The most recent issue of Free Astronomy Magazine (January-February 2020) is available for your reading and downloading pleasure at www.astropublishing.com (click the link to go directly to the issue).
Feature articles this month include:
(1) a great read on the history of the discovery of the (dwarf) planet Pluto
(2) SOFIA confirming the collision of two planets in an old star system
(3) details about the landing site selection of Jezero Crater for Mars 2020 (with an image from the article featured about and downloadable from www.jpl.nasa.gov…PIA23239).
For those wanting a quick look at what the issue has to offer, the Table of Contents is reproduced below.
Poster’s Note: One of the many under-appreciated aspects of NASA is the extent to which it publishes quality science content for children and Ph.D.’s alike. Your tax dollars help promote science! The following article was provided for reprinting by the Night Sky Network in February, 2019.
The stars that make up the
Winter Hexagon asterism are some of the brightest in the night sky and
February evenings are a great time to enjoy their sparkly splendor. The Winter
Hexagon is so large in size that the six stars that make up its points are also
the brightest members of six different constellations, making the Hexagon a
great starting point for learning the winter sky. Find the Hexagon by looking
southeast after sunset and finding the bright red star that forms the “left shoulder”
of the constellation Orion: Betelgeuse. You can think of Betelgeuse as
the center of a large irregular clock, with the Winter Hexagon stars as the
clock’s hour numbers. Move diagonally across Orion to spot its “right foot,”
the bright star Rigel. Now move clockwise from Rigel to the brightest
star in the night sky: Sirius in Canis Major. Continue ticking along clockwise
to Procyon in Canis Minor and then towards Pollux, the brighter
of the Gemini twins. Keep moving around the circuit to find Capella in
Auriga, and finish at orange Aldebaran, the “eye” of the V-shaped face
of Taurus the Bull.
Two naked-eye planets are
visible in the evening sky this month. As red Mars moves across Pisces,
NASA’s InSight Mission is readying its suite of geological instruments designed
to study the Martian interior. InSight and the rest of humanity’s robotic
Martian emissaries will soon be joined by the Mars 2020 rover. The SUV-sized
robot is slated to launch next year on a mission to study the possibility of
past life on the red planet. A conjunction between Mars and Uranus on
February 13 will be a treat for telescopic observers. Mars will pass a little
over a degree away from Uranus
and larger magnifications will allow comparisons between the small red disc of
dusty Mars with the smaller and much more distant blue-green disc of ice giant
Uranus.
Speedy Mercury has
a good showing this month and makes its highest appearance in the evening on
February 27; spot it above the western horizon at sunset. An unobstructed
western view and binoculars will greatly help in catching Mercury against the
glow of evening twilight.
The morning planets put
on quite a show in February. Look for the bright planets Venus, Jupiter,
and Saturn above the eastern horizon all month, at times forming a neat
lineup. A crescent Moon makes a stunning addition on the mornings of
February 1-2, and again on the 28th. Watch over the course of the month as
Venus travels from its position above Jupiter to below dimmer Saturn. Venus and
Saturn will be in close conjunction on the 18th; see if you can fit
both planets into the same telescopic field of view. A telescope reveals
the brilliant thin crescent phase of Venus waxing into a wide gibbous phase as the
planet passes around the other side of our Sun. The Night Sky Network has a
simple activity that helps explain the nature of both Venus and Mercury’s
phases at bit.ly/venusphases
You can catch up on all
of NASA’s current and future missions at nasa.gov
The stars of the Winter Hexagon Image created with help from Stellarium
The Night Sky Network program supports astronomy clubs across the USA dedicated to astronomy outreach. Visit nightsky.jpl.nasa.gov to find local clubs, events, and more!
