Slide: 1 / of 1. Caption: Jamie Lyons

On Saturday morning, the white stone buildings on UC Berkeleys campus radiated with unfiltered sunshine. The sky was blue, the campanile was chiming. But instead of enjoying the beautiful day, 200 adults had willingly sardined themselves into a fluorescent-lit room in the bowels of Doe Library to rescue federal climate data.

Like similar groups across the countryin more than 20 citiesthey believe that the Trump administration might want to disappear this data down a memory hole. So these hackers, scientists, and students are collecting it to save outside government servers.

But now theyre going even further. Groups like DataRefuge and the Environmental Data and Governance Initiative, which organized the Berkeley hackathon to collect data from NASAs earth sciences programs and the Department of Energy, are doing more than archiving. Diehard coders are building robust systems to monitor ongoing changes to government websites. And theyre keeping track of whats already been removedbecause yes, the pruning has already begun.

The data collection is methodical, mostly. About half the group immediately sets web crawlers on easily-copied government pages, sending their text to the Internet Archive, a digital library made up of hundreds of billions of snapshots of webpages. They tag more data-intensive projectspages with lots of links, databases, and interactive graphicsfor the other group. Called baggers, these coders write custom scripts to scrape complicated data sets from the sprawling, patched-together federal websites.

Its not easy. All these systems were written piecemeal over the course of 30 years. Theres no coherent philosophy to providing data on these websites, says Daniel Roesler, chief technology officer at UtilityAPI and one of the volunteer guides for the Berkeley bagger group.

One coder who goes by Tek ran into a wall trying to download multi-satellite precipitation data from NASAs Goddard Space Flight Center. Starting in August, access to Goddard Earth Science Data required a login. But with a bit of totally legal digging around the site (DataRefuge prohibits outright hacking), Tek found a buried link to the old FTP server. He clicked and started downloading. By the end of the day he had data for all of 2016 and some of 2015. It would take at least another 24 hours to finish.

The non-coders hit dead-ends too. Throughout the morning they racked up 404 Page not found errors across NASAs Earth Observing System website. And they more than once ran across databases that had already been emptied out, like the Global Change Data Centers reports archive and one of NASAs atmospheric CO2 datasets.

And this is where the real problem lies. They cant be sure when this data disappeared (or if anyone backed it up first). Scientists who understand it better will have to go back and take a look. But meantime, DataRefuge and EDGI understand that they need to be monitoring those changes and deletions. Thats more work than a human could do.

So theyre building software that can do it automatically.

Later that afternoon, two dozen or so of the most advanced software builders gathered around whiteboards, sketching out tools theyll need. They worked out filters to separate mundane updates from major shake-ups, and explored blockchain-like systems to build auditable ledgers of alterations. Basically its an issue of what engineers call version controlhow do you know if something has changed? How do you know if you have the latest? How do you keep track of the old stuff?

There wasnt enough time for anyone to start actually writing code, but a handful of volunteers signed on to build out tools. Thats where DataRefuge and EDGI organizers really envision their movement goinga vast decentralized network from all 50 states and Canada. Some volunteers can code tracking software from home. And others can simply archive a little bit every day.

By the end of the day, the group had collectively loaded 8,404 NASA and DOE webpages onto the Internet Archive, effectively covering the entirety of NASAs earth science efforts. Theyd also built backdoors in to download 25 gigabytes from 101 public datasets, and were expecting even more to come in as scripts on some of the larger datasets (like Teks) finished running. But even as they celebrated over pints of beer at a pub on Euclid Street, the mood was somber.

There was still so much work to do. Climate change data is just the tip of the iceberg, says Eric Kansa, an anthropologist who manages archaeological data archiving for the non-profit group Open Context. There are a huge number of other datasets being threatened with cultural, historical, sociological information. A panicked friend at the National Parks Service had tipped him off to a huge data portal that contains everything from park visitation stats to GIS boundaries to inventories of species. While he sat at the bar, his computer ran scripts to pull out a list of everything in the portal. When its done, hell start working his way through each quirky dataset.

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Diehard Coders Just Rescued NASA's Earth Science Data - WIRED

Tiera Guinn hasnt graduated college yet but shes already working for NASA.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technologyseniorhas workedas a rocket structural design and analysis engineer for the space agency since June 2016. She designs rocket components for ventures to Mars and other deep space destination, and analyzes them to ensure they wont break during flight.

Shes living out adream shes had since she was 11 years old. Guinn remembers seeinga plane and wantingto know how to build one.

Id had a passion to become a mathematician, inventor everything you can think of under STEM (science, technology, engineering and math), but when I lookedat theplane, Iwanted to do that, Guinn tells USA TODAY College. I got stuck on that.

(Photo: Tiera Guinn)

That interest sparked her desire to study aerospace engineering, which led to her work with NASA.

After a Boeing representative visited MIT in 2016, Guinn accepted her dream job with company working on NASA projects. She works withthe structural analysis and design team at BoeingsHuntsville, Ala. location on school breaks and puts in about 20 hours a week working remotely from campus all while maintaining a semesters load of classes.

Ive seen the design (for the rocket) come into fruition somewhat so far, says Guinn, 22. I love looking at something Im designing and realizing it will be built.

Guinns success doesnt surprise her mentor Orren Williams, who taught her high school engineering classes.

Shes fulfilling her dream, but it wasnt handed to her she has worked every step of the way, Williams says.She was one of those students who made me get up in morning looking forward to go to class.

Guinn says her drivecomes from the significanceof her work.

The best part isknowing that what Im building isgoing to affect the world and mankind, shesays.This rocket can really change what we visualize as possible.

Guinn counts Katherine Johnson, a NASA mathematician,as one of her role models. Johnsons work made instrumental strides in sending the first American to space. Whats more, itinspired the Oscar-nominated, box office hitHidden Figures.

Even in those times, when everything was against her, she still did what she wanted to get done and made history as a result, Guinn says. Shes been a huge motivation in my study.

Like Johnson, Guinn is no stranger to challenges. She says she focuses on the support she has received instead of the obstacles yet to come.

My parents always told me that others dont declare the fate of your destiny, she says. Its up to you to achieve the dream you set in the first place.

Guinn willjoin NASA as a full-time employee inAugust andwill continue to work with rockets.

My most memorable experience in college has been implementing what Ive learned and experienced, says Guinn, who serves on the Black Womens Alliance and also choreographs African dance at MIT. Its great because it gets to continue after I graduate.

She may havealready achieved her childhood dream, but Guinn shows no signs of slowing down.She plans to create an organization for low-income students that will inspire them to reach their goals as well.

I always like to make the dream larger after its achieved, Guinn says.I want to pass onthe resources Ive received and much more.

Brooke Metz is a member of the USA TODAY College contributor network.

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This college senior juggles school and a job with NASA like it's no big deal - USA TODAY College

February 13, 2017 The NASA Kennedy Space Center launch pad from which Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin blasted off to the moon has sat dormant for years. In a few days, its next chapter will begin.

