NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day

June 7, 2024

SH2-308: The Dolphin Head Nebula

Blown by fast winds from a hot, massive star, this cosmic bubble is huge. Cataloged as Sharpless 2-308 it lies some 5,000 light-years away toward the well-trained constellation Canis Major and covers slightly more of the sky than a Full Moon. That corresponds to a diameter of 60 light-years at its estimated distance. The massive star that created the bubble, a Wolf-Rayet star, is the bright one near the center of the nebula. Wolf-Rayet stars have over 20 times the mass of the Sun and are thought to be in a brief, pre-supernova phase of massive star evolution. Fast winds from this Wolf-Rayet star create the bubble-shaped nebula as they sweep up slower moving material from an earlier phase of evolution. The windblown nebula has an age of about 70,000 years. Relatively faint emission captured by narrowband filters in the deep image is dominated by the glow of ionized oxygen atoms mapped to a blue hue. Presenting a mostly harmless outline, SH2-308 is also known as The Dolphin-head Nebula.

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html?

>>20982920

Moon Tree Dedication with Artemis II Crew

JUN 06, 2024

NASA astronauts Victor Glover (left), Reid Wiseman (middle left), and Christina Koch (middle right), and Canadian Space Agency (CSA) astronaut Jeremy Hansen (right), pose for a photo after a Moon Tree dedication ceremony, Tuesday, June 4, 2024, at the United States Capitol in Washington. The American Sweetgum tree pictured was grown from a seed that was flown around the Moon during the Artemis I mission.

Moon Trees originated with the Apollo 14 mission, when NASA astronaut Stuart Roosa carried tree seeds into lunar orbit. In a nod to the legacy of Apollo 14, and a celebration of the future of space exploration with NASA’s Artemis Program, a “new generation” of Moon Tree seeds traveled into lunar orbit aboard the Orion spacecraft. The seeds travelled thousands of miles beyond the Moon, spending about 4 weeks in space before returning to Earth. Organizations from across the United States will receive the seedlings and plant them in their communities.

https://www.nasa.gov/image-article/moon-tree-dedication-with-artemis-ii-crew/

NASA Scientists Take to the Seas to Study Air Quality

JUN 06, 2024

Satellites continuously peer down from orbit to take measurements of Earth, and this week a group of scientists set sail to verify some of those data points.

On June 2, the SCOAPE (Satellite Coastal and Oceanic Atmospheric Pollution Experiment) research team, in partnership with the U.S. Interior Department’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, took to the seas in the Gulf of Mexico for its second campaign to make surface-based measurements of air pollutants.

The primary pollutant scientists are measuring is nitrogen dioxide (NO2), the compound that reacts with sunlight to make ground-level ozone, said Anne Thompson, senior scientist emeritus for atmospheric chemistry at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, and senior researcher at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County.

The Gulf of Mexico is highly concentrated with oil and natural gas drilling platforms, which are sources of NO2. By taking measurements of these emissions from the sea surface nearby, scientists can help validate measurements taken from a much different vantage point.

The research vessel the scientists are using, Point Sur, is owned by the University of Southern Mississippi and operated by the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium.

“We’re the eyes on the surface to understand how well the eyes in the sky are working,” said Ryan Stauffer, research scientist for the atmospheric chemistry and dynamics laboratory at Goddard. Stauffer is also the principal investigator for the SCOAPE II project.

For the first iteration of the project in 2019, ship-based measurements were compared to data gathered by the Ozone Monitoring Instrument aboard NASA’s Aura satellite and the Tropospheric Monitoring Instrument aboard ESA’s (European Space Agency) Sentinel-5 Precursor satellite.

Both instruments fly on polar orbiting satellites, which pass over every part of the globe once per day. They capture snapshots at the same time each day, but cannot capture the short-lived NO2 emissions that come and go at different times.

