FYYSIKA.EE

Watch the replay of the opening session of the Living Planet Symposium in Prague, 9–13 May

The model contains, for the first time, a realistic description of how neutron stars are deformed just before they collide.

Cassini was able to measure the amount of water vapor erupting from the geysers, offering new insights on geologic activity beneath the moon’s surface.

Scientists on NASA’s Cassini mission were surprised to find that a small-scale surface change produces very visible effects on Saturn’s active moon Enceladus.

Social media users may apply now for access to a two-day media event at JPL on July 3-4, 2016, culminating in the arrival of NASA’s Juno spacecraft in orbit around Jupiter.

SLOOH Observatory will be livestreaming the event, which you can watch here.

Our week through the lens: 2-6 May 2016

For the latest news, interviews and web streaming of the world’s largest Earth observation conference, being held in Prague on 9–13 May, visit our dedicated web page

Watch selected sessions of the Living Planet Symposium live from the Prague Conference Centre in the Czech Republic on 9–13 May

The company landed a first stage of a geostationary launch on its drone ship.

A start-up company hosted in an ESA business incubator is developing the world’s first vertical takeoff and landing aircraft for personal use. The electric two-seater will open the door to a new class of simpler, quieter and environmentally friendly planes available from 2018.

Join us Friday, 6 May, at 10:00 CEST for the ‘Earth from Space’ video programme. This week features a Sentinel-1 image of the Zachariae Isstrom Glacier

To determine the actual mass of a supermassive black hole, astronomers must measure the strength of its gravitational pull on the stars and clouds of gas that swarm around it.

Shocks provide unique opportunities to study high-energy phenomena in the intra-cluster medium — the hot plasma between galaxies.

Operations image of the week: Mission controllers monitor a network for astronauts to remotely drive rovers on planets

Researchers thought that Pluto was characterized more like a comet, which has a large region of gentle slowing of the solar wind, as opposed to the abrupt diversion solar wind encounters at a planet like Mars or Venus, but instead Pluto is a hybrid.

NASA will host a news teleconference Tuesday, May 10 to announce the latest discoveries made by its planet-hunting mission, the Kepler Space Telescope.

By using multiple telescopes, they were able to get one of the best maps ever of a star other than the sun.

Technology image of the week: the design evolution of ESA’s Proba-3 double satellite mission shown by this trio of 3D-printed models

Volcanoes erupted beneath an ice sheet on Mars billions of years ago, far from any ice sheet on the Red Planet today, new evidence from NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter suggests.

Volcanoes erupted beneath an ice sheet on Mars billions of years ago, far from any ice sheet on the Red Planet today, new evidence from NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter suggests.
The research about these volcanoes helps show there was extensive ice o…

The mission’s board concluded that, taking into account the delays in European and Russian industrial activities and deliveries of the scientific payload, a launch in 2020 would be the best solution.

Space Science Image of the Week: Mercury’s intriguing Kertész crater fools the eye in this image from NASA’s Messenger probe

As an intergovernmental space agency, ESA engages with countries well beyond those of its member states. A key partnership is with Argentina, one of South America’s most space-connected countries.

Together with the London Science Museum and top European fashion schools, ESA is harnessing next-generation technology and exploring the future of fashion 

ESA is in partnership with top European fashion schools to harness next-generation technology and explore the future of fashion. 

ESA is in partnership with top European fashion schools to harness next-generation technology and explore the future of fashion. 

A team of scientists has now shown that even though water that emerges onto the surface of Mars immediately begins to boil, it creates an unstable turbulent flow that can eject sediment and cause dry avalanches.

These worlds have sizes and temperatures similar to those of Venus and Earth and are the best targets found so far for the search for life outside the solar system.

From asteroid belt to Oort Cloud, C/2014 S3 may be an important relic of the early solar system.

ESA astronaut Tim Peake and his crewmates Yuri Malenchenko and Tim Kopra will return to Earth on 18 June, giving them almost two more weeks more in space than their original mission.

Each International Space Station crew flies as a trio to the outpost and back to Earth in a Soyuz spacecraft. About every three months, a crew returns to Earth shortly before a new one arrives, often leaving a few days when only three astronauts look after the Station. 

