Keyword: jupiter
-
NASA has announced that its Europa Clipper space probe, set to explore Jupiter’s moon Europa, will carry with it a unique “message in a bottle,” blending science, art, and human aspiration into its groundbreaking expedition. The Europa Clipper mission, scheduled for launch later this year, hopes to unveil the secrets hidden beneath Europa’s icy shell. Europa, the smallest of the four Galilean moons orbiting Jupiter, is thought to possess a vast liquid ocean beneath its smooth frozen surface, potentially holding over twice the volume of water than Earth’s oceans. Since water is essential to all life on Earth, Europa is...
-
(Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SETI Institute) NASA's Juno spacecraft made a close flyby of Jupiter's intriguing moon Europa in 2022, revealing potential hints of present day surface activity. The spacecraft's Stellar Reference Unit (SRU), which is a star camera designed to assist Juno's onboard attitude determination, was used to image Europa's surface with high resolution while being lit up by Jupiter-shine, or sunlight scattered off Jupiter. The SRU image from the flyby is explored in an article published in the journal JGR Planets on Dec. 22, 2023. The image shows an oddly-shaped area of the icy surface, measuring 23 miles by 42...
-
Jupiter’s moon Io, its night side illuminated by reflected sunlight from Jupiter, or “Jupitershine.” Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS, Emma Wälimäki © CC BY NASA’s Juno spacecraft has conducted the closest flybys of Jupiter’s moon Io in over two decades, capturing detailed images with its JunoCam instrument. NASA’s Juno spacecraft just made the closest flybys of Jupiter’s moon Io that any spacecraft has carried out in more than 20 years. An instrument on this spacecraft called “JunoCam” returned spectacular, high-resolution images—and raw data are now available for you to process, enhance, and investigate. On December 30th, 2023, Juno came within about 930 miles...
-
There never has been an independent, self-governed national entity called "Palestine." In Biblical times, the region now encompassing Israel was known as Canaan, which included the kingdoms of Israel and Judah. The term "Palestine" originally referred to a small area occupied by the Philistines (as one theory has it), from whence comes the name "Palestine." In Roman times, the area was known as Judea and was ruled by Jewish kings, and, under the Roman Emperor Constantine, became a Christian province generally known in Europe simply as "The Holy Land." The name "Palestine" was not legally applied until the British occupation...
-
Explanation: What does the largest moon in the Solar System look like? Jupiter's moon Ganymede, larger than even Mercury and Pluto, has an icy surface speckled with bright young craters overlying a mixture of older, darker, more cratered terrain laced with grooves and ridges. The cause of the grooved terrain remains a topic of research, with a leading hypothesis relating it to shifting ice plates. Ganymede is thought to have an ocean layer that contains more water than Earth -- and might contain life. Like Earth's Moon, Ganymede keeps the same face towards its central planet, in this case Jupiter....
-
NIRCam (the Near Infrared Camera) on NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope captured this picture of the surface of Jupiter’s moon Europa. Webb identified carbon dioxide on the icy surface of Europa that likely originated in the moon’s subsurface ocean. Photo courtesy of NASA Sept. 22 (UPI) -- Data from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope shows carbon dioxide on a region of Jupiter's moon Europa, suggesting it potentially could harbor conditions suitable for life. Astronomers found carbon dioxide on the icy surface of a region called Tara Regio, and analysis from two studies suggests it likely originated in the moon's subsurface...
-
NASA has tested the functions of Lucy, the agency’s first spacecraft to study Jupiter’s Trojan asteroids, filled it with fuel, and is preparing to pack it into a capsule for launch Saturday, October 16, 2021. Named after characters in Greek mythology, these asteroids circle the Sun in two swarms, with one group leading ahead of Jupiter in its path, the other trailing behind it. Lucy will be the first spacecraft to visit these asteroids. By studying these asteroids up close, scientists hope to hone their theories on how our solar system’s planets formed 4.5 billion years ago and why they...
-
Sorry, Jupiter. Astronomers have discovered 62 new moons orbiting the ringed planet Saturn. The satellite haul brings the planet's total number of moons to over 100 and also means the gas giant takes back the crown as the solar system's "moon king" from Jupiter. Prior to this discovery, Saturn had 83 moons recognized by the International Astronomical Union(opens in new tab), so the new batch brings the total number to an incredible 145. The discovery marks another milestone for Saturn, with the planet becoming the first world in the cosmos known to be orbited by more than 100 moons. The...
-
Archaeologists with the University of Tübingen, in cooperation with the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, uncovered ancient Egyptian murals depicting the zodiac signs beneath 2,000 years of grime and soot in the Temple of Esna. The archaeologists have been working to restore the temple, which lies on the West Bank of the Nile, near the city of Luxor, which was once known as Thebes. “The zodiac was used to decorate private tombs and sarcophagi and was of great importance in astrological texts, such as horoscopes found inscribed on pottery sherds,” Dr. Daniel von Recklinghausen, a Tübingen researcher, said in...
