie?'
Not that it's a dog...
...except further conjecture is that some of the complex super-virus genus might conceivably be lifeforms in stasis. Or gestating...haven't they seen 'The Thing' ?

Ahem.
I remove my protective but highly - sensitive tin-foil helmet...

Meanwhile, back on Ceres
Well, strictly speaking, above Ceres...
The image above is a view of the 'Occator' crater, alias 'spot 2'. The crater walls are some two miles high, and very steep.

Personally, the more I see, the more I think it may be some subsurface, molten activity - for instance , it seems as though much of Plutos shifting surface landscape is altered through some form of internal heat, so why not.
The latest images from the Dawn mission, taken from a height of  915 miles, also show detail of a crater with the ubiqitous 'reflective' material on the crater walls.
This lends weight to the idea that it is some form of highly reflective material, possibly a form of salt crystal / magnesium sulfate?
It appears to be a very recent crater, and further imaging indicates some form of ongoing modification happening.
That's right, the dwarf planet is self-repairing !
Although, I'm sure there are better, more accurate, scientific terms available...
I'm just highly excited!
It's all happening!
After a fallow period, we're getting images thick and fast from the solar system!

Pluto with better resolution

Thanks to artefacts hampering the quality of previous images from Pluto, we are now get stunning full resolution versions, and Ceres continues to impress and puzzle.
There's even a fine 3-d anaglyph, for those with red / blue viewing specs.
I'm not going to waste time with conjecture, I'll just create links to the sites with the best images.
All I will say is this (dons tin-foil helmet);
although the latest images of the Occator and Haulani craters on Ceres (the craters with the most reflective 'lights') are taken from a much closer point , we still don't see clear definition.
There are images which clearly show light coloured ejecta around craters, which seems to indicate that this is subsurface material which has been displaced.
However, we have to wait until December for the final, closest, yet probably still ambiguous images...

A new Ceres crater with light streaks on the wall...

Limpets, Rubber Ducks and Cookies in Space

After my recent 'Dismaland' diversion, it's back to outer space - a new photo of Ceres reveals the mysterious mountain in greater detail.
The frustration increases, however, as we realise that this is the only close-up view we currently have, taken from some 900 miles above.
The strange mountain is also bizarre because it really is alone in an otherwise flat landscape, which is surely suggestive of an artificial origin.
I find this both fascinating and totally frustrating.
Frustrating because we won't get any more detailed images until December, when spacecraft Dawn enters a much lower orbit , taking closer shots from just 275 miles above.
Theories abound as to the nature of the 'mesa', with some saying it's material excavated from the nearby crater, and others declaring the 'spurs'  to be ice water.
The site has already been dubbed 'lonely mountain' by some Tolkien - lovers :
and I wouldn't be surprised if there was a dragon guarding treasure there...

A mountain or a space limpet ?                                   ©NASA/Caltech/JPL

Conjecture is all we have until further evidence arrives - I think it's amazing, especially given that our initial interest in Ceres was piqued by the highly reflective areas in what is now called the 'Occator' crater  - also still a mystery -
infact there has been a dearth of new information on that front, which has allowed exotic theories to abound.
There is conjecture that the mysterious 'reflections' are atop tall pillars which project above the crater edge ( giving us pillar / structures some two miles high)
An abandoned city / mining site has also been mooted - this is no longer such an outlandish idea , don't forget that we already have companies in place gearing up for offworld mining, after all.

New System tests             NASA jpg

Personally, I wonder if such ideas are being encouraged, purely to keep people interested in the otherwise quite 'dry' science of 'space-geography'.
Speaking of which, is there such a thing?
There should be, with the incoming data helping to create a database - after all, surely many of the oddities we are seeing arise because we try to make otherworld  geology match our own:
but our own knowledge is limited to this little blue planet.
Oh, and the moon.
Mars can be partly included as well, with Curiosity continuing its examination of ancient sedimentary rock and the like.
The recent flypast of Pluto / Charon gave us dramatic new geology with flowing water / methane ice, and changing, active landscapes.
The next focus for New horizons will be a Kuiper Belt object , 2014 MU69, about a billion miles beyond Pluto.

