What Strange World Is This? Earth. In The Foreground Of The Featured Image Are ThePinnacles, Unusual

AD ASTRA PER ASPERA........ Lest we forge

Is Proxima b another Earth? It’s difficult to answer because no one has actually “seen” this distant planet which orbits the red dwarf star Proxima Centauri right in theGoldilocks Zone. Scientists have merely concluded that Proxima b (which is about 4.2 light years away from Earth) is right where it should be, by observing the regular, subtle changes in Proxima Centauri’s color. Proxima b is tidally locked to its star — which means one side of it is always facing Proxima Centauri, and the other side is perpetually dark. With just an 11.2-year revolution, it lies very close to its star, although red-dwarf stars are not as hot as yellow-dwarves (like our Sun).  There is a possibility that water exists on Proxima b, and that it has an atmosphere protecting it from extreme heat, and scattering heat even to its dark side.  How can we be sure? Harvard’s Avi Loeb and astronomer Laura Kreidberg propose that we use NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). UNCERTAINTIES The long-delayed JWST is set to launch by 2018 (originally 2011). Loeb explains that if a rocky planet, like Proxima b, has an atmosphere, it would absorb light from its star and re-emit it as infrared light. Incidentally, the JWST is specifically designed to observe infrared light. The JWST can take photos of infrared light on the surface Proxima b, looking for patterns that would confirm whether or not this exoplanet has water or is covered by an atmosphere. Things aren’t so simple, however. The proposed method may be doable. But there are other factors that have to be considered. For instance, the existence of an atmosphere may not guarantee life, says astrophysicist Ed Turner of Princeton University. Proxima b may be like Venus, with an atmosphere 90 times thicker than ours, and extreme heat. Still, Loeb’s and Kriedberg’s plan is the only option we have for a glimmer of an answer about this “Earth next-door”. References: Business Insider, Scientific American

Want to take a relaxing interstellar vacation? Consider visiting Kepler-16b, a world in a binary star system. In fact Kepler-16b is the first discovered circumbinary planet. It was detected in a wide 229 day orbit around a close pair of cool, low-mass stars some 200 light-years away. The parent stars eclipse one another in their orbits, observed as a dimming of starlight. But Kepler-16b itself was discovered by following the additional very slight dimming produced during its transits. Like sci-fi planet Tatooine of Star Wars fame, two suns would set over its horizon. Still, Kepler 16b is probably not a Tatooine-like terrestrial desert world. Instead, Kepler 16b is thought to be a cold, uninhabitable planet with about the mass of Saturn and a gaseous surface ... so plan to dress accordingly. Or, choose another Visions of the Future vacation destination. For image credit and copyright guidance, please visit the image websitehttp://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap160220.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2973592/Tearful-William-Shatner-pictured-hours-death-brother-Leonard-Nimoy-echoes-Spock-actor-s-final-tweet-telling-fans-Live-Long-Prosper.html

William Shatner pictured hours after the death of Leonard Nimoy @MailOnline

Helix Nebula // NGC 7293

There are some that fly an airplane, and there are those who become one with the air and machine.  Sad news today.  Bob Hoover passed away at the age of 94.  A stick and rudder pilot for the ages.  I met and got an autograph back in the late 1990s.  A class act all the way.  Mr. Hoover brought flying to an artistic level.  RIP Mr. Hoover, you took to the skies, dazzling and inspiring so many.  We mourn his loss, and celebrate a life. 

Robert A. “Bob” Hoover (January 24, 1922 - October 25, 2016)

http://www.flyingmag.com/aviation-legend-bob-hoover-dies-at-94

Eta Carinae and Keyhole Nebula (NGC 3324), inside the Carina Nebula (NGC 3372)

Vote for Space at SXSW 2017

We need your help! There are a number of exciting space-related panels proposed for next year’s South by Southwest Interactive Festival in Austin, Texas. SXSW is a community-driven event and voting accounts for 30% of the decision-making process for any given programming slot. The selection process is extremely competitive and the more votes we submit for the space panels, the more likely a panel related to space exploration will be included in the final SXSW program. 

To help you out as you consider what to vote for, we’ve put together a list of all the NASA-related panel proposals. 

These proposals look at ways we explore the solar system and beyond:

New Eyes on our Home System: NASA’s Next Telescope

Dark Energy and Exoplanets: NASA’s WFIRST Mission

Capturing NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope

Lessons from the Fringes of the Solar System

Into the Unknown: The People Behind Webb Telescope

These proposals looks at how we’re using out-of-this-world tech and data to create incredible experiences here on Earth and helping solve challenges through your participation:

Space 360: Experience NASA Missions in VR/AR/video

The Power of Many: Wisdom from the Crowd 

It’s Time to Ask More of Open Data

A little closer to home, this proposal explores our work to study and observe our dynamic home world, Earth:

NASA - Doing Work to Keep it Cool 

We want to send humans on a journey to Mars. How? These proposals would dive into this question and more: 

So you want to go to Mars?

Humans, Robots + Microbes: The Challenge of Mars

“Because They Are Hard”: NASA & Mars

Lastly, we’re proposing a meetup for NASA and the entire space community at SXSW 2017:

Space Meetup

Community voting and commenting for SXSW 2017 is open through September 2, 2016.

We look forward to seeing you in Austin in March at the SXSW Interactive Festival. Thanks!

Pluto in Combined Color

What is fascinating about Pluto is how young its surface is. We can see some canyons, planes, and mountains in this image - which is an indication of a young surface. This image of Pluto was taken when the New Horizons spacecraft was only 280,000 miles away from the surface. In the image you can see features as small as 1.4 miles! Four images from New Horizons’ Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) were combined with color data from the Ralph instrument to create this enhanced color global view.

