to see if they're structurally different from similar objects printed by the AMF at Earth atmosphere.
#Insanely Fuel efficient Engine Could Go to Mars And Back On One Tank Of Fuel An ion engine that smashes the fuel efficiency record has been registered for an innovation patent.
and back on a tank of fuel but its first application may be shunting networks of small satellites around in Earth orbit.
So you would need more fuel to get to Mars, but could get there faster. Neumann says metal fuels have advantages besides efficiency.
enon is hard to source away from Earth. Magnesium is found as olivine in asteroids,
Ion thrusters such as the one that took Dawn to Ceres are only suitable for use in vacuums
However, he says his drive could be suitable for lifting a spacecraft from low gravity objects like Mars'moons Phobos
very early calculations we think 20 kilograms 44 pounds of magnesium could get a 100 kilogram 220 pound ship to Mars and back.
or parking fuel in Mars orbit, or on a refuelling station established at Phobos or Deimos, preparatory to the voyage.
and likely exponentially more existing on the planet today. Determining an accurate number would require billions more dollars
No one wants the aircraft engine that is holding them 35,000 feet above the earth to shatter like a vase.
and adventure races across some of Earth's harshest terrain, including to the south Pole. He would learn to make a meaningful life using a wheelchair
The colors show deformation in the earth caused by the 7. 8-magnitude earthquake. The eastest"fringes"cross the city,
and the United states Geological Society (USGS). The April 28 image was taken by NASA's Earth Observing-1 satellite.
NASA Earth Observatory) Emitted light Kathmandu Satellite Image-Emitted Light This satellite image shows the city of Kathmandu and its surrounding areas after the April 25 earthquake.
Earth scientists had anticipated major aftershocks and even larger earthquakes in the area. In fact, a recent study found that smaller aftershocks strike within the main earthquake rupture,
Meteor showers occur when the Earth, on its orbital path through space, collides with particles from a comet or an asteroid.
which last made its closest approach to Earth in 1992. This week marks the peak of the Perseid meteor shower,
#Salty Water Flows on Mars Today, Boosting Odds for Life Liquid water flows on Mars today,
boosting the odds that life could exist on the Red planet, a new study suggests. The enigmatic dark streaks on Mars called recurring slope lineae (RSL) that appear seasonally on steep,
relatively warm Martian slopes are caused likely by salty liquid water, researchers said.""Liquid water is a key requirement for life On earth,
"The presence of liquid water on Mars'present-day surface therefore points to environment s that are more habitable than previously thought."
by studying images captured by the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (Hirise) camera aboard NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO).
100 meter-long streaks (called recurring slope lineae) are flowing downhill on Mars, and are inferred to have been formed by contemporary flowing water.
RSL occur in many different locations on Mars, from equatorial regions up to the planet's middle latitudes.
Ojha and his colleagues scrutinized data gathered about four different RSL locations by another MRO instrument, the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM."
we can deduce the mineralogical makeup of surface materials on Mars, "Ojha said.""What we found was that at times
and places when we see biggest RSL on the surface of Mars, we also found spectral evidence for hydrated salts on the slopes where RSL form."
CRISM observes the Red planet at the driest time of the Martian day, about 3 p m,
No planet is steeped more in myth and misconception than Mars. This quiz will reveal how much you really know about some of the goofiest claims about the red planet."
"Due to that, I do not think we will ever find the RSL still in their liquid form at 3: 00 p m,
a class of chlorine-containing substances that are widespread on Mars. These salts lower the freezing point of water from 32 degrees Fahrenheit (0 degrees Celsius) to minus 94 F (minus 70 C),
"This property vastly increases the stability of brine salty water on Mars, "he said. Perchlorates can absorb atmospheric water,
if Mars'air is the source of the brine flows. Other possibilities include melting of surface or near-surface ice or discharges of local aquifers."
"It is conceivable that RSL are forming in different parts of Mars through different formation mechanisms,
the Red planet was a relatively warm and wet world that could have supported microbial life, at least in some regions.
Mars is extremely cold and dry today, which is why the discovery of RSL sites has generated so much excitement over the past four years:
The features point to the possibility that simple life-forms could exist on the planet's surface now.
But the new results don't imply that life thrives on Mars today, or even that this is a likely proposition, Ojha stressed.
