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Arctic sea ice has reached its peak winter extent for the year, and it’s the lowest winter maximum on record. The sea ice cap of the Arctic appeared to reach its annual maximum winter extent on Feb. 25, according to data from the NASA-supported National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) at the University of Colorado, Boulder. At 5.61 million square miles (14.54 million square kilometers), this year’s maximum extent was the smallest on the satellite record and also one of the earliest. Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/J. Beck; -
A strong flare erupted into space from an active region that was roughly facing towards Earth on Mar. 11, 2015. X-class flares are rather uncommon. The bright flash of the flare was followed by streams of dark ejecta that move across the sun to the left. The flare did cause some radio blackouts on Earth when it disturbed our ionosphere. The flare was also associated with a coronal mass ejection. The video clip covers about 2.5 hours. Credit: NASA/SDO; -
Happy Saint Patrick's Day! This gorgeous view of the aurora (above) was taken from the International Space Station as it crossed over the southern Indian Ocean on Sept. 17, 2011. While aurora are often seen near the poles, this aurora appeared at lower latitudes due to a geomagnetic storm - the insertion of energy into Earth's magnetic environment called the magnetosphere - caused by a coronal mass ejection (CME) from the sun that erupted As solar particles from an incoming CME move into Earth's magnetosphere they travel around to its back side - or night side, since it is on the opposite side from the sun - along the magnetic field lines. When these magnetic field lines reconnect in an area known as the magnetotail, energy is released and it sends the particles down onto Earth's poles, and sometimes even lower latitudes. As the particles bombard oxygen and nitrogen in the upper atmosphere, the atoms release a photon of light that we see as the beautiful colors of the aurora. Image Credit: NASA #StPatricksDay #HappySaintPatricksDay #nasa #green #nasa #aurora #iss #spacestation #space #science; -
"Mini Supernova" Explosion Could Have Big Impact: In Hollywood blockbusters, explosions are often among the stars of the show. In space, explosions of actual stars are a focus for scientists who hope to better understand their births, lives, and deaths and how they interact with their surroundings. Using our Chandra X-ray Observatory, astronomers have studied one particular explosion that may provide clues to the dynamics of other, much larger stellar eruptions. Astronomers cite GK Persei as an example of a “classical nova,” an outburst produced by a thermonuclear explosion on the surface of a white dwarf star, the dense remnant of a Sun-like star. This new image of GK Persei contains X-rays from Chandra (blue), optical data from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope (yellow), and radio data from the National Science Foundation’s Very Large Array (pink). Image Credit: NASA/CXC/RIKEN/D.Takei et al #nasa #chandra #hubble #space #astronomy #telescope #hst #science; -
Groovy Rings at Saturn! From afar, Saturn's rings look like a solid, homogenous disk of material. But upon closer examination from Cassini, we see that there are varied structures in the rings at almost every scale imaginable. Structures in the rings can be caused by many things, but often times Saturn's many moons are the culprits. The dark gaps near the left edge of the A ring (the broad, outermost ring here) are caused by the moons (Pan and Daphnis) embedded in the gaps, while the wider Cassini division (dark area between the B ring and A ring here) is created by a resonance with the medium-sized moon Mimas (which orbits well outside the rings). Prometheusis seen orbiting just outside the A ring in the lower left quadrant of thisimage; the F ring can be faintly seen to the left of Prometheus. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute #nasa #saturn #space #cassini #science;
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Explores the Mysteries of a Galaxy: The galaxy UGC 8201, captured here by the Hubble Space Telescope, is a dwarf irregular galaxy, so called because of its small size and chaotic structure. It lies just under 15 million light-years away from us in the constellation of Draco (the Dragon). As with most dwarf galaxies it is a member of a larger group of galaxies. In this case UCG 8201 is part of the M81 galaxy group; this group is one of the closest neighbors to the Local Group of galaxies, which contains our galaxy, the Milky Way. The galaxy is at an important phase in its evolution. It has recently finished a long period of star formation, which had significant impact on the whole galaxy. This episode lasted for several hundred million years and produced a high number of newborn bright stars. These stars can be seen in this image as the dominating light source within the galaxy. This process also changed the distribution and amount of dust and gas in between the stars in the galaxy. Credit: ESA/NASA #nasa #hubble #hst #hubble25 #space #galaxy #astronomy #science; -
