By Dan Nosowitz The Russian Soyuz TMA-21 spacecraft, carrying three astronauts (Commander Andrei Borisenko and Alexander Samokutyayev, both Russian, and American Ron Garan) safely landed this morning in Kazakhstan, bringing them home after five months on the International Space Station. The landing, about 94 miles southeast of the smallish Kazakh city Zhezkazgan, wasn’t entirely flawless–mission control […]
A mournful French horn blows. An angsty Luke Skywalker stomps out of his aunt and uncle’s sand hut and peers up at Tatooine’s double sunset, his hair blowing in the breeze. It’s a memorable scene from Star Wars—but now, a precedent for such a sky with two suns has been found in our universe. Using […]
An American ‘armchair astronaut’ claims to have discovered a mysterious structure on the surface of the red planet – by looking on Google earth. David Martines, whose YouTube video of the ‘station’ has racked up over 200,000 hits so far, claims to have randomly uncovered the picture while scanning the surface of the planet one […]
A tiny world of molten rock, orbiting scorchingly close to its host star, is the smallest planet ever discovered outside our solar system, NASA announced today. And it’s likely only the first in a parade of planet discoveries to be announced this spring by the Kepler Space Telescope team. Kepler-10b, as the new world is […]
Astronomers have been busy trying to determine the spin period and composition of Venus‘ moon. December 8, 2010, results were announced by JPL/Caltech scientists, led by Michael Hicks. “Wait a minute; back up”, I hear you ask. “Venus has a Moon?” Of course it does. Well, kind of… Let me explain. It has […]
Topographic computer model of Sotra Facula, an apparent ice volcano on Saturn’s moon Titan. Not unlike the volcanoes of Hawaii, the supposed ice volcano, known as Sotra Facula, rises 5,000 feet (1,500 meters) above the surrounding plain in a large, gently shaped dome, according to the mountain’s discoverer, geophysicist Randolph Kirk. The feature had previously […]
On 27 December, COROT is to be launched into space on a unique astronomy mission: its twin goals are to detect exoplanets orbiting around other stars and to probe the mysteries of stellar interiors as never before. . . . While CNES is completing preparations for the launch from Baikonur/Kazakhstan, ESA and a large number […]