In 2024, the research team is working to validate the measurements taken by TEMPO (the Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of Pollution instrument), which was launched on a commercial satellite in April 2023. The TEMPO instrument provides a different perspective to the NO2 measurements due to its geostationary orbit — it focuses solely on North America and has a constant view of the Gulf of Mexico region. This allows scientists to better quantify emissions and make comparisons across all daylight hours.

From space, satellites collect measurements of the “total column” of air, which means they measure the concentrations of NO2 from the land or ocean surface all the way up to the top of the atmosphere.

With SCOAPE, scientists are taking measurements from the ship, about 33 feet above sea level, to focus measurements on the air that people breathe.

Learning more about how those surface measurements compare to what satellites see in the total column can help scientists figure out how to use satellite data most effectively. Measuring NO2 from space over the past two decades has helped scientists understand how the compound affects air quality, and has helped to inform policies to reduce emissions of the pollutant. During SCOAPE’s 2019 campaign, researchers detected concentrations of methane – a significant greenhouse gas – near the Gulf Coast.

This time around, the scientists are looking to accurately measure these concentrations from the surface as well.

They will mount the NASA Airborne Visible and InfraRed Imaging Spectrometer–3 imaging spectrometer instrument on a Dynamic Aviation B-200 plane to collect methane measurements above the Gulf, which will add an extra layer to understanding emissions of this potent greenhouse gas from Gulf of Mexico oil and gas operations.

It has historically been difficult to measure methane from space, but scientists are working to build those capabilities.

As with NO2, taking surface measurements helps scientists better understand the measurements taken from space.

https://www.nasa.gov/earth/nasa-scientists-take-to-the-seas-to-study-air-quality/

>>20983000

Measles case reported in central N.J., Health Department says

Jun. 06, 2024, 4:39 p.m.

A Somerset County resident who just returned from overseas travel has contracted measles and could have exposed others while visiting a hospital in central Jersey last week, the state Health Department announced Thursday.

The unidentified patient visited the emergency room at Penn Medicine Princeton Medical Center on Saturday, June 1 from 12 p.m. to 3:30 p.m., according to the state announcement. The hospital is located at 1 Plainsboro Road, Plainsboro Township.

There were no other cases reported as of Wednesday, the announcement said. The virus is easily spread by an infected person talking, coughing or sneezing.

Measles symptoms typically emerge three to five days after exposure, although the health department said signs of the illness may show as late as June 26.

The health department did not identify the country visited by the infected person.

From January 1 to May 30, 2024, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has been notified of 146 confirmed U.S. cases of measles across 21 states. Many of these cases reported are linked to international travel and are among people who had not received MMR (measles, mumps and rubella) vaccine. Children under 5 accounted for 65 of these cases, the CDC said.

Symptoms include a high fever, cough, runny nose, watery red eyes, and a red rash that begins at the hairline. In serious cases, infected people may develop pneumonia and encephalitis. Pregnant women may miscarry or deliver a low birth-weight baby, the health department said.

The vaccine, administered in two doses, is mandatory for children who attend school or day care centers in New Jersey, unless their parent or guardian seeks a medical or religious waiver.

https://www.nj.com/healthfit/2024/06/measles-case-reported-in-central-nj-health-department-says.html

Webb Finds Plethora of Carbon Molecules Around Young Star

JUN 06, 2024

An international team of astronomers has used NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to study the disk of gas and dust around a young, very low-mass star.

The results reveal the largest number of carbon-containing molecules seen to date in such a disk.

These findings have implications for the potential composition of any planets that might form around this star.

Rocky planets are more likely than gas giants to form around low-mass stars, making them the most common planets around the most common stars in our galaxy.

Little is known about the chemistry of such worlds, which may be similar to or very different from Earth.

By studying the disks from which such planets form, astronomers hope to better understand the planet formation process and the compositions of the resulting planets.

Planet-forming disks around very low-mass stars are difficult to study because they are smaller and fainter than disks around high-mass stars.

A program called the MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) Mid-INfrared Disk Survey (MINDS) aims to use Webb’s unique capabilities to build a bridge between the chemical inventory of disks and the properties of exoplanets.

