Was the Moon Captured?

The general consensus is that Theia crashed into Earth billions of years ago and led to the formation of the Moon. The story doesn’t end there though since there are a few lines of evidence to suggest the Moon could have been captured by the gravitational pull of the Earth instead. The orbit of the Moon is one such observation that leads to a different conclusion for it’s in-line with the plane of the ecliptic rather than the Earth’s equator. A team of researchers have suggested capture theory was the Moon’s origin. 

The Giant Impact Theory is by far the most widely accepted theory to explain the origin of the Moon. In the theory, Theia is thought to have crashed into the Earth 4.5 billion years ago. Following the catastrophic impact, debris from Earth and Theia was ejected out into space and, over time the material is thought to have coalesced to form the Moon. There is a lot of evidence to suggest this, such as the lunar composition which is very similar to the mantle of Earth. 

This image shows what the collision between Earth and Theia might have looked like. Image: Hagai Perets

The data collected from lunar soil samples from over 6 Apollo missions revealed calcium rich, basaltic rocks. The composition was identified by chemical and isotopic analysis and was dated at 60 million years after the formation of the Solar System. Using this information, planetary scientists concluded that, due to the similar with the Earth’s mantle, the Moon must have formed from the collision. That was back in 1984. 

A new piece of research published in the Planetary Science Journal by Darren Williams from Penn State Behrend in Pennsylvania and Michael Zugger from the Applied Research Lab at Penn State proposes an alternative. They suggest that instead, the moon was captured during a close encounter between a young Earth and a terrestrial binary — the moon and another rocky object.

This is not a unique idea though since it has been seen to happen elsewhere in the Solar System. Williams points out that Triton, the largest moon of Neptune may have experienced a similar origin. Triton is thought to have been a Kuiper Belt object that got pulled into an orbit by Neptune. Of the Kuiper Belt objects, 1 in every 10 are thought to be binary objects supporting the theory that the Moon’s formation could well have involved a binary pair. The orbit of Triton around Neptune is retrograde, meaning it moves opposite to the direction of the rotation of the planet. It’s also tilted by 67 degrees to the equator of Neptune. 

Global color mosaic of Neptune’s largest moon, Triton, taken by NASA’s Voyager 2 in 1989. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/USGS)

The team argue that, even though Earth could have captured an object larger than the Moon, the orbit is unlikely to have been stable. In the capture scenario, the original lunar orbit would have started as an ellipse but, through the effects of tides, been altered. By calculating the tidal changes, the team identify that initial lunar orbit would have contracted over thousands of years, becoming more circular at the same time. It’s this orbit that we see today. 

Now we see the tidal forces causing the Moon to slowly drift away from Earth at a rate of 3cm per year. The team’s calculations showed mathematically that a binary exchange captured satellite may well have led to the behaviour shown by the Earth-Moon system. If this was the case, it doesn’t explain how the Moon formed, just how it came to be a part of our planetary system. 

Source : What is the moon’s true origin story?

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The ESO Releases the Most Detailed Infrared Map of our Galaxy Ever Made

Despite decades of large-scale optical surveys, there are still mysteries about the Milky Way galaxy that astronomers are eager to resolve. This is particularly true of its internal structure and the core region, which is difficult to survey due to clouds of gas and dust in the interstellar medium (ISM). This material absorbs visible light, making fainter objects difficult to see in optical wavelengths. Luckily, advances in infrared astronomy have enabled surveys of the Milky Way that have revealed things that would otherwise remain invisible to us.

For more than 13 years, an international team of astronomers has been observing the Milky Way using the ESO’s 4.1-meter Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy (VISTA). In a recently published study, they announced the release of their final data product: a gigantic infrared map of the Milky Way containing more than 1.5 billion objects—the most detailed map our galaxy has ever created! With over 200,000 images and 500 terabytes of data, this map is also the largest observational project ever carried out with an ESO telescope.

Located at the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) Paranal Observatory in Chile, the VISTA telescope is responsible for mapping large areas of the sky. This latest map contains data gathered by the VISTA Variables in the Via Lactea (VVV) survey and its companion project, the VVV eXtended (VVVX) survey. Led by Dante Minniti, an astrophysicist at Universidad Andrés Bello in Chile, these surveys used the VISTA InfraRed CAMera (VIRCAM) to survey the Milky Way, the Small and Large Magellanic Clouds (SMC, LMC), and extragalactic space.

This spectacular view of the VISTA telescope was taken from the roof of the building during the opening of the enclosure at sunset. The VLT is visible on the neighboring mountain. Credit: VVV Survey/ESO

This latest map contains about ten times as many objects as the previous version, which the VVV Survey team released in 2012. As always, the ability to see the Universe in the infrared wavelength allows astronomers to see objects that would otherwise be obscured by clouds of gas and dust. These include newborn stars embedded in dusty globular clusters, brown dwarfs, and free-floating planets (FFP)—aka rogue planets—that do not orbit stars. “We made so many discoveries, we have changed the view of our Galaxy forever,” said Minniti in a recent ESO press release.

The observations began in 2010, using the camera’s 16 special detectors with a combined resolution of 67 million pixels to survey billions of point sources of light in an area measuring 520 deg². By observing each patch of sky many times, the team could determine the locations and proper motions of the 1.5 billion objects and monitor them for changes in brightness. The team also tracked hypervelocity stars kicked out of our galaxy’s central region due to gravitational interaction with the supermassive black hole (SMBH) there – Sagittarius A*.

The observations lasted for 420 nights, ending in the first half of 2023. The resulting map provides an accurate 3D view of the Milky Way’s inner regions that were previously obscured by dust. With the surveys now complete, the ESO’s Paranal Observatory is preparing for future surveys by upgrading the VISTA with the 4-meter Multi-Object Spectrograph Telescope (4MOST) instrument. This new instrument will allow VISTA to perform large spectroscopic surveys, capturing the spectra of 2400 objects simultaneously over an area of the sky equivalent to 20 full Moons.

