Cassini says goodbye to a true Titan

more »
Mere weeks away from its dramatic, mission-ending plunge into Saturn, NASA's Cassini spacecraft has a hectic schedule, orbiting the planet every week in its Grand Finale. On a few orbits, Saturn's largest moon, Titan, has been near enough to tweak Cassini's orbit, causing the spacecraft to approach Saturn a bit closer or a bit farther away. A couple of those distant passes even pushed Cassini into the inner fringes of Saturn's rings.
via Science Daily
Zazzle Space Exploration market place

Cosmic magnifying lens reveals inner jets of black holes

more »
Jet material ejected from a black hole is magnified in new observations from Caltech's Owens Valley Radio Observatory. This discovery provides the best view yet of blobs of hot gas that shoot out from supermassive black holes.
via Science Daily
Zazzle Space Exploration market place

Tracking a solar eruption through the solar system

more »
Ten spacecraft, from ESA's Venus Express to NASA's Voyager-2, felt the effect of a solar eruption as it washed through the solar system while three other satellites watched, providing a unique perspective on this space weather event.
via Science Daily
Zazzle Space Exploration market place

Monogram Starry Wingtip of Small Magellanic Cloud Throw Pillow

Monogram Starry Wingtip of Small Magellanic Cloud Throw Pillow

Galaxies, Stars and Nebulae series: The tip of the "wing" of the Small Magellanic Cloud galaxy is dazzling in this new view from NASA's Great Observatories. The Small…

Atomically thin layers bring spintronics closer to applications

more »
Scientists have created a graphene-based device, in which electron spins can be injected and detected with unprecedented efficiency. The result is a hundredfold increase of the spin signal, big enough to be used in real life applications, such as new spin transistors and spin-based logic.
via Science Daily

Tidally locked exoplanets may be more common than previously thought

more »
Many exoplanets to be found by coming high-powered telescopes will probably be tidally locked -- with one side permanently facing their host star -- according to new research.
via Science Daily
Zazzle Space Exploration market place

Stars, Gas, and Dust Battle in the Carina Nebula

more »

Chaos reigns in the Carina Nebula where massive stars form and die. Striking and detailed, this close-up of a portion of the famous nebula is a combination of light emitted by hydrogen (shown in red) and oxygen (shown in blue). Dramatic dark dust knots and complex features revealed are sculpted by the winds and radiation of Carina's massive and energetic stars. One iconic feature of the Carina Nebula is the dark V-shaped dust lane that occurs in the top half of the image. The Carina Nebula spans about 200 light years, lies about 7,500 light years distant, and is visible with binoculars toward the southern constellation of Carina. In a billion years after the dust settles -- or is destroyed, and the gas dissipates -- or gravitationally condenses, then only the stars will remain -- but not even the brightest ones.

Zazzle Space Gifts for young and old

Tracking a solar eruption through the Solar System

more »

Ten spacecraft, from ESA’s Venus Express to NASA’s Voyager-2, felt the effect of a solar eruption as it washed through the Solar System while three Earth-orbiting satellites watched, providing a unique perspective on this space weather event.

via ESA Space Science
http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Science/Tracking_a_solar_eruption_through_the_Solar_System

Earth in Suspension

more »
A total solar eclipse is not just the momentary theft of day. It is a profound interruption of the world as we know it.
via New York Times