'Closest black hole system' to Earth actually contains NO black holes, astronomers discover

• Two scenarios were proposed for the discovery of the unusual HR 6819 system

• One suggested a black hole, the other a 'vampire' star feasting on a partner star

• The idea of a black hole just 1,000 light years away was more widely reported

• However, a new study found the vampire star theory is the most likely to be real 

By RYAN MORRISON FOR DAILYMAIL.COM 

The closest black hole system to the Earth, found about 1,000 light years away, doesn't actually contain a black hole, according to a new study.

When it was discovered in 2020, two scenarios were proposed for the discovery of the unusual HR 6819 system, one with, and one without a black hole.

The idea of a black hole just 1,000 light years away, within our stellar neighbourhood, hit the headlines at the time of the discovery and was presented as the main finding - with the other scenario not being widely reported.

However, a new study, by researchers from KU Leuven in Belgium, took new measurements of the system, to see which scenario was most likely to be true.

They pointed the European Southern Observatory Very Large Telescope (ESO, VLT), and the VLT Interferometer at the star system, as this instrument can provide decisive data required to distinguish between the two explanations.

All the evidence pointed to a 'vampire' star system, finding two stars in a very close orbit, with one ripping material from the other. 

There was no evidence of a distant orbiting star, as would be required by the black hole theory. 

The closest black hole system to the Earth, found about 1,000 light years away, doesn't actually contain a black hole, according to a new study

Thomas Rivinius, a Chile-based ESO astronomer and lead author on the original black hole paper, was not surprised by the astronomy community's reception. 

'Not only is it normal, but it should be that results are scrutinised,' he said, adding that it was 'even more so' important for results that 'make the headlines'.

Rivinius and his colleagues were convinced that the best explanation for the data they had was that HR 6819 was a triple system, with one star orbiting a black hole every 40 days and a second star in a much wider orbit. 

But a study led by Julia Bodensteiner, then a PhD student at KU Leuven, Belgium, proposed a different explanation for the same data.

She suggested that HR 6819 could also be a system with only two stars.

Each of the stars would be found in a very close 40-day orbit, with no black hole at all. 

This alternative scenario would require one of the stars to be 'stripped', meaning that, at an earlier time, it had lost a large fraction of its mass to the other star.

'We had reached the limit of the existing data, so we had to turn to a different observational strategy to decide between the two scenarios proposed by the two teams,' says KU Leuven researcher Abigail Frost, who led the new study 

The researchers turned to the Very Large Telescope, and in particular the Interferometer on the VLT, known as the VLTAI, to gather detailed observations. 

'The VLTI was the only facility that would give us the decisive data we needed to distinguish between the two explanations,' says Dietrich Baade, author on both the original HR 6819 study and the new paper. 

Working together, the new team worked with Baade and colleagues, so they only needed to request time on the VLT once. 

'The scenarios we were looking for were rather clear, very different and easily distinguishable with the right instrument,' says Rivinius.

Wide field view of the area where this system is present. The idea of a black hole just 1,000 light years away, within our stellar neighbourhood, hit the headlines at the time of the discovery and was presented as the main finding

'We agreed that there were two sources of light in the system, so the question was whether they orbit each other closely, as in the stripped-star scenario, or are far apart from each other, as in the black hole scenario.'

They used the GRAVITY and MUSE instruments on the VLT to study the star system, and pin down the distance each star is from its partners, finding no evidence of a bright companion star in a wide orbit - as the black hole model predicted.

They also found two bright objects in a close orbit, as suggested by the 'vampire' star model. 

'MUSE confirmed that there was no bright companion in a wider orbit, while GRAVITY's high spatial resolution was able to resolve two bright sources separated by only one-third of the distance between the Earth and the Sun,' said Frost. 

'These data proved to be the final piece of the puzzle, and allowed us to conclude that HR 6819 is a binary system with no black hole.'

Bodensteiner said the best interpretation is that they caught this binary system in a moment shortly after one of the stars sucked the atmosphere off its companion.

'This is a common phenomenon in close binary systems, sometimes referred to as "stellar vampirism" in the press,' he explained. 

'While the donor star was stripped of some of its material, the recipient star began to spin more rapidly.' 

Catching this sort of 'post-interaction phase' of a binary star system is difficult, as this point in the life of the two stars is very short. 

'This makes our findings for HR 6819 very exciting, as it presents a perfect candidate to study how this vampirism affects the evolution of massive stars, and in turn the formation of their associated phenomena including gravitational waves and violent supernova explosions,' said Frost.

This chart shows the location of HR 6819 in the constellation of Telescopium. This map shows most of the stars visible to the unaided eye under good conditions and the system itself is marked with a red circle

The newly formed Leuven-ESO joint team now plans to monitor HR 6819 more closely using the VLTI's GRAVITY instrument.

The researchers will conduct a joint study of the system over time, to better understand its evolution, constrain its properties, and use that knowledge to learn more about other binary systems.

They're also optimistic that they could find a black hole in our stellar neighbourhood at some point in the future. 

'Stellar-mass black holes remain very elusive owing to their nature,' says Rivinius. 'But order-of-magnitude estimates suggest there are tens to hundreds of millions of black holes in the Milky Way alone,' Baade adds. 

The findings have been published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

THE VERY LARGE TELESCOPE IS A POWERFUL GROUND-BASED INSTRUMENT IN CHILE

The European Southern Observatory (ESO) built the most powerful telescope ever made in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile.

It is called the Very Large Telescope (VLT) and is widely regarded as one of the most advanced optical instruments ever made.

It consists of four telescopes, whose main mirrors measures 27 feet (8.2 metres) in diameter.

There are also four movable six feet (1.8 metre) diameter auxiliary telescopes.

The large telescopes are called Antu, Kueyen, Melipal and Yepun. 

The European Southern observatory (ESO) built the most powerful telescope ever made in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile and called it the Very Large Telescope (VLT).

The first of the Unit Telescopes, 'Antu', went into routine scientific operations on April 1, 1999.

The telescopes can work together to form a giant 'interferometer'.

This interferometer allows images to be filtered for any unnecessary obscuring objects and, as a result, astronomers can see details up to 25 times finer than with the individual telescopes.  

It has been involved in spotting the first image of an extrasolar planet as well as tracking individual stars moving around the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way.

It also observed the afterglow of the furthest known Gamma Ray Burst.

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

04-03-2022 om 18:41 geschreven door peter  

The system in question is called HR 6819. The 2019 paper announced a three-star system with a non-accreting black hole and two stellar companions. Researchers were looking for double-star systems when they found HR 6819. The closest star’s orbit was affected by the hole’s presence, they thought at the time. They learned the black hole’s mass by figuring out the closest star’s orbit. “An invisible object with a mass at least four times that of the Sun can only be a black hole,” concluded lead author Rivinius at the time.

The 2020 study was based on spectroscopy of the system with different instruments in different studies over a few years. Data from the ESA’s Gaia mission also played a role. The lack of x-rays from the black hole was an issue, but the 2019 study said the lack of x-rays was expected based on the system’s architecture.

“HR 6819 is a hierarchical triple star with a non-accreting BH in the inner binary,” the authors said in the conclusion of their 2019 paper. But something else they wrote foreshadows the new study showing that there is no black hole: “The detection was facilitated by the incompatibility of the spectral sequences with a simple binary.” It turns out they were correct when they said the spectral sequences were incompatible with a simple binary, but their conclusion was incorrect.

