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By Daniel Fischer Every page present in Europe & the U.S.!
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The latest issue!
| A German companion - only available here! Current mission news: MGS (latest pictures!) + Cassini + Stardust |
Telescopic observers got very excited in early July when a dust cloud appeared and quickly grew in Hellas, but it hasn't expanded into another global dust storm thus far: Science@NASA, S&T, BBC. Earlier small storms as seen by the MGS: SR, SN. Stunning current amateur pictures: CMO Gallery and Int'l Mars Watch . Observing Mars: S&T. Watch for Mars eclipse, flares: SC, S&T.
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First exoplanet confirmed in globular cluster, orbits pair of pulsar and white dwarf, breaks various recordsIt was a long quest but finally proof is in hand that a planet, of 2.5 Jupiter masses, exists in the globular cluster Messier 4 - where it orbits a double system, consisting of a pulsar and a white dwarf. Given the high age of this cluster, the planet is the oldest one known (at some 13 Gyr); its also the most distant one (at 5600+ light years) and the first one found to orbit around a close pair of two stars (other exoplanets have been known to orbit only one of two stars in wide systems). The story of this planet's discovery began in 1988, when the millisecond pulsar PSR B1620-26 was discovered in M4. It is a neutron star spinning just under 100 times per second, and the white dwarf was quickly found through its effect on the clock-like pulsar, as the two stars orbited each other twice per year.Sometime later, astronomers noticed further irregularities in the pulsar that implied that a third object was orbiting the others. This new object was suspected to be a planet, but it could also be a brown dwarf or a low-mass star. Debate over its true identity continued through the 1990s, but now the planet's actual mass has finally been determined through some ingenious celestial detective work: The white dwarf has been located on HST images of M4, and its color and temperature could be measured. Using evolutionary models, the star's mass was found. And compared to the amount of wobble in the pulsar's signal, the tilt of the white dwarf's orbit as seen from Earth could be calculated. When finally combined with the radio studies of the wobbling pulsar, this critical piece of evidence provided the tilt of the planet's orbit, too, and so its precise mass could at last be known. With a mass of only 2.5 Jupiters, the object is too small to be a star or brown dwarf, and must instead be a planet - which has had a rough road over the last 13 billion years. When it was born, it probably orbited its youthful yellow sun at approximately the same distance Jupiter is from our Sun. The planet survived blistering ultraviolet radiation, supernova radiation, and shockwaves, which must have ravaged the young globular cluster in a furious firestorm of star birth in its early days. Around the time multi-celled life appeared on Earth, the planet and star were plunging into the core of M4. In this densely crowded region, the planet and its sun passed close to an ancient pulsar, formed in a supernova when the cluster was young, that had its own stellar companion. In a slow-motion gravitational dance, the sun and planet were captured by the pulsar, whose original companion was ejected into space and lost. The pulsar, sun, and planet were themselves flung by gravitational recoil into the less-dense outer regions of the cluster. Eventually, as the star aged it ballooned to a red giant (which later became the white dwarf we see now) and spilled matter onto the pulsar. The momentum carried with this matter caused the neutron star to "spin-up" and re-awaken as a millisecond pulsar. Meanwhile, the planet continued on its leisurely orbit at a distance of about 3 billion km from the pair. It is likely that the planet is a gas giant, without a solid surface like the Earth. Because it was formed so early in the life of the universe, it probably doesn't have abundant quantities of elements such as carbon and oxygen: For these reasons, it is very improbable the planet would host life. |
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Twelve days late, Opportunity rises - while Mars Express is suffering from a power glitchThe end of the launch window on July 15 was already drawing near, but on July 7 (July 8 UTC) the 2nd Mars Exploration Rover "Opportunity" has finally made it off the launch pad - 12 days late due to a sequence of technical problems with the Delta-Heavy rocket. Opportunity's dash to Mars began with liftoff at 11:18:15 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time (3:18:15 UTC) from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla. The spacecraft separated successfully from the Delta's third stage 83 minutes later, after it had been boosted out of Earth orbit and onto a course toward Mars. Flight controllers at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., received a signal from Opportunity at 12:43 a.m. Tuesday EDT via the Goldstone, Calif., antenna complex of NASA's Deep Space Network.All systems on the spacecraft are operating as expected, JPL's Richard Brace, Mars Exploration Rover deputy project manager, reports. "We have a major step behind us now," says Pete Theisinger, project manager: "There are still high-risk parts of this mission ahead of us, but we have two spacecraft on the way to Mars, and that's wonderful." As of early Tuesday, July 8, Opportunity's twin, Spirit, has traveled 77 million kilometers since its launch on June 10 and is operating in good health. Opportunity is scheduled to arrive at a site on Mars called Meridiani Planum on Jan. 25, 2004, Universal Time, three weeks after Spirit lands in a giant crater about halfway around the planet. Meanwhile a serious problem has been found during the checkout of ESA's Mars Express: an interconnection problem between the solar arrays and the power conditioning unit on board the spacecraft! This means that only about 70% of the power generated by the solar arrays is available for the satellite and its payload to use. This anomaly has no effect on the state of the spacecraft and has no impact on the mission during the whole trip to Mars, including the orbit insertion phase once at destination. However, once in orbit the operational sequence of the science instruments will probably have to be adjusted somewhat, though the total science output of the mission should not be affected. |
