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Red dwarf stars, also known as M-dwarfs, dominate the Milky Way’s stellar population. They can last for 100 billion years or longer. Since these long-lived stars make up the bulk of the stars in our galaxy, it stands to reason that they host the most planets.

Astronomers examined one red dwarf star named SPECULOOS-3, a Jupiter-sized star about 55 light-years away, and found an Earth-sized exoplanet orbiting it. It’s an excellent candidate for further study with the James Webb Space Telescope.

SPECULOOS stands for the Search for habitable Planets EClipsing ULtra-cOOl Stars. It’s a European Southern Observatory effort that searches for terrestrial planets orbiting cool stars like red dwarfs. (Its odd name is an homage to a Belgian sweet biscuit.) Its goal is to find planets that are good targets for spectroscopy with the JWST and the ELT.

The new planet is named SPECULOOS-3b, and its discovery was presented in a recent paper in Nature Astronomy. The paper is titled “Detection of an Earth-sized exoplanet orbiting the nearby ultracool dwarf star SPECULOOS-3.” The lead author is Michaël Gillon from the Astrobiology Research Unit, Université de Liège, Belgium.

SPECULOOS is an automated search using four telescopes around the world: one at the Paranal Observatory in Chile, one at the Teide Observatory in Tenerife, one at the La Silla Observatory in Chile, and one at the Oukaïmden Observatory in Morocco. The project is searching 1,000 ultra-cool stars and brown dwarfs for terrestrial planets.

One of the problems in detecting planets around these stars is their low luminosity. Since they’re so dim, transiting exoplanets are difficult to detect, making their planetary populations difficult to characterize and study. So far, astronomers have found only one planetary system around one of these stars, and it’s rather well-known: the TRAPPIST-1 system. When it began, the SPECULOOS program expected to find at least one dozen systems similar to TRAPPIST-1.

“We designed SPECULOOS specifically to explore nearby ultra-cool dwarf stars in search of rocky planets,” lead author Gillon said. “With the SPECULOOS prototype and the crucial help of the NASA Spitzer Space Telescope, we discovered the famous TRAPPIST-1 system. That was an excellent start!”

The dimness of these stars can’t be understated. “Though this particular red dwarf is more than a thousand times dimmer than the Sun, its planet orbits much, much closer than the Earth, heating up the planetary surface,” said co-author Catherine Clark, a postdoctoral researcher at NASA’s JPL in Southern California.

The new planet is an Earth-sized world that orbits its star in only 17 hours. The star has a spectral type M6.5, and it delivers 16.5 more solar irradiation to its planet than the Sun does to Earth. That may sound surprising since the star is much cooler than the Sun. The Sun’s surface temperature is 5,772 K (5,500 C), while SPECULOOS-3’s temperature is only 2,900 K (2,627 C.) But SPECULOOS 3 bombards the planet with radiation due to the small distance separating them.

Since the irradiation is largely infrared and the star is only Jupiter-sized, it makes the planet an exceptional candidate for follow up observations, which is exactly what the SPECULOOS program is all about. The SPECULOOS Program 1 has found about 365 temperate, Earth-sized targets for further study with the JWST.

This chart shows the classifications by spectral type for main sequence stars according to the Harvard classification. Image Credit: By Pablo Carlos Budassi – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=92588077

The SPECULOOS-3 system is about 6.6 billion years old. Its luminosity, mass and radius are 0.084%, 10.1% and 12.3% of those of the Sun. “Just slightly larger than TRAPPIST-1, SPECULOOS-3 is the second-smallest main sequence star found to host a transiting planet,” the authors explain in their paper.

Two different telescopes observed the planetary transits around the star in 2021 and 2022 over eight nights. “Visual inspection of the 2021 and 2022 light curves showed some transit-like structures that motivated future intensive monitoring of the star,” the authors explain. The star was re-observed in 2023.

This figure from the study shows the transit of SPECULOOS-3b around its dim, cool star. Image Credit: Gillon et al. 2024.