HR 6819’s spectral absorption lines are at the heart of the matter. HR 6819’s spectrum contained many different absorption lines: bright and dark, broad and narrow, moving and static.

The broad lines come from a Be star, a type of star behaving quite strangely. They’re giant blue stars that are hotter and more massive than the Sun. “Be stars actually rotate so rapidly that they almost fall apart,” Rivinius explained. “They are no longer spherical but somewhat flattened, and around their equator, they form a gaseous disc ejected from the star itself.” This hot gas around the star creates bright emission lines, clearly visible in the spectrum of HR 6819.

But there was a second set of spectral lines that were much narrower and more indicative of a different type of star called a B star. B stars are also massive blue stars, but they don’t spin as rapidly as Be stars. There was something odd about the lines from this B star: they moved back and forth every 40 days.

And this is where the black hole conclusion enters the story. For those lines to move back and forth like this, the B star had to be orbiting something. The unusual spectral sequences they observed in HR 6819 were incompatible with a simple binary. They couldn’t see a third star in the system, so the team concluded that there was a black hole at least four times more massive than the Sun was in the system.

There’s a third study involved in this narrative. Julia Bodensteiner, then a Ph.D. student at KU Leuven, Belgium, led that study published in 2020. In that study, the authors wrote that “We re-investigate the properties of HR 6819 to search for a possibly simpler alternative explanation for HR 6819, which does not invoke the presence of a triple system with a BH in the inner binary.”

“Our analysis suggests that HR 6819 is a binary system containing a stripped star and a Be star…” they wrote in their conclusion. “This work shows that the HR 6819 system can be explained without invoking the presence of a stellar-mass BH.” Other follow-up studies on HR 6819 also questioned the existence of the black hole.

When the studies doubting the existence of a black hole came out, it made Rivinius a little nervous. Could he and his team have gotten it wrong? “There were several papers,” remembers Rivinius, “and for some of them, I thought they proposed very viable hypotheses. When I realized that the no-black-hole scenario was indeed a viable hypothesis, at least as likely as ours, I started to sweat a little.”

Bodensteiner’s study had the same spectral lines as Rivinius’s, but they reached different conclusions. “Basically, the difference in our analysis is which of the spectral lines we used to study the motion of the Be star,” explained Bodensteiner. “Depending on which lines you use, you either get a significant result showing the Be star is moving back and forth or not.”

That’s where things stood until this new study was published. “We had reached the limit of the existing data, so we had to turn to a different observational strategy to decide between the two scenarios proposed by the two teams,” says KU Leuven researcher Abigail Frost, who led the new study published today in Astronomy & Astrophysics.

Researchers needed new data to solve the mystery, and they knew what facility could gather it. They knew there were two light sources in the system; the question was how closely they orbit each other. The two teams worked together to obtain new, sharper data of HR 6819 using ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) and Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI). “The VLTI was the only facility that would give us the decisive data we needed to distinguish between the two explanations,” says Dietrich Baade, author on both the original HR 6819 study and the new Astronomy & Astrophysics paper. Since it made no sense to ask for the same observation twice, the two teams joined forces, which allowed them to pool their resources and knowledge to find the true nature of this system.

“The scenarios we were looking for were rather clear, very different and easily distinguishable with the right instrument,” says Rivinius. “We agreed that there were two sources of light in the system, so the question was whether they orbit each other closely, as in the stripped-star scenario, or are far apart from each other, as in the black hole scenario.”

“MUSE confirmed that there was no bright companion in a wider orbit, while GRAVITY’s high spatial resolution was able to resolve two bright sources separated by only one-third of the distance between the Earth and the Sun,” says Frost. “These data proved to be the final piece of the puzzle and allowed us to conclude that HR 6819 is a binary system with no black hole.”

While discovering a black hole only 1,000 light-years away is now no longer a thing, HR 6819 is still an exciting place. It’s a case of stellar vampirism, where a giant star is stripping away the atmosphere of a smaller star. That arrangement isn’t rare in binary systems, but it’s still interesting.

The researchers were fortunate to observe the system right after the vampire star had sucked away the donor star’s atmosphere.

“Our best interpretation so far is that we caught this binary system in a moment shortly after one of the stars had sucked the atmosphere off its companion star. This is a common phenomenon in close binary systems, sometimes referred to as “stellar vampirism” in the press,” explains Bodensteiner, now a fellow at ESO in Germany and an author on the new study. “While the donor star was stripped of some of its material, the recipient star began to spin more rapidly.”

“Catching such a post-interaction phase is extremely difficult as it is so short,” adds Frost. “This makes our findings for HR 6819 very exciting, as it presents a perfect candidate to study how this vampirism affects the evolution of massive stars, and in turn the formation of their associated phenomena including gravitational waves and violent supernova explosions.”

“Therefore, we conclude that HR 6819 is a binary system and reject the presence of a BH on a short-period orbit in this system. HR 6819, therefore, constitutes a perfect source for investigating the origin of Be stars and their possible formation through a binary channel,” the authors of the new study write.

It would’ve been a great scientific opportunity if there had been a quiet black hole in the system. While that opportunity is gone, an equally compelling opportunity is replacing it.

“Personally, I would have wanted my interpretation to be correct,” said Rivinius. “But I have to admit that this interpretation is the far more interesting option.”

According to Frost, the lead author of the new paper, “It was really a win-win situation: either way, we find something pretty cool. On the one hand, we confirm the existence of the nearest stellar-mass black hole to Earth. Or on the other hand, we find this really exciting and difficult to capture evolutionary stage of a massive binary stellar system.”

The pair of research teams have combined into one joint Leuwen/ESO team. They intend to study HR 6819 over time to understand how these systems evolve, their characteristics, and how binary systems work in general.

“In future work, further monitoring of the system with GRAVITY will be crucial,” the authors write. GRAVITY is an interferometric instrument at the ESO’s VLT. It’s a powerful instrument that lets astronomers observe tiny details in faint objects. The research team says that GRAVITY will help them better constrain HR 6189’s orbit, distances, and masses.

“Together with higher-resolution spectroscopy, abundances of both stars could be derived,” they conclude. “With this information, HR 6819 would constitute a cornerstone object for comparing binary evolution models.”

More:

• Press Release: “Closest black hole” system found to contain no black hole
• Research Paper: HR 6819 is a binary system with no black hole
• Original 2019 paper: A naked-eye triple system with a nonaccreting black hole in the inner binary

The post It Turns out, the “Closest Black Hole” System Doesn’t Contain a Black Hole At All appeared first on Universe Today.

Source: 

• https://www.universetoday.com/154805/it-turns-out-the-closest-black-hole-system-doesnt-contain-a-black-hole-at-all/

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

04-03-2022 om 18:10 geschreven door peter  

{ https://beforeitsnews.com/ }

04-03-2022 om 17:57 geschreven door peter  

• https://www.universetoday.com/154807/thanks-to-observations-a-potentially-dangerous-asteroid-was-found-to-be-harmless/

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

04-03-2022 om 17:51 geschreven door peter  

An Interview With UK Artist Imbue About His UFO Sighting, March 2022, UFO Sighting News.

Date of interview: March 3, 2022

Location of interview:

•  @Imbue instagram 

Imbues official website: 

• https://imbuesource.com

A few years back I was reading a Forbes article about the artist Imbue. He creates ingenious art using modern technology like 3D printers, PC board and even price tags. He always adds a humorous and eye opening take on life in his art. In the article they had his Instagram link, so I followed him. This week he posted a short video of two ancient alien sculptures he created, and thats where our conversation began. 