The NASA News Service provides up-to-date announcements of NASA policy, news events, and space science. A recent selection of space science articles are provided below, including direct links to the full announcements. Those interested in receiving these announcements from NASA can subscribe to their service by sending an email to: hqnews-request@newsletters.nasa.gov?subject=subscribe
NASA’s Juno Spacecraft In Orbit Around Mighty Jupiter
After an almost five-year journey to the solar system’s largest planet, NASA’s Juno spacecraft successfully entered Jupiter’s orbit during a 35-minute engine burn. Confirmation that the burn had completed was received on Earth at 8:53 p.m. PDT (11:53 p.m. EDT) Monday, July 4.
“Independence Day always is something to celebrate, but today we can add to America’s birthday another reason to cheer — Juno is at Jupiter,” said NASA administrator Charlie Bolden. “And what is more American than a NASA mission going boldly where no spacecraft has gone before? With Juno, we will investigate the unknowns of Jupiter’s massive radiation belts to delve deep into not only the planet’s interior, but into how Jupiter was born and how our entire solar system evolved.”
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More information on the Juno mission is available at: www.nasa.gov/juno
This month, NASA begins an airborne experiment to improve scientists’ understanding of the sources of two powerful greenhouse gases and how they cycle into and out of the atmosphere.
Atmospheric Carbon and Transport–America, or ACT-America, is a multi-year airborne campaign that will measure concentrations of carbon dioxide and methane in relation to weather systems. The study will gather real-time measurements from research aircraft and ground stations to improve the ability to detect and quantify the surface sources and sinks of the gases.
After an extensive review process and passing a major development milestone, NASA is ready to proceed with final design and construction of its next Mars rover, currently targeted to launch in the summer of 2020 and arrive on the Red Planet in February 2021.
The Mars 2020 rover will investigate a region of Mars where the ancient environment may have been favorable for microbial life, probing the Martian rocks for evidence of past life. Throughout its investigation, it will collect samples of soil and rock and cache them on the surface for potential return to Earth by a future mission.
“The Mars 2020 rover is the first step in a potential multi-mission campaign to return carefully selected and sealed samples of Martian rocks and soil to Earth,” said Geoffrey Yoder, acting associate administrator of NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. “This mission marks a significant milestone in NASA’s Journey to Mars – to determine whether life has ever existed on Mars, and to advance our goal of sending humans to the Red Planet.”
Using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have conducted the first search for atmospheres around temperate, Earth-sized planets beyond our solar system and found indications that increase the chances of habitability on two exoplanets.
Specifically, they discovered that the exoplanets TRAPPIST-1b and TRAPPIST-1c, approximately 40 light-years away, are unlikely to have puffy, hydrogen-dominated atmospheres usually found on gaseous worlds.
“The lack of a smothering hydrogen-helium envelope increases the chances for habitability on these planets,” said team member Nikole Lewis of the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore. “If they had a significant hydrogen-helium envelope, there is no chance that either one of them could potentially support life because the dense atmosphere would act like a greenhouse.”
Julien de Wit of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Massachusetts, led a team of scientists to observe the planets in near-infrared light using Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3. They used spectroscopy to decode the light and reveal clues to the chemical makeup of an atmosphere. While the content of the atmospheres is unknown and will have to await further observations, the low concentration of hydrogen and helium has scientists excited about the implications.
NASA is joining with Baylor College of Medicine in Houston to operate a new institute charged with researching and developing innovative approaches to reduce risks to humans on long-duration exploration missions, including NASA’s Journey to Mars.
Work under the Translational Research Institute Cooperative Agreement, overseen by NASA’s Human Research Program, begins Oct. 1.
Translational research is an interdisciplinary model of research that focuses on translating fundamental research concepts into practice, with appreciable health outcomes. The NASA Translational Research Institute (NTRI) will implement a “bench-to-spaceflight” model, moving results or methods from laboratory experiments or clinical trials to point-of-care astronaut health and performance applications. The goal of the research is to produce promising new approaches, treatments, countermeasures or technologies that have practical application to spaceflight.
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For more information on NASA’s Human Research Program, go to: www.nasa.gov/hrp
