Just some Astronomy photos and Info

This interstellar apparition has a surprisingly familiar shape. Known as the Bubble Nebula, the cosmic circle is formed from the wind of a massive star.

This spectactular photo was taken by astrophotographer Jaspal Chadha from London. Chadha used a Altair Astro RC 250TT Scope.

Approximately 6 light-years wide, NGC 7635 is located roughly 7,100 light-years from Earth in the constellation Cassiopeia. A light-year is the distance light travels in one year, or about 6 trillion miles (10 trillion kilometers). Intense radiation and stellar winds from a nearby star created this delicate-looking bubble, surrounded by red, hot gas.

 Astronomers using ESO’s Very Large Telescope in Chile have captured this image of planetary nebula Abell 33.

 The hand might look like an X-ray from the doctor's office, but it is actually a cloud of material ejected from a star that exploded. NASA's NuSTAR spacecraft has imaged the structure in high-energy X-rays for the first time, shown in blue. Lower-energy X-ray light previously detected by NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory is shown in green and red.

 This picture of the nebula around a rare yellow hypergiant star called IRAS 17163-3907 is the best ever taken of a star in this class and shows for the first time a huge dusty double shell surrounding the central hypergiant. The star and its shells resemble an egg white around a yolky centre, leading astronomers to nickname the object the Fried Egg Nebula.

Huble 25 years plus and still working

I didn't even said anything about Hubble Space Telescope 25 years of being in space and making so many discoveries.Well here are some!
1)The telescope's observations of a special kind of supernova type 1a were crucial to the discovery that the universe was dominated by a mysterious factor known as dark energy, which appears to be behind the accelerating expansion of the universe. The discoverers won the Nobel Prize for physics in 2011. Well they count all the mass of the universe or they though they did when they obverse the most distance galaxies they expect them to begin their slow down and start moving inward but surprise they was moving ever faster!!!!
2)Hubble set records for its far-seeing views of the cosmos. Those views showed that galaxies started forming earlier in the universe's history than scientists expected, and that they look very different from the galaxies that are closer to us in time and space.
3)Studies of how the universe has changed over time, made possible by Hubble and other space observatories, helped physicists narrow down their estimates of the observable universe's age to 13.8 billion years.This was one of the reason they build the HST.
4)Hubble's detailed observations of gravitational interactions in distant galaxies led scientists to conclude that there are supermassive black holes at the centers of virtually all large galaxies — including our own.
5)Hubble provided amazing shots of Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, charted new moons and rings around Uranus, and spotted four previously unknown moons of Pluto. Its observations of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9's crash into Jupiter was a wake-up call about cosmic impacts.Plus they used Hubble after the impacts to look deeper into JUpiter clouds.
6)The telescope and its team also helped get the ball rolling for the study of planetary systems beyond our own. Last year, scientists used Hubble's observations to produce the best weather map ever created for an extrasolar planet.
They hope if Hubble last long past its 2030 when Hubble orbit will make it hit deeper into Earth atmosphere when it does this soon it will force to burn up,but there are group that want to save when the new manned space ship and rocket are ready.They said NASA shouldn't just allow it to burn up.They are also talking about replacing it but with NASA budget the way its is this mightn't happen.It would need a very good repair mission almost everyting would need to be replace plus a higher orbit as well.Only time will tell how we treat such highlly working telescope that made so many discovery!
But the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), would be in space let just hope they test out the mirror unlike the HST they launch it and its mirror was screwup with the JWST it orbit would be a million miles away.I just said they should test it out and not let history repeat. LOL While the Hubble view of the universe in the near ultraviolet, visible, and near infrared spectra.JWST mainly a primarily an infrared instrument, its coverage extends down to 600 nm wavelength light, or roughly orange in the visible spectrum. A typical human eye can see to about 750 nm wavelength light, so there is some overlap with the longest visible wavelength bands, including orange and red light. So the pics would look different...

NASA Chief Wants to Cut Mars Travel Time in Half

CANOGA PARK, Calif. — Getting astronauts to Mars will take all the spacefaring expertise the United States can muster, including advanced propulsion technologies such as solar-electric engines and perhaps even nuclear rockets, according to NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden.
In statements made during a visit to the Aerojet Rocketdyne plant here last Thursday (May 28), Bolden stressed that he'd like to slash the travel time required to send astronauts to Mars.
"Right now it's about an eight-month mission; we'd like to cut that in half," Bolden told reporters after speaking to Aerojet Rocketdyne workers for 30 minutes or so.

