Had to double take seeing Adam Beyer's name in this thread
Hehe...yeah I guess he's a bit of a science fan. #Drumcode
Astronomy & Space Exploration
- Thread starter MrMarcello
- Start date
Hehe...yeah I guess he's a bit of a science fan. #Drumcode
If you're online and want to watch inside or can't observe outside for whatever reasons.
Stayed up to watch the Blood Moon fascinating
https://phys.org/news/2019-01-astronomers-star-material-block-life.html#jCpAn organic molecule detected in the material from which a star forms could shed light on how life emerged on Earth, according to new research led by Queen Mary University of London. The researchers report the first ever detection of glycolonitrile (HOCH2CN), a pre-biotic molecule which existed before the emergence of life, in a solar-type protostar known as IRAS16293-2422 B.
This warm and dense region contains young stars at the earliest stage of their evolution surrounded by a cocoon of dust and gas—similar conditions to those when our Solar System formed. Detecting pre-biotic molecules in solar-type protostars enhances our understanding of how the solar system formed as it indicates that planets created around the star could begin their existence with a supply of the chemical ingredients needed to make some form of life.
This finding, published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters, is a significant step forward for pre-biotic astrochemistry since glycolonitrile is recognised as a key precursor towards the formation of adenine, one of the nucleobases that form both DNA and RNA in living organisms. IRAS16293-2422 B is a well-studied protostar in the constellation of Ophiuchus, in a region of star formation known as rho Ophiuchi, about 450 light-years from Earth.
The Rho Ophiuchi star formation region. Credit: ESO/Digitized Sky Survey 2. Acknowledgement: Davide De Martin
The research was also carried out with the Centro de Astrobiología in Spain, INAF-Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri in Italy, the European Southern Observatory, and the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in the USA. Lead author Shaoshan Zeng, from Queen Mary University of London, said: "We have shown that this important pre-biotic molecule can be formed in the material from which stars and planets emerge, taking us a step closer to identifying the processes that may have led to the origin of life on Earth."
The researchers used data from the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimetre Array (ALMA) telescope in Chile to uncover evidence for the presence of glycolonitrile in the material from which the star is forming—known as the interstellar medium.
Glycolonitrile Credit: Víctor M. Rivilla & Ben Mills & Herschel-SPIRE 500 microns
With the ALMA data, they were able to identify the chemical signatures of glycolonitrile and determine the conditions in which the molecule was found. They also followed this up by using chemical modelling to reproduce the observed data which allowed them to investigate the chemical processes that could help to understand the origin of this molecule. This follows the earlier detection of methyl isocyanate in the same object by researchers from Queen Mary. Methyl isocyanate is what is known as an isomer of glycolonitrile—it is made up of the same atoms but in a slightly different arrangement, meaning it has different chemical properties.
It really is fascinating. The God references in the article were not needed though. Check this article out as well, it has a good NASA illustration of how the 'probe' zipped in and outwards from our solar system
https://www.theatlantic.com/science...a-interstellar-harvard-astrophysicist/580948/
Stunning, it's like artwork.
It's like sand art. Beautiful!
Scientific research and understanding has progressed hugely in the last couple of decades as has our understanding of how our universe came into being.
It is now believed that the Big Bang was not the beginning of space and time but was preceeded by a very short period of cosmic inflation. This inflation exponentially expanded our universe from possibly the size of an electron with about 100 doublings to the size of a grapefruit in an incredibly tiny fraction of a second.
As the inflation stopped it dumped it's energy into our universe causing the Big Bang.
It is now believed that the Big Bang was not the beginning of space and time but was preceeded by a very short period of cosmic inflation. This inflation exponentially expanded our universe from possibly the size of an electron with about 100 doublings to the size of a grapefruit in an incredibly tiny fraction of a second.
As the inflation stopped it dumped it's energy into our universe causing the Big Bang.
Just finished reading HUMAN UNIVERSE by Brian Cox. An excellent read I have to say.
One particularly interesting comment regarding the Apollo programme.
It cost the US government the equivalent of $200bn at today's prices.
Sounds a massive amount just to put 12 men on the Moon.
However, the estimated return on capital is between 4 to 7 times and that doesn't include the effect of inspiring decades of children to become scientists.
More interesting is that figure is about ONE QUARTER OF THE 2008 UK BANK BAILOUT.
I understand that the bank bailout was probably inevitable. But it does illustrate that scientific research is not that expensive.
One particularly interesting comment regarding the Apollo programme.
It cost the US government the equivalent of $200bn at today's prices.
Sounds a massive amount just to put 12 men on the Moon.
However, the estimated return on capital is between 4 to 7 times and that doesn't include the effect of inspiring decades of children to become scientists.
More interesting is that figure is about ONE QUARTER OF THE 2008 UK BANK BAILOUT.
I understand that the bank bailout was probably inevitable. But it does illustrate that scientific research is not that expensive.
Are the original photos in colour or is colour added based on some image processing algorithms? They look absolutely incredible.
Looks like they're officially calling it on Opportunity, 15 years into its 90 day mission.
Good job, little buddy.
NASA photos are usually heavily edited when it comes to colour. Possibly is that colour but nowhere near as intense.
Yes I suspected as much, but perfectly understandable given the difficulty in getting to these planets.
Yes I suspected as much, but perfectly understandable given the difficulty in getting to these planets.
It's more to show the different features than anything nefarious, too. It's the same with photographs of objects beyond our galaxy. Galaxies can be quite colourful and beautiful, but not quite as colourful as portrayed in images from NASA (and others)... to us. They don't strictly make stuff up, though, they just colour light that isn't visible to humans, but which is just as real as the light we can see.
Good explanation. It's a bit cheeky in a way and maybe a little disappointing, but it also shows us what we wouldn't otherwise be able to see, but is there, or just emphasises it. It makes me feel better about it when I think that if our eyes were different we'd perceive it differently anyway.
Still looks pretty amazing in (approx) true colour, just subtler
RIP, Rover. You will be missed.
That's amazing. Using the probe to discover the make up of the asteroid is amazing.
It is incredible that the Sun gravity can be felt that far far away by what is probably a quite small object.
Every time I drop something small or light I wonder how the Sun bending space/time can make that happen.
What are the best space related Twitter accounts? I might clear everything and actually make it worth using.
Unless you're looking for niche content, the quintet of Astronomy Magazine (generalized news), Bad Astronomer aka Phil Plait (one of the most active commentators and popular explainers around), Emily Lakdawala (not the best on her own but retweets a lot of good stuff), Astronomy Picture Of The Day (self explanatory) and SPACEdotcom (aggregator/news account) should more than cover your astronomy-info needs.
Huh, that's not quite right. There are known comets that are much further out than 140 AU. They must not be counting comets, I guess.
You're right — there are known comets that traverse beyond from the Kuiper Belt (e.g. K2 was discovered at 16 AU but has an aphelion of about 45000 AU), and the Oort Cloud is theorized to be 5,000-10,0000 AU away (compared with just ~140 AU for FarFarOut), but the latter is the furthest trans-Neptunian object that is being monitored right now and a dwarf planet with an estimated diameter of ~250 miles (which puts it in a different class to comets), at least according to the initial calculations/reports. Worth bearing in mind that FarFarOut's orbit hasn't even been derived yet — it could go even further away on a hyperbola (for reference, 90377 Sedna has an aphelion of almost 1,000 AU...about 13 times greater than its distance at closest approach: ~75 AU)...
The solar system really is fecking big. By some measures it might even be said to reach as far as half-way to Proxima Centauri.
And with gravity being by far the weakest of the four forces it is mind bending the our Sun can exert enough for it to be felt that far out.
Isn't science and physics wonderful.
We are living in a special time for cosmology discoveries.
To be fair, gravity is the weakest force only on an atomic and sub-atomic level, so some of the hierarchical categorizations of the four fundamental forces in order of supposed strength are a bit misleading. The range of strong and weak nuclear force is so mindbogglingly paltry that they don't effect things beyond the billionth of a meter, and even though electromagnetic force has a massive range — it's heavily throttled per the Law of Conservation of Charge with positive-negative pairing wreaking havoc on it effect/range. That leaves gravity to utterly dominate on an infinite scale in the absence of negative-mass to subdue it, at least according to simplistic Newtonian mechanics (which doesn't hold true when you consider gravitate to be a warped field rather a traditional force with matter being distorted and moving along a geodesic instead of being “pulled” by gravitational force in a classical way).
My favourite gravity-related tidbit is that if the only two things in the entire Universe were two marbles, they would eventually hit each other no matter how far away from each other they began. Obviously the "no matter how far away" part assumes a non-expanding universe, which isn't the case, but it's still interesting.
So - if a rogue Jupiter sized planet passed through the Solar System (entirely possible) and interacted with Earth, pulling it onto an escape velocity trajectory out of the Solar System also (entirely possible), doing so without breaking up Earth's mantle and crust (I'm less sure that that's possible but go with it)...
How long could humans survive?
Bear in mind we'd probably have a decade to prepare.
How long could humans survive?
Bear in mind we'd probably have a decade to prepare.
Given the two first conditions, the third is also absolutely possible. It would have to get really close to the Earth to break it up, and it would take a lot less than that to make us a rogue planet.
As for the question... given a decade to prepare, humanity would go extinct very quickly. If we had more time, like hundreds of years, maybe we could dig deeply enough to survive off of the Earth's geothermal energy, which isn't going to go away any time soon.
@Invictus @niMic Ooh haven't seen that video.
Let's break down the problem into three stages.
1) Preparation. 2) The event. 3) End of days.
The first problem we will face is during the event itself. We will be hit with tidal wave after tidal wave as the rogue Jupiter fecks with our seas. Most of humanity lives near the coasts.
I wonder if we should actually put a solar blocker on the L1 point between the Sun and Earth, and try to actually freeze our oceans prior to meeting the rogue planet? We'll be experiencing this eternal winter soon enough anyway.
Let's break down the problem into three stages.
1) Preparation. 2) The event. 3) End of days.
The first problem we will face is during the event itself. We will be hit with tidal wave after tidal wave as the rogue Jupiter fecks with our seas. Most of humanity lives near the coasts.
I wonder if we should actually put a solar blocker on the L1 point between the Sun and Earth, and try to actually freeze our oceans prior to meeting the rogue planet? We'll be experiencing this eternal winter soon enough anyway.