[Domestic Church]

Post # 2402 didn't come through on my netscape browser but do you mean this is just Hollywood opportunism milking the space dust for all it's worth? How did they know the timing? This level of distractive entertainment can be a population control measure. For all we know population reduction might be the real issue...they can put the blame on space dust?

[milkncookies]

Space dust heading towards earth
18/08/2003 - 16:27:10

A cosmic dust storm is heading for the Earth, scientists said today.

Stardust from deep space is penetrating the Sun’s magnetic field, which normally acts as a barrier keeping most of it out.

Although the dust is unlikely to have a direct effect on Earth, it is expected to chip larger particles off asteroids, say the researchers.

This will increase the amount of dust swirling around the Solar System, which can damage the solar panels of spacecraft.

It may also raise the number of random meteors that can be seen from Earth streaking across the sky.

Some scientists believe stardust from interstellar clouds helps to seed life throughout the universe.

Laboratory experiments have shown that amino acids – the basic building blocks of life – can form naturally within the clouds.

Until 10 years ago, most astronomers did not believe stardust could enter the Solar System. Then the European Space Agency’s Ulysses probe discovered tiny stardust particles leaking through the Sun’s magnetic shield.

The agency said in a statement today: “Now, the same spaceprobe has shown that a flood of dusty particles is heading our way.

” A team led by Markus Landgraf, at the ESA’s European Space Operation Centre in Darmstadt, Germany, has found that two to three times more stardust is pouring into the Solar System than at the end of the 1990s.

One reason is thought to be a weak configuration of the Sun’s magnetic field. The greater dust influx may also be due to the Solar System entering a region of dense interstellar cloud.

“Currently located at the edge of what astronomers call the local interstellar cloud, our Sun is about to join our closest stellar neighbour Alpha Centauri in its cloud, which is less hot but denser,” said ESA.

It takes more than 70,000 years to traverse a typical interstellar cloud.

The dust grains are very fine, measuring just 100th of the width of a human hair.

Astronomers want to know how much of the dust in the Solar System is shed by comets and asteroids, and how much comes directly from interstellar space.

By taking measurements in regions too remote for cometary dust, the scientists were able to isolate particles of stardust entering the Solar System.

The dust had the same flight direction and speed as atoms of helium, which are known to come exclusively from interstellar space.