Meanwhile, the Very Large Telescope (VLT) will receive the new Multi-Object Optical and Near-infrared Spectrograph (MOONS) instrument. MOONS consists of two identical cryogenic spectrographs (with 500 fibers each), allowing astronomers to obtain optical and near-infrared spectra for about 1000 objects simultaneously. The combined power of these instruments will provide spectra for millions of the objects surveyed by VVV and VVX, and many more discoveries are anticipated!

Further Reading: ESO, Astronomy & Astrophysics

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Stranded Astronauts To Get Their Ride Home

You might remember the story of the two astronauts on board the International Space Station that went for an 8 day mission, that was back in June 2024! Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams have been stranded there ever since but their ride home has just arrived at the ISS. A SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule carrying Nick Hague and Aleksandr Gorbunov has just docked so that the two can join the Expedition 72 crew already on board. There are now 11 people on boar the ISS but the Crew-9 capsule will return in February carrying Wilmore and Williams finally back home. 

Being stranded in space sounds like the stuff of nightmares but the reality is a little more mundane….if space travel can ever be classed as mundane! The two astronauts living this reality, Wilmore and Williams have been stuck on board the ISS as a result of thruster problems on the trouble stricken Starliner capsule. Tests were completed, analysis undertaken but the module was autonomously returned home for further tests without the risk to an onboard crew. 

International Space Station. Credit: NASA

Enter the Dragon capsule. Developed by SpaceX, the state of the art spacecraft was designed to ferry astronauts to and from the ISS. It’s been a key part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program and has been a significant development in the private space sector. One of the key features of the capsule is in its automation, not requiring any pilot to complete its journey but it, if needed, be controlled manually. Somewhat more reliably than the Starliner, the Dragon capsule safely docked and its hatch opened at 7.04pm EDT (23:04 GMT.) 

The Dragon capsule is launched into low Earth orbit by the Falcon 9 rocket. The two stage rocket was also developed by Space X and has operated reliably since its first launch in June 2010. Together with the Dragon capsule, they can deliver crewed and uncrewed missions into low Earth orbit. 

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying the company’s Crew Dragon spacecraft is launched from Launch Complex 39A on NASA’s SpaceX Demo-2 mission to the International Space Station with NASA astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley onboard, Saturday, May 30, 2020, at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The Demo-2 mission is the first launch with astronauts of the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft and Falcon 9 rocket to the International Space Station as part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program. The test flight serves as an end-to-end demonstration of SpaceX’s crew transportation system. Behnken and Hurley launched at 3:22 p.m. EDT on Saturday, May 30, from Launch Complex 39A at the Kennedy Space Center. A new era of human spaceflight is set to begin as American astronauts once again launch on an American rocket from American soil to low-Earth orbit for the first time since the conclusion of the Space Shuttle Program in 2011. Photo Credit: (NASA/Joel Kowsky)

The occupants of the Dragon, Nick Hague and cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov joined the 9 existing crew members of the Expedition 72 crew. The astronauts on board are Matthew Dominick, Michael Barratt, Jeanette Epps, Don Petitt, Butch Wilmore, Suni Williams and cosmonauts Alexander Grebenkin, Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner.

Assuming all goes to plan, Wilmore and Williams will return back with the Dragon capsule in February turning their 8 day mission to an 8 month mission! Fingers crossed for them. 

Source : Expedition 72 Welcomes Crew-9 Duo Aboard Station

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An October Annular Solar Eclipse Rounds Out 2024

A remote annular solar eclipse bookends the final eclipse season for 2024.

The final eclipse of the year is almost upon us. If skies are clear, a few lucky observers and intrepid eclipse-chasers will get to witness the passage of the Moon in front of the Sun one last time on Wednesday, October 2^nd during an annular solar eclipse.

The eclipse is the final one of the current season, and the last solar eclipse for 2024. The first—the April 8^th total solar eclipse spanning North America—was witnessed by millions. This week’s eclipse is by contrast much more bashful.

The path and timing for Wednesday’s annular solar eclipse. Credit: from Michael Zeiler’s Atlas of Solar Eclipses (2020 to 2045).

Why Do Annulars Occur?

An annular solar eclipse occurs when the Moon is visually too small to cover the Sun. Both vary in apparent size throughout the month and year, as the orbits of the Moon and the Earth are both elliptical. The shadow of the Moon falls short of the surface of the Earth during an annular eclipse, and the ‘ring of fire’ path is known as an antumbra.

Stages of the 2019 annular eclipse as seen from Guam. Credit: Eliot Herman

We often marvel at how ‘perfect’ total solar eclipses are, but this situation slowly changing. Going forward, annulars are already more common, as the Moon slowly moves away from the Earth… in about 600 million years annulars will win this battle for good, as total solar eclipses will cease to occur on the surface of the Earth.

The path for Wednesday’s annular solar eclipse over the southern tip of South America. Credit: from Michael Zeiler’s Atlas of Solar Eclipses (2020 to 2045).

There’s good reason why this eclipse is annular. The Moon reaches its most distant apogee of 2024 on October 2^nd at 50 minutes after eclipse conjunction at 19:08 Universal Time, at 406,516 kilometers from Earth.

Eclipse Path and Circumstances

The path crosses the South Pacific, and only makes landfall across Easter Island, Chile, Argentina. Maximum annularity reaches 7 minutes and 25 seconds in duration northwest of Easter Island. There’s a chance for some excellent ‘horns of the Sun’ shots towards sunset around to Falkland Islands and the Horn of South America.

An animation of Wednesday’s eclipse. Credit: NASA/GSFC/A.T. Sinclair

The partial phases of the eclipse will be visible from Antarctica and northern New Zealand, across southern South America all the way up to Brazil, Paraguay and Peru, up to a small sliver of the west Pacific coast of Mexico. The Falkland Islands in the Atlantic ocean will see a narrow miss, with Stanley seeing an 84% obscured partial eclipse.

This eclipse also marks the end of the second and final eclipse season for 2024. This season was book-ended by the slight partial lunar eclipse earlier this month.

This eclipse is also member 17 in the 70 eclipses in relatively new Solar Saros Series 144. This saros is a prolific producer of annulars, and started on April 11^th, 1736 and will end on May 5^th 2980.

