Artemis Astronauts Will Deploy New Seismometers on the Moon

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Back in the 1960s and 1970s, Apollo astronauts set up a collection of lunar seismometers to detect possible Moon quakes. These instruments monitored lunar activity for eight years and gave planetary scientists an indirect glimpse into the Moon’s interior. Now, researchers are developing new methods for lunar quake detection techniques and technologies. If all goes …

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Ice Deposits on Ceres Might Only Be a Few Thousand Years Old

Astronomy, Ceres, craters, Dawn mission, digital elevation models, dwarf planet ceres, ice deposits, permanently shadowed crater, Solar System, water, water ice / By

The dwarf planet Ceres has some permanently dark craters that hold ice. Astronomers thought the ice was ancient when they were discovered, like in the moon’s permanently shadowed regions. But something was puzzling. Why did some of these shadowed craters hold ice while others did not? Ceres was first discovered in 1801 and was considered …

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The Mystery of Cosmic Rays Deepens

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Cosmic rays are high-energy particles accelerated to extreme velocities approaching the speed of light. It takes an extremely powerful event to send these bits of matter blazing through the Universe. Astronomers theorize that cosmic rays are ejected by supernova explosions that mark the death of supergiant stars. But recent data collected by the Fermi Gamma-ray …

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NASA Confirms that a Piece of its Battery Pack Smashed into a Florida Home

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NASA is in the business of launching things into orbit. But what goes up must come down, and if whatever is coming down doesn’t burn up in the atmosphere, it will strike Earth somewhere. Even Florida isn’t safe. Careful consideration goes into releasing debris from the International Space Station. Its mass is measured and calculated …

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Live coverage: SpaceX to launch 23 Starlink satellites on Falcon 9 flight from Cape Canaveral

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A Falcon 9 stands ready for a Starlink mission at Cape Canaveral’s pad 40. File photo: Adam Bernstein/Spaceflight Now. SpaceX is preparing for one more Falcon 9 launch to close out the week at the Cape. The Starlink 6-52 mission will add 23 more satellites to the growing low Earth orbit constellation. Liftoff from Space …

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Are Titan's Dunes Made of Comet Dust?

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A new theory suggests that Titan’s majestic dune fields may be have come from outer space. Researchers had always assumed that the sand making up Titan’s dunes was locally made, through erosion or condensed from atmospheric hydrocarbons. But researchers from the University of Colorado want to know: Could it have come from comets? The dunes …

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The Solar Wind is Stripping Oxygen and Carbon Away From Venus

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The BepiColombo mission, a joint effort between JAXA and the ESA, was only the second (and most advanced) mission to visit Mercury, the least explored planet in the Solar System. With two probes and an advanced suite of scientific instruments, the mission addressed several unresolved questions about Mercury, including the origin of its magnetic field, …

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The Solar Eclipse Like We’ve Never Seen it Before

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You had to be in the right part of North America to get a great view of the recent solar eclipse. But a particular telescope may have had the most unique view of all. Even though that telescope is in Hawaii and only experienced a partial eclipse, its images are interesting. You had to be …

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The Milky Way’s Most Massive Stellar Black Hole is Only 2,000 Light Years Away

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Astronomers have found the largest stellar mass black hole in the Milky Way so far. At 33 solar masses, it dwarfs the previous record-holder, Cygnus X-1, which has only 21 solar masses. Most stellar mass black holes have about 10 solar masses, making the new one—Gaia BH3—a true giant. Supermassive black holes (SMBH) like Sagittarius …

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Live coverage: SpaceX to launch Falcon 9 rocket on Starlink mission from Kennedy Space Center

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A Falcon 9 rocket stands in launch position at Launch Complex 39A ahead of the Starlink 6-51 mission on April 17, 2024. Image: Spaceflight Now SpaceX is preparing for its latest Falcon 9 launch from pad 39A NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. The Starlink 6-51 mission comes about a week-and-a-half after the launch of its first …

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