Space Photos

Credit:

NASA/JPL-Caltech/T. Pyle (SSC)

Description:

Diamonds may be rare on Earth, but surprisingly common in space — and the super-sensitive infrared eyes of NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope are perfect for scouting them, say scientists at the NASA Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif.

Using computer simulations, researchers have developed a strategy for finding diamonds in space that are only a nanometer (a billionth of a meter) in size. These gems are about 25,000 times smaller than a grain of sand, much too small for an engagement ring. But astronomers believe that these tiny particles could provide valuable insights into how carbon-rich molecules, the basis of life on Earth, develop in the cosmos.

Scientists began to seriously ponder the presence of diamonds in space in the l980s, when studies of meteorites that crashed into Earth revealed lots of tiny nanometer-sized diamonds. Astronomers determined that 3 percent of all carbon found in meteorites came in the form of nanodiamonds. If meteorites are a reflection of the dust content in outer space, calculations show that just a gram of dust and gas in a cosmic cloud could contain as many as 10,000 trillion nanodiamonds.

“The question that we always get asked is, if nanodiamonds are abundant in space, why haven’t we seen them more often?” says Charles Bauschlicher of Ames Research Center. They have only been spotted twice. “The truth is, we just didn’t know enough about their infrared and electronic properties to detect their fingerprint.”

To solve this dilemma, Bauschlicher and his research team used computer software to simulate conditions of the interstellar medium–the space between stars–filled with nanodiamonds. They found that these space diamonds shine brightly at infrared light ranges of 3.4 to 3.5 microns and 6 to 10 microns, where Spitzer is especially sensitive.

Astronomers should be able to see celestial diamonds by looking for their unique “infrared fingerprints.” When light from a nearby star zaps a molecule, its bonds stretch, twist and flex, giving off a distinctive color of infrared light. Like a prism breaking white light into a rainbow, Spitzer’s infrared spectrometer instrument breaks up infrared light into its component parts, allowing scientists to see the light signature of each individual molecule.

Team members suspect that more diamonds haven’t been spotted in space yet because astronomers have not been looking in the right places with the right instruments. Diamonds are made of tightly bound carbon atoms, so it takes a lot of high-energy ultraviolet light to cause the diamond bonds to bend and move, producing an infrared fingerprint. Thus, the scientists concluded that the best place to see a space diamond’s signature shine is right next to a hot star.

Once astronomers figure out where to look for nanodiamonds, another mystery is figuring out how they form in the environment of interstellar space.

“Space diamonds are formed under very different conditions than diamonds are formed on Earth,” says Louis Allamandola, also of Ames.

He notes that diamonds on Earth form under immense pressure, deep inside the planet, where temperatures are also very high. However, space diamonds are found in cold molecular clouds where pressures are billions of times lower and temperatures are below minus 240 degrees Celsius (minus 400 degrees Fahrenheit).

“Now that we know where to look for glowing nanodiamonds, infrared telescopes like Spitzer can help us learn more about their life in space,” says Allamandola.

Bauschlicher’s paper on this topic has been accepted for publication in Astrophysical Journal. Allamandola was a co-author on the paper, along with Yufei Liu, Alessandra Ricca, and Andrew L. Mattioda, also of Ames.

Credit:

NASA

Description:

The equinox is an astronomical event that marks the first day of autumn in the northern hemisphere and spring in the south. Equinox means equal night and with the sun on the celestial equator, Earth dwellers will experience nearly 12 hours of daylight and 12 hours of darkness. Of course, for those in the south, the days will grow longer as the sun marches higher in the sky as summer approaches. A few weeks after the September Equinox of 1994, the crew of the space shuttle Endeavour recorded this image of the sun poised above the Earth’s limb. Glare illuminates Endeavour’s vertical tail (pointing toward the Earth) along with radar equipment in the payload bay.

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NASA TV’s This Week @NASA

Week Ending Dec. 28 - A Space Shuttle update, resupply of the International Space Station, flight testing of the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy, or SOFIA, Exploration Development Laboratory was dedicated, Global Hawks transferred, photo by NASA photographer Bill Ingalls honored.