Viewing and Safety

Unlike a total solar eclipse, proper safety precautions must be taken during Wednesday’s eclipse… even during the annular phase. A few percent of the Sun is still pretty bright, enough to give the sky a deep blue-steely tint, the only hint that something might be afoot. NASA has a pretty solid eclipse safety page.

There’s another low tech way to observe the eclipse. Keep an eye out for tiny crescent suns cast though natural pin hole projectors. These can include gaps in tree leaves and latticework. Kitchen utensils such as graters and strainers will also do the trick.

Crescents cast through gaps in the tree leaves seen from Mapleton Maine during the June 2021 annular solar eclipse. Credit: Dave Dickinson.

Comet T-ATLAS ‘may’ also make an appearance during the eclipse. Have any comets ever appeared during an annular? Certainly bright comets have made themselves known during the daytime. There’s now a chance that Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS ‘may’ reach negative magnitudes in early October, and the comet will be ~20 degrees from the Sun during next Wednesday’s annular eclipse… To be sure, it’s an extremely remote chance to see comet T-ATLAS against a bright sky, but I remember noticing Venus becoming plainly visible on April 8^th about 10 minutes prior to totality, so you just never know…

The next eclipses in 2025 includes only two partial solars worldwide: one on March 29th for the North Atlantic, and another on September 21st for New Zealand and the South Pacific. The next annular won’t occur until February 17^th, 2026 for the remote Antarctic.

Will the eclipse be carried live? As of writing this, no live streams along the path have emerged, but we’ll drop them here if any turn up.

if you have the chance, don’t miss this final eclipse of the year.

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Nuclear Detonations Could Deflect Dangerous Asteroids Away from Earth

Before you read the rest of this article know there are no known threats to life on Earth! We shouldn’t sit complacently on this tiny rock in space though so NASA have been working on ways to neutralise potential asteroid threats should they arise. The DART mission proved it was possible to alter the trajectory of an asteroid in space. Direct impact though where a probe smashes into the rock is one way but potentially not the best. A team of researchers have now been exploring ways that a nuclear explosion near an asteroid may send a blast of X-rays sufficiently powerful to vaporise material generating thrust to redirect the asteroid. 

Statistically the risks of an asteroid are low but the ‘impact’ of such an event could be catastrophic. The majority of asteroids that enter our atmosphere burn up giving us the stunning sight of a ‘shooting star’  but those over 1km wide could cause widespread damage and devastation. The likelihood is rare and might occur once every several hundred thousand years but smaller objects hit more often. They can also create significant localised damage. Take the Chelyabinsk event in Russia in 2013 when an asteroid exploded in mid air sending shockwaves across hundreds of kilometres. 

This image of a vapor trail was captured about 125 miles (200 kilometers) from the Chelyabinsk meteor event, about one minute after the house-sized asteroid entered Earth’s atmosphere. Credits: Alex Alishevskikh

Whilst the risk is low we must put in place a plan to deal with such threats when they arise. The Double Asteroid Redirection Test mission that NASA launched back in 2021 sent a probe to the binary asteroid system Didymos with its tiny moon Dimorphos. The probe hit Dimorphos in September 2022 and very slightly altered the orbit proving it is possible to effect change in an asteroid trajectory. Whilst the approach worked, the scope of such an approach is limited since colliding a spacecraft may not be so effective on large asteroids. Coupled with the liklihood of not getting much notice and an alternative, more, effective approach is needed. 

The asteroid Dimorphos was captured by NASA’s DART mission just two seconds before the spacecraft struck its surface on Sept. 26, 2022. Observations of the asteroid before and after impact suggest it is a loosely packed “rubble pile” object. Credit: NASA/JHUAPL

Other approaches have been explored from deployment of fusion engines to the target rock, focussing laser beams on them, neutron bursts and of course nuclear blasts that generate X-ray radiation. Analysis of these options reveals that only the latter, nuclear blasts has been deemed as a suitable approach for the neutralisation of the threat of a large asteroid impact when only limited time is available. 

A team of researchers led by Nathan W Moore has shown through simulations that a nuclear bomb could indeed deflect an incoming asteroid. Much of the energy release from a nuclear explosion is in the form of X-rays. the team showed that the X-ray emission would be sufficiently powerful to be able to vaporise the surface of an asteroid causing the results vapour to slowly propel the asteroid in the opposite direction. You can think of this as a very basic rocket engine with the vapour producing thrust. In simulations, the test asteroid reached speeds of 250 kilometres per hour! 

The results showed for the first time that X-rays could work and may provide sufficient protection against an incoming asteroid up to 4 km wide assuming of course, we have sufficient notice! There in lies the challenge, asteroids are typically dark and finding them against the blackness of space can be a challenge. The more time we have, then the greater chance we have of deflection being a viable proposition. 

The next step is for actual tests however, nuclear explosions come with high costs, high risks and a whole bunch of international legal restrictions. Careful planning is now needed with perhaps a little more research before this approach can be put on the shelf to be used should the need arise! 

Source : Simulation of asteroid deflection with a megajoule-class X-ray pulse

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Unloading Cargo on the Moon

I don’t think it’s something I have ever really thought of! Robotic explorers can travel around the Solar System visiting our neighbouring planets but when they arrive, sometimes a scientific package must be deployed to the surface. Never occurred to me just how that’s achieved! With a number of landers scheduled to visit the Moon, NASA are testing a new robotic arm called the Lightweight Surface Manipulation System AutoNomy capabilities Development for Surface Operations or LANDO for short! It will lift payloads off the lander and pop them down gently on the surface of the Moon. 

The Moon has always held a special place in our hearts. Since the first humans saw it as they gazed up at the sky, their descendents continued the fascination with our nearest neighbour. Artists, musicians, poets and writers are among just a few of the members of our society that have reflected on its beauty. It was only natural that it would be the first target for human exploration at the dawn of space flight. The Apollo missions saw the first human visitors to the Moon and now we wait with bated breath as Artemis looks set to take us back again very soon. 

