nokasa14's Blog
Sorry, but the blog post could not be located.
 |
| |
The crew of space shuttle Atlantis gathered in the shadow of the launch-ready spacecraft Monday morning to discuss mission STS-122. The seven astronauts are to attach the European-built Columbus laboratory to the International Space Station during an 11-day flight targeted to begin Dec. 6.
Speaking to news media representatives gathered near Launch Pad 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, the seven astronauts detailed their roles during the mission and reflected on its larger meaning for the orbiting base.
"For us Europeans, it's a special event," said Hans Schlegel, a European Space Agency astronaut from Germany who will serve as a mission specialist. "It's an honor, it's a duty, and it's a joy." Schlegel flew his last mission in 1992, as a part of the STS-55 crew.
Frenchman Leopold Eyharts will be the second ESA mission specialist aboard Atlantis, and he will remain on the station for three months after the STS-120 crew returns home. Eyharts will replace current station resident and NASA astronaut Dan Tani.
NASA astronaut Steve Frick is commanding the mission, with Alan Poindexter as pilot and Leland Melvin, Rex Walheim and Stan Love serving as mission specialists. The group will perform three spacewalks to install Columbus, and will be equipped to stage a fourth one as well.
Atlantis is targeted to launch December 6 at 4:31 p.m. EST on its 11-day mission to the International Space Station.
www.nasa.gov
NASA Conducts Second Test of Ares Rockets' Main Parachute  Image above: Second test of the parachute system that will allow Ares I and Ares V first stage boosters to be recovered and reused. Image Credit: NASA/MSFC
Validating an earlier test conducted in September, NASA and industry engineers on Thursday successfully tested the main parachute for Constellation Program rockets. Outfitted with a 42,000-pound weight, the parachute was dropped from a U.S. Air Force C-17 aircraft flying at an altitude of 16,500 feet. The one-ton parachute and all supporting hardware functioned properly, landing safely approximately three minutes later at the U.S. Army's Yuma Proving Ground near Yuma, Ariz. The parachute system will allow Ares I and Ares V first stage boosters to be recovered and reused.
+ News Release
+ Photo 1
+ Photo 2
http://www.nasa.gov/
|
| |
Hubble Zooms in on Heart of Mystery Comet
Image above: Images of Comet 17P/Holmes as seen from the ground (left) and the Hubble Space Telescope (right). Click image for enlargement. Credit: A. Dyer, Alberta, Canada (left); NASA/ESA/H. Weaver/The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (right)
|
| NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has probed the bright core of Comet 17P/Holmes, which, to the delight of sky watchers, mysteriously brightened by nearly a millionfold in a 24-hour period beginning Oct. 23, 2007.
Astronomers used Hubble's powerful resolution to study Comet Holmes' core for clues about how the comet brightened. The orbiting observatory's Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 (WFPC2) monitored the comet for several days, snapping images on Oct. 29, Oct. 31, and Nov. 4. Hubble's crisp "eye" can see objects as small as 33 miles (54 kilometers) across, providing the sharpest most detailed view yet of the source of the spectacular brightening.
The Hubble image at right, taken Nov. 4, shows the heart of the comet. The central portion of the image has been specially processed to highlight variations in the dust distribution near the nucleus. About twice as much dust along lies along the east-west direction (the horizontal direction) as along the north-south direction (the vertical direction), giving the comet a "bow tie" appearance.
The composite color image at left, taken Nov. 1 by an amateur astronomer, shows the complex structure of the entire coma, consisting of concentric shells of dust and a faint tail emanating from the comet's right side.
The nucleus-the small solid body that is the ultimate source of all the comet's activity-is still swaddled in bright dust, even 12 days after the spectacular outburst. "Most of what Hubble sees is sunlight scattered from microscopic particles," explained Hal Weaver of The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Md., who led the Hubble investigation. "But we may finally be starting to detect the emergence of the nucleus itself in this final Hubble image."
Hubble first observed Comet 17P/Holmes on June 15, 1999, when there was virtually no dusty shroud around the nucleus. From that observation, astronomers deduced that the nucleus had a diameter of approximately 2.1 miles (3.4 kilometers), about the length of New York City's Central Park. Astronomers hope to use the new Hubble images to determine the size of the comet's nucleus to see how much of it was blasted away during the outburst.
Hubble's two earlier snapshots of Comet Holmes also showed some interesting features. On Oct. 29, the telescope spied three "spurs" of dust emanating from the nucleus, while the Hubble images taken on Oct. 31 revealed an outburst of dust just west of the nucleus.
The Hubble images, however, do not show any large fragments near the nucleus of Comet Holmes, unlike the case of Comet 73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 3 (SW3). In the spring of 2006 Hubble observations revealed a multitude of "mini-comets" ejected by SW3 after the comet increased dramatically in brightness.
Ground-based images of Comet Holmes show a large, spherically symmetrical cloud of dust that is offset from the nucleus, suggesting that a large fragment did break off and subsequently disintegrated into tiny dust particles after moving away from the main nucleus.
Unfortunately, the huge amount of dust near the comet's nucleus and the comet's relatively large distance from Earth (149 million miles, or 1.6 astronomical units, for Holmes versus 9 million, or 0.1 astronomical unit for SW3), make detecting fragments near Holmes nearly impossible right now, unless the fragments are nearly as large as the nucleus itself.
The Hubble Comet Holmes observing team comprises H. Weaver and C. Lisse (The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory); P. Lamy (Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille, France); I. Toth (Konkoly Observatory, Hungary); M. Mutchler (Space Telescope Science Institute); W. Reach (California Institute of Technology); and J. Vaubaillon (California Institute of Technology).
The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency. The Space Telescope Science Institute conducts Hubble science operations. The institute is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy, Inc., Washington.
The Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) is a not-for-profit laboratory and division of The Johns Hopkins University. APL conducts research and development primarily for national security and for nondefense projects of national and global significance. APL is located midway between Baltimore and Washington, D.C., in Laurel, Md.
Related links:http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hubble/news/hubble-holmes.html
|
|
Recent Posts
Top Posts
Recent Comments
Categories
Archive
Syndication Tools
|
|