#There's water on Mars, NASA confirms There's water on Mars, and it flows there today.
In an eagerly anticipated news event, NASA revealed this morning the evidence of liquid, flowing seasonal water on the Red planet.
Water often signals life, so this new discovery gives hope to the search for life in our solar system.
Data from various probes and rovers like Curiosity and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have provided researchers with evidence concluding that there is flowing water on present-day Mars. Scientists understand that Mars was once Earthlike with large
Something unknown happened in the planet's history causing it to change. However today's revelation confirms that Mars has harbored water in the past,
and that water exists there today. Now, scientists can pursue the implications of what flowing water means in relation to the planet's history
and what it could also mean for the potential for life. Michael Meyer of the Mars Exploration Program at NASA explained,
"We found the active process on Mars today that shows that water was a likelihood."
"He continued with a description of the geological features that caused scientists to suspect water prior to the confirmation of its presence.
which shows how scientists were able to study the RSLS on the planet's surface.
However, recently scientists found a way to analyze data from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter by extracting data from the pictures on a per pixel level.
This allows scientists to study smaller details on the Red planet's surface and those details provided the new information.
Findings show that hydrated salts are present on the surface of Mars. Hydrated salts would mean that the water on Mars is briny.
Also, water on Mars could aid in the human exploration of the planet. Water on Mars would be a crucial resource for astronauts visiting the planet or for long-term colonists.
Of course scientists will need to study the nature of the water to know the full implications.
Another possibility is the future Mars 2020 rover or other rovers designed for the task.
The discovery of liquid water on Mars leads to more intriguing questions and mysteries. If there has been did life on mars,
These new findings about liquid water on Mars make scientists and space exploration enthusiasts thirsty for more information n
which detonate after penetrating deep in the earth. Because of the system's toughness, Leever says, initial testing suggests that the flexible circuitry would remain viable
If the planet's CO2 levels rise much higher than they are today, it may even be necessary to remove CO2 directly from the atmosphere to make the planet livable.
Long and his colleagues describe how the new materials--diamine-appended MOFS--work in this week's issue of the journal Nature("Cooperative insertion of CO2 in diamine-appended metal-organic frameworks".
#Electrospray thruster makes small satellites more capable Small satellites are becoming increasingly popular tools for Earth-imaging, communications,
#Desalination with nanoporous graphene membrane Less than 1 percent of Earth's water is drinkable. Removing salt and other minerals from our biggest available source of water--seawater--may help satisfy a growing global population thirsty for fresh water for drinking, farming, transportation, heating, cooling and industry.
the direction of the center of the Earth. An accelerometer measures all the accelerations of the aircraft including gravity,
which is directed always toward the center of the Earth. However, this essential tool has no equivalent in insects,
#Astronomers discover'young Jupiter'exoplanet The first planet detected by the Gemini Planet Imager (GPI) from an international team of astronomers,
& Astronomy at Stony Brook University, is one outside earths solar system at 100 light years away.
The exoplanet is being called a young Jupiter by the researchers because it shares many characteristics of Jupiter.
A paper outlining the full findings is published in Science. Discovery image of the planet 51 Eridani b with the Gemini Planet Imager taken in the near-infrared light on December 18 2014.
The bright central star has been removed mostly to enable the detection of the exoplanet one million times fainter.
Image: J. Rameau, Udem and C. Marois, NRC Herzberg) The finding could serve as a decoder ring for astronomers to understand how planets formed around our sun
because one of the best ways to learn how our solar system evolved is to look to younger star systems in the earlier phase of development.
They are both members of the international Gemini Planet Imager Exoplanet Survey (GPIES) team which is dedicated to imaging and characterising exoplanets, planets discovered outside of earths solar system.
The new planet is called 51 Eridani b. The GPI is a new astronomy instrument operated by an international collaboration headed by Bruce Macintosh, a Professor of Physics in the Kavli Institute at Stanford.
The exoplanet is the'faintest'one on record, and also shows the strongest methane signature ever detected on an alien planet,
which should yield additional clues as to how the planet formed. The key to the solar system?
What makes 51 Eridani particularly interesting is that it also harbours dust and ice in the planetary system,"explains Professor Metchev.