Aldrin on the Moon. Astronaut Buzz Aldrin walks on the surface of the moon near the leg of the lunar module Eagle during the Apollo 11 mission. Mission commander Neil Armstrong took this photograph with a 70mm lunar surface camera. While astronauts Armstrong and Aldrin explored the Sea of Tranquility region of the moon, astronaut Michael Collins remained with the command and service modules in lunar orbit. Image Credit: NASA

Even with human explorers it’s likely only to be a few at a time so mission planners are turning to robotic helpers for the more mundane work. A team of researchers at the Langley Research Centre in Virginia have been working upon a piece of robotic hardware with new software that can operate autonomously to move objects around on the surface! The team, led by Dr Julia Cline from NASA demonstrated the LANDO system and it performed perfectly.

Looking like a movie set, the team established the arena to look like the Moon, complete with boulders that Hollywood would be proud of. The team undertook their first demo by lifting a payload off a tall black pedestal and onto the floor. They then upped the challenge and tried the same manouver but with a small rover instead. Both tests were succesful.

Closeup of lunar surface (Credit NASA)

Pivotal to the system is a series of sensors on the camera and encoders affixed to the side of the package. Once the system was ready the camera scanned the area looking for the payload which was outlined with the encoders (somewhat like a QR code.) Once it identified the item the robotic arm gently swung over the object and carefully manoeuvred its hook to snare the package. With a destination already defined using a graphical interface of the scene, the robotic arm moved around and dropped the placed the package just where the team commanded it too. 

After a succesful delivery the hook slowly disengaged, returned to its home position and paused, ready for the next command. The testing nicely demonstrated the reliability of the system setting the scene for further more advanced tests. Now the team are looking to develop a larger more robust version that can be tested ahead of its first lunar mission.

The use of robotic arms like LANDO are of immense benefit, helping us to explore the Moon. Not only will they help with repetitive tasks but they can perform more precise scientific studies even in the relatively hostile environment of the lunar surface. Their high levels of dexterity and reliability mean they are an ideal tool for further development with lunar ready versions already being worked upon.

Source : Robotic Moving ‘Crew’ Preps for Work on Moon

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How Does the Milky Way Compare to Other Galaxies?

The Milky Way is special because it is our home. No matter where we are on Earth we can see its arc of light overhead if the night is dark enough. But how similar is our galaxy to others? Is it an unusual spiral galaxy, or is it rather typical in the cosmos?

Before we had discovered exoplanets, astronomers generally thought our solar system was rather typical. Sure, there would be differences, but the general arrangement of rocky worlds close to the Sun and cold gas giants in the outer system made sense. However when we studied planetary systems we found ours was rather unusual. Most planets orbit red dwarfs, not sun-like stars, and large gas giants often orbit close to their star. Now that we have sky surveys of galaxies throughout the Universe, we can answer the same question of the Milky way, as a recent study shows.

The study is based on the Satellites Around Galactic Analogs (SAGA) Survey, which began collecting data in 2013. The goal of SAGA is to look at the small galaxies which orbit large galaxies. The team looked at 101 galaxies with masses similar to the Milky Way and found 378 satellite galaxies for them. Because of observational limits, this only covers satellites with a mass of about a million Suns or more. In this range our galaxy has four satellites. We know of many more, but most of them are below the mass cutoff.

This would seem to indicate that the Milky Way is rather typical. But then the team looked at those galaxies with a large companion, like the Large Magellanic Cloud we see in the southern hemisphere. For those galaxies the number of satellites is typically much larger than four. The Milky Way has an unusually low number of satellites. One reason for this may be that the Large Magellanic Cloud entered our sphere of influence rather recently on the cosmic timeline.

A second study based on the SAGA data looked at star formation in the satellite galaxies. It found that the closer a satellite is to the main galaxy the more likely it is to still be producing stars. This is similar to what we see among the Milky Way satellites. So it seems that while the Milky Way is a little unusual, it isn’t unique among galaxies of similar mass.

But it will always be our special spiral galaxy.

Reference: Mao, Yao-Yuan, et al. “The SAGA Survey. III. A Census of 101 Satellite Systems around Milky Way-mass Galaxies.” arXiv preprint arXiv:2404.14498 (2024).

Reference: Geha, Marla, et al. “The SAGA Survey. IV. The Star Formation Properties of 101 Satellite Systems around Milky Way-mass Galaxies.” arXiv preprint arXiv:2404.14499 (2024).

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Space Perspective Completes a Test Flight, Sending a Balloon to 30 km

It’s great to see so many private organisations entering the space sector. Space Perspective are another and they have just completed a successful uncrewed capsule ascent to an altitude of 30km. Their Neptune-Excelsior capsule was carried by a balloon and landed in the ocean 6 hours later. It was able to maintain its cabin pressure and stability throughout the flight proving that it met the requirements for future passenger flights starting in 2025. 

Space Perspective was founded in 2019 by Jane Poynter and Taber MacCallum. Their focus in the sector is space tourism and they aim to provide an accessible way for people to experience space without the need for rockets. The concept is to provide trips on board their pressurised capsules which are lifted gently to the upper atmosphere by large hydrogen filled balloons. The gentle journey is a far cry from the adrenalin fuelled rocket launches we are accustomed to seeing but still allows passengers to take in the view of the Earth from an altitude of 100,000 feet (30km.) The experience should be a comfortable and luxurious one with large windows, spacious interior and a smooth, calm experience. 

A view of Earth’s atmosphere from space. Credit: NASA

The concept is a fabulous one allowing access to space by anyone and especially those less inclined to attach themselves to a controlled explosion. It’s a carbon-neutral spaceflight experience and this latest test of the Neptune-Excelsior capsule is a positive step forward. The ascent began at the Marine Spaceport from the deck of MS Voyager off the coast of St Petersburg in Florida on 15 September 2024. 

Apollo 11 launch using the Saturn V rocket

The whole journey lasted 6 hours, and reaching an altitude of 100,000 feet took the capsule above 99% of the Earth’s atmosphere. Enroute the Neptune-Excelsior travelled high above the ocean and on completion of the ascent the module completed a controlled descent and completed a splashdown landing. The flight marks a significant milestone in space tourism opening up a space experience to all and bringing with it innovations in spaceport technology, spacecraft design and flight safety. 

