Archive for 2009
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NASA Debuts the 2008 Hurricane Season in On-line Video
June 30, 2009
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See the tracks of 2008 storms from Arthur to Paloma from birth to death.
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Landforms on Mars Add to Evidence for Recent Water
June 30, 2009
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The weather on Mars was much balmier in the recent past than scientists have previously thought, according to a new interpretation of the formation of certain landforms on the surface.
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Increasing dust speeds melting of mountain snow
June 30, 2009
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Dust in the wind is rewriting the cycle of life in the mountains. Throughout memory the warmth of spring has begun the mountain snowmelt, bringing life-giving water to greening plants so they can blossom and renew their species.
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Herschel Opens Its Infrared Eyes
June 30, 2009
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The Herschel Space Observatory has snapped its first picture since blasting into space on May 14, 2009.
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First Conclusive Signature for Lunar Uranium
June 30, 2009
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Using data obtained from the gamma ray spectrometer on the Kaguya spacecraft scientists have found signatures of uranium, an element not seen in previous moon-mapping efforts.
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NASA, Japan Release Most Complete Topographic Map of Earth
June 30, 2009
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A new global digital elevation model of Earth was created from nearly 1.3 million individual stereo-pair images collected by the Japanese Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer, or ASTER.
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Linking Climate and Habitability
June 29, 2009
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The change in Earth’s climate may help scientists better understand planetary habitability in general. Scientists are now learning how small shifts in climate can have dramatic consequences for the planet’s environment and the life that depends on it.
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GOES-O Weather Satellite Launches
June 29, 2009
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The latest Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite will aid the nation's meteorologists and climate scientists, providing familiar weather pictures seen in daily newscasts in the U.S.
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Ulysses Hears the Siren's Song
June 29, 2009
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Ulysses, a joint NASA and European Space Agency mission, will officially cease operations Monday, June 29, when the command to switch off the transmitter is uplinked to the spacecraft.
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Satellites Guide Relief to Earthquake Victims
June 29, 2009
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A deadly earthquake rocked Honduras, but SERVIR helped disaster officials know exactly where to send help.
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Ozone hole has unforeseen effect on ocean carbon sink
June 29, 2009
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The Southern Ocean has lost its appetite for carbon dioxide, and now it appears that the ozone hole could be to blame.
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Mars Rover Yielding New Clues While Lodged in Martian Soil
June 26, 2009
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NASA's Mars Rover Spirit, lodged in Martian soil that is causing traction trouble, is taking advantage of the situation by learning more about the Red Planet's environmental history.
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GOES-O Weather Satellite to Launch Today
June 26, 2009
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The latest Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite is designed to aid the nation's meteorologists and climate scientists. GOES satellites provide the familiar weather pictures seen in daily newscasts in the U.S.
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Galactic link to climate change in doubt
June 26, 2009
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Some physicists believe that changes to the Earth’s climate can be explained in large part by variations in the flux of cosmic rays reaching the Earth.
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Coaxing Cold Colonies Back to Life
June 26, 2009
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A bacterium recovered from beneath three kilometers of glacial ice in Greenland may hold clues as to how life could exist on other planets. Astrobiologists are now studying the unique organism, which has been isolated under ice for over 120,000 years.
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QuikScat Satellite Detects Extratropical Cyclones
June 26, 2009
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Due to QuikScat scientists know that such storms occur more often than previously thought.
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Galaxies Coming of Age in Cosmic Blobs
June 25, 2009
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The "coming of age" of galaxies and black holes has been pinpointed thanks to new data from Chandra.
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Exotic Life Could Sprout From Chemistry on Titan
June 25, 2009
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A new study has found that hydrocarbon lakes on Titan could be good hosts for a certain type of chemistry that could lead to life.
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1908 Tunguska Event Caused by Comet, New Research Reveals
June 25, 2009
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The 1908 Tunguska event has always been mysterious and intriguing because no one has been able to fully explain the explosion that leveled 830 square miles of Siberian forest.
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NASA Earth System Science Meeting Celebrates 20 Years of Discovery
June 24, 2009
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Twenty years ago NASA embarked on a revolutionary new mission for its Earth science program: to study our home planet from space as an inter-related whole, rather than as individual parts. To acknowledge this milestone, NASA is holding a symposium June 22-24 to examine the accomplishments of 20 years of NASA's Earth system science program and discuss what discoveries and opportunities lay ahead.