On Sunday, SpaceX, an aerospace company based in Hawthorne, Calif. that rents the historic Launch Complex 39A from NASA, tested the engines of its Falcon 9 rocket there in preparation to deliver supplies and science experiments to the International Space Station (ISS) on February 18. This will be the companys 10th cargo trip to the ISS under its contract with NASA, according to Space.com, and its first launch from 39A in Florida.

Falcon 9 rocket now vertical at Cape Canaveral on launch complex 39-A, SpaceX founder and chief executive Elon Musk posted on Instagram Sunday, alongside a photo of the rocket.This is the same launch pad used by the Saturn V rocket that first took people to the moon in 1969. We are honored to be allowed to use it, Mr. Musk wrote.

SpaceX signed a 20-year lease to take over the pad in 2014 and has spent the ensuing years fixing it up. NASA stopped using the launch pad in 2011, when its 30-year-old space shuttle program was shut down after Atlantis, one of five NASA space shuttles of that era, blasted off from 39A toward the ISS in the last-ever US shuttle mission.

Throughout the decades-long shuttle program, NASAs spacecraft Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis, and Endeavour carried people into orbit, launched and maintained satellites, and made it possible for humans to build the space station. The 18-year-old international science laboratory orbits 240 miles above Earth.

And starting Saturday, SpaceX will use the site to launch cargo in the Dragon capsule aboard its Falcon 9 rocket. The company hopes to use the Florida launch pad to send humans to the ISS in about a year.

That is a big deal. Its absolutely symbolic we are launching from there, former NASA launch director Bob Sieck told the Orlando Sentinel on February 8.

Since shutting down its space shuttle program, NASA has relied on the Russian space fleet and, increasingly, on the private space industry to step in to fill the void in space exploration and to make it more affordable.

In addition to SpaceX, NASA has contracted with Orbital ATK, an aerospace and defense contractor based inDulles, Va., and with Colorado-based aerospace company Sierra Nevada Corporation, to deliver cargo to the ISS for years to come.

The agency also is relying on SpaceX and Boeing to start delivering astronauts to space as soon as possible, though both companies are facing technical delays.

SpaceX, following a rocket explosion in September, has pushed back human flight to the ISS from this year to 2018.Boeing has, too.

Though the delays are necessary to ensure astronaut safety, they put pressure on NASA because of the high cost of sending astronauts to the space station. The agency pays $82 million to the Russian space agency for each seat it reserves aboard Russias Soyuz rocket, the only one capable of ferrying people to space for now. According to recent estimates by NASA, seats aboard SpaceX and Boeing rockets could cost a comparatively cheap $58 million each.

"Given the delays in initiating a US capacity to transport crew to the ISS, NASA has extended its contract with the Russian Space Agency for astronaut transportation through 2018 at an additional cost of $490 million, wrote NASA's Office of Inspector General in a September audit. If the Commercial Crew Program experiences additional delays, NASA may need to buy additional seats from Russia to ensure a continued US presence on the ISS.

Despite pushing private companies to innovate in space technologies, NASA hasn't given up on its own rockets. The agency is working with Boeing to build the Space Launch System rocket, which is expected to carry astronauts into deep space one day. It is scheduled to take its first test flight in fall of 2018, when it will to launch from Kennedys Launch Complex 39B, a site located down the street from SpaceXs historic launch pad.

[Editor's Note: This article was updated with more accurate information about SpaceX's plans for the launch pad 39A.]

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SpaceX reignites historic launch pad that sent NASA astronauts to moon - Christian Science Monitor

Sidd Bikkannavar said in a post on social media that US Customs and Border Protection officers wanted his cell phone -- and password -- before they would let him through at Houston's George Bush Intercontinental Airport.

"On my way home to the US last weekend, I was detained by Homeland Security and held with others who were stranded under the Muslim ban," Bikkannavar wrote in a Facebook post shared by a friend on Twitter. "I initially refused, since it's a (NASA)-issued phone and I must protect access," Bikkannavar wrote.

"Just to be clear -- I'm a US-born citizen and NASA engineer, traveling with a valid US passport. Once they took both my phone and the access PIN, they returned me to the holding area with cots and other sleeping detainees until they finished copying my data."

Since the order, a Muslim civil rights organization says it has filed 10 complaints with CBP, the Department of Homeland Security and the Department of Justice alleging systematic targeting of American-Muslim citizens for enhanced screening by CBP.

The Council on American Islamic Relations reports increased scrutiny of American-Muslims' social media accounts and contents of their mobile phones since Trump's ban, which has since been blocked in court.

CAIR-Florida spokseman Wilfredo A. Ruiz says citizens must surrender laptops and phones if a border agent asks for them, but not the passwords or social media information. Border agents might give the device back and let the person go. Or they might hold onto it and seek a warrant to break it open. Or a wide range of responses in between.

"Sometimes they play hardball and delay you, maybe cause you to miss your flight or get home hours later," he said. "There's no magic formula."

CNN has attempted to contact Bikkannavar, CBP and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory where Bikkannavar works for comment. This story will be updated as more information becomes available.

Ruiz, a convert to Islam, said he doesn't know if Bikkannavar is a Muslim, and that it doesn't matter. "This widens the scope of those being targeted to those who are not perceived as being the traditional, white American," Ruiz said. "It is not a Muslim issue."

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US-born NASA scientist says he was told to unlock his phone at border - CNN

NASA has selected three potential landing sites for the upcoming Mars 2020 rover: an ancient lake, a past volcanic hotbed and an early hot-spring site.

Scientists chose the final three candidates at a workshop Feb. 8-10 in Monrovia, California, from eight sites chosen in 2015 (out of a pool of around 30, NASA officials said in a statement ).

NASA began its final design and construction phase for Mars 2020 in July of 2016. The rover is intended to hunt for signs of ancient life on the Red Planet after touching down in February 2021, exploring for at least two years, mission team members have said. [NASA's Mars Rover 2020 Mission in Pictures]

The Jezero crater stood out as a forerunner site in 2015, and is among the three remaining potential sites. It's an ancient lakebed where microbial life could have developed, NASA officials said in the statement. The river-delta structure suggests that water filled and drained from the crater at least twice, and NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has identified minerals that have been chemically altered by water.

Starting in 2004, the Mars exploration rover Spirit explored Gusev crater, which stretches larger than the state of Connecticut. Spirit discovered evidence of past mineral hot springs at one particular location, according to the statement. That spot, Columbia Hills, is the only place where Spirit found signs of water in the enormous crater, and it is another of NASA's top picks for Mars 2020. (Later data analysis suggested Gusev may have hosted a shallow lake.)

An ancient volcano warmed Northeast Syrtis, and this heat could have led to hot springs and melting ice, making a welcome haven for past microbial life. The edge of the Syrtis Major volcanos is Mars 2020's third potential site. The spot exposes 4-billion-year-old bedrock, as well as many minerals altered by encounters with water during Mars' early history.