These are much like the dust and the ice grains produced by collisions among asteroids and comets in the Solar system."
who led the WISE study and whose previous work identifying recycled planetary dust, known as debris disks, around close to a hundred other star systems, puts the discovery of the exoplanet in context.
Finding dust around a star is like seeing a large signpost that tells us there might be a planet,
and destroy each other, usually pushed around by a large planet like 51 Eridani b. Metchev adds,"
"And more data from the European space agency's Herschel Space observatory reveal that 51 Eridani is surrounded also by a more distant and colder cometary belt, much like the Kuiper belt of comets beyond Neptune in the Solar system."
"The two belts the asteroid and the cometary belt around 51 Eridani fall on either side of the newly discovered planet 51 Eridani b."The overall structure bears striking resemblance to our own Solar system,
with Jupiter as the most massive planet orbiting between a belt of asteroids and a belt of comets,"explains Metchev."
around the time when the Earth was still forming.""A clear line of sight The GPI was designed specifically for discovering
young planets orbiting bright stars. NASA's Kepler mission indirectly discovers planets by the loss of starlight
when a planet blocks a star.""To detect planets, Kepler sees their shadow; GPI sees their glow,
"says Macintosh.""What GPI does is referred to as direct imaging.""The astronomers use adaptive optics to sharpen the image of a star,
and then block out the starlight. Any remaining incoming light is analyzed then, the brightest spots indicating a possible planet.
After GPI was installed on the 8-meter Gemini South Telescope in Chile, the team set out to look for planets orbiting young stars.
To date, the astronomers have looked at nearly 100 stars.""51 Eridani is only 20 million years old,
and this is exactly what made the direct detection of the planet possible, explains Macintosh.""When planets coalesce, material falling into the planet releases energy and heats it up.
Over the next hundred millions years they radiate that energy away, mostly as infrared light,"says Macintosh.
and spotted 51 Eridani b orbiting a little farther away from its parent star than Saturn does from the sun
. Even though the light from the planet is very faint nearly a million times fainter than its star subsequent observations revealed that it is roughly twice the mass of Jupiter.
Other directly-imaged planets are five times the mass of Jupiter or more. In addition to being the faintest planet ever imaged
it's also the coldest 400 Celsius (C), whereas others are around 700 C and features the strongest atmospheric methane signal on record.
Previous Jupiter-like exoplanets have shown only faint traces of methane, far different from the heavy methane atmospheres of the gas giants in our solar system.
point to a planet that is very much what models suggest Jupiter was like in its infancy."
"All of the exoplanets astronomers have imaged before have atmospheres that look like stars very cool stars, but still stars,"says Macintosh,
who led the construction of GPI and now leads the survey.""This is the first one that really looks like a planet."
"Of course, it's not exactly like Jupiter. The planet is so young and still has a temperature of 400 C,
which is hot enough to melt lead.""In the atmospheres of the cold giant planets of our solar system carbon is found as methane,
unlike most exoplanets where carbon has mostly been found in the form of carbon monoxide. Since the atmosphere of 51 Eridani is also methane rich,
it signifies that this planet is well on its way to becoming a cousin of our own familiar Jupiter,
"says Mark Marley, an astrophysicist at NASAS Ames Research center r
#Black phosphorus surges ahead of graphene A Korean team of scientists tune BP's band gap to form a superior conductor,
allowing for the application to be produced mass for electronic and optoelectronics devices("Observation of tunable bandgap and anisotropic Dirac semimetal state in black phosphorus").The research team operating out of Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH),
which involved an astronaut stranded on Mars growing potatoes while living in an artificial habitat, had a bit more science fact than fiction than people might think,
#NASA Mars isolation experiment begins SIX people are about to shut themselves inside a dome in Hawaii for a year,
in the longest US isolation experiment yet aimed at helping NASA prepare for a pioneering journey to Mars. The crew includes a French astrobiologist, a German physicist and four Americans a pilot, an architect, a doctor/journalist and a soil
NASA current technology can send a robotic mission to the Red planet in eight months, and the space agency estimates that a human mission would take between one and three years.
and Simulation (HI-SEAS) before pressing on toward Mars, which NASA hopes to reach sometime in the 2030s.
The first HI-SEAS experiment involved studies about cooking on Mars, and was followed by a four-month and an eight-month cohabitation mission.