As we speak, tests are being run for Orion, NASAs next big thing, which will launch into lower Earth - orbit on December 4th as a test prelude to manned deep space missions, ultimately using a module which will facilitate deep space missions, but hasn't been created yet !
I'm a little dubious, given that the new Orion craft will be capable of  twenty- one days in space - surely not long enough to go anywhere meaningful - or is there some as yet unexplained quantum secret ?
As well as this, rather strangely, objects to be carried include a rubber duck, and a giant cookie - I kid you not !
So the next 'big' proposal from NASA involves astronauts circumnavigating the moon with the munchies and toys...

A giant cookie for space, obviously...          © NASA jpg

Surely the widespread legalisation of pot in the U.S.A. has affected hitherto serious decisions ?
Good to know then, that in this new space race, priorities are suitably warped...

Watch The Skies

I'm getting all fired up with astronomy here, thanks to the recent Pluto flypast.
One piece of trivia that excited me was the fact that the brain of New Horizons is powered by the same CPU as the Playstation1*

The mind boggles - this might explain why its  download rate is a mere 1kb / second.
Apparently it will take up to 16 months to completely download the info from Pluto / Charon, etc.
Don't forget though, the transmission point is over 3 billion miles away - and getting more distant all the time.

Ps One Evan Amos CC Licensed

Even so, we already have a wealth of stuff to mull over about this distant corner of our solar system.
We learned that there are mountains of water ice some 11,000 feet high on Pluto.
We even got a 3D gif ...

The icy mountains of Pluto...*

We have discovered a mountain in a weird moat - like depression on Charon, and evidence of chasms up to seven miles deep.
Also the relatively youthful geology of both Pluto and Charon indicate that they are very much active - this in itself, despite the lack of any obvious heat source, is peculiar.

Before I plunge headlong into the depths of tinfoil helmet - land...

* I mentioned the CPU of the PS one which powers the brain of New Horizons. - well, the thruster controls etc...
The craft itself is powered by an RTG, specifically Plutonium, an element named after - guess.

As well as the gadgetry for readings and suchlike, New Horizons also contains some of the ashes of Clyde Tombaugh, the American astronomer who discovered Pluto.
Enroute to the Kuiper Belt now, he becomes  the first human whose mortal remains have travelled beyond our solar system.

 Clyde Tombaugh was also one of the highest profile astronomers to report a ufo sighting.

Clyde Tombaugh discovered Pluto in 1930

Not only that , but he spotted unusual activity on the surface of Mars in 1941, in the form of bright flashes of light.

Curious ?

How about the bright lights recently spotted in craters on Ceres , which even NASA are puzzled over?

The mysterious lights of Ceres...

Yes, Ceres, remember that little blip of excitement ?

Another dwarf planet, some 250 million miles away, the largest object in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.

It's gone oddly quiet on that front lately , and the only real news which I could glean was that in early August the Dawn craft should get closer, as it enters an orbit of around 900 miles above the surface for hopefully more  in - depth photos.

Speculation already abounds - not least because we are seemingly being teased with almost but not quite detailed closeups.

The previous link above leads to a piece on the mysterious hazes which occasionally appear above the reflective patches.
there is debate as to whether these patches are composed of ice or salt - more importantly why don't we have Spectrometer analysis ?

Apparently the Spectrometer is otherwise engaged ...

Speaking of which, an animation of Ceres rotation has been released, which has missing footage.
Footage which may reveal the true nature of the lights...

Some say the haze is linked to an area of 'mini - atmosphere'...

Another theory is that it is an abandoned space base.

As the Dawn probe spirals closer, we can only wait.