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Jet Propulsion Lab Audio and Video

Explorer 1 — JPL and the Beginnings of the Space Age - JPL designed and built — and, in cooperation with the Army, launched — Explorer 1, the first U.S. satellite and the first spacecraft ever to return scientific data from space.

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2007: An Out-of-This-World Year - 2007 was a year of scientific surprises and major milestones for JPL missions studying Earth, our solar system and distant galaxies.

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Science @ NASA Feature Stories Podcast

SERVIR: NASA lends a hand in Central America - SERVIR’s supercomputer at the Water Center for the Humid Tropics of Latin America and the Caribbean (CATHALAC) in Panama City integrates data from a variety of sources and displays a real-time map of crisis points.

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The Hidden Universe of the Spitzer Space Telescope

Showcase: The X-Planets - These two extreme planets have set the records for the hottest and windiest known worlds anywhere.
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How to Observe the Quadrantids Meteor Shower - Describes ways to watch the Quadrantids Meteor Shower.

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Well I am going to try to add this feature every week. So here is a list of vidcast episodes updated this week.

NASA Glen Research Facilities
Space Power Facility - View an in-depth video about the world’s largest space simulation chamber (8 min.)

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10′x10′ Supersonic Wind Tunnel - View an in-depth video about the capabilities of this premier research wind tunnel (6 min.)

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Research Combustion Laboratory - View an in-depth video about the propulsion research capabilities of the RCL (10 min.)

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Electric Propulsion Laboratory - View an in-depth video about the space research capabilities of the EPL (8 min.)

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NASA Science Multimedia

New Phenomena on the Sun - Video podcast of the NASA TV broadcast of the event on March 21, 2007. This video shows the latest footage we have captured of the suns magnetic field.

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What is a Planet? - This is the final version of the “What Is A Planet?” animation which visually describes the definition of a planet as outlined by the IAU ruling in August, 2006.

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NASA TV’s This Week @NASA, Week Ending Dec. 21 - A review of all the happenings at NASA this Week.

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Beyond the Light: Dark Matter - The cosmic ocean twinkles and transforms with the birth of stars and their explosive demise into supernovas.

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How to Observe the Ursids Meteor Shower - A meteor shower occurs when small pieces of comet dust collide with the Earth’s atmosphere.

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Credit:

NASA/CXC/Wesleyan Univ./R.Kilgard et al; UV: NASA/JPL-Caltech; Optical: NASA/ESA/S. Beckwith & Hubble Heritage Team (STScI/AURA); IR: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ Univ. of AZ/R. Kennicutt

Description:

M51, whose name comes from being the 51st entry in Charles Messier’s catalog, is considered to be one of the classic examples of a spiral galaxy. At a distance of about 30 million light years from Earth, it is also one of the brightest spirals in the night sky. A composite image of M51, also known as the Whirlpool Galaxy, shows the majesty of its structure in a dramatic new way through several of NASA’s orbiting observatories. X-ray data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory reveals point-like sources (purple) that are black holes and neutron stars in binary star systems. Chandra also detects a diffuse glow of hot gas that permeates the space between the stars. Optical data from the Hubble Space Telescope (green) and infrared emission from the Spitzer Space Telescope (red) both highlight long lanes in the spiral arms that consist of stars and gas laced with dust. A view of M51 with the GALEX telescope shows hot, young stars that produce lots of ultraviolet energy (blue).

The textbook spiral structure is thought be the result of an interaction M51 is experiencing with its close galactic neighbor, NGC 5195, which is seen just above. Some simulations suggest M51’s sharp spiral shape was partially caused when NGC 5195 passed through its main disk about 500 million years ago. This gravitational tug of war may also have triggered an increased level of star formation in M51. The companion galaxy’s pull would be inducing extra starbirth by compressing gas, jump-starting the process by which stars form.

