From NASA Chandra- “N49: Stellar Shrapnel Seen in Aftermath of Explosion

NASA Chandra

N49 is a supernova remnant located in the Large Magellenic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way. X-ray data from Chandra (blue) reveals the presence of a bullet-shaped object to the lower right This “bullet,” which is traveling at 5 million miles per hour, is evidence that the supernova explosion was highly asymmetric

Composite

Xray

Optical

Credit X-ray: (NASA/CXC/Penn State/S.Park et al.); Optical: NASA/STScI/UIUC/Y.H.Chu & R.Williams et al
Release Date May 24, 2010

This beautiful composite image shows N49, the aftermath of a supernova explosion in the Large Magellanic Cloud. A new long observation from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory, shown in blue, reveals evidence for a bullet-shaped object being blown out of a debris field left over from an exploded star.

In order to detect this bullet, a team of researchers led by Sangwook Park of Penn State University used Chandra to observe N49 for over 30 hours. This bullet can be seen in the bottom right hand corner of the image and is rich in silicon, sulphur and neon. The detection of this bullet shows that the explosion that destroyed the star was highly asymmetric.

The bullet is traveling at a high speed of about 5 million miles an hour away from a bright point source in the upper left part of N49. This bright source may be a so-called soft gamma ray repeater (SGR), a source that emits bursts of gamma rays and X-rays. A leading explanation for these objects is that they are neutron stars with extremely powerful magnetic fields. Since neutron stars are often created in supernova explosions, an association between SGRs and supernova remnants is not unexpected. This case is strengthened by the apparent alignment between the bullet’s path and the bright X-ray source. However, the new Chandra data also shows that the bright source is more obscured by gas than expected if it really lies inside the supernova remnant. In other words, it is possible that the bright X-ray source actually lies beyond the remnant and is projected along the line of sight. Another possible bullet is located on the opposite side of the remnant, but it is harder to see in the image because it overlaps with the bright emission – described below – from the shock-cloud interaction.

Optical data from the Hubble Space Telescope (yellow and purple) shows bright filaments where the shock wave generated by the supernova is interacting with the densest regions in nearby clouds of cool, molecular gas.”

See the full article here.

Using the new Chandra data, the age of N49 — as it appears in the image — is thought to be about 5,000 years and the energy of the explosion is estimated to be about twice that of an average supernova. These preliminary results suggest that the original explosion was caused by the collapse of a massive star.

Chandra X-ray Center, Operated for NASA by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory

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From NASA Chandra- “NGC 3576: Massive Stars Revealed by Chandra”

NASA Chandra

“NGC 3576 is a giant HII region of glowing gas located about 9,000 light years from Earth. In the Chandra image of this star forming region, lower-energy X-rays (0.5-2.0 keV) are shown in red and higher-energy X-rays (2-8 keV) are in blue. Chandra reveals a cluster of point-like X-ray sources, some of which are massive young stars that are shredding the cloud of gas from which they formed. The blue sources are stars that are deeply embedded in gas. Regions of diffuse X-ray emission are likely caused by hot winds flowing away from the most massive stars. Some of the diffuse gas near the center of the image is also deeply embedded.

Credit: NASA/CXC/Penn State/L.Townsley et al.
Observation Dates Jul 21 & 23, 2005
Release Date September 27, 2006

Another view, this one from ESO

HII (pronounced “H-two”) regions are where stars are born from condensing clouds of hydrogen gas (they are named for the large amounts of ionized atomic hydrogen they contain.) These regions are characterized by hot, young, massive stars which emit large amounts of ultraviolet light and ionize the nebula. Because NGC 3576 is very dense, many of the young, massive stars visible in the Chandra image have previously been hidden from view. A cluster of stars is visible in infrared observations, but not enough young, massive stars have been identified to explain the brightness of the nebula. Astronomers have found a large flow of ionized gas in radio observations and huge bubbles in optical images that extend out from the edge of the HII region. Taken with the X-ray data, this information hints that powerful winds are emerging from this hidden cluster.

See the full article here.

Chandra X-ray Center, Operated for NASA by the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory

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From NASA

April 19, 2013

Anticipation is building as Comet ISON plunges into the inner solar system for a close encounter with the sun in November 2013. Blasted at point-blank range by solar radiation, the sungrazer will likely become one of the finest comets in many years.

