The Cassini mission to Saturn is over, but scientists still pore over its data. The newest discovery is of organic compounds – the ingredients of amino acids, the building blocks of life – in water vapor plumes from Saturn’s moon Enceladus. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/new-organic-compounds-discovered-in-enceladus-plumes-ingredients-of-amino-acids…
Tag: South Pole
How Do Compasses Tell Which Way Is North at the South Pole?
For thousands of years, people have relied on magnetic compasses to find their way around the planet. But the closer that compasses draw to the magnetic North and South Poles, the less reliable they become. Source: https://www.livescience.com/compasses-behave-oddly-magnetic-poles.html
Neutrino produced in a cosmic collider far away
The neutrino event IceCube 170922A, detected at the IceCube Neutrino Observatory at the South Pole, appears to originate from the distant active galaxy TXS 0506+056, at a light travel distance of 3.8 billion light years. TXS 0506+056 is one of many active galaxies and it remained a mystery why and how only this particular galaxy generated neutrinos so far. Source: https://phys.org/news/2019-10-neutrino-cosmic-collider.html…
How to find the North Star and Southern Cross
In the next in our stargazing series, learn to navigate by the stars by finding Polaris in the north, or using the Southern Cross to find the South Pole Source: https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg24332490-900-how-to-find-the-north-star-and-southern-cross/?utm_campaign=RSS%7CNSNS&utm_source=NSNS&utm_medium=RSS&utm_content=home…
Nobody Knows What Made the Gargantuan Crater on the Dark Side of the Moon
The moon’s South Pole-Aitken basin is one of the largest craters in the solar system, and a new study debunks the most popular explanation for its formation. Source: https://www.livescience.com/dark-side-crater-impact-unexplained.html
All you need to know: September equinox
We have an equinox coming up on September 23. Happy autumn, Northern Hemisphere. Happy spring, Southern Hemisphere. Source: https://earthsky.org/astronomy-essentials/everything-you-need-to-know-september-equinox…
What has China’s rover found on the moon’s far side?
Chinese media have reported that the Yutu-2 rover has discovered a “gel-like” substance in a crater on the far side of the moon. It sounds intriguing, but details are still scarce. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/what-has-chinas-rover-found-on-the-moons-far-side…
India’s moon mission: “95% of mission objectives accomplished”
Saturday’s heartbreaking loss of contact with the Vikram lander – part of the Chandrayaan-2 mission to the moon – hasn’t changed the upbeat tone of India’s space science. Here’s what we know so far. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/india-chandrayaan-2-vikram-loss-of-contact-what-next…
Chandrayaan-2’s Orbiter Is Still Going Strong
An anonymous reader quotes Space.com: India’s Chandrayaan-2 orbiter attempted to drop a lander named Vikram near the lunar south pole yesterday afternoon (Sept. 6), but mission controllers lost contact with the descending craft when it was just 1.3 miles (2.1 kilometers) above the gray dirt. As of early Saturday morning (Sept. 7), the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) still had not…
Ka-bam! Signs of a giant impact with Jupiter
Scientists used Juno spacecraft data and models of how Jupiter’s inner core should look to probe the giant planet’s early history. They now think an object with 10 times Earth’s mass might have struck Jupiter billions of years ago. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/core-shows-possible-giant-impact-for-jupiter…