solar system – Techdirt (original) (raw)

Stories filed under: "solar system"

DailyDirt: My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nine…

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If you’re young enough, you were only taught about the eight planets in our solar system — and possibly that there was a mysterious ‘Planet X‘ or planet Tyche beyond Neptune. More recently, there’s a new ninth planet proposal from the same folks who re-named Pluto as a dwarf planet. Check out these links on Pluto and this new ninth planet that might redefine the outer edge of our solar system.

• Twisting the knife into Pluto, Michael Brown and his fellow Caltech astronomer Konstantin Batygin have proposed a ninth planet in our solar system — that’s about the same size as Neptune but with an orbit so large that it would take roughly 15,000 earth-years to complete its own journey around the sun. What does Brown have against Pluto? Dwarf planets are still cute, I suppose. [url]
• Pluto was discovered in 1930, and at the time, it was mistakenly thought to be about the same size as the Earth. Further measurements revealed that Pluto is actually about 0.2% as massive as the Earth — and that similarly-sized bodies in space called ‘trans-Neptunian objects’ (TNOs) also existed in our solar system. Since the discovery of TNO Eris in 2005 meant that Pluto was less planet-like than previously thought, these larger TNOs were named dwarf planets — and Pluto was demoted. (And Pluto still hasn’t even finished its 248-year-long orbit around the sun since it was discovered as a ‘planet’… before it was re-classified as not a planet.) [url]
• Despite its dwarf planet status, Pluto has five moons of its own. Seriously. Five. Charon, Styx, Nix, Kerberos, and Hydra are the names of Pluto’s satellites, and Charon is about half the size of Pluto — which had some astronomers proposing to call Pluto a binary planet or double planet (binary dwarf planet?). [url]

After you’ve finished checking out those links, take a look at our Daily Deals for cool gadgets and other awesome stuff.

Filed Under: astronomy, binary planet, charon, dwarf planet, eris, hydra, kerberos, konstantin batygin, michael brown, ninth planet, nix, planet x, pluto, solar system, space, space exploration, styx, tno, trans-neptunian object, tyche

DailyDirt: Solar System Factoids

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Every so often, it’s good to take a look up into the sky and think about how small our troubles are — compared to the size of the universe. Our little planet orbits a second (or maybe third) generation star, burning up heavier elements from previous stars that no longer exist. As Carl Sagan famously said, “We’re made of star stuff.” So as some of us take a couple days off to be thankful for the things we have, check out some of these links about our solar system.

• Jupiter’s red spot has existed for centuries, but the reason why this vortex persists isn’t immediately obvious. Apparently, three dimensional simulations are getting closer to explaining how the Great Red Spot (GRS) absorbs energy from both horizontal and vertical winds. (Also, it’s interesting to note that Kepler predicted a red spot on Jupiter about 200 years before it was observed — but only because he decoded a message from Galileo incorrectly.) [url]
• There are a lot of stars in the universe, but how many of them can you actually see with your own eyes at night? If the earth didn’t block your view of half the sky, you might see around 5,000 stars, but since you’re stuck on the ground, you only see about 2,500 stars. [url]
• You might remember that Pluto was discovered in 1930 as our solar system’s ninth planet, and that it has been downgraded to the classification “dwarf planet” or a Kuiper Belt Object (KBO) or a Trans-Neptunian Object (TNO). But what you might not know is that Pluto hasn’t yet completed a trip around the sun since people first named it because Pluto’s year lasts 248 Earth years. [url]

If you’d like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post via StumbleUpon.

Filed Under: astronomy, dwarf planet, great red spot, grs, jupiter, kbo, kepler, pluto, solar system, space, stars, tno

DailyDirt: Exploring Our Solar System

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Our solar system is a pretty big place, and we haven’t really seen that much of it. But as we send out more and more probes and get fancier telescopes, we’re learning about a ton of interesting phenomena that occur beyond our own planet. Here are just a few fascinating factoids and links on how we’re exploring space without sending astronauts anywhere (yet).

• While the Earth and other rocky objects in our solar systems aren’t perfectly round, our Sun is remarkably spherical… almost too spherical. The Sun isn’t perfectly spherical, but it’s actually one of the roundest objects humans have ever measured, and it’s a bit puzzling why it should be so round. [url]
• NASA’s Cassini spacecraft has discovered that Saturn’s moon Titan could hold bodies of liquid water under its crust. This could mean there’s yet another place in our solar system with water that could possibly sustain life. [url]
• A geochronometer is an instrument that could help determine how old various things in our solar system are. Portable geochronometers could be sent to other planets (like Mars) to improve our estimates of how long it takes for certain planetary features to develop. [url]

If you’d like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post.

