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Category Archives: NASA

NASA Seeking Crowd-source Help to Save Earth from Asteroids

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With nothing less at stake than the future of planet Earth, NASA has decided to crowd-source ideas to detect and track asteroids that have the potential to wipe out life as we know it.

After a previously undetected, 65-foot asteroid exploded over Russia in February 2013, unleashing the force of 500,000 tons of TNT, NASA launched a series of contests for smart folks around the globe to come up with ways to keep an eye on asteroids that could threaten earth.

Currently, NASA estimates that only 1 percent of the millions of asteroids hurtling around our solar system have been found.

So NASA calls the series of contests that make up the Asteroid Grand Challenge "a broad call to action" to defend Earth against any number of asteroids that could be bearing down on us right this instant.

"Good ideas can come from anywhere," said Ben Burress, staff astronomer at Oakland's Chabot Space & Science Center, which is not affiliated with NASA's Asteroid Grand Challenge. "There are millions of asteroids we don't know about, so the idea of more information really is better. Are we going to be hit? Yes. The question is, when and by how big of an asteroid?"

In a video announcing the series of contests, a NASA narrator says, "Asteroid hunting is an activity everyone can get involved with, whether it's writing computer code, building hardware, making observations through a telescope. Survival is its own reward. It's up to each of us to protect our planet from asteroids."

And in a throw down to all citizens of Earth, the narrator says, "The dinosaurs would have cared if they knew about this problem."

With NASA out of the business of launching humans into space -- and asteroid killer and action star Bruce Willis on the bench --"Earth's defense," as NASA calls it, is left in the hands of mere mortals.

NASA first invited what it calls "citizen scientists" to join the search for killer asteroids in March at the South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas during a session entitled, "Are We Smarter than the Dinosaurs?"

On Friday, NASA ended the third contest of its competition to create an algorithm to detect hidden asteroids. No fewer than 422 people from 63 countries -- from Argentina to Zimbabwe -- submitted algorithmic solutions.

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NASA Seeking Crowd-source Help to Save Earth from Asteroids

NASA seeks help to save Earth from killer asteroids

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With nothing less at stake than the future of planet Earth, NASA has decided to crowdsource ideas to detect and track asteroids that have the potential to wipe out life as we know it.

After a previously undetected, 65-foot-wide asteroid exploded over Russia in February 2013, unleashing the force of 500,000 tons of TNT, NASA launched a series of contests for smart folks around the globe to come up with ways to keep an eye on asteroids that could threaten Earth.

Currently, NASA estimates that only 1 percent of the millions of asteroids hurtling around our solar system have been found.

So NASA calls the series of contests that make up the Asteroid Grand Challenge "a broad call to action" to defend Earth against any number of asteroids that could be bearing down on us right this instant.

"Good ideas can come from anywhere," said Ben Burress, staff astronomer at Oakland's Chabot Space & Science Center, which is not affiliated with NASA's Asteroid Grand Challenge. "There are millions of asteroids we don't know about, so the idea of more information really is better. Are we going to be hit? Yes. The question is, when and by how big of an asteroid?"

In a video announcing the series of contests, a NASA narrator says, "Asteroid hunting is an activity everyone can get involved with, whether it's writing computer code, building hardware, making observations through a telescope. Survival is its own reward. It's up to each of us to protect our planet from asteroids."

And in a throw down to all citizens of Earth, the narrator says, "The dinosaurs would have cared if they knew about this problem."

With NASA out of the business of launching humans into space -- and asteroid killer and action star Bruce Willis on the bench --"Earth's defense," as NASA calls it, is left in the hands of mere mortals.

NASA first invited what it calls "citizen scientists" to join the search for killer asteroids in March at the South by Southwest festival in Austin, Texas, during a session titled, "Are We Smarter than the Dinosaurs?"

On Friday, NASA ended the third contest of its competition to create an algorithm to detect hidden asteroids. No fewer than 422 people from 63 countries -- from Argentina to Zimbabwe -- submitted algorithmic solutions.

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NASA seeks help to save Earth from killer asteroids

NASA's Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 Satellite Arrives At Launch Site

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May 2, 2014

Image Caption: A truck convoy carrying NASA's Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 spacecraft arrives at California's Vandenberg Air Force Base April 30. The observatory will undergo final tests and then be integrated atop a United Launch Alliance Delta II rocket in preparation for a planned July 1 launch. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory

A NASA spacecraft designed to make precise measurements of carbon dioxide in Earths atmosphere is at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., to begin final preparations for launch.

The Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 arrived Wednesday at its launch site on Californias central coast after traveling from Orbital Sciences Corp.s Satellite Manufacturing Facility in Gilbert, Ariz. The spacecraft now will undergo final tests and then be integrated on top of a United Launch Alliance Delta II rocket in preparation for a planned July 1 launch.

The observatory is NASAs first satellite mission dedicated to studying carbon dioxide, a critical component of Earths carbon cycle that is the leading human-produced greenhouse gas driving changes in Earths climate. It replaces a nearly identical spacecraft lost due to a rocket launch mishap in February 2009.

OCO-2 will provide a new tool for understanding both the sources of carbon dioxide emissions and the natural processes that remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and how they are changing over time. Since the start of the Industrial Revolution more than 200 years ago, the burning of fossil fuels, as well as other human activities, have led to an unprecedented buildup in this greenhouse gas, which is now at its highest level in at least 800,000 years. Human activities have increased the level of carbon dioxide by more than 25 percent in just the past half century.

Greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide, trap the suns heat within Earths atmosphere, warming it and keeping it at habitable temperatures. However, scientists have concluded that increases in carbon dioxide resulting from human activities have thrown Earths natural carbon cycle off balance, increasing global temperatures and changing the planets climate.

While scientists understand carbon dioxide emissions resulting from burning fossil fuels and can estimate their quantity quite accurately, their understanding of carbon dioxide from other human-produced and natural sources is relatively less quantified. Atmospheric measurements collected at ground stations indicate less than half of the carbon dioxide humans emit into the atmosphere stays there. The rest is believed to be absorbed by the ocean and plants on land.

But the locations and identity of the natural sinks absorbing this carbon dioxide currently are not well understood. OCO-2 will help solve this critical scientific puzzle. Quantifying how the natural processes are helping remove carbon from the atmosphere will help scientists construct better models to predict how much carbon dioxide these sinks will be able to absorb in the future.

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NASA's Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 Satellite Arrives At Launch Site

Zero gravity: NASA scientists find astronauts’ heart become more spherical in outer space – Video

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Zero gravity: NASA scientists find astronauts #39; heart become more spherical in outer space
Originally published on March 31, 2014 Check out our official website: http://us.tomonews.net/ Check out our Android app: http://goo.gl/PtT6VD Check out our ...

By: TomoNews US

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Zero gravity: NASA scientists find astronauts' heart become more spherical in outer space - Video

Designer Uses NASA Hubble Telescope Images For Line Of Fantastically Ethereal Silk – Video

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Designer Uses NASA Hubble Telescope Images For Line Of Fantastically Ethereal Silk
Celine Semaan Vernon of Slow Factory has designed line of fantastically ethereal scarves and other silk wares around open-sourced images from the NASA Hubble Telescope using only organic materials...

By: stilodef

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Designer Uses NASA Hubble Telescope Images For Line Of Fantastically Ethereal Silk - Video


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