The researchers determined that SPECULOOS-3b is about the same size as Earth, about 96% of our planet’s radius. But the planet’s density and mass are so far unconstrained. “Nevertheless,” the authors write in their paper, “several factors strongly suggest a rocky composition.”

There are two empirical reasons why the planet is likely rocky, though. The first is that its radius is on the rocky side of the radius gap. The second is that “all of the known Earth-sized planets in the NASA exoplanet archive have masses that imply rocky compositions,” Gillon and his co-authors explain.

This figure from the research compares SPECULOOS-3b to other transiting terrestrial exoplanets with less than 1.6 Earth radii. All of these planets are also cool enough to have rocky daysides rather than molten daysides. The shaded green area highlights planetary radii most similar to Earth’s (0.9–1.1R). Image Credit: Gillon et al. 2024.

But the big question concerns the planet’s potential atmosphere.

“From a theoretical point of view, the intense extreme ultraviolet emission of low-mass stars during their early lives makes it unlikely that such a small planet on such a short orbit could have maintained a substantial envelope of hydrogen.” the authors explain.

Red dwarfs are known to emit extreme radiation that strips away planetary atmospheres. However, there is some evidence that some planets can hold on to their atmospheres despite intense radiation, as with the recently discovered TIC365102760 b. Only time and more observations can tell us if the planet has an atmosphere and what type it has.

The researchers watched closely to see if there was a second planet around the star but didn’t find one. They also examined the planet spectroscopically with ground-based facilities. But we’ll have to wait for the JWST to examine the planet before we can really understand its atmosphere. The two most likely types of atmospheres for hot rocky planets are CO2-dominated and H2O-dominated.

The JWST will be able to examine SPECULOOS-3b with emission spectroscopy. This means it can examine the light the planet is emitting rather than just the light from the star as it passes through the atmosphere, which is called transmission spectroscopy. Emission spectroscopy is unaffected by irregular stellar behaviour, which red dwarfs are known to exhibit. JWST emission spectroscopy can also help determine the surface mineralogy if there’s no atmosphere. There’s a potential wealth of information waiting to be uncovered.

“We’re making great strides in our study of planets orbiting other stars,” said Steve B. Howell, one of the planet’s discoverers at NASA Ames Research Center. “We have now reached the stage where we can detect and study Earth-sized exoplanets in detail. The next step will be to determine whether any of them are habitable or even inhabited.”

The post An Earth-sized Exoplanet Found Orbiting a Jupiter-Sized Star appeared first on Universe Today.

NASA has awarded contracts to six companies to supply liquid nitrogen and liquid oxygen in support of operations at agency centers and facilities across the United States. The indefinite-delivery/fixed-price contract runs from Monday, July 1, 2024, through June 30, 2029.

The awards and approximate maximum contract values are:

• Air Products and Chemicals Inc., Allentown, Pennsylvania, $36.9 million
• Airgas USA LLC (South), Kennesaw, Georgia, $4.7 million
• Airgas USA LLC (Central), Tulsa, Oklahoma, $5.1 million
• Linde Inc., Danbury, Connecticut, $42.2 million
• Matheson Tri-Gas Inc., Warren, New Jersey, $1.8 million  
• Messer LLC, Bridgewater, New Jersey, $62.3 million

The total maximum delivery of liquid nitrogen, which NASA uses for pneumatic actuation, purging and inerting, pressurization, and cooling, will be about 656.8 tons, 30.4 million gallons, and 740,000 liters. The total maximum delivery of liquid oxygen, which is used as an oxidizer in cryogenic rocket engines, will be about 2.1 million gallons and 243,000 tons.

The commodities will support current and future aerospace flight, simulation, research, development, testing, and other operations at the following NASA centers and facilities: Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley; Glenn Research Center in Cleveland and Neil Armstrong Test Facility in Sandusky, Ohio; Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland; Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California; Johnson Space Center in Houston and White Sands Test Facility in Las Cruces, New Mexico; Kennedy Space Center in Florida; Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia; Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama; Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans; and Stennis Space Center in Bay St. Louis, Mississippi.