Filed Under: astronomy, cassini, geochronometer, mars, saturn, solar system, space, sun, titan, water
Companies: nasa

DailyDirt: Space Race 2.0

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Space exploration is starting a new era. With more and more commercial ventures taking over low earth orbit missions, government space programs can focus on more long-term missions to increasingly distant places in our solar system. Unfortunately, there don’t seem to be many collaborative international efforts for missions to other planets, so it’s looking like a new nationalistic space race is emerging. Here are just a few space projects aimed beyond our planet.

• NASA is about to announce ambitious plans for manned space outposts on the moon and at a Lagrangian point. There are only a handful of Earth-moon Lagrangian points, so if NASA gets to the better ones first, the US will occupy some of the best space real estate. [url]
• China is planning to land a probe on the moon sometime in 2013. China ultimately wants to have a manned mission to the moon, but it hasn’t set a timeframe for that goal. [url]
• If you want to keep score, the Soviets have landed spacecraft on two other planets (Venus and Mars), while the US has only landed equipment on Mars. But if we’re counting quality, not quantity, then the US has gathered far more information on Mars than any other space program. [url]
• NASA’s Morpheus lander is designed to touch down on other planets, moons and even asteroids. Morpheus runs on methane and oxygen so that it could potentially re-fuel on extra-terrestrial bodies, and it could handle a variety of payloads such as robots, laboratories and even astronauts. [url]

If you’d like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post.

Filed Under: exploration, lagrangian point, mars, moon, morpheus, solar system, space, venus
Companies: nasa

DailyDirt: Spaceworthy Engines That Will Take Us 'To Infinity And Beyond!'

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Humans — not content to be stuck on this planet and itching to find alien life — are hard at work developing better ways to send satellites and spacecraft into orbit and outer space. If we actually want to colonize Mars by 2023, then some new propulsion technologies might be in order. Here are a few examples of various efforts going on around the world.

• MIT researchers have developed a penny-sized rocket thruster that runs on jets of ion beams. The thruster is flat and square, like a computer chip, and covered with 500 microscopic tips that emit ion beams strong enough to propel a shoebox-sized satellite. Placing several of these thrusters on a small satellite could enable it to move to change its orbit, as well as turn and roll. [url]
• Engineers in the UK are testing some key technology for a propulsion system that could one day take a spaceplane, like the Skylon vehicle, straight into orbit without all the multiple propellant stages required with current throw-away rockets. The Sabre propulsion system, which is part jet engine and part rocket engine, burns hydrogen and oxygen to provide thrust. [url]
• Researchers at The Australian National University are working on a plasma thruster that could eventually be used to send satellites to Mars. The plasma thruster could be ready by 2014, and initial missions will attempt to send old satellites into “graveyard” orbits using the thruster. [url]
• The Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency and NASA are both testing solar sail technology as a form of primary propulsion for spacecraft. The solar sail technology relies on the concept that surfaces exposed to electromagnetic radiation will experience “radiation pressure,” which exerts a small pushing force against the surface. Japan’s Ikaros 27-square-meter solar sail gets only 0.0002 pounds of force due to radiation pressure from the sun, but over a long period of time, incredibly high speeds could be achieved. [url]

If you’d like to read more awesome and interesting stuff, check out this unrelated (but not entirely random!) Techdirt post.

Filed Under: exploration, jaea, nasa, plasma thrusters, propulsion, rockets, skylon, solar sail, solar system, space

DailyDirt: Space Exploration

from the urls-we-dig-up dept

Manned space exploration is in a bit of a funk these days, depending on how you look at it. Robots are doing a lot of heavy lifting, and the potential deaths of astronauts make governments wary of much risk-taking. Commercial ventures are starting to ramp up, but their missions aren’t quite as awe-inspiring as the former glory of NASA. Here are just some quick links on the future of space exploration.

• There’s some pessimism about the prospect of humans colonizing the rest of the solar system. That is, if you think a one-way (aka “suicidal”) mission to other destinations in the solar system is a “half-empty” strategy. [url]
• Some folks are pretending to go to Mars and have spent quite a bit of time doing it. Maybe there should be a reality TV show like this, called “Real World: Mars” — where seven fake astronauts have to live together, trapped in a simulated environment… [url]
• The National Security Space Strategy has been published by the Dept of Defense, and it seems that, as space exploration technologies have matured, the goals of space technology development have gotten more complex. Just getting to the moon (again) or to Mars or to an asteroid isn’t enough these days, there has to be a pretty clear return on the investment and the involvement of multiple entities that could potentially fund such ambitious ventures. [url]
• To discover more links on space exploration, check out what’s floating around in StumbleUpon universe. [url]

By the way, StumbleUpon can also recommend some good Techdirt articles, too.

Filed Under: colonizing, mars, national security space strategy, solar system