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Iron-ic twist deepens cosmic ray puzzle
June 24, 2009
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Researchers present new findings about the most energetic charged particles in the universe.
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Heat of the Moment
June 24, 2009
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Scientists have developed a way of studying ancient temperatures on Earth - from the body temperature of dinosaurs to the planet's surface temperature during the ice ages. The method could help scientists understand the connections between the biosphere and the early environment of Earth.
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GOES-O Weather Satellite to Launch Friday
June 24, 2009
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The latest Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite is designed to aid the nation's meteorologists and climate scientists. GOES satellites provide the familiar weather pictures seen in daily newscasts in the U.S.
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Salt Finding From NASA's Cassini Hints at Ocean Within Saturn Moon
June 24, 2009
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For the first time, scientists working on NASA's Cassini mission have detected sodium salts in ice grains of Saturn's outermost ring.
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Ozone-friendly HFCs still pose threat
June 24, 2009
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Chemicals used in cooling – known as hydroflourocarbons (HFCs) – will be a far more dangerous threat to global warming in upcoming decades than previously thought, according to a study published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
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LRO in Lunar Orbit, LCROSS Swings By Moon
June 23, 2009
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The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter has successfully entered orbit around the moon following a nearly five-day journey.
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Thermal Imaging Camera of Mars Spacecraft Expected to Detect More Energy
June 23, 2009
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The Mars Odyssey orbiter is now overhead at about 3:45 in the afternoon instead of 5 p.m., so the ground is warmer and there is more thermal energy for the camera's infrared sensors to detect
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The Weirdest Object in the Solar System?
June 23, 2009
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The dwarf planets and other objects that litter the Kuiper belt in the far reaches of our solar system are a strange bunch, but astronomers have found what they think might be the weirdest one.
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NASA Radar Provides 3-D View of San Andreas Fault
June 23, 2009
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Earth’s crust is a collection of fractured plates that shift across the planet’s surface over millions of years.
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NASA Earth System Science Meeting Celebrates 20 Years of Discovery
June 22, 2009
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Twenty years ago NASA embarked on a revolutionary new mission for its Earth science program: to study our home planet from space as an inter-related whole, rather than as individual parts. To acknowledge this milestone, NASA is holding a symposium June 22-24 to examine the accomplishments of 20 years of NASA's Earth system science program and discuss what discoveries and opportunities lay ahead.
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JPL Wind Watcher Blows Into its Second Decade
June 22, 2009
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NASA's QuikScat satellite has reached a milestone--10 years of tracking wind speed and direction, and revolutionizing marine weather forecasts.
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Follow Ocean Trends From With NASA’s 'Sea Level Viewer'
June 22, 2009
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Internet users can access ocean heat data by using the Sea Level Viewer, an interactive visualization tool developed at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
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The Trouble With Trifids
June 22, 2009
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Almost everyone who is familiar with space images has seen this beautiful and color emission and reflection nebula – but take a really close look.
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Rock Bands Spin an Oxygen Record
June 22, 2009
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The rise of oxygen on early Earth may have been caused by a microbial changing of the guard between methane-producers and oxygen-producers. This swap may have been initiated by a drop in the ocean's nickel abundance. Continuing studies of the world's largest iron ore deposits could cement the case.
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LRO, LCROSS Headed For The Moon
June 19, 2009
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NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter is set to enter the moon's orbit early Tuesday. The Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite will perform a flyby, and is set to impact the moon in October.
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Jet Streams Suspected of Triggering Sunspots
June 19, 2009
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The sun is in the pits of a century-class solar minimum, and sunspots have been puzzlingly scarce for more than two years. Now, for the first time, solar physicists might understand why.
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GOES-O Weather Satellite to Launch June 26
June 19, 2009
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The latest Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite is designed to aid the nation's meteorologists and climate scientists. GOES satellites provide the familiar weather pictures seen in daily newscasts in the U.S.
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Stellar Shrapnel Cuts Life Short
June 19, 2009
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If a star located light-years away explodes, it could take out life on Earth. A group of researchers previously proposed that this might explain a mass extinction event millions of years ago. A follow-up project is now trying to beef up the case.
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NASA Scientists Bring Light to Moon's Permanently Dark Craters
June 19, 2009
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A new lunar topography map with the highest resolution of the moon's rugged south polar region provides new information on some of our natural satellite's darkest inhabitants – permanently shadowed craters.
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Exoplanet Has Oddball Orbit
June 18, 2009
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In what might be a evidence of planetary billiards, astronomers have found an exoplanet with an extremely odd orbit.