Enabling the flight are a number of technological advances; launch and ascent systems, environment management and thermal management. The launch system employed a new four-roller system to raise the balloon and get it airborne. It’s an approach that significantly reduces the cost of launch to high altitude, reduces the risk and the carbon footprint.  Unlike other capsules designed for space, the Neptune module has been designed for comfort and enjoyment with the largest windows ever flown. 

The Development Test Flight has enabled the collection of data to inform the next phase in the programme. Teams of engineers will analyse the results and the capsule to see how the pressurisation, structure and thermal systems have handled the flight setting the stage for the first crewed flight. 

Is this for everyone? Space Perspective have sold at least 1,800 tickets at a cost of $125,000 that’s compared to more conventional rocket based journeys costing anything from $250,000 and above. Alas for now, the price point still puts space travel outside the financial capability of most but it’s a great step toward driving down the cost and opening up the amazing wonders of space to everyone. 

Source : Space Perspective Successfully Completes Development Flight 2

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Martian Clay Could Be Hiding the Planet's Atmosphere

Ages ago in its youth, Mars appeared much like Earth. It was a warm planet with lakes, rivers, and vast seas. It had a thick atmosphere with clouds and rain. One major difference is that the atmosphere was rich with carbon dioxide instead of oxygen. Then about 3.5 billion years ago much of the atmosphere disappeared, and we haven’t understood how. A new study in Science Advances suggests that the waters of Mars may have been the key, and much of the ancient atmosphere may be locked in the surface of the red planet.

The authors center their paper on a clay mineral known as smectite. On Earth smectite is produced through tectonic activity. As tectonic plates are uplifted they can drag material from the mantle to the surface, some of which is this kind of clay. One characteristic of smectite is that it’s full of little folds. Nooks and crannies if you will, that can trap carbon dioxide for billions of years. In an earlier study the team demonstrated how smectite on Earth helped prevent our world from becoming a greenhouse planet by pulling carbon dioxide out of our early atmosphere. It’s a process still going on today. Mars doesn’t experience tectonic activity, but smectite can be found all over Mars, and the authors wondered if it might solve the mystery of the Martian atmosphere.

The processes that captured the Martian atmosphere. Credit: Murray & Jagoutz

The challenge was to figure out how so much smectite formed on Mars. Rather than uplifting tectonic plates it is a series of chemical reactions. The authors suggest that water on Mars seeped through olivine, a magnesium iron silicate common on Earth, Mars, and even asteroids. The iron in olivine would bind with the water’s oxygen and release hydrogen. This hydrogen would then react with carbon dioxide to form methane. Over time this process would transform the olivine into smectite, which would trap methane and carbon dioxide. Based on their calculations the team argues that 80% of the ancient atmosphere is now trapped in the Martian clay, leaving the thin atmosphere we see today.

If this model is true, it could be a boon for future Martian explorers. Not only will there be plenty of water found beneath the surface, there will also be large quantities of methane. The solution to the problems of water and fuel could be right under the feet of those first explorers, trapped in the nooks and crannies of common clay.

Reference: Murray, Joshua & Jagoutz, Oliver. “Olivine alteration and the loss of Mars’ early atmospheric carbon.” Science Advances 10.39 (2024): eadm8443.

Reference: Murray, Joshua, and Oliver Jagoutz. “Palaeozoic cooling modulated by ophiolite weathering through organic carbon preservation.” Nature Geoscience 17.1 (2024): 88-93.

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Astronomers Find a Strange Lopsided Planet

I’ve often stated that planets come in a wide range of sizes but rarely do I find myself stating they come in a wide range of shapes too! The discovery of WASP-107b is a case  in point since this planet is the size of Jupiter but only a tenth of its mass. But there’s more… Using the James Webb Space Telescope a team of astronomers have accurately identified that the planet has an east-west asymmetry in its atmosphere, in other words, it’s lopsided. It is tidally locked to the star and on one side, the atmosphere seems to be inflated compared to the other. 

Planets orbiting other stars are known as exoplanets. WASP-107b is one such planet in orbit about a star 200 light years away in the constellation of Virgo. The first exoplanet detection was confirmed in 1992 and since then over 5,000 alien planets have been identified. A multitude of different techniques are used to hunt them down from searching for dips in light from distant stars to analysing the spectra of a star. A wide variety of planet systems have been found from Earth-like possibly habitable planets to great big gas giants like Jupiter. With the new generation of space telescopes like the JWST it is now possible to study the atmosphere of exoplanets to learn even more about them.

Artist impression of the James Webb Space Telescope

A team of astronomers from the University of Arizona have been using the JWST with an international group of researchers to study WASP-107b. They discovered the east-west asymmetry of the planet as it passed in front of its host star just like the Moon does during a solar eclipse. 

The shape of the planet is an atmospheric phenomenon but of course when it comes to gas giants like Jupiter that’s pretty much referring to the planet itself. It’s not just a physical asymmetry though as there are temperature and cloud property differences between the eastern and western hemisphere. It’s now important to explore the asymmetry observed to learn more about the dynamics of the planet and whether it’s a unique phenomenon. 

“Icy and Rocky Worlds” is a new exoplanet infographic by Slovak artist and space enthusiast Martin Vargic. It’s available as a wall poster at his website. Image Credit and Copyright: Martin Vargic

One element of the planet which is cause for investigation and likely cause is that it’s tidally locked to the star. The force of gravity from the star and the force of gravity on the planet have acted upon each other to lock one face of the planet to the star. This means one hemisphere is constantly illuminated and warmed by the star while the other hemisphere is permanently night! Tidal locking is not unique to WASP-107b though so if this is the cause then the asymmetry should be common. 

To make their finding, the team used a technique known as transmission spectroscopy. In this technique, observations are made of the starlight as it passes through the atmosphere of the planet during transit events. As the light passes through atmospheric gasses, the presence of different gasses interacts with the light in different ways that can be seen during spectral analyses. 