For more information about NASA programs and missions, visit:

https://www.nasa.gov

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Abbey Donaldson
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600
abbey.a.donaldson@nasa.gov  

Despite being extraordinarily difficult to detect for the first time, gravitational waves can be found using plenty of different techniques. The now-famous first detection at LIGO in 2015 was just one of the various ways scientists had been looking. A new paper from researchers from Europe and the US proposes how scientists might be able to detect some more by tracking the exact position of the upcoming Uranus Orbiter and Probe (UOP).

Initially suggested by NASA’s Planetary Science and Astrobiology Decadal Survey, UOP will be the first mission to Uranus since Voyager visited the system in 1986. When it finally arrives in 2044, after a 2031 launch date, it will be almost 60 years since humanity last had an up-close look at the Uranian system.

But 13 years in transit sure is a long time. Part of that time will be spent getting a gravitational boost from Jupiter, but most will be spent coasting between planetary bodies. And that much time spent in between planets is what the paper’s authors want to utilize to do non-Uranian science.

Fraser has long been a proponent of returning to Uranus, as he explains here.

Gravitational waves can disrupt the fabric of space-time, causing discernible distortions, especially over long distances. If the instruments in question are sensitive enough, the massive distance between UOP and the Earth would be a viable way to detect them.

This isn’t the first time using the distance between a spacecraft and Earth has been considered for detecting gravitational waves. Pioneer 11, Cassini, and a triangulation of Galileo, Ulysses, and Mars Orbiter all had entertained suggestions of being utilized for gravitational wave detection while on their journey to their final destinations. However, the equipment they were designed with was not sensitive enough to pick up the minute fluctuations required for an actual detection.

UOP will have the added advantages of decades of improved equipment, especially communications and timing electronics, which are critical to any gravitational wave detection. It also benefits that we’ve already officially detected a gravitational wave, so we know at least what to look for.

Long distance communication is hard, as Fraser explains in this video, but it’s also key to capturing data on gravitational waves.

The underlying mechanism is simple enough – consistently track the exact established position of UOP during its 13-year cruise to Uranus and cross-reference any anomalies in its position against what could be expected from known causes. These include the gravitational pull of some of the planets, or even asteroids, and solar radiation pressure on the spacecraft itself. As the authors note, some or even all of these could impact the spacecraft’s exact position; for the calculations to work effectively to find gravitational waves, better accounting for what, if any, impact they have must be completed.

But there is another potentially scientifically interesting cause of slight positional drift for the UOP: ultra-light dark matter. In theory, UOP could be used to test or even directly detect a form of dark matter known as ultra-light dark matter if it happens to exist in the solar system. Theorists have numerous models showing how it would work if it did exist. UOP could also use the same sort of exact positional calculation to contribute to that scientific research.

Best of all, UOP can do all this with literally no change to its primary functional mission – exploring the Uranian system. All that would have to be changed about the mission would be to update Earth with consistent positional data about once every 10 seconds for the duration of the 13-year trip to UOP’s final destination. Suppose there’s a chance that those more frequent check-ins with home could help detect gravitational waves or potentially dark matter. In that case, it seems well worth the consideration of the UOP mission planners – but it remains to be seen whether it will be included or not. The paper’s authors have made a persuasive argument about why it should be.

Learn More:
Zwick et al. – Bridging the micro-Hz gravitational wave gap via Doppler tracking with the Uranus Orbiter and Probe Mission: Massive black hole binaries, early universe signals and ultra-light dark matter
UT – It’s Time to Go Back to Uranus. What Questions do Scientists Have About the Ice Giants?
UT – We Could SCATTER CubeSats Around Uranus To Track How It Changes
UT – What Mission Could Detect Oceans at Uranus’ Moons?

Lead Image:
Proposed Uranus orbiter mission.
Credit – NASA Decadal Survey

The post A Mission to Uranus Could Also be a Gravitational Wave Detector appeared first on Universe Today.