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Evidence Found for Ancient Mars Lake
June 18, 2009
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Several studies in recent years have claimed evidence for shorelines and other features that suggest ancient lakes on Mars. Firm evidence has remained elusive.
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S'COOL Sets Sail To Promote Ocean Health
June 18, 2009
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A NASA student weather monitoring program joins adventuring scientists on a voyage to raise awareness of ocean health.
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NASA Kepler to return data
June 18, 2009
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If all goes as planned, NASA’s most ambitious unmanned mission to detect terrestrial planets orbiting distant stars will deliver its first operational results today.
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NASA Earth System Science Meeting Celebrates 20 Years of Discovery
June 17, 2009
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Twenty years ago NASA embarked on a revolutionary new mission for its Earth science program: to study our home planet from space as an inter-related whole, rather than as individual parts. To acknowledge this milestone, NASA is holding a symposium June 22-24 to examine the accomplishments of 20 years of NASA's Earth system science program and discuss what discoveries and opportunities lay ahead.
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European Satellites Probe a New Magnetar
June 17, 2009
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NASA's Swift satellite reported multiple blasts of radiation from a rare object known as a soft gamma repeater, or SGR. Now, astronomers report an in-depth study of these eruptions using the European Space Agency's XMM-Newton and International Gamma-Ray Astrophysics Laboratory (INTEGRAL) satellites.
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Endeavour Launch Scrubbed
June 17, 2009
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Endeavour's STS-127 launch today was officially scrubbed at 1:55 a.m. EDT when the same type of gaseous hydrogen leak occurred.
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Tidal Habitable Zone
June 17, 2009
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Astronomers searching for habitable planets beyond our solar system often focus on the 'habitable zone' around stars – where the heat from the star is at the perfect level for liquid water to exist.
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The Case of the Missing Sunspots: Solved?
June 17, 2009
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The Sun has seen precious few sunspots (as shown in this NASA closeup) in the past year, and solar physicists have been working to understand why the Sun has seen so few in the past year. Now, some think they have an answer.
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Scientists Search for a Pulse in Skies Above Earthquake Country
June 17, 2009
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NASA Gives California's San Andreas, Other Faults a 3-D Close-up
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NASA Earth System Science Meeting Celebrates 20 Years of Discovery
June 16, 2009
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Twenty years ago NASA embarked on a revolutionary new mission for its Earth science program: to study our home planet from space as an inter-related whole, rather than as individual parts. To acknowledge this milestone, NASA is holding a symposium June 22-24 to examine the accomplishments of 20 years of NASA's Earth system science program and discuss what discoveries and opportunities lay ahead.
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Meteorite May Hold Clues to Solar System Formation
June 16, 2009
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Maybe we’re not as old as we think (or feel?). The interstellar stuff that was integrated into the planets and life on Earth has younger cosmic roots than theories predict, according to the University of Chicago scholar Philipp Heck and his international team of colleagues.
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LRO, LCROSS Set to Launch Thursday
June 16, 2009
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As a result of the rescheduling of space shuttle Endeavour's STS-127 mission for June 17, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter and Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite are now set to lift off together aboard an Atlas V rocket on Thursday, June 18.
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Endeavour 'in Good Shape' for Wednesday Launch
June 16, 2009
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NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter and Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite are set to kick off their missions to the moon.
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Eclipsing Earth
June 16, 2009
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Astronomers have captured a snapshot of Earth's chemical fingerprint by viewing light reflected back to Earth from the moon during a lunar eclipse. The information could be used to help identify habitable planets beyond our solar system.
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Running Out of This World
June 16, 2009
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With NASA poised to launch the world's most famous treadmill (COLBERT) to the International Space Station, an astronaut describes what it's like to run in space where sweat floats and there is no gravity to hold your feet to the ground.
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Even brown dwarfs have grey days
June 15, 2009
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ODD cosmic objects halfway between a planet and a star may feature their own weather, enhancing their identity as the universe's mongrels.
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Tiny, Deep-Frozen Greenland Bacterium May Hold Extra-Terrestrial Clues
June 15, 2009
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Researchers have breathed new life into a bacterium trapped deep under glacial ice in Greenland — for over 120,000 years.
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Sphere
June 15, 2009
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A team of researchers at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute conducted the first field test earlier this year of a new configuration of Deep-ESP. The device is designed to perform long-term studies of how deep-sea ecosystems respond to environmental changes.
