Lifeboat Foundation

Research utilizing the James Webb Space Telescope highlights the destructive power of ultraviolet “winds” on the gas in protoplanetary disks surrounding young stars, shedding light on the intricate dynamics that limit the formation of gas giants in the cosmos.

Ultraviolet “winds” from nearby massive stars are stripping the gas from a young star’s protoplanetary disk, causing it to rapidly lose mass, according to a new study. It reports the first directly observed evidence of far-ultraviolet (FUV)-driven photoevaporation of a protoplanetary disk. The findings, which use observations from the James Web Space Telescope (JWST), provide new insights into the constraints of gas giant planet formation, including in our own Solar System.

Insights into gas giant planet formation.

Now, astronauts who witness solar eclipses do so from the International Space Station (ISS). But instead of looking at the sun, they look down at the Earth to observe a solar eclipse. “ISS astronauts can see the [moon’s] shadow but not the eclipse itself, because their windows don’t point toward the sun,” says Levasseur. Rather, remotely operated equipment on the station collects data from the eclipse, while astronauts peer at the darkened ground on the planet below.

The first time anyone got this unique view was in 1999, when Russian cosmonauts Viktor Afanasyev and Sergei Avdeyev, as well as French astronaut Jean-Pierre Haigneré, witnessed the 20th century’s final total solar eclipse from the former Russian space station, Mir. On August 11, they saw the moon’s shadow pass over England.

What can Titan’s methane-rich atmosphere teach us about finding life beyond Earth? This is what a recent study published in Planetary and Space Science hopes to address as a team of international researchers investigated the photochemistry of Saturn’s largest moon, which is also the only moon in the solar system with a dense atmosphere, to ascertain if the moon’s methane-rich atmosphere can support life. This study holds the potential to help researchers better understand the conditions necessary for life to emerge, along with where to search for it beyond Earth.

“Titan’s atmosphere works like a planetary-sized chemical reactor, producing many complex carbon-based molecules,” said Rafael Rianço-Silva, who is a master’s degree student at the University of Lisbon and lead author of the study. “Of all the atmospheres we know in the Solar System, the atmosphere of Titan is the most similar to the one we think existed on the early Earth.”

For the study, the team used the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope Ultraviolet and Visual Echelle Spectrograph (VLT-UVES) to conduct high resolution analyses of Titan’s hazy and methane-rich atmosphere. Using this data, the team identified possible traces of the tricarbon molecule (C3), which is known for being a building block for the development of complex molecules and has been previously identified in cometary comas and interstellar clouds, the latter of which was found using VLT-UVES. If confirmed, Titan will be the first planetary body to possess tricarbon either in its atmosphere or on its surface.

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The view was “awe-inspiring and a little scary,” Shang Yang told Newsweek, noting “it was definitely not part of normal aurora activity.”

At SXSW Jeff Cardenas, CEO of Austin-based Apptronik along with Shaun Azimi, of NASA’s discussed the possibilities of humanoid robots in space.

Jupiter is iconic, with its swirls of water and ammonia vapor that characterize its outer surface and its distinctive Giant Red Spot, a gigantic storm raging across its face.

But its mysteries abound — such as Jupiter’s strange and asymmetrical magnetic field, which has a strong area of magnetism in its equator called the “Great Blue Spot” — blue because that’s how it’s color-coded in maps tracing the magnetic field.

In an effort to understand the planet’s magnetic field better, a team of American scientists from Harvard University, the California Institute of Technology, NASA and the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio, Texas studied an atmospheric jet — a high speed current in the gas giant’s atmosphere — in the Great Blue Spot. Their finding? It’s a dynamic system that fluctuates every four years or so.

Researcher Norman Wagner speaks to Interesting Engineering about the complex chemistry of extraterrestrial cement.

This is a sci-fi documentary, looking at what it takes to build an underground city on Mars. The choice to go underground is for protection, from the growing storm radiation that rains down on the surface every day. And to further advance the Mars colonization efforts.

Where will the materials to build the city come from? How will the crater be covered to protect the inhabitants? And what will it feel like to live in this city, that is in a hole in the ground?

Continue reading “The Dream of Building an Underground City on Mars (Sci-Fi Documentary)” »

When a star like our Sun reaches the end of its life, it can ingest the surrounding planets and asteroids that were born with it. Now, using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (ESO’s VLT) in Chile, researchers have found a unique signature of this process for the first time — a scar imprinted on the surface of a white dwarf star. The results are published today in The Astrophysical Journal Letters.

“It is well known that some white dwarfs — slowly cooling embers of stars like our Sun — are cannibalising pieces of their planetary systems. Now we have discovered that the star’s magnetic field plays a key role in this process, resulting in a scar on the white dwarf’s surface,” says Stefano Bagnulo, an astronomer at Armagh Observatory and Planetarium in Northern Ireland, UK, and lead author of the study.

The scar the team observed is a concentration of metals imprinted on the surface of the white dwarf WD 0816–310, the Earth-sized remnant of a star similar to, but somewhat larger than, our Sun.