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Category: space – Page 34

Until now, only a small fraction of meteorites that land on Earth had been firmly linked back to their parent body out in space – but a set of new studies has just given us compelling origin stories for more than 90 percent of meteorites today.

Past analyses of meteorites striking our planet today suggest some kind of shared origin; they’re made from very similar materials and have been baked by cosmic radiation for a suspiciously short amount of time, hinting at a relatively recent break-up from shared parent bodies.

The teams behind three new published papers used a combination of super-detailed telescope observations and computer modeling simulations to compare asteroids out in space with meteorites recovered on Earth, matching up rock types and orbital paths between the two.

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Today, only about 6% of the observable Universe is reachable due to cosmic expansion.

The Universe is a vast, wondrous, and strange place. From our perspective within it, we can see out for some 46 billion light-years in all directions. Everywhere we look, we see a Universe filled with stars and galaxies, but are they all unique? Is it possible, perhaps, that if you look far enough in one direction and see a galaxy, that you’d also see that same galaxy, from a different perspective, in the opposite direction? Could the Universe actually loop back on itself? And if you traveled far enough in a straight line, would you eventually return to your starting point, just as if you traveled in any one direction for long enough on the surface of the Earth? Or would something stop you?

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Part of a groundbreaking effort to harness artificial intelligence (AI) to unlock the mysteries of the cosmos, the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory is a key collaborator in the newly launched NSF-Simons AI Institute for the Sky (SkAI, pronounced “sky”), led by Northwestern University.

Jointly funded by a $20 million grant from the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) and the Simons Foundation, SkAI aims to revolutionize how researchers explore the universe by developing innovative AI technologies capable of handling the vast data generated by astronomical surveys.

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As detailed in a new study published in the journal Astronomy & and Astrophysics, the tunnel exists as part of an enormous structure of hot gas with a radius of hundreds of light years that surrounds our solar system known as the Local Hot Bubble. What’s more, the findings suggest that it could connect with a nearby and even larger bubble.

Using extensive data collected by the eROSITA telescope, the first x-ray observatory fully outside of the Earth’s atmosphere, the researchers generated a 3D model of the entire LHB, confirming some features that astronomers had predicted, but also uncovering entirely new ones.

“What we didn’t know was the existence of an interstellar tunnel towards Centaurus, which carves a gap in the cooler interstellar medium,” said study coauthor Michael Freyberg, an astronomer at Germany’s Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, in a statement. “This region stands out in stark relief thanks to the much-improved sensitivity of eROSITA and a vastly different surveying strategy compared to ROSAT,” the space telescope’s predecessor.

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According to Banerjee and colleagues, that could drive enough volcanism to blanket the planet in sulfur dioxide and hydrogen sulfide.

But other planetary scientists aren’t so sure, and that underscores how difficult it is to understand what we’re seeing when we look at an exoplanet’s atmosphere from 35 light years away, even with a powerful and sensitive telescope like JWST.

“The era of detection and characterization of atmospheres around rocky exoplanets is now here,” write Banerjee and colleagues in their recent paper. And that’s true, but it’s not always as straightforward as astronomers might hope.

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SAN FRANCISCO – Austrian space domain awareness startup iSEE Global established a U.S. subsidiary in Arlington, Virginia, led by former Kleos Space CEO Andy Bowyer.

The U.S. subsidiary of iSEE, which stands for Impact Space Expedition & Exploration Global Corp., seeks “proximity to key government and defense customers, like the U.S. Space Force, and major commercial clients,” Bowyer told SpaceNews by email. “The U.S. is the biggest and most influential SDA [space domain awareness] market.”

Having a U.S. subsidiary will help iSEE “navigate the complex regulatory requirements,” Bowyer said.

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WASHINGTON — The Defense Department should step up support of commercial space companies to take advantage of capabilities that might otherwise be lost, a new report concludes.

That recommendation is among several in a study called Space Agenda 2025 released Oct. 24 by The Aerospace Corporation and its Center for Space Policy and Strategy (CSPS). The report is intended to provide advice to the next administration on key topics in civil, commercial and national security space.

In a briefing held in advance of the report’s release, Sam Wilson, systems director at CSPS, said the Defense Department is benefitting from growing commercial capabilities in areas like commercial remote sensing, much of which was fueled by a boom in private investment in space companies several years ago. Private investment has dropped significantly since a peak in 2021, though, and investors say access to capital remains difficult for space companies today, especially those trying to raise larger, later rounds.

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During the time you read this article, something will happen in the sky that many scientists didn’t believe would happen until recently. NASA says that a magnetic doorway will open that will connect the Earth and the Sun, which are 150 million kilometers apart.

Hundreds of thousands of high-energy particles will pass through this gap until it closes, which will happen about the time you reach the bottom of the page.

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center’s space physicist David Seebeck calls it a “flux transfer event” or “FTE.” “In 1998, I was sure they didn’t exist, but the proof is now clear.” In fact, David Seebeck proved their existence in 2008 at a plasma conference in Huntsville, Alabama, when he told a group of space physicists from all over the world about his research.

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Throughout their childhood, Earth and Theia lived in harmony but everything changed when gravitational disturbances attacked.

Scientists have proposed that two massive rock formations deep within Earth’s mantle, known as large low-shear velocity provinces (LLSVPs), might be the remnants of the protoplanet Theia, which collided with Earth 4.5 billion years ago to form the Moon. These formations, located beneath West Africa and the Pacific Ocean, are denser and chemically distinct from the surrounding mantle. Researchers are using new seismic and isotopic data to investigate whether Theia’s dense mantle survived and sank into Earth’s core. If true, this discovery could change our understanding of Earth’s structure and early history.

After reading the article, Marcus gained more than 529 upvotes with this comment: “I wonder where on Earth Theia hit. Is there even a way to determine this, or does the constant tectonic activity of Earth just erase that over time?” Don’t forget to share your thoughts about Theia and Earth’s mantle in the comment section below! For a long time, scientists have agreed that the Moon was formed after a protoplanet called Theia collided with the early Earth about 4.5 billion years ago. Now, a team of researchers has a new bold idea: The remains of Theia may be hidden in two massive layers of rock located deep within Earth’s mantle.

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In a groundbreaking discovery, astronomers have identified an exoplanet unlike any other in our known universe. Dubbed “Cotton Candy” due to its ethereal appearance, this celestial body has left scientists baffled and intrigued.

Located in the Kepler-47-star system, approximately 1,200 light-years away from Earth, Cotton Candy orbits a binary star—a pair of stars that orbit each other. Its most remarkable feature is its unusually low density, which has led astronomers to describe it as the fluffiest exoplanet ever detected.

Cotton Candy’s density is so low that it defies our current understanding of planetary formation. According to Dr. Elena Rodriguez, lead researcher at the Galactic Exoplanet Institute, “We cannot explain how this planet formed.” The prevailing theories about planet formation involve the accumulation of dust and gas in a protoplanetary disk, eventually coalescing into a solid body. However, Cotton Candy’s density challenges this model.

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