The international Cassini mission has concluded its remarkable exploration of the Saturnian system in spectacular style, by plunging into the gas planet’s atmosphere.
A beautiful conjunction of Venus and Moon, human, sand, and Milky Way is depicted in this night skyscape from planet Earth. The scene is a panorama of 6 photos taken in a moment near the end of a journey. In the foreground, footsteps along the wind-rippled dunes are close to the Huacachina oasis in the southwestern desert of Peru. An engaging perspective on the world at night, the stunning final image was also chosen as a winner in The World at Night's 2017 International Earth and Sky Photo Contest.
Art McDonald presenting in CERN's main auditorium on 4 September (Image: Julien Ordan/CERN)
Watch Art McDonald, Nobel prize-winning physicist, speaking on the science involved in building the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory.
Speaking at CERN last week, he discusses how scientists and technicians building the machine took more than 70,000 showers as part of their efforts to maintain a completely clean and uncontaminated laboratory, and how at one point the team had to repair the 78-tonne tank of liquid scintillator after it sprung a leak, using the same principles that you would use to fix a flat tyre on your bike.
McDonald was jointly awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics 2015 with Takaaki Kajita "for the discovery of neutrino oscillations, which shows that neutrinos have mass". He is the director of this unique observatory, which hopes to detect solar neutrinos through their interactions with a large tank of heavy water.
Watch the recording here.