To choose from among the three top sites, which all have evidence of liquid water in their history, scientists will determine where the rover could land and travel safely. They will also look at which location has a variety of rocks and soils to analyze, the best conditions to have supported past life, and rock types that would retain evidence of past life, among other considerations .

The final determination should come after a fourth workshop, likely in 2018, researchers said at the 2015 meeting or perhaps at a fifth, in 2019, if necessary. The craft itself should launch in July 2020 on an Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral, Florida.

Original article on Space.com.

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Landing sites for 2020 Mars rover: NASA weighs 3 options - Fox News

February 13, 2017 by Rob Gutro NASA engineers and technicians perform vibration testing on the James Webb Space Telescope. Credit: NASA/Chris Gunn

Scientists and engineers had many challenges in designing the components of NASA's James Webb Space Telescope and then had to custom design and build ways to test it.

Because of the sheer size and scale of the assembled Webb telescope, some of the equipment typically used to test spacecraft simply doesn't measure up. One of those is a "shaker table" that is used to shake satellites to ensure a spacecraft like Webb can withstand the shaking that comes with a ride into space on a rocket.

So, engineers at Team Corporation in Burlington, Washington built a new, large and advanced shaker table system at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, especially for testing Webb. "The new "Vibration Test Systems" simulates the forces the telescope will feel during the launch by vibrating it from 5 to 100 times per second" said Jon Lawrence, Webb telescope mechanical systems lead and launch vehicle liaison at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

For Webb, the need for a new shaker system was a combination of things, including shaker force magnitude, the shaker table's ability to handle the telescope's highly offset center of gravity, and the need for a precision "smart" shaker control systemone that will automatically adjust shaker input levels based on test article responses, including an automatic 'soft shutdown' capability. "No matter what facility anomaly might be experienced during testing (loss of power, loss of coolant, etc.), the Vibration Test System or VTS is designed to shut down 'softly' so as to avoid imparting potentially damaging loads," Lawrence said. After vibration testing of the telescope is completed soon, the new VTS can be used to test other future large spacecraft.

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To make sure it works properly before using it to test the flight telescope, engineers put the new shaker system though its paces with many practice runs over months, using a dummy mass to represent the telescope. In November, Webb was moved from the Spacecraft Systems Development and Integration Facility 'cleanroom' and onto the new neighboring Vibration Test System (VTS), where testing is ongoing. While in the shirtsleeve environment of the VTS, a large 3-story tall cover enshrouds the telescope, acting as a portable 'cleanroom' that protects it from dust and dirt.

This spring, after vibration testing is complete, the Webb telescope will be shipped to NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, for end-to-end optical tests in a vacuum at extremely cold temperatures, before it goes to Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems in Redondo Beach, California, for final assembly and testing prior to launch.

Explore further: NASA's Webb Telescope to resume vibration testing in January

Vibration tests are one of the many tests that spacecraft and instruments endure to ensure they are fit for spaceflight. During routine testing of NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, an unexpected response occurred from several ...

Testing on the James Webb Space Telescope successfully resumed last week at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, in Greenbelt, Maryland.

What looks like a teleporter from science fiction being draped over NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, is actually a "clean tent."

The year 2015 marked big progress on NASA's James Webb Space Telescope and there are still a number of large milestones before the next generation telescope is launched in 2018. Recently, all of the 18 segments of the Webb ...

Inside a massive clean room at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland the James Webb Space Telescope team used a robotic am to install the last of the telescope's 18 mirrors onto the telescope structure.

In this photograph taken on Sept. 1, 2016, the James Webb Space Telescope Pathfinder structure has been configured for the Thermal Pathfinder Test at NASA Johnson Space Center's giant thermal vacuum chamber, called Chamber ...

(Phys.org)An international team of astronomers reports the discovery of a new giant radio galaxy (GRG) associated with the galaxy triplet known as UGC 9555. The newly discovered galaxy turns out to be one of the largest ...

The search for planets beyond our solar system is about to gain some new recruits.

A long time ago, in a galaxy far away, a supergiant red star ended its life in a spectacular explosion known as a supernova.

An international team of astronomers released the largest-ever compilation of exoplanet-detecting observations made using a technique called the radial velocity method. They demonstrated how these observations can be used ...

Radar images of asteroid 2017 BQ6 were obtained on Feb. 6 and 7 with NASA's 70-meter (230-foot) antenna at the Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex in California. They reveal an irregular, angular-appearing asteroid ...

Comet hunters still have a chance to see comet 45P/Honda-Mrkos-Pajdukov in the next few days using binoculars or a telescope. It's the first of a trio of comets that willbetween now and the end of 2018pass close ...

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NASA gives the Webb Telescope a shakedown - Phys.Org

From the International Space Station, Expedition 42 Flight Engineer Terry W. Virts took this photograph of the Gulf of Mexico and U.S. Gulf Coast at sunset

Nasa

This image of an area on the surface of Mars, approximately 1.5 by 3 kilometers in size, shows frosted gullies on a south-facing slope within a crater. The image was taken by Nasa's HiRISE camera, which is mounted on its Mars Reconaissance Orbiter

Nasa

The Orion capsule jetted off into space before heading back a few hours later having proved that it can be used, one day, to carry humans to Mars

Nasa

The Soyuz TMA-15M rocket launches from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Monday, Nov. 24, 2014, carrying three new astronauts to the International Space Station. It also took caviar, ready for the satellite's inhabitants to celebrate the holidays

Nasa

NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman shared this image of Yellowstone via his twitter account

Nasa

Nasa celebrated Black Friday by looking into space instead sharing pictures of black holes

Nasa

X-rays stream off the sun in this image showing observations from by NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array, or NuSTAR, overlaid on a picture taken by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO)

Nasa

This near-infrared color image shows a specular reflection, or sunglint, off of a hydrocarbon lake named Kivu Lacus on Saturn's moon Titan

Nasa

Although Mimas and Pandora, shown here, both orbit Saturn, they are very different moons. Pandora, "small" by moon standards (50 miles or 81 kilometers across) is elongated and irregular in shape. Mimas (246 miles or 396 kilometers across), a "medium-sized" moon, formed into a sphere due to self-gravity imposed by its higher mass

Nasa

An X1.6 class solar flare flashes in the middle of the sun in this image taken 10 September, captured by NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory

Nasa

An image from Nasa's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) shows a 200,000 mile long solar filament ripping through the Sun's corona in September 2013

Nasa

A false colour image of Cassiopeia A comprised with data from the Spitzer and Hubble Space Telescopes and the Chandra X-Ray observatory

Nasa

An image of the Large Magellanic Cloud galaxy seen in infrared light by the Herschel Space Observatory. Regions of space such as this are where new stars are born from a mixture of elements and cosmic dust

