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There was enough time on Earth for us this week, but do not forget to watch from time to time. Here's all you missed galactic during Halloween and early voting.
NASA events
Two NASA historical missions ran out of fuel this week: the 11-year-old Dawn mission to explore the two largest objects in the asteroid belt and the Kepler Space Telescope's nine-year mission that uncovered thousands d & # 39; exoplanets.
Although the two conclusions of the mission are expected, it is sad to see them come to an end. Fortunately, the data they have provided will make discoveries for years to come. And ni is on a collision course with the Earth. Dawn orbits the dwarf planet Ceres for decades and Kepler is 94 million kilometers away.
Farewell, brave travelers, and thanks for all the science.
But let's invite Parker's solar probe to break a record and get closer to the sun of any other spaceship.
Hubble is awake; The opportunity is not
Despite our letter to the rover of Mars Opportunity, she still has not been awake and has not responded to NASA's many messages since she was plunged into a dust storm that has exploded around the planet and started in May.
NASA will continue to send more messages, and scientists are hoping that stronger winds will blow the dust off of Oppy's solar panels.
Meanwhile, NASA's Hubble Space Telescope resumes operations and makes further observations.
A gyroscope or a device measuring the speed at which the spacecraft spins broke down. This meant that Hubble could not turn and lock on new targets. A backup gyroscope proved useless, even if it worked badly.
The backup has been recovered, so expect more beautiful images of the famous space telescope.
NASA's Chandra X-ray observatory, which also had a gyroscope problem recently, is also operational.
Shadows in the space
Speaking of Hubble, the space telescope captured an image called a bat's shadow 1,300 light-years away from the stellar nursery known as the Serpens Nebula.
So what is it? A sun-like star, HBC 672, is surrounded by a large ring of dusty debris. But Hubble can not see this ring. Instead, it captures the shadow of the ring created by the bright light of the star. NASA scientists have compared the big shadow to what happens when something small crosses in front of a flashlight beam.
"This is an analogue of what the solar system looked like when it was only 1 or 2 million years ago," said Klaus Pontoppidan, astronomer at the same time. Institute of Space Telescope Sciences. "For all we know, the solar system has already created a shadow like this."
Do not approach too much
If you were in space, the last thing you would want to get close to is a black hole, the dreadful and destructive elimination of garbage from the universe. Once you are close to it, you have really passed the point of no return.
Many astronomers assume that a supermassive black hole is at the center of the Milky Way, our galaxy. This is because they also tend to hide in the center of other galaxies.
But for the first time, materials were seen surrounding the drain, so to speak. The GRAVITY instrument of the European European Observatory has observed light eruptions around the Sagittarius A disc, the massive object in the center of the galaxy.
"It's amazing to see materials gravitating around a huge black hole at 30% of the speed of light," said Oliver Pfuhl, a scientist at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics.
It also gives a thrilling image.
A milky way of stars
Have you ever wondered why there are so many stars in our galaxy? It turns out that the halo of the Milky Way was gifted – somehow.
Galaxies are not exactly friendly neighbors in the universe. Instead, they tend to merge or cannibalize. The Milky Way is one of the largest galaxies and astronomers are trying to determine if it grew up after many small mergers or just a few big ones. Sometimes evidence of these fusions can be found using "galactic fossils" or simply following an unusual flow of stars.
The new data from the Gaia satellite mission, released this week, revealed that 10 billion years ago, the Milky Way had merged with another great galaxy, Gaia-Enceladus. The stars of this galaxy make up most of the halo of the Milky Way and have helped shape its thick disc.
The stars given by the fusion are different from the "native stars" of our galaxy, because they are younger, said the researchers.
And in about 4 million years, the Milky Way will collide with the gigantic neighboring Andromeda galaxy. So there is that to wait.
Hey, Bennu!
After two years of trekking through space in search of an appointment with an asteroid, NASA's OSIRIS-REx spacecraft sends images of the original asteroid Bennu.
The spacecraft and the asteroid will have their official appointment in December. We will then have photos with color filters. I can not wait to see the instagram of this date.
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