TYB
NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day
February 20, 2025
Messier 87
Enormous elliptical galaxy Messier 87 is about 50 million light-years away. Also known as NGC 4486, the giant galaxy holds trillions of stars compared to the mere billions of stars in our large spiral Milky Way. M87 reigns as the large central elliptical galaxy in the Virgo galaxy cluster. An energetic jet from the giant galaxy's core is seen to stretch outward for about 5,000 light-years in this sharp optical and near-infrared view from the Hubble Space Telescope. In fact, the cosmic blow torch is seen across the electromagnetic spectrum from gamma-rays to radio wavelengths. Its ultimate power source is M87's central, supermassive black hole. An image of this monster in the middle of M87 has been captured by planet Earth's Event Horizon Telescope.
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
In Memoriam: Pierre Morel [1933–2024]
Feb 20, 2025
Pierre Morel, the first director of the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) and founding member of WCRP’s Global Energy and Water Exchanges (GEWEX) Core project, died on December 10, 2024.
Pierre began his research as a theoretical physicist. His doctoral thesis examined the existence and properties of a condensed superfluid state of liquid Helium 3 at very low temperature.
He lectured on basic physics, geophysical fluid dynamics, and climate science. As his career progressed, he focused his research on studying the circulation of the atmosphere.
He was devoted to the development of numerical modelling of atmospheric flow that laid the groundwork for the study of climatology.
Pierre’s work played an integral role in the development of tools used to study the atmosphere, many of which are still active today.
Examples include Project Éole – an experimental wind energy plant conceived in the 1980s and created in Quebec, Canada that closed down in 1993; the ARGOS satellite, a collaboration between the Centre National d’Études Spatiale (CNES) [French Space Agency], National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), and NASA, to collect and relay meteorological and oceanographic data around the world that launched in 1978; the Search and Rescue Satellite Aided Tracking (SARSAT) system, which was developed by the U.S. – specifically NOAA, NASA, and the U.S. Coast Guard and Air Force – Canada, and France, with the first satellite launch in 1982; and the European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites’ METEOSAT series of geostationary satellites, which launched in 1977 and remain active today. The launch of Meteosat–12 in 2022 was the first METEOSAT Third Generation (MTG) launch.
Early in his career, Pierre was the director of the French Laboratoire de Météorologie Dynamique (LMD) before he became the director of the Centre National d’Études Spatiales (CNES).
In 1980 he became the first chairman of the WCRP, where he steered a broad interdisciplinary research program in global climate and Earth system science that involved the participation of atmospheric, oceanic, hydrological, and polar scientists worldwide.
Pierre was later in charge of planetary programs at NASA and was involved in discussions about the future of NASA’s Earth Observing System (EOS) in the mid-to-late 1990s.
As an example, the Earth Observer article, “Minutes Of The Fourteenth Earth Science Enterprise/Earth Observing System (ESE/EOS) Investigators Working Group Meeting,” includes a summary of a presentation Pierre gave that focused on flight mission planning for the EOS “second series,” which was NASA’s plan at the time although ultimately not pursued, with the “first series” (i.e., Terra, Aqua, Aura) enduring much longer than anticipated.
Pierre was the recipient of the 2008 Alfred Wegener Medal & Honorary Membership for his outstanding contributions to geophysical fluid dynamics, his leadership in the development of climate research, and the applications of space observation to meteorology and the Earth system science.
https://science.nasa.gov/science-research/earth-science/in-memoriam-pierre-morel-1933-2024/
Jim Free, NASA associate administrator, to retire
February 20, 2025
NASA’s associate administrator will leave the agency at the end of the week as uncertainty continues about the timing and scope of potential job cuts.
In a statement late Feb. 19, NASA announced that Associate Administrator Jim Free will retire from the agency, effective Feb. 22.
Free had been associate administrator, the top civil-service position in the agency, since the retirement of Bob Cabana at the end of 2023.
Free was previously associate administrator for exploration systems development, a position NASA created in 2021 when it split the former Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate into two directorates, one overseeing exploration programs and the other the International Space Station and related operations.
Earlier in his 30-year NASA career, he was director of the Glenn Research Center in Cleveland.
The announcement did not disclose why Free was leaving the agency now or his future plans.
“I am grateful for the opportunity to be part of the NASA family and contribute to the agency’s mission for the benefit of humanity,” he said in a statement.
As associate administrator, Free was expected to become acting administrator when Bill Nelson and Pam Melroy stepped down as administrator and deputy administrator, respectively, at the end of the Biden administration.
Immediately after Donald Trump was inaugurated as president Jan. 20, NASA’s website was updated to list Free as acting administrator.
However, several hours later the White House announced it had selected Janet Petro, director of the Kennedy Space Center, as acting administrator.
The decision reportedly even took top agency officials by surprise. The White House did not explain why it chose Petro to be the agency’s interim leader.
There is speculation, though, that it did so because they considered Free too much of an advocate of the current Artemis lunar exploration architecture, one that the administration is considering revising.
Free, in a speech at a conference in Huntsville, Alabama, before the election, urged the next administration not to make major changes to Artemis.
“We need that consistency in purpose. That has not happened since Apollo,” he said then. “If we lose that, I believe we will fall apart and we will wander, and other people in this world will pass us by.”
“Jim’s legacy is one of selfless service, steadfast leadership, and a belief in the power of people,” Petro said in a statement about Free.
The announcement of Free’s departure comes a day after the agency avoided, at least temporary, major layoffs.
The projected firings of probationary civil-service employees — those who have been hired in the last year or recently moved into new positions — would have involved 1,000 or more people at NASA, but did not materialize.
In a Feb. 19 statement, NASA said it was working with the Office of Personnel Management (OPM) on both the status of probationary employees as well as those who signed up for the Deferred Resignation Program, a buyout where employees resign but are paid through the end of the fiscal year.
At least 750 NASA employees, and potentially more than 900, agreed to the buyout, according to sources, but the agency has not provided a figure.
Some probationary employees are among those who signed up for the buyout, the agency stated, and will go on administrative leave by the end of the week.
“NASA is working with OPM on exemptions for those in the probationary period in mission critical functions,” the agency added.
The agency has reportedly sought a blanket exemption for all or most of its probationary employees from layoffs.
It was not clear, though, why NASA would get special treatment when the administration has been firing probationary employees, with limited exceptions, across other federal agencies.
Some have questioned the legality of those firings, arguing that even probationary employees can only be fired for cause.
“In order to be fired in federal government as a probationary employee, it has to be for performance reasons or misconduct,” argued Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) during a town hall Feb. 19 in Silver Spring, Maryland, a suburb of Washington.
“In these cases, that was not what they did.”
He said he supported efforts in the courts to reinstate fired probationary employees.
“We are going to fight to get them fully reinstated with all their protection, and I think we have a very reasonable chance of success in many of these cases, if not all of these cases.”
https://spacenews.com/jim-free-nasa-associate-administrator-to-retire/
NIBULON has started cooperation with NASA Harvest
20 Feb, 2025
NIBULON and NASA Harvest, a programme of NASA, have announced a strategic partnership to strengthen global food security.
The collaboration between NASA Harvest and NIBULON combines satellite data and analytics with NIBULON’s extensive expertise in agricultural production.
"Partnering with NIBULON provides NASA Harvest with critical insights for analyzing the production of key crops in Ukraine, helping the Ukrainian government assess yields in both free and occupied territories.
By using NIBULON’s field data, we refine our research, verifying and calibrating crop recognition models.
The strategic location of NIBULON’s fields in Mykolaiv region, near the frontline, allows us to obtain accurate data from areas closest to occupied territories.
This is extremely important, as access to data from these areas is impossible.
Therefore, NIBULON’s expertise in this region is invaluable to our work," said Oleksandra Oliinyk, Strategic Partnerships Manager at NASA Harvest in Ukraine.
By combining NASA Harvest’s expertise in remote sensing with NIBULON’s agricultural production knowledge, this partnership contributes to building a more sustainable and resilient future for global food systems.
"Despite the challenges in the agricultural sector, we had the courage to rethink our approach to farming, shifting our focus to efficiency and profitability through investments.
We saw tangible results in the first year under the new model: EBITDA growth from $200/ha to $800/ha, depending on the region, and a 60% increase in production compared to the previous year.
We sincerely thank NASA Harvest for their support and valuable data, which have informed our management decisions," commented Oleg Veselov, NIBULON’s Director of Agricultural Production.
https://odessa-journal.com/nibulon-has-started-cooperation-with-nasa-harvest
https://www.nibulon.com/en/
NASA Sends Experiment to Space to Study Antibiotic-Resistant Bacteria
Feb 19, 2025
In an effort to learn more about astronaut health and the effects of space on the human body, NASA is conducting a new experiment aboard the International Space Station to speed up the detection of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, thus improving the health safety not only of astronauts but patients back on Earth.
Infections caused by antibiotic-resistant bacteria can be difficult or impossible to treat, making antibiotic resistance a leading cause of death worldwide and a global health concern.
Future astronauts visiting the Moon or Mars will need to rely on a pre-determined supply of antibiotics in case of illness. Ensuring those antibiotics remain effective is an important safety measure for future missions.
The Genomic Enumeration of Antibiotic Resistance in Space (GEARS) experiment, which is managed by NASA’s Ames Research Center in California’s Silicon Valley, involves astronauts swabbing interior surfaces across the space station and testing those samples for evidence of antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and in particular Enterococcus faecalis, a type of bacteria commonly found in the human body.
The experiment is the first step in a series of work that seeks to better understand how organisms grow in a space environment, and how those similarities and differences might help improve research back on Earth.
“Enterococcus is a type of organism that’s been with us since our ancestors crawled out of the ocean, and is a core member of the human gut,” said Christopher Carr, assistant professor at the Georgia Institute of Technology and co-principal investigator of GEARS.
“It’s able to survive inside and outside of its host, which has allowed it to become the second highest leading cause of hospital-acquired infections. We want to understand how this type of organism is adapting to the space environment.”
The GEARS experiment seeks to improve the detection and identification of these bacteria, building on existing efforts to understand what organisms grow on the station’s surfaces.
“We’ve been monitoring the surfaces of the space station since 2000, but this experiment will give us insight beyond the identities of present organisms, which is currently all that is used for risk assessment,” said Sarah Wallace, a microbiologist at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston and co-principal investigator of GEARS.
“With the station orbiting close to Earth, it’s a low-risk space to evaluate and learn more about the frequency of this bacteria and how it responds to the space environment so we can apply this understanding to missions to the Moon and Mars, where resupplies are more complex.”
Over the next year, astronauts will swab parts of the station and analyze samples by adding an antibiotic to the medium in which the samples will grow.
The results will reveal where this and other resistant bacteria are growing and whether they can persist or spread across the station.
The experiment was originally launched to the ISS on the 30th SpaceX commercial resupply services (CRS) mission in March 2024, and the first round of GEARS testing turned up surprising results: very few resistant bacteria colonies, none of which were E. faecalis. This bodes well for the threat of antibiotic resistance in space.
“There was some cleaning done before swabbing the station, which may have removed some bacteria,” said Carr.
To better understand how and where risky bacteria may live, the astronauts paused some cleaning before the second round of swabbing.
“We want the astronauts to have a clean environment, but we also want to test those high-touch areas, so they intentionally and briefly avoided cleaning some areas so we can understand how bacteria may grow or spread on the station.”
This experiment is the first study to perform metagenomic sequencing in space, a method that analyzes all the genetic material in a sample to identify and characterize all organisms that are present, an important research and medical diagnostic capability for future deep space missions.
The GEARS team hopes to create a rapid workflow to analyze bacteria samples, reducing the time between swabbing and test results from days to hours.
That workflow could be applied in hospitals and make a huge impact when treating hospital-acquired infections from antibiotic-resistant microbes.
The result could save lives – more than 35,000 people die each year as a result of antibiotic-resistant infections. The issue is personal to Wallace, who lost a family member to a hospital-acquired infection.
“It’s not that uncommon: so many people have experienced this kind of loss,” said Wallace. “A method to give an answer in a matter of hours is huge and profound.
https://www.nasa.gov/missions/station/nasa-sends-experiment-to-space-to-study-antibiotic-resistant-bacteria/
https://science.nasa.gov/biological-physical/investigations/gears/
Introducing the New Hampshire Space Potatoes: Baseball Topped By a History Lesson
February 20, 2025
The New Hampshire Fisher Cats will be serving a side of history with their Double-A baseball three times this season.
The first of those contests is April 19, when the Fisher Cats will become for that evening the New Hampshire Space Potatoes.
Space Potatoes?
The moniker and accompanying logo the players will wear for their alternate identity (also on July 18 and Aug. 30) nights are throwbacks to two big parts of New Hampshire lore: potatoes and UFOs.
“I’ve been amazed at watching our staff bring the Space Potatoes identity to life,” said Taylor Fisher, the Fisher Cats general manager.
“It’s been a lot of fun to combine two notable New Hampshire firsts into one brand, and I’m so excited to watch our fans get to enjoy it in 2025.”
So here is how the Space Potatoes came to be – and maybe only the most fervent history buffs in the Live Free or Die state know this.
The first white potato on American soil was found in Londonderry, N.H. – now known as Derry – in the early 18th century by Scottish Irish settlers.
The little potato became the official vegetable of the state in 2013.
But New Hampshire also is known as the site of the Barney & Betty Hill incident, in which a couple traveling along Route 3 in the state’s famed White Mountains said they were abducted by aliens.
Space, meet potatoes.
That isn’t the only alternate identity for the Fisher Cats.
They also have been known to go by the name Manchester Chicken Tenders to commemorate the invention of the chicken tender at a local restaurant in 1974.
Whatever the franchise calls itself, the place to watch the Toronto Blue Jays’ Double-A Affiliate is Delta Dental Stadium in Manchester.
The team’s season begins April 4 at home against the Binghamton Rumble Ponies.
https://www.si.com/onsi/minor-league-baseball/introducing-the-new-hampshire-space-potatoes-baseball-topped-by-a-history-lesson
https://www.milb.com/new-hampshire/team/space-potatoes
Communication breakdown: Polish Space Agency faces scrutiny over Falcon 9 debris
20.02.2025 15:00
As part of the EU Space Surveillance and Tracking (EU SST) program, POLSA regularly monitors space debris and provides reports to relevant departments.
The agency confirmed it had issued multiple alerts about the rocket’s uncontrolled re-entry, but due to an email delivery failure, some officials never received the warnings.
On Wednesday, authorities confirmed the discovery of large debris, prompting cooperation between POLSA, local police, and SpaceX to verify its origin.
Defense Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz acknowledged the communication failure, revealing that critical emails were sent to outdated addresses, delaying the response.
In light of the incident, the government has ordered a review of POLSA’s reporting system and is working on improved procedures to handle future space debris events more effectively.
At a press conference in Parliament on Thursday, Minister of Development and Technology Krzysztof Paszyk announced that Poland’s Space Agency (POLSA) must immediately develop new communication protocols, streamline their implementation, and ensure an appropriate response to incidents like the recent Falcon 9 debris case.
https://www.polskieradio.pl/395/7784/Artykul/3487401,communication-breakdown-polish-space-agency-faces-scrutiny-over-falcon-9-debris
https://twitter.com/brusselssignal/status/1892582363470737863
Blue Origin Announces Crew for New Shepard’s 30th Mission
Feb 18, 2025
Blue Origin today revealed the six people flying on its NS-30 mission. The crew includes: Lane Bess, Jesús Calleja, Elaine Chia Hyde, Dr. Richard Scott, Tushar Shah, and an undisclosed sixth crew member.
Lane is flying on New Shepard for the second time, the fourth astronaut to do so.
This mission is the 10th human flight for the New Shepard program and the 30th in its history.
To date, the program has flown 47 humans above the Kármán line, the internationally recognized boundary of space.
Meet the Crew
Lane Bess
Lane is the Principal and Founder of Bess Ventures and Advisory, a family office fund supporting technology firms that innovate and disrupt across multiple market sectors.
He has led and built some of the world’s largest cybersecurity companies, including Palo Alto Networks and Zscaler, both of which he helped lead to IPO.
Lane also serves as a Trustee at Carnegie Mellon University and supports philanthropic interests across health and social issues. Lane first flew to space on NS-19 on December 11, 2021.
Jesús Calleja
Jesús is a Spanish TV host, mountaineer, pilot, and lifelong adventurer. He currently hosts Calleja Planet, Flying By, and Calleja Universe, which air on Mediaset channels in Spain.
Jesús’s adventures have taken him to every corner of the world, including the Seven Summits, the North and South Poles, and numerous deserts, active volcanoes, and ancient sinkholes.
A passionate race car driver, Jesús has participated in numerous international racing competitions, including four editions of the Dakar Rally and a 3,400-mile journey from the French Pyrenees to Dakar, Senegal.
Elaine Chia Hyde
Elaine is an entrepreneur, physicist, and pilot. She is the founder of Chicago Star, a news and media company, and Eastside Enterprises, a research and development company focused on AI-assisted media products.
Elaine was born in Singapore and grew up in Australia. Space has captivated her imagination since childhood.
A graduate of the University of Melbourne, she studied business and physics with the goal of inventing experiments to be conducted in space.
Elaine soon immigrated to the United States, where she worked as an intern at the University of Pennsylvania and later became a research scientist. Elaine, her husband, also a physicist, and their five children live in Florida.
Dr. Richard Scott
Dr. Scott is a reproductive endocrinologist, embryologist, professor, research scientist, philanthropist, entrepreneur, and avid pilot.
He was a founding partner and CEO of IVIRMA Global, the world’s largest fertility care group with clinics and laboratories in 10 countries.
Dr. Scott is an adjunct professor at Yale University and the University of South Carolina (Greenville) Medical Schools, and founded The Foundation for Embryonic Competence, a nonprofit focused on reproduction research, where he also serves as Scientific Director.
He has served on the national boards of Directors of the Resolve and the American Fertility Associations, the two largest patient advocacy organizations for fertility care.
He and his wife have been married for 45 years and have four children.
Tushar Shah
Tushar is a partner and the co-head of research at a quantitative hedge fund in New York City.
He studied physics as an undergraduate at MIT and high energy experimental particle physics for his PhD, also at MIT.
He and his wife, Sara, are philanthropists focused on addressing issues related to poverty, health, and education. They have two children.
The flight date will be announced soon.
https://www.blueorigin.com/news/new-shepard-ns-30-mission
SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket debris creates dramatic fireball over Europe, crashes in Poland
February 20, 2025
A SpaceX rocket stage fell to Earth early Wednesday (Feb. 19), blazing a trail of fire through European skies.
Across the English region of Lincolnshire, the fireball was visible over homes, with locals posting images on social media, the BBC reported.
"It was quite bright, so it does seem to have been quite a substantial object," astronomer Paul Money told the BBC.
An early morning Reddit post showed the fireball over Berlin, and later on Wednesday, reports from Poland detailed a large object that fell from the sky outside Poznań, a large city in western Poland.
"Today, around 9:20 a.m., we received information from employees of one of the companies from Komornik near Poznań that, after starting work, they noticed an unspecified object resembling a reservoir on its premises," said Łukasz Paterski of the Poznań Police, according to a website that provides news for the city.
"No one was affected as a result of this incident."
The flaming debris was part of the upper stage of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that launched 22 of the company's Starlink internet satellites to orbit from California on Feb. 1, experts say.
The Falcon 9 upper stage is expendable (unlike the rocket's first-stage booster) but is designed to be brought down in a controlled fashion shortly after launch.
That didn't happen on this particular mission, however.
"The Falcon 9 second stage from the Starlink 11-4 launch failed to deorbit itself on Feb 2.
It reentered over Northern Europe last night, with entry over the Irish Sea at 0343 UTC Feb 19 and the reentry track extending to Poland and Ukraine a couple of minutes later," astrophysicist and satellite tracker Jonathan McDowell, of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, said via X early Wednesday morning.
The Polish Space Agency (POLSA) confirmed that finding in a statement, noting an "uncontrolled entry into the atmosphere of a member of the FALCON 9 R/B launch vehicle — the object with the number NORAD/COSPAR ID 62878/2025-022Y — over Polish territory."
"The part of the rocket, weighing about 4 tons, came from the SpaceX Starlink Group 11-4 mission, which took off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California on February 1, 2025," the agency added (in Polish; translation by Google).
Later, a second object that closely resembles the first was discovered in the forest near Wiry Village, about 19 miles (30 kilometers) from the first debris-landing site.
"We cannot rule out that the object found near Poznań comes from the Falcon 9 rocket, whose flight we monitored," Agnieszka Gapys, press officer for POLSA, told Reuters on Wednesday. "Confirmation of this requires appropriate examination."
Recently, a photo posted to X from a Europe-based reporter suggests that a third piece has been found.
As of Wednesday afternoon, SpaceX had yet to release a statement on the debris. This story is still developing.
https://www.space.com/space-exploration/launches-spacecraft/spacex-falcon-9-rocket-debris-creates-dramatic-fireball-over-europe-crashes-in-poland
https://polsa.gov.pl/wydarzenia/komunikat-polsa-w-sprawie-niekontrolowanego-wejscia-w-atmosfere-czlonu-rakiety-nosnej/
https://twitter.com/planet4589/status/1892178779746791890
Largest-ever discovery of 'missing link' black holes revealed by dark energy camera
February 19, 2025
Astronomers have uncovered a treasure trove of feeding black holes at the heart of dwarf galaxies — small, faint galaxies containing thousands to several billions of stars but very little gas.
The discovery, made with the Dark Energy Spectroscopic Instrument (DESI), contains several "missing link" intermediate-mass black holes.
This is both the largest sample of dwarf galaxies with active black holes ever seen and the largest haul of elusive intermediate-mass black holes ever collected.
The data could help scientists better understand the dynamics between the evolution of dwarf galaxies and the growth of black holes while building an evolutionary model of the universe's earliest black holes.
However, there is still a mystery associated with this sample: The team behind this discovery was surprised that their data didn't contain more of these mid-sized black holes.
"When a black hole at the center of a galaxy starts feeding, it unleashes a tremendous amount of energy into its surroundings, transforming into what we call an active galactic nucleus," team leader and University of Utah researcher Ragadeepika Pucha said in a statement. "This dramatic activity serves as a beacon, allowing us to identify hidden black holes in these small galaxies."
Some mid-sized black holes are big eaters
Intermediate mass black holes are so fascinating to scientists because they seem to exist within the vast mass gap between stellar mass black holes, which have masses up to 1,000 times that of the sun, and supermassive black holes, which have masses of millions or even billions of times the mass of our star.
These mid-sized black holes are thought to be relics of the first black holes formed in the universe, acting as the "seeds" of the cosmic titans we now call supermassive black holes.
Intermediate-mass black holes could, therefore, be the "missing link" in the growth process that sees stellar-mass black holes grow into supermassive black holes. Yet, intermediate-mass black holes have been frustratingly elusive.
Supermassive black holes are thought to sit at the heart of all large galaxies, and when they are hungrily feasting on gas and dust, they cause this material to grow brightly, with astronomers referring to these regions as "active galactic nuclei (AGNs)."
What is less clear is if smaller galaxies, such as dwarf galaxies, also host supermassive black holes at their hearts. As Pucha explained above, it is easier to hunt black holes of any mass when they are feeding.
DESI joins the hunt for missing link black holes
DESI, mounted on the Nicholas U. Mayall 4-meter Telescope at the Kitt Peak National Observatory, was ideal for this investigation because it is capable of capturing light from 5,000 galaxies simultaneously.
Pucha and colleagues used data collected during the first year of DESI's five-year mission, which included light from 410,000 galaxies, around 115,000 of which were dwarf galaxies.
From this, the team was able to investigate the connection between the evolution of the dwarf galaxy and the evolution of its central black hole.
This led to the discovery of 2,500 candidate dwarf galaxies hosting an AGN. Representing 2% of the overall sample, this was a much higher rate than found in other similar samples, usually around 0.5%.
The team also discovered around 300 intermediate-mass black holes. The results suggest that scientists have thus far been missing a substantial number of low-mass black holes.
Thus far, scientists have discovered no more than around 150 intermediate-mass black hole candidates. That means this DESI haul triples the number of known missing link black holes.
The results suggest that scientists have thus far been missing a substantial number of low-mass black holes.
Prior to this research, scientists had expected black holes in dwarf galaxies to be within the mass range of intermediate-mass black holes.
Interestingly, this data suggested that just 70 intermediate-mass black hole candidates corresponded with dwarf galaxy AGNs.
Thus, by discovering the largest batch of intermediate-mass black holes to date, DESI has arguably left scientists with more questions than answers. Luckily, this team is eager to solve these new puzzles.
"For example, is there any relationship between the mechanisms of black hole formation and the types of galaxies they inhabit?" Pucha concluded.
https://www.space.com/desi-missing-link-intermediate-mass-black-hole
https://noirlab.edu/public/news/noirlab2508/?lang
https://www.space.com/the-universe/stars/einstein-probes-x-ray-vision-discovers-an-impossible-pair-of-vampire-stars
https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Einstein_Probe_catches_X-ray_odd_couple
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/ad9580
'Impossible' pair of vampire stars discovered by Einstein Probe's X-ray vision
February 20, 2025
A flash of powerful X-ray light coming from a nova explosion on a white dwarf star has caught the attention of astronomers using the Chinese–European Einstein Probe.
This nova is especially exciting because the white dwarf star on which it is found exists in a particularly unusual binary star system.
The high-energy flare was spotted on May 27, 2024 coming from a star system in the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC), which is a neighboring satellite of our Milky Way galaxy.
"We were chasing fleeting sources, when we came across this new spot of X-ray light in the SMC," said Alessio Marino of the Institute of Space Sciences in Spain in a statement.
"We realized that we were looking at something unusual, [something] that only Einstein Probe could catch."
The Einstein Probe was launched in January 2024 to study the high-energy universe, and among its instruments is its Wide-field X-ray Telescope (WXT), which is the only X-ray telescope currently in orbit that can detect lower-energy X-rays with enough sensitivity to pinpoint their sources.
And, in this case, the source was a bizarre pairing of stars.
One of the stars is quite massive, totaling about 12 times the mass of our sun. It’s called a "Be" star, meaning that it is of spectral type B (the second hottest type of main sequence star) and that it exhibits strong spectral emission lines.
Its companion is a white dwarf star that is about 20% more massive than our sun. White dwarfs are the final stage of sun-like stars that have expelled their outer layers to uncover their cores.
It's in this dichotomy between the two objects that a stellar paradox lies. A sun-like star can survive for at least hundreds of millions of years, or in the actual sun's case, billions of years, before it becomes a white dwarf.
Yet, a star of 12 solar masses should explode as a supernova after just 20 million years. So, given the huge difference in lifespans, how can this Be star find itself co-orbiting with a white dwarf companion?
The solution seems to be that the Be star and the white dwarf are sharing material, taking turns feeding off one another like vampires.
Originally, scientists believe, the system probably contained two stars with masses six and eight times the mass of our sun, respectively.
The more massive a star is, the faster it uses up its fuel for nuclear fusion reactions in its core, and the shorter its lifespan is.
So, it would have been the eight-solar-mass star that reached this point first. As the fusion reactions in its core began to stutter, the radiation pressure of the energy produced in those reactions began to drop off.
This energy holds a star up against the inward pull of its own gravity, and when this radiation stream weakens it leads to gravity making the outer layers around the core more compact, raising temperatures so that fusion reaction could sporadically ignite in the star's outer layers.
This would have led to pulsations that reverberated through the star, puffing up its outer extremities so that it became a giant.
1/2
At this point, the giant eight-solar-mass star's outer layers would have become vulnerable to being stolen by the gravity of the less massive star.
At the time, the two stars would have only been a few million miles apart, orbiting each other once every three days.
This proximity should have allowed the gravity of the less massive star to begin stealing material from the more massive star, whittling it down.
Eventually, the six-solar-mass star would have grown to 12 solar masses, while all that was left of the eight-solar-mass star was its core: a white dwarf 1.23 times the mass of our sun.
Now, the more compact white dwarf is returning the favor, its gravity stealing back loosely held material from the 12-solar-mass star.
As this material streams back onto the white dwarf, the pressure and temperature at the point of accretion on the white dwarf's surface grows, until a localized thermonuclear explosion erupts.
This results in a nova, or a brilliant outburst of light, including X-rays. That's what Einstein Probe saw.
"This study gives us new insights into a rarely observed phase of stellar evolution, which is the result of a complex exchange of material that must have happened among the two stars," said Ashley Chrimes of the European Space Agency, in the statement.
"It's fascinating to see how an interacting pair of massive stars can produce such an intriguing outcome."
The exchange of material has also altered the fates of the two stellar objects. Ordinarily, a six-solar-mass star would reach the end of its life by swelling into a red giant, before casting away its outer layers to leave behind a white dwarf.
But by having accreted so much mass from its companion, it becomes destined to explode as a supernova.
Meanwhile an eight-solar-mass star is right on the borderline between stars that evolve into red giants and stars that go supernova — but this one has instead turned into a white dwarf that's more typical of less massive stars.
That's not to say it won’t eventually go supernova. Type Ia supernova explosions spur the destruction of white dwarf stars that have accreted too much mass.
The limit is 1.44 times the mass of our sun; it won't take too much accretion to push this white dwarf over the edge so that it obliterates itself in a supernova.
Its only chance to survive relies on its 12-solar-mass companion exploding first. It's now a race against time to see which of the companions survives the longest.
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Trump orders $50 billion cut from 2026 defense budget, shields ‘Iron Dome’ initiative
February 19, 2025
The Trump administration has directed the Pentagon to reduce its budget by 8% annually over the next five years, However, key administration priority programs will be shielded from cuts, including border security and the newly proposed Iron Dome for America missile defense initiative, according to a statement issued on Feb. 19 by Robert Salesses, who is performing the duties of Deputy Secretary of Defense.
In a Feb. 18 memo, the administration ordered the military branches and civilian defense agencies to submit budget proposals by Feb. 24 reflecting the reductions.
The targeted cuts amount to approximately $50 billion from the fiscal year 2026 budget proposal that had been completed by the Biden administration.
“President Trump’s charge to the Department is clear: to achieve peace through strength.
We will do this by putting forward budgets that revive the warrior ethos, rebuild our military, and reestablish deterrence,” Salesses said.
The Iron Dome for America, directed in a Jan. 27 executive order, aims to create a comprehensive shield against sophisticated threats including hypersonic and ballistic missiles, and relies heavily on space assets.
No cost estimates have been released for the program.
Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth initiated a review to identify items that would be cut from the Biden administration’s fiscal year 2026 budget proposal.
The review will focus on programs considered “low-impact and low-priority Biden-legacy programs,” according to Salesses.
The targeted cuts would be redirected toward initiatives aligning with Trump’s priorities, the statement said.
Specifically, the administration has signaled that programs related to climate change and what it describes as “excessive bureaucracy” will be first in line for reductions.
The Pentagon’s finalized budget proposal, reflecting these directives, is expected to be submitted to Congress in the coming months, setting the stage for a contentious debate over defense priorities.
https://spacenews.com/trump-orders-50-billion-cut-from-2026-defense-budget-shields-iron-dome-initiative/
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2025/02/19/trump-pentagon-budget-cuts/
True Anomaly opens Long Beach factory, citing proximity to Space Force customers
February 19, 2025
Space and defense technology startup True Anomaly, based in Colorado, is expanding its operations to Southern California, opening a 90,000-square-foot factory in Long Beach, the company announced Feb. 19.
The move places True Anomaly in closer proximity to the Space Systems Command in Los Angeles, which oversees billions in Space Force procurement, and taps into Southern California’s deep aerospace talent pool.
The majority of the Long Beach factory will be dedicated to the design, development and manufacturing of new products for the military market, including some being developed for classified U.S. Space Force programs, True Anomaly’s CEO Even Rogers said in an interview.
The company’s headquarters and existing manufacturing facility will remain in Centennial, Colorado, where True Anomaly makes its flagship product, the Jackal satellite, designed to perform in-orbit activities such as rendezvous and proximity operations, and imaging of objects in orbit.
The company also developed an operating system software for space domain awareness called Mosaic.
“Southern California has the right mix of startup experience plus deep aerospace experience,” said Rogers.
The region has historically been a nexus for aerospace innovation, home to facilities operated by Boeing, Northrop Grumman, and more recently, a growing cluster of space technology startups.
Founded in 2022, True Anomaly has positioned itself exclusively in the defense market, eschewing commercial applications in favor of developing specialized capabilities for military space operations.
The venture-backed company’s expansion comes as it prepares for its first mission under contract to the Space Force, called Victus Haze. The mission aims to demonstrate rapid-launch capabilities for emergency scenarios.
Scheduled to launch sometime this year, Victus Haze will involve coordinated operations between a Jackal satellite launched by Firefly Aerospace and a Rocket Lab spacecraft also launched by Rocket Lab.
Rogers said True Anomaly decided to plant roots in Long Beach to be close to its key customer. The startup plans to challenge traditional defense contractors by offering satellites, software and services for a fixed price.
At the Space Systems Command, he said, “what we have seen is a growing awareness and understanding of the power of partnering with a venture-backed private company,” he said, as private investment helps reduce development risks for the government.
“I think we’re starting to see program managers and leadership at the Space Systems Command understand the calculus of financial leverage that comes with working with a venture-backed startup,” Rogers said. “They just get the end product.”
The company’s path hasn’t been without challenges. Its inaugural Jackal mission in March 2024 encountered difficulties when ground controllers lost communication with both satellites shortly after deployment.
A second mission launched in December 2024 has shown more promise, with Rogers reporting that the company is “meeting a variety of our objectives.”
https://spacenews.com/true-anomaly-opens-long-beach-factory-citing-proximity-to-space-force-customers/
Hundreds of NASA employees decide to resign as DOGE investigates the space agency
February 19, 2025 8:50pm EST
Hundreds of NASA employees accepted resignation offers from the federal government on Thursday as President Trump tries to gut federal spending.
On Wednesday, a NASA spokesperson confirmed new details as the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) started looking into NASA contracts this week.
What they're saying:
Here’s the latest statement NASA shared on the developing situation:
"NASA continues to work as quickly as possible to comply with the guidance and direction provided by the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) for the Deferred Resignation Program and probationary employees.
The agency is in the process of validating hundreds of employees who responded to the deferred resignation offer before the deadline.
Some probationary employees have taken the deferred resignation offer and those individuals have been, or will be, on administrative leave by the end of this week.
NASA is working with OPM on exemptions for those in the probationary period in mission-critical functions."
A former NASA employee tells FOX 35’s Esther Bower this is just the beginning of job cuts at the federal space agency.
The other side:
Keith Cowing is a retired rocket scientist who was with NASA for about a decade in the 1980s. What’s happening now brings him back to 1996.
He says President Clinton also tried to make massive federal spending cuts, and hundreds of NASA employees lost their jobs back then.
The retired scientist says he’s hearing from employees who aren’t sure what will happen to their jobs or the programs they’re working on.
"Everybody's confused. Everybody’s freaking out, and everybody just wants to get back to the dream job of exploring the universe," said Cowing, who’s the editor of NASAWatch.com.
Cowing still hears from employees working at NASA. His online publication keeps a close watch on what’s happening at the agency.
"I’m hearing things now in 2025 that are a scary echo of 1996, the last time there was a big layoff," said Cowing.
He thinks thousands of jobs are on the chopping block. "This is the pre-game show. There is still a big layoff coming, a reduction in force," he said.
The Planetary Society is also sounding the alarm about layoffs this week.
The independent space advocacy organization put out a statement condemning the dismissal of 1,000 scientists, engineers, and explorers.
The statement reads in part:
"We urge the Trump Administration to reverse this arbitrary decision and work with Congress and other stakeholders to define a clear strategy for continued U.S. leadership in space and to ensure the nation’s space agency has the workforce necessary to succeed in its mission."
Not everyone thinks NASA’s mission is in jeopardy even with the cuts.
"You think Elon Musk is going to hurt our ability to go back to the Moon and Mars? Absolutely not," said Space Coast State Senator Randy Fine.
State Senator Fine says federal spending is outrageous, and every agency needs to be investigated.
"How many people at NASA were focused on DEI?" asked Fine. "The federal government has been irresponsible beyond our wildest imaginations in how they spend our tax dollars."
FOX 35 reached out to NASA on Wednesday, asking if DOGE was on-site specifically at Kennedy Space Center. Officials were not able to confirm that with us.
Cowing says he’s hearing more rumors about layoffs also being announced on Friday.
https://www.fox35orlando.com/news/hundreds-nasa-employees-decide-resign-doge-investigates-space-agency
Astronomers reveal 3D structure of an alien planet's atmosphere
20 Feb 2025 01:07AM
Astronomers for the first time have deciphered the three-dimensional structure of the atmosphere of a planet beyond our solar system, revealing three layers like a wedding cake on a ferociously hot gas planet that orbits close to a star bigger and hotter than our sun.
The researchers peered through the atmosphere of WASP-121b, a planet also called Tylos, by combining all four telescope units of the European Southern Observatory's Chile-based Very Large Telescope, discerning a stratification of layers with different chemical compositions and intense winds.
WASP-121b is tidally locked, meaning that one side of it perpetually faces its star and the other side faces away, like the moon is to Earth.
The side facing the star has a temperature around 4,900 degrees Fahrenheit (2,700 degrees Celsius/3,000 degrees Kelvin). The other side is at about 2,200 degrees Fahrenheit (1,250 degrees Celsius/1,500 degrees Kelvin).
The planet orbits its star at about 2.5 per cent of the distance of Earth to the sun. It is about a third closer to its star than our solar system's innermost planet Mercury is to the sun - so close that it completes an orbit in 1.3 days.
Its host star, called WASP-121, is roughly 1-1/2 times the mass and diameter of the sun, and hotter.
Being able to make out the structure of an exoplanet's atmosphere could be helpful as astronomers search for smaller rocky planets capable of harboring life.
"In the future, we will likely be able to provide similar observations for smaller and cooler planets and thus more similar to Earth," Prinoth said, especially with the European Southern Observatory's Extremely Large Telescope due to be completed in Chile by the end of the decade as the world's largest optical telescope.
"These detailed studies are necessary to provide context for our place in the universe," Seidel said. "Is Earth's climate unique? Can theories we derive from our one data point - Earth - actually explain the whole population of exoplanets?"
"With our study we have shown that climates can behave vastly differently that predicted. There is much more diversity out there than what we have at home," Seidel added.
https://www.channelnewsasia.com/business/astronomers-reveal-3d-structure-alien-planets-atmosphere-4947831
Defense executives demand clarity on space agencies’ missions
February 19, 2025
A lack of clearly defined roles and overlapping missions between the U.S. Space Force, Space Command, and intelligence agencies is sowing confusion among lawmakers, contractors, and the public, raising concerns about the service’s ability to secure resources and execute its mission effectively, industry executives said Feb. 19.
The criticism comes as the military space enterprise faces increased scrutiny over its ability to counter China’s growing capabilities in an increasingly militarized space domain.
A new report from the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies, drawing on insights from an October workshop with dozens of experts from industry, military and academia, highlights persistent challenges in the Space Force’s mission clarity and strategic messaging.
Defense executives who participated in the workshop raised these concerns during an online event hosted by the Mitchell Institute, where they discussed the findings of the report.
Robert Winkler, vice president of corporate development and national security programs at Kratos Defense & Security Solutions, noted that responsibilities remain blurred among the Space Force, which is a military service; U.S. Space Command, which is a unified combatant command; and intelligence agencies operating in space.
“We’ve got Space Command, Space Force, the IC [intelligence community] all doing work in space,” Winkler said, stressing that even within the military, clarity is lacking. “We haven’t really defined what those differences are.”
Arnie Streland, senior director of strategy and business development at Northrop Grumman, echoed those concerns, citing confusion among lawmakers, industry partners, and the public regarding the Space Force’s precise role.
The recent “Iron Dome for America” executive order issued by the Trump administration highlights the challenge, as it mandates the acceleration of space technologies for missile defense without clearly delineating the responsibilities of the Space Force versus those of the Missile Defense Agency and other organizations.
“What is the Space Force’s role going to be for space-based missile defense and space-based sensing versus the Missile Defense Agency or other organizations?” Streland asked.
“You need the clarity in the Pentagon, you need it on Capitol Hill, you need it in the general public so that the Space Force gets the support they need.”
Hesitation to go on the offensive
The executives also called out the Space Force’s current strategy for being too defensive.
Winkler pointed to the service’s emphasis on resilience — hardening satellites and ensuring the survivability of space assets — as a limited approach.
“The Space Force talks about protect and defend, a very defensive mindset, and then they use it as a euphemism to try to talk a little bit about offensive,” he said.
“If all you’re going to do is sit there and be resilient and be able to take punches, you are going to lose the fight in the end.”
He noted that, unlike other military branches that openly discuss offensive capabilities, the Space Force has shied away from such rhetoric.
“First and foremost, we should be able to say the word offensive,” Winkler added, arguing that restrictions on discussing offensive operations could put the U.S. at a disadvantage.
The reluctance to embrace offensive space operations stems in part from concerns over the physical destruction of satellites, which could create dangerous orbital debris.
However, Streland emphasized that the concept of offensive operations does not necessarily mean kinetic strikes on enemy satellites.
“Physically destroying a satellite may not be in our best interest because of the larger debris problem,” Streland said.
“But there should still be a focus on denying the enemy its space capability, which could happen in a number of ways.”
Call for policy change
David Deptula, a retired U.S. Air Force general and dean of the Mitchell Institute, said the Biden administration actively avoided discussions of offensive space operations — an approach that he believes must change.
“We just went through an administration whose policy was not to discuss or embrace the ability to achieve offensive effects in space,” Deptula said. “And that needs to change with the new administration.”
https://spacenews.com/defense-executives-demand-clarity-on-space-agencies-missions/
https://spacenews.com/report-space-force-strategy-resources-insufficient-to-counter-china/