Nasa

Nasa's Mars Rover Spirit took the first picture from Spirit since problems with communications began a week earlier. The image shows the robotic arm extended to the rock called Adirondack

Nasa

Nasa astronaut Scott Kelly captured this photograph of the green lights of the aurora from the International Space Station

The Space Shuttle Challenger launches from Florida at dawn. On this mission, Kathryn Sullivan became the first U.S. woman to perform a spacewalk and Marc Garneau became the first Canadian in space. The crew of seven was the largest to fly on a spacecraft at that time, and STS-41G was the first flight to include two female astronauts

Galaxy clusters are often described by superlatives. After all, they are huge conglomerations of galaxies, hot gas, and dark matter and represent the largest structures in the Universe held together by gravity

Nasa's Hubble Space Telescope has unveiled in stunning detail a small section of the Veil Nebula - expanding remains of a massive star that exploded about 8,000 years ago

The arrangement of the spiral arms in the galaxy Messier 63, seen here in an image from the Nasa Hubble Space Telescope, recall the pattern at the center of a sunflower

The spectacular cosmic pairing of the star Hen 2-427 more commonly known as WR 124 and the nebula M1-67 which surrounds it

Four images from New Horizons Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) were combined with colour data from the Ralph instrument to create this enhanced colour global view of Pluto

The HiRISE camera aboard Nasa's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter acquired this closeup image of a "fresh" (on a geological scale, though quite old on a human scale) impact crater in the Sirenum Fossae region of Mars. This impact crater appears relatively recent as it has a sharp rim and well-preserved ejecta

This photograph of the Florida Straits and Grand Bahama Bank was taken during the Gemini IV mission during orbit no. 19 in 1965. The Gemini IV crew conducted scientific experiments, including photography of Earth's weather and terrain, for the remainder of their four-day mission following Ed White's historic spacewalk on June 3

For 50 years, NASA has been "suiting up" for spacewalking. In this 1984 photograph of the first untethered spacewalk, NASA astronaut Bruce McCandless is in the midst of the first "field" tryout of a nitrogen-propelled backpack device called the Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU)

This Nasa Hubble Space Telescope image presents the Arches Cluster, the densest known star cluster in the Milky Way

Nasa astronaut Reid Wiseman tweeted this photo from the International Space Station on 2 September 2014

On Mars, we can observe four classes of sandy landforms formed by the wind, or aeolian bedforms: ripples, transverse aeolian ridges, dunes, and what are called draa

A sokol suit helmet can be seen against the window of the Soyuz TMA-11M capsule shortly after the spacecraft landed with Expedition 39 Commander Koichi Wakata of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), Soyuz Commander Mikhail Tyurin of Roscosmos, and Flight Engineer Rick Mastracchio of NASA near the town of Zhezkazgan, Kazakhstan

Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system and perhaps the most majestic. Vibrant bands of clouds carried by winds that can exceed 400 mph continuously circle the planet's atmosphere

This Chandra X-Ray Observatory image of the young star cluster NGC 346 highlights a heart-shaped cloud of 8 million-degree Celsius gas in the central region

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Nasa preparing mission to send lander to Europa, offering humanity's best ever chance of meeting aliens - The Independent

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A team of NASA scientists developed electronics that can operate in the harsh conditions on Venus surface.

The new developments mean NASA could soon send a rover to Venus.

With further technology development, such electronics could drastically improve Venus lander designs and mission concepts, enabling the first long-duration missions to the surface of Venus, Phil Neudeck, lead electronics engineer for this NASA project, said in a press statement. We demonstrated vastly longer electrical operation with chips directly exposedno cooling and no protective chip packagingto a high-fidelity physical and chemical reproduction of Venus surface atmosphere.

Presently, extreme conditions on Venus prevent landers from operating on the planets surface for longer than a few hours. Venus average surfacetemperature is typically 864 degrees Fahrenheit, making it hotter than most ovens. Typical electronics simply cant operate in such an environment, forcingany landers to be protected bythermal and pressure-resistant shells. Theseshells only last a few hoursand are extremely expensive, limitingthe amount of science that can be done on the planet.

NASAs Glenn team created anextremely durable silicon carbidecircuit and tested it in a lab simulating conditions of the Venus surface.The circuits tolerated the extreme temperatures and atmospheric conditions for 521 hours, about 100 times longer than any other Venus mission.

This work not only enables the potential for new science in extended Venus surface and other planetary exploration, but it also has potentially significant impact for a range of Earth relevant applications, such as in aircraft engines to enable new capabilities, improve operations, and reduce emissions, Gary Hunter, NASAs principle investigator for Venus surface electronics development, told reporters.

NASA has a long history of successfully operating rovers on Mars. The agencys Curiosityrover found evidence that organic material is all overthe Red Planet in Decemberas well as discovering new geological evidence of liquid water possibly flowing on the Red Planet in the distant past.

The U.S. space agency is currently operating two rovers on Mars, dubbed Opportunity and Curiosity. Americas space agency successfully landed seven different probes on Mars and only crashed two.

No country besides the U.S. has successfully operated a probe on Mars for longer than14.5 seconds.

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Content created by The Daily Caller News Foundation is available without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact [emailprotected].

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Is NASA Ready For A Venus Rover? - Daily Caller

Its probably safe to assume peanuts dont really spark fear in many people unless youre allergic to them.

Unless, of course, what is masquerading as a giant peanut is actually a huge space rock hurdling toward Earth.

On February 12, the Arecibo Observatory, an enormous radio telescope located inside a sinkhole in Puerto Rico, captured new movies of an asteroid, which they have named2015 BN509.

Measuring approximately 200 meters (660 feet) wide by 400 meters (1,310 feet) long which, by the way, is taller than the Empire State Building asteroid 2015 BN509 has been deemed potentially hazardous by NASA.

This means the objects orbit through space may lead it to crash into Earth one day.

According to Ed Rivera-Valentn, who studies Arecibo data as a planetary scientist with the Universities Space Research Association, asteroid 2015 BN509 flew by Earth last week, traveling at about70,500 kilometers per hour (44,000 mph).

Rivera-Valentn told Business Insider,

The peanut shape comes from the fact that it is a contact binary, where the two parts [of asteroids] could not successfully orbit each other and fell back together.

He added these contact binaries are quite often shaped just like peanuts. Yum.

If the threat of a ginormous asteroid striking Earth gives you that dj vu feeling, youre not crazy. In the past three weeks, weve seen not one, but twosimilar space rocks that seem determined to strike our planet.

Whats different about 2015 BN509 (lets just call it the peanut monstrosity), though, is how close its come to Earth. The object flew by at arange of about 14 times the distance between Earth and the moon.

Rivera-Valentn added,

An asteroid impact, unlike other natural catastrophes, can actually be avoided. The data from Arecibo can be used by NASA to inform a planetary defense mission.

I guess thats his comforting way of telling us were not actually as screwed as it sounds?

