Science is for Sharing

An Equinox is the astronomical event when both the hemispheres have equal duration and amount of sunshine. Sun would be exactly overhead of the equator. It happens twice in a year Spring (Summer) equinox (20 March) and Vernal (Autumnal) equinox (22 September) . Here is the view of the beautiful event from space for 22 September 2016. I have animated it (time series for the day). Watch the day-night solar terminator move through the earth. Observe the equal area of sunshine and night on either hemisphere. The visible imagery is from MeteoSat VISSR (IODC) stationed at 57deg.E longitude above equator in a geostationary orbit. For a typical comparison of Equinoxes with Solistices, you may go through this link http://akmnscience.blogspot.in/2012/07/equinox-solstice-better-view.html Image Courtesy: Dundee Satellite Receiving Station http://www.sat.dundee.ac.uk/

There are many proposals to reduce the climatic impact and change because of the Global Warming. Some of them tries to address the causative mechanism while some treats symptoms..... Geo-Engineering is d eliberate large-scale engineering and manipulation of the planetary environment to combat or counteract man made changes in atmosphere. Have a look at the three proposals to reduce increasing temperature. Click on the image of use the link below for a recent article in BBC. More details:  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/8338853.stm

Lyrids Meteor Shower is round the corner..... Look up in the sky  to watch the Lyrids brighten the skies. On Saturday, April 21.  For the 2012 Lyrids meteor shower, a new moon will set darker skies that are ideal for meteor watching.  rid meteor shower will be viewable all over the world, with best rates seen just before dawn at the location where you're watching the skies. The Lyrids are very unpredictable, with peak meteor rates between 10-100 per hour.  Lyrids are pieces of debris from the periodic Comet C/1861 G1 Thatcher and have been observed for more than 2,600 years. In mid-April of each year, Earth runs into the stream of debris from the comet, which causes the Lyrid meteor shower. Read More:  http://www.nasa.gov/connect/chat/lyrids2012_chat.html

Space weather starts at the sun.  It begins with an eruption such as a huge burst of light and radiation called a solar flare or a gigantic cloud of solar material called a coronal mass ejection (CME) .  The effects of those eruptions happen at Earth, or at least near-Earth space. Scientists monitor several kinds of space "weather" events -- geomagnetic storms, solar radiation storms, and radio blackouts – all caused by these immense explosions on the sun. They cause wide disruptions in Radio communications, power blackouts but for the beautiful aurora..... Read more :  http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/sunearth/news/storms-on-sun.html http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/sunearth/spaceweather/index.html

Photographer :  Anthony Ayiomamitis At  apogee , the  Moon  is on average approximately 406,500 km (252,587 mi) away from Earth with an apparent diameter of about 29.5  arc-minutes  (about one half degree); whereas at  perigee , the Moon is approximately 356,500 km (221,500 mi) distant and has an apparent diameter of about 33.6 arc-minutes. This difference of 50,000 km (31,069 mi) between apogee and perigee results in a dramatic change in the apparent diameter as illustrated by the two  full Moons  above, photographed in 2010. These particular full Moons were strategically selected to have the full Moon as near as possible to its minimum perigee and maximum apogee when crossing the local meridian in Athens, Greece. The Moon photo at left was taken on January 30, 2010 (at 00:31:28 local time) and the Moon at right was snapped on August 25, 2010 (01:26:33 local time). Courtesy: http://epod.usra.edu/blog/2011/03/full-moon-...

We have seen fire in earth where gravity is dominant. Can you guess how the same fire out of same fuel would behave in zero gravity or say in space....? Read this interesting article to know more... http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/FLEX_Video.html In space, where there is no up or down, flames behave in unconventional ways. When a flame burns on Earth, heated gases rise from the fire creating a buoyant flow that draws oxygen into the flame and combustion products away from it. In space, warm gases do not rise, and molecular diffusion drives flame behavior. "In space molecular diffusion draws oxygen to the flame and combustion products away from the flame at a rate 100x slower than the buoyant flow on Earth," Dan Dietrich, project scientist, NASA's Glenn Research Center, said. Flames in space burn with a lower temperature, at a lower rate, and with less oxygen than in normal gravity. This means that materials used to extinguish ...

LRO Camera Team Releases High Resolution Global Topographic Map of Moon. click on the image to go to the official website and high resolution image. Source: NASA-LRO http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/LRO/news/lro-topo.html

First images of the Asteroid which came close to earth has been released... You can watch the video Team of astronomers decided to animate an entire sequence of their high-resolution radar images of YU55 to make a short movie clip from the data from  Deep Space Network antenna in Goldstone, California. you can watch it http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cIwX0Qeid9o&feature=colike Courtesy: Nasa You can download the first images video http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/videogallery/index.html?media_id=119737731

An Asteroid named   2005 YU55 will have a flyby near earth and moon on 8-Nov-2011. NASA scientists will track asteroid 2005 YU55 from the agency's Deep Space Network. At the point of closest approach, it will be no closer than 324,600 kilometers or 0.85 the distance from the moon to Earth. Look at this animation. More details and videos: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/asteroids/overview/yu55.html   http://youtu.be/ucuegbwT8MU 

Three U.S.-born scientists won the Nobel Prize in physics Tuesday for discovering that the universe is expanding at an accelerating pace, a stunning revelation that suggests the cosmos will eventually freeze to ice. Saul Perlmutter and Adam Riess of the United States and US-Australian Brian Schmidt won the 2011 Nobel Physics Prize Tuesday for their research on supernovae, the Nobel jury said. The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences said American Saul Perlmutter would share the 10 million kronor ($1.5 million) award with U.S.-Australian Brian Schmidt and U.S. scientist Adam Riess. Working in two separate research teams during the 1990s - Perlmutter in one and Schmidt and Riess in the other - the scientists raced to map the universe's expansion by analyzing a particular type of supernovas, or exploding stars. They found that the light emitted by more than 50 distant supernovas was weaker than expected, a sign that the universe was expanding at an accelerating rate, the academy ...