 

I said, "Wow! Ancient Aliens, love it! Hey Imbue, have you ever had a UFO sighting before? If so...can you tell me about it please? 

 

Imbue responded two days later, "when I was younger I distinctly remember seeing a group of stationary lights in the sky. They moved slowly at first and then sped off, it was weird!"

 

I said, "Wow so awesome! Hey what city was the sighting over? Did anyone else see it too?" 

 

Later Imbue answered, "it was in Surrey, UK where I grew up. No one was with me at the time, but I later learned there were official reports on multiple sightings in Surrey released by the Ministry of Defense from around the same time!"

 

I said, "Hey two final questions. Did the experience of that sighting change your outlook on life at all? How did this sighting impact on your artistic works over the years? Thanks so much for responding. It very kind of you." 

 

Imbue responded, "the experience definitely got me thinking and it put things into perspective, Earth is a tiny dot in an infinite universe! I've made a few artworks about space, its definitely an inspiring subject."

 

I answered, " Hey thank you so much for taking the time to answer. The readers of UFO Sightings Daily will be delighted."

 

I was just blown away. He was very kind to take the time to give his expense and perspective on alien life. The artist Imbue admitted to not only seeing a fleet of UFOs when he was younger, but also to seeing the world differently afterwards and thus created some art about space, like his statues fittingly called Ancient Aliens. My hopes are that Imbues words will inspire others out there that have had sightings, but held the information back out of fear of ridicule. The truth will set you free, and it will inspire others to do the same. 

 

Full conversation on the chat below his IG post. 

Scott C. Waring - Taiwan 

{ https://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/ }

04-03-2022 om 17:32 geschreven door peter  

According to Michael Salla of Ecopolitics, news reports have confirmed that the Russian army has captured the Ukrainian port city and region (oblast) of Kherson, where an ancient space ark is claimed to be buried. 

Two independent sources, the space ark is buried under Oleshky Sands National Nature Park, which is only 25 km (15 miles) east of Kherson. The space ark is said to be activating and predicted to eventually begin flying into the air. 

One source told Ecopolitics: "Don’t be surprised if it starts activation and probably gets to be one of the first ships to go up in the air. Everybody sees. Now that the nations in the world [attention] is … on Ukraine, this is probably going to be one the first one that’s going to go up, and everybody is going to see it. Everything is going to come to a halt. Everybody is going to be shocked because of this".

{ http://ufosightingshotspot.blogspot.com/ }

04-03-2022 om 17:06 geschreven door peter  

Lawyer Exposes Classified UFO Information

Lawyer Peter Gersen talks about classified documents about UFO’s and Clifford Stone tells the story of witnessing a real-life alien attack.

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ https://www.latest-ufo-sightings.net/ }

04-03-2022 om 16:55 geschreven door peter  

LATEST UFO SIGHTINGS AND VIDEOS

UFO Over Calhoun Georgia (A UFO SIGHTING)

Unidentified Craft spotted by two friends who were surprised by what they were witnessing.

Video Source YouTube Channel Jake Ramirez a :

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q3xWc...

{ https://www.youtube.com/ }

04-03-2022 om 16:31 geschreven door peter  

Mysterious Aircraft Spotted At Area 51 In Unprecedented Satellite Image

A delta-shaped tailless fighter-sized aircraft that looks like nothing we've seen before calls the secretive base home.

{ https://www.patriotfreepress.com/ 

- https://www.thedrive.com/ }

04-03-2022 om 01:43 geschreven door peter  

Ancient Reptilians: The Unanswered Mystery of the 7,000-Year-Old Ubaid Lizardmen

It is a commonly accepted view in mainstream archaeology that civilization started in ancient Mesopotamia with the great  civilization of Sumer  in what is now modern-day Iraq. However, at the beginning of the 20th century, archaeologists excavating at Tell Al’Ubaid in Iraq made an unusual discovery when they unearthed several 7,000-year-old artifacts which appear to represent humanoid figures with reptilian features.

Examples of the Ubaid lizardmen discovered in Iraq.

(Mary Harrsch / CC BY 2.0 )

Understanding Ubaidian Culture

The Ubaidian culture is a prehistoric culture in Mesopotamia that dates between 4000 and 5500 BC. As with the Sumerians, the origins of the Ubaidian people is unknown. They lived in large village settlements in mud-brick houses and they had developed architecture, agriculture and farmed the land using irrigation.

• Eridu: The Sumerian Garden of Eden and the Oldest City in the World?
• Ancient Mesopotamia and the Rise of Civilization

The domestic architecture of the Ubaidians included large T-shaped houses, open courtyards, paved streets, as well as food processing equipment. According to the Metropolitan Museum of Art , some of these villages began to develop into towns, temples began to appear, as well as monumental buildings such as in Eridu, Ur and Uruk, the major sites of the Sumerian Civilization.  Sumerian texts explain that Ur was believed to be the first city.

Tell al-Ubaid is a small tell discovered near Ur in southern Iraq.

(David Stanley / CC BY 3.0)

Discovering Ubaid Lizardmen Figurines at Tell Al’Ubaid

The main site where the unusual artifacts were discovered is called Tell Al’Ubaid – although figurines were also found in Ur and Eridu. The Al’Ubaid site is a small mound of about half a kilometer (0.3 mi) in diameter and two meters (6.56 ft) above ground. First excavated by Harry Reginald Hal in 1919, male and female figurines were found in different postures. Most of the figurines appear to be wearing a helmet and have some kind of padding on the shoulders.

Other figurines were found to hold a staff or scepter, possibly as a symbol of justice and ruling. Each figurine has a different pose but the strangest of all is that some female figurines hold babies suckling milk, with the child also represented as a lizard-type creature.

Lizard-headed nude woman nursing a child, from Ur, Iraq, c. 4000 BC, now at Iraq Museum.

(Osama Shukir Muhammed Amin FRCP / CC BY-SA 4.0 )

Ubaid Lizardmen: The Prehistoric Lizard Figurines

The figurines are presented with long heads, almond shaped eyes, long tapered faces and a lizard-type nose. What exactly they represent is completely unknown. According to archaeologists, their postures, such as a female figure breast-feeding, do not suggest that they were ritualistic objects. So what did these Ubaid lizardmen represent?

• Enki: The Epic Mesopotamian Water God Who Saved Humanity
• The Great City of Uruk Became Sumerian Powerhouse of Technology, Architecture and Culture

Whatever they were, they appear to have been important to the ancient Ubaidian people. We know that the serpent was a major symbol used in many societies to represent a number of gods, for example, the Sumerian god Enki, and the snake was used later on as the symbol for the Brotherhood of the Snake , supposedly an ancient secret society. Is there a link between the symbol of the snake and the representations of lizards? For now, these questions remain unanswered.

• Top image: Ubaid Lizardmen Source: CC by SA 4.0

{ https://www.ancient-origins.net/ }

04-03-2022 om 01:04 geschreven door peter  

By UNIVERSITY OF BIRMINGHAM  

A perspective of future gravity cartography being used with 0.5 m spatial resolution over a region, at an uncertainty level of 20 E. Expected signal sizes for a range of applications are shown.