-
The weather is slowly changing on Jupiter and Uranus, according to our galaxy’s own interplanetary meteorologist. The NASA Hubble Space Telescope captured Earth’s outer planetary neighbors in images from 2014 to 2022, documenting changes in the planets’ weather and seasons over time With Jupiter at about 484 million miles (779 million kilometers) away from our sun and Uranus about 1.8 billion miles (3 billion kilometers) away, each takes longer to orbit the sun, which means a slower pace of seasons. But the gas giants still experience extreme weather. That’s especially true for Uranus, with its peculiar, tilted axis that causes...
-
Have you seen the “planetary parade” after sunset? It’s getting a lot of media attention, partly because Jupiter is about to sink into the Sun’s glare and ruin it, but you can glimpse some to all of the five planets naked-eye and with binoculars on any night this week. Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Uranus and Mars are all visible right after sunset. Get somewhere high with a clear view of the western horizon to watch the sunset. After sunset have a look for Jupiter and Mercury very close to the horizon. You may need binoculars. Above them will be a very...
-
Egypt's first complete Zodiac was uncovered on the ceiling of the Temple of Esna in Luxor governorate during restoration work carried out by an Egyptian-German expedition...After five years of cleaning and restoration work, the joint Egyptian-German mission uncovered a bright and colourful astronomical representation of the ancient Egyptian night sky.The relief contains all the twelve Zodiac signs, the outer planets of Jupiter, Saturn and Mars, as well as depictions of the so-called seven arrows and constellations used by the ancient Egyptians in time measurement....these findings were not recorded by the temple's previous publication by late French Egyptologist Serge Sauneron, who...
-
Indian scientists recently found a scientific method of predicting earthquakes quite accurately. The great quake of Sumatra along Andaman fault line on December 26th, could have been predicted if the world would have taken these scientists seriously. If this theory is true, we are in for many mega earthquakes soon. When two or more planets, moon and earth and sun come in one line, these mega earthquakes happen. The sun influences the rotation of earth. Now imagine you are in a train or bus. If all on a sudden the driver pushes the brake, you tend to move forward...
-
During the past couple of weeks, skywatchers around the world have been observing the western evening sky soon after sundown, as four naked-eye planets -- Venus, Mars, Saturn and Jupiter - have stretched out in a long line. The line has slowly contracted each night, as the four planets draw closer to each other.Even the Moon got involved, closely passing each of the four planets over a span of five nights in mid-April. Now through the first days of May will likely be the best time to see yet a fifth planet: Mercury. Mercury has actually been visible for the...
-
A grand celestial reunion is due in Earth’s skies throughout June. Sky-watchers will get a rare chance to see all the major planets in our solar system bunched together—with the moon joining the festivities, too, from June 17 to June 27. This rare alignment includes the five planets easily spotted with the naked eye: Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, and Saturn. Each is bright enough to be seen even in light-polluted city skies, with brilliant Venus being the brightest and Mercury the faintest. Our closest planets will appear to be arranged across the sky in the same order as their distance...
-
This Sunday, April 17th, Jupiter will move into position closest to the eastern horizon, and almost on top of Venus. A bit south and above will be Mars looking very red, and then Saturn further up and further south. For most people in North America, the ideal time will be to go out and look southeast about 45 minutes before the sun begins to rise. On April 23rd, the Moon will appear in conjunction with the other spheres, appearing to the right and above Saturn, before moving off again by April 29th. In mid-June, due to its rapid orbiting around...
-
Explanation: It is not a coincidence that planets line up. That's because all of the planets orbit the Sun in (nearly) a single sheet called the plane of the ecliptic. When viewed from inside that plane -- as Earth dwellers are likely to do -- the planets all appear confined to a single band. It is a coincidence, though, when three of the brightest planets all appear in nearly the same direction. Such a coincidence was captured earlier this month. Featured above (right to left), Venus, Saturn, and Jupiter were all imaged together in a line just after sunset, from...
-
A rare event in the heavens just ahead of Christmas will feature an alignment of planets that a famous astronomer believed was the phenomenon that is mentioned in the Bible when Jesus Christ was born. The alignment of Jupiter and Saturn will appear in the skies on December 21, the winter solstice. The last time the rare alignment of the planets was this close was in 1623, nearly 400 years ago. That was only 14 years after Galileo discovered the moons of Jupiter with the invention of the telescope. Another famous astronomer, Johannes Kepler, posited in 1614 that the alignment...
-
Jupiter, Mercury, Venus, Uranus and Mars are expected to align March 28.. A spectacular celestial sight is on the horizon and you won't want to miss it. Planets Jupiter, Mercury, Venus, Uranus and Mars are expected to align in the night sky on March 28. Planetary alignments occur when the orbit of several planets coincide with each other and they appear to be lined up in the sky. Alignments typically only include two or three planets and are fairly brief, making a 5-planet alignment fairly noteworthy. This rare planetary parade will first become visible in the western sky just after...
-
Whether it was the Big Bang, Midas or God himself, we don’t really need to unlock the mystery of the origins of gold when we’ve already identified an asteroid worth $700 quintillion in precious heavy metals. If anything launches this metals mining space race, it will be this asteroid--Psyche 16, taking up residence between Mars and Jupiter and carrying around enough heavy metals to net every single person on the planet close to a trillion dollars. The massive quantities of gold, iron and nickel contained in this asteroid are mind-blowing. The discovery has been made. Now, it’s a question of...
|
|
|