Tim, Tim and Yuri will stay longer in space because ground control aims to keep the Space Station operating at full capacity with six astronauts.

Tim Peake says: “Although I am looking forward to being back on Earth and seeing friends and family again, each day spent living in space is a huge privilege and there is much work to do on the Station.

“This extension will keep the Station at a full crew of six for several days longer, enabling us to accomplish more scientific research.

“And, of course, I get to enjoy the beautiful view of planet Earth for a little while longer!”

Our week through the lens: 25-29 April 2016

The XMM-Newton satellite has discovered gas streaming away at a quarter of the speed of light from bright X-ray binaries in two nearby galaxies.

Europe’s latest navigation satellites, launched last December, have been officially commissioned into the Galileo constellation, and are now broadcasting working navigation signals. 

NASA is developing new technologies to help astronomers capture the shine of Earth-like worlds and ultimately look for evidence of life elsewhere in our galaxy.

Less than three days after it was launched, Sentinel-1B has delivered its first radar image of Earth

Explore the International Space Station’s Tranquility module from all angles on your mobile phone or headset

Launched on 25 April from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana, Sentinel-1B has produced its first images only two hours after the radar was switched on – a record time for a space radar.

Join us Friday, 29 April, at 10:00 CEST for the ‘Earth from Space’ video programme. This week features a Sentinel-2A image of Namibia

NASA’s Fermi Gamma-Ray Space Telescope helped astronomers connect a blazar’s outburst to Big Bird, one of the most powerful neutrino events ever detected.

A giant star that exploded 30 million years ago in a galaxy near Earth had a radius prior to going supernova that was 200 times larger than our sun, according to astrophysicists at Southern Methodist University, Dallas.
The sudden blast hurled material…

How instruments called coronagraphs might help us ultimately find Earth-like worlds.

NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover has nearly finished crossing a stretch of the most rugged and difficult-to-navigate terrain encountered during the mission’s 44 months on Mars.

In a live space-to-ground test of human–robot cooperation, ESA astronaut Tim Peake will control a rover on Earth on Friday from the International Space Station, helping prepare for future exploration missions.

NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover has nearly finished crossing a stretch of the most rugged and difficult-to-navigate terrain encountered during the mission’s 44 months on Mars.
The rover climbed onto the Naukluft Plateau of lower Mount Sharp in early March …

In a tweet, the company says it’s prepared to send a Dragon to Mars within the decade.

Following liftoff on 25 April from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana, Sentinel-1B has opened its large solar wings and radar antenna.

Once a lonely ice block, now it seems the dwarf planet may have a close-in companion.

Saturn’s largest moon is covered in seas and lakes of liquid hydrocarbons – and one sea has now been found to be filled with pure methane, with a seabed covered by a sludge of organic-rich material, and possibly surrounded by wetlands.

Of all th…

A new study finds that a large sea on Saturn’s moon Titan is composed mostly of pure liquid methane, independently confirming an earlier result.

Astronomers used echoes of light to determine the distance from a star to the inner wall of its surrounding protoplanetary disk.

Technology image of the week: the eerie blue exhaust trail of a T6 ion thruster, a quartet of which will transport BepiColombo towards the innermost planet

Human spaceflight and robotic exploration image of the week: Growing blood vessels in space – tissue culture ready for the International Space Station

Saturn’s largest moon is covered in seas and lakes of liquid hydrocarbons – and one sea has now been found to be filled with pure methane, with a seabed covered by a sludge of organic-rich material, and possibly surrounded by wetlands.

Researchers stacked and matched images taken from orbit to reveal objects at a resolution up to five times greater than previously achieved.

The 3 student Cubesats launched with Sentinel-1 on 25 April have phoned home. Follow their progress

Space science image of the week: A massive star has blown a giant bubble in space – and Hubble has finally seen it all

From ESA’s ESRIN centre for Earth observation in Italy, watch the replay of the event celebrating Sentinel-1B

Watch the replay of the Sentinel-1B launch coverage from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana on 25 April

The second Sentinel-1 satellite – Sentinel-1B – was launched today to provide more ‘radar vision’ for Europe’s environmental Copernicus programme.

