Space Stuff

NASA's Kepler space telescope finishes its original mission catalog
Fifty possible planets later, we're a step closer to a possible vacation Earth
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NASA’s Journey to Mars seems to be pretty dead
New video is designed to highlight all of the things Trump has accomplished in space.

On Friday, the space agency released what it called a "mid-year report" on NASA five months into the presidency of Donald Trump. The nearly five-minute video is mostly a chronological summary of NASA's announcements so far this year and seems designed to highlight all of the things the new administration has accomplished in space. However, there are some curious inclusions and omissions in the promotional video that provide clues about where NASA is headed under the new administration.
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Orbital shot of Curiosity rover climbing Mount Sharp (colour enhanced).
 
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Humanity uploaded an AI to Mars and lets it shoot rocks with lasers
Curiosity Rover's autonomous operation experiments have been a great success, say astro-boffins

In late 2015 NASA gave the Curiosity Mars rover a software upgrade to let it operate autonomously. The Autonomous Exploration for Gathering Increased Science (AEGIS) code was uploaded because the rover can't be told what to do during the long periods communication with Earth is not possible. A little autonomy, NASA reckoned, could mean Curiosity could do more and perhaps better science.

We now know that letting Curiosity think for itself was a very fine idea, thanks to a paper (PDF) titled “AEGIS autonomous targeting for ChemCam on Mars Science Laboratory: Deployment and results of initial science team use.”
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PLATO mission to find alien life is given the thumbs up
ESA to start the construction of space telescope network
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The European Space Agency’s PLATO mission hunting for habitable exoplanets has been given the green light to move from blueprint into construction.

It was previously selected in 2014 as part of the ESA’s Cosmic Vision Programme, but the launch date has been pushed out two years from 2024 to 2026.

The goal is to detect Earth-size planets or super-Earths orbiting around stars in the habitable zone – an area with conditions that might support liquid water and an atmosphere.
 
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Exoplanet with partly cloudy atmosphere detected with direct imaging

Direct imaging of exoplanets was once only possible for the brightest of planets orbiting the dimmest of stars — but improving technology is turning this into an increasingly powerful technique. In a new study, direct-imaging observations of the Jupiter-like exoplanet 51 Eridani b provide tantalizing clues about its atmosphere.
 
Astroboffins dig into the weird backwards orbit of the Bee-Zed asteroid
Tiny body moves similar to Jupiter – but travels in the opposite direction

Bee-Zed is an odd asteroid:
  • It's rare in that only 82 of more than 726,000 asteroids orbit in the opposite direction of the incoming traffic of planetary bodies.
  • Its orbit is similar to that of a planet – it has the same orbital period as Jupiter.
  • Its configuration has been stable for millions of years, baffling scientists.
 
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