Cassini Spacecraft

The Cassini spacecraft observations of Saturn's largest moon, the orange-colored Titan, have given scientists a glimpse of what Earth might have been like before life evolved. They now believe Titan possesses many parallels to Earth, including lakes, rivers, channels, dunes, rain, snow, clouds, mountains and possibly volcanoes. "Titan is just covered in carbon-bearing material -- it's a giant factory of organic chemicals," according to Ralph Lorenz of Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory. "We are carbon-based life, and understanding how far along the chain of complexity towards life that chemistry can go in an environment like Titan will be important in understanding the origins ... Read Full Story

A giant, glassy lake larger than North America's Lake Ontario graces the south pole of Saturn's largest moon Titan, according to research from the University of Arizona's Lunar and Planetary Laboratory. Titan, which is one-and-a-half times the size of Earth's moon and bigger than either Mercury or Pluto, is one of the most intriguing bodies in the solar system when it comes to exploring environments that may give rise to life. "This is the first observation that really pins down that Titan has a surface lake filled with liquid,"reported lead researcher Robert Brown of the University of Arizona in late July, 2008. The lake ... Read Full Story

In a paper published Oct. 15 in Science, researchers from the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) present a new view of the region of the sun’s influence, or heliosphere, and the forces that shape it. Images from one of the Magnetospheric Imaging Instrument’s sensors, the Ion and Neutral Camera (MIMI/INCA), on NASA’s Cassini spacecraft suggest that the heliosphere may not have the comet-like shape predicted by existing models. “These images have revolutionized what we thought we knew for the past fifty years; the sun travels through the galaxy not like a comet but more like a big, round bubble” said Stamatios Krimigis, principal ... Read Full Story

One may wonder why a coronal has such higher temperature. Picture clearly shows a vague snapped shot of the sun's surface along with relatively thin strips of corona. This rare scene is hardly seen from the Earth. Their temperature is hundreds times higher than the sun. Astronomers have long been searching the main source of the cyclic heat radiation that causes magnetic field within the solar surface. From the close observation via the orbiting satellites, one can see the far ultraviolet and its related images. These images revealed to the astronomers that the surface thermal radiation is less between the ring and the solar ... Read Full Story

"It is critical to know what to look for in the search for life in the solar system. The search so far has focused on Earth-like life because that's all we know, but life that may have originated elsewhere could be unrecognizable compared with life here.  Advances throughout the last decade in biology and biochemistry show that the basic requirements for life might not be as concrete as we thought." John Baross, Professor of Oceanography and the Astrobiology Program at the University of Washington. As the New Horizons mission  -currently en route for the newly christened dwarf planet Pluto and its three moons, Charon, ... Read Full Story