The United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket with our Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) spacecraft onboard launches from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Space Launch Complex 41, Thursday, March 12, 2015, Florida. Our mission studies the mystery of how magnetic fields around Earth connect and disconnect, explosively releasing energy via a process known as magnetic reconnection. MMS consists of four identical spacecraft that work together to provide the first three-dimensional view of this fundamental process, which occurs throughout the universe. Image Credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani #nasa #space #mms #science #magrecon #earthrightnow #sun #launch #ula #atlasv; -
The United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket with NASA’s Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) spacecraft onboard launched from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Space Launch Complex 41 on Thursday, March 12, 2015. One hour, 47 minutes after launch, all four Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) observatories separated from the Centaur upper stage and are now flying on their own. MMS will study magnetic reconnection, a fundamental process that occurs throughout the universe when magnetic fields connect and disconnect explosively, releasing energy and accelerating particles up to nearly the speed of light. Unlike previous missions that have observed only evidence of magnetic reconnection events, MMS has sufficient resolution to observe and measure reconnection events as they occur. While MMS will fly through reconnection regions in less than a second, key sensors on each spacecraft are able to capture measurements 100 times faster than any previous mission. In addition, MMS consists of four identical observatories, which together will provide the first ever three-dimensional view of magnetic reconnection. The mission observes reconnection directly in Earth’s protective magnetic space environment known as the magnetosphere. By studying reconnection in this local, natural laboratory, MMS helps scientists understand reconnection elsewhere, such as in the atmosphere of the sun and other stars, in the vicinity of black holes and neutron stars and at the boundary between our solar system’s heliosphere and interstellar space. Image credit: NASA/Aubrey Gemignani; -
Ready for Liftoff! At Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Space Launch Complex 41, all remains on schedule for the liftoff of our Magnetospheric Multiscale (MMS) spacecraft atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket at 10:44 p.m. EDT. Weather forecast has improved and is now 80 percent favorable during the 30-minute launch window. NASA Television and blog coverage of launch will begin at 8 p.m. and continue through spacecraft separation, about an hour and 30 minutes after liftoff. Image Credit: NASA #nasa #space #mms #science #magrecon #earthrightnow #sun #launch #ula #atlasv 7F6FEC49-5125-4759-A07E-81BB373271C7; -
Space Station Crew Returns to Earth: The Soyuz TMA-14M spacecraft is seen as it lands with International Space Station Expedition 42 commander Barry Wilmore of NASA, Alexander Samokutyaev of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) and Elena Serova of Roscosmos near the town of Zhezkazgan, Kazakhstan. The landing took place on the evening of Wednesday, March 11 in the U.S, and early in the morning on Thursday, March 12, in Kazakhstan. The three crew members returned to Earth after a 167-day mission on the orbital outpost that included hundreds of scientific experiments and several spacewalks to prepare the orbiting laboratory for future arrivals by U.S. commercial crew spacecraft. Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls #nasa #space #isscrew #iss #spacestation #astronauts #roscosmos #soyuz #astrobutch #exp42;
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Smoke & Fire! The largest, most powerful rocket booster ever built successfully fired up Wednesday for a major-milestone ground test in preparation for future missions to help propel our Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft to deep space destinations, including an asteroid and Mars. The booster fired for two minutes, the same amount of time it will fire when it lifts the SLS off the launch pad, and produced about 3.6 million pounds of thrust. The test was conducted at the Promontory, Utah test facility of commercial partner Orbital ATK, and is one of two tests planned to qualify the booster for flight. Once qualified, the flight booster hardware will be ready for shipment to Kennedy Space Center in Florida for the first SLS flight. Image Credit: NASA #slsfiredup #journeytomars #nasa #test #space #sls #rocket #fire #smoke #mars #orion #orbitalatk; -
