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Astronaut: Moon, Mars and Beyond prepares to plumb the depths of space for adventure
While NASA's shuttle mission may be over and the International Space Station's future in doubt, there is one place that space exploration is moving forward: online. Astronaut: Moon, Mars and Beyond is looking more promising by the day, especially now that the team has secured almost $40,000 via Kickstarter to help fund the project. So why did NASA agree to an MMO of all things? Daniel Laughlin, project manager of NASA's Learning Technologies, sees the two as having a lot in common. Talking with Universe Today, Laughlin said, "Based on the existing literature as well as my own experiences gaming, an MMO was the logical choice for a game project for NASA." While NASA is partnered with the development team, the space agency is not funding the game -- hence the use of Kickstarter to raise money for Astronaut. It takes place in 2035 as mankind is just starting to colonize the solar system, and it promises to use real physics and technology to simulate these efforts. Khal Shariff says that players should expect a lot of crafting, use of proper gear, and missions that flow together for a bigger storyline. Interestingly enough, it seems that even NASA has room for a few new heroes. "We have protagonists in the game, and I won't say much about them, because I don't want to spoil the opening scene of Chapter One," Shariff said. He hopes that players will enjoy the melding of science fiction with science fact: "We want you to sit down and curl up with one session and have a feeling like you had when you read the best short science fiction stories, especially like those of Clarke. There is plenty of adventure to plumb."
Visualized: Mercury
It may look like a spotty, monochromatic water melon, but we're taking NASA's word on this one -- the image above is the very first taken from an orbiting spacecraft of our solar system's innermost planet. Mercury has been snapped by NASA's MESSENGER probe, which is currently preparing itself to start on its elliptical trajectory around the planet and commence collecting data about it in earnest. Hit the links below to learn more about this bold exploration project.
NASA's MESSENGER begins orbit around Mercury, will start beaming back science early next month
Mercury, the innermost planet of our humble little solar system, is getting itself an orbital friend. The MESSENGER space probe (known as MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry and Ranging to his nearest and dearest) is concluding a six-year sojourn through the dark void of space with an elliptical orbit around the tiny and otherwise inhospitable planet. Systems are about to get turned on and fully checked next week, before the data-gathering phase kicks off in earnest on April 4th. Science, isn't it beautiful?
Why did Pluto lose its planet status? Because it never mattered enough
It's kind of hard to accept, Pluto has always been our favorite underdog, but the truth is that the Solar System's ninth planet was never really significant enough to earn that designation. Such is the coldly logical reason given for its removal from the planetary annals by a man who had a lot to do with its demise. Caltech astronomer Mike Brown discovered Eris, what he'd hoped was the tenth planet, back in 2005, but its extreme distance from the Sun and diminutive (by planetary standards) dimensions disqualified it from consideration. Unfortunately, its discovery is what doomed Pluto to be downgraded to a "dwarf planet," though Mike's not shedding too many tears over it. In fact, he's gone and written a book about the whole thing, the smug planet destroyer that he is. You don't have to buy it to learn more, however, as the source link has an interview with Mike all ready and waiting.
Voyager 1 will exit solar system soon, is so close to the void it can taste it
Endurance: it's important in every race, including the space race, even though many pundits would argue that it kind of fizzled a long time ago. Thirty-three years prior to now, NASA's Voyager 1 began its journey to check in on the outer planets. It accomplished that goal in 1989, and has since moved on to bigger and better things -- you know, like leaving the solar system. Ten billion miles away, Voyager 1's Low-Energy Charged Particle Instrument is spitting out "solid zeroes," which means it's not detecting any more outward movement from solar winds. The heliopause (read: the official edge of the solar system) is just a few short years away for the radioactive-powered spacecraft, which is frightening to think about regardless of your experience in Space Camp. What will happen once it enters interstellar space? We're not sure, but we're trying to set up radio comms with its earth-bound synthesizer progeny for some kind of freaky space jam. We'll keep you posted. [Image courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech]
Astronomers theorize what it's like when worlds (and black holes) collide
Tight binary solar systems are inhabited in science fiction -- remember the Star Wars world of Tatooine -- but humanity might find such planets inhospitable over the long term, and not just because of the heat. Using NASA's Spitzer telescope, scientists discovered clouds of dust around three such binary systems far too recent to come from the stars themselves, and theorize that as the stars attract one another over time and get closer and closer together, their respective orbiting planets may get closer as well, and crash into one another catastrophically. Meanwhile, when supermassive black holes dance in pairs, they can merge as one, and astrophysicists have recently simulated how such a joining might appear on our telescopes. According to a team of US and Canadian researchers, the pair may emit strong jets of electromagnetic radiation before they merge, which twist around one another and throw off gravitational waves that can help pinpoint the source. Speaking of sources, we've got plenty of those immediately below if you'd like to read more.