The mystery of how a single-celled predator extends its "neck" by more than 30 times its overall length has finally been solved

The mystery of how a single-celled predator extends its "neck" by more than 30 times its overall length has finally been solved

Reid Wiseman felt a little jealous about the tree that he and his crewmates helped dedicate on the grounds of the U.S. Capitol. The NASA astronaut was, in a way, beaten to the moon by the sapling.

5 Min Read Webb Finds Plethora of Carbon Molecules Around Young Star

This is an artist’s impression of a young star surrounded by a disk of gas and dust.

An international team of astronomers has used NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to study the disk of gas and dust around a young, very low-mass star. The results reveal the largest number of carbon-containing molecules seen to date in such a disk. These findings have implications for the potential composition of any planets that might form around this star.

Rocky planets are more likely than gas giants to form around low-mass stars, making them the most common planets around the most common stars in our galaxy. Little is known about the chemistry of such worlds, which may be similar to or very different from Earth. By studying the disks from which such planets form, astronomers hope to better understand the planet formation process and the compositions of the resulting planets.

Planet-forming disks around very low-mass stars are difficult to study because they are smaller and fainter than disks around high-mass stars. A program called the MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) Mid-INfrared Disk Survey (MINDS) aims to use Webb’s unique capabilities to build a bridge between the chemical inventory of disks and the properties of exoplanets.

Image A: Artist’s Concept of Protoplanetary Disk This is an artist’s impression of a young star surrounded by a disk of gas and dust. An international team of astronomers has used NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to study the disk around a young and very low-mass star known as ISO-ChaI 147. The results reveal the richest hydrocarbon chemistry seen to date in a protoplanetary disk.

“Webb has better sensitivity and spectral resolution than previous infrared space telescopes,” explained lead author Aditya Arabhavi of the University of Groningen in the Netherlands. “These observations are not possible from Earth, because the emissions from the disk are blocked by our atmosphere.”

In a new study, this team explored the region around a very low-mass star known as ISO-ChaI 147, a 1 to 2 million-year-old star that weighs just 0.11 times as much as the Sun. The spectrum revealed by Webb’s MIRI shows the richest hydrocarbon chemistry seen to date in a protoplanetary disk – a total of 13 different carbon-bearing molecules. The team’s findings include the first detection of ethane (C2H6) outside of our solar system, as well as ethylene (C2H4), propyne (C3H4), and the methyl radical CH3.

“These molecules have already been detected in our solar system, like in comets such as 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko and C/2014 Q2 (Lovejoy),” added Arabhavi. “Webb allowed us to understand that these hydrocarbon molecules are not just diverse but also abundant. It is amazing that we can now see the dance of these molecules in the planetary cradles. It is a very different planet-forming environment than we usually think of.”

Image B: Protoplanetary disk of ISO-ChaI 147 (MIRI emission spectrum)

The team indicates that these results have large implications for the chemistry of the inner disk and the planets that might form there. Since Webb revealed the gas in the disk is so rich in carbon, there is likely little carbon left in the solid materials that planets would form from. As a result, the planets that might form there may ultimately be carbon-poor. (Earth itself is considered carbon-poor.)

“This is profoundly different from the composition we see in disks around solar-type stars, where oxygen bearing molecules like water and carbon dioxide dominate,” added team member Inga Kamp, also of the University of Groningen. “This object establishes that these are a unique class of objects.”

“It’s incredible that we can detect and quantify the amount of molecules that we know well on Earth, such as benzene, in an object that is more than 600 light-years away,” added team member Agnés Perrin of Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in France.

Next, the science team intends to expand their study to a larger sample of such disks around very low-mass stars to develop their understanding of how common or exotic such carbon-rich terrestrial planet-forming regions are. “The expansion of our study will also allow us to better understand how these molecules can form,” explained team member and principal investigator of the MINDS program, Thomas Henning, of the Max-Planck-Institute for Astronomy in Germany. “Several features in the Webb data are also still unidentified, so more spectroscopy is required to fully interpret our observations.”