Superfast propulsion tech would help limit astronauts' radiation exposure during the trek to Mars and reduce the amount of water, food and other "consumables" such a mission would require, NASA officials have said.
Bolden was flanked by Aerojet Rocketdyne's CEO and president Scott Seymour and Julie Van Kleeck, the company's Vice President of Advanced Space & Launch Systems, during the news conference. The trio discussed the advanced solar-electric propulsion systems (SEP) the company has been working on.
"We're now trying to get to higher power levels; that's the next step," Seymour said, referring to the 5-kilowatt (kW) engines Aerojet Rocketdyne is currently building for NASA robotic missions. "Fifteen kilowatts would be the next step, and then to cluster them together ... then, in the long term, 50 to 100 kilowatts."
"The limiting power of this type of propulsion has been the power to drive it," Bolden said. "Aerojet Rocketdyne has partnered with different entities around the country in looking [at] how to get more energy density onto a solar cell. The more power we can get, the larger we can make the engine and its capability.
"The advantage of using that kind of propulsion, pound for pound, is that it can fly nearly forever as opposed to chemical engines," Bolden added, in reference to the traditional liquid-fueled rocket engines that propel the vast majority of NASA's spacecraft.
But these SEP units — which generate thrust by accelerating charged atoms and molecules out the back of a spacecraft — are limited in what they can accomplish. Discussing more advanced in-space propulsion, Van Kleeck referred back to nuclear rockets, such as the NERVA (Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Performance) system studied by NASA decades ago.

"This country did a lot of work on that back in the 1960s and 1970s, and there is some technology being looked at regarding the fuels aspects of that, to make it lower cost and safer for the future," Van Kleeck said. (NERVA was scrapped in 1972, despite successful ground-firing tests and promising performance.)
"We don't build rocket engines; we depend on our industry partners. " Bolden said. "My job is to try and keep things stable for them, to let them know that we are committed to in-space propulsion."
Bolden said that he wanted to put more money into these advanced space-only systems, which could potentially be "game changers" — and not just for delivering cargo to Mars.
"You've got to be specific," Bolden said. "If I say I want game-changing in-space propulsion, everyone will go back to [the idea of] moving cargo. I want industry to focus on getting peopleto move really fast. I think we can do far better than we are doing today, but we've got to show our commitment by putting some money into it."
Right Now the only power source is solar cell which don't have the muscle to increase the speed to get them there within 3 month or so! Atomic power does!!!

The Baby Eagle Nebula (LBN 777), also sometimes called the Vulture Nebula, is a reflection nebula in the constellation Taurus the Bull. It is part of the much larger Taurus Molecular Cloud, a huge region of dust and cold gas some 400 light-years away. (Canon 6D DSLR, Nikon AF-S 600mm f/4 DIF-ED lens, ISO 200, sixty-three 10-minute exposures, stacked)

Europa Clipper is a mission concept under study by NASA that would conduct detailed reconnaissance of Jupiter's moon Europa and would investigate whether it has conditions suitable for life.
The mission name is a reference to the lightweight clipper ships of the 19th century that routinely plied trade routes around the world.
Europa has been identified as one of the locations in the Solar System, other than the Earth, that could possibly harbor microbial extraterrestrial life.
Immediately following the Galileo spacecraft's discoveries, JPL conducted preliminary mission studies that envisioned a capable spacecraft such as the Jupiter Icy Moons Orbiter (a $16B mission concept), the Jupiter Europa Orbiter (a $4.3B concept), an orbiter ($2B concept), and a multi-flyby spacecraft: Europa Clipper. The proposal and scope of the Europa Clipper mission are still in the conceptual stage, but the approximate cost is estimated at $2 billion. Meanwhile, the European Space Agency is already developing the Jupiter Icy Moon Explorer for a proposed launch in 2022.
In March 2013, $75 million USD were authorized to expand on the formulation of mission activities, mature the proposed science goals, and fund preliminary instrument development, as suggested in 2011 by the Planetary Science Decadal Survey. In May 2014, a House bill substantially increased Europa Clipper funding budget for the 2014 fiscal year from $15 million to $100 million. The funds would be applied to pre-formulation work.It look like it could happen!!
The goals of the proposed Europa Clipper space probe are to explore Europa, investigate its habitability and aid in the selection of future landing sites. Specifically, the objectives are to study:
Ice shell and ocean: Confirm the existence, and characterize the nature, of water within or beneath the ice, and processes of surface-ice-ocean exchange.
Composition: Distribution and chemistry of key compounds and the links to ocean composition.
Geology: Characteristics and formation of surface features, including sites of recent or current activity.
The spacecraft, trajectory and payload are subject to change as the design matures. The eight science instruments under consideration, with a calculated total mass of 82.3 kg are:
Shortwave Infrared Spectrometer (SWIRS) can identify materials exposed on Europa's surface and map their distribution, and eventually study it with a lander.
Ice-penetrating radar (IPR) would determine the thickness of the ice, study whether bodies of water are trapped within the ice between the surface and the ocean below, study fracturing of the shell and help understand how material is transported between the ocean and the surface.
Stereo Topographical Imager (TI) to map the surface.
Neutral Mass Spectrometer (NMS) to elucidate the chemical structures of molecules on the surface, and to analyze the moon's trace atmosphere during flybys
Magnetometer would characterize the magnetic field and gravity of Europa.
Langmuir probes would measure the plasma field around Europa.
Reconnaissance Camera (RC) to acquire surface images in the visible spectrum.
Thermal Imager (ThI) to map temperature at the surface.
Nanosatellites
The scientists proposing this mission are also considering deploying from the spacecraft several miniaturized satellites of the CubeSat type, possibly driven by xenon thrusters, to sample and analyse Europa's plumes. Europa Clipper will relay signals from the satellites with its high gain antenna back to Earth. With propulsion, some nanosatellites will be capable of entering orbit around Europa. However, including additional mass would only be possible if the Europa Clipper is launched with the powerful Space Launch System (SLS) heavy lift launch vehicle.
Europa Clipper would inherit tested technology of the Galileo and Juno Jupiter orbiters with regards to radiation protection. Shielding will be provided by 150 kilograms of material. To maximize its effectiveness, the electronics will be nested in the core of the spacecraft for additional radiation protection.
 Solar power Cell get degraded as space probe goes through Jupiter's intense magnetosphere.RTGs are the best but there are only few left.It would take cash to make more.
This mission has not be approve let,So far they are studying it!
There are two model-Solar or RTG.

