The Astronomy Thread

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MusicForFish

MusicForFish

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Cybsled said:
For it to be so dead that it is a black dwarf seems off...you’re talking a white dwarf that totally burned out already, but our sun is still main sequence? A large planet that got flung into an odd orbit early in the solar systems history seems more likely.
Click to expand...
This terrible article/theory is similar to the article I read a few months ago. Trying to find the link still. Should have bookmarked it. It's similar to the Nemisis theory in some regards.

phys.org

Sun has binary partner, may affect the Earth

The ground-breaking and richly illustrated new book, Lost Star of Myth and Time, marries modern astronomical theory with ancient star lore to make a compelling case for the profound influence on our planet of a companion star to the sun. Author and theorist, Walter Cruttenden, presents the...
phys.org phys.org


Edit* It's an "updated with new study info" version of this one, but on a more professional site with citations.
phys.org

New evidence that all stars are born in pairs

Did our sun have a twin when it was born 4.5 billion years ago?
phys.org phys.org
 
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Mudcrush Durtfeet

Mudcrush Durtfeet

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MusicForFish said:
This terrible article/theory is similar to the article I read a few months ago. Trying to find the link still. Should have bookmarked it. It's similar to the Nemisis theory in some regards.

phys.org

Sun has binary partner, may affect the Earth

The ground-breaking and richly illustrated new book, Lost Star of Myth and Time, marries modern astronomical theory with ancient star lore to make a compelling case for the profound influence on our planet of a companion star to the sun. Author and theorist, Walter Cruttenden, presents the...
phys.org phys.org


Edit* It's an "updated with new study info" version of this one, but on a more professional site with citations.
phys.org

New evidence that all stars are born in pairs

Did our sun have a twin when it was born 4.5 billion years ago?
phys.org phys.org
Click to expand...

Considering that there are actual observations of star systems forming that do not involve pairs of stars at various points in the process, this is obviously bunk.
 
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Lambourne

Lambourne

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The Nemesis (companion star) hypothes is pretty much dead because it would have been detected in IR surveys by now. A cold and distant planet is still possible and has been suggested as an answer to observed clustering of Kuiper belt objects. Scott Manley did a video on it a few years ago, I think this is it.

 
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meStevo

meStevo

I think your wife's a bigfoot gus.
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This rover and it's helicopter launch tomorrow morning at 4:50am PST.

mars.nasa.gov

Mars 2020: Perseverance Rover - NASA Science

NASA’s Mars Perseverance rover seeks signs of ancient life and collects samples of rock and regolith for possible Earth return.
mars.nasa.gov mars.nasa.gov

1596073980763.png
 
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Zindan

Zindan

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Cybsled

Cybsled

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It's a good proof of concept. Even if it fails or doesn't last long, what they will learn from it will help them develop improvements. The air on Mars is so damn thin, your options are limited for maneuverable craft. Helicopter blade-style drones have been tested a lot on Earth already and they're good for autonomous/minimal human involvement because worst case scenario, they can hover in place or quickly land if something goes wrong. An inflatable craft wouldn't be able to do that as well, nor would some traditional aircraft-style drone.
 
Big Phoenix

Big Phoenix

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So what are they expecting it to do science wise? I can't imagine that thing carries much of a useful payload considering the constraints of the Martian atmosphere.
 
meStevo

meStevo

I think your wife's a bigfoot gus.
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It's 100% a proof of concept.

Key Objectives
  • Prove powered flight in the thin atmosphere of Mars. The Red Planet has lower gravity (about onethird that of Earth) but its atmosphere is just 1% as thick, making it much harder to generate lift.
  • Demonstrate miniaturized flying technology. That requires shrinking down onboard computers, electronics and other parts so that the helicopter is light enough to take off.
  • Operate autonomously. Ingenuity will use solar power to charge its batteries and rely on internal heaters to maintain operational temperatures during the cold Martian nights. After receiving commands from Earth relayed through the rover, each test flight is performed without real-time input from Mars Helicopter mission controllers.
mars.nasa.gov

Ingenuity Mars Helicopter - NASA Science

NASA's Ingenuity Mars Helicopter completed 72 historic flights since first taking to the skies above the Red Planet.
mars.nasa.gov mars.nasa.gov
 
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Cybsled

Cybsled

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Ya, if you look at the specs for it, it's fairly barebones. It's only designed to fly for around 90 seconds per day. Mars team basically plots a flight path, the thing runs it on its own, then they can examine the results later.

But if this is successful or they learn a lot from it, future Mars missions could be much more ambitious. In theory you could fly these things into caves to explore, or past obstacles that would give rovers trouble. And if you put humans on Mars, having scouting drones like these would be very useful.
 
Araxen

Araxen

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All the stuff this rover has is pretty amazing. Hopefully the mic works this time around.

 
Lambourne

Lambourne

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2021 should be a good year for Mars stuff. In addition to Perseverence, a Chinese mission launched last week which includes a lander and rover too. Emirates launched their first mission as well although that is an orbiter only.
 
Cybsled

Cybsled

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I think only the US has successfully landed on Mars thus far? Failure rate for Mars missions is fairly high across all missions over all, esp non-US
 
Merrith

Merrith

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Lambourne said:
The Nemesis (companion star) hypothes is pretty much dead because it would have been detected in IR surveys by now. A cold and distant planet is still possible and has been suggested as an answer to observed clustering of Kuiper belt objects. Scott Manley did a video on it a few years ago, I think this is it.

Click to expand...


Maybe the Elusive Planet 9 Doesn't Exist After All - Universe Today

Basically claims that observational biases about when and how we find KBO's made it seem like there was a clumping together of objects that a potential Planet 9 could explain, but in fact there isn't actually a clumping going on.
 
Oldbased

Oldbased

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eyes.nasa.gov

Solar System Interactive

NASA’s Solar System Interactive (also known as the Orrery) is a live look at the solar system, its planets, moons, comets, and asteroids, as well as the real-time locations of dozens of NASA missions.
eyes.nasa.gov eyes.nasa.gov
Tracking map for Perseverance.

Cool thing is you can go to Solar System view and alter axis and zoom out to see Voyager and other probes location.
 
Oldbased

Oldbased

> Than U
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Any reason the Dragon is splashing down for the first time since 75? Hell, I was only a few years old the last time it happened.
 
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