Credit: Stray et al. 2022 Nature DOI: 10.1038/s41586-021-04315-3

An object hidden below ground has been located using quantum technology — a long-awaited milestone with profound implications for industry, human knowledge, and national security.

University of Birmingham researchers from the UK National Quantum Technology Hub in Sensors and Timing have reported their achievement in Nature. It is the first in the world for a quantum gravity gradiometer outside of laboratory conditions.

The quantum gravity gradiometer, which was developed under a contract for the Ministry of Defence and in the UKRI-funded Gravity Pioneer project, was used to find a tunnel buried outdoors in real-world conditions one meter below the ground surface. It wins an international race to take the technology outside.

The sensor works by detecting variations in microgravity using the principles of quantum physics, which is based on manipulating nature at the sub-molecular level.

The success opens a commercial path to significantly improved mapping of what exists below ground level.

This will mean:

• Reduced costs and delays to construction, rail, and road projects.
• Improved prediction of natural phenomena such as volcanic eruptions.
• Discovery of hidden natural resources and built structures.
• Understanding archaeological mysteries without damaging excavation.

Professor Kai Bongs, Head of Cold Atom Physics at the University of Birmingham and Principal Investigator of the UK Quantum Technology Hub Sensors and Timing, said: “This is an ‘Edison moment’ in sensing that will transform society, human understanding, and economies.

“With this breakthrough we have the potential to end reliance on poor records and luck as we explore, build and repair. In addition, an underground map of what is currently invisible is now a significant step closer, ending a situation where we know more about Antarctica than what lies a few feet below our streets.”

Current gravity sensors are limited by a range of environmental factors. A particular challenge is vibration, which limits the measurement time of all gravity sensors for survey applications.  If these limitations can be addressed, surveys can become faster, more comprehensive, and lower cost.

How the quantum gravity sensor works

The quantum gravity sensor measures subtle changes in the pulling strength of gravitational fields when a cloud of atoms is dropped. The bigger the object and the greater the difference in density of the object from its surroundings, the stronger the measurable difference in pull. But vibration, instrument tilt and disruption from magnetic and thermal fields have made turning quantum theory into commercial reality challenging. The Birmingham quantum sensor breakthrough is the first to meet these real-world challenges and perform a high spatial resolution survey. The removal of noise due to vibration will unlock gravity mapping at high spatial resolution.

The sensor developed by Dr. Michael Holynski, Head of Atom Interferometry at Birmingham and lead author of the study, and his team at Birmingham is a gravity gradiometer. Their system overcomes vibration and a variety of other environmental challenges in order to successfully apply quantum technology in the field.

The successful detection, realized in collaboration with civil engineers led by Professor Nicole Metje of the School of Engineering, is the culmination of a long-term development program that has been closely linked to end-users from its outset.

This breakthrough will allow future gravity surveys to be cheaper, more reliable, and delivered 10 times faster, reducing the time needed for surveys from a month to a few days. It has the potential to open a range of new applications for gravity survey, providing a new lens into the underground.

Professor George Tuckwell, Director for Geoscience and Engineering at RSK, said: “Detection of ground conditions such as mine workings, tunnels, and unstable ground is fundamental to our ability to design, construct and maintain housing, industry, and infrastructure. The improved capability that this new technology represents could transform how we map the ground and deliver these projects”

Dr. Gareth Brown, joint Project Technical Authority for Quantum Sensing and Senior Principal Scientist at Dstl, said: “For national Defence and Security, accurate and rapid measurements of variations in microgravity open up new opportunities to detect the otherwise undetectable and navigate more safely in challenging environments. As gravity sensing technology matures, applications for underwater navigation and revealing the subterranean will become possible.”

Reference: “Quantum sensing for gravity cartography” by Ben Stray, Andrew Lamb, Aisha Kaushik, Jamie Vovrosh, Anthony Rodgers, Jonathan Winch, Farzad Hayati, Daniel Boddice, Artur Stabrawa, Alexander Niggebaum, Mehdi Langlois, Yu-Hung Lien, Samuel Lellouch, Sanaz Roshanmanesh, Kevin Ridley, Geoffrey de Villiers, Gareth Brown, Trevor Cross, George Tuckwell, Asaad Faramarzi, Nicole Metje, Kai Bongs and Michael Holynski, 23 February 2022, Nature.
DOI: 10.1038/s41586-021-04315-3

The breakthrough is a collaboration between the University of Birmingham, environmental, engineering and sustainability solutions provider RSK, Dstl (the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory, part of the UK Ministry of Defence), and technology company Teledyne e2v. The project is funded by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) as part of the UK National Quantum Technologies Program and under contract from the Ministry of Defence.

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{ https://scitechdaily.com/ }

03-03-2022 om 23:45 geschreven door peter  

Titan-in-a-test-tube: Earthbound chemists search for alien life

Titan's unique surface, possibly an abode to life, is seen here in this artist's concept.

Jurik Peter/Shutterstock

If all the worlds in our solar system entered an Earth impersonation contest, Titan would steal the show. Sure, human visitors to Saturn’s largest moon would die instantly without supplemental oxygen and protection against the cold — a frigid -290 degrees Fahrenheit — but the similarities shouldn’t be discounted. With a rich trove of organic molecules and weather patterns resembling our own, scientists consider Titan one of the likeliest harbors for extraterrestrial life.

The problem is, it lies just short of a billion miles away.

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft did capture more than a decade of data on Titan while orbiting Saturn alongside it. And in 2026 the agency plans to launch a drone, called the Dragonfly, which will scour the moon’s surface for signs of chemical processes that could breathe life into inanimate material. That mission won’t land until 2034, however.

In the meantime, a research team led by chemists at Southern Methodist University is studying those same processes here on Earth. In the decidedly non-celestial setting of a Dallas, Texas, laboratory, they’ve created what they call Titan-in-a-test-tube: the conditions of a remote, exotic world reproduced in a tiny glass cylinder.

A familiar scene

Naturally, that’s no small task. Even Tomče Runčevski, the experiment’s principal investigator, doesn’t claim a perfect understanding of the environment. “It is incredibly difficult to mimic Titan,” he said at the fall meeting of the American Chemical Society, acknowledging that they don’t even know how many chemicals exist there. But, he added, “it's better to start from something, and then to build on that.”

What we do know is that beneath the smoggy, orange haze that masks the world below, Titan is a wondrous place. It’s the only moon with a substantial atmosphere, which, like Earth’s, is composed mostly of nitrogen. It’s also the only other heavenly body of any kind known to sport liquid rivers, lakes and seas on its surface — though they obviously aren’t made of H2O, which freezes at temperatures well above those on Titan. “On Earth we have water,” Runčevski said. “On Titan, the same role of water is played by methane.”

These streams and pools give rise to a climate with hydrological cycles similar to the ones that sustain us. Methane evaporates from the surface, condenses in the atmosphere and rains down to refill the reservoirs from which it came. It's a reprise of our own home planet in its early years, before these same phenomena somehow begat the world we see today. If it happened here, why not there?

Foundations of life

After replicating these features in the test tube, the researchers added two carbon-based compounds believed to be mixed in with all that methane: acetonitrile and propionitrile. Despite their status as common organic solvents, familiar to any chemist, their structures as solids are poorly understood. But Runčevski and his colleagues found that on Titan, they are typically polarized mineral crystals and could serve as templates for the assembly of other organic compounds — a gathering with the potential to generate biotic matter.