What does make WASP-107b unique is low gravity and low density giving rise an atmosphere that is somewhat over-inflated compared to other alien worlds of this mass. This is the first time such an asymmetry has been seen so it will be interesting to see how unique this fascinating world really is. 

Source : Astronomers catch a glimpse of a uniquely inflated and asymmetric exoplanet

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Another Building Block of Life Can Handle Venus’ Sulphuric Acid

Venus is often described as a hellscape. The surface temperature breaches the melting point of lead, and though its atmosphere is dominated by carbon dioxide, it contains enough sulfuric acid to satisfy the comparison with Hades.

But conditions throughout Venus’ ample atmosphere aren’t uniform. There are locations where some of life’s building blocks could resist the planet’s inhospitable nature.

Among the rocky planets, Venus has by far the largest atmosphere by volume. So, while its surface is inhospitable, its atmosphere has regions that are the most Earth-like of anywhere else in the Solar System. Scientists have wondered if life could survive in parts of the planet’s upper atmosphere, and the discovery of the potential biomarker phosphine (though it was later disproved) generated more interest.

Some research suggests that life could exist within Venus’ voluminous clouds. Image Credit: Abreu et al. 2024.

One reason Venus keeps coming up in discussions around habitability is that it’s accessible, whereas exoplanets aren’t. Venus is easily reached, and we currently have one orbiter in place, the Japanese Akatsuki spacecraft. Three other missions to Venus are planned for the mid-2030s: NASA’s Veritas and DAVINCI and the ESA’s EnVision.

Nobody is convinced we’ll find life on Venus. But the planet can teach us a lot about chemistry and biology and their limits.

In new research, a team of scientists tested different building blocks under Venus-like conditions to see if they can withstand the planet’s perilous nature. The research is “Simple lipids form stable higher-order structures in concentrated sulfuric acid.” The lead author is Daniel Duzdevich from the Department of Chemistry at the University of Chicago. The paper is in pre-print now and has been submitted to the journal Astrobiology.

Venus’ surface isn’t a candidate for habitability. But regions in its atmosphere may be. The issue is that much of Venus’ sulfuric acid is concentrated in discrete clouds rather than diffused throughout its atmosphere.

“The Venusian surface is sterilizing, but the cloud deck includes regions with temperatures and pressures conventionally considered compatible with life. However, the Venusian clouds are thought to consist of concentrated sulfuric acid,” the authors explain.

Cloud structure in the Venusian atmosphere in 2016, revealed by observations in the two ultraviolet bands by Akatsuki. Credit: Kevin M. Gill

They wanted to test if any of life’s “fundamental features” could withstand Venus’ challenging environment. Can any of life’s chemistry resist sulfuric acid?

“Organic chemistry in concentrated sulfuric acid is rarely studied yet surprisingly rich, with recent work supporting the notion that complex organic molecules, including amino acids and nucleobases can be stable in this unusual solvent,” the authors write.

If simple organic molecules can remain stable in sulfuric acid, it’s an interesting observation in favour of life. But it takes more complexity than that, and that’s what this research focuses on.

“One fundamental feature of life is cellularity: the differentiation of “inside” (the contents of a cell, including information, molecules, and all their interactions) and “outside” (the environment), in addition to a mechanism for communication and exchange between the two,” Duzdevich and his co-researchers write.

The researchers focused on lipids, the membranes that define cells. Lipids are the foundation of cellular structure, not only as membranes between cells but also as membranes that create distinct parts of the interior of cells. “The cell membrane is especially important in extreme environments because it must help maintain the homeostasis of the intracellular environment against otherwise harsh external conditions,” the authors write.

The researchers performed lab experiments to determine whether lipids can withstand Venus’ harsh environment. They asked two questions: Can simple lipids resist decomposition by sulfuric acid, and can the lipids form stable higher-order structures like they do in cells?

The researchers placed masses of lipids in vials and exposed them to different concentrations of sulfuric acid and measured each vial at specific intervals. Their results show that some lipids can survive exposure to the acid and even form structures.

This figure from the research shows the vesicle-like structures that formed after concentrated sulfuric acid was added to solid lipids. Each panel is a different region of the same sample taken on the same day. Subsequent images showed that the structures remained intact even after seven days. Image Credit: Duzdevich et al. 2024.

Interested readers can explore the detailed chemistry for themselves.

In summary, the results suggest that stable membranes can form and persist in the presence of sulfuric acid. Life uses water as a solvent because it’s a polar molecule, can form networks of hydrogen bonds, has a high heat capacity, and, of course, is abundant on Earth. But it’s not abundant everywhere.

Critically, this study shows that some aspects of the chemistry of life don’t require water as a solvent. Instead, they can tolerate and use sulfuric acid as a solvent. “Here, we show the unexpected stability of complex membranous structures in another polar solvent: concentrated sulfuric acid,” the authors write.

What does this mean for exoplanet habitability and astrobiology?

“Concentrated sulfuric acid as a planetary solvent could be widespread on exoplanets, either on exo-Venuses or on other rocky planets that are desiccated as a result of the stellar activity of their host star,” the researchers explain.

And, of course, sulfuric acid is present in large amounts at Venus.

“Concentrated sulfuric acid is also present in our immediate planetary vicinity as a dominant liquid in the clouds of Venus, further emphasizing its importance for planetary science, planetary habitability, and astrobiology,” the authors write.

The question of whether life could somehow survive in Venus’ clouds is one that won’t go away. We’re new at the astrobiology game, and we’re simply not in a position to rule things out. It might seem far-fetched, but science is an evidence game, and evidence can be surprising.

This study doesn’t present evidence that can answer the question—big questions like this are answered incrementally—but it does present an intriguing result.

“By demonstrating the stability of lipid membranes in this aggressive solvent, we have taken a significant step forward in exploring the potential habitability of the concentrated sulfuric acid cloud environment on Venus,” the authors conclude.

