Six toaster-size satellites will work together to form the largest radio telescope ever launched. SunRISE, the Sun Radio Interferometer Space Experiment, is an upcoming NASA mission aimed at detecting bursts of radio waves from the Sun’s atmosphere.

http://go.nasa.gov/3A8FTb4
Source: @NASAJPL

45 years ago, Voyager 2 (shown in the background) launched at 10:29 a.m., carrying this Golden Record and flag on its quest into deep space.

Voyager 2 is the only spacecraft to have visited Uranus and Neptune, and along with Voyager 1, is NASA's longest-lived mission!
Source: @NASAhistory

Is Civilization on the Brink of Collapse?

At its height, the Roman Empire was home to about 30 % of the world’s population, and in many ways the pinnacle of human advancement. Rome became the first city in history to reach one million inhabitants and was a center of technological, legal, and economic progress. An empire impossible to topple, stable and rich and powerful.

Until it wasn’t anymore. First slowly then suddenly, the most powerful civilization on earth collapsed. If this is how it has been over the ages, what about us today? Will we lose our industrial technology, and with that our greatest achievements, from one dollar pizza to smartphones or laser eye surgery? Will all this go away too?

Video (Kurzgesagt)
@EverythingScience

The sounds of a black hole

The misconception that there is no sound in space originates because most space is a ~vacuum, providing no way for sound waves to travel. A galaxy cluster has so much gas that we've picked up actual sound.

Here it's amplified, and mixed with other data, to hear a black hole!
Source: @NASAExoplanets

All systems go for Artemis 1 mission to Moon
Scheduled to launch at 12:33 UTC on the 29th of August.
Article
@EverythingScience

Prelaunch Checks

Read more about the mission here:
http://nasaspaceflight.com/news/artemis
Source: @NASA_Nerd

The launch of #Artemis I is no longer happening today as teams work through an issue with an engine bleed. Teams will continue to gather data, and we will keep you posted on the timing of the next launch attempt. https://blogs.nasa.gov/artemis/
Source: @NASA

📅 Next Attempt: September 2nd, 16:48 UTC*

*Subject to change

NASA’s Webb Takes Its First-Ever Direct Image of Distant World

For the first time, astronomers have used NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to take a direct image of a planet outside our solar system. The exoplanet is a gas giant, meaning it has no rocky surface and could not be habitable.

The image, as seen through four different light filters, shows how Webb’s powerful infrared gaze can easily capture worlds beyond our solar system, pointing the way to future observations that will reveal more information than ever before about exoplanets.

“This is a transformative moment, not only for Webb but also for astronomy generally,” said Sasha Hinkley, associate professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom, who led these observations

The exoplanet in Webb’s image, called HIP 65426 b, is about six to 12 times the mass of Jupiter, and these observations could help narrow that down even further. It's 385 light years away.

Taking direct images of exoplanets is challenging because stars are so much brighter than planets. The HIP 65426 b planet is more than 10,000 times fainter than its host star in the near-infrared, and a few thousand times fainter in the mid-infrared.

Read More
@EverythingScience

Stem cell biologists create new human cell type for research

Professor Vincent Pasque and his team at KU Leuven have managed to generate a new type of human cell in the lab using stem cells. The new cells closely resemble their natural counterparts in early human embryos.

As a result, researchers can now better study what happens just after an embryo implants in the womb.

Article
@EverythingScience

⁣Frank Drake, pioneer in the search for alien life, dies at 92

⁣Drake’s contributions to science were numerous. A founder of the scientific field engaged in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI), he developed the Drake Equation, a framework for estimating the number of possible civilizations in the Milky Way galaxy.

He made the first observations of Jupiter’s radiation belts, and he was one of the first astronomers to measure Venus’s searing surface temperature and the greenhouse effect of its thick atmosphere.

Drake served as the director of the Arecibo radio observatory in Puerto Rico. He was a mentor and inspiration to generations of astronomers and astrophysicists.

“When the history of science is written a few hundred years from now, after we have made the detection of intelligent life beyond Earth—which I absolutely believe at some point we will—I believe Frank will take a place among the greatest scientists who ever lived,” says astrophysicist Andrew Siemion

Article
@EverythingScience

Fueling operations of the SLS rocket were going well this morning until a hydrogen leak was found in the engine cavity. Propellant loading of the liquid hydrogen tank has been stopped at 8 percent full while the launch team assesses.

Why does the SLS rocket use liquid hydrogen fuel if it leaks all the time? Well, it is very efficient, energy density-wise. But most importantly, it's what space shuttle designers used 50 years ago, and Congress mandated that the SLS rocket use those same engines.

Source: @SciGuySpace

Artemis I has scrubbed its second attempt.

The launch director waived off today’s Artemis I launch attempt. Teams encountered a liquid hydrogen leak while loading the propellant into the core stage of the Space Launch System rocket.

Multiple troubleshooting efforts to address the area of the leak by reseating a seal in the quick disconnect where liquid hydrogen is fed into the rocket did not fix the issue. Engineers are continuing to gather additional data.
Source: @NASASpaceflight