When NASA’s Swift spacecraft observed the comet in January 2013, it was still near the orbit of Jupiter, but already very active. More than 112,000 pounds of dust were spewing from the comet’s nucleus every minute.

NASA SWIFT

It turns out, some of that dust might end up on Earth.

Veteran meteor researcher Paul Wiegert of the University of Western Ontario has been using a computer to model the trajectory of dust ejected by Comet ISON, and his findings suggest that an unusual meteor shower could be in the offing.

‘For several days around January 12, 2014, Earth will pass through a stream of fine-grained debris from Comet ISON,’ says Wiegert. ‘The resulting shower could have some interesting properties.

According to Wiegert’s computer models, the debris stream is populated with extremely tiny grains of dust, no more than a few microns wide, pushed toward Earth by the gentle radiation pressure of the sun. They will be hitting at a speed of 56 km/s or 125,000 mph. Because the particles are so small, Earth’s upper atmosphere will rapidly slow them to a stop.

‘Instead of burning up in a flash of light, they will drift gently down to the Earth below,’ he says.

Don’t expect to notice. The invisible rain of comet dust, if it occurs, would be very slow. It can take months or even years for fine dust to settle out of the high atmosphere.

See the full article here.

And now, a neat video from NASA

NASA leads the nation on a great journey of discovery, seeking new knowledge and understanding of our planet Earth, our Sun and solar system, and the universe out to its farthest reaches and back to its earliest moments of existence. NASA’s Science Mission Directorate (SMD) and the nation’s science community use space observatories to conduct scientific studies of the Earth from space to visit and return samples from other bodies in the solar system, and to peer out into our Galaxy and beyond. NASA’s science program seeks answers to profound questions that touch us all:

This is NASA’s science vision: using the vantage point of space to achieve with the science community and our partners a deep scientific understanding of our planet, other planets and solar system bodies, the interplanetary environment, the Sun and its effects on the solar system, and the universe beyond. In so doing, we lay the intellectual foundation for the robotic and human expeditions of the future while meeting today’s needs for scientific information to address national concerns, such as climate change and space weather. At every step we share the journey of scientific exploration with the public and partner with others to substantially improve science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) education nationwide.

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From NASA/ESA Hubble: “A fresh take on the Horsehead Nebula”

New infrared view of the Horsehead Nebula — Hubble’s 23rd anniversary image

“This new Hubble image, captured and released to celebrate the telescope’s 23rd year in orbit, shows part of the sky in the constellation of Orion (The Hunter). Rising like a giant seahorse from turbulent waves of dust and gas is the Horsehead Nebula, otherwise known as Barnard 33.

Release date: 19 April 2013, 15:00

Another view, this one from ESA Herschel

This year marks the 23rd year of observing for the Hubble Space Telescope. Alongside cutting-edge science, the orbiting observatory has produced countless stunning astronomical images. Some of the most striking and beautiful subjects of Hubble’s images have been nebulae — vast interstellar clouds of gas and dust.

This new Hubble image, captured and released to celebrate this milestone, shows part of the sky in the constellation of Orion (The Hunter). Rising like a giant seahorse from turbulent waves of dust and gas is the Horsehead Nebula, otherwise known as Barnard 33. The nebula formed from a collapsing interstellar cloud of material, and glows as it is illuminated by a nearby hot star [1].

The gas clouds surrounding the Horsehead have already dissipated, but the jutting pillar is made of stronger stuff — thick clumps of material — that is harder to erode. Astronomers estimate that the Horsehead formation has about five million years left before it too disintegrates.

This nebula is a very well-known object and a popular target for observations, most of which show the Horsehead as a dark cloud silhouetted against a background of glowing gas. This new image shows the same region in infrared light, which has longer wavelengths than visible light and can pierce through the dusty material that usually obscures the nebula’s inner regions. The result is a rather ethereal and fragile-looking structure, made of delicate folds of gas — very different to the nebula’s appearance in visible light.”

The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI), is a free-standing science center, located on the campus of The Johns Hopkins University and operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) for NASA, conducts Hubble science operations.

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From NASA Kepler: “NASA’s Kepler Discovers its Smallest ‘Habitable Zone’ Planets to Date

Kepler Spacecraft

04.18.2013

“NASA’s Kepler mission has discovered two new planetary systems that include three super-Earth-size planets in the “habitable zone,” the range of distance from a star where the surface temperature of an orbiting planet might be suitable for liquid water.

