Mission to resurrect space telescope 185 milion miles from Earth.
The ambitious plan is the first attempt of a private company to revive expired astronomical tools so far way.
In January 2019, China made history by becoming the first country to land a spacecraft on the far side of the moon. As part of this mission, the Chang’e-4 lunar rover carried a small biosphere with six living organisms, including cotton seeds. While the other plants in the biosphere died quickly, the cotton seeds produced a small plant, which grew two leaves before it died. Researchers then created a 3D simulation of the cotton plant using data from the experiment, which revealed that the cotton plant grew much better than expected before it died from the cold.
This experiment marked the first time that humans have attempted to grow plants on the moon. Growing plants in space is an important part of NASA’s vision of long-term space travel. If astronauts are to embark on missions lasting months or years, they will need fresh produce to supplement their diet. While vitamins and other supplements are effective for short-term missions, the nutrients in supplements and ready-made meals can break down over time. Radiation in space can speed up this process. In addition, fresh vegetables would give astronauts more nutrients and improve the taste of their food. Furthermore, growing plants in space would enable astronauts to have access to fresh, uncooked food, reducing their reliance on pre-cooked meals.
However, growing plants in space is not just about ensuring astronauts have access to fresh food. NASA is also interested in how growing plants can impact the psychological well-being of astronauts. Studies have shown that access to plants and green spaces can have a positive impact on mental health, and astronauts on the International Space Station have reported that fresh flowers and gardens can create a beautiful atmosphere and make them feel more connected to Earth.
The James Webb Space Telescope has helped astronomers detect the first chemical signs of supermassive stars, “celestial monsters” blazing with the brightness of millions of Suns in the early universe.
So far, the largest stars observed anywhere have a mass of around 300 times that of our Sun.
But the supermassive star described in a new study has an estimated mass of 5,000 to 10,000 Suns.
Stability AI, the AI startup behind the text-to-image model Stable Diffusion, this week announced the release of StableStudio, an open source version of DreamStudio, Stability AI’s commercial AI-powered design suite.
In a blog post, Stability AI writes that it hopes to “foster a project [that] can outpace anything developed by a single company,” alluding to recent investments in the generative AI space from tech giants like Microsoft, Google and Amazon.
“We believe the best way to expand upon that impressive reach is through open, community-driven development rather than a private iteration of a closed-source product,” Stability AI said. “Our goal is to work with the broader community to create a world-class user interface for generative AI [that] users fully control.”
Beyond our solar system, the universe is full of planets—but also asteroids, auroras, and other familiar cosmic wonders.
The James Webb Space Telescope took its first close look at a “mini-Neptune” — the most common type of planet beyond our solar system — and found signs of water.
Astronomers report the first direct evidence of an exoplanet being swallowed by an ancient Sun-like star, a fate that likely awaits the Earth in around five billion years.
Micrometeoroids in Saturn’s rings reveal that these dusty bands are no more than 400 million years old, making them significantly younger than the 4.5-billion-year-old gas giant.
With its wide bands of encircling dust, Saturn’s rings are the biggest and brightest in our Solar System. They are also the most mysterious. Unanswered questions remain about why, how, and when the seven rings formed. Now Sascha Kempf of the University of Colorado Boulder and colleagues have addressed the latter problem, using dust contaminants within the rings to place an upper limit of 400 million years on the rings’ age [1]. Kempf says that for as long as he’s been in the field, astronomers have been discussing whether Saturn’s rings are as old as the planet or if they are younger. Now they know. “They are significantly younger,” he says.
Kempf and colleagues produced their age estimate by studying the contamination rate of the rings by small pieces of rock and debris, known as micrometeoroids. These contaminants are constantly zooming around our Solar System, colliding with objects in their paths. When one of these micrometeoroids hits one of Saturn’s rings it can get incorporated into the ice the rings contain. Kempf and colleagues realized they could use the rate at which this process happens as a clock to reveal the rings’ age.
The first results from the James Webb Space Telescope have hinted at galaxies so early and so massive that they are in tension with our understanding of the formation of structure in the universe. Various explanations have been proposed that may alleviate this tension. But now a new study from the Cosmic Dawn Center suggests an effect which has never before been studied at such early epochs, indicating that the galaxies may be even more massive.
If you have been following the first results from the James Webb Space Telescope, you have probably heard about the paramount issue with the observations of the earliest galaxies: They are too big.
From a few days after the release of the first images, and repeatedly through the coming months, new reports of ever-more distant galaxies appeared. Disturbingly, several of the galaxies seemed to be “too massive.”