Watch The Skies





* Pluto mountains GIF by MattiasMalmer , all other images Creative commons educational please thank you

A Backyard Full of Flybys

Apparently there was flowing water on Mars until about 500,000 years ago.
Evidence is visible in images taken by Curiosity -
It's also what the orbiting craft Maven is looking for :
What caused the atmosphere to dissipate and the water to dry up ?


Was the planet inhabited ?
Did they leave suddenly because of drought ?
Did they come here ?
Are we the descendants of Martians ?

And why so many questions ?

Evidence of waterflow on Mars  Newton crater pic by NASA

Anyway, this idea has moved from the tin - foil realm into 'maybe' territory.
Actually it hasn't - but I like to speculate.

'Speculative fiction' seems to be a new category, although the term was allegedly coined in 1941.
This may have happened in a strange parallel multiverse, and has only now come to light.

I suppose that if the future is now, (as we frequently seem to hear ),
then speculative fiction is closer to now than science - fiction.
It sounds more plausible.
With events being 'Just around the corner'.

500,000 years ago was the last evidence of flowing water on Mars.
About the same time here on Earth, we see evidence of interbreeding in the human fossil record,
As modern man develops from diverse archaic threads...
...food for thought ?

Or just the premise for a hokey sci-fi ?

- Deep breath -

Dr David Miller, chief technological officer at NASA, says we are aiming to colonise Mars now, not
just go for a  visit.

This being the case , are we  returning en - masse to the old homeworld ?
I say 'en -masse', but it will probably be a lottery.
Or like the Hunger Game of Thrones, a fierce challenge
Winner Takes All
Survival of the fittest.


I was going to include a time-line diagram of the development of flight, but I'm no good at technical details, so -

2,400 years ago, kites were invented by the Chinese.

1783 was the year of the first hot air balloon flight (courtesy of the Montgolfier brothers).

The Wright brothers made the first manned aircraft flight in 1903.

The first moon landing was 46 years ago.

Now we are on Mars - well, a couple of robot explorers are.
Also, the lander Philae is riding a comet out there somewhere.
Our first ever landing on a comet

Comets were once considered omens, harbingers of news...

I still find it amazing to think:

We have exploration spacecraft wandering amongst the planets.
As well as Rosetta (Philae mothership),
we have the Mars Orbiter (Curiosity mothership) and Maven
Also Dawn which is orbiting Ceres
Cassini is exploring Saturn and its moons
New Horizons heading to Pluto and beyond .
And Voyager 1 & 2 which are already in the beyond...

Cassini anim using Gimp copyright NASA ?

Pictures from our very first flypast of Pluto will be here imminently.
Whilst New Horizons has been travelling,
Pluto was downgraded from Planet to dwarf planet
and upgraded to Planet again.

Whilst New Horizons has been travelling, we have seen the birth of Facebook and Twitter.

When New Horizons began its trek to Pluto, the International Space Station was not a thing.
Think about that for a moment.
The object orbiting the world with spacemen inside
Now such an everyday accepted fact,
was still in its infancy - the scheduled completion date was 2010.

In 2010, having passed Jupiter,
the New Horizons craft went into hibernation mode.
Finally, after a five year journey, it is awake again
Travelling at 32,000 mph (approximately)
We are mere days away from our first ever proper close-up sight of a world so small and so far away, that it was only discovered by its effects on other bodies.

We are closing in on the heavenly body formerly known as Planet X  (and almost named Percival )

What Pluto actually looks like will no longer be in the realms of Speculative Fiction.

So I'm quite excited...

Latest image  from Ceres showing a couple of bright spots...

P.S. Here is a link to lots of new NASA images
P.P.S. I have forgotten to mention Keppler in my rundown of explorercraft , for which I am sorry .
Keppler is drifting on a wobbly path having lost 2 of its 4 stabilisers.
It continues in its mission to detect potential habitable exoplanets in the 'goldilocks zone'.
It is now on a second mission, known as K2.