Relative sizes of Kepler habitable zone planets discovered as of 2013 April 18.
Left to right: Kepler-22b, Kepler-69c, Kepler-62e, Kepler-62f, and Earth (except for Earth, these are artists’ renditions). Credit: NASA/Ames/JPL-Caltech.

The Kepler-62 system has five planets; 62b, 62c, 62d, 62e and 62f. The Kepler-69 system has two planets; 69b and 69c. Kepler-62e, 62f and 69c are the super-Earth-sized planets.

Two of the newly discovered planets orbit a star smaller and cooler than the sun. Kepler-62f is only 40 percent larger than Earth, making it the exoplanet closest to the size of our planet known in the habitable zone of another star. Kepler-62f is likely to have a rocky composition. Kepler-62e, orbits on the inner edge of the habitable zone and is roughly 60 percent larger than Earth.

The third planet, Kepler-69c, is 70 percent larger than the size of Earth, and orbits in the habitable zone of a star similar to our sun. Astronomers are uncertain about the composition of Kepler-69c, but its orbit of 242 days around a sun-like star resembles that of our neighboring planet Venus.

Scientists do not know whether life could exist on the newfound planets, but their discovery signals we are another step closer to finding a world similar to Earth around a star like our sun.”

See the full article here.

The Kepler Mission, NASA Discovery mission #10, is specifically designed to survey our region of the Milky Way galaxy to discover hundreds of Earth-size and smaller planets in or near the habitable zone→ and determine the fraction of the hundreds of billions of stars in our galaxy that might have such planets.Kepler is part of NASA’s Discovery Program of relatively low-cost, focused primary science missions. The telescope’s construction and initial operation were managed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, with Ball Aerospace responsible for developing the Kepler flight system. The Ames Research Center is responsible for the ground system development, mission operations since December 2009, and science data analysis. The initial planned lifetime was 3.5 years, but in 2012 this was extended to 2016.

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From NASA: “NASA’S Newest Solar Satellite Arrives at Vandenberg AFB for Launch”

“NASA’s Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) satellite arrived at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on Tuesday, April 16, to begin its final preparations for launch currently scheduled no earlier than May 28. IRIS will improve our understanding of how heat and energy move through the deepest levels of the sun’s atmosphere, thereby increasing our ability to forecast space weather. Following final checkouts, the IRIS spacecraft will be placed inside an Orbital Sciences Pegasus rocket. Deployment of the Pegasus from the L-1011 carrier aircraft is targeted for 7:27 p.m. PDT at an altitude of 39,000 feet at a location over the Pacific Ocean about 100 miles northwest of Vandenberg AFB off the central coast of California south of Big Sur.

Workers unload NASA’s IRIS spacecraft from a truck at the processing facility at Vandenberg where the spacecraft will be readied for launch aboard an Orbital Sciences Pegasus XL rocket. Photo credit: VAFB/Randy Beaudoin

‘IRIS will contribute significantly to our understanding of the interface region between the sun’s photosphere and corona,’ said Joe Davila, IRIS mission scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. “This region is crucial for understanding how the corona gets so hot.”

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From JPL at Caltech: “NASA-Funded Asteroid Tracking Sensor Passes Key Test”

April 15, 2013
Whitney Clavin 818-354-4673/ D.C. Agle 818-393-9011
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
whitney.clavin@jpl.nasa.gov/David.C.Agle@jpl.nasa.gov

J.D. Harrington 202-358-5241
Headquarters, Washington
j.d.harrington@nasa.gov

“An infrared sensor that could improve NASA’s future detecting and tracking of asteroids and comets has passed a critical design test.

The NEOCam sensor (right) is the lynchpin for the proposed Near Earth Object Camera, or NEOCam, space mission (left). Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Teledyne

The test assessed performance of the Near Earth Object Camera (NEOCam) in an environment that mimicked the temperatures and pressures of deep space. NEOCam is the cornerstone instrument for a proposed new space-based asteroid-hunting telescope. Details of the sensor’s design and capabilities are published in an upcoming edition of the Journal of Optical Engineering.

The sensor could be a vital component to inform plans for the agency’s recently announced initiative to develop the first-ever mission to identify, capture and relocate an asteroid closer to Earth for future exploration by astronauts.