Heres to hoping that, if the peanut monstrosity does make contact with Earth, it will simply unleash millions of peanuts to rain down upon us, la Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs.

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Allie is a News Writer at Elite Daily, as well as a recent graduate from The University of Delaware. If you are in her social circle, you probably know more than you care to about her cat, Jasper. She loves to exercise, but basically cancels th ...

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NASA Says Asteroid Bigger Than Empire State Building Is On Track To Hit Earth - Elite Daily

Scientists believe that Europa's icy crust is hiding a global saltwater ocean. They also believe that ocean is in contact with a rocky, silicate seafloor, which is a necessary source of elements and energy needed to give rise to and sustain life. The only other ocean in contact with a seafloor outside our planet is Saturn's moon Enceladus, making Europa an ideal world to explore if we want to find extraterrestrial life forms.

Next in the lander's goal list is assessing whether Europa is habitable by examining its non-ice materials. Finally, it has to characterize the properties of its surface and subsurface materials for future explorations. It'll be a long time before this lander takes off, though -- it was designed to follow the Europa Multiple Flyby Mission that's scheduled to launch in the 2020s. If it does push through, it'll be the first mission since the 1970s' Martian Viking program that will "conduct... in situ search for evidence of life on another world."

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NASA wants to send a life-detecting lander to Europa - Engadget

While you were sitting in your office this morning, sipping your half-milk soy latte, space was out there being awesome. It was there when you grabbed lunch at Chipotle, too, and again when you got stuck in traffic on your way home. Thankfully, the Hubble Space Telescope is out there, capturing ridiculously gorgeous shots like this one (full version) of a galaxy in the Andromeda constellation, so at least you can come home at night and enjoy some celestial eye candy while you binge on Netflix and drip Ben & Jerrys on your couch cushions.

The galaxy, known by the very clinical name of NGC 7640, is what is called a barred spiral galaxy. NASA describes it thusly:

These are recognizable by their spiral arms, which fan out not from a circular core, but from an elongated bar cutting through the galaxys center. Our home galaxy, the Milky Way, is also a barred spiral galaxy.

The agency goes on to note that the photo, while spectacular, might not actually show a visible spiral due to the galaxys orientation to the Hubbles location, making it more difficult to identify the crescent-shaped arms that extend from the bar.

NASA believes that NGC 7640 has experienced some kind of interaction in its past, which is really just a vague way of saying that something intense happened to it in the distant past, such as merger between two smaller galaxies. NASA studies these distant structures in the hopes of further developing our own understanding of how galaxies like our own were born and mature over time. Oh, and because the photos are fantastic.

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NASA reminds us that space is gorgeous with breathtaking new Hubble snapshot - BGR

Back in November, leaked documents showed that Nasa believed that it had cracked the once impossible warp drive mystery and were working on an engine that could drastically reduce the time that it takes to travel through space.

Super-fast warp drive faster than any travel currently available would make it possible to travel to the Moon in a matter of hours.

The warp drive Nasa was working on is an EM Drive which is an engine that would outperform any booster that is currently available and has no exhaust.

The technology works by bouncing microwaves around inside a closed engine. The microwaves subsequently push against the side of the container, acting as a propellor.

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GETTY

This was once considered impossible as it violate Newtons third law for every action, there is an equal reaction.

The new engine would also make it possible to get humans to Mars within a month, compared to current technology which takes upwards of three months to get to the Red Planet.

GETTY

The news sent shockwaves around the scientific community who were impressed with Nasas feat, but now China says that it already has the technology in operation.

The China Academy of Space Technology (CAST) said that it has been funding research into the project since 2010, and Nasas news just re-confirm what they allegedly already knew.

GETTY

They added that they have been testing the device aboard the Tiangong-2 Chinas low-orbit manned satellite.

Dr Chen Yue, head of the communication satellite division at Cast said at a recent press conference: National research institutions in recent years have carried out a series of long-term, repeated tests on the EmDrive.

NASAs published test results can be said to re-confirm the technology. We have successfully developed several specifications of multiple prototype principles.

The establishment of an experimental verification platform to complete the milli-level micro thrust measurement test, as well as several years of repeated experiments and investigations into corresponding interference factors, confirm that in this type of thruster, thrust exists.

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Has China beaten Nasa in building warp-drive technology dubbed the 'impossible engine'? - Express.co.uk

NASA astronauts train at Fairchild to...

AIRWAY HEIGHTS, Wash. - Four of the astronauts that will put America back in the driver's seat when it comes to space exploration were in Spokane this week.

The crew, training at Fairchild Air Force Base, were practicing what would happen if their SpaceX capsule ended up landing in the ocean.

The four NASA astronauts on that life raft will be among the first Americans to blast into space aboard an American-made spacecraft in more than 6 years. Friday, they were getting some important training.

The astronauts were participating in a water survival course, which is something they need now that they're switching over to space capsules that could possibly splashdown in the ocean beginning in 2018.

When we flew on the shuttle we were always looking for a runway, said Captain Sunny Williams, NASA astronaut. Now we're going to be flying on capsules and capsules can land anywhere.

The 336th training group tried to make its survival lessons as realistic as possible. Fans, fog machines, and fire hoses recreated the difficulties of ditching at sea.

There's lots of waves, lots of wind, and lots of rain, said Colonel Doug Hurley, NASA astronaut. This is a great way to tell how bad it could possibly get. It's a good way to reset everything you've learned over the years.

Dealing with the deluge in a controlled environment, right down to getting hoisted aboard a rescue copter, gives students the confidence they need for the real thing.

It also allows us to talk to the providers and get a better insight as to what type of survival gear and techniques we may need, especially for an ocean-landing spaceship, said Hurley.

There were a lot more people in the pool today than just astronauts and that's because the space crew was integrated in one of Fairchild's regularly scheduled survival courses. It's the only place it can happen in the Air Force and it makes Fairchild that much more valuable to the Pentagon.

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NASA astronauts train at Fairchild to prep for space capsules - KXLY Spokane

SpaceX is preparing to launch its Falcon 9 rocket from the historic Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket has gone vertical at NASA's historic Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) for the first time.

The California-based company is getting ready for a planned Feb. 18 liftoff from LC-39A, which is part of NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The Falcon 9 will blast SpaceX's robotic Dragon cargo capsule toward the International Space Station (ISS) for NASA, if all goes according to plan.

Over the years, Apollo moon missions and space shuttles lifted off from LC-39A. SpaceX signed a 20-year lease for the pad in 2014 and, after making some modifications, is now ready to start using it.

"This is the same launch pad used by the Saturn V rocket that first took people to the moon in 1969. We are honored to be allowed to use it," SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk posted on Instagram Friday (Feb. 10), along with a photo of the Falcon 9 at LC-39A.

The Feb. 18 launch will kick off SpaceX's 10th ISS resupply mission, during which Dragon will deliver more than 5,500 lbs. (2,500 kg) of scientific hardware and other cargo to the orbiting lab.