Cassini see sunlight being reflected by the methane lakes

This near-infrared, colour mosaic from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft shows the sun glinting off of Titan’s north polar seas. While Cassini has captured, separately, views of the polar seas and the sun glinting off of them in the past, this is the first time both have been seen together in the same view.
The sunglint, also called a specular reflection, is the bright area near the 11 o’clock position at upper left. This mirror-like reflection, known as the specular point, is in the south of Titan’s largest sea, Kraken Mare, just north of an island archipelago separating two separate parts of the sea.

This particular sunglint was so bright as to saturate the detector of Cassini’s Visual and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (VIMS) instrument, which captures the view. It is also the sunglint seen with the highest observation elevation so far — the sun was a full 40 degrees above the horizon as seen from Kraken Mare at this time — much higher than the 22 degrees seen earlier. Because it was so bright, this glint was visible through the haze at much lower wavelengths than before, down to 1.3 microns.

The southern portion of Kraken Mare (the area surrounding the specular feature toward upper left) displays a “bathtub ring” — a bright margin of evaporate deposits — which indicates that the sea was larger at some point in the past and has become smaller due to evaporation. The deposits are material left behind after the methane & ethane liquid evaporates, somewhat akin to the saline crust on a salt flat.

The highest resolution data from this flyby — the area seen immediately to the right of the sunglint — cover the labyrinth of channels that connect Kraken Mare to another large sea, Ligeia Mare. Ligeia Mare itself is partially covered in its northern reaches by a bright, arrow-shaped complex of clouds. The clouds are made of liquid methane droplets, and could be actively refilling the lakes with rainfall.

The view was acquired during Cassini’s August 21, 2014, flyby of Titan, also referred to as “T104″ by the Cassini team.

The view contains real colour information, although it is not the natural colour the human eye would see. Here, red in the image corresponds to 5.0 microns, green to 2.0 microns, and blue to 1.3 microns. These wavelengths correspond to atmospheric windows through which Titan’s surface is visible. The unaided human eye would see nothing but haze.

NASA Probe Zapped by Saturn Moon's Static

A spacecraft exploring the Saturn system was zapped by static electricity sent out by one of the ringed wonder's many moons in 2005, a new study suggests.
In fact, scientists have found that the Cassini spacecraft was "briefly bathed in a beam of electrons"
 coming from the moon Hyperion's surface, NASA officials said. No, this isn't proof of alien life: The particle beam was likely generated by the odd, porous moon's exposure to ultraviolet radiation from the sun and Saturn's magnetic field.
It was rather like Cassini receiving a 200-volt electric shock from Hyperion, even though they were over 2,000 kilometers [1,200 miles] apart at the time.
The study presents some surprising results. Scientists studying Saturn and its moons didn't think that the small, sponge-looking moon Hyperion could have any major interaction with the ringed planet's magnetosphere.
Researchers have long known that static electricity is an important phenomenon on Earth's moon. However, this is the first time they have confirmation of static at play on another cosmic body. Luckily, the beam didn't seem to harm Cassini, but future robotic and crewed missions should be wary of possible electric shocks from bodies in the solar system.

"Our observations show that this is also an important effect at outer planet moons, and that we need to take this into account when studying how these moons interact with their environment," Geraint Jones, a member of the Cassini Plasma Spectrometer instrument team who helped supervise the study, said in the same statement.
The $3.2 billion Cassini mission launched to space in 1997. The probe arrived at Saturn in 2004 and has been orbiting the gas giant ever since. Cassini is expected to continue studying Saturn and its moons until 2017, when the spacecraft will end its mission by intentionally plunging into the gas giant's atmosphere.