Rather than speculate on the possibility of alien life, though, Runčevski prefers to focus on demystifying its origins. “In my opinion, for now we cannot answer that question,” he said. “There is so much to be learned about the basics of what can lead to life — what is there on Titan, what was there on Earth when life started.” A better grasp of how compounds like acetonitrile and propionitrile behave under various circumstances could help with modeling prebiotic chemistry.

An improved picture of the moon’s conditions — the nature of its terrain, what chemicals are present and in what form — could also yield useful insights for the Dragonfly mission. “We’ll learn something about the next of kin to Earth, and I do believe that’s very important,” Runčevski said, reiterating that Titan may be our best bet in the search for galactic neighbors. “In order to detect that life, in order to understand it … we do need to know a little bit more about how this surface would look like.”

RELATED VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

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{ https://astronomy.com/ }

03-03-2022 om 20:50 geschreven door peter  

Space oddities: Curiousity finds a Mars flower, Yutu 2 locates glass balls on the Moon

It’s amazing the sorts of things you can find on planetary surfaces humans haven’t spent very much time. Or have they? Nah, there’s no evidence of intelligent life on Mars and the Moon. Heck, there’s barely evidence of intelligent life on Earth. But, like our blue-and-green planet, there are a few strange things to be found. Thanks to space travel, the internet, and cameras, we even get to take a look at some of it.

NASA and China’s own CNSA have both located some oddities — Mars plays host to a flower (of sorts), while someone’s been dropping marbles on the Moon. More or less.

Space for a garden

NASA’s Curiosity rover came across something curious in its expeditions last month. That’d be, according to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Labs, a flower. Now, that’s not an actual flower, obviously. If there were photosynthesis taking place off-world, it would certainly be a more visible announcement. Besides the other events dominating the news, plant life on Mars would be world-changingly huge.

NASA’s discovery is, as with most planets where nothing’s going on, a geological one. The formation, captured last month by the Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) camera, only looks kinda flowery. Or, more accurately, a little sea-weedy. This is appropriate since this particular space oddity was formed by water. Specifically, it was “…formed when mineralizing fluids traveled through conduits in the rock”. It is valuable to NASA because it helps explain how water behaved in the Gale Crater that Curiosity is exploring. Back when there was water on the Martian surface, of course.

Space Balls 2: The Fall of Yogurt

The China National Space Administration (CNSA), not to be left out, has also located something strange out in space. Not too far away, mind you. Its Yutu 2 lunar rover has sent back images it snapped of the lunar surface. Normally there’s just dust and rocks, but now there’s also glass to look at. Yes, it’s naturally-occurring glass. Yes, that’s an actual thing. It’s made here on Earth by various warm things, like volcanos, lighting strikes, and asteroid or meteor strikes.

It’s this latter explanation that is most likely to blame for these two up-to-2.5cm glass spheres sighted by Yutu 2 in the Von Kármán crater. Dr. Zhiyong Xiao of Sun Yat-sen University said, “Such glass globules should be commonly produced by ancient impact basins on the Moon, so their compositions and isotopic ages will be highly valuable to understand the early impact history.”

There are likely to be loads of glass marbles littering the Moon, which is a bizarre thing to know. Meteor strikes from space are common on the lunar surface and these orbs are likely created by most of them. The Apollo astronauts even brought a few back from their mission to the lunar surface. But, Xiao says, the existence of these space marbles is good news for potential building material on the lunar surface.

“The first discovery of macro-sized translucent glass globules on the Moon confirms that lunar anorthosites are excellent raw materials to manufacture glasses with good light-admitting quality.” Translated: We have everything we need to make space-glass. After that, glasshouses. And then no stone-throwing, okay? We’ve heard that’s bad.

{ https://stuff.co.za/ }

03-03-2022 om 20:21 geschreven door peter  

{ https://nationalufocenter.com/ }

03-03-2022 om 18:11 geschreven door peter  

UFO Sightings in the United States

Sightings are from MUFON CMS

Arizona Light

Phoenix– on January 17, 2022, the witness sent the above video that shows a bright illuminated object that was significantly brightened. The video was taken at 10:22 PM

with a cheap $30 Wyse security camera. The camera was,  set to auto night vision mode. Any brightness of photo would have been done by the camera.

Note: I believe that the object in the video could be a regular aircraft. I have four security cameras and aircraft can look much different on a video screen.. Thanks to Will Pucket/www.ufosnw.com/newsite/

 California Object

Pacific Ocean on February 14, 2022, I always take pictures on my flight and I was flying from LAX to EUG on Allegiant Airlines. I had noticed at take off what looked like a military container vessel and a white object under the water moving fast keeping the exact distance from the center glowing white boomerang? Caught object in one of three pictures.

Colorado Object

Colorado Springs on February 9, 2022, thought it might be a cloud but there was no other clouds in the sky at the time. Looking back a little bit later it was completely gone. I also saw an orb of light being followed by a helicopter coming from NORAD headed towards an Air Force Base.

Iowa Object

Ralston on February 9, 2022, the dark object was shaped like the end of a sharpened pencil, and distant, and remained in same position. I was driving west for 15 minutes and pulled over at sunset took 10 photos using a Canon 80 D with a 100-400mm lens at ISO 800, f/5.6, 1/90 sec. I watched until it was too dark to see.

Maine Light

Bridgton on February 22, 2022, I woke up abruptly and went outside to have a cigarette. Looked up and saw a bright light moving across the sky changing direction multiple times. Was not a satellite, sky was clear and stars were bright. It took a path from the west, headed east then turned north

Massachusetts Lights

Peabody on February 23, 2022, while driving I saw two bright wobbling lights in the sky. We pulled into the driveway and the lights were still there, My girlfriend agreed that they were moving towards the other two. A couple started moving up and down a substantial amount as. one flew in from the horizon. As the fourth light showed up one of the original two flew away. Another flew in from the horizon and three formed a horizontal single file line.

My girlfriend and her parents came outside and a third one appeared in the same spot. There were again three lights in a single file line,

 Michigan  Lights

Adrian on December 31st 2020, my wife and I were put up our Christmas gift security cameras. Our motion activated were set off by a 3 foot bar of light hovering in our backyard.

Five minutes later we got r notified something with a animal face was on our back deck that didn’t approach and disappears. Later, I looked at where the shadow of the face was in the center of my deck. There’s no way it was some kind of animal standing on a railing. It had be hovering or standing directly in the middle of the deck. This means the being was around 5 feet tall or was hovering. The shadow proves the whole thing. There’s no animal that stands upright 5 feet tall and vanishes without moving.

Missouri Light

Lake St Louis – on December 3, 2021, I was sitting in my living room and looked out SW window at dark sky with one bright light. A bar shaped light extended from circular light. I took a picture.

New Jersey Lights

Springfield Township on August 10, 2021, blinking red and white lights movement was amazingly fast. No drone or anything that we’ve ever seen moved that fast and humming when it moved.

New Mexico Disc

Rio Rancho on February 17, 2022, I was driving on a desert road and saw this object. As I approached it. It rapidly shot to the west a short bit and stopped. I stopped the car and took a few pictures, and watched it for a few minutes. It made me a bit nervous since no one was around.

New York Lights

Albion on January  23, 2022, there were over 20 in total of these crafts. You can see if watched in slow motion at beginning, they are disk shaped and turn or tip. Once crafts reach a certain elevation they become a lit orb appearance , and follow the same path and move quickly without sound.