Water Vapour is in Excess of Saturation in the Atmosphere of Mars,  reveals the results from the SPICAM spectrometer on board ESA's Mars Express spacecraft. It measured the altitudinal profile of water vapour in the martian atmosphere..... Here is the published paper: "Evidence of Water Vapor in Excess of Saturation in the Atmosphere of Mars", by L. Maltagliati, F. Montmessin, A. Fedorova, O. Korablev, F. Forget, and J.-L. Bertaux, published in the 30 September 2011 issue of Science. http://www.sciencemag.org/content/333/6051/1868.abstract Read a very good report here: http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-09-supersaturation-martian-atmosphere.html

I am sharing a beautiful video uploaded by NASA yesterday 26th Sep. in youtube. It was a real observation from the International Space Station on 17th of this month. First you see the beautiful 'Aurora Australis' and then you can see forest fires in land. If you look more keen, you can see also the air-glow too.... You can find more information here. http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=52287 http://t.co/gbfh7Zhk

                World Space Week  Resource Material prepared by our Team has been uploaded in the official WEBsite. here is it . http://www.vssc.gov.in:8080/ wsw2011/index.jsp http://www.vssc.gov.in:8080/ wsw2011/wswatschools.html Download PDF http://www.vssc.gov.in:8080/ wsw2011/downloads/WSW_2011_ Resourcematerial.pdf http://www.vssc.gov.in:8080/ wsw2011/downloads/WSW_ Handbook.pdf Materials for Media already sent...  ...... will be published/ relayed soon...! Celebrate the 'Golden jubilee of Human Space Flight'

This is how Solstice and Equinox look like ....... ....... a wider perspective.... ......view from space. Equinox ------ Sun overhead equator ---- sunlight falls equally in both Hemispheres. Solstice  ------ Sun is overhead northern/ southernmost position ---- sunlight falls maximum in Summer Hemispheres. I have taken the selected days visible imagery from Meteosat and arranged them in a 2x2 matrix..... Image courtesy: Dundee Satellite Receiving Station. (Isn't it better and give real information than the long used Inspiration obtained from: Seeing Equinoxes and Solstices from Space http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=52248

China is launching a Space module this month.........  to initiate building its own space station...... By 2016 plans to put a laboratory into orbit...!! Space station set up by 2020. Read more: http://www.physorg.com/news/2011-09-china-space-station-module.html

How about taking part in World Space Week Competitions....? Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre VSSC, the lead centre of ISRO coordinates World Space Week activities in Kerala to motivate students  and teachers. Many competitions for School children...... Mars Habitat design competition for College Students...! http://www.vssc.gov.in:8080/wsw2011/index.html http://www.vssc.gov.in:8080/wsw2011/essay.html http://www.vssc.gov.in:8080/wsw2011/mars_habitat_design.html SPACE QUIZ                   As part of the World Space Week celebrations, Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre, Thiruvananthapuram is organising a Space Quiz during first week of October 2011.                  Students of Class 10,11 and 12 can participate. Only one team is allowed to represent a school.                   Schools can send the details of the particip...

Why should humans go to Space ........?                                 Exploration is the inquisite nature of human mind, which has historically led to the discovery of new continents and development of new habitats. Looking back, without these discoveries and advances, living on Earth would have been completely different from what we see today. Rapid developments in human race, limitations in resources on Earth, and the potential threat from weapons of mass destruction necessitates that we will have to boldly go far beyond the Earth's boundaries if the human race has to continue for thousands of years forward. More importantly, space explorations hold the key to unravel the secrets behind the origin and evolution of life and environment surrounding us. These drive the quest for space exploration and colonization. Where else can earthlings colonize?               ...

NASA announced on 14 Sep 2011,development of the Space Launch System (SLS) -- an advanced heavy-lift launch vehicle that will help take human exploration beyond Earth's orbit. The SLS rocket will use a liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen propulsion system.  Have a look at this animation and related links... A step closer to travel in space...!!! http://www.nasa.gov/exploration/systems/sls/sls1.html# http://anon.nasa-global.edgesuite.net/HD_downloads/HLV_Launch_anim.mov http://www.sciencenewsblog.com/blog/914111

Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC) is conducting a   ‘Mars Habitat Design Competition’    for the college students of Kerala in connection with World Space Week celebrations from October 4 to 10,  Check this link for the official website http://www.vssc.gov.in/ http://www.vssc.gov.in/internet/compRepository/spaceweek/mars_habitat_design_competition.htm Take part in this interesting and creative competition ........ Let your   imagination   spread wings and fly to Mars..... and beyond..... Best Wishes