Astronomy Articles

Wesley Lancaster

August 26: This Weird Galaxy Is Actually 99.99 Percent Dark Matter
o http://www.space.com/33850-weird-galaxy-is-mostly-darkmatter.html
o Dragonfly 44 is a galaxy as big as our own Milky Way, but emits only
1% as much light. It is one of 47 ultradiffuse galaxies in the Coma
cluster. Captured by The Gemini North Telescope in Mauna Kea,
Hawaii. I think it's amazing that we have telescopes on the surface
that can see such clear images of dark galaxies.

Sept 2: Jupiter's Wild North Pole, Southern Auroras Photographed for 1st
Time
o http://www.space.com/33957-jupiter-north-pole-southern-aurorasfirst-photos.html
o Juno spacecraft was able to capture images of Jupiters north pole
while orbiting 2600 miles above its cloud tops. It was revealed that
the poles are much bluer and have a mixed composition, unlike the
bands around its middle. Junos infrared mapper was also able to
reveal hot spots of a highly active southern aurora. Scientists say
that the flybys will help us better understand Jupiters composition
and structure, meaning well be able to better understand the
formation of the solar system. I believe that Jupiter harbors a
relatively small super-dense heavy element core that has acquired
one heck of an atmosphere, but hopefully Juno will find more
concrete evidence.

Sept 9: Did Asteroid Strikes Help Spur Life on Earth?

o http://www.space.com/34003-asteroid-strikes-origin-life-earth-osirisrex.html
o The OSIRIS-Rex probe is launching to an asteroid to collect samples.
Scientists are eager to search for evidence of life in the samples
when returns in 2023.We believe that Earths supply of chemicals
found in DNA were brought by asteroids such as these, as well as its
large supply of water. At first, I was skeptical of this idea, but it
seems reasonable to assume that some of the rarer elements that
form life on Earth would have arrived after its formation; also, the
elements would have needed to be directly on the surface of our
planet to form life at the surface.

Sept 16: Huge Mars Lakes Formed Much More Recently Than Thought
o http://www.space.com/34095-mars-lakes-suggest-habitable-longerthan-thought.html

o The discovery of water on Mars was big news, and scientists are
studiously examining its surface to determine Mars capacity for life.
It seems that giant lakes were on Mars, some larger than the Great
Lakes, but they were only formed 2-3 billion years ago. This is
surprising because it was thought that Mars had lost its atmosphere
by then, which would have made it warm enough to host liquid
water on its surface. Even still, water condensation should have only
occurred in snow, so now the mystery is how the snow melted and
migrated to the caps.

Sept 23: Gravitational Microlensing - How Planets Are Found Using This
Technique
o http://www.space.com/34152-gravitational-microlensing-howplanets-are-found-using-this-technique-video.html
o This is actually an instructional video on the breakthroughs of
gravitational microlensing. Some stars are completely obstructed
from our view by other stars or sometimes planets. The
gravitational field around the object closer to us stretches out the
light and we see the object behind as a ring or duplicated multiple
times. They use lenses that counteract this lensing effect to put the
light back in order. This is a genius way to counteract the lensing
effect and study stars that are normally obstructed from our view.

Sept 30: The Life and Death of the Rosetta Spacecraft: 2004 to 2016
o http://www.space.com/34255-rosetta-spacecraft-obituary.html
o The Rosetta spacecraft crashed into a comet, finishing its 12-year
studies. As it neared the comet, it was taking mounds of data for
later evaluation. For some reason, we like smashing up our
expensive equipment when were done with them, but I suppose its
more awesome that way.

Oct 6: Saturn's Moon Dione Probably Has a Buried Ocean, Too

o http://www.space.com/34314-saturn-moon-dione-undergroundocean.html
o Just like Jupiters famous Europa, Saturns moon Dione may also
have an ocean of liquid water under its icy surface. The ocean
probably lies 60 miles underneath ice, right next to its rocky core.
According to scientists, the fact that the water is directly next to
rock makes it a prime suspect for harboring life due to the shared
nutrients. Dione is believed to be the third moon with a subsurface
ocean. This could be a great place to check out far in the future, but
drilling 60 miles down remotely is not a task well be ready for in a
long, long time.

Oct 12: Ancient Stars Spotted at Milky Way's Heart

o http://www.space.com/34367-ancient-stars-milky-way-heart.html
o A dozen RR Lyrae variable stars were discovered in the center of the
Milky Way galaxy, but this type of star is typically found to be 10
billion years old. This implies that an ancient star cluster was
absorbed by the center, which adds evidence to the theory of
galaxy creation by merging star clusters. It seems to me that the
cluster was around before the supermassive black hole at our
center, and subsequently was pulled into orbit.
Oct 21: Mysterious X-Ray Blasts May Reveal New Stellar Objects
o http://www.space.com/34459-mystery-x-ray-blasts-may-reveal-newstellar-objects.html
o Astronomers have found 2 objects that emit super-bright x-rays for
about an hour. They become 100 times brighter than usual, making
them outshine the x-rays of black holes and neutron stars by
hundreds to thousands of times over. The sources are normal black
hole or neutron binary systems, and its suspected that they are old
magnetars (which are usually younger stars). At first I thought it
was a lower-energy gamma ray burst, but since the stars flare
regularly, it may be something similar to pulsars.