SpaceX plans to launch Falcon Heavy rockets as well as Falcon 9s from LC-39A. The Falcon Heavy is still in development; the booster's first flight should come sometime this year, Musk has said.

The last launch from LC-39A occurred in July 2011, when the orbiter Atlantis lifted off on the last-ever mission of NASA's space shuttle program.

Follow Mike Wall on Twitter@michaeldwallandGoogle+.Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebookor Google+. Originally published onSpace.com.

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SpaceX's Falcon 9 Rocket Stands Atop Historic NASA Launchpad for 1st Time - Space.com

Given that a return trip to Venus would be about 30 to 50 percent shorter than a round ticket to Mars, you might wonder why so much scientific effort revolves around getting us to the Red Planet, rather than exploring the second planet from the Sun.

Consider this: the longest-lasting probe that made it to the surface of Venus survived for a grand total of 2 hours and 7 minutes before its circuits were fried. Nope, Venus's scorchingly hot, corrosive, and heavy atmosphere isn't exactly inviting but new electronics developed by NASA could give us our best chance yet of studying this toxic hellhole up close.

Engineers at the space agency's Glenn Research Centre in Cleveland have come up with circuitry capable of lasting 100 times longer than previous Venus mission electronics.

That means we might finally have the technological basics for actually getting some long-lasting science done on the hottest planet in the Solar System, with an average surface temperature of 462 Celsius (863 Fahrenheit).

"If you look at Mars missions, there've been rovers on the surface getting all sorts of scientific data," NASA electronics engineer Philip Neudeck told Ryan F. Mandelbaum at Gizmodo.

"That dataset is totally missing from Venus, and that's because the electronics don't function on Venus."

While Venus's skies are made up of clouds of sulphuric acid, the real problem for sensors on the ground is the blistering surface temperature, along with the oppressively dense pressure of the planet's atmosphere.

Venus has a high-pressure carbon dioxide atmosphere, which offers more than 90 times the atmospheric pressure at Earth's surface. That means just standing on the surface of Venus would be comparable to the pressure you'd find 900 metres (3,000 feet) underwater on Earth.

With the dual challenges of insane pressure and scorching heat, regular electronics just wouldn't cut it on Venus, so previous Soviet missions to the surface have used thermal and pressure-resistant vessels equipped with hermetically sealed chambers to try to keep lander circuitry as cool as possible.

But the fact that 127 minutes was the survival record up until now set by the Soviet Venera 13 probe in 1982 shows a whole new approach is required.

To that end, the Glenn Research Centre engineers have developed semiconductor integrated circuits from extremely durable silicon carbide.

The integrated circuit before (above) and after (below) testing. Credit: NASA

Silicon carbide chips have very high heat resistance, whereas conventional silicon chips are only good up to about 250 Celsius (482 Fahrenheit) at which point there's so much energy in the system that electrons behave erratically, meaning the silicon effectively ceases to function as a semiconductor.

To test the new circuitry, the researchers put a pair of the silicon carbide chips in the Glenn Extreme Environments Rig (GEER) an 800-litre chamber that basically works like a hellish oven to accurately recreate the extreme heat and pressure of Venus's atmosphere.

The integrated circuits managed to withstand these pseudo-Venus conditions for 521 hours, a 100-fold improvement on previous tests.

"We demonstrated vastly longer electrical operation with chips directly exposed no cooling and no protective chip packaging to a high-fidelity physical and chemical reproduction of Venus' surface atmosphere," Neudeck says in a press release.

"And both integrated circuits still worked after the end of the test."

It's an impressive result, following on from previous NASA tests with similar silicon carbide integrated circuits, which showed the chips could survive more than 1,000 hours at 500 Celsius (932 Fahrenheit) with Earth's level of atmospheric pressure.

While NASA's current ambitions to explore Venus were put on hold recently in favour of other research missions, it's encouraging to know that studying this tantalising but terrifying planet is now at least technologically feasible.

"No one has ever made circuits run in this environment at this temperature for this long," Neudeck told Gizmodo.

"It really opens up a whole new way of doing Venus missions."

The findings are reported in AIP Advances.

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NASA Has Developed Electronics to Withstand the Toxic Hellhole That Is Venus - ScienceAlert

WGNO

NASA update: Mars projects at Michoud Facility appear undamaged by tornado WGNO NEW ORLEANS (WGNO) NASA says the Space Launch System and Orion spacecraft being built at the Michoud Facility in New Orleans East do not appear to be damaged after Tuesday's tornado. NASA crews have assessed the hardware of the two Mars ... and more »

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NASA update: Mars projects at Michoud Facility appear undamaged by tornado - WGNO

Forbes

Why A Tornado-Damaged Facility In New Orleans Is Critical To NASA Forbes An EF-3 tornado tore through east New Orleans, Louisiana on Tuesday February 7th. Widespread damage was found throughout the affected areas. There were also several injuries but thankfully there were no fatalities. I find that to be quite amazing based ... Tornado damages NASA facility in New OrleansThe Verge NASA facility in NO East vows to reopen after tornadoWWLTV.com NASA facility with deep-space rocket takes direct hit from a tornadoWashington Post NOLA.com -Space.com -NASA all 180 news articles »

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Why A Tornado-Damaged Facility In New Orleans Is Critical To NASA - Forbes

An email suggested an internal NASA competition between "Old Space" vehicles like Orion (left) and "New Space" alternatives like Dragon (right), but others involved in the transition say no such competition is under consideration. Credit: SpaceNews illustration/ESA/SpaceX

The email promised that big changes were coming soon to NASA.

The Jan. 23 message from Charles Miller, a member of the Trump administrations landing team at NASA, to former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Robert Walker, the former congressman who advised the Trump campaign on space, claimed that the White House was preparing to approve a series of memos that would be signed by the acting NASA administrator, outlining a new strategy for NASA.

The memos would establish three task forces within the agency to study various space commercialization issues, offering strategic options for the White House to consider. This is an opportunity for some positive messaging for Trump, Miller wrote, saying the studies could demonstrate he is a smart futurist that knows how to leverage the entrepreneurial genius of American industry.

One would examine how to carry out a seamless low-risk transition from the International Space Station to commercial space stations. That is something NASA was already exploring with studies that could lead to the addition of a commercial module to the ISS.

Another would study a space industrialization initiative that could, Miller wrote, prioritize economic growth and the organic creation of new industries and private sector jobs, over exploration and other more esoteric activities. It would be modeled on the work of NASAs predecessor, the National Advisory Council for Aeronautics, in the early aviation era.

The other task force would examine a rapid and affordable return to the moon that might not require NASAs Space Launch System and Orion vehicles. Instead, the message stated, NASA will hold an internal competition between Old Space and New Space about getting people to at least lunar orbit by 2020.