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Rockot launches 8 satellites into different orbits; among them a tiny Canadian space telescopeOn 30 June 2003 the Eurockot Launch Services GmbH successfully launched the Multiple Orbit Mission into different orbits, using the ROCKOT launch system from Plesetsk Cosmodrome in Northern Russia. The multiple payload consisted of 8 micro- and nano-satellites for scientific purposes as well as a satellite simulator. The launch was Eurockot`s first sun-synchronous mission. The ROCKOT launch vehicle successfully deployed the Czech republic`s MIMOSA spacecraft into an elliptical orbit of 820 x 320 km and the Canadian Space Agency`s MOST spacecraft, together with a host of nano-satellites, including the Japanese Cubesat and CUTE-1, the Canadian Can X-1, the Danish AAU Cubesat and DTUsat, the US Quakesat, into a sun-synchronous orbit of 820 km.Next to demonstrating the multiple orbit deployment capability of its Breeze upper stage, this launch was also Eurockot`s first sun-synchronous mission. The ninth payload of this mission, a mass frequency simulator of the Russian MONITOR satellite, intentionally remained on Breeze and will burn up during deorbiting. Like most of its co-passengers, MIMOSA will perform a scientific mission: The Czech Astronomical Institute will use it to measure the density of the earth's upper atmosphere. MOST carries Canada's first space telescope and will probe the age of planets and stars for the Canadian Space Agency. The Japan spacecraft Cubesat Xl and CUTE-1 are educational nano-satellites, while the main purposes of CanX-1, AAU Cubesat and DTUsat is star-imaging. They will be operated for the University of Toronto, Aalborg University and the Danish Technical University respectively. And Quake-sat's mission will be the detection of earthquakes for the Quake-Finder Institute. |
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STS-107/ISS UpdateIn a dramatic test on July 7 engineers fired a chunk of foam insulation at a mockup of a shuttle wing leading edge, blowing a gaping 40-cm-wide hole in the carbon composite structure and putting to rest any lingering doubts a launch-day foam strike was responsible for the Columbia disaster. This lead to a "definitive" disaster scenario which was presented to the world on July 11 - but the full CAIB report will come out only on August (and not July) 25 or so: | CAIB preliminary recommendations # 4 and 3, an ESA Release on Node 2, a JSC Release on the STS management and coverage of July 12: FT 3, 2, 1, WP. July 11: SN, FT 3, 2, 1, SC, AFP, Rtr, ST. July 10: CSM, FT, WP, AP, ST, SD, NZ. July 9: FT, ST, NZ. July 8: New Sci., FT, AP. WP, San Antonio Express, Philly Inq., CNN, BBC, AFP (other story), ST, NZ, RP, Welt. July 7: SN, FT, AP, SC (other story). July 5: ST, SC. July 4: AFP. July 3: WP, AFP, ST. July 2: WP, FT, ST 3, 2, 1, SC, AFP. July 1: SC. June 30: SN, WP, ABC, FT, AP, ST. June 28: FT, WP, ST. June 27: SN, FT 3, 2, 1, ST, SC, AFP 2, 1, NZ. June 26: SC, AP. |
SOHO data blackout avoided!After a number of tests and new insights, SOHO engineers now say there will be no 'blackout' periods for SOHO science data as they can also be piped through the LGA - if large enough antennas are listening on Earth: ESA News, AstroBio, Ast., New Sci., SN, SC, ST. Earlier: Status of June 26, S&T, ST, SC.SMART-1 Moon launch now set for August 28 - the move was rubber stamped on July 8 at a flight review at ESTEC: ESA Science News, BBC. Building the JWST, the great Hubble successor: AW&ST. Helios prototype solar aircraft lost in mishapThe remotely operated Helios Prototype aircraft, a proof-of-concept solar-electric flying wing designed to operate at extremely high altitudes for long duration, was destroyed on June 26 when it crashed during a checkout flight off the Hawaiian island of Kauai - according to the ongoing investigation Helios experienced undamped pitch oscillations that led to a partial breakup of the aircraft in mid-air: DFRF Release (earlier, still earlier), AP, BBC, SR, RP.Scale model of Japanese space shuttle crashes in Swedish swamp - the 4 meter model had been lifted by a stratospheric balloon to a height of 31 km at the European Space Range Esrange in Kiruna in northern Sweden on July 1: CNES Release, AFP, AP, SR, Rtr. Solar sail test draws nearer, but there's still no firm launch date for Cosmos 1: SN. Strange claim that it won't work: a paper by Gold; New Sci. Claim wrong: Plan. Soc. The Prometheus promise - a new way of thinking in space propulsion: SpaceRev, SC. The first Galileo contracts have been signed: ESA, SSTL Press Releases, ST. Space to be mentioned in EU constitution: EU Press Release. |
Rocket telescope gets sharp UV images of the SunThe Very high Angular resolution ULtraviolet Telescope (VAULT), flying on a sounding rocket on June 14, 2002, has resolved areas as small as 240 kilometers (or 0.3 arcseconds), about three times better than the previous-best pictures from space: GSFC Press Release.A remarkable amateur picture of the Sun with intricate prominence detail: APOD. The solar & lunar eclipses of 2004 and the transit of Venus previewed. Noctilucent clouds of June 26/27: Lohf. Shape of the Owl nebula explainedAstronomers have assembled the first effective model for both the shape and evolutionary history of the Owl Nebula, the well-known planetary nebula in the constellation Ursa Major: NOAO Press Release, BdW.An X-ray movie of the Vela pulsar, made from a series of observations by Chandra, reveals a spectacularly erratic jet that varies in a way never seen before: Chandra Release, Ast., BdW. Filaments in SNR N 49 in the LMC as seen by the HST: HST Release, APOD, Ast.
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Compiled and written by Daniel Fischer
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