This work also highlights the crucial need for scientists to collaborate across disciplines. The team notes that these results and the accompanying data can contribute towards other fields including theoretical physics, chemistry, and astrochemistry, to interpret the spectra and to investigate new features in this wavelength range.

The James Webb Space Telescope is the world’s premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency).

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Laura Betz – laura.e.betz@nasa.gov, Rob Gutro – rob.gutro@nasa.gov
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Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md.

Related Information

Infographic: Destiny of Dust

Infographic: Recipe for Planet Formation

Animation: Exploring Star and Planet Formation

Video: Scientists’ Perspective: Science Snippets

More Webb News – https://science.nasa.gov/mission/webb/latestnews/

More Webb Images – https://science.nasa.gov/mission/webb/multimedia/images/

Webb Mission Page – https://science.nasa.gov/mission/webb/

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As part of his new role as JPL’s chief scientist, Jonathan Lunine has also been appointed professor of planetary science with the Division of Geological and Planetary Science at Caltech.NASA/JPL-Caltech

In his new role, his leadership will be critical in fostering an environment of scientific innovation and excellence, ensuring that JPL remains at the forefront of discovery.

Distinguished planetary scientist and astrophysicist Jonathan I. Lunine has been appointed chief scientist of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He will officially assume his role Aug. 16.

As chief scientist, Lunine will guide the laboratory’s scientific research and development efforts, drive innovation across JPL’s missions and programs, and enhance collaborations with NASA Headquarters, NASA centers, Caltech, academia, the science community, government agencies, and industry partners. In addition, he will oversee the formulation of JPL’s scientific policies and priorities and guide the integrity of missions that JPL manages for NASA.

“I’m elated that Jonathan is joining JPL,” said Laurie Leshin, director of JPL. “As chief scientist, he will play a critical role in fostering innovation and excellence, ensuring that JPL remains at the forefront of scientific discovery and innovation as we dare mighty things together.”

Lunine currently serves as the David C. Duncan Professor in the Physical Sciences and chair of the Department of Astronomy at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. A Caltech alumnus, he has performed pioneering research on the formation and evolution of planetary systems, the nature of planetary interiors and atmospheres, and where environments suited for life might exist in the solar system and beyond. His deep expertise will help JPL continue to seek answers to fundamental questions that crosscut the diverse science portfolio of the laboratory.

“My first experience working with scientists and engineers at JPL was over 40 years ago as a Caltech graduate student,” said Lunine. “From that time to the present, it has been clear to me that no other institution matches its combination of scientific breadth and engineering capability. JPL’s portfolio of missions and research projects across the gamut — from our home planet to the solar system, heliosphere, and universe beyond — is an extraordinary resource to the nation. I am thrilled to be able to play a leadership role on the science side of this remarkable institution.”

Lunine has collaborated with JPL on numerous missions. He was a guest investigator for the ultraviolet spectrometer on NASA’s Voyager 2 Neptune encounter and an interdisciplinary scientist on the Cassini/Huygens mission, and he is co-investigator on the agency’s Juno mission to Jupiter as well as for the MISE (Mapping Imaging Spectrometer for Europa) instrument on NASA’s Europa Clipper mission. Lunine is also a member of the gravity science team for Europa Clipper and the Gravity & Geophysics of Jupiter and Galilean Moons gravity experiment on the ESA (European Space Agency) JUICE (Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer) mission.

In addition, he served on the science working group as an interdisciplinary scientist for NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope and has contributed to concept studies for solar system and exoplanet characterization missions. A member of the National Academy of Sciences, he has chaired or co-chaired numerous advisory and strategic planning committees for the Academy, NASA, and the National Science Foundation.

As part of his new role, Lunine has also been appointed professor of planetary science with the Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences at Caltech.