That idea competing NASAs program of record against commercial challengers attracted the most attention, particularly among critics of the current programs. NASAs current plans dont expect the first crewed SLS/Orion mission to take place before 2021, and possibly not until 2023. Such a competition might be as the first step in canceling those programs.

We have to be seen giving Old Space a fair and balanced shot at proving they are better and cheaper than commercial, Miller said, not specifically identifying the companies considered to be Old Space, or even SLS and Orion. But, he added, If this initiative can be approved quickly by the White House, and appropriately funded, we will see private American astronauts, on private space ships, circling the moon by 2020. (Emphasis in original.)

Yet, while the email promised that the memos might be signed as soon as Jan. 27, theres no evidence of action by either the White House or NASA. No memos have been released, and theres been no sign of other changes in direction at NASA directed by the new administration. (Miller, no longer at NASA, declined to comment Feb. 7 on the proposals in his earlier message.)

Many folks are asking about new initiatives and guidance, NASA Acting Administrator Robert Lightfoot wrote in a Feb. 3 memo to agency employees. At this point, there has been no new guidance on any of our current work, despite what you might have heard being speculated.

Others took issue with the accuracy of the email. It does not reflect the discussions that took place or the agency action plan that was sent to the White House, said a source familiar with the transition effort, but not authorized to speak on the record, in an interview. Its just plain wrong.

The transition team, the source said, was not seeking to pit established programs versus commercial upstarts but instead looking at how they could work together. There was broad agreement, the source added, that NASA needed its own heavy-lift launch vehicle and spacecraft.

What the transition team ultimately provided to the new administration was a more balanced view of the need for both government and private efforts that could re-energize the space program, according to the source. That was well-received.

Pledging allegiance to SLS If the intent of the plan, or at least the leaked email, was to shake up the status quo at NASA, including cornerstone exploration programs like SLS and Orion, the opposite seems to have happened. People have since lined up to profess their support for SLS and Orion as essential programs, whether NASA continues its Journey to Mars or takes a near-term detour to the moon.

They include Rep. Jim Bridenstine (R-Okla.), widely considered a leading candidate to be the next NASA administrator. Miller, in his email, supported Bridenstine for the job while also identifying potential candidates for deputy administrator who share the same general/overall vision of transforming NASA by leveraging commercial space partnerships.

Bridenstine, though, asked about SLS and Orion after a luncheon speech Feb. 8 at the 20th Annual Commercial Space Transportation Conference in Washington, emphasized his support for them. SLS and Orion are absolutely critical to the future of Americas preeminence in space, without question, he said. I fully support SLS and Orion.

Bridenstines comments came a day after the Commercial Spaceflight Federation (CSF), one of the conferences cosponsors, came out in support of SLS.

The exploration of space for all purposes, including commercial spaceflight, is our interest. And to that end, the CSF is announcing that we see many potential benefits in the development of NASAs Space Launch System, said Alan Stern, chairman of the board of the CSF. The SLS can be a resource that benefits commercial spaceflight.

The CSFs endorsement of SLS is particularly surprising since some of its member companies, such as Blue Origin and SpaceX, are developing their own heavy-lift vehicles that might ultimately be competition for SLS. Those vehicles, while having a smaller payload capacity than SLS, may be far less expensive than the estimated price of $1 billion per SLS launch, a figure NASAs Bill Gerstenmaier provided at the conference.

CSF has evolved over the years. Theres a strong net benefit in SLS, Stern said in an interview at the conference, describing why the organization, whose members include launch providers as well as spaceports, suppliers and other companies, would back SLS. As for commercial competition, he said, The market will sort that out.

Even critics of the new administration support SLS and Orion. In a Feb. 9 white paper, the Center for American Progress, a Washington think tank that has opposed many of President Trumps political nominees and policies, called on the White House to provide stability to NASA by continuing key exploration programs.

Instead of commissioning yet another time consuming, high-level study of Americas human spaceflight program that forces NASA to change direction, the Trump administration should build on the bipartisan consensus achieved by Congress and the Obama administration in 2010, the center said in its white paper. In particular, NASA should receive additional funding for the Orion and SLS programs, which are critical parts of any deep space exploration mission.

This confluence of endorsements may simply be a coincidence: people expressing their support for SLS and Orion for their own reasons, rather than a coordinated campaign. And even without their support, any effort to eliminate or bypass SLS with commercial alternatives would likely face strong opposition in Congress, where many key members remain strong advocates of the rocket.

We obviously have to also make certain that the SLS rocket is fully funded, that it stays on time and on track, said Rep. John Culberson (R-Texas), chairman of the appropriations subcommittee that funds NASA, in a Feb. 7 speech at a Space Transportation Association luncheon. He went so far as to suggest that the Trump administration include SLS in any broader infrastructure bill it plans to introduce in the near future.

Big changes may yet come to NASA, although it appears the administration is in no hurry to enact them hardly a surprise given the historic low priority of space policy. But if and when those changes come, its more likely they will revolve around, rather than involve, SLS and Orion.

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The big changes that may (not) be coming to NASA - SpaceNews

At the end of 2015, Congress gave NASA a big directive: develop a spacecraft that can land on Jupiters moon Europa an icy world that is thought to harbor a saltwater ocean underneath its surface. Because of the likelihood of liquid water on Europa, the moon has become an enticing place of study for researchers and is considered a top candidate in the search for alien life in our Solar System. And now, thanks to the will of Congress, NASA has come up with a mission concept for landing on Europa, as well as the top scientific goals of such a project. The main priority? Figuring out if were alone out here.

The main priority? Figuring out if were alone out here

Before the Congressional directive, NASA had already been developing a mission that would send a spacecraft to explore Europa. Called the Europa Clipper mission, it envisioned putting a vehicle in orbit around Jupiter. The spacecraft would then periodically fly close to Europa, gather data about the moon, and then fly back out again. However, the mission does not call for the vehicle to actually land on Europas surface.

It seemed that such a concept was not ambitious enough for Congress, particularly for one representative John Culberson (R-TX), who has been a driving force behind a mission to the moon, according to Ars Technica. So included in a massive omnibus bill that funded the government for fiscal year 2016, Congress told NASA to develop a Europa orbiter and lander, both of which are meant to launch on the space agencys future rocket, the Space Launch System, sometime in the 2020s.

After that bill was passed, NASA put together a Science Definition Team, which convened in June to discuss a feasible lander mission and what the top science goals of such a program would be. That teams report has now been delivered to NASA, and it defines three key goals of a Europa lander, the first of which is seemingly obvious: look for evidence of life. Since liquid water is essential for supporting life on our planet, scientists think that Europas subsurface ocean may help support life on the moon as well. Plus, theres speculation that Europas ocean may be twice the size of all the oceans on Earth. This water is also thought to come in contact with a heated rocky seafloor, and the interactions between the liquid and the rock may provide the right amount of energy needed to support microbial life.