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Shaken and Stirred: Lab Studies Ice From Frigid Worlds
June 15, 2009
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The most exotic frozen cocktails on Earth won’t be found in a chic restaurant or trendy bar. Scientists are mixing up these icy concoctions in a rather nondescript laboratory not much bigger than a janitor’s closet.
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Revealing Jamestown Settlers' Sketches of The New World
June 15, 2009
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NASA researchers who normally study futuristic materials are using their high tech scanners to reveal the past.
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Planck Chills Out
June 15, 2009
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A JPL-developed and -built cooler on the Planck spacecraft has chilled the mission's low-frequency instrument down to its operating temperature of a frosty 20 Kelvin (minus 424 degrees Fahrenheit).
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Kid’s Astronomy - The Crow’s Nest
June 12, 2009
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With the Moon now gone from the early evening sky and the lightning bugs beginning to twinkle in the summer fields, isn’t it time you stopped to do a little stargazing?
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GOES-O Moves Ever Closer to Launch with Transport to the Delta IV Launch Pad
June 12, 2009
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The weather satellite, GOES-O, prepared for a June 26 launch as it moved this week from Titusville Fla. to Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.
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Doing the Math on Life
June 12, 2009
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By studying theories about why the universe is the way it is, mathematicians are hoping to uncover what these theories mean for the origin and future of life. Mathematics could be the key to answering some of life's biggest questions, and could help astrobiologists understand life's place in the universe.
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Czech scientists take photos of solar corona
June 12, 2009
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Czech scientists have taken the pictures of the solar corona which were carried on the cover of the latest issue of the prestigious international journal of Nature this week.
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Add Heat, Then Tectonics: Narrowing the Hunt for Life in Space
June 12, 2009
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New research is suggesting that in order to support life, such a planet might also need plate tectonics, and those are triggered in a narrower band of distance from the parent star.
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Glimpse of Earth as seen from afar
June 11, 2009
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Astronomers have seen what the Earth's atmosphere might look like from outer space by using the Moon as a giant mirror. Sunlight that bounced back from the Moon carried a fingerprint of the Earth's atmosphere that could help astronomers determine if the extrasolar planets they're finding harbour life.
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Wild Little Mercury to Cause Interplanetary Smashup? Maybe.
June 11, 2009
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The chaotic evolution of the planetary orbits in the Solar System could cause a close approach or even a collision within the next 5 billion years, according to a paper in this week’s issue of Nature.
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Spring Bloom Colors the Pacific Near Hokkaido
June 11, 2009
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In the northwest Pacific Ocean, the Oyashio Current flows down out of the Arctic, past Siberia and the Kamchatka Peninsula.
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Not so windy: Research suggests winds dying down
June 11, 2009
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The wind, a favorite power source of the green energy movement, seems to be dying down across the United States. And the cause, ironically, may be global warming - the very problem wind power seeks to address.
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Baby Stars Finally Found in Jumbled Galactic Center
June 11, 2009
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Astronomers have at last uncovered newborn stars at the frenzied center of our Milky Way galaxy, using the infrared vision of NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.
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Keck Study Sheds New Light on 'Dark' Gamma-ray Bursts
June 10, 2009
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Gamma-ray bursts are the universe's biggest explosions, capable of producing so much light that ground-based telescopes easily detect it billions of light-years away.
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Doubting the Dinosaur-Bird Connection
June 10, 2009
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New research is casting doubts about the connections between dinosaurs and birds. The results indicate that although birds and dinosaurs may have shared a common ancestor, birds did not directly descend from dinosaurs. The study sheds new light on the processes behind the evolution of life on Earth.
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Stretched neutrinos could span the universe
June 10, 2009
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TALK about misnomers. It seems the particles that Enrico Fermi dubbed neutrinos, meaning "little neutral ones", might stretch across billions of light years.
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Powerful Mars Orbiter Recovers From Glitch
June 10, 2009
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NASA has successfully revived its powerful Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter from a protective slumber following a glitch that silenced its science observations last week.
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NASA Study Acknowledges Solar Cycle, Not Man, Responsible for Past Warming
June 10, 2009
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Report indicates solar cycle has been impacting Earth since the Industrial Revolution
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M87's Super-Size Me: Black Hole Bigger Than Previously Thought
June 09, 2009
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Using a new computer model, astronomers have determined that the black hole in the center of the M87 galaxy is at least twice as big as previously thought.
