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What astronauts do: Science, spacewalks and chores
Buzz Aldrin walking on the Moon. Credit: NASA. The stars, planets, and galaxies that speckle the cosmos are not the only fascinating denizens of the universe. At any given moment, there are also a handful of brave humans who currently call space home: astronauts. These modern-day pioneers do more than just float around in microgravity.…
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Mysterious fast radio burst traveled 8 billion years to reach Earth
(CNN) — Astronomers have detected a mysterious blast of radio waves that have taken 8 billion years to reach Earth. The fast radio burst is one of the most distant and energetic ever observed. Fast radio bursts, or FRBs, are intense, millisecond-long bursts of radio waves with unknown origins. The first FRB was discovered in…
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Astronomers detect most distant fast radio burst to date
image: This artist’s impression (not to scale) illustrates the path of the fast radio burst FRB 20220610A, from the distant galaxy where it originated all the way to Earth, in one of the Milky Way’s spiral arms. The source galaxy of FRB 20220610A, pinned down thanks to ESO’s Very Large Telescope, appears to be located…
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The most ancient and distant fast radio burst to date
A global team led by Australian astronomers have discovered a record-breaking fast radio burst (FRB) that offers a way to measure the “missing” matter between galaxies. On 10 June 2022 CSIRO’s Australian Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) radio telescope, on Wajarri Yamaji Country in Western Australia, detected the FRB. At about 8 billion years old,…
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Record-breaking radio burst could help us find the universe’s missing matter
An 8 billion-year-old rapid burst of radio waves, stemming from ancient colliding galaxies, could help astronomers solve the mystery of our universe’s missing matter. The record-breaking Fast Radio Burst (FRB), which is the oldest and most distant example of its kind ever spotted, demonstrates that scientists can use these emissions to effectively “weigh” the universe. …
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James Webb Space Telescope spots jet stream on Jupiter stronger than a Category 5 hurricane
Though NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) was initially touted as having the power to unveil our universe’s furthest horizons — and it surely has — some of the observatory’s most gorgeous images are actually ones of our very own solar system. With its gold-plated hive of mirrors and backpack of infrared equipment, such as…
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What it means for planets to align
Venus, the star Regulus, the Moon, Mars, and Mercury seen over the Badlands in South Dakota on Sept. 18, 2017. Credit: Gregg Alliss. When we look up at the night sky, the dance of the planets is a constant, mesmerizing ballet. And occasionally, this dance creates patterns that spark both wonder and curiosity, as is…
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Southwest Research Institute scientist heading to space aboard Virgin Galactic’s VSS Unity
A Southwest Research Institute scientist and former NASA associate administrator is set to go to space soon aboard the Virgin Galactic spaceship VSS Unity. Alan Stern, a planetary scientist and associate vice president of SwRI’s space science division, will fly on the suborbital space mission scheduled to launch Nov. 2 from Spaceport America in Truth or…
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Webb telescope discovers intense jet stream in Jupiter’s atmosphere
NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has discovered a fast-moving jet stream in Jupiter’s atmosphere that is blowing twice as fast as the visible cloud layers below it, creating wind shears that far exceed anything seen on Earth. The high-speed jet stream, which is traveling at 320 miles per hour (515 kilometers per hour) and is…
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Astro Brief: JuMBO Planets
Recently, the James Webb Space Telescope made an interesting discovery of massive binary planets without solar systems. These planets likely formed contrary to current formation theories, directly from the nebular. Join us this week as Mike describes JuMBO planets as they defy our thoughts on formation. Astro Brief is a collaboration between KSMU, the Missouri…