Sentinel-1B lifted off on a Soyuz rocket together with three Fly Your Satellite! CubeSats and the CNES Microscope satellite

NASA satellites help the City of Los Angeles monitor Santa Monica Bay during wastewater treatment plant repairs.

The Dawn probe is currently in orbit around Ceres after a visit to Vesta. Now, its researchers want to visit a third world to finish out the mission.

The spacecraft is now ready for science operations, officially starting K2’s new gravitational microlensing campaign, known as Campaign 9.

Following an anomaly observed during the countdown for the launch of Soyuz flight VS14 carrying Sentinel-1B, the countdown on 24 April was halted. 

The latest meteorological observations indicate a ‘red’ weather conditions for the time of liftoff, initially set for Saturday 23 April 2016, therefore Arianespace has decided not to undertake final fueling operations with the launcher.

T…

Explore the why and how of lunar exploration in this comprehensive web documentary

This Earth Day, join NASA in a behind-the-scenes look at all we do in Earth science — and the people working to better understand our home planet, every minute of every day.

This Earth Day, join NASA in a behind-the-scenes look at all we do in Earth science — and the people working to better understand our home planet, every minute of every day.

During the technical review prior to the start of Soyuz fueling, the availability of the launcher, satellites, ground facilities and the launch base was confirmed.

Our week through the lens: 18-22 April 2016

Discover how the Sentinel-1 mission uses its radar to make our lives safer

Astronomers have discovered that the central 2,000 light-years within the Milky Way Galaxy hosts an ancient population of stars.

This Earth Day, we can remember one of the catalysts: an image of the entire Earth taken from above.

This new video from ESA’s Herschel space observatory reveals in stunning detail the intricate pattern of gas, dust and star-forming hubs along the plane of our Galaxy, the Milky Way.

As Earth Day is celebrated across the globe, discover some of the aspects satellites can ‘see’

Cosmic rays pelting the upper atmosphere are evidence of a recent supernova in the cosmic neighborhood.

NASA is soliciting ideas from U.S. industry for designs of a Mars orbiter for potential launch in the 2020s

NASA has selected Aerojet Rocketdyne, Inc. to design/develop an advanced electric propulsion system for deep space exploration missions like NASA’s Asteroid Redirect Mission.

New maps of the seafloor around Greenland help scientists understand which glaciers are at increased risk for melting.

Operations image of the week: Asteroid named after space debris expert Heiner Klinkrad

A final, full rehearsal has confirmed that teams at ESA’s mission control are ready for tomorrow’s launch of the Sentinel-1B radar satellite. 

Scientists have identified a free-floating planetary-mass object within a young star family, called the TW Hydrae association.

Images from the Sentinel-1A satellite are being used to monitor aquaculture in the Mediterranean, in another example of the mission’s contribution to food security, as fisheries become the main source of seafood. 

Technology image of the week: ESA’s veteran Proba-1 minisatellite images Europe’s most northerly satellite ground station

Explore Japan’s Kibo space laboratory with your mobile phone or VR headset in this panorama

With just two days to liftoff, the next Sentinel for Europe’s environmental monitoring programme in now poised high in the launch tower at Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana.

Follow the Sentinel-1B launch live from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana on 25 April. Streaming begins at 20:40 GMT (22:40 CEST), with liftoff scheduled at 21:02 GMT (23:02 CEST)

Live from ESA’s Earth observation centre in Italy: follow the event to celebrate the launch of Sentinel-1B. Streaming begins at 19:00 GMT (21:00 CEST)

Scientists want to pin down the processes that create solar flares and even some day predict them before our communications can be interrupted.

ESA, in partnership with Ars Electronica, is announcing art&science@ESA, a new art residency to explore the fertile ground between art and space science.

Why does Earth need an asteroid-deflection test? Queen guitarist Brian May, ESA astronaut Luca Parmitano, UK Astronomer Royal Sir Martin Rees and Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield share their thoughts

If you have a smart idea for a novel application using Europe’s Galileo satnav system, here’s your chance to turn it into a business

Craters with bright material on dwarf planet Ceres shine in new images from NASA’s Dawn mission.

Sitting all by itself in space, a newfound object may help answer mysteries about planets without parent stars.

Human spaceflight and robotic exploration image of the week: Umberto Guidoni, the first European to visit the International Space Station