This year, for the first time, there was none only dry earth. The state's governor, Jerry brown, made the journey for the annual measurement
He borrowed the algorithm his colleagues used to analyse the Earth vibrations, and incorporated it into his modified MRI SCANNER.
Once theye there, they can do serious science, from climate modelling to exoplanet hunting. But they are stuck also in that orbit for their entire working lives.
So Lozano and his colleagues are designing a miniature propulsion system small enough to fit in your pocket that can steer Cubesats around low-Earth orbit
his team has provided the astronomers with geometric phase holograms that they have used build advanced coronagraphs--telescopes that can see things close to stars--to study exoplanets beyond our solar system."
so that the faint light coming from a planet orbiting that star can be observed with better contrast
--and then analyze the planet's light to learn about its composition and other characteristics,
Down to earth applications In addition to astronomy, the DWLS has found use in creating geometric phase holograms for use in mobile displays, holographic imaging,
#Liquid Water Likely Flows On the Salty Hills of Mars It almost as if our moon turned blood red last night to herald NASA latest Red planet news. At 11:30 EDT,
new data that suggests liquid water exists on Mars even today. This could be the first time in mission history that we have definitive reason to believe there might be microbial life on our closest neighbor.
In 1972, NASA Mariner 9 spacecraft discovered evidence of erosion features on Mars that implicated the presence of water at some point in the planet past.
the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) aboard the European space agency Mars Express spacecraft took a photo of a water ice crater 35 meters in diameter at the Martian north pole.
Finally, in March of this year, NASA and colleagues at the European Southern Observatory (ESO) uncovered evidence of a massive ancient ocean that once covered almost half of Mars northern hemisphere.
But until now, scientists had not yet found any signs of liquid water on the present-day surface of Mars
In 2011, Dr. Mcewen (a planetary geologist at the University of Arizona and principal investigator of images from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter) spotted dark streaks sloping down some of Mars canyons and mountains.
but measurements indicate very low humidity on Mars only enough for 10 microns, or about 1/2, 500th of an inch, of rain across the planet if all of the wetness were wrung out of the air.
That idea cannot be ruled entirely out if the lower part of the atmosphere turns out more humid than currently thought.
Such an engine is currently being used on the Dawn mission to the dwarf planet Ceres. However,
And the more communication satellite constellations circulating our planet, the closer we get to a more connected world d
#MIT Invention Turns Salt water Into Drinking water Using Solar power From plants to people, every living thing on this planet needs water.
But the movement of the earth's tectonic plates isn't like the smooth movement of gears in a machine.
the earth jerks in a sudden and devastating release, cracking along a fault, or fracture in the earth's crust.
is a fault where one part of the earth is pushed up and over another section of the earth.
Earth-abundant materials that could provide low-cost alternatives to platinum-based catalysts. Platinum is an extremely efficient catalyst for splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen
and protect our planet for future generations"said EPA Administrator Gina Mccarthy.""Today's announcement presents a major environmental, social and public health opportunity for the U s,
Remember that the ISS is orbiting more than 320 km (200 miles) above Earth and travelling at around 29,772 km h (18,500 mph),
"I said to them how wonderful Earth must look from up there, "he added, saying the total conversation lasted around 50 seconds in total."
but when you look down at Earth it is full of colour. I basically asked who he was
but says the potential of this research could radically change the way modern society derives its power. f we can convert all the human-made structures on the surface of Earth,
and we can have distributed food and fuel across the planet, he told Hall at the ABC
NASA finds evidence of liquid water flowing on the surface of Mars NASA told us it was announcing something big today,
the space agency says images from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) have revealed compelling evidence of liquid brines flowing across the planet's surface.
The seasonal rivers of salty water mean there's a greater chance of Mars being able to support life now or in the future.
or dark streaks on the surface of Mars during warmer weather -while it was suspected that trickling water was the cause,
the summer months on Mars see a shallow subsurface flow of briny water coming down from the planet's canyons and crater walls.
or it could be created by some kind of condensation process in the atmosphere of Mars."Our quest on Mars has been to'follow the water'in our search for life in the universe,
-albeit briny-is flowing today on the surface of Mars."Perhaps the biggest potential consequence of the discovery is that visitors to the Red planet could use the water that's hidden away to support themselves
then these sites would be prime candidates for landing spots on the first manned mission to the planet."