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Dark Matter Could a Have Slight Interaction With Regular Matter

The reason we call dark matter dark isn’t because it’s some shadowy material. It’s because dark matter doesn’t interact with light. The difference is subtle, but important. Regular matter can be dark because it absorbs light. It’s why, for example, we can see the shadow of molecular clouds against the scattered stars of the Milky Way. This is possible because light and matter have a way to connect. Light is an electromagnetic wave, and atoms contain electrically charged electrons and protons, so matter can emit, absorb and scatter light. Dark matter isn’t electrically charged. It has no way to connect with light, and so when light and dark matter meet up they simply pass through each other.

All of our observations suggest that dark matter and light only have gravity in common. When dark matter is clustered around a galaxy, for example, its gravitational tug can deflect light. Because of this we can map the distribution of dark matter in the Universe by observing how light is gravitationally lensed around it. We also know that dark and regular matter interact gravitationally. The tug of dark matter causes galaxies to gather together into superclusters. But an unanswered question is whether dark and regular matter only interact gravitationally. If an atom and dark matter particle intersected, would they really just pass through each other?

Since we haven’t directly observed dark matter particles we can only speculate, but most dark matter models argue that gravity is the only common link with light and regular matter. Dark and regular matter clump around each other, but they don’t collide and merge like interstellar clouds. But a new study suggests the two do interact, which could reveal subtle aspects of the mysterious stuff.

The study looks at six ultrafaint dwarf galaxies, or UFDs. They are satellite galaxies near the Milky Way that seem to have far fewer stars than their mass would suggest. This is because they are mostly made of dark matter. If regular and dark matter only interact gravitationally, then the distribution of stars in these small galaxies should follow a certain pattern. If dark and regular matter interact directly, then this distribution will be skewed.

To test this the team ran computer simulations of both scenarios. They found that in the non-interacting model the distribution of stars should become more dense in the center of the UFDs and more diffuse at the edges. In the interacting model the stellar distribution should be more uniform. When they compared these models with observations of the six galaxies, they found the interacting model was a slightly better fit.

So it seems dark and regular matter interact in ways beyond their gravitational tugs. There isn’t enough data to pin down the exact nature of the interaction, but the fact there is any interaction at all is a surprise. It means that our traditional models of dark matter are at least partly wrong. It may also point the way toward new methods of detecting dark matter directly. In time we may finally solve the mystery of this dark, but not entirely invisible, material.

Reference: Almeida, Jorge Sánchez, Ignacio Trujillo, and Angel R. Plastino. “The Stellar Distribution in Ultrafaint Dwarf Galaxies Suggests Deviations from the Collisionless Cold Dark Matter Paradigm.” The Astrophysical Journal Letters 973.1 (2024): L15.

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A New Rover Design Could Crawl Across the Moon for Decades Harvesting Water

We have known that water ice exists on the Moon since 1998. These large deposits are found in the permanently shadowed craters around the polar region. The challenge is how to get it since shadowed craters are not the best place for solar powered vehicles to operate. A team of engineers have identified a design for an ice-mining vehicle powered by americium-241. With a half-life of 432 years, this element is an ideal power source for a vehicle to operate in the dark for several decades. 

Ice in the polar regions of the Moon is of vital importance for our future space explorations, not just lunar visits but as we stretch our legs in the Solar System. Its thought to be ancient material deposited by comets or formed by interactions with solar wind. It is expensive to take materials to the Moon so harvesting on site is far more efficient. Ice on the Moon can provide drinking water, oxygen for breaking and even hydrogen for rocket fuel. Surveys suggest something in the region of 600 billion kilograms of ice deposited at the lunar poles. 

Exposed water ice (green or blue dots) in lunar polar regions and temperature. Credit: Shuai Li

The challenge facing future lunar harvesting missions is that operations in the permanently  shadowed regions (or PSRs as they have been called) cannot be powered by solar panels as is often the case. The environment is cold too, in the region of 40K, that’s -233?C and at those temperatures special power considerations are required. 

A team of researchers have been exploring the use of Radioisotope Power Systems (RPS) to provide thermal and electrical power systems. These power systems have been used before during deep space missions for example Voyager and New Horizons. They work by generating electricity using the heat that is released from the natural decay of a radioactive isotope usually plutonium-238.

Artist rendition of Voyager 1 entering interstellar space. (Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

The team led by Marzio Mazzotti from the University of Leicester have explored an ice-mining rover using power generated by the radio activate decay fo Americium-241. It has a half-life of 432 years which means it takes 432 years for half of a sample of Americium to decay. During this time, half of the atoms in the substance will transform into a different element. Using this power source will provide a stable power supply for an ice-mining rover in the darkness of the lunar polar craters for decades.

Apollo 17 commander Eugene Cernan with the lunar rover in December 1972, in the moon’s Taurus-Littrow valley. Credit: NASA

Using a radioisotope power system is not new however the team came upon the idea that the excess heat that is not used can be used to thermally mine ice from samples of lunar material. The rover would be fitted with a sublimation plate that would turn any ice deposits into a gas which would be collected in a cold trap.

The team developed a model of its Thermal Management System and tested it for icy regolith (the fine dusty lunar surface) material with a water ice content of 0-10 vol %. Their simulations showed that it is possible to mine ice using thermal techniques in the PSR of the Moon using an RPS (I had to really concentrate writing that sentence!) powered lunar rover. 

Source : Ice-Mining Lunar Rover using Americium-241 Radioisotope Power Systems

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Space Travel Weakens the Heart, New Study Finds

It’s no secret that spending extended periods in space takes a toll on the human body. For years, NASA and other space agencies have been researching the effects of microgravity on humans, animals, and plants aboard the International Space Station (ISS). So far, the research has shown that being in space for long periods leads to muscle atrophy, bone density loss, changes in vision, gene expression, and psychological issues. Knowing these effects and how to mitigate them is essential given our future space exploration goals, which include long-duration missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.

However, according to a recent experiment led by researchers at Johns Hopkins University and supported by NASA’s Johnson Space Center, it appears that heart tissues “really don’t fare well in space” either. The experiment consisted of 48 samples of human bioengineered heart tissue being sent to the ISS for 30 days. As they indicate in their paper, the experiment demonstrates that exposure to microgravity weakens heart tissue and weakens its ability to maintain rhythmic beats. These results indicate that additional measures must be taken to ensure humans can maintain their cardiovascular health in space.