Credit: John’s Hopkin’s APL/NASA JPL

ABRACADABRA (A Broadband/Resonant Approach to Cosmic Axion Detection with an Amplifying B-field Ring Apparatus), consists of a series of magnetic coils, wound in the shape of a toroid, or donut, which is then encased in a layer of superconducting metal and kept at temperatures just above absolute zero. The scientists plan to use a highly sensitive magnetometer, placed inside the donut hole, to detect any signs of axions’ influence. MIT physicists are proposing a new experiment to detect a dark matter particle called the axion. If successful, the effort could crack one of the most perplexing unsolved mysteries in particle physics, as well as finally yield a glimpse of dark matter. Axions are hypothetical elementary particles that are thought to be among the lightest particles in the universe — about one-quintillionth the size of a proton. These ultralight particles are virtually invisible, yet if they exist, axions and other yet-unobserved particles may make up 80 percent of the material in the universe, in the form of dark matter. In a paper published online in Physical Review Letters, the MIT team proposes an experiment to detect axions by simulating an extreme astrophysical phenomenon known as a magnetar — a type of neutron star that generates an immensely powerful magnetic field. The physicists reasoned that in the presence of an axion such a huge magnetic field should waver ever so slightly, producing a second, vastly smaller magnetic field as a signature of the axion itself. The team consists of MIT associate professor of physics Jesse Thaler, MIT Pappalardo Fellow Benjamin Safdi, and Yonatan Kahn PhD ’15, now a postdoc at Princeton University. Together, they designed an experiment to recreate the physics of a magnetar in a controlled laboratory environment, using technology borrowed from magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). The core of the experiment, which they’ve named ABRACADABRA (A Broadband/Resonant Approach to Cosmic Axion Detection with an Amplifying B-field Ring Apparatus), consists of a series of magnetic coils, wound in the shape of a toroid, or donut, which is then encased in a layer of superconducting metal and kept in a refrigerator at temperatures just above absolute zero, to minimize external noise. The scientists plan to use a highly sensitive magnetometer, placed inside the donut hole, to detect any signs of axions’ influence. “Axions are very strange, counterintuitive particles,” Thaler says. “They’re extremely light, with feeble interactions, and yet this particle may dominate the matter budget of the universe and be five times more abundant by mass than ordinary matter. So we really had to think hard on whether these particles are in principle detectable using current technology. It’s extremely daunting.” A “tantalizing” particle If they are detected, axions may also explain an outstanding dilemma in particle physics, known as the Strong CP (charge parity) problem: Since the 1970s, scientists have grown increasingly puzzled over what Safdi describes as “the indifference of neutrons to electric fields.” Neutrons are elementary particles that are found in the nucleus of almost every atom in matter, and they do not carry a net charge. “We don’t expect neutrons to accelerate in the presence of an electric field because they don’t carry electric charge, but you might expect them to rotate,” Safdi says. “That’s because we expect them to have an electric dipole moment, where you can think of a neutron having a plus charge on one side and a minus charge on the other. But from our current understanding, this rotation effect does not exist, whereas theory says it should.” Scientists have hypothesized that this bizarre effect may be explained by the axion, which would somehow remove a neutron’s electric dipole moment. If so, the axion would modify electric and magnetic phenomena in a way that could be detectable experimentally. “It’s very tantalizing to say there might be a particle that serves this deep purpose, and even more so if we were to detect the presence of these particles in the form of dark matter,” Thaler says. The hunt is on Currently, Thaler says most axion hunting has been carried out by researchers at the University of Washington who are running the Axion Dark Matter Experiment, or ADMX. The experiment uses a resonant microwave cavity, set within a large superconducting magnet, to detect very weak conversions of axions to microwave photons. The experiment is tuned to look for axions within a specific range of around one quadrillionth the mass of a proton. Thaler and his team realized that they could extend this range, and look for much smaller, lighter particles, on the order of one quintillionth the mass of a proton, by recreating the physics of magnetars, in the lab. “The Strong CP problem is associated with whether a neutron’s spin responds to electric effects, and you can kind of think of a magnetar as one gigantic spin with big magnetic fields,” Thaler explains. “If axions are coming in and changing the properties of nuclear matter to resolve the Strong CP problem, maybe axions can interact with this magnetar and allow you to see it in a new way. So the subtle effects of axions should be amplified.” The team’s prototype design is surprisingly small — “about the palm of your hand,” Safdi says. The researchers, who are theoretical physicists by training, are now working with experimentalists at MIT to build the prototype, which is designed to generate a baseline magnetic field of about 1 tesla, comparable to current MRI machines. If axions are present, that field should waver slightly, producing a very tiny oscillation at a frequency that is directly related to the axion’s mass. Using a high-precision magnetometer, Thaler hopes to pick up that frequency and ultimately use it to identify the axion’s size. “Only recently have there been many good ideas to search for [low-frequency axions],” says Gray Rybka, an assistant professor of physics at the University of Washington and an ADMX researcher, who was not involved in the research. “The experiment proposed here builds on previous ideas and, if the authors are correct, may be the most practical experimental configuration that can explore some of the plausible lower-frequency axion regimes.” “We have an instrument that’s sensitive to many wavelengths, and we can tickle it with an axion of one particular wavelength, and ABRACADABRA will resonate,” Thaler says. “And we will be going into uncharted territory, where we could possibly see dark matter from this prototype. That would be amazing.” This research was supported, in part, by the U.S. Department of Energy and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.