Texas Disc

Katy– on January 12, 2022, the witness sent several videos and still images of interesting objects. One of the most interesting images was the disk shaped object shown in the still image above. The Sun is reflecting off of a portion of the object. Thanks to Will Pucket/www.ufosnw.com/newsite/

Vermont Disk

St. Albans – on December 18, 2021, I was simply watching television with my wife when I walked out to the back porch to smoke. I instantly noticed some bright low flying green lights to my west over Lake Champlain. lights. It was silent and skirted the tops of the trees. Then the bight green lights were blinding a hundred feet away. It was a huge flying saucer type craft a third of the size of a football stadium. A glowing green ring underneath opened and turned a deep pink with two bars going across an open circle. Then it shot straight into space jumping in time.

Washington DC Lights

Washington D.C. on February 16, 2022, it’s a UFO sphere on live camera near to the White House. Aliens clearly were trying to observe and record the US presidents emotions and thought using telepathic abilities. President Biden is under a lot of stress right now from Russia going to war with Ukraine and China with Taiwan. Nuclear war is a possibility. And Aliens want keep their planet safe. Yes, this planet belonged to aliens long before humanity even existed. It’s like a kid saying the house belongs to him but it’s really his fathers. This video is 100% proof that aliens are watching Biden. Thanks to Scott C. Waring- Taiwan

Wisconsin Light

Stoughton – on November 9, 2021, I was running late for work and noticed big bright lights just above the tree line. As I got closer I realized, that it was a UAP/UFO. My fiancé and I saw them frequently, but never one so close. I noticed big an bright lights just above the tree line I was alone on the Highway. I came around the next bend and there it was it was sitting in a field! It was a disc shaped craft with lights bright I had a tough time seeing. I work for USPS and they don’t take kindly to tardiness. So while driving shot pictures with one hand while going 60 mph. At work a retired USAF guy told me he saw it also.

Worldwide UFO Sightings

 Canada Lights

Saskatoon on February 22, 2022, I was driving to work just before 6am, west of Saskatoon, and notice a hovering bright light.. Watched for.5 minutes and took 30 second video and picture. I had to keep driving to get to work and when I looked back it was gone.

Mexico Moon shot

Chihuahua on January 19, 2022, I was at my parents’ house shooting the moon with camera on a tripod and I understood something clearly at last that was on the dark surface of the moon (in an area where the sun does not hit.) In the video understand something clearly at last turn off at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bjYOLVRd47E&t=7s

New Zealand Objects

Space Orbital on February 20, 2022, I noticed these odd lights in this space video orbiting earth. There appears to be several UAPs and glowing lights. One looks like a Tic Tac, several others appear circular in formation heading down towards Earth and start to become translucent or appear to cloak. There also seems to be two additional circular translucent objects in the lower right area around the middle of the video.

UK/England Light

Swansea on February 26, 2022, took a photo at night, dark but street lights around. Viewing the photo I seen an unusual object and light. This could not be seen with the naked eye.

Bristol on January  , 2022,  my wife noticed plane then Tic Tac shape craft moving east to west in straight line no sound, bright clear day

United Arab Emirates Light

Abu Dhabi on February 20, 2022, my friends was having a classic cars tour at the seaside road at afternoon time, when we stopped and I get out of my car immediately in front above me. I see this thing either reflecting the sun which was setting to my left or pulsating, it was moving very slow to be anything can fly and big to be a drone. I tried to zoom in try to find any details but nothing only this slow silver moving thing. And It was very low maybe about 1000 meters high.

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{ https://nationalufocenter.com/ }

03-03-2022 om 18:10 geschreven door peter  

UFO Fleet At Space Station, Jan 3, 2022, Video, UFO Sighting News.

Date of sighting: January 3, 2022

Location of sighting: Over Italy, Near Space Station

Source: ISS Live Cam

 

These three UFOs near the space station were caught by Youtuber Marco Pedotti. On his channel he watches the space station, but he only posts videos of the view only...but this time he caught something fantastic...a fleet of UFOs. Now I went over this footage again and again, and I cannot see anything wrong with it. It is 100% authentic. When I took screenshots of some of the UFOs...I noticed they were all blurry and transparent. But one UFO was over land and it looked like a triangle, but when focused is actually a four sided pyramid. In the screenshot above, it actually looks like a doorway has opened on the right side of the UFO. It could reveal the cockpit of the craft. Perhaps the pilot wanted a better look with his own eyes, since it looks like the craft normally has no windows. How many? I lost count...close to 12...man that big one shot past a few times close up...but so fast I almost missed it.

 

This is crazy cool for sure. Each of the three UFOs throws a huge shadow onto the earth below them. Watch it, pause every once in a while...its mind blowing stuff. These are not satellites, they shoot off turning incredibly fast. I have seen satellites released before from the space station...this is not such a thing. These are 100% alien technology, piloted by living entities. 

Scott C. Waring - Taiwan  

RELATTD VIDEOS, selected and posted by peter2011

{ https://www.ufosightingsdaily.com/ }

03-03-2022 om 16:26 geschreven door peter  

Prince Philip’s Secret UFO Investigation

Ancient Astronaut Theorists believe that Prince William might’ve investigated and researched a classified UFO phenomenon.

{ https://www.latest-ufo-sightings.net/ }

03-03-2022 om 16:04 geschreven door peter  

NASA is urgently investigating how to stop the ISS from crashing to Earth after Russia threatened to withdraw its propulsion experts who keep space station afloat, after Elon Musk offered SpaceX support

• The International Space Station is a cooperation of multiple nations in orbit

• The main partners are the US and Russia, with Russia responsible for propulsion

• This ensures it remains in orbit, about 250 miles above the surface of the Earth

• After invading Ukraine, the US and other nations sanctioned Russia including in space, which could lead to the end of cooperation over the orbital facility 

• If this were to happen, another agency would need to manage ISS propulsion

• NASA says it doesn't expect this to happen, but is considering its options 

By RYAN MORRISON FOR DAILYMAIL.COM  and AFP

NASA is exploring ways to keep the International Space Station operational in low Earth orbit without Russian help to maintain the spacecraft's propulsion. 

It comes after Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, prompting a spate of sanctions from the US, including restricting cooperation with its space industry. 

Last week, the head of the Russian space agency, Dmitry Rogozin, warned the US against introducing sanctions against its space program, threatening to stop maintenance that could see the 500 ton ISS fall out of orbit on to the US.

Russian cargo spaceships manage propulsion on the station, and keep it in orbit 253 miles above the Earth. Without their regular adjustments, it would fall back to Earth.  

NASA says it is exploring ways to keep it in orbit without Russian help, including using commercial cargo vehicles from SpaceX and Northrup Grumman.

However, the US space agency says it doesn't see any immediate signs of Moscow withdrawing from the international orbital collaboration.

The International Space Station (ISS) is seen on a monitor after a Soyuz MS-20 space craft undocked from the ISS, starting the landing of the International space crew including Japanese space tourists

Kathy Lueders, who heads the agency's human spaceflight program, said operations on the research platform were proceeding 'nominally' and 'we're not getting any indications at a working level that our counterparts are not committed.'

'That said, we always look for how do we get more operational flexibility and our cargo providers are looking at how do we add different capabilities,' she continued.

While the US side of the ISS supplies power and life support, Russia is responsible for propulsion and keeping the station in its orbit, over 250 miles above the planet.