The study was led by Deok-Ho Kim and his colleagues from the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Johns Hopkins University (BME-JHU) and the JHU Center for Microphysiological Systems. They were joined by researchers from UC Boulder’s Ann and HJ Smead Department of Aerospace Engineering Sciences, the Institute for Stem Cell & Regenerative Medicine (ISCRM) and the Center for Cardiovascular Biology at the University of Washington, the Stanford Institute for Stem Cell & Regenerative Medicine, BioServe Space Technologies, and NASA’s Johnson Space Center. The paper that details their findings was published yesterday (September 23rd) in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Heart tissues within one of the launch-ready chambers. Credit: Jonathan Tsui

Previous research has shown that astronauts returning to Earth from the ISS suffer from a myriad of health effects consistent with certain age-related conditions, including reduced heart muscle function and irregular heartbeats (arrhythmias), most of which will dissipate over time. However, none of this research has addressed what happens at the cellular and molecular level. To learn more about these effects and how to mitigate them, Kim and his colleagues sent an automated “heart-on-a-chip” platform to the ISS for study.

To create this payload, the team relied on human-induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs), which can become many types of cells, to produce cardiomyocytes (heart muscle cells). These resulting tissues were placed in a miniaturized bioengineered tissue chip designed to mimic the environment of an adult human heart. The chips would then collect data on how the tissues would rhythmically contract, imitating how the heart beats. One set of biochips was launched aboard the SpaceX CRS-20 mission to the ISS in March 2020, while another was kept on Earth as a control group.

Once on the ISS, astronaut Jessica Meir tended the experiment, changing the liquid nutrients surrounding the tissues once each week while preserving tissue samples at specific intervals so gene readout and imaging analyses could be conducted upon their return to Earth. Meanwhile, the experiment sent real-time data back to Earth every 30 minutes (for 10 seconds at a time) on the tissue samples’ contractions and any irregular beating patterns (arrhythmias).

“An incredible amount of cutting-edge technology in the areas of stem cell and tissue engineering, biosensors and bioelectronics, and microfabrication went into ensuring the viability of these tissues in space,” said Kim in a recent Hub news release.

When the tissue chambers returned to Earth, he and his colleagues continued to maintain and collect data from the samples to see if there was any change in their abilities to contract. In addition to losing strength, the muscle tissues developed arrhythmias, consistent with age-related heart conditions. In a healthy human heart, the time between beats is about a second, whereas the tissue samples lasted nearly five times as long – though they returned to nearly normal once returned to Earth.

The team further found that the tissue cell’s protein bundles that help them contract (sarcomeres) were shorter and more disordered than those of the control group, another symptom of heart disease. What’s more, the mitochondria in the tissue samples grew larger and rounder and lost the characteristic folds that help them produce and use energy. Lastly, the gene readout in the tissues showed increased gene production related to inflammation and an imbalance of free radicals and antioxidants (oxidative stress).

This is not only consistent with age-related heart disease but also consistently demonstrated in astronauts’ post-flight checks. The team says these findings expand our scientific knowledge of microgravity’s potential effects on human health in space and could also advance the study of heart muscle aging and therapeutics on Earth. In 2023, Kim’s lab followed up on this experiment by sending a second batch of tissue samples to the ISS to test drugs that could help protect heart muscles from the effects of microgravity and help people maintain heart function as they age.

Meanwhile, the team continues to improve its tissue-on-a-chip system and has teamed up with NASA’s Space Radiation Laboratory to study the effects of space radiation on heart muscles. These tests will assess the threat solar and cosmic rays pose to cardiovascular health beyond Low Earth Orbit (LEO), where Earth’s magnetic field protects against most space radiation.

Further Reading: John Hopkins University, PNAS

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Will Comet A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS Shine Brighter Than Expected?

Now is the time to catch Comet A3-Tsuchinshan-ATLAS at dawn.

The window is now open. If skies are clear, set your alarm heading into this weekend to see Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS at dawn. We’re already seeing great views of the comet this week from southern observers and astronauts aboard the International Space Station. The visibility window is now even creeping up to the southern tier latitudes of the contiguous United States (CONUS). If fortune favors us, the comet could hit an easy naked eye magnitude +2 by next week, and forward scattering could even boost this into negative magnitudes… the rare term ‘daytime comet’ is even getting kicked around a bit in cometwatching circles.

But the span to see this comet will be brief indeed. For most northern hemisphere observers, the comet will be a bashful one, never reaching much more than 10 degrees above the eastern horizon about 45 minutes before sunrise on the week centered around September 29th.

Exposures of Comet A3 against the brightening dawn. Credit: Chris Schur

The Story of Comet A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS Thus Far

We wrote about prospects for this comet for Universe Today previously just last month. China’s Tsuchinshan (Purple Mountain) observatory and the automated ATLAS (Asteroid Terrestrial impact Last Alert System) survey discovered the comet on January 9^th, 2023. I’ve seen the name abbreviated to simply ‘Comet A3’ or ‘Comet T-ATLAS’ in discussions on keystroke-conservative social media.

Likely a first-time visitor to the inner solar system from the distant Oort Cloud, the comet is on an orbit measured in millions of years. This may also be the one and only appearance of the comet in the inner solar system. That’s a good thing, in terms of dynamics and activity, as the comet may have never experienced the heat of the inner solar system in the past. The comet could well head towards permanent ejection from the solar system after perihelion.

Key dates coming right up include when the comet reaches perihelion this coming Friday on September 27^th at 0.391 Astronomical Units (AU, 36.4 million miles or 58.6 million kilometers) from the Sun, just interior to Mercury’s aphelion point. The comet then makes its closest Earth approach on October 12^th, at 0.556 AU distant.

Comet A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS will become more difficult to catch after October 7^th, as it heads in to the Solar Heliospheric Observatory’s (SOHO) LASCO C3 field of view and approaches less than 15 degrