sayareakd
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can you provide flexible solar panel, which can handle rugged handling. I need those for defence related product.
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Space exploration and technology
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LETHALFORCE
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India Is A Spacefaring Nation
http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/gene...68.xml&headline=India Is A Spacefaring Nation
India Is A Spacefaring Nation
India's recent failure to orbit a satellite with an indigenous cryogenic upper-stage engine—after a decade of trying**—will slow the country's ambitious space program, but it is not likely to stop it.
Plans to send astronauts to orbit on an Indian launch vehicle depend on making the engine work, and India's space program has a long history of overcoming setbacks on its own. As it does, it is becoming a respected member of the international spacefaring club in its own right.
Loss of the first launch vehicle to fly with the Indian cryogenic engine was a setback, but there is so much momentum in India's space enterprise that its launch campaign continues with the orbiting this summer of Cartosat 2B on a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV).
That mission continues India's focus on Earth observation from space to help its huge population, particularly in the countryside. The push to develop a cryogenic upper stage for its space launch vehicles has more of an urban thrust, and the nascent human spaceflight program epitomizes it. As they struggle to find out why their new cryogenic engine apparently failed its first flight test, Indian rocket engineers are gaining valuable experience that government planners fully expect will help underpin India's 21st century high-tech economy. The excitement of sending humans into space is calculated to maintain public interest in the effort.
Even with the delay in its human spaceflight plans, this South Asian nation's long-running program to bring the benefits of space to its rural population is steadily moving beyond national borders and low Earth orbit to closer cooperation with other spacefaring nations on Earth-observation and robotic deep-space exploration. As its hardware delivers urban expertise to more and more of India's 600,000 villages, the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) is overcoming years of Cold War isolation to make considerable contributions to international exploration efforts.
Take the Moon. ISRO's Chandra*yaan-1 lunar orbiter provided a platform for a U.S.-built instrument that proved once and for all there is water on Earth's natural satellite. The piggyback instrument may have been provided by scientists at Brown University in Providence, R.I., but the data it delivered was retrieved by an Indian dish antenna in a radio-quiet valley an hour's drive from the center of this high-tech city of six million.
Chandrayaan-2 is already in the works. It will include an Indian-built rover that will trundle another international instrument package across the lunar surface, studying its chemical composition with sophisticated in situ instrumentation. India will build the rocket that sends it to space, and the orbiter that will position it for landing. But the lander itself will be provided by Russia's venerable Lavochkin Association, based on the landers that took the Soviet Lunokhod rovers to the Moon's surface in the early 1970s.
As typified by the ongoing effort to build an indigenous cryogenic rocket engine, ISRO has a long history of developing its own spaceflight hardware. But it will also buy space equipment abroad, if its managers decide that is the best way to go. For example, India will need a large centrifuge for the astronaut training center it is planning here, and it is looking abroad to acquire one.
India also could buy cryogenic upper-stage engines elsewhere —it has been using Russian cryo-engines to launch satellites for years. But that would deprive its propulsion engineers of the experience they will gain in developing the technology. Like neighboring China, India is as interested in the economic and political benefits of space exploration as in the scientific take, and its leaders do not pretend otherwise.
"The Indian space program is now on the threshold of a transition into developing newer capabilities, perspective and direction for ensuring enhanced significance in the national scene and gaining international leadership in a few selected areas," says K. Radhakrishnan, the new chairman of India's Space Commission and head of ISRO. "Space should become the bedrock on which the national systems for societal and other national imperatives are built up. Space should emerge as a catalyst for breeding self-reliance in critical technologies."
http://www.aviationweek.com/aw/gene...68.xml&headline=India Is A Spacefaring Nation
India Is A Spacefaring Nation
India's recent failure to orbit a satellite with an indigenous cryogenic upper-stage engine—after a decade of trying**—will slow the country's ambitious space program, but it is not likely to stop it.
Plans to send astronauts to orbit on an Indian launch vehicle depend on making the engine work, and India's space program has a long history of overcoming setbacks on its own. As it does, it is becoming a respected member of the international spacefaring club in its own right.
Loss of the first launch vehicle to fly with the Indian cryogenic engine was a setback, but there is so much momentum in India's space enterprise that its launch campaign continues with the orbiting this summer of Cartosat 2B on a Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV).
That mission continues India's focus on Earth observation from space to help its huge population, particularly in the countryside. The push to develop a cryogenic upper stage for its space launch vehicles has more of an urban thrust, and the nascent human spaceflight program epitomizes it. As they struggle to find out why their new cryogenic engine apparently failed its first flight test, Indian rocket engineers are gaining valuable experience that government planners fully expect will help underpin India's 21st century high-tech economy. The excitement of sending humans into space is calculated to maintain public interest in the effort.
Even with the delay in its human spaceflight plans, this South Asian nation's long-running program to bring the benefits of space to its rural population is steadily moving beyond national borders and low Earth orbit to closer cooperation with other spacefaring nations on Earth-observation and robotic deep-space exploration. As its hardware delivers urban expertise to more and more of India's 600,000 villages, the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) is overcoming years of Cold War isolation to make considerable contributions to international exploration efforts.
Take the Moon. ISRO's Chandra*yaan-1 lunar orbiter provided a platform for a U.S.-built instrument that proved once and for all there is water on Earth's natural satellite. The piggyback instrument may have been provided by scientists at Brown University in Providence, R.I., but the data it delivered was retrieved by an Indian dish antenna in a radio-quiet valley an hour's drive from the center of this high-tech city of six million.
Chandrayaan-2 is already in the works. It will include an Indian-built rover that will trundle another international instrument package across the lunar surface, studying its chemical composition with sophisticated in situ instrumentation. India will build the rocket that sends it to space, and the orbiter that will position it for landing. But the lander itself will be provided by Russia's venerable Lavochkin Association, based on the landers that took the Soviet Lunokhod rovers to the Moon's surface in the early 1970s.
As typified by the ongoing effort to build an indigenous cryogenic rocket engine, ISRO has a long history of developing its own spaceflight hardware. But it will also buy space equipment abroad, if its managers decide that is the best way to go. For example, India will need a large centrifuge for the astronaut training center it is planning here, and it is looking abroad to acquire one.
India also could buy cryogenic upper-stage engines elsewhere —it has been using Russian cryo-engines to launch satellites for years. But that would deprive its propulsion engineers of the experience they will gain in developing the technology. Like neighboring China, India is as interested in the economic and political benefits of space exploration as in the scientific take, and its leaders do not pretend otherwise.
"The Indian space program is now on the threshold of a transition into developing newer capabilities, perspective and direction for ensuring enhanced significance in the national scene and gaining international leadership in a few selected areas," says K. Radhakrishnan, the new chairman of India's Space Commission and head of ISRO. "Space should become the bedrock on which the national systems for societal and other national imperatives are built up. Space should emerge as a catalyst for breeding self-reliance in critical technologies."
LETHALFORCE
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continued
Radhakrishnan's remarks in a speech at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore (IIM-B), his alma mater, are illustrated in the ambitious plan he is outlining for ISRO after only half a year in office. Building on the work of his predecessor, G. Madhavan Nair, Radhakrishnan is overseeing a program of scientific and technical missions in parallel with upgrades to the communications and Earth-observation spacecraft that are ISRO's traditional core.
As ISRO branches out into new activities, a lot of the outside attention has gone to its fledgling human spaceflight work, which could make India only the fourth nation to send people into space. While delayed by the April 15 upper-stage failure, and funded only through unmanned orbital flights of the spacecraft being designed to take crews to space, India's human program is moving toward selection of the nation's first astronauts. The choice, Radhakrishnan says, will not be limited to military pilots, as in China, but open to civilian scientists of both genders as well (see p. 65).
India also is moving beyond low Earth orbit with its second lunar probe, and preparing to peer even deeper into the Universe with its first space telescope.
Teams of Lavochkin engineers from Moscow can be seen eating together in the spacious dining hall of the ISRO Satellite Center here, where Chandrayaan-1 was built. But they are strictly in a supporting role, reprising their Lunokhod lander for the Indian rover that will descend from the Indian orbiter to ride on Indian lightweight motorized composite wheels across the lunar surface.
T.K. Alex, director of the Satellite Center, says the rover—and the Chandrayaan-2 orbiter overhead—will draw on the lessons of Chandrayaan-1 to carry on with the science the first orbiter started.
"It is a continuation of the previous mission," Alex says. "The capabilities will be enhanced."
Chandrayaan-1 eventually failed in orbit, just as it was beginning bistatic observations with NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (AW&ST Sept. 7, 2009, p. 28). The harsh thermal environment over the Moon's surface probably contributed to the failure, and the lessons learned from operating Chandrayaan-1 will be applied to its successor spacecraft, Alex says. For example, the new orbiter, essentially a twin of the first one, will have more capable radiators to cope with the combined heat of the direct Sun and solar energy reflected up from the surface.
A scientific advisory board is helping ISRO select instruments for Chandrayaan-2, which will continue its earlier work in exploring the structure and origin of Earth's natural satellite. As was the case with Chandrayaan-1, ISRO has invited foreign participation in the new mission, and foreign proposals are among those in the running to fly on it.
Some Indian instruments already have been chosen, Alex says. The 15-kg. (33-lb.), 10-watt, solar-powered rover will include a laser ablation tool for spectral analysis of rocks and soil, and video cameras for navigation. Set for launch on a Geostationary Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV-Mk.II) in 2013, Chandrayaan-2 will follow essentially the same trajectory to the Moon as its predecessor: a series of longer and longer elliptical orbits that will eventually bring it into the lunar gravity well, where the orbiter thrusters will circularize its orbit. The orbiter is expected to last longer than the rover, continuing the mapping and analysis work started with Chandrayaan-1.
ISRO is also branching into space astronomy with Astrosat, a 1,500-kg. orbiting telescope set for launch next year on a PSLV. From its planned 650-km. (404-mi.) orbit, the scientific spacecraft will conduct simultaneous observations in X-ray and ultraviolet wavelengths with two 20-cm. (8-in.) collecting mirrors, plus a grazing-angle mirror for soft and hard X-rays. The three instruments are in preparation, and the satellite's engineering model has gone through thermal vacuum qualification at the ISRO Satellite Integration and Test Establishment (Isite), which houses a 6.5-meter (21-ft.) thermal vacuum chamber, a 29-ton vibration table and a compact antenna test facility.
Radhakrishnan's remarks in a speech at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore (IIM-B), his alma mater, are illustrated in the ambitious plan he is outlining for ISRO after only half a year in office. Building on the work of his predecessor, G. Madhavan Nair, Radhakrishnan is overseeing a program of scientific and technical missions in parallel with upgrades to the communications and Earth-observation spacecraft that are ISRO's traditional core.
As ISRO branches out into new activities, a lot of the outside attention has gone to its fledgling human spaceflight work, which could make India only the fourth nation to send people into space. While delayed by the April 15 upper-stage failure, and funded only through unmanned orbital flights of the spacecraft being designed to take crews to space, India's human program is moving toward selection of the nation's first astronauts. The choice, Radhakrishnan says, will not be limited to military pilots, as in China, but open to civilian scientists of both genders as well (see p. 65).
India also is moving beyond low Earth orbit with its second lunar probe, and preparing to peer even deeper into the Universe with its first space telescope.
Teams of Lavochkin engineers from Moscow can be seen eating together in the spacious dining hall of the ISRO Satellite Center here, where Chandrayaan-1 was built. But they are strictly in a supporting role, reprising their Lunokhod lander for the Indian rover that will descend from the Indian orbiter to ride on Indian lightweight motorized composite wheels across the lunar surface.
T.K. Alex, director of the Satellite Center, says the rover—and the Chandrayaan-2 orbiter overhead—will draw on the lessons of Chandrayaan-1 to carry on with the science the first orbiter started.
"It is a continuation of the previous mission," Alex says. "The capabilities will be enhanced."
Chandrayaan-1 eventually failed in orbit, just as it was beginning bistatic observations with NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (AW&ST Sept. 7, 2009, p. 28). The harsh thermal environment over the Moon's surface probably contributed to the failure, and the lessons learned from operating Chandrayaan-1 will be applied to its successor spacecraft, Alex says. For example, the new orbiter, essentially a twin of the first one, will have more capable radiators to cope with the combined heat of the direct Sun and solar energy reflected up from the surface.
A scientific advisory board is helping ISRO select instruments for Chandrayaan-2, which will continue its earlier work in exploring the structure and origin of Earth's natural satellite. As was the case with Chandrayaan-1, ISRO has invited foreign participation in the new mission, and foreign proposals are among those in the running to fly on it.
Some Indian instruments already have been chosen, Alex says. The 15-kg. (33-lb.), 10-watt, solar-powered rover will include a laser ablation tool for spectral analysis of rocks and soil, and video cameras for navigation. Set for launch on a Geostationary Satellite Launch Vehicle (GSLV-Mk.II) in 2013, Chandrayaan-2 will follow essentially the same trajectory to the Moon as its predecessor: a series of longer and longer elliptical orbits that will eventually bring it into the lunar gravity well, where the orbiter thrusters will circularize its orbit. The orbiter is expected to last longer than the rover, continuing the mapping and analysis work started with Chandrayaan-1.
ISRO is also branching into space astronomy with Astrosat, a 1,500-kg. orbiting telescope set for launch next year on a PSLV. From its planned 650-km. (404-mi.) orbit, the scientific spacecraft will conduct simultaneous observations in X-ray and ultraviolet wavelengths with two 20-cm. (8-in.) collecting mirrors, plus a grazing-angle mirror for soft and hard X-rays. The three instruments are in preparation, and the satellite's engineering model has gone through thermal vacuum qualification at the ISRO Satellite Integration and Test Establishment (Isite), which houses a 6.5-meter (21-ft.) thermal vacuum chamber, a 29-ton vibration table and a compact antenna test facility.
LETHALFORCE
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continued
Those facilities should get plenty of use in the years to come. A national program in planetary science and exploration, known as Planex, is developing long- and short-term strategies for ISRO's Advisory Committee for Space Research. Planex is running 15 projects and considering three more. It also organizes workshops on potential areas of study, and conducts research with data already at hand.
That includes ongoing analysis of the 5 terabytes of data generated by Chandrayaan-1 and its lunar impactor, which is maintained at the new Indian Space Science Data Center near the Indian Deep Space Network antenna farm, and at an undisclosed second location for backup.
ISRO experts also are focusing on characterizing radiation signatures from planetary surfaces to develop instruments for future missions. The work includes the study of meteorites, such as the Sulagiri meteorite that fell in India's Tamil Nadu state on Sept. 12, 2008.
The Indian Deep Space Network is based at Byalalu, in a sheltered valley below Savandurga Mountain on the outskirts of sprawling Bengaluru. The Byalalu facility boasts an 18-meter tracking antenna and the 32-meter antenna designed and built in India for Chandra*yaan-1. With X- and S-band uplink and downlink capability, the big dish boasts a "periscope" wave guide from its antenna to receivers in its base for better energy efficiency than would be possible with cables.
Beyond India, ISRO maintains a worldwide tracking network, with dedicated antennas and cooperative arrangements. That system, known as the ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command network, was used during the Chandrayaan-1 mission, but it was built to support the broader Indian satellite constellation aimed at serving the villages.
"It is very important," says Radhakrishnan. "Because we are using space in every walk of life, space is touching the life of the common man, directly and indirectly."
Before being named ISRO chairman, Radhakrishnan was directly involved in using India's communications and Earth-observation satellites to help guide the response to the Dec. 26, 2004, tsunami that ravaged India's southeast coast, and upgrade space-based disaster early warning services afterward. In a country with about 200 political districts prone to some kind of natural disaster, the connectivity and broad view available from space are invaluable.
"When there is a disaster, the first thing that will go out is the power and the communications," he says. "So you have communications established through satellites. And [next], when there is a disaster, you have relief operations that need spatial data, which comes from remote-sensing."
The new Cartosat 2B is the latest in the Indian Remote Sensing (IRS) series of spacecraft, a follow-on to Cartosat 2A that was launched April 28, 2008. Its utility will go far beyond natural disasters. With a panchromatic resolution better than 1 meter, it approximates the international standard for commercial remote-sensing spacecraft. The 690-kg. satellite will generate a revisit schedule of four to five days from its nominal 630-km. orbit, and can be dropped to 560 km. for daily passes over specific targets. It will produce a 9.6-km. swath, and can be tilted across or up and down its ground track as much as 45 deg.
Once it is fully checked out, Cartosat 2A will be the 11th operational IRS platform, providing data for land-use and resource management, mapping and disaster work. India's Earth resources constellation is one of the largest in the world, and provides some of the most direct benefits to rural Indians under the ISRO portfolio
Those facilities should get plenty of use in the years to come. A national program in planetary science and exploration, known as Planex, is developing long- and short-term strategies for ISRO's Advisory Committee for Space Research. Planex is running 15 projects and considering three more. It also organizes workshops on potential areas of study, and conducts research with data already at hand.
That includes ongoing analysis of the 5 terabytes of data generated by Chandrayaan-1 and its lunar impactor, which is maintained at the new Indian Space Science Data Center near the Indian Deep Space Network antenna farm, and at an undisclosed second location for backup.
ISRO experts also are focusing on characterizing radiation signatures from planetary surfaces to develop instruments for future missions. The work includes the study of meteorites, such as the Sulagiri meteorite that fell in India's Tamil Nadu state on Sept. 12, 2008.
The Indian Deep Space Network is based at Byalalu, in a sheltered valley below Savandurga Mountain on the outskirts of sprawling Bengaluru. The Byalalu facility boasts an 18-meter tracking antenna and the 32-meter antenna designed and built in India for Chandra*yaan-1. With X- and S-band uplink and downlink capability, the big dish boasts a "periscope" wave guide from its antenna to receivers in its base for better energy efficiency than would be possible with cables.
Beyond India, ISRO maintains a worldwide tracking network, with dedicated antennas and cooperative arrangements. That system, known as the ISRO Telemetry, Tracking and Command network, was used during the Chandrayaan-1 mission, but it was built to support the broader Indian satellite constellation aimed at serving the villages.
"It is very important," says Radhakrishnan. "Because we are using space in every walk of life, space is touching the life of the common man, directly and indirectly."
Before being named ISRO chairman, Radhakrishnan was directly involved in using India's communications and Earth-observation satellites to help guide the response to the Dec. 26, 2004, tsunami that ravaged India's southeast coast, and upgrade space-based disaster early warning services afterward. In a country with about 200 political districts prone to some kind of natural disaster, the connectivity and broad view available from space are invaluable.
"When there is a disaster, the first thing that will go out is the power and the communications," he says. "So you have communications established through satellites. And [next], when there is a disaster, you have relief operations that need spatial data, which comes from remote-sensing."
The new Cartosat 2B is the latest in the Indian Remote Sensing (IRS) series of spacecraft, a follow-on to Cartosat 2A that was launched April 28, 2008. Its utility will go far beyond natural disasters. With a panchromatic resolution better than 1 meter, it approximates the international standard for commercial remote-sensing spacecraft. The 690-kg. satellite will generate a revisit schedule of four to five days from its nominal 630-km. orbit, and can be dropped to 560 km. for daily passes over specific targets. It will produce a 9.6-km. swath, and can be tilted across or up and down its ground track as much as 45 deg.
Once it is fully checked out, Cartosat 2A will be the 11th operational IRS platform, providing data for land-use and resource management, mapping and disaster work. India's Earth resources constellation is one of the largest in the world, and provides some of the most direct benefits to rural Indians under the ISRO portfolio
nandu
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Comet in northeastern sky offers delight for skygazers
The comet, with a green atmosphere, will be closer to Earth on June 15-16.
MUMBAI : A comet is swinging through the inner solar system and is brightening rapidly even as it approaches the Sun, according to US space agency NASA.
Comet McNaught (C/2009 R1), which has a vivid green head and a long wispy tail, can be found low in the northeastern sky before dawn gliding through the constellation Perseus. It is brightening as it approaches Earth for a 1.13 AU close encounter on June 15th and 16th, NASA said.
"By the end of the month it could be visible to the naked eye perhaps as bright as the stars of the Big Dipper...Because this is the comet's first visit to the inner solar system, predictions of future brightness are necessarily uncertain; amateur astronomers should be alert for the unexpected," NASA said in its website www.spaceweather.com.
The comet's green atmosphere is larger than the planet Jupiter, while the long willowy ion tail stretches more than a million kilometres through space. These dimensions make the comet a fine target for backyard telescopes.
Mid-June is when McNaught should be most interesting, offering the best compromise between its increasing brightness and its decreasing altitude at the start of dawn. Moreover, the sky will be free of moonlight, according to astronomy journal 'Sky and Telescope'.
http://www.brahmand.com/news/Comet-in-northeastern-sky-offers-delight-for-skygazers/4118/1/14.html
The comet, with a green atmosphere, will be closer to Earth on June 15-16.
MUMBAI : A comet is swinging through the inner solar system and is brightening rapidly even as it approaches the Sun, according to US space agency NASA.
Comet McNaught (C/2009 R1), which has a vivid green head and a long wispy tail, can be found low in the northeastern sky before dawn gliding through the constellation Perseus. It is brightening as it approaches Earth for a 1.13 AU close encounter on June 15th and 16th, NASA said.
"By the end of the month it could be visible to the naked eye perhaps as bright as the stars of the Big Dipper...Because this is the comet's first visit to the inner solar system, predictions of future brightness are necessarily uncertain; amateur astronomers should be alert for the unexpected," NASA said in its website www.spaceweather.com.
The comet's green atmosphere is larger than the planet Jupiter, while the long willowy ion tail stretches more than a million kilometres through space. These dimensions make the comet a fine target for backyard telescopes.
Mid-June is when McNaught should be most interesting, offering the best compromise between its increasing brightness and its decreasing altitude at the start of dawn. Moreover, the sky will be free of moonlight, according to astronomy journal 'Sky and Telescope'.
http://www.brahmand.com/news/Comet-in-northeastern-sky-offers-delight-for-skygazers/4118/1/14.html
nandu
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An exoplanet in motion caught!
The above composite image shows the reflected light on the dust disc in the outer part. In the central part, the observations of the planet obtained in 2003 and autumn 2009 are shown.
PARIS (BNS): An exoplanet revolving around its host star has caught the attention of astronomers who, for the first time, have directly followed the planet's movement from one side of the star to the other.
The planet, having a mass about nine times that of the Jupiter, is orbiting the star Beta Pictoris.
Astronomers, with the help of European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope, have directly tracked the planet's movement from one side of its host star to the other side.
The planet, called Beta Pictoris b, has the smallest orbit so far of all the directly imaged exoplanets. The planet's distance from its host star is similar to Saturn's distance from the Sun. Astronomers believe that the planet may have formed the same way as the giant planets of our Solar System.
The star it is revolving around is only 12 million years old or less than three-thousandths of the age of the Sun, but is 75% more massive than the Sun. Located about 60 light-years away towards the constellation of Pictor (the Painter), the Beta Pictoris is one of the best-known examples of a star surrounded by a dusty debris disc which result from the collisions of large cosmic bodies like planetary embryos or asteroids.
The disc around Beta Pictoris extends up to about 1000 times the distance between the Earth and the Sun. Since the star is so young, the exoplanet's existence around it proves that gas giant planets can form within discs in only a few million years, a short time in cosmic terms.
The immediate surroundings of Beta Pictoris were first studied in 2003 during which a faint source inside the disc was observed. In the subsequent images taken in 2008 and 2009, the object, to astronomers' surprise, had disappeared from the scene.
The most recent observations, taken during autumn 2009, revealed the object on the other side of the disc after a period of hiding either behind or in front of the star (in which case it is hidden in the glare of the star). This confirmed that the source indeed was an exoplanet and that it was orbiting its host star. It also provided insights into the size of its orbit around the star.
"Those were indirect, but tell-tale signs that strongly suggested the presence of a massive planet, and our new observations now definitively prove this," said Anne-Marie Lagrange, the team leader of astronomers who studied the exoplanet.
"Because the star is so young, our results prove that giant planets can form in discs in time-spans as short as a few million years," Lagrange said.
http://www.brahmand.com/news/An-exoplanet-in-motion-caught!/4128/1/14.html
The above composite image shows the reflected light on the dust disc in the outer part. In the central part, the observations of the planet obtained in 2003 and autumn 2009 are shown.
PARIS (BNS): An exoplanet revolving around its host star has caught the attention of astronomers who, for the first time, have directly followed the planet's movement from one side of the star to the other.
The planet, having a mass about nine times that of the Jupiter, is orbiting the star Beta Pictoris.
Astronomers, with the help of European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope, have directly tracked the planet's movement from one side of its host star to the other side.
The planet, called Beta Pictoris b, has the smallest orbit so far of all the directly imaged exoplanets. The planet's distance from its host star is similar to Saturn's distance from the Sun. Astronomers believe that the planet may have formed the same way as the giant planets of our Solar System.
The star it is revolving around is only 12 million years old or less than three-thousandths of the age of the Sun, but is 75% more massive than the Sun. Located about 60 light-years away towards the constellation of Pictor (the Painter), the Beta Pictoris is one of the best-known examples of a star surrounded by a dusty debris disc which result from the collisions of large cosmic bodies like planetary embryos or asteroids.
The disc around Beta Pictoris extends up to about 1000 times the distance between the Earth and the Sun. Since the star is so young, the exoplanet's existence around it proves that gas giant planets can form within discs in only a few million years, a short time in cosmic terms.
The immediate surroundings of Beta Pictoris were first studied in 2003 during which a faint source inside the disc was observed. In the subsequent images taken in 2008 and 2009, the object, to astronomers' surprise, had disappeared from the scene.
The most recent observations, taken during autumn 2009, revealed the object on the other side of the disc after a period of hiding either behind or in front of the star (in which case it is hidden in the glare of the star). This confirmed that the source indeed was an exoplanet and that it was orbiting its host star. It also provided insights into the size of its orbit around the star.
"Those were indirect, but tell-tale signs that strongly suggested the presence of a massive planet, and our new observations now definitively prove this," said Anne-Marie Lagrange, the team leader of astronomers who studied the exoplanet.
"Because the star is so young, our results prove that giant planets can form in discs in time-spans as short as a few million years," Lagrange said.
http://www.brahmand.com/news/An-exoplanet-in-motion-caught!/4128/1/14.html
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http://www.space-travel.com/reports/Japans_space_yacht_starts_sailing_999.html
Japan's 'space yacht' starts sailing
Japan said Friday its kite-shaped "space yacht", designed to float through space using only the power of the sun, successfully started sailing with solar power generation.
A Japanese rocket last month launched the experimental "Ikaros" -- Interplanetary Kite-craft Accelerated by Radiation of the Sun -- designed to be propelled by the pressure of sunlight particles.
The technology could eventually enable space travel without fuel, as long as there is sunlight.
Similar to an ocean yacht pushed by wind, the device has a square, ultra-thin and flexible sail measuring 14 metres by 14 metres (46 by 46 feet) that will be driven through space as it is pelted by solar particles.
The sail, which was fully expanded Thursday, is only a fraction of the thickness of a human hair and is partly coated with thin-film solar cells to generate electricity.
Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) "confirmed the full expansion of the sail and electric generation with thin film solar cells at about 7.7 million kilometres from Earth," it said in a statement.
JAXA will continue monitoring and studying "navigation technology using the solar sail", it said.
The name alludes to Icarus, the figure from Greek mythology who flew too close to the sun. The space yacht, however, is headed in the direction of Venus.
Ikaros, which cost 1.5 billion yen (16 million dollars) to develop, will be the first use of propellant-free technology in deep space, although it has been tested in orbit around the Earth before.
JAXA has said the navigation technology "will mark the first spectacular achievement of its kind in the world."
Japan's 'space yacht' starts sailing
Japan said Friday its kite-shaped "space yacht", designed to float through space using only the power of the sun, successfully started sailing with solar power generation.
A Japanese rocket last month launched the experimental "Ikaros" -- Interplanetary Kite-craft Accelerated by Radiation of the Sun -- designed to be propelled by the pressure of sunlight particles.
The technology could eventually enable space travel without fuel, as long as there is sunlight.
Similar to an ocean yacht pushed by wind, the device has a square, ultra-thin and flexible sail measuring 14 metres by 14 metres (46 by 46 feet) that will be driven through space as it is pelted by solar particles.
The sail, which was fully expanded Thursday, is only a fraction of the thickness of a human hair and is partly coated with thin-film solar cells to generate electricity.
Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) "confirmed the full expansion of the sail and electric generation with thin film solar cells at about 7.7 million kilometres from Earth," it said in a statement.
JAXA will continue monitoring and studying "navigation technology using the solar sail", it said.
The name alludes to Icarus, the figure from Greek mythology who flew too close to the sun. The space yacht, however, is headed in the direction of Venus.
Ikaros, which cost 1.5 billion yen (16 million dollars) to develop, will be the first use of propellant-free technology in deep space, although it has been tested in orbit around the Earth before.
JAXA has said the navigation technology "will mark the first spectacular achievement of its kind in the world."
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Extrasolar Planets
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/CoRoT_Unveils_A_Rich_Assortment_Of_New_Exoplanets_999.html
CoRoT Unveils A Rich Assortment Of New Exoplanets
By detecting the faint dimming in the light emitted by stars during a transit event, CoRoT has detected six new exoplanets - each with its own peculiar characteristics - and one brown dwarf. One of these exoplanets, designated CoRoT-11b, has twice the mass of Jupiter and orbits a rapidly rotating star; this type of star is an extremely difficult target for exoplanet searches and its detection marks a significant achievement for the CoRoT team.
In order to detect planets
orbiting other suns, the CoRoT satellite, which is operated by CNES (the French space agency), observes a large number of stars over a significant period of time, trying to spot a subtle decrease in their luminosity: this 'dimming' could be a signature that the star hosts a planet, which is transiting in front of it and partially obscuring its light.
This transit technique is one of several methods used to search for exoplanets but is the only one that allows astronomers to determine the radius of the planet - by measuring the depth of the transit.
Other geometrical configurations of a stellar system, for instance the presence of one or more companion stars can, however, mimic the presence of a planet.
For this reason follow-up observations are needed to confirm the planetary nature of the transiting body. Alerted by CoRoT's detection of a candidate planet-hosting star, some of the foremost ground-based observatories collect high-resolution images and spectra, yielding a wealth of additional information.
In particular, astronomers look for a Doppler shift in the stellar spectrum, highlighting the periodic 'wobble' of the star in the two-body system. From the amplitude of this wobble, it is possible to estimate the mass of the transiting body and, consequently, to determine whether or not it is indeed a planet.
Once the mass and the radius are known, the mean density of the planet can be derived - a key factor in distinguishing between gaseous giant planets and rocky terrestrial ones. The discovery of these six new exoplanets adds variety to the large number of exoplanets that have been detected to date.
"With the addition of this new batch, the number of exoplanets discovered by CoRoT has risen to 15," says Magali Deleuil from Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille, Head of the CoRoT exoplanet programme. "The increasing size of the census, which includes objects with very diverse characteristics, is of vital importance for a better understanding of planetary systems other than our own," she adds.
The new discoveries exhibit a wide variety of physical properties, spanning a broad range of sizes and masses: the smallest of the sample, CoRoT-8b, is about 70% of Saturn's size and mass, while CoRoT-10b, CoRoT-11b, CoRoT-12b, CoRoT-13b and CoRoT-14b are larger, belonging to the class known as 'hot Jupiters'.
CoRoT-15b, being 60 times as massive as Jupiter, is a brown dwarf, an intermediate object between a planet and a star. In addition, other peculiarities are exhibited in this very heterogeneous set of exoplanets: CoRoT-10b has an extremely eccentric orbit, resulting in large variations in its surface temperature over the course of its year, and CoRoT-11b's parent star spins around its axis at an extraordinarily fast rate.
"The rich diversity emerging from this sample is a very interesting result, showing CoRoT's ability to detect exoplanets which are rather different from each other", comments Malcolm Fridlund, ESA's Project Scientist for CoRoT. "Being able to study a wide variety of planets will provide important insights into the formation and evolution of planetary systems", he adds.
One of the planets, CoRoT-11b, stands out from the set of six because of the rotation velocity of CoRot-11, its parent star, which spins around its axis in less than 2 days - an exceptionally high speed, as compared to the Sun's rotation period of about 26 days.
"This is the third exoplanet discovered around such a rapidly rotating star", notes Davide Gandolfi, the ESA Research Fellow who led the study of CoRoT-11b. "Because of the fast rotation of its host star, such a planet could only have been discovered because it transits in front of it, thus only a transit-hunter, such as CoRoT, could have spotted it", he adds.
The search for Doppler shifts in the spectra of stars, which represents another prolific method for detecting exoplanets, is in fact biased against planets orbiting fast rotators, as the high rotational velocity of the star makes it extremely hard to achieve high-precision Doppler measurements and hence to detect the tiny signature of the presence of a planet.
"If it had been included as a possible exoplanet candidate during such a campaign, CoRoT-11b would have been rejected because of the intensive observational effort needed to achieve the required accuracy", explains Gandolfi.
Instead, the object was first noticed by CoRoT, and then became the subject of extensive photometric and spectroscopic follow-up observations across the world, using the Swiss Leonhard Euler 1.2 m telescope at ESO's La Silla Observatory and the TEST 30 cm telescope at the Thuringer Landessternwarte Tautenburg, as well as a number of world-class spectrographs (HARPS at ESO's La Silla Observatory, SOPHIE at the Haute-Provence Observatory, UVES at ESO's Very Large Telescope and HIRES at the Keck Observatory), and the high- and low-resolution spectrograph also at Tautenburg, in Germany.
Thanks to the combination of these exceptional data, it was possible to estimate the mass of CoRoT-11b, which is about twice as massive as Jupiter, and its radius, which is about 1.4 times that of Jupiter, thus confirming its planetary nature.
"This result anticipates what may be achieved by future space-based missions searching for exoplanets", says Fridlund. CoRoT is in fact a precursor for PLATO, a Cosmic Vision candidate mission that will seek planetary transits over a much larger sample of stars - the size of the sample is an important factor determining the number of planets that may be discovered.
This significant increase in the sample size is possible because of PLATO's very wide field of view, which in turn relies on the combined use of 34 small telescopes.
In addition, PLATO will study brighter stars than those that can be observed with CoRoT, making it possible to determine the age of the planet-hosting stars through asteroseismology measurements. This, combined with the tremendous improvement in the accuracy on the estimate of exoplanet masses and sizes that is expected from PLATO, will provide an important step in the quest to understand the conditions that favour the formation of Earth-like planets.
Since 1995, astronomers have discovered over 450 exoplanets by employing a number of techniques, including astrometry, radial velocity and the transit method. Of the 82 planets that have been discovered using the transit method, 15 were first spotted by CoRoT.
The CoRoT satellite has been developed and is exploited by the French national space agency, CNES, with significant participation from Austria, Belgium, the European Space Agency (ESA), Germany, Spain, and Brazil.
ESA has joined the mission by providing the optics and baffle for the telescope and testing of the payload. Through this collaboration a number of European scientists, from Denmark, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and Portugal, have been selected as Co-Investigators in open competition. As a result of ESA's participation in CoRoT, scientists from ESA's Member States also have access to the satellite's data.
ESA's Research and Scientific Support Department (RSSD) at ESTEC is a full partner in CoRoT by providing the on-board Data Processing Units (DPU's).
The ESA PRODEX programme has supported the development of the CoRoT telescope baffle, and the software development and data processing of CoRoT light curves.
The ground stations used for CoRoT are located in Kiruna (S), Aussaguel (F) Hartebeesthoek (South Africa), and Kourou (French Guyana), with mission-specific ground stations in Alcantara (Brazil) and Vienna (A).
A number of ground-based telescopes support CoRoT observations and contribute to the characterization of planets: the Canada France Hawaii Telescope, Hawaii, USA; the IAC80 and the ESA-OGS of Teide Observatory, Spain; the 1.2 m telescope at Observatoire Haute Provence, France; the Swiss Leonhard Euler 1.2 m telescope, Chile; the 46 cm and 1 m Wise Observatory, Israel; the 2 m and 30 cm TEST telescopes of Tautenburg Observatory, Germany; the BEST and BEST2 telescopes of the Deutsche Luft und Raumfahrt Gesellschaft (DLR) HARPS spectrograph on the ESO 3.6 m telescope, Chile; the UVES spectrograph on the ESO 8.2 m Very Large Telescopes at Paranal Observatory, Chile; the HIRES spectrograph on the 10 m KECK telescope at Hawaii, USA, the SOPHIE spectrograph on the 1.93 m telescope at Haute Provence Observatory in France; the Sandiford spectrograph on the 2.1 m telescope at McDonald Observatory in Texas, USA; and the AAOmega multi-object spectrograph on the 3.9 m telescope at the Anglo-Australian Observatory.
http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/CoRoT_Unveils_A_Rich_Assortment_Of_New_Exoplanets_999.html
CoRoT Unveils A Rich Assortment Of New Exoplanets
By detecting the faint dimming in the light emitted by stars during a transit event, CoRoT has detected six new exoplanets - each with its own peculiar characteristics - and one brown dwarf. One of these exoplanets, designated CoRoT-11b, has twice the mass of Jupiter and orbits a rapidly rotating star; this type of star is an extremely difficult target for exoplanet searches and its detection marks a significant achievement for the CoRoT team.
In order to detect planets
orbiting other suns, the CoRoT satellite, which is operated by CNES (the French space agency), observes a large number of stars over a significant period of time, trying to spot a subtle decrease in their luminosity: this 'dimming' could be a signature that the star hosts a planet, which is transiting in front of it and partially obscuring its light.
This transit technique is one of several methods used to search for exoplanets but is the only one that allows astronomers to determine the radius of the planet - by measuring the depth of the transit.
Other geometrical configurations of a stellar system, for instance the presence of one or more companion stars can, however, mimic the presence of a planet.
For this reason follow-up observations are needed to confirm the planetary nature of the transiting body. Alerted by CoRoT's detection of a candidate planet-hosting star, some of the foremost ground-based observatories collect high-resolution images and spectra, yielding a wealth of additional information.
In particular, astronomers look for a Doppler shift in the stellar spectrum, highlighting the periodic 'wobble' of the star in the two-body system. From the amplitude of this wobble, it is possible to estimate the mass of the transiting body and, consequently, to determine whether or not it is indeed a planet.
Once the mass and the radius are known, the mean density of the planet can be derived - a key factor in distinguishing between gaseous giant planets and rocky terrestrial ones. The discovery of these six new exoplanets adds variety to the large number of exoplanets that have been detected to date.
"With the addition of this new batch, the number of exoplanets discovered by CoRoT has risen to 15," says Magali Deleuil from Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille, Head of the CoRoT exoplanet programme. "The increasing size of the census, which includes objects with very diverse characteristics, is of vital importance for a better understanding of planetary systems other than our own," she adds.
The new discoveries exhibit a wide variety of physical properties, spanning a broad range of sizes and masses: the smallest of the sample, CoRoT-8b, is about 70% of Saturn's size and mass, while CoRoT-10b, CoRoT-11b, CoRoT-12b, CoRoT-13b and CoRoT-14b are larger, belonging to the class known as 'hot Jupiters'.
CoRoT-15b, being 60 times as massive as Jupiter, is a brown dwarf, an intermediate object between a planet and a star. In addition, other peculiarities are exhibited in this very heterogeneous set of exoplanets: CoRoT-10b has an extremely eccentric orbit, resulting in large variations in its surface temperature over the course of its year, and CoRoT-11b's parent star spins around its axis at an extraordinarily fast rate.
"The rich diversity emerging from this sample is a very interesting result, showing CoRoT's ability to detect exoplanets which are rather different from each other", comments Malcolm Fridlund, ESA's Project Scientist for CoRoT. "Being able to study a wide variety of planets will provide important insights into the formation and evolution of planetary systems", he adds.
One of the planets, CoRoT-11b, stands out from the set of six because of the rotation velocity of CoRot-11, its parent star, which spins around its axis in less than 2 days - an exceptionally high speed, as compared to the Sun's rotation period of about 26 days.
"This is the third exoplanet discovered around such a rapidly rotating star", notes Davide Gandolfi, the ESA Research Fellow who led the study of CoRoT-11b. "Because of the fast rotation of its host star, such a planet could only have been discovered because it transits in front of it, thus only a transit-hunter, such as CoRoT, could have spotted it", he adds.
The search for Doppler shifts in the spectra of stars, which represents another prolific method for detecting exoplanets, is in fact biased against planets orbiting fast rotators, as the high rotational velocity of the star makes it extremely hard to achieve high-precision Doppler measurements and hence to detect the tiny signature of the presence of a planet.
"If it had been included as a possible exoplanet candidate during such a campaign, CoRoT-11b would have been rejected because of the intensive observational effort needed to achieve the required accuracy", explains Gandolfi.
Instead, the object was first noticed by CoRoT, and then became the subject of extensive photometric and spectroscopic follow-up observations across the world, using the Swiss Leonhard Euler 1.2 m telescope at ESO's La Silla Observatory and the TEST 30 cm telescope at the Thuringer Landessternwarte Tautenburg, as well as a number of world-class spectrographs (HARPS at ESO's La Silla Observatory, SOPHIE at the Haute-Provence Observatory, UVES at ESO's Very Large Telescope and HIRES at the Keck Observatory), and the high- and low-resolution spectrograph also at Tautenburg, in Germany.
Thanks to the combination of these exceptional data, it was possible to estimate the mass of CoRoT-11b, which is about twice as massive as Jupiter, and its radius, which is about 1.4 times that of Jupiter, thus confirming its planetary nature.
"This result anticipates what may be achieved by future space-based missions searching for exoplanets", says Fridlund. CoRoT is in fact a precursor for PLATO, a Cosmic Vision candidate mission that will seek planetary transits over a much larger sample of stars - the size of the sample is an important factor determining the number of planets that may be discovered.
This significant increase in the sample size is possible because of PLATO's very wide field of view, which in turn relies on the combined use of 34 small telescopes.
In addition, PLATO will study brighter stars than those that can be observed with CoRoT, making it possible to determine the age of the planet-hosting stars through asteroseismology measurements. This, combined with the tremendous improvement in the accuracy on the estimate of exoplanet masses and sizes that is expected from PLATO, will provide an important step in the quest to understand the conditions that favour the formation of Earth-like planets.
Since 1995, astronomers have discovered over 450 exoplanets by employing a number of techniques, including astrometry, radial velocity and the transit method. Of the 82 planets that have been discovered using the transit method, 15 were first spotted by CoRoT.
The CoRoT satellite has been developed and is exploited by the French national space agency, CNES, with significant participation from Austria, Belgium, the European Space Agency (ESA), Germany, Spain, and Brazil.
ESA has joined the mission by providing the optics and baffle for the telescope and testing of the payload. Through this collaboration a number of European scientists, from Denmark, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and Portugal, have been selected as Co-Investigators in open competition. As a result of ESA's participation in CoRoT, scientists from ESA's Member States also have access to the satellite's data.
ESA's Research and Scientific Support Department (RSSD) at ESTEC is a full partner in CoRoT by providing the on-board Data Processing Units (DPU's).
The ESA PRODEX programme has supported the development of the CoRoT telescope baffle, and the software development and data processing of CoRoT light curves.
The ground stations used for CoRoT are located in Kiruna (S), Aussaguel (F) Hartebeesthoek (South Africa), and Kourou (French Guyana), with mission-specific ground stations in Alcantara (Brazil) and Vienna (A).
A number of ground-based telescopes support CoRoT observations and contribute to the characterization of planets: the Canada France Hawaii Telescope, Hawaii, USA; the IAC80 and the ESA-OGS of Teide Observatory, Spain; the 1.2 m telescope at Observatoire Haute Provence, France; the Swiss Leonhard Euler 1.2 m telescope, Chile; the 46 cm and 1 m Wise Observatory, Israel; the 2 m and 30 cm TEST telescopes of Tautenburg Observatory, Germany; the BEST and BEST2 telescopes of the Deutsche Luft und Raumfahrt Gesellschaft (DLR) HARPS spectrograph on the ESO 3.6 m telescope, Chile; the UVES spectrograph on the ESO 8.2 m Very Large Telescopes at Paranal Observatory, Chile; the HIRES spectrograph on the 10 m KECK telescope at Hawaii, USA, the SOPHIE spectrograph on the 1.93 m telescope at Haute Provence Observatory in France; the Sandiford spectrograph on the 2.1 m telescope at McDonald Observatory in Texas, USA; and the AAOmega multi-object spectrograph on the 3.9 m telescope at the Anglo-Australian Observatory.
nandu
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Water content in Moon's interior higher than estimated: Scientists
WASHINGTON (BNS): The volume of water molecules locked inside the minerals of Moon's interior could be much higher than previous estimations, a team of researchers has claimed.
The researchers studied hydroxyl – a component of the rocks found in the lunar interior that bears an oxygen atom bound with hydrogen, and apatite – a water-bearing mineral in the assemblage of minerals. The elements were collected from two Apollo missions and from a lunar meteorite.
The NASA-funded team, led by Francis McCubbin, utilised tests which detect elements in the parts per billion range. Combining their measurements with models that characterise how the material crystallized as the moon cooled during its formation, they found that the minimum water content ranged from 64 parts per billion to 5 parts per million.
The result is at least two orders of magnitude greater than previous results from lunar samples that estimated water content of the Moon to be less than 1 parts per billion, the researchers said.
As per their findings, water is native to the Moon as it was present since the satellite's formation years.
Moon's origin has been commonly believed to be result of a Mars-sized object hitting the Earth 4.5 billion years ago. This impact put a large amount of material into Earth's orbit that ultimately compacted to form the moon.
The lunar magma ocean, thought to have formed at some point during the compacting process, began to cool. During this cooling, water either escaped or was preserved as hydroxyl molecules in the crystallizing minerals.
Evidence of water on the Moon's surface and its interior was confirmed by India's Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft and other lunar sample analysis.
The identification of water from multiple types of lunar rocks that display a range of incompatible trace element signatures indicates that water may be at low concentrations but ubiquitous within the Moon's interior, potentially as early as the time of lunar formation and magma ocean crystallization.
"It is gratifying to see this proof of the hydroxyl contents in lunar apatite. The concentrations are very low and, accordingly, they have been until recently nearly impossible to detect.
"We can now finally begin to consider the implications – and the origin – of water in the interior of the moon," said lunar scientist Bradley Jolliff of Washington University in St. Louis.
http://www.brahmand.com/news/Water-...gher-than-estimated-Scientists/4154/1/14.html
WASHINGTON (BNS): The volume of water molecules locked inside the minerals of Moon's interior could be much higher than previous estimations, a team of researchers has claimed.
The researchers studied hydroxyl – a component of the rocks found in the lunar interior that bears an oxygen atom bound with hydrogen, and apatite – a water-bearing mineral in the assemblage of minerals. The elements were collected from two Apollo missions and from a lunar meteorite.
The NASA-funded team, led by Francis McCubbin, utilised tests which detect elements in the parts per billion range. Combining their measurements with models that characterise how the material crystallized as the moon cooled during its formation, they found that the minimum water content ranged from 64 parts per billion to 5 parts per million.
The result is at least two orders of magnitude greater than previous results from lunar samples that estimated water content of the Moon to be less than 1 parts per billion, the researchers said.
As per their findings, water is native to the Moon as it was present since the satellite's formation years.
Moon's origin has been commonly believed to be result of a Mars-sized object hitting the Earth 4.5 billion years ago. This impact put a large amount of material into Earth's orbit that ultimately compacted to form the moon.
The lunar magma ocean, thought to have formed at some point during the compacting process, began to cool. During this cooling, water either escaped or was preserved as hydroxyl molecules in the crystallizing minerals.
Evidence of water on the Moon's surface and its interior was confirmed by India's Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft and other lunar sample analysis.
The identification of water from multiple types of lunar rocks that display a range of incompatible trace element signatures indicates that water may be at low concentrations but ubiquitous within the Moon's interior, potentially as early as the time of lunar formation and magma ocean crystallization.
"It is gratifying to see this proof of the hydroxyl contents in lunar apatite. The concentrations are very low and, accordingly, they have been until recently nearly impossible to detect.
"We can now finally begin to consider the implications – and the origin – of water in the interior of the moon," said lunar scientist Bradley Jolliff of Washington University in St. Louis.
http://www.brahmand.com/news/Water-...gher-than-estimated-Scientists/4154/1/14.html
nandu
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- Oct 5, 2009
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- 163
No dark matter in Universe, claim researchers
LONDON (BNS): A new research carried out by two Durham University scientists has questioned the existence of dark matter in the Universe.
The researchers, after giving a fresh look at the observations made by the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) satellite in 2001 to study the remnant heat from the Big Bang, have concluded that "errors in its data may be much larger than previously thought."
Their finding appears in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
The WMAP satellite had measured the differences in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation, the residual heat of the Big Bang that fills the Universe and appears over the entire sky. The angular size of the ripples in the CMB is thought to be connected to the composition of the Universe.
The WMAP data showed that the ripples were about twice the size of the full Moon. On the basis of the finding, scientists had concluded that the Universe is made up of 4% 'normal' matter, 22% 'dark' or invisible matter and 74% 'dark energy'.
However, British scientists Utane Sawangwit and Professor Tom Shanks, using astronomical objects that appear as unresolved points in radio telescopes to test the way the WMAP telescope smoothes out its maps, have found that the smoothing is much larger than previously believed, thereby suggesting that its measurement of the size of the CMBR ripples is not as accurate as was thought.
If true this could mean that the ripples are significantly smaller, which could imply that dark matter and dark energy are not present after all.
"CMB observations are a powerful tool for cosmology and it is vital to check for systematic effects. If our results prove correct then it will become less likely that dark energy and exotic dark matter particles dominate the Universe. So the evidence that the Universe has a 'Dark Side' will weaken!", says Professor Shanks.
Further analysis of the CMB structure has led the scientists to conclude that the Universe is not expanding as rapidly as it is believed to be due to the presence of dark energy.
Prof. Shanks concludes "Odds are that the standard model with its enigmatic dark energy and dark matter will survive - but more tests are needed. The European PLANCK satellite, currently out there collecting more CMB data will provide vital new information and help us answer these fundamental questions about the nature of the Universe we live in."
http://www.brahmand.com/news/No-dark-matter-in-Universe-claim-researchers/4159/1/14.html
LONDON (BNS): A new research carried out by two Durham University scientists has questioned the existence of dark matter in the Universe.
The researchers, after giving a fresh look at the observations made by the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) satellite in 2001 to study the remnant heat from the Big Bang, have concluded that "errors in its data may be much larger than previously thought."
Their finding appears in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
The WMAP satellite had measured the differences in the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB) radiation, the residual heat of the Big Bang that fills the Universe and appears over the entire sky. The angular size of the ripples in the CMB is thought to be connected to the composition of the Universe.
The WMAP data showed that the ripples were about twice the size of the full Moon. On the basis of the finding, scientists had concluded that the Universe is made up of 4% 'normal' matter, 22% 'dark' or invisible matter and 74% 'dark energy'.
However, British scientists Utane Sawangwit and Professor Tom Shanks, using astronomical objects that appear as unresolved points in radio telescopes to test the way the WMAP telescope smoothes out its maps, have found that the smoothing is much larger than previously believed, thereby suggesting that its measurement of the size of the CMBR ripples is not as accurate as was thought.
If true this could mean that the ripples are significantly smaller, which could imply that dark matter and dark energy are not present after all.
"CMB observations are a powerful tool for cosmology and it is vital to check for systematic effects. If our results prove correct then it will become less likely that dark energy and exotic dark matter particles dominate the Universe. So the evidence that the Universe has a 'Dark Side' will weaken!", says Professor Shanks.
Further analysis of the CMB structure has led the scientists to conclude that the Universe is not expanding as rapidly as it is believed to be due to the presence of dark energy.
Prof. Shanks concludes "Odds are that the standard model with its enigmatic dark energy and dark matter will survive - but more tests are needed. The European PLANCK satellite, currently out there collecting more CMB data will provide vital new information and help us answer these fundamental questions about the nature of the Universe we live in."
http://www.brahmand.com/news/No-dark-matter-in-Universe-claim-researchers/4159/1/14.html
nandu
Senior Member
- Joined
- Oct 5, 2009
- Messages
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Russia, India may jointly make Glonass, GPS navigation devices
Russia, India may jointly make Glonass, GPS navigation devices
Russia and India might establish a joint venture to produce navigation equipment for GPS and its Russian equivalent Glonass, the head of the Russian federal satellite navigation operator said on Tuesday.
Glonass - the Global Navigation Satellite System - is the Russian equivalent of the U.S. Global Positioning System, or GPS, and is designed for both military and civilian use. Both systems allow users to determine their positions to within a few meters.
"We are actively working on a project to establish a joint venture on Indian territory to produce various navigation equipment. In March a group of our negotiators will head there for another round of talks," said Aledxander Gurko, CEO of Navigation and Information Systems (NIS).
Russia currently has a total of 22 Glonass satellites in orbit, but only 16 of them are operational. The system requires 18 operational satellites for continuous navigation services covering the entire territory of Russia and at least 24 satellites to provide navigation services worldwide.
The Glonass navigation satellite system is expected to start operating worldwide by the end of 2010. As soon as global operations are launched, India will be able to use the civilian signal, allowing users to determine their position to within five to 15 meters.
India's access to a more precise military signal is yet to be approved by the heads of the two states.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said he would discuss cooperation in the Glonass project with Indian officials during his forthcoming visit to New Delhi in the first half of March.
http://en.rian.ru/russia/20100309/158137947.html
Russia, India may jointly make Glonass, GPS navigation devices
Russia and India might establish a joint venture to produce navigation equipment for GPS and its Russian equivalent Glonass, the head of the Russian federal satellite navigation operator said on Tuesday.
Glonass - the Global Navigation Satellite System - is the Russian equivalent of the U.S. Global Positioning System, or GPS, and is designed for both military and civilian use. Both systems allow users to determine their positions to within a few meters.
"We are actively working on a project to establish a joint venture on Indian territory to produce various navigation equipment. In March a group of our negotiators will head there for another round of talks," said Aledxander Gurko, CEO of Navigation and Information Systems (NIS).
Russia currently has a total of 22 Glonass satellites in orbit, but only 16 of them are operational. The system requires 18 operational satellites for continuous navigation services covering the entire territory of Russia and at least 24 satellites to provide navigation services worldwide.
The Glonass navigation satellite system is expected to start operating worldwide by the end of 2010. As soon as global operations are launched, India will be able to use the civilian signal, allowing users to determine their position to within five to 15 meters.
India's access to a more precise military signal is yet to be approved by the heads of the two states.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said he would discuss cooperation in the Glonass project with Indian officials during his forthcoming visit to New Delhi in the first half of March.
http://en.rian.ru/russia/20100309/158137947.html
nandu
Senior Member
- Joined
- Oct 5, 2009
- Messages
- 1,913
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Sun could trigger massive space storms in 2013
LONDON (PTI): As the Sun is waking up from a "deep slumber", it could soon trigger massive space storms as early as 2013 which may knock out power and communication systems on Earth, scientists have warned.
The Sun follows an 11-year cycle of high and low periods of solar activity and now it is leaving a notably quiet phase, according to scientists.
During this period, they believe, there would be fiery explosions having the power of 100 hydrogen bombs that could cause twenty times more economic damage than Hurricane Katrina, the Daily Mail reported.
Smart power grids, GPS navigation, air travel, financial services and emergency radio communications can all be knocked out by intense solar activity.
Worried about the possible impact of such storms on our planet, scientists recently met in Washington to discuss how to protect Earth from the ferocious flares, which are expected sometime around 2013.
The 'space conference' was attended by scientists, government policy-makers and researchers.
Richard Fisher, head of NASA's Heliophysics Division, said: "The Sun is waking up from a deep slumber, and in the next few years we expect to see much higher levels of solar activity.
"At the same time, our technological society has developed an unprecedented sensitivity to solar storms."
NASA is using dozens of satellites – including the Solar Dynamics Observatory – to study the threat.
The problem was investigated in depth two years ago by the National Academy of Sciences, in a report which outlined the social and economic impacts of severe space weather events.
But scientists believe much of the damage could be minimised if there was foreknowledge that the storm was approaching.
Putting satellites in "safe mode" and disconnecting transformers could protect them from damaging electrical surges, they said.
Preventative action, however, requires accurate forecasting – a job that has been assigned to The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA.)
"Space weather forecasting is still in its infancy, but we are making rapid progress," said Thomas Bogdan, director of NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Centre in Boulder, Colorado.
Bogdan said the collaboration between NASA and NOAA would be the key to avoid the possible damage.
"NASA's fleet of heliophysics research spacecraft provides us with up-to-the-minute information about what's happening on the Sun. They are an important complement to our own GOES and POES satellites, which focus more on the near-Earth environment," he added.
http://www.brahmand.com/news/Sun-could-trigger-massive-space-storms-in-2013/4163/1/14.html
LONDON (PTI): As the Sun is waking up from a "deep slumber", it could soon trigger massive space storms as early as 2013 which may knock out power and communication systems on Earth, scientists have warned.
The Sun follows an 11-year cycle of high and low periods of solar activity and now it is leaving a notably quiet phase, according to scientists.
During this period, they believe, there would be fiery explosions having the power of 100 hydrogen bombs that could cause twenty times more economic damage than Hurricane Katrina, the Daily Mail reported.
Smart power grids, GPS navigation, air travel, financial services and emergency radio communications can all be knocked out by intense solar activity.
Worried about the possible impact of such storms on our planet, scientists recently met in Washington to discuss how to protect Earth from the ferocious flares, which are expected sometime around 2013.
The 'space conference' was attended by scientists, government policy-makers and researchers.
Richard Fisher, head of NASA's Heliophysics Division, said: "The Sun is waking up from a deep slumber, and in the next few years we expect to see much higher levels of solar activity.
"At the same time, our technological society has developed an unprecedented sensitivity to solar storms."
NASA is using dozens of satellites – including the Solar Dynamics Observatory – to study the threat.
The problem was investigated in depth two years ago by the National Academy of Sciences, in a report which outlined the social and economic impacts of severe space weather events.
But scientists believe much of the damage could be minimised if there was foreknowledge that the storm was approaching.
Putting satellites in "safe mode" and disconnecting transformers could protect them from damaging electrical surges, they said.
Preventative action, however, requires accurate forecasting – a job that has been assigned to The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA.)
"Space weather forecasting is still in its infancy, but we are making rapid progress," said Thomas Bogdan, director of NOAA's Space Weather Prediction Centre in Boulder, Colorado.
Bogdan said the collaboration between NASA and NOAA would be the key to avoid the possible damage.
"NASA's fleet of heliophysics research spacecraft provides us with up-to-the-minute information about what's happening on the Sun. They are an important complement to our own GOES and POES satellites, which focus more on the near-Earth environment," he added.
http://www.brahmand.com/news/Sun-could-trigger-massive-space-storms-in-2013/4163/1/14.html
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Russia and India may Produce Navigation Equipment for Glonass
Russia and India might establish a joint venture to produce navigation equipment for GPS and its Russian equivalent Glonass, the head of the Russian federal satellite navigation operator said on Tuesday.Glonass - the Global Navigation Satellite System - is the Russian equivalent of the U.S. Global Positioning System, or GPS, and is designed for both military and civilian use. Both systems allow users to determine their positions to within a few meters.India will be able to use the civilian signal, allowing users to determine their position to within five to 15 meters.
Russia and India might establish a joint venture to produce navigation equipment for GPS and its Russian equivalent Glonass, the head of the Russian federal satellite navigation operator said on Tuesday.Glonass - the Global Navigation Satellite System - is the Russian equivalent of the U.S. Global Positioning System, or GPS, and is designed for both military and civilian use. Both systems allow users to determine their positions to within a few meters.India will be able to use the civilian signal, allowing users to determine their position to within five to 15 meters.
LETHALFORCE
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http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Kepler_Data_On_Potential_Extrasolar_Planets_Released_999.html
Kepler Data On Potential Extrasolar Planets Released
NASA's Kepler Mission has released 43 days of science data on more than 156,000 stars. These stars are being monitored for subtle brightness changes as part of an ongoing search for Earth-like planets outside of our solar system
.
Astronomers will use the new data to determine if orbiting planets are responsible for brightness variations in several hundred stars. These stars make up a full range of temperatures, sizes and ages. Many of them are stable, while others pulsate. Some show starspots, which are similar to sunspots, and a few produce flares that would sterilize their nearest planets.
Kepler, a space observatory, looks for the data signatures of planets by measuring tiny decreases in the brightness of stars when planets cross in front of, or transit them. The size of the planet can be derived from the change in the star's brightness.
The 28-member Kepler science team also is using ground-based telescopes and the Hubble Space Telescope and Spitzer Space Telescope to perform follow-up observations on a specific set of 400 objects of interest.
The star field that Kepler observes in the constellations Cygnus and Lyra can only be seen from ground-based observatories in spring through early fall. The data from these other observations will determine which of the candidates can be identified as planets. That data will be released to the scientific community in February 2011.
Without the additional information, candidates that are actual planets cannot be distinguished from false alarms, such as binary stars - two stars that orbit each other. The size of the planetary candidates also can be only approximated until the size of the stars they orbit is determined from additional spectroscopic observations made by ground-based telescopes.
"I look forward to the scientific community analyzing the data and announcing new exoplanet results in the coming months," said Lia LaPiana, Kepler's program executive at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
"This is the most precise, nearly continuous, longest and largest data set of stellar photometry ever," said Kepler Deputy Principal Investigator David Koch of NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif. "The results will only get better as the duration of the data set grows with time."
Kepler will continue conducting science operations until at least November 2012, searching for planets as small as Earth, including those that orbit stars in a warm habitable zone where liquid water could exist on the surface of the planet.
Since transits of planets in the habitable zone of solar-like stars occur about once a year and require three transits for verification, it is expected to take at least three years to locate and verify an Earth-size planet.
"The Kepler observations will tell us whether there are many stars with planets that could harbor life, or whether we might be alone in our galaxy," said mission science principal investigator William Borucki of Ames.
Ames is responsible for the ground system development, mission operations and science data analysis. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., managed the Kepler mission development. Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corp. in Boulder, Colo., developed the Kepler flight system, and supports mission operations with the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado, Boulder. The Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore archives, hosts and distributes the Kepler science data.
Kepler Data On Potential Extrasolar Planets Released
NASA's Kepler Mission has released 43 days of science data on more than 156,000 stars. These stars are being monitored for subtle brightness changes as part of an ongoing search for Earth-like planets outside of our solar system
.
Astronomers will use the new data to determine if orbiting planets are responsible for brightness variations in several hundred stars. These stars make up a full range of temperatures, sizes and ages. Many of them are stable, while others pulsate. Some show starspots, which are similar to sunspots, and a few produce flares that would sterilize their nearest planets.
Kepler, a space observatory, looks for the data signatures of planets by measuring tiny decreases in the brightness of stars when planets cross in front of, or transit them. The size of the planet can be derived from the change in the star's brightness.
The 28-member Kepler science team also is using ground-based telescopes and the Hubble Space Telescope and Spitzer Space Telescope to perform follow-up observations on a specific set of 400 objects of interest.
The star field that Kepler observes in the constellations Cygnus and Lyra can only be seen from ground-based observatories in spring through early fall. The data from these other observations will determine which of the candidates can be identified as planets. That data will be released to the scientific community in February 2011.
Without the additional information, candidates that are actual planets cannot be distinguished from false alarms, such as binary stars - two stars that orbit each other. The size of the planetary candidates also can be only approximated until the size of the stars they orbit is determined from additional spectroscopic observations made by ground-based telescopes.
"I look forward to the scientific community analyzing the data and announcing new exoplanet results in the coming months," said Lia LaPiana, Kepler's program executive at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
"This is the most precise, nearly continuous, longest and largest data set of stellar photometry ever," said Kepler Deputy Principal Investigator David Koch of NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif. "The results will only get better as the duration of the data set grows with time."
Kepler will continue conducting science operations until at least November 2012, searching for planets as small as Earth, including those that orbit stars in a warm habitable zone where liquid water could exist on the surface of the planet.
Since transits of planets in the habitable zone of solar-like stars occur about once a year and require three transits for verification, it is expected to take at least three years to locate and verify an Earth-size planet.
"The Kepler observations will tell us whether there are many stars with planets that could harbor life, or whether we might be alone in our galaxy," said mission science principal investigator William Borucki of Ames.
Ames is responsible for the ground system development, mission operations and science data analysis. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., managed the Kepler mission development. Ball Aerospace and Technologies Corp. in Boulder, Colo., developed the Kepler flight system, and supports mission operations with the Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics at the University of Colorado, Boulder. The Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore archives, hosts and distributes the Kepler science data.
LETHALFORCE
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India to Launch Five Satellites After Fixing Rocket 'Anomaly'
http://www.businessweek.com/news/20...-satellites-after-fixing-rocket-anomaly-.html
India to Launch Five Satellites After Fixing Rocket 'Anomaly'
June 17 (Bloomberg) -- India plans to put five remote- sensing satellites into orbit in the first half of next month after fixing a rocket "anomaly" that forced it to delay launches in May.
The Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle will carry India's Cartosat-2B, Algeria's ALSAT-2A and two small satellites from the University of Toronto, P.S. Veeraraghavan, director of Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, said by phone today from the southern city of Thiruvananthapuram. The fifth unit will be a one-kilogram satellite built by Indian students, he said.
The agency, based in Thiruvananthapuram, has corrected the anomaly, which was in the second stage of the rocket, Veeraraghavan said. The delay had disrupted India's challenge to China, Japan, and South Korea as it competes for commercial- satellite launches.
In April, India also failed in its bid to join a group of five nations using their own rocket technology to launch large satellites into higher orbits when scientists lost control of the 50-meter (164 feet) GSLV-D3 spacecraft minutes after blastoff.
"The reasons for the failure are still being analyzed and we expect a report in a month's time," Veeraraghavan said.
India is planning a $2.5 billion unmanned mission to space by 2015 and is slated to launch a second unmanned moon craft Chandrayaan II at a cost of $87.5 million before March 2013.
The Asian nation launched its first space rocket in 1963 and its first satellite in 1975. The country's satellite program consists of 21 orbiters, of which 11 are currently in service.
http://www.businessweek.com/news/20...-satellites-after-fixing-rocket-anomaly-.html
India to Launch Five Satellites After Fixing Rocket 'Anomaly'
June 17 (Bloomberg) -- India plans to put five remote- sensing satellites into orbit in the first half of next month after fixing a rocket "anomaly" that forced it to delay launches in May.
The Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle will carry India's Cartosat-2B, Algeria's ALSAT-2A and two small satellites from the University of Toronto, P.S. Veeraraghavan, director of Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, said by phone today from the southern city of Thiruvananthapuram. The fifth unit will be a one-kilogram satellite built by Indian students, he said.
The agency, based in Thiruvananthapuram, has corrected the anomaly, which was in the second stage of the rocket, Veeraraghavan said. The delay had disrupted India's challenge to China, Japan, and South Korea as it competes for commercial- satellite launches.
In April, India also failed in its bid to join a group of five nations using their own rocket technology to launch large satellites into higher orbits when scientists lost control of the 50-meter (164 feet) GSLV-D3 spacecraft minutes after blastoff.
"The reasons for the failure are still being analyzed and we expect a report in a month's time," Veeraraghavan said.
India is planning a $2.5 billion unmanned mission to space by 2015 and is slated to launch a second unmanned moon craft Chandrayaan II at a cost of $87.5 million before March 2013.
The Asian nation launched its first space rocket in 1963 and its first satellite in 1975. The country's satellite program consists of 21 orbiters, of which 11 are currently in service.
Rahul Singh
Senior Member
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Strange, did South Korea successfully put any type of satellite using its own rocket lately? Last i read, their second attempt to join this club also failed even when that rocket was half russian....
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Thales studies integrating military systems with civilian airspace
New Delhi, June 16 (IANS) In a step that could have applications in India, aerospace major Thales has completed a year-long technical study on integrating unmanned aerial systems (UAS) with Europe's civilian airspace. Kicking off in early 2009, SIGAT was a study on allocating military frequency spectrum for the integration of UAS with general air traffic. India is currently engaged in the integration of its military and civilian radars to ensure the flexible and optimum use of airspace. The Indian Air Force (IAF), in fact, had also conducted the Dakshin Prahar exercise over the southern peninsula last year to validate the integration concepts.
Central to the integration is a network of seven satellites, collectively named GAGAN or GPS-Aided Geo-Augmented Navigation System, that is currently being put together to create an Indian Regional Navigational Satellite System.
“We have just heard about the Thales study and though it primarily relates to unmanned aerial systems, it could also have applications for manned aircraft. To that extent, it could have lessons for us,†a senior defence official told IANS, speaking on condition of anonymity.
SIGAT identified four possible options, including frequency spectrum needs with associated levels of difficulty, performance and time frame.
“Each of these four paths would enable military UAS to integrate with civil air space while providing appropriate safety to other air traffic,†a Thales statement said.
“This finding represents a major outcome for European defence ministries as it widens the number of potential solutions and provides the relevant regulatory and technical elements to enable a balanced choice to be made between optimal cost, result and time frame solutions for military UAS integration,†the statement said.
“One of the major issues at the heart of UAS development today is the integration of these vehicles into civil airspace. We need to ensure proper segregation of existing air traffic and maintain a high level of safety for all airspace users to the standards of international civil aviation, said Pierre-Eric Pommellet, Thales senior vice president in charge of defence mission systems.
Thales successfully led a consortium of 23 European companies representing nine countries to carry out the SIGAT study for the European Defence Agency.
http://www.southasiamail.com/news.php?id=71158
New Delhi, June 16 (IANS) In a step that could have applications in India, aerospace major Thales has completed a year-long technical study on integrating unmanned aerial systems (UAS) with Europe's civilian airspace. Kicking off in early 2009, SIGAT was a study on allocating military frequency spectrum for the integration of UAS with general air traffic. India is currently engaged in the integration of its military and civilian radars to ensure the flexible and optimum use of airspace. The Indian Air Force (IAF), in fact, had also conducted the Dakshin Prahar exercise over the southern peninsula last year to validate the integration concepts.
Central to the integration is a network of seven satellites, collectively named GAGAN or GPS-Aided Geo-Augmented Navigation System, that is currently being put together to create an Indian Regional Navigational Satellite System.
“We have just heard about the Thales study and though it primarily relates to unmanned aerial systems, it could also have applications for manned aircraft. To that extent, it could have lessons for us,†a senior defence official told IANS, speaking on condition of anonymity.
SIGAT identified four possible options, including frequency spectrum needs with associated levels of difficulty, performance and time frame.
“Each of these four paths would enable military UAS to integrate with civil air space while providing appropriate safety to other air traffic,†a Thales statement said.
“This finding represents a major outcome for European defence ministries as it widens the number of potential solutions and provides the relevant regulatory and technical elements to enable a balanced choice to be made between optimal cost, result and time frame solutions for military UAS integration,†the statement said.
“One of the major issues at the heart of UAS development today is the integration of these vehicles into civil airspace. We need to ensure proper segregation of existing air traffic and maintain a high level of safety for all airspace users to the standards of international civil aviation, said Pierre-Eric Pommellet, Thales senior vice president in charge of defence mission systems.
Thales successfully led a consortium of 23 European companies representing nine countries to carry out the SIGAT study for the European Defence Agency.
http://www.southasiamail.com/news.php?id=71158
LETHALFORCE
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http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Plentiful_And_Potential_Planets_999.html
Plentiful And Potential Planets
Two planet-hunting telescopes - CoRoT and Kepler - are keeping astronomers hard at work cataloging far-distant planets that orbit other stars in our galaxy. CoRoT recently reported the discovery of six gas giant planets similar to Jupiter. Kepler, meanwhile, is not confirming the discovery of any planets, but has announced hundreds of planet candidates after only 43 days of scanning the stars.
COROT Catches a Unicorn
The CoRoT space telescope has made seven new discoveries during its observations from Earth orbit - six extrasolar planets and a brown dwarf.
One of the new discoveries is the exoplanet CoRoT-13b. Dr Juan Cabrera, from the German Aerospace Center (DLR) Institute of Planetary Research in Berlin, led a team that authored the publication announcing its discovery. The radius of CoRoT-13b is 90 percent that of Jupiter, making it nearly as big as the largest planet in the solar system.
It is very dense, indicating that it has a solid core. The planet orbits a Sun-like star in the constellation of the Unicorn, roughly 4,300 light years distant from us. The rocky exoplanet CoRoT-7b was found in the same region in 2008, causing a stir, as it is very similar to Earth in diameter and mass.
The newly-discovered planets also have distinctive characteristics. CoRoT-10b is a gas planet on an extremely eccentric orbit, so that as it orbits its parent star, it comes very close to the star and also moves very far away. Consequently, during a 13-day orbit, its temperature fluctuates between about 250 degrees and 600 degrees Celsius.
"The density of CoRoT-13b is very high for its mass -2.37 grams per cubic centimetre - nearly double that of Jupiter," says Dr Cabrera. "This suggests that CoRoT-13b has a solid core."
CoRoT-15b, on the other hand, is not a planet but a brown dwarf - the second to have been discovered by CoRoT. Brown dwarfs fill the gap between planets and stars. Because they are much more rare than planets, this finding represents something of a sensation.
Whenever the orbital path of a planet causes it to traverse the line of sight between the CoRoT telescope and its star, it darkens the image of that star slightly for several hours. CoRoT measures this reduction in brightness. This technique, known as the planetary transit method, allows astronomers to determine the orbital period of the planet, its distance from the star and its radius.
The planet's mass can then be determined in combination with subsequent measurements taken by ground-based telescopes. Transiting exoplanets being tracked by CoRoT are of great interest, since this is the only way of determining the planet's density. From these measurements, it can be inferred whether the planets are rocky exoplanets such as Venus, Earth and Mars, or gaseous planets like Jupiter and Saturn.
Transiting exoplanets are the extrasolar planets about which the most accurate data has been obtained. Of the roughly 450 extrasolar planets that have been discovered in the last 15 years, 82 have been observed as transiting exoplanets. Of these 82, CoRoT has detected fifteen.
"We look forward to every new member of the CoRoT family. This shows how successful the mission is," said Prof. Heike Rauer of the DLR Institute of Planetary Research, who directs the German contribution to the CoRoT mission and whose department is involved in scientific analysis. "Every new discovery contributes to a deeper understanding of the formation and evolution of planetary systems. In this way, we can answer the question whether our solar system is an exceptional case, or whether other, similar planetary systems exist."
CoRoT was launched at the end of 2006, and now orbits Earth every two hours in a polar orbit at an altitude of 900 kilometres. The mission is led by the French space agency CNES. DLR has also made substantial contributions to the mission from the outset. The CoRoT mission has now been extended until March 2013.
Kepler's Copious Count
NASA's Kepler Mission has released 43 days of science data on more than 156,000 stars. These stars are being monitored for subtle brightness changes as part of an ongoing search for Earth-like planets outside of our solar system.
Astronomers will use the new data to determine if orbiting planets are responsible for brightness variations in several hundred stars. These stars represent a full range of temperatures, sizes and ages. Many of them are stable, while others pulsate. Some show starspots, which are similar to sunspots, and a few produce flares that would sterilize their nearest planets.
Kepler, a space observatory, looks for the data signatures of planets by measuring tiny decreases in the brightness of stars when planets cross in front of, or transit, them. The size of the planet can be derived from the change in the star's brightness.
The 28-member Kepler science team also is using ground-based telescopes and NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and Spitzer Space Telescope to perform follow-up observations on a specific set of 400 objects of interest. The star field that Kepler observes in the constellations Cygnus and Lyra can only be seen from ground-based observatories in spring through early fall.
The data from these other observations will determine which of the candidates can be identified as planets. That data will be released to the scientific community in February 2011.
Without the additional information, candidates that are actual planets cannot be distinguished from false alarms, such as binary stars - two stars that orbit each other. The size of the planetary candidates also can be only approximated until the size of the stars they orbit is determined from additional spectroscopic observations made by ground-based telescopes.
"I look forward to the scientific community analyzing the data and announcing new exoplanet results in the coming months," said Lia LaPiana, Kepler's program executive at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
"This is the most precise, nearly continuous, longest and largest data set of stellar photometry ever," said Kepler Deputy Principal Investigator David Koch of NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif. "The results will only get better as the duration of the data set grows with time."
Kepler will continue conducting science operations until at least November 2012, searching for planets as small as Earth, including those that orbit stars in a warm, habitable zone where liquid water could exist on the surface of the planet.
Since transits of planets in the habitable zone of solar-like stars occur about once a year and require three transits for verification, it is expected to take at least three years to locate and verify an Earth-size planet.
"The Kepler observations will tell us whether there are many stars with planets that could harbor life, or whether we might be alone in our galaxy," said the mission's science principal investigator, William Borucki of Ames.
Plentiful And Potential Planets
Two planet-hunting telescopes - CoRoT and Kepler - are keeping astronomers hard at work cataloging far-distant planets that orbit other stars in our galaxy. CoRoT recently reported the discovery of six gas giant planets similar to Jupiter. Kepler, meanwhile, is not confirming the discovery of any planets, but has announced hundreds of planet candidates after only 43 days of scanning the stars.
COROT Catches a Unicorn
The CoRoT space telescope has made seven new discoveries during its observations from Earth orbit - six extrasolar planets and a brown dwarf.
One of the new discoveries is the exoplanet CoRoT-13b. Dr Juan Cabrera, from the German Aerospace Center (DLR) Institute of Planetary Research in Berlin, led a team that authored the publication announcing its discovery. The radius of CoRoT-13b is 90 percent that of Jupiter, making it nearly as big as the largest planet in the solar system.
It is very dense, indicating that it has a solid core. The planet orbits a Sun-like star in the constellation of the Unicorn, roughly 4,300 light years distant from us. The rocky exoplanet CoRoT-7b was found in the same region in 2008, causing a stir, as it is very similar to Earth in diameter and mass.
The newly-discovered planets also have distinctive characteristics. CoRoT-10b is a gas planet on an extremely eccentric orbit, so that as it orbits its parent star, it comes very close to the star and also moves very far away. Consequently, during a 13-day orbit, its temperature fluctuates between about 250 degrees and 600 degrees Celsius.
"The density of CoRoT-13b is very high for its mass -2.37 grams per cubic centimetre - nearly double that of Jupiter," says Dr Cabrera. "This suggests that CoRoT-13b has a solid core."
CoRoT-15b, on the other hand, is not a planet but a brown dwarf - the second to have been discovered by CoRoT. Brown dwarfs fill the gap between planets and stars. Because they are much more rare than planets, this finding represents something of a sensation.
Whenever the orbital path of a planet causes it to traverse the line of sight between the CoRoT telescope and its star, it darkens the image of that star slightly for several hours. CoRoT measures this reduction in brightness. This technique, known as the planetary transit method, allows astronomers to determine the orbital period of the planet, its distance from the star and its radius.
The planet's mass can then be determined in combination with subsequent measurements taken by ground-based telescopes. Transiting exoplanets being tracked by CoRoT are of great interest, since this is the only way of determining the planet's density. From these measurements, it can be inferred whether the planets are rocky exoplanets such as Venus, Earth and Mars, or gaseous planets like Jupiter and Saturn.
Transiting exoplanets are the extrasolar planets about which the most accurate data has been obtained. Of the roughly 450 extrasolar planets that have been discovered in the last 15 years, 82 have been observed as transiting exoplanets. Of these 82, CoRoT has detected fifteen.
"We look forward to every new member of the CoRoT family. This shows how successful the mission is," said Prof. Heike Rauer of the DLR Institute of Planetary Research, who directs the German contribution to the CoRoT mission and whose department is involved in scientific analysis. "Every new discovery contributes to a deeper understanding of the formation and evolution of planetary systems. In this way, we can answer the question whether our solar system is an exceptional case, or whether other, similar planetary systems exist."
CoRoT was launched at the end of 2006, and now orbits Earth every two hours in a polar orbit at an altitude of 900 kilometres. The mission is led by the French space agency CNES. DLR has also made substantial contributions to the mission from the outset. The CoRoT mission has now been extended until March 2013.
Kepler's Copious Count
NASA's Kepler Mission has released 43 days of science data on more than 156,000 stars. These stars are being monitored for subtle brightness changes as part of an ongoing search for Earth-like planets outside of our solar system.
Astronomers will use the new data to determine if orbiting planets are responsible for brightness variations in several hundred stars. These stars represent a full range of temperatures, sizes and ages. Many of them are stable, while others pulsate. Some show starspots, which are similar to sunspots, and a few produce flares that would sterilize their nearest planets.
Kepler, a space observatory, looks for the data signatures of planets by measuring tiny decreases in the brightness of stars when planets cross in front of, or transit, them. The size of the planet can be derived from the change in the star's brightness.
The 28-member Kepler science team also is using ground-based telescopes and NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and Spitzer Space Telescope to perform follow-up observations on a specific set of 400 objects of interest. The star field that Kepler observes in the constellations Cygnus and Lyra can only be seen from ground-based observatories in spring through early fall.
The data from these other observations will determine which of the candidates can be identified as planets. That data will be released to the scientific community in February 2011.
Without the additional information, candidates that are actual planets cannot be distinguished from false alarms, such as binary stars - two stars that orbit each other. The size of the planetary candidates also can be only approximated until the size of the stars they orbit is determined from additional spectroscopic observations made by ground-based telescopes.
"I look forward to the scientific community analyzing the data and announcing new exoplanet results in the coming months," said Lia LaPiana, Kepler's program executive at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
"This is the most precise, nearly continuous, longest and largest data set of stellar photometry ever," said Kepler Deputy Principal Investigator David Koch of NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif. "The results will only get better as the duration of the data set grows with time."
Kepler will continue conducting science operations until at least November 2012, searching for planets as small as Earth, including those that orbit stars in a warm, habitable zone where liquid water could exist on the surface of the planet.
Since transits of planets in the habitable zone of solar-like stars occur about once a year and require three transits for verification, it is expected to take at least three years to locate and verify an Earth-size planet.
"The Kepler observations will tell us whether there are many stars with planets that could harbor life, or whether we might be alone in our galaxy," said the mission's science principal investigator, William Borucki of Ames.
LETHALFORCE
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