Sidusglacies - ⚡️

Picture of the moon that I had to take for my astronomy class. reddit.com/r/spaceporn

The speed of light between Earth and Moon in real time

via reddit

#TBT to 1989 when Voyager 2 spotted Uranus looking like a seemingly perfect robin’s egg. 💙⁣ ⁣ When our Voyager 2 spacecraft flew by it in this image, one pole was pointing directly at the Sun. This means that no matter how much it spins, one half is completely in the sun at all times, and the other half is in total darkness.. ⁣ ⁣ Far-flung, Uranus – an ice giant of our solar system – is as mysterious as it is distant. Soon after its launch in 2021, our James Webb Space Telescope will change that by unlocking secrets of its atmosphere. ⁣ ⁣ Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech⁣ ⁣

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Claude Monet’s water structure and shades, II, transparent single picture version.

Water Discovered in the Atmosphere of an Exoplanet in the Habitable zone - Universe Today

Huge news! Astronomers using the Hubble space telescope have discovered water in the atmosphere of an exoplanet in its star’s habitable zone. If confirmed, it will be the first time we’ve detected water—a critical ingredient for life as we know it—on an exoplanet. The water was detected as vapour in the atmosphere, but the temperature of the planet means it could sustain liquid water on its surface, if it’s rocky.

The planet is called K2-18b, and it’s about 110 light years away. The planet is much different than Earth. It’s a Super-Earth, and it’s twice as large as Earth, and about 8 times as massive. K2-18b is orbiting a red dwarf star, and it was first discovered in 2015 by the Kepler Space Telescope.

Dr. Angelos Tsiaras (UCL Centre for Space Exochemistry Data, CSED), said: “Finding water on a potentially habitable world other than Earth is incredibly exciting. K2-18b is not ‘Earth 2.0’ as it is significantly heavier and has a different atmospheric composition. However, it brings us closer to answering the fundamental question: Is the Earth unique?”

The team behind the discovery developed algorithms and ran archived Hubble data from 2016 and 2017 through them. They analyzed starlight from the red dwarf star as it passed through the exoplanet’s atmosphere. They discovered the molecular signature of water, as well as hydrogen and helium.

This discovery needs follow-up observations to confirm it. We also need better telescopes to study its atmosphere in greater detail, and the atmospheres of other exoplanets. Two telescopes on the horizon will tackle that job. The James Webb Space Telescope will have the powerful capability to examine the atmospheres of exoplanets, which is really the next step in understanding all of the exoplanets found by Kepler, and which will be found by TESS.

The ESA’s ARIEL (Atmospheric Remote-sensing Infrared Exoplanet Large-survey) mission will launch in 2028 and will study the atmospheres of about 1000 exoplanets in detail. ARIEL, along with the JWST, will give us a much better understanding of K2-12b and exoplanets like it.

↳ in the profound darkness of certain nights i have seen the sky streaked with so many trailing sparks that it seemed to me a great gale must be blowing through the outer heavens (antoine de saint-exupery)

(insp.)