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Huge Cosmic Explosions Are Dark and Mysterious
June 09, 2009
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Some of the most powerful explosions in the universe are invisible. But astronomers are a sneaky bunch. By monitoring X-rays and gamma rays, they're able to see what's going on.
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Five Things About LRO
June 09, 2009
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If you have never heard of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), here are five quick things you should know.
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STS-127 Astronauts, Endeavour Set For Saturday Launch
June 09, 2009
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The STS-127 mission is officially set to launch at 7:17 a.m. EDT on June 13. The crew will install Japanese elements on the space station.
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A New Way to Keep Clean
June 09, 2009
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It is almost impossible to get a spacecraft completely clean before launch. Because of this, one of the biggest difficulties in searching for life on planets like Mars is not contaminating the research site with microbes from Earth. Now, scientists have developed a new cleaning protocol that could help alleviate the problem.
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Inflatable tower could climb to the edge of space
June 08, 2009
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A GIANT inflatable tower could carry people to the edge of space without the need for a rocket, and could be completed much sooner than a cable-based space elevator, its proponents claim.
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Free-floating black hole may solve space 'firefly' mystery
June 08, 2009
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A wandering black hole may have torn apart a star to create a strange object that brightened mysteriously and then faded from view in 2006, a new study suggests. But more than three years later, astronomers are still at a loss to explain all the features of the strange event.
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Endeavour's Payload Bay Closed for Flight
June 08, 2009
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At NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, space shuttle Endeavour is in the final week of prelaunch preparations for its upcoming STS-127 mission.
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Titan's Clouds Linger Longer
June 08, 2009
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Clouds on Saturn's moon Titan form and move much like those on Earth, only much slower. Contrary to what was expected, scientists have found that Titan's clouds don't move with the seasons. Studying Titan's weather is allowing astrobiologists to draw some unique comparisons between the tiny moon and our home planet.
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The Search for Life on Earth
June 08, 2009
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A great deal of money and effort have gone into searching for life on other worlds. But what a second genesis of life, a type of life unrelated to DNA-based life, is here on Earth? Paul Davies urges the scientific community to take a look.
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OSU scientist hopes rover can be a free Spirit
June 08, 2009
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Spirit is not stuck. The Mars rover is simply "mobility-impeded," according to NASA.
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NASA Develops Rehydration Beverage
June 05, 2009
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To help keep astronauts at peak performance during missions, NASA researched, qualified and patented a highly effective electrolyte concentrate formula.
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LRO, LCROSS Set For Lunar Journey
June 05, 2009
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NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter and Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite are set to launch on June 17, kicking off their missions to the moon.
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How Magnetic Tornadoes Might Regenerate Mercury’s Atmosphere
June 05, 2009
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Compared to Earth, Mercury doesn’t have much of an atmosphere. The smallest rocky planet has weak surface gravity, only 38% that of Earth.
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What If There Is Only One Universe?
June 05, 2009
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When it comes to universes, perhaps one is enough after all.
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Rocking the Atmosphere
June 05, 2009
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A new study shows that frequent meteorite impacts during an early period of the solar system known as the 'Late Heavy Bombardment' may have furnished the Earth and other planets like Mars with liquid water. By providing a source of water for the Earth's oceans, these impacts could have helped to make the early earth habitable.
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Fake Astronaut Gets Hit by Artificial Solar Flare
June 04, 2009
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Researchers are about to subject a fake astronaut complete with blood cells and simulated human tissue to an artificial solar flare. How the unlucky volunteer emerges from the radiation storm will reveal for the first time how much of a threat severe solar flares pose to astronauts en route to the Moon and Mars.
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Endeavour and Crew 'Go' For June 13 Launch
June 04, 2009
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The STS-127 mission is officially set to launch at 7:17 a.m. EDT on June 13. The crew will install Japanese elements on the space station.
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Students Learn Physics of Spaceflight on Roller Coaster Ride
June 04, 2009
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As Millennium Force crested the peak of its first hill, 20 students took a deep breath and braced for a high-speed plunge toward the earth. The ride plummeted 310 feet at 93 miles per hour, and their bodies rose unwillingly from their seats. Thank heaven for the lap bar!
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Scarce Shelter on Mars
June 04, 2009
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Microbes that hitch a ride on a spacecraft might make it all the way to Mars, but a recent study finds they probably won’t survive for very long there.
