Multi-colored Specimen Of Cerussite Crystals In A Matrix Seam

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God damn it, Neil. 

Dioptase on Calcite Covered Matrix

Locality:  Tsumeb Mine (Tsumcorp Mine), Tsumeb, Otjikoto Region, Namibia.

Glorious star formation in NGC 1569, a galaxy in our local neighbourhood. Taken by Hubble.

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💙 Colours over the bridge on 500px by Gary Alway, Melbourne, Australia ☀  Canon EOS 70D-f/4-1/125s-35mm-iso400, 3648✱5472px-rating:91.2 ◉  Photo location: Google Maps 

Largest Collection of Planets EVER Discovered!

Guess what!? Our Kepler mission has verified 1,284 new planets, which is the single largest finding of planets to date. This gives us hope that somewhere out there, around a star much like ours, we can possibly one day discover another Earth-like planet.

But what exactly does that mean? These planets were previously seen by our spacecraft, but have now been verified. Kepler’s candidates require verification to determine if they are actual planets, and not another object, such as a small star, mimicking a planet. This announcement more than doubles the number of verified planets from Kepler.

Since the discovery of the first planets outside our solar system more than two decades ago, researchers have resorted to a laborious, one-by-one process of verifying suspected planets. These follow-up observations are often time and resource intensive. This latest announcement, however, is based on a statistical analysis method that can be applied to many planet candidates simultaneously.

They employed a technique to assign each Kepler candidate a planet-hood probability percentage – the first such automated computation on this scale, as previous statistical techniques focused only on sub-groups within the greater list of planet candidates identified by Kepler. 

What that means in English: Planet candidates can be thought of like bread crumbs. If you drop a few large crumbs on the floor, you can pick them up one by one. But, if you spill a whole bag of tiny crumbs, you’re going to need a broom. This statistical analysis is our broom.

The Basics: Our Kepler space telescope measures the brightness of stars. The data will look like an EKG showing the heart beat. Whenever a planet passes in front of its parent star a viewed from the spacecraft, a tiny pulse or beat is produced. From the repeated beats, we can detect and verify the existence of Earth-size planets and learn about their orbits and sizes. This planet-hunting technique is also known as the Transit Method.

The number of planets by size for all known exoplanets, planets that orbit a sun-like star, can be seen in the above graph. The blue bars represent all previously verified exoplanets by size, while the orange bars represent Kepler’s 1,284 newly validated planets announced on May 10.

While our original Kepler mission has concluded, we have more than 4 years of science collected that produced a remarkable data set that will be used by scientists for decades. The spacecraft itself has been re-purposed for a new mission, called K2 – an extended version of the original Kepler mission to new parts of the sky and new fields of study.

The above visual shows all the missions we’re currently using, and plan to use, in order to continue searching for signs of life beyond Earth.

Following Kepler, we will be launching future missions to continue planet-hunting , such as the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), and the James Webb Space Telescope. We hope to continue searching for other worlds out there and maybe even signs of life-as-we-know-it beyond Earth.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

Allophane

Locality: Cala Mine, Huelva, Andalusia, Spain

Auroras on Jupiter [NASA/ESA Hubble]

Not cars but…

X-57 Electric Plane (nicknamed Maxwell). NASA has announced an experimental electric airplane called the X-57, which could reduce flight times and carbon emissions for passenger planes in the future. The plane, which will test the space agency’s new propulsion technology, is nicknamed after James Clerk Maxwell, the 19th century Scottish physicist who worked in the field of electromagnetism. The space agency’s Scalable Convergent Electric Propulsion Technology Operations Research project plans to build the plane by modifying the existing Italian-designed Tecnam P2006T twin-engine light aircraft. The X-57 will use a long skinny wing embedded with 14 electric motors. Twelve of the motors will be positioned on the leading edge of the plane for take offs and landings, while the larger motor on each wing tip will be used while at cruise altitude. It will be powered only by batteries, eliminating carbon emissions altogether. NASA hopes to demonstrate that X-57 technology could benefit travellers by reducing journey times, aircraft noise and fuel usage, as well as reducing operational costs for small airplanes by as much as 40%. While fuel-powered planes typically need to fly slower in order to get the best fuel efficiency, electric propulsion could help to tackle this problem, according to the space agency. X-57 is part of NASA’s decade-long New Aviation Horizons initiative, which will see it develop as many as five larger X-Planes with the aim of eventually producing them commercially.

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