Oct 28: Dead Star's Corpse Twirls in Eerie Cosmic Graveyard

o http://www.space.com/34535-crab-nebula-star-corpse-eerieglow.html
o Since I first learned about it in high school, the Crab Nebula has
been my favorite object in space (well, besides the Earth and the
Sun I guess). In 1054, a high-mass star erupted so violently, it could
be seen during the daytime for three weeks, and to the naked eye
at night for two years afterward. Now theyve been able to
determine that its collapsed into a neutron star, sending waves into
its gas own gas clouds while spinning 30 times per second.

Nov 3: Cassini's Last Days at Saturn Will be Science Gold

o http://www.space.com/34611-nasa-cassini-mission-saturn-ringsmoons-solar-system-grand-finale.html
o The spacecraft Cassini has been studying Saturn and its moons
since 2004, and the time has come for it to get thrown away in one
of the biggest trash cans ever: Saturn. Its had amazing discoveries
regarding Titans lakes, storms on Saturn, ice plumes on Enceladus,
and will finish its mission by taking a close-up examination of
Saturns F ring before being thrown into its atmosphere, where it will
continue to take data until termination. Hopefully Cassini will serve
us well by solving another mystery or two while in the throes of
death (especially those odd F-ring disturbances).

Nov 7: Galactic 'Eyelids' Show Space Gas 'Tsunami'

o http://www.space.com/34636-galactic-eyelids-space-gas-tsunamiphotos.html
o Chile and Hubble caught a perfect glimpse of 2 galaxies midcollision. The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array showed
arms of carbon dioxide gas swirling around two separate points, and
when combined with the Hubble image it makes a spectacular
display of merging galaxies. Since both galaxies are facing us, we
can actually see how the galaxies arms become integrated into its
partner galaxy. Surprisingly, the gas slows down, becomes dense,
and joins the rotation of the bulge. My guess is that the clouds
collide with all sorts of matter in the center, so it just becomes
integrated with the partner galaxy.

Nov 18: 'Great Valley' on Mercury Points to Shrinking Planet

o http://www.space.com/34750-mercury-great-valley-shrinkingplanet.html
o Mercurys Great Valley is a huge dent on Mercurys surface that
shows signs of tectonic activity except Mercury doesnt have plate
tectonics. The Great Valley is 620 miles long and 2 miles deep, and
shows evidence that Mercury is actually been shrinking as a result
of cooling. It kind of makes sense for Mercury to shrink because of
cooling it has an enormous core that was very hot and active, but
now that its cooled the planet should become more dense from the
lack of heat on the interior of the planet.

Nov 24: Galaxy Gobbles Up Its Neighbors, Explodes with Stars

o http://www.space.com/34802-hungry-galaxy-ngc-1222.html
o Galaxy NGC 1222 seems to be stealing matter from 2 nearby dwarf
galaxies, and as it does it sparks a host of brand new stars. Since
the galaxy is a lenticular galaxy, it has a host of old low-mass stars;
but because of the new mass its taking in, it is able to form new
bright high-mass stars. I suppose galaxies could continuously form
stars as long as there is matter to feed them, which would make
them more massive and in turn attract more matter to them. I
wanna be a galaxy someday so that I can eat as much as I want.

Dec 2: Sun Storm May Have Caused Flare-Up of Rosetta's Comet

o http://www.space.com/34874-sun-eruption-comet-flareuprosetta.html
o The comet 67P flared up almost 100 times brighter, possibly due to
a coronal mass ejection from the sun. At first, scientists thought that
the comet itself was jetting material out at a more rapid rate, but
data points to a CME as the likely suspect. Comets are really neat.
Too bad Rosetta died on that comet later.

Dec 6: Mystery (Partially) Solved? 'Heat Bombs' Warm Sun's Outer

Atmosphere
o http://www.space.com/34919-heat-bombs-warm-sun-corona.html
o NASA recently found evidence that magnetic fields cross and realign
in the suns atmosphere, causing a heat bomb. The magnetic
reconnection is shown to heat up the suns corona rapidly, making it
much hotter than its actual surface. Though this factor has been
verified, there are still other factors causing coronal heating such as
plasma waves moving energy into the atmosphere. Its good to
make progress on this issue, especially since it was discovered in
the 1940s.