“Jonathan will bring a tremendous amount of experience in planetary science to the Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences and the broader Caltech community,” said John Grotzinger, chair of the Division of Geological and Planetary Sciences at Caltech. “He has worked on a remarkably diverse set of science questions spanning the solar system and extending to exoplanets. We are thrilled to have him join our faculty.” A division of Caltech in Pasadena, California, JPL began in 1936 and ultimately built and helped launch America’s first satellite, Explorer 1, in 1958. By the end of that year, Congress established NASA and JPL became a part of the agency. Since then, JPL has managed such historic missions as Voyager, Galileo, Cassini, the Mars Exploration Rover program, the Perseverance Mars rover, and many more.

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Astronomers using the JWST have discovered tiny stars may be better suited at birthing small, rocky planets with atmospheres dominated by carbon.

The Artemis II crew, NASA astronauts Victor Glover, Reid Wiseman, and Christina Koch, and Canadian Space Agency (CSA) astronaut Jeremy Hansen, pose for a photo after a Moon tree dedication ceremony, Tuesday, June 4, 2024, at the United States Capitol in Washington. The American Sweetgum tree planted on the southwestern side of the Capitol, was grown from a seed that was flown around the Moon during the Artemis I mission.

NASA/Aubrey Gemignani

NASA astronauts Victor Glover (left), Reid Wiseman (middle left), and Christina Koch (middle right), and Canadian Space Agency (CSA) astronaut Jeremy Hansen (right), pose for a photo after a Moon Tree dedication ceremony, Tuesday, June 4, 2024, at the United States Capitol in Washington. The American Sweetgum tree pictured was grown from a seed that was flown around the Moon during the Artemis I mission.

Moon Trees originated with the Apollo 14 mission, when NASA astronaut Stuart Roosa carried tree seeds into lunar orbit. In a nod to the legacy of Apollo 14, and a celebration of the future of space exploration with NASA’s Artemis Program, a “new generation” of Moon Tree seeds traveled into lunar orbit aboard the Orion spacecraft. The seeds travelled thousands of miles beyond the Moon, spending about 4 weeks in space before returning to Earth. Organizations from across the United States will receive the seedlings and plant them in their communities.

Image Credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani

SpaceX conducted the fourth flight test of its Starship megarocket on June 6, putting on quite the show for photographers gathered near its Starbase facility in Texas.

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Sols 4207-4208: A Taste of Rocky Road NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity acquired this image using its Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI), located on the turret at the end of the rover’s robotic arm, on June 4, 2024, Sol 4205 of the Mars Science Laboratory Mission, at 22:09:26 UTC. NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS

Earth planning date: Wednesday June 5, 2024

Curiosity was still at the ice cream shop for planning today, with the delicious feast of rock flavours still at arm’s reach and begging to be sampled. In the previous plan, one such flavour, captured in today’s blog image and perhaps most analogous to Rocky Road (not only given that Curiosity drove over this rock causing it to fracture, but also arguably the appearance as well), caught the eye of the operations team. There was desire to place APXS on this target, “Convict Lake,” in the previous plan but the team ultimately did not have the image data available that would permit Curiosity to safely do so at a suitably close distance for APXS. Not to be discouraged, Monday’s operations team pivoted and utilized part of the plan to acquire images of Convict Lake that would enable better APXS placement in today’s plan.

The required images for targeting Convict Lake (aka Rocky Road, just with a chocolate to marshmallow ratio that would leave chocolate lovers heartbroken) with APXS arrived just in time for planning today. These images made it possible to focus on the central task of today’s two-sol plan: place APXS close to Rocky Road and target two areas that are specifically more “marshmallow” and less on “chocolate” (sorry chocolate fans).

In addition to APXS on Convict Lake, ChemCam also targeted Convict Lake using its laser and imaging capabilities.  MAHLI returned for seconds (and thirds!), only this time pairing yet more daytime images with others taken at night while utilizing its illumination capabilities. ChemCam and Mastcam also imaged “Petes Col” and “Buckeye Ridge,” with Mastcam additionally imaging “Camp Four,” as well as “Ten Lakes” and “Walker Lake” a number of times over the course of the two-sol plan.

