Astronomy Picture of the Day: A Sun Halo Over Cambodia
February 8, 2010
A Sun Halo Over Cambodia Have you ever seen a halo around the Sun? This fairly common sight occurs when high thin clouds containing millions of tiny ice crystals cover much of the sky. Each ice crystal acts like a miniature lens....
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Universe Today (Top 5 items)
- Answer for Last Week's WITU Challenge (Mon Feb 8 8:26 pm)
I was late posting last week's Where In the Universe Challenge, and now am even later in posting the answer. But find it back on the original post. Hopefully I'll be able to have a new challenge for you in a couple of days! ©... - Caught in the Act! Merging Galaxies Create a Binary Quasar (Mon Feb 8 8:14 pm)
Excellent teamwork by astronomers working in two different wavebands - x-ray and optical – has lead to the discovery of a binary quasar being created by a pair of merging galaxies. "This is really the first case in which you see two separate... - Sky on Fire as Endeavour Blasts to Space (Mon Feb 8 3:58 pm)
(Editor's Note: Ken Kremer is in Florida for Universe Today covering the launch of Endeavour.) Night literally turned to day as shuttle Endeavour roared off the pad early this morning Feb.8 at 4:14 AM beginning a 2 day chase to link up... - If the Earth is Rare, We May Not Hear from ET (Mon Feb 8 7:34 am)
If civilization-forming intelligent life is rare in our Milky Way galaxy, chances are we won't hear from ET before the Sun goes red giant, in about five billion years' time; however, if we do hear from ET before then, we'll have... - Awesome Shot! STA Over the Launchpad (Mon Feb 8 6:34 am)
During the early morning countdown for the launch of space shuttle Endeavour today, it was back and forth, yes and no, red and green, no and no-go. And all because of weather. As per standard procedure, an astronaut flies the Shuttle Training...
EurekaAlert Space News (Top 5 items)
- Conservation from space: Landscape diversity helps to conserve insects (Sat Feb 6 11:00 pm)
(Centre for Ecology & Hydrology) Rugged, hilly landscapes with a range of different habitat types can help maintain more stable butterfly populations and thus aid their conservation, according to new findings published today in the journal... - Prof. Stephen Hawking to visit Perimeter Institute and provide TV lecture across Canada (Thu Feb 4 11:00 pm)
(Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics) Dr. Neil Turok, Director of Canada's Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics, is pleased to announce that Prof. Stephen Hawking will visit the institute in Waterloo, Ontario, this summer to... - Cyclone Oli reaches category 4 strength on its way to open waters (Wed Feb 3 11:00 pm)
(NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center) Oli has exploded in strength and as of February 4 it was a Category 4 cyclone with peak sustained winds of 132 mph (115 knots/213 km/hr). NASA's Aqua and TRMM satellites observed Oli's clouds grow colder and... - GOES-P all fueled up (Wed Feb 3 11:00 pm)
(NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center) The GOES spacecraft continues its processing at the Astrotech Facility in Titusville, Fla., and fuel was loaded into the GOES-P spacecraft on Saturday, Jan. 30. The fuel will keep GOES-P in orbit for about... - 4 ORNL researchers selected for Recovery Act early career funds (Wed Feb 3 11:00 pm)
(DOE/Oak Ridge National Laboratory) Four Oak Ridge National Laboratory researchers are among the 69 scientists that will receive five-year research grants as part of the US Department of Energy's new Early Career Research Program.
Bad Astronomy Blog (Top 5 items)
- Advisor to the planets^h^h^h stars (Mon Feb 8 3:14 pm)
I was pleasantly surprised to see my old friend Kevin Grazier — planetary scientist with Cassini, and science advisor for Battlestar Galactica and Eureka — highlighted in a Eureka Unscripted blog post. It’s a two-parter, with... - Earth Sky interviews me about NASA's future (Mon Feb 8 1:00 pm)
I was recently interviewed on EarthSky about Obama’s budget and future plans for NASA. I talked about some of the things I covered in my earlier blog post, but I also added some thoughts about where I see NASA going and what I see its... - Looks like the Sun is in its teens again (Mon Feb 8 9:00 am)
I’ve been posting sporadically on how sunspots are starting to come back to the Sun, and I’m glad to see a new group sprouted up recently… and it’s a monster: These images are from SOHO, the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory.... - Geeks love the whole world (Mon Feb 8 4:31 am)
Of course I have like 20 minutes before I have to leave to catch a plane (yes, at 3:30 frakking in the a.m.) but I had to let y’all know about this: a video with a lot of famous and not-so-famous geeks singing the "Boom-de-yadda" song:... - SDO launches on February 9 (Sun Feb 7 10:17 am)
The Solar Dynamics Observatory, due for launch on February 9 at 10:30 Eastern time (15:30 GMT), is a revolution in solar observing: equipped with state-of-the art detectors, it’ll stare at the Sun and teach us far more about our closest...
Space.com News (Top 5 items)
- Space Shuttle Endeavour Soars in Predawn Launch (Mon Feb 8 5:08 pm)
The space shuttle Endeavour lit up the predawn sky above Florida when it launched Feb. 8 on its STS-130 mission. - Nimble Space Companies: Fixed-Price vs. Cost-Plus (Mon Feb 8 5:08 pm)
Are small private firms better suited to reducing the cost of space? Maybe, if we're willing to trade uncertainty for opportunity. Commercial Spaceflight Federation's Brett Alexander and Astronaut Leroy Chiao explore the issues. - Go Cosmic Sightseeing with Orion, the Hunter (Mon Feb 8 5:08 pm)
Orion is the richest constellation of the winter sky, a perfect place to begin exploring the night sky. - Astronauts Inspect Shuttle for Damage (Mon Feb 8 5:08 pm)
Astronauts aboard the space shuttle Endeavour will scan their spacecraft overnight to search for any signs of heat shield damage from their early Monday launch. - MISSION UPDATE: Shuttle Astronauts Wake to Music in Space (Mon Feb 8 5:08 pm)
Science@NASA (Top 5 items)
- Solar Dynamics Observatory: The 'Variable Sun' Mission (Fri Feb 5 12:00 am)
The Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO), slated for liftoff on Feb. 9th, will make IMAX-quality movies of solar explosions, peer beneath the stellar surface to see the sun's inner dynamo, and--researchers hope--unravel the mysteries of solar... - Hubble Sees Suspected Asteroid Collision (Tue Feb 2 12:00 am)
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has observed a mysterious X-shaped debris pattern and trailing streamers of dust that suggest a head-on collision between two asteroids. Please vote for this podcast at PodcastAlley! Get this podcast... - Firefly Mission to Study Terrestrial Gamma-ray Flashes (Fri Jan 29 12:00 am)
There's a mystery in the skies of Earth: Something is producing bright flashes of gamma radiation in the upper atmosphere of our own planet. A new NASA-NSF mission called Firefly is going to investigate. Please vote for this podcast... - Close Encounter with Mars (Tue Jan 26 12:00 am)
This week Earth and Mars are having a close encounter. On Jan. 27th, the Red Planet will be only 99 million kilometers away and look bigger through a telescope than at any time between 2008 and 2014. Please vote for this podcast at... - Spirit is Now a Stationary Science Platform (Tue Jan 26 12:00 am)
NASA announced today that Mars rover Spirit cannot be freed from its Martian sandtrap. Now the rover will begin a second career as a stationary science platform. Please vote for this podcast at PodcastAlley! Get this podcast story....
Astronomer's Telegrams (Top 5 items)
- ATel 2426: Discovery of kilohertz QPOs in RXTE observations of SAX J1748.9-2021. (Wed Dec 31 6:00 pm)
We report on RXTE observations of the ongoing outburst of the accreting millisecond X-ray pulsar SAX J1748.9-2021 (Altamirano et al. 2008, 674, 45A, see ATEL #2360 and #2407). ... - ATel 2425: MAXI/GSC detects an increase in X-ray flux from 4U 1711-34 (Wed Dec 31 6:00 pm)
MAXI/GSC detected an outburst of a transient X-ray burster, 4U 1711-34 (=2S 1711-339), beginning from 2010-02-03 (MJD=55230). Observations of its previous outbursts in March 2004 (ATEL #255) and the potential quiescent counterpart (ATEL... - ATel 2424: Swift Pointed Observations of XTE J1752-223 (Wed Dec 31 6:00 pm)
Swift obtained ~1.4ks of pointed observations of the recently discovered X-ray transient, XTE J1752-223 (ATEL #2258) on 2010-02-04 from 14:11 UT. The source had just emerged from approximately 90 days of being sun constrained to pointed observations.... - ATel 2423: Large amplitude variability and detection of a 35 sec modulation of the soft X-ray flux of nova KT Eri by Swift (Wed Dec 31 6:00 pm)
Swift X-ray Telescope (XRT) observations of Nova Eri 2009 (KT Eri) show that the supersoft source (SSS) reported by Bode et al (ATel #2392) first increased, and then decreased in variability. ... - ATel 2422: Candidate Progenitor of the Type Ib SN 2010O in NGC 3690 (Wed Dec 31 6:00 pm)
SN 2010O in the galaxy NGC 3690 was discovered on 2010 Jan 24 UT by Newton & Puckett (CBET 2144) at magnitude 15.6. NGC 3690 is interacting with IC 694; the pair is cataloged as Arp 299, lying at a distance of about 45 Mpc. ... - ATel 2421: The radio and optical counterpart of the new Fermi LAT flaring source J0109+6134 (Wed Dec 31 6:00 pm)
Following the recent ATELs #2414, #2416 and #2420 concerning the Fermi-LAT, AGILE and Swift/XRT consistent detections of the new gamma-ray flaring source J0109+6134, we wish to remind that the proposed radio counterpart (VCS2 J0109+6133/GT... - ATel 2420: Swift/XRT Follow-up of the Fermi-LAT Galactic Plane Transient J0109+6134 (Wed Dec 31 6:00 pm)
Following the Fermi-LAT detection of the Galactic Plane gamma-ray transient Fermi J0109+6134 (l, b = 125.121 deg, -1.226 deg) peaking on 1 Feb 2010 (ATEL #2414), we obtained a Swift observation on 3 Feb (from 05:30 -10:00 UTC). ... - ATel 2419: Detection of U Sco in X-rays (Wed Dec 31 6:00 pm)
Eric M. Schlegel (UT-San Antonio); Brad Schaefer and Ashley Pagnotta (LSU); Kim Page and Julian Osborne (Leicester); Jeremy Drake (SAO); Marina Orio (Wisconsin), Dai Takei (Rikkyo Univ.), and Erik Kuulkers and Jan-Uwe Ness (ESA/ESAC), representing... - ATel 2418: A Chandra High-Resolution X-ray spectrum of KT Eri (Wed Dec 31 6:00 pm)
A high resolution X-ray spectrum was obtained of the Classical Nova KT Eri with the Low Energy Transmission Grating (LETG) onboard Chandra. The exposure began at 2010-01-23T21:48:52 and ended at 2010-01-24T02:25:30. ... - ATel 2417: Massive outburst of 29P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 1 (Wed Dec 31 6:00 pm)
A continuous photometric monitoring of Centaur 29P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 1 is being currently performed from Spain. We have analyzed multi-band images taken in V, R, and I filters on Feb. ...