“Webb has better sensitivity and spectral resolution than previous infrared space telescopes,” explained lead author Aditya Arabhavi of the University of Groningen in the Netherlands.

“These observations are not possible from Earth, because the emissions from the disk are blocked by our atmosphere.”

In a new study, this team explored the region around a very low-mass star known as ISO-ChaI 147, a 1 to 2 million-year-old star that weighs just 0.11 times as much as the Sun.

The spectrum revealed by Webb’s MIRI shows the richest hydrocarbon chemistry seen to date in a protoplanetary disk – a total of 13 different carbon-bearing molecules.

The team’s findings include the first detection of ethane (C2H6) outside of our solar system, as well as ethylene (C2H4), propyne (C3H4), and the methyl radical CH3.

“These molecules have already been detected in our solar system, like in comets such as 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko and C/2014 Q2 (Lovejoy),” added Arabhavi.

“Webb allowed us to understand that these hydrocarbon molecules are not just diverse but also abundant.

It is amazing that we can now see the dance of these molecules in the planetary cradles. It is a very different planet-forming environment than we usually think of.”

The team indicates that these results have large implications for the chemistry of the inner disk and the planets that might form there.

Since Webb revealed the gas in the disk is so rich in carbon, there is likely little carbon left in the solid materials that planets would form from.

As a result, the planets that might form there may ultimately be carbon-poor. (Earth itself is considered carbon-poor.)

“This is profoundly different from the composition we see in disks around solar-type stars, where oxygen bearing molecules like water and carbon dioxide dominate,” added team member Inga Kamp, also of the University of Groningen.

“This object establishes that these are a unique class of objects.”

“It’s incredible that we can detect and quantify the amount of molecules that we know well on Earth, such as benzene, in an object that is more than 600 light-years away,” added team member Agnés Perrin of Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in France.

Next, the science team intends to expand their study to a larger sample of such disks around very low-mass stars to develop their understanding of how common or exotic such carbon-rich terrestrial planet-forming regions are.

“The expansion of our study will also allow us to better understand how these molecules can form,” explained team member and principal investigator of the MINDS program, Thomas Henning, of the Max-Planck-Institute for Astronomy in Germany.

“Several features in the Webb data are also still unidentified, so more spectroscopy is required to fully interpret our observations.”

This work also highlights the crucial need for scientists to collaborate across disciplines.

The team notes that these results and the accompanying data can contribute towards other fields including theoretical physics, chemistry, and astrochemistry, to interpret the spectra and to investigate new features in this wavelength range.

https://science.nasa.gov/missions/webb/webb-finds-plethora-of-carbon-molecules-around-young-star/

NASA scientist claimed to find proof of ancient alien cities on the moon but was fired after refusing to destroy evidence

21:00 6 Jun 2024 GMT+1

A former worker at NASA believes that the agency has been hiding evidence of an ancient alien civilization from the general public.

The moon remains a curious and fascinating place, even decades after man first stepped foot on it.

The Apollo program, which saw the United States aim to get men on the moon starting in 1961 and concluding in 1972, remains clouded in mystery for several reasons.

While most people agree that the program succeeded at its ambitions - landing groups of men on the moon six different times between 1968 and 1972 - some question the reports of what the men found when they got there.

While it’s hard to not slip into the world of conspiracy theories when discussing people’s beliefs regarding the Apollo program, it’s hard to discredit somebody who was a part of them when they unveil fascinating information.

Ken Johnston is a former Civilian Astronaut Consultant Pilot for NASA, being credited with training Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins, the former two being the first to walk on the lunar surface.

Following the three men’s trip to the moon, known by the masses as Apollo 11, Johnston was put in charge of all the data and photographs involved with the lunar missions NASA was conducting.

In the process, Johnston discovered photographs that displayed artifacts that he believes belonged to an ancient alien civilization on the moon.

The now-former NASA engineer discussed his discoveries with The New Indian Express, explaining that he was subsequently told to destroy the photos by a superior at NASA.

“I was put in charge of photographing and documenting their exact location. One day, my boss ordered me to destroy these images,” Ken explained.

“There were elements in the pictures that were unexplainable.”

Johnston has also said that he believes NASA has doctored the footage and photographs that were released to the public to hide what he believes are signs of extraterrestrial life on the moon.

“You can see the lunar anomalies too. It looks like something has been smudged out. Way before Photoshop, they would paint things out,” Ken alleged.

“Way before Photoshop, [NASA] would paint things out.”

Ken wrote about these photographs and his personal experiences in and outside of NASA in his book, Ken's Moon!: Revealing The "Dark Mission of NASA.

In it, Ken reveals the photos, many of which include the ruins of different structures that could potentially indicate some sort of lifeform had lived there many years ago.

Ken’s stance is far from widely accepted, and several of his other statements, such as his belief that President Eisenhower met with aliens in the 1950s, could easily be considered merely conspiracy theories.

However, many view him and his revelations as playing an instrumental role in finding out if alien life does or has ever lived among us in the universe.

https://www.unilad.com/technology/nasa/nasa-scientist-ken-johnston-proof-aliens-400608-20240606

Radio signal from space repeats every hour, defying explanation

June 06, 2024

The universe is awash with strange radio signals, but astronomers have now detected a really bizarre one that repeats every hour, cycling through three different states. While they have some ideas about its origin it can’t be explained by our current understanding of physics.

The signal first appeared in data gathered by the ASKAP radio telescope in Australia, which watches a big swath of sky at once for transient pulses.

Officially designated ASKAP J1935+2148, the signal seems to repeat every 53.8 minutes.

Whatever it is, the signal cycles through three different states.

Sometimes it shoots out bright flashes that last between 10 and 50 seconds and have a linear polarization, meaning the radio waves all “point” in the same direction.

Other times, its pulses are much weaker with a circular polarization, lasting just 370 milliseconds. And sometimes, the object misses its cue and stays silent.

“What is intriguing is how this object displays three distinct emission states, each with properties entirely dissimilar from the others,” said Dr. Manisha Caleb, lead author of the study.

“The MeerKAT radio telescope in South Africa played a crucial role in distinguishing between these states.

If the signals didn’t arise from the same point in the sky, we would not have believed it to be the same object producing these different signals.”

So what could be behind such a weird radio signal? Let’s get it out of the way up front: it’s not aliens (probably).

The most likely explanation, according to the scientists who discovered it, is that it’s coming from a neutron star or a white dwarf. But it’s not a neat solution, since the signal’s weird properties don’t fit with our understanding of the physics of those two kinds of objects.

Neutron stars and white dwarfs are fairly similar, but with some key differences. They’re both born from the deaths of bigger stars, with the original mass dictating whether you end up with a neutron star or a white dwarf.

Neutron stars are known to blast radio waves out regularly, so they’re a prime suspect here. It’s possible that signals this varied could be produced by interactions between their strong magnetic fields and complex plasma flows.

But there’s a major problem: they usually spin at speeds of seconds or fractions of a second per revolution. It should be physically impossible for one to spin as slow as once every 54 minutes.

White dwarfs, on the other hand, would have no problem spinning that slowly, but as the team says, “we don’t know of any way one could produce the radio signals we are seeing here.”

This isn’t the first time a repeating radio signal from space has stumped scientists. Another was found a few years ago on an 18-minute loop, which should also be impossible.

This new one is not only far longer but more complex, deepening the mystery. Whether the signal is from an unusual neutron star, an elusive “white dwarf pulsar,” or something else entirely, can only be answered with more observations.

“It might even prompt us to reconsider our decades-old understanding of neutron stars or white dwarfs; how they emit radio waves and what their populations are like in our Milky Way galaxy,” said Caleb.

https://newatlas.com/space/radio-signal-space-repeats-hour-neutron-star-white-dwarf/