I for one am very excited about the particular offerings at his specific shop and what we may ultimately learn from our sampling. I, like APXS, may just have two scoops of ice cream tonight myself, perhaps even following in MAHLI’s footsteps by doing so after the sun has set when nobody else is watching (we’ve all done it, let’s be honest). Unfortunately, I do not have Rocky Road, and I think I missed my chance to have watermelon (don’t knock it until you try it!). 

Written by Scott VanBommel, Planetary Scientist at Washington University

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Boeing's Starliner capsule arrived at the ISS on its second try today (June 6), overcoming a problem with several of its reaction-control system thrusters.

SpaceX’s Starship earned high marks today in its fourth uncrewed flight test, making significant progress in the development of a launch system that’s tasked with putting NASA astronauts on the moon by as early as 2026.

The Super Heavy booster blasted off from SpaceX’s Starbase complex in South Texas at 7:50 a.m. CT (12:50 p.m. UTC), rising into the sky with 32 of its 33 methane-fueled Raptor engines blazing. Super Heavy is considered the world’s most powerful launch vehicle, with 16.7 million pounds of thrust at liftoff.

Minutes after launch, the rocket’s upper stage — known as the Ship — separated from the first stage, firing up its own set of six Raptor engines. Meanwhile, Super Heavy flew itself to a controlled splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico.

The soft splashdown marked a new achievement for Starship. During the third flight test, which took place in March, only a few of Super Heavy’s engines were able to light up again for a crucial landing burn. As a result, the booster hit the water with an uncontrolled splat.

Eventually, SpaceX plans to have the Super Heavy booster fly itself back to its base after doing its job.

The upper stage reached orbital-scale altitudes in excess of 200 kilometers (125 miles), but completing a full orbit wasn’t part of today’s plan. Instead, SpaceX aimed to have Ship make its own soft splashdown in the Indian Ocean.

Streaming video, relayed via SpaceX’s Starlink satellite network, showed the rocket’s protective skin glowing with the heat of atmospheric re-entry. Burning debris broke off from one of Ship’s control fins, damaging the camera’s lens — but the fuzzy view nevertheless confirmed that the spacecraft successfully hit the mark. That represented another advance over the third test, when the Ship broke up during its descent to the ocean.

“Despite loss of many tiles and a damaged flap, Starship made it all the way to a soft landing in the ocean!” SpaceX founder Elon Musk exulted in a posting to his X social-media platform.

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson added his congratulations on X, and noted that the successful test was a plus for the space agency’s Artemis moon program. “We are another step closer to returning humanity to the moon through Artemis — then looking onward to Mars,” he wrote.

A customized version of Ship is slated to serve as the lunar lander for Artemis 3, which would mark the first crewed mission to the moon’s surface since Apollo 17 in 1972. That mission is currently scheduled for 2026, but the timing depends in part on when the Starship system will be ready.

SpaceX’s uncrewed flight tests are following a step-by-step path to get Starship in shape for a wide variety of missions — including the deployment of hundreds of Starlink satellites, point-to-point travel between spaceports on Earth, and crewed odysseys to the moon, Mars and beyond.

Starship rockets aren’t carrying payloads for these early tests. “We said it before, we’re going to say it 9,000 times: The data is the payload,” SpaceX commentator Dan Huot said during today’s flight test.

But as the development program proceeds, the envelope for the flight tests will be widened to include multi-orbit operations, payload deployments and precision touchdowns on landing pads. Before today’s test, SpaceX and the Federal Aviation Administration worked out an arrangement that’s expected to streamline the regulatory process for future flights.

The post Success! SpaceX’s Starship Makes a Splash in Fourth Flight Test appeared first on Universe Today.

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Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)

Satellites continuously peer down from orbit to take measurements of Earth, and this week a group of scientists set sail to verify some of those data points.