The second goal defined in the report is to assess Europas habitability. Even if signs of life arent found, the lander could determine if its even possible for organisms to live on the moons surface or subsurface. Finally, the third goal is to figure out if Europa could support future, more ambitious missions. For instance, NASA would like to know if its possible for a spacecraft to go deeper inside the icy shell the covers the ocean, or perhaps a vehicle could dip into the water.

The report clarifies that this lander is meant to be separate from the Europa Clipper mission, so it would travel on its own to the moon. The team also lays out the complex way in which the lander will get to Jupiter and then touch down on Europas surface. Seeing as how the moon doesnt have an atmosphere, the lander wont need a heat shield for protection. The lander also wont use a parachute to slow itself down, but will instead use a combination of its engine and a sky crane similar to the one used by NASAs Curiosity rover to lower down to Europas surface. And the entire process will have to be automated too, given how far Europa is from Earth.

The lander will have a suite of instruments designed to look for life and assess Europas habitability

Once on the surface, the lander will have a suite of instruments designed to look for life and assess Europas habitability. Its the first time NASA has developed a life-detection system of this kind since the Viking spacecraft, which the space agency sent to Mars in the 1970s. The Europa lander will include instruments like an Organic Compositional Analyzer, tasked with looking for organic compounds like amino acids, lipids, and more. The vehicle will also be equipped with a microscope, which can look for microbial cells less than 0.2 microns in diameter.

The full details of the instruments and goals of the lander are in NASAs Europa report. NASA will also be discussing the new lander concept at two upcoming town hall meetings in March and April.

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NASA's 'Europa report' details how it could land a spacecraft on Jupiter's moon - The Verge

In 2015, in a moment of science communication genius, NASA created a mission called OMG. The acronym basically ensured that a newscientific mission measuring how quickly the Oceans are Melting Greenland would get maximum press attention.

The subject is actually extremely serious. OMG amounts to a comprehensive attempt, using ships, planes, and other research tools, to understand whats happening as warm seas creep into largenumbers of fjords that serve as avenues into the vast ice sheet many of which contain large and partly submerged glaciers that are already melting and contributing to sea-level rise.

Greenland is, in fact, the largest globalcontributor to rising seas adding about a millimeterper year to the global ocean, NASA says and it has 7.36 potential meters (over 24 feet) to give.The question is how fast it could lose that ice, and over five years, OMG plans to pull in enough data to give the best answer yet.

Weve never observed Greenland disappearing before, and thats what OMG is about, says Josh Willis, a researcher at NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory who is the principal investigator on the mission. We want to watch how it shrinks over the next fiveyears, and see how we can use that information to better predict the future.

And now the first data are coming in, in the form of notonebuttwonew studies published in the journal Oceanography by NASA scientists and affiliated university researchers, seeking to measure the swirl of oceans around Greenland and in particular how a warm, deep layer of Atlantic-originating water is moving and interacting with its glaciers.

Basically, it works like this: Waters swirl in a broadly clockwise rotation around the enormous island (see below), often darting inward toward the outlying glaciers along the way. And in fjords that are the deepest, the Atlantic layer, which tends to be over 200 meters (more than 650 feet) deep, has the greatest chance of causing sustained melting.

Where its deep, theres warm water, says Willis. Above the Atlantic layer, meanwhile, is a layer of colder polar water that has far less of an effect on glaciers meaning that the big and thick glaciersoften get hit hard at their bases, even as the small and thin ones dont necessarily get hit much at all.

Heres a figure that the scientists have produced, showing the overall flow of waters around the ice island:

The newly published research does not present any answer yet to the big question animating all of this: How fast will Greenland melt and raise seas in a way that threatens, say, Florida?

In order to answer this key question, the researchers need comprehensive data on the depths and shapes of the fjords, the thickness of the glaciers, and the behavior of the oceans around a Greenland coastline that, NASA notes, is 27,000 miles in length. Then, they will need to feed all of that information into a computer simulation that projects climate change forward to 2100 and calculates the consequences, at a high resolution, for Greenlands icy coasts.

Its too early to run the model, said Mathieu Morlighem, a researcher at the University of California and the lead author ofone of the paperspresenting the accumulating data. I think you need to wait another year or two, maybe more. It was not possible at all before OMG.

Still, the recently published findings mark a start. Morlighemsstudy, for instance,looked at the depth and shape of the seafloor near the fronts of and beneath numerous Greenland glaciers. The research shows that numerous glaciers extend deeper beneath the surface of the ocean than previously thought.

For instance, Store Glacier in northwestern Greenland (at around 70 degrees North latitude in the image above) starts at 400 meters (around 1,300 feet) deep where its front touches the ocean, and then plunges to depths as high as 1,000 meters deep (3,280 feet) farther inland making it quite vulnerable to the ocean. Prior research, however, had suggested the glacier was much shallower.

The same was true of numerous other glaciers, which also appear more vulnerable than previously thought.

OMG is transforming our knowledge of which glaciers are vulnerable to more warming or not, Morlighem said. So I wouldnt say we have been surprised; its more, we had no idea, for many of these fjords, what they were looking like.

Overall, the data are also showing that Greenlands west coast is far more vulnerable, in general, than its east, Morlighem said.

The second study, meanwhile,examines ocean circulation around the Greenland coast and finds, strikingly, that between 68 degrees North latitude along the coast and 77 degrees North (see above), the deepest warm layer of Atlantic water cools from 3.5 degrees Celsius down to 2.5 degrees Celsius. Moreover, it does so in part because the water busily melts away at a large and deep glacier called Upernavik at 73 degrees North, which touches the ocean in 675 meter (over 2,000 foot) deep waters. The cold meltwater from the glacier spills into the ocean and, through mixing, cools the warm Atlantic water somewhat.

The glaciers there are actively losing enough ice, and enough fresh water, that its important for the oceanography, and how the water changes as it goes up the west coast of Greenland, says Willis. That in itself is proof that Greenland is melting quite a lot.

The big picture is that NASAs new data suggest thats right new vulnerabilities.

Overall, together I think these papers suggest that the glaciers as a whole are more vulnerable than we thought they were, Willis said. He says that, of course, with the aforementioned caveat that NASA is not ready yet to feed the data into a model that actually shows how this could play out over the decades of our future.

For now, were still stuck with official estimates from bodies such as the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The panelsaid in 2013that Greenlands melting might at most contribute 21 centimeters to sea-level rise by 2100, with some possible addition from rapid ice collapse (this is the high-end number for what scientists call the likely range in a worst-case global warming scenario, to be precise). But missions like OMG, in the meantime, are giving us plenty to worry about.

These kinds of results suggest that we could be in for more sea level rise than we thought, Willis said. And were not alone; the fact is that almost every time some new results come out of Greenland or Antarctica, we find these glaciers are more vulnerable than we thought.

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NASA took on an unprecedented study of Greenland's melting. Now, the data are coming in - Washington Post