It does this by using docked Progress spacecraft to periodically give the station a boost to maintain its altitude, and stop it falling back to the Earth. 

Rogozin raised the prospect of pulling out of the partnership in response to US sanctions, warning that without the Progress spacecraft, the 400 ton structure would fall back to Earth without any indication of where it might lands. 

NASA is exploring ways to keep the International Space Station operational in low Earth orbit without Russian help to maintain propulsion 

Lueders said: 'Northrop Grumman has been offering up a reboost capability, and you know, our SpaceX folks are looking at can we have additional capability.'

The last Northrop Grumman Cygnus cargo vessel that arrived at the ISS on February 21 was the first to boast a capacity to 'reboost' the outpost without Russian help.

On Friday, SpaceX boss Elon Musk tweeted his company's logo in response to Rogozin's rhetorical question about who would save the ISS.

But Lueders stressed that such plans were a contingency measure only, adding 'It would be very difficult for us to be operating on our own -- ISS is an international partnership that was created...with joint dependencies,' she said.

'As a team, we are looking at where we may have operational flexibilities, but... it would be a sad day for international operations if we can't continue to peacefully operate in space,' she concluded.

A symbol of post Cold War detente, the ISS has been continuously habited for more than 21 years and has weathered past geopolitical storms, notably Russia's invasion of Crimea in 2014, with space exploded from sanctions at the time.

But some observers believe the invasion of Ukraine could hasten the demise of US-Russian space cooperation.

Currently, seven astronauts – four from the US, two from Russia and one from Germany – are on the ISS.  

Rogozin has said that US sanctions could 'destroy our cooperation' and said the research platform would plummet to the Earth without his nation's help. 

'If you block cooperation with us, who will save the ISS from uncontrolled deorbiting and falling on US or European territory?' said Rogozin – while noting that the station doesn't fly over much of Russia. 

However, one space expert said this was unlikely, considering Roscosmos has Russian personnel on board.  

'Nobody wants to put the lives of astronauts and cosmonauts in danger by political maneuvering,' John Logsdon, a professor and space analyst at George Washington University.  

Last week, the head of the Russian space agency, Dmitry Rogozin, warned the US against introducing sanctions against its space program, threatening to stop maintenance that could see the 500 ton ISS fall out of orbit on to the US 

The ISS is a collaboration between the US and Russia, as founding partners, along with Canada, the European Space Agency and Japan.

It is split into two main sections, the Russian and US orbital segments, and they depend on each other for operational survival. 

'The Russian segment can't function without the electricity on the American side, and the American side can't function without the propulsion systems that are on the Russian side,' former NASA astronaut Garrett Reisman told CNN. 

'So you can't do an amicable divorce. You can't do a conscious uncoupling.' 

NASA said in a statement soon after the conflict started, that there were no changes planned to the cooperation between Russia and the US on the ISS, but appear to have begun looking at contingencies, in case the situation further escalates.  

It isn't just the US looking at contingency operations when it comes to working with Russia in space. The European Space Agency has postponed its ExoMars rover launch, likely until at least 2024 as it was scheduled to go up on a Russian rocket.

In a statement posted to its website, ESA said it is 'assessing the consequences on each of our ongoing programmes' that are being conducted in cooperation with Roscosmos, while condemning Russia's actions. 

'We deplore the human casualties and tragic consequences of the war in Ukraine,' ESA said. 

'We are giving absolute priority to taking proper decisions, not only for the sake of our workforce involved in the programmes, but in full respect of our European values, which have always fundamentally shaped our approach to international cooperation.'

EXPLAINED: THE $100 BILLION INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION SITS 250 MILES ABOVE THE EARTH

The International Space Station (ISS) is a $100 billion (£80 billion) science and engineering laboratory that orbits 250 miles (400 km) above Earth.

It has been permanently staffed by rotating crews of astronauts and cosmonauts since November 2000. 

Crews have come mainly from the US and Russia, but the Japanese space agency JAXA and European space agency ESA have also sent astronauts. 

The International Space Station has been continuously occupied for more than 20 years and has been expended with multiple new modules added and upgrades to systems 

Research conducted aboard the ISS often requires one or more of the unusual conditions present in low Earth orbit, such as low-gravity or oxygen.

ISS studies have investigated human research, space medicine, life sciences, physical sciences, astronomy and meteorology.

The US space agency, NASA, spends about $3 billion (£2.4 billion) a year on the space station program, with the remaining funding coming from international partners, including Europe, Russia and Japan.

So far 244 individuals from 19 countries have visited the station, and among them eight private citizens who spent up to $50 million for their visit.

There is an ongoing debate about the future of the station beyond 2025, when it is thought some of the original structure will reach 'end of life'.

Russia, a major partner in the station, plans to launch its own orbital platform around then, with Axiom Space, a private firm, planning to send its own modules for purely commercial use to the station at the same time. 

NASA, ESA, JAXA and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) are working together to build a space station in orbit around the moon, and Russia and China are working on a similar project, that would also include a base on the surface. 

{ https://www.dailymail.co.uk/ }

03-03-2022 om 01:57 geschreven door peter  

NASA onderzoekt of ruimtestation ISS zonder Rusland kan

De Amerikaanse ruimtevaartorganisatie NASA bekijkt of het Internationaal Ruimtestation (ISS) ook zonder de hulp van Rusland kan functioneren. De samenwerking zou volgens Rusland in gevaar kunnen komen door het conflict in Oekraïne. Vorige week nog beweerde een Russische ruimtechef dat het ISS kan neerstorten op Europa of de VS, als de steun van zijn thuisland wegvalt. 

Glenn Haex 

Bron: The Guardian

De VS en Rusland werken nauw samen bij het ISS. De NASA is verantwoordelijk voor de elektriciteitsvoorziening en de levensondersteuning. Rusland voorziet dan weer de stuwkracht die het station in een baan rond de aarde houdt. 

Lees ook

• 

  Anonymous roept op: "Omzeil censuur en vertel Russische burgers over oorlog via restaurantreviews”

De sancties die de VS aan Rusland hebben opgelegd vanwege de inval in Oekraïne, zouden echter grote gevolgen kunnen hebben voor het ruimtestation. Dat werd vorige week pijnlijk duidelijk uit een online tirade van de Russische ruimtechef Dmitry Rogozin:  “Wie zal ervoor zorgen dat het ISS niet neerstort in de VS of Europa als je de samenwerking met ons stopzet? Er is ook de mogelijkheid dat een constructie van 500 ton neerstort op China of India. Het ISS vliegt niet boven Rusland, dus jullie lopen al het risico”, schreef hij onder meer.

De NASA neemt daarom het zekere voor het onzekere, en zoekt naar oplossingen. Zo zou ruimtevaartbedrijf Northrop Grumman al hebben aangeboden om een alternatief stuwsysteem te leveren. Ook SpaceX zou al oplossingen hebben voorgesteld. Oprichter Elon Musk besloot bovendien om ruimtechef Rogozin nog wat meer ‘te pesten’ door het logo van Space X onder zijn tirade te plaatsen.  

Elon Musk @elonmusk

<a href="https://t.co/4kRJyp0FOv">pic.twitter.com/4kRJyp0FOv</a>

Geen problemen

Voorlopig zijn er wel nog geen echte problemen bij het ISS. De Russische werknemers zouden volgens Kathy Lueders, het hoofd van NASA’s bemande ruimtevaartprogramma, nog steeds toegewijd aan het werk zijn: “Maar we kijken continu hoe we flexibeler kunnen werken. Het zou wel heel moeilijk zijn voor ons om alleen te werken. Het ISS is namelijk een internationaal project met wederzijdse afhankelijkheden.”