On June 2, the SCOAPE (Satellite Coastal and Oceanic Atmospheric Pollution Experiment) research team, in partnership with the U.S. Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, took to the seas in the Gulf of Mexico for its second campaign to make surface-based measurements of air pollutants.

The NASA/GSFC SCOAPE team launches an ozonesonde weather balloon from the stern of the research vessel Point Sur during the May 2019 cruise. Ryan Stauffer (NASA/GSFC)

The primary pollutant scientists are measuring is nitrogen dioxide (NO2), the compound that reacts with sunlight to make ground-level ozone, said Anne Thompson, senior scientist emeritus for atmospheric chemistry at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, and senior researcher at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.

The Gulf of Mexico is highly concentrated with oil and natural gas drilling platforms, which are sources of NO2. By taking measurements of these emissions from the sea surface nearby, scientists can help validate measurements taken from a much different vantage point. The research vessel the scientists are using, Point Sur, is owned by the University of Southern Mississippi and operated by the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium.

The Petronius deepwater oil platform flaring during the May 2019 SCOAPE cruise. The helicopter in the foreground is used as a means of transporting personnel to and from the platform. Ryan Stauffer (NASA/GSFC)

“We’re the eyes on the surface to understand how well the eyes in the sky are working,” said Ryan Stauffer, research scientist for the atmospheric chemistry and dynamics laboratory at Goddard. Stauffer is also the principal investigator for the SCOAPE II project.

For the first iteration of the project in 2019, ship-based measurements were compared to data gathered by the Ozone Monitoring Instrument aboard NASA’s Aura satellite and the Tropospheric Monitoring Instrument aboard ESA’s (European Space Agency) Sentinel-5 Precursor satellite. Both instruments fly on polar orbiting satellites, which pass over every part of the globe once per day. They capture snapshots at the same time each day, but cannot capture the short-lived NO2 emissions that come and go at different times.

In 2024, the research team is working to validate the measurements taken by TEMPO (the Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of Pollution instrument), which was launched on a commercial satellite in April 2023. The TEMPO instrument provides a different perspective to the NO2 measurements due to its geostationary orbit — it focuses solely on North America and has a constant view of the Gulf of Mexico region. This allows scientists to better quantify emissions and make comparisons across all daylight hours.

From space, satellites collect measurements of the “total column” of air, which means they measure the concentrations of NO2 from the land or ocean surface all the way up to the top of the atmosphere. With SCOAPE, scientists are taking measurements from the ship, about 33 feet above sea level, to focus measurements on the air that people breathe.

The SCOAPE Pandora spectrometer instrument, which were used to gather the air quality near the operation sites, during sunset with a shallow water gas platform on the horizon.Ryan Stauffer (NASA/GSFC)

Learning more about how those surface measurements compare to what satellites see in the total column can help scientists figure out how to use satellite data most effectively. Measuring NO2 from space over the past two decades has helped scientists understand how the compound affects air quality, and has helped to inform policies to reduce emissions of the pollutant.

During SCOAPE’s 2019 campaign, researchers detected concentrations of methane – a significant greenhouse gas – near the Gulf Coast. This time around, the scientists are  looking to accurately measure these concentrations from the surface as well. They will mount the NASA Airborne Visible and InfraRed Imaging Spectrometer–3 imaging spectrometer instrument on a Dynamic Aviation B-200 plane to collect methane measurements above the Gulf, which will add an extra layer to understanding emissions of this potent greenhouse gas from Gulf of Mexico oil and gas operations.

It has historically been difficult to measure methane from space, but scientists are working to build those capabilities. As with NO2, taking surface measurements helps scientists better understand the measurements taken from space.

By Erica McNamee

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

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Details Last Updated Jun 06, 2024 EditorKate D. RamsayerContactErica McNameeerica.s.mcnamee@nasa.govLocationGoddard Space Flight Center Related Terms

• Earth
• Goddard Space Flight Center
• Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of Pollution (TEMPO)

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