Emerald Observatory for iPad is stunning to look at, and it's useful too
I can't think of another iPad app that looks quite as striking as Emerald Observatory. This US $0.99 app is the kind of thing you'd be proud to display if it was a physical object; even when it's running on the iPad, I'm tempted to leave it on as a conversation piece. The single display gives you your local time, the position of the sun, the rise and set times of the sun and moon (and the 5 brightest planets), twilight start and end times, the current moon phase, a display of day and night on a world map, the current day and date (with a leap year indicator), and the ability to move forward or backward in time in order to see different planetary alignments and sun positions. The app is certainly nice for star gazers, and it's also handy for photographers who may be looking for the best time of day to shoot outdoors. %Gallery-96497%
NASA gives Voyager 2 a RAM reset, fixes communication bug
NASA's finished successfully resetting the computer system of the Voyager 2 satellite, which had begun transmitting unintelligible data in mid-April. The Voyager 2 was launched in August of 1977 to study Saturn, and has also flown past Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune. It's now around 8.6 billion miles from earth, in the heliosphere which surrounds the solar system. While the cause of the glitch is unknown, NASA officials say that they noticed on May 12th that a single memory location had been changed from a 0 to a 1, causing all transmissions to be completely garbled. After the reset, Voyager 2 resumed transmission of data on May 22nd -- and continues its journey to leave the solar system entirely.
Take a planetary tour with Solar Walk
Solar Walk is a nifty astronomy romp from the folks who did the popular Star Walk iPhone and iPad app. Instead of exploring the night sky and deep space, you get to tour our solar system in luscious 3D graphics. While the app is universal for the iPhone and iPad, the iPad version is breathtaking with crisp graphics and beautiful color. Tapping on any planet will take you close to it, and you can use your finger to orbit the planet and see it from any angle or zoom. You can see the planets on any particular date and time, and speed up the animation to watch the planets in their elliptical orbits. Tapping the info button gets you some information on all the planets, like size, gravity, composition and more. One omission is that the program doesn't tell you which planets are up for viewing on a particular night. You'll need Star Walk for that. %Gallery-93500%
Grand Tour for the iPhone is a grand exploration of the solar system
I admit I have a real love for astronomy and other science apps. Mike Smithwick, the creator of Distant Suns [App Store link] has come up with another winner for the space minded. Grand Tour [App Store link] is a $4.99US application that will let you tour the solar system in very smooth and realistic animations. Named after the NASA Voyager missions* of the '70s that explored the outer planets, Grand Tour will let you move to Mars, explore its two moons, and then shuffle off to Jupiter, Saturn and beyond. The program beautifully renders the starry background accurately, as well as presenting the Milky Way. The app is loaded with information about the planets and moons, and with a flick of your finger you can rotate the planets and see their relationship to the sun and their satellites in real time. You can also speed up or reverse time, illustrating the orbits of the planets and their smaller companions.Another nice touch is when you look at the earth, the images of the clouds are in real time (updated every 3 hours) so you are pretty much seeing the real thing in the palm of your hand.I still marvel at how esoteric iPhone apps are getting. There is truly something for everyone, and the ability to hold a scale model of our solar system and interact with it would have seemed like science fiction a few years ago. Thank goodness Apple decided to bless real apps last year. The experience offered by programs like Grand Tour would really have been lame as a web app.Grand Tour runs on the iPhone and iPod Touch with OS software 2.1 or greater.* One of our readers correctly points out that the original NASA Grand Tour missions never happened, because of deep budget cuts. Many of the ideas from the mission were incorporated into the Voyager missions. Thanks for the clarification Mark.Check out the gallery for some screen shots.%Gallery-49388%
Star Trek-style deflector shield to fend off harmful radiation
When you've got folks dreaming up such things as a $2.5 trillion "space sunshade," we reckon a Star Trek-style deflector shield isn't too far-fetched. Apparently, a team of British scientists are looking into the possibility of crafting such a device in order to " protect astronauts from radiation" when they venture beyond the Earth's protective magnetic envelope, or "magnetosphere." Reportedly, the team is hoping to "to mimic the magnetic field which protects the Earth" and deploy the shields "around spacecraft and on the surfaces of planets to deflect harmful energetic particles." As nation's begin to revive plans of space exploration, the homegrown shield should look mighty attractive at the Royal Astronomical Society's National Astronomy Meeting, but details concerning a proposed launch date, and moreover, the presumably lofty pricetag, have yet to emerge.[Via Slashdot]
Explosive data mining robots could be sent to hazardous asteroids
Sending robotic creatures into space has become somewhat of a worldwide pastime, but sending explosive robots to take care of multiple acts of business is what Dennis Ebbets of Ball Aerospace in Boulder, Colorado has on his mind. In a recent presentation given to the American Astronomical Society, Mr. Ebbets described a fleet of robotic probes small and cheap enough to "investigate a near-Earth asteroid's composition and structure." The devices would be battery-powered and would only be useful for a matter of days, but during the time it was on the asteroid, it would collect data of the surface, explode, and allow other still-in-tact siblings to "listen for vibrations that could reveal the object's inner structure." Considering that NASA has compiled a list of over 800 asteroids that could be potentially dangerous to our planet due to their orbit, these exploding bots would serve a dual purpose as they erupted on the surface to break up the asteroid or veer it off course, all while collecting precious data about the "inner structures" of these mysterious rocks. Although funding still isn't guaranteed for the volatile critters to take off just yet, as many as six of the 12-kilograms probes could loaded onto a single spacecraft and launched to its destination "relatively cheaply," and if things go as planned, we could see the first of these gizmos gettin' dirty by 2011.