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Credit:

NASA/JPL-Caltech/T. Velusamy (Jet Propulsion Laboratory)

Description:

In this processed Spitzer Space Telescope image, baby star HH 46/47 can
be seen blowing two massive “bubbles.” The star is 1,140 light-years
away from Earth.The infant star can be seen as a white spot toward the center of the
Spitzer image. The two bubbles are shown as hollow elliptical shells of
bluish-green material extending from the star. Wisps of green in the
image reveal warm molecular hydrogen gas, while the bluish tints are
formed by starlight scattered by surrounding dust.

These bubbles formed when powerful jets of gas, traveling at 200 to 300
kilometers per second, or about 120 to 190 miles per second, smashed
into the cosmic cloud of gas and dust that surrounds HH 46/47. The red
specks at the end of each bubble show the presence of hot sulfur and
iron gas where the star’s narrow jets are currently crashing head-on
into the cosmic cloud’s gas and dust material.

Whenever astronomers observe a star, or snap a stellar portrait,
through the lens of any telescope, they know that what they are seeing
is slightly blurred. To clear up the blurring in Spitzer images,
astronomers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory developed an image
processing technique for Spitzer called Hi-Res deconvolution.

This process reduces blurring and makes the image sharper and cleaner,
enabling astronomers to see the emissions around forming stars in
greater detail. When scientists applied this image processing technique
to the Spitzer image of HH 46/47, they were able to see winds from the
star and jets of gas that are carving the celestial bubbles.

This infrared image is a three-color composite, with data at 3.6
microns represented in blue, 4.5 and 5.8 microns shown in green, and 24
microns represented as red.

Technorati Tags: NASA, JPL, Spitzer Space Telescope, HH 46/47, Vela (the Sails),

Credit:

NASA/JPL/University of Arizona

Description:

This image shows several gullies along the southern wall of unnamed crater in the eastern Hellas region of Mars. This particular crater has gullies on both the polar and equatorial-facing walls. The gully floors appear to be filled with rough-textured, somewhat knobby-looking materials. As multiple gullies located upslope feed into a single gully reaching the crater floor, the materials have converged to form a large deposit. Lineations parallel to apparent flow direction are evident on the textured surface. It’s not clear if liquid flows carved the gullies at this location, but the eastern Hellas region is well known for its abundant ice-rich flow features, such as lobate debris aprons at the base of knobs and massifs. Thus, the gully floor materials may have also incorporated ice at some time in the recent past and moved downslope as possible glacial-like flows.

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Technorati Tags: NASA, JPL, University of Arizona, Hellas region, Hirise

Credit:

NASA/IoA/A.Fabian et al.

Description:

The Chandra X-ray Observatory is a devilishly clever machine which can look back in time and probe the dark, hidden mysteries of the Universe. Chandra has seen the unseen, probing the fall of the house of the Cas A supernova remnant, measuring the tell tale heart of the Crab Pulsar, and many other amazing things. Here we reprise probably the “scariest” of Chandra’s observations, an image of the dark hot glowing demonic visage in the Perseus cluster of galaxies. The demon is the result of the “drumming” of a monster with a heart of darkness which has produced a banshee wail heard through the known Universe. Happy Halloween!

Technorati Tags: NASA, IoA, Chandra X-ray Observatory, Cas A supernova, Crab Pulsar, HEAPOW

Credit & Copyright:

Franck Bugnet

Description:

What caused the Crescent Nebula? Looking like an emerging space cocoon, the Crescent Nebula, visible in the center of the above image, was created by the brightest star in its center. A leading progenitor hypothesis has the Crescent Nebula beginning to form about 250,000 years ago. At that time, the massive central star had evolved to become a Wolf-Rayet star (WR 136), shedding its outer envelope in a strong stellar wind, ejecting the equivalent of our Sun’s mass every 10,000 years. This wind impacted surrounding gas left over from a previous phase, compacting it into a series of complex shells, and lighting it up. The Crescent Nebula, also known as NGC 6888, lies about 4,700 light-years away in the constellation of Cygnus. Star WR 136 will probably undergo a supernova explosion sometime in the next million years.

Technorati Tags: The Crescent Nebula, Wolf-Rayet star, NASA, Deep Space,