Don't Talk To Me Right Now I'm Thinking Of The New Jupiter Photos And Vincent Van Gogh:

Hey. Why isn’t the moon landing a national holiday in the US. Isn’t that fucked up? Does anyone else think that’s absurd?

Venus makes Oxygen During the Day

Ok, it's little more than an excuse to show a beautiful image of a fascinating planet, but in a recent scientific study, it was discovered in the upper atmosphere of Venus, during the day (which lasts a little longer than our day, at 243 Earth Days !!) Carbon Dioxide and Carbon Monoxide is broken down by sunlight into it's Carbon and Oxygen. The oxygen then moves around the planet, and over to the night side too, where it plays an important role in the upper atmosphere of the planet.

Amusingly, a full year on Venus is only 225 Earth days, making a day on Venus longer than a year on Venus.

I guess the upshot of this is, every day is your Birthday on Venus, so Happy Venusian Birthday to you all !

South Island, New Zealand

Titan's high-level haze taken by Cassini on October 12, 2010.

Image credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute. Edited by J. Major.

Earth as seen through Saturn's ring(Cassini)

Bioluminescence and Milky Way

Comet Nishimura l Michael Jäger

The glittering globular cluster Terzan 12 — a vast, tightly bound collection of stars — fills the frame of this image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope. This star-studded stellar census comes from a string of observations that aim to systematically explore globular clusters located towards the centre of our galaxy, such as this one in the constellation Sagittarius. The locations of these globular clusters — deep in the Milky Way galaxy — mean that they are shrouded in gas and dust, which can block or alter the wavelengths of starlight emanating from the clusters.

Here, astronomers were able to sidestep the effect of gas and dust by comparing the new observations made with the razor-sharp vision of Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys and Wide-Field Camera 3 with pre-existing images. Their observations should shed light on the relation between age and composition in the Milky Way’s innermost globular clusters.

[Image Description: The frame is completely filled with bright stars, ranging from tiny dots to large, shining stars with prominent spikes. In the lower-right the stars come together in the core of the star cluster, making the brightest and densest area of the image. The background varies from darker and warmer in colour, to brighter and paler where there are more stars.]Credit:

ESA/Hubble & NASA, R. Cohen (Rutgers University)

www.spacetelescope.org

Glittering globular cluster Terzan 12

Glittering globular cluster Terzan 12

Protostar

HOW DO ASTRONOMERS DETECT EXOPLANETS AND DETERMINE IF THEY COULD SUPPORT LIFE??

Blog#335

Wednesday, September 27th, 2023

Welcome back,

On March 21, NASA announced the confirmation of the 5,000th planet outside our Solar System. From scorching-hot gas giants nestled near their parent star to rocky worlds that may host water on their surface, there’s a variety for scientists to study.

But finding these strange new worlds is a science in itself.

We’ve only been able to definitively detect planets of any kind for a few decades, and even at that, there are challenges in detecting such a small object at that distance in even the most powerful telescopes.

Inverse spoke with Marie-Eve Naud, an exoplanet researcher and outreach coordinator for the University of Montreal’s Institute for Research on Exoplanets, to tell us more about how astronomers find these worlds and the considerations for each method.

While there are numerous methods, the ones cited below are the most common.

THE TRANSIT METHOD

Astronomers have discovered most exoplanets using the transit method, notably with NASA's Kepler telescope launched in 2009. This method observes planets as they pass in front of their stars, causing a slight dimming of starlight, which photometers can detect. This approach works best in space due to minimal atmospheric interference, favored by missions like ESA's Cheops and NASA's TESS.

To confirm exoplanets, multiple transits are necessary to rule out sunspots or dust as causes of light fluctuations. Typically, two or three transits are required to gather substantial data.

Once a planet is detected, astronomers can estimate its radius, while mass is often determined through the radial velocity method. The combination of mass and radius helps classify a planet as rocky or gaseous, impacting its potential habitability.

Factors like proximity to an active star and radiation levels also affect habitability assessments, as seen with TRAPPIST-1's uncertain habitability despite hosting seven Earth-sized planets in its habitable zone.

RADIAL-VELOCITY METHOD

The radial velocity method is commonly used to discover planets, particularly with instruments like HARPS at the European Southern Observatory’s La Silla 3.6m telescope in Chile.

Planets and stars both orbit around their center of mass. A star with a planet exhibits a slight motion. Multiple planets can lead to complex motions.

This method involves analyzing the star's spectrum. When the star approaches, its light shifts towards red due to compression. When it moves away, the light shifts towards blue.

The planet's motion slightly affects the star's spectrum, creating a "barcode" of the star.

The first detection of a planet around a Sun-like star using this method was in 1995 when Didier Queloz and Michel Mayor found 51 Pegasi b. Prior to that, in 1992, planets were detected around pulsar PSR B1257+12, using changes in the pulsar's radio signal. This showcases the diverse scientific approaches to discovering distant worlds.

Originally published on www.inverse.com

COMING UP!!

(Saturday, September 30th, 2023)

"WHAT IS THE BLOCK THEORY??"