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No Nature VS. Nurture for Stars
June 04, 2009
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Stars don’t seem to mind where they grow up. Either in a nice quiet neighborhood or in the hellish environment near a supermassive black hole, astronomers were surprised to find the same proportions of low- and high-mass young stars in different types of star forming regions.
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Mysterious night-shining clouds may peak this year
June 03, 2009
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Sky watchers in the northern hemisphere have snapped the first images of this year's noctilucent clouds – silvery blue structures that are the highest clouds to form in Earth's atmosphere.
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Democracy Bridge Damaged by Earthquake
June 03, 2009
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The Honduran city of El Progreso was among the cities most affected when a magnitude 7.3 earthquake rattled Central America on May 28, 2009. The powerful earthquake killed at least 6, injured 25, and destroyed houses and public buildings throughout Honduras, said the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
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Space rocks turned tide for Earth
June 03, 2009
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A storm of meteorites that pounded Earth and Mars four billion years ago may have made the planets warmer and wetter.
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Book Your Tours of Titan and Enceladus Today!
June 03, 2009
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Looking to go somewhere far-flung and exotic? Now is the time to book your excursion, and the Cassini spacecraft has several flyby tours of the moons Titan and Enceladus scheduled for the next few months.
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Applied Sciences Projects Improve Famine Predictions
June 03, 2009
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Two new projects are using satellites and computer models to better anticipate famine and speed up the delivery of aid to populations in critical need.
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Long odds on space viruses seeding life
June 02, 2009
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LIFE on Earth is unlikely to have come from space, says a new study on viruses. If life is ever found on another planet, however, the findings could help us judge whether it arrived from space or not.
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Ice on the Moon? NASA, ISRO May Collaborate to Find Out
June 02, 2009
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The debate has endured since the early 1960’s: could there be water ice hiding in deep, dark craters near the Moon’s poles, left untouched by sunlight? Several spacecraft orbiting the moon have tried to peer into these craters to find out, but so far no definitive data has been obtained either way.
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Have Astronomers Discovered A New Type of Supernova?
June 02, 2009
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A team of astronomers at the University of Warwick think they’ve finally explained what caused the bizarre transient object SCP 06F6. By comparing the optical spectrum of SCP 06F6 to that of carbon-rich stars in our own galaxy, the team concludes the sudden outburst was not a low-energy local event but a supernova-like explosion within a cool carbon-rich atmosphere some 2 billion light years away.
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The Greening of Kennedy
June 02, 2009
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America's Space Program and Florida get new green power source.
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Penguin poo seen from space
June 02, 2009
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If you want to know where penguins go, then study their poo. Emperor penguins sully the ice with so much guano that scientists are able to use these poo stains to locate new breeding colonies.
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Astrometry Finally Finds a Planet
June 02, 2009
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Astrometry is a method of detecting planets by precisely measuring the motion of a star as planets tug it back and forth ever so slightly. The technique was first attempted 50 years ago, but has failed to turn up any extrasolar planets until now.
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Galaxy Cluster X-ray Revealed
June 01, 2009
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Astronomers took a peek at the first X-ray image of an entire galaxy cluster, courtesy of a Japan-U.S. space observatory.
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Solar Evaporation Ponds, Atacama Desert
June 01, 2009
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Brightly colored solar evaporation (salt) ponds in a desert landscape give this astronaut photo an unreal quality. The ponds sit near the foot of a long alluvial fan in the Pampa del Tamarugal, the great hyper-arid inner valley of Chile’s Atacama Desert.
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New Solar Cycle Prediction
June 01, 2009
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An international panel of experts has issued a new prediction for the solar cycle which takes into account the surprisingly deep solar minimum of 2008-2009. Read today's story to find out when they think solar maximum will return.
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NASA Supercomputing Goes Green: Modeling Ocean Climate
June 01, 2009
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Earth scientists are reaping huge benefits from research performed on NASA's advanced supercomputers.
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Atlantic and East Pacific Ocean Hurricane Seasons Begin for 2009
June 01, 2009
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Summer soon begins in the Northern Hemisphere and, on June 1st, the Atlantic hurricane season kicks off. What do Atlantic and Pacific Ocean surface temperatures and heights tell forecasters about what they can expect this season?
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Astronomers Seek New Home Closer to Home
June 01, 2009
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The nearest Earth out there in space? It might be right next door, galactically speaking.
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Alluvial Fans on Mars
June 01, 2009
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Alluvial fans are sedimentary deposits that accumulate where streams emerge from steep mountain watersheds onto low-gradient plains.