-which is why the discovery that water is now likely to be regularly flowing across Mars is commented so stunning
"The brine on Mars might not directly support life but it suggests that the arid world isn't as dry as once thought.
but that's like scorching the earth,"said Reddy.""I wanted to develop tools to go in
The Synthetic Muscle could be used in robotics in deep space travel such as travel to Mars because of its radiation resistance."
"Based on the good results we had on planet Earth, the next step is to see how it behaves in a space environment,
"From there the next step might be to use it on a mission to Mars."Early Connection with PPPLRASMUSSEN began working with PPPL in 2007 just four years after she started Ras Labs. She received her first patent for a synthetic muscle in 1998.
and was equivalent to a trip from earth to Mars and back. A second test of 45 hours was enough to be equivalent to a trip to Jupiter
and beyondrasmussen and Gentile found that there was no change in the strength, electroacivity, or durability of the material due to the radiation although there was a slight change in color.
When the material returns to Earth in July, it will be tested and compared with identical materials that remained On earth.
The International space station is an international science laboratory in low Earth orbit where astronauts conduct scientific research in biology, human biology, astronomy, meteorology and other fields in a gravity-free environment.
wind turbines Karl A. Gschneidner and fellow scientists at the U s. Department of energy's Ames Laboratory have created a new magnetic alloy that is an alternative to traditional rare-earth permanent magnets.
"Previous attempts to use cerium in rare-earth magnets failed because it reduces the Curie temperature--the temperature above
inspection of shiny parts and sensing for robots used to explore the moon and planets.
"says Phd candidate Daniel Hunter from the UNSW School of Biological, Earth and Environmental sciences.""The devil is the obvious answer.
They used a robotic system developed at SSRL to study the crystals at SLAC's LCLS, an X-ray laser that is one of the brightest sources of X-rays on the planet.
"It's just the same as wanting to look at Pluto in more detail or establishing that pentaquarks are out there,
and more suited to climate change in order to feed Earth's increasing population. Currently European union GMO regulations don't allow for food with added DNA.
and reducing it to a number of overlapping 2-D images that contain all the same information, much like making maps of Earth,
what happens in common Mercator projections of Earth, in which Africa and Greenland appear as the same size.
such as another star, a planet, or, very occasionally, a telescope mirror.""Astronomers have known that the universe is slowly fading out since the late 1990s.
#Exoplanet 51 Eridani b: A Red-hot Young Jupiter Around Distant Star (Infographic) Astronomers have photographed directly a planet not unlike Jupiter orbiting 51 Eridani, a sunlike star 96 light-years from Earth.
The star is young, only 20 million years old (compared with the sun's 4. 6 billion years).
The planet, 51 Eridani b, still glows with the heat of its formation. Scientists used the Gemini Planet Imager, an instrument on the Gemini South telescope in Chile,
to make the discovery. The Gemini Planet Imager is designed an instrument specifically for directly imaging exoplanets around distant stars s
#Saltwater lamp could replace dangerous kerosene lights The majority of inhabitants on the Philippines7000 islands do not have access to electricity.
but that like scorching the earth, said Reddy. wanted to develop tools to go in and modify very specific epigenetic marks in very specific places to find out what individual enhancers are doing.
#Star Pair#s Dusty Disk Shines Light on Planet formation Astronomers using the Gemini South telescope in Chile have discovered striking new evidence for planet formation in a dusty disk surrounding
The team took advantage of an offering for Early Science using the Gemini Planet Imager to study infrared light scattered off dust grains in the disk around the binary system V4046 Sgr.
The coronagraph is represented by the black filled circles. he Gemini Planet Imager allows us to study nearby planet forming disks in sufficient detail that we can obtain direct-image evidence for young planets in orbits similar to those of the giant planets
the GPI imaging reveals an intriguing double ring structure around the V4046 Sgr binary that is most likely due to the formation of a giant planet
(or planets) at some 4-12 times the Earth-Sun distance (approximately between Jupiter and Uranus,
if orbiting our Sun). his is perhaps the best such evidence yet for planet formation so close to a binary system,
as predicted by recent planet formation models. The result is published in The Astrophysica i
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