Preparing to Test the Booster for NASA's New Rocket Engineers at Orbital ATK prepare to test the largest, most powerful booster ever built for NASA's new rocket, the Space Launch System (SLS), which will fire up for a ground test at 11:30 a.m. EDT on Wednesday, March 11, at Orbital ATK Propulsion Systems’ test facilities in Promontory, Utah. The two-minute static test is a significant milestone for the SLS as part of NASA’s journey to Mars, and follows years of development. It is one of two ground tests to qualify the booster for flight. A second test is planned for early 2016. Once qualification is complete, the hardware will be ready to help send the rocket, along with NASA’s Orion spacecraft, on its first flight test. When completed, two five-segment, solid-rocket boosters and four RS-25 main engines will power the SLS as it begins its deep space missions. The boosters operate in parallel with the main engines for the first two minutes of flight, providing more than 75 percent of the thrust needed for the rocket to escape Earth’s gravitational pull. The first flight test of the SLS will feature a configuration for a 70-metric-ton (77-ton) lift capacity and carry an uncrewed Orion spacecraft beyond low-Earth orbit to test the performance of the integrated system. As the SLS is updated, it will provide an unprecedented lift capability of 130 metric tons (143 tons) to enable missions even farther into our solar system. Live coverage of the test on NASA TV begins on Wednesday at 11:00 a.m. EDT. Image Credit: Orbital ATK; -
Taking a Closer Look at Orion After Successful Flight Test Engineers across the country have been busy taking a closer look at NASA's Orion spacecraft and the data it produced during its successful flight test in December 2014. Inside the Launch Abort System Facility at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, Orion was lifted using a special crane for removal of its heat shield on Feb. 13, 2015. In the background, technicians move the heat shield on a work stand. The spacecraft’s heat shield protected Orion as it reentered Earth’s atmosphere at searing temperatures. Removing the back shell allows the team to get a closer look at Orion’s systems to see how they fared during the trip to space. The heat shield was removed in preparation for shipment to NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, where special equipment will be used to remove its ablative material. From there, the heat shield will be shipped to NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia, where it will be outfitted on a test article for water impact testing. Meanwhile, NASA and Lockheed Martin, the prime contractor for Orion, continue to take a look at the data the flight test produced to validate pre-flight models and improve the spacecraft’s design. Analysis of data obtained during its two-orbit, four-and-a-half hour mission Dec. 5 will provide engineers detailed information on how the spacecraft fared. Photo Credit: NASA/Jim Grossmann; -
Astronomers using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope have spotted for the first time a distant supernova split into four images. The multiple images of the exploding star are caused by the powerful gravity of a foreground elliptical galaxy embedded in a massive cluster of galaxies. This unique observation will help astronomers refine their estimates of the mass of dark matter in the lensing galaxy and cluster. Dark matter is an invisible form of matter that makes up most of the mass of the universe. The gravity from both the elliptical galaxy and its galaxy cluster distorts and magnifies the light from the supernova behind it in an effect called gravitational lensing. First predicted by Albert Einstein, this effect is similar to a glass lens bending light to magnify and distort the image of an object behind it. The multiple images are arranged around the elliptical galaxy in a cross-shaped pattern, also known an Einstein Cross. The elliptical galaxy and its galaxy cluster, MACS J1149.6+2223, are 5 billion light-years away from Earth. The supernova behind it is 9.3 billion light-years away. The image shows the galaxy's location within a hefty cluster of galaxies called MACS J1149.6+2223. Arrows (inset) point to the multiple copies of Supernova Refsdal. The four images were spotted on Nov. 11, 2014. Image Credit: NASA/ESA/STScI/UCLA; -
Free Fall in the Zero G Mechanical Engineering Technician Alex Camargo retrieves a drop vehicle after its 432-foot free fall in NASA Glenn’s Zero Gravity Research Facility. The drop vehicle, which weighs about 2000 lbs., contains hardware for the Saffire experiment, which is being developed to study how fires behave in spacecraft in microgravity. The Zero-G research team was verifying the ignition system design. Microgravity, a condition of relative near weightlessness, can only be achieved on Earth by putting an object in a state of free fall. In the Zero-G, low gravity is achieved for 5.18 seconds as the drop vehicle falls inside a 470 ft. long vacuum chamber. Image Credit: NASA Acknowledgment: Bridget R. Caswell and Mark Grills (Wyle Information Systems, LLC);
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