Marsrover

De situatie in Rusland zorgt wel voor problemen bij de Europese ruimtevaartorganisatie ESA. Die was van plan om komende zomer samen met Rusland een nieuwe Marsrover te lanceren. Dat project loopt nu vertraging op: “De sancties en algemene context zorgen ervoor dat een lancering in 2022 heel onwaarschijnlijk wordt”, klinkt het.

Lees ook

• Marsrover viert eerste verjaardag op rode planeet: wat heeft Perseverance al die tijd uitgespookt?

{ https://www.hln.be/ }

03-03-2022 om 01:35 geschreven door peter  

Last-Minute Defense Against an Asteroid That Could Obliterate it Before Impact

Gazing at the night sky can evoke a sense of wonder regarding humanity’s place in the Universe. But that’s not all it can evoke. If you’re knowledgeable about asteroid strikes like the one that wiped out the dinosaurs, then even a fleeting meteorite can nudge aside your enjoyable sense of wonder. What if?

Luckily, planetary defence is at the top of mind for some scientists and engineers. One of those scientists is Professor Philip Lubin from the University of California Santa Barbara. Lubin is developing his idea called PI-Terminal Defense for Humanity. The PI stands for Pulverize It, and Lubin thinks pulverizing an incoming impactor into tiny pieces is our best bet to protect ourselves from an asteroid on short notice.

Lubin presented his PI Planetary Defence idea at the 2021 Planetary Defence Conference. His idea is now a Phase One awardee in the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program. NIAC aims to promote and support visionary ideas that can transform future NASA missions. NASA operates the Planetary Defence Coordination Office (PDCO), and Lubin’s PI Planetary Defense idea fits that office’s mandate.

The threat of an asteroid strike is genuine. A massive asteroid like the one that wiped out the dinosaurs would kill our civilization. We’ve faced more minor threats, like the Tunguska Event and the Chelyabinsk meteor, but can we count on luck to avoid devastating impacts? That wouldn’t be wise.

“So far, humanity has been spared large-scale catastrophe as was visited upon our previous tenants, but counting upon being “lucky” is a poor strategy in the longer term,” Philip Lubin said in 2021.

NASA is busy finding and cataloguing asteroids that pose a threat to Earth. But that’s only an initial step. We must develop ways to protect Earth from a catastrophic impact.

Much of the thinking around asteroid impact mitigation is focused on long lead times. If we know months or years ahead of time when an asteroid will impact Earth, we can send out a kinetic impactor to redirect the asteroid. With enough lead time, even a small kinetic impactor can redirect a large asteroid away from us.

But what if time is short? What if we find out too late? What if we’ve launched a kinetic impactor, but it missed or failed somehow? That’s where Lubin’s PI idea could come into play.

The main idea of PI is to pulverize an asteroid into smaller debris which would then burn up in Earth’s atmosphere. In an article for NIAC from February 18th, 2022, Lubin wrote, “In short intercept scenarios, the asteroid fragments of maximum ~10-meter diameter allow the Earth’s atmosphere to act as a “beam dump” where the fragments either burn up in the atmosphere or air burst, with the primary channel of energy going into spatially and temporally de-correlated shock waves.”

PI’s idea is to design an impactor that’s not only kinetic but explosive. The impacting device would be fitted with penetrating rods to pierce the asteroid. Explosives would fill some rods, and the resulting explosion would pulverize the bolide into smaller chunks, hopefully 15 m or less in diameter. The pieces would form a cloud of debris. Depending on the size of the bolide, the size of the device, and the distance from Earth when detonated, some of the debris might strike Earth. But much of it would be destroyed through friction with the Earth’s atmosphere.

“The effectiveness of the approach depends on the time to intercept and size of the asteroid, but allows for effective defence against asteroids in the multi-hundred-meter diameter class and could virtually eliminate the threat of mass destruction caused by these threats,” Lubin explains.

ACCORDING TO LUBIN, the PI System could be in orbit around Earth or even housed on a lunar base. “Compared to other threat reduction scenarios, this approach represents an extremely cost-effective, testable, and deployable approach with a logical roadmap of development and testing. Pre-deployment of the system into orbit or a lunar base allows for rapid response on the order of less than a day if needed,” Lubin said.

“The great advantage of this approach is that it allows for terminal defence in the event of short warning times and target distance mitigation where orbital deflection is not feasible,” said Lubin. “Even intercepts as close as the Moon with intercept times of a few hours prior to impact are viable.”

The Moon has a couple of inherent advantages. For one thing, it has no atmosphere, so as a base for observing the asteroid environment near Earth, it would allow “long-range optical/NIR LIDAR detection” of incoming asteroids. The Moon also has a lower escape velocity than Earth, making launches easier and less expensive.

Launching a large explosive impactor from Earth is becoming more feasible over time, too. Heavy launch vehicles like SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy, NASA’s Space Launch System, and others are heralding a new age of powerful rocket technology.

Lubin says that the PI system only needs a five-hour prior to impact window to destroy an asteroid the size of the object in the Tunguska Event. That object was likely about 50 meters in diameter and exploded with a force of about 10 Megatons. It knocked over millions of trees in a remote part of Siberia. If an object that size were to explode over one of our cities, it would be devastating.

The Chelyabinsk meteor blew the windows out of buildings and caused injuries, and it was only about 20 meters in diameter.

The system could also work when it comes to massive asteroids like Apophis. Apophis will pass near Earth in 2029, but it won’t impact Earth. However, if it passes through what’s called a “gravitational keyhole” during its 2029 flyby, it could be nudged enough that it could strike Earth on the subsequent flyby. Apophis is about 370 meters in diameter, and its yield is about four gigatons. Lubin said that his PI system could successfully destroy Apophis-sized asteroids with a 10-day prior to impact intercept.

It’ll be interesting to see how much further Lubin develops his Pulverize It asteroid defence idea. NASA launched its Double Asteroid Redirection Test mission in November 2021. DART is headed for the double asteroid system of Didymos and its smaller companion, Dimorphos, which orbits Didymos.

Dimorphos isn’t on a trajectory toward Earth. DART is purely a test mission, and impacting Dimorphos will lead to a slight change in the trajectory of the double asteroid system. NASA will monitor the system after the impact to see if the mission was successful.

But there’s no reason we can’t develop multiple asteroid mitigation systems in parallel. That might be the most prudent way forward. As we get better and better at finding all of the asteroids that threaten Earth, we’ll be more prepared for intercepting asteroids with advanced lead times. But no system is foolproof.

It’d be wise for humanity to develop another system that could launch rapidly and be employed on short notice. Then we can look up at the sky and relax.

More:

• Pi – Terminal Defense for Humanity
• NIAC: NASA Innovative Advance Concepts Program
• Universe Today: NASA’s New Asteroid Impact Monitoring System Comes Online

The post Last-Minute Defense Against an Asteroid That Could Obliterate it Before Impact appeared first on Universe Today.

Source: 

• https://www.universetoday.com/154759/last-minute-defense-against-an-asteroid-that-could-obliterate-it-before-impact/

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03-03-2022 om 01:18 geschreven door peter