‘This sensor represents one of many investments made by NASA’s Discovery Program and its Astrophysics Research and Analysis Program in innovative technologies to significantly improve future missions designed to protect Earth from potentially hazardous asteroids,’ said Lindley Johnson, program executive for NASA’s Near-Earth Object Program Office in Washington.”

See the full article here.

Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is a federally funded research and development center and NASA field center located in the San Gabriel Valley area of Los Angeles County, California, United States. Although the facility has a Pasadena postal address, it is actually headquartered in the city of La Cañada Flintridge [1], on the northwest border of Pasadena. JPL is managed by the nearby California Institute of Technology (Caltech) for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The Laboratory’s primary function is the construction and operation of robotic planetary spacecraft, though it also conducts Earth-orbit and astronomy missions. It is also responsible for operating NASA’s Deep Space Network.

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From NASA Webb: “NASA Engineers Rehearse Placement of Webb Telescope’s NIRSpec and Microshutters”

04.15.13
Rob Gutro
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

“The installation of equipment into the James Webb Space Telescope requires patience and precision. To prepare for the installation of the actual flight equipment and ensure perfection in the installations, scientists need to practice with an identical test unit. Scientists at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. are currently rehearsing with the placement of the Webb’s Microshutter Array into the NIRSpec.

Engineers prepare and install the Microshutter Array simulator onto the NIRSpec Engineering Test Unit at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center. Credit: NASA/Chris Gunn

ETUs or engineering test units are simulations of equipment that will fly on the Webb telescope. Back in 2010, NASA Goddard received the ETU of the Webb telescope’s Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) instrument from its manufacturer in Germany. Currently, engineers and scientists are preparing and installing the Microshutter Array simulator into the engineering test unit of the Webb telescope’s Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) instrument.

‘The implementation of a new technology like this depends not only on the conception of it, but it depends on the skilled hands of the engineers and technicians,’ said Harvey Moseley, a senior astrophysicist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. ‘Using the hundred-fold increase in observing speed provided by the microshutters opens the epoch of the universe where the first galaxies are forming and the elements of our current universe.’”

See the full article here.

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), previously known as Next Generation Space Telescope (NGST), is a planned space telescope optimized for observations in the infrared, and a scientific successor to the Hubble Space Telescope and the Spitzer Space Telescope. The main technical features are a large and very cold 6.5-meter (21 ft) diameter mirror, an observing position far from Earth, orbiting the Earth–Sun L2 point, and four specialized instruments. The combination of these features will give JWST unprecedented resolution and sensitivity from long-wavelength visible to the mid-infrared, enabling its two main scientific goals – studying the birth and evolution of galaxies, and the formation of stars and planets.

The telescope is planned for launch on an Ariane 5 rocket on a five-year mission (10-year goal) with a planned launch date in 2018.

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From JPL at Caltech: “Where are the Best Windows Into Europa’s Interior?”

April 12, 2013
Guy Webster 818-354-6278
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
guy.webster@jpl.nasa.gov

“The surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa exposes material churned up from inside the moon and also material resulting from matter and energy coming from above. If you want to learn about the deep saltwater ocean beneath this unusual world’s icy shell — as many people do who are interested in possible extraterrestrial life — you might target your investigation of the surface somewhere that has more of the up-from-below stuff and less of the down-from-above stuff.

This graphic of Jupiter’s moon Europa maps a relationship between the amount of energy deposited onto the moon from charged-particle bombardment and the chemical contents of ice deposits on the surface in five areas of the moon (labeled A through E). Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Ariz./JHUAPL/Univ. of Colo.

New analysis of observations made more than a decade ago by NASA’s Galileo mission to Jupiter helps identify those places.

‘We have found the regions where charged electrons and ions striking the surface would have done the most, and the least, chemical processing of materials emplaced at the surface from the interior ocean,’ said J. Brad Dalton of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., lead author of the report published recently in the journal Planetary and Space Science. ‘That tells us where to look for materials representing the most pristine ocean composition, which would be the best places to target with a lander or study with an orbiter.’

Europa is about the size of Earth’s moon and, like our moon, keeps the same side toward the planet it orbits. Picture a car driving in circles around a mountain with its left-side windows always facing the mountain.

Europa’s orbit around Jupiter is filled with charged, energetic particles tied to Jupiter’s powerful magnetic field. Besides electrons, these particles include ions of sulfur and oxygen originating from volcanic eruptions on Io, a neighboring moon.

The magnetic field carrying these energetic particles sweeps around Jupiter faster than Europa orbits Jupiter, in the same direction: about 10 hours per circuit for the magnetic field versus about 3.6 days for Europa’s orbit. So, instead of our mountain-circling car getting bugs on the front windshield, the bugs are plastered on the back of the car by a “wind” from behind going nearly nine times faster than the car. Europa has a “leading hemisphere” in front and a “trailing hemisphere” in back.

Earlier studies had found more sulfuric acid being produced toward the center of the trailing hemisphere than elsewhere on Europa’s surface, interpreted as resulting from chemistry driven by sulfur ions bombarding the icy surface.

Dalton and his co-authors at JPL and at Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, Laurel, Md., examined data from observations by Galileo’s near infrared mapping spectrometer of five widely distributed areas of Europa’s surface. The spectra of reflected light from frozen material on the surface enabled them to distinguish between relatively pristine water and sulfate hydrates. These included magnesium and sodium sulfate salt hydrates, and hydrated sulfuric acid. They compared the distributions of these substances with models of how the influxes of energetic electrons and of sulfur and oxygen ions are distributed around the surface of Europa.

The concentration of frozen sulfuric acid on the surface varies greatly, they found. It ranges from undetectable levels near the center of the leading hemisphere, to more than half of the surface materials near the center of the heavily bombarded trailing hemisphere. The concentration was closely related to the amount of electrons and sulfur ions striking the surface.

‘The close correlation of electron and ion fluxes with the sulfuric acid hydrate concentrations indicates that the surface chemistry is affected by these charged particles,’ says Dalton. ‘If you are interested in the composition and habitability of the interior ocean, the best places to study would be the parts of the leading hemisphere we have identified as receiving the fewest electrons and having the lowest sulfuric acid concentrations.’

Surface deposits in these areas are most likely to preserve the original chemical compounds that erupted from the interior. Dalton suggests that any future spacecraft missions to Europa should target these deposits for study from orbit, or even attempt to land there.”

See the full article here.

Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) is a federally funded research and development center and NASA field center located in the San Gabriel Valley area of Los Angeles County, California, United States. Although the facility has a Pasadena postal address, it is actually headquartered in the city of La Cañada Flintridge [1], on the northwest border of Pasadena. JPL is managed by the nearby California Institute of Technology (Caltech) for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The Laboratory’s primary function is the construction and operation of robotic planetary spacecraft, though it also conducts Earth-orbit and astronomy missions. It is also responsible for operating NASA’s Deep Space Network.

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From NASA/ESA Hubble: “Hubble captures view of ‘Mystic Mountain’ “

“This craggy fantasy mountaintop enshrouded by wispy clouds looks like a bizarre landscape from Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope image, which is even more dramatic than fiction, captures the chaotic activity atop a pillar of gas and dust, three light-years tall, which is being eaten away by the brilliant light from nearby bright stars. The pillar is also being assaulted from within, as infant stars buried inside it fire off jets of gas that can be seen streaming from towering peaks.

Credit: NASA, ESA, M. Livio and the Hubble 20th Anniversary Team (STScI)
Release date: 23 April 2010, 10:00

This turbulent cosmic pinnacle lies within a tempestuous stellar nursery called the Carina Nebula, located 7500 light-years away in the southern constellation of Carina. The image celebrates the 20th anniversary of Hubble’s launch and deployment into an orbit around the Earth.

Scorching radiation and fast winds (streams of charged particles) from super-hot newborn stars in the nebula are shaping and compressing the pillar, causing new stars to form within it. Streamers of hot ionised gas can be seen flowing off the ridges of the structure, and wispy veils of gas and dust, illuminated by starlight, float around its towering peaks. The denser parts of the pillar are resisting being eroded by radiation.

Nestled inside this dense mountain are fledgling stars. Long streamers of gas can be seen shooting in opposite directions from the pedestal at the top of the image. Another pair of jets is visible at another peak near the centre of the image. These jets, (known as HH 901 and HH 902, respectively, are signposts for new star birth and are launched by swirling gas and dust discs around the young stars, which allow material to slowly accrete onto the stellar surfaces.

Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3 observed the pillar on 1-2 February 2010. The colours in this composite image correspond to the glow of oxygen (blue), hydrogen and nitrogen (green), and sulphur (red).”

The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency. NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI), is a free-standing science center, located on the campus of The Johns Hopkins University and operated by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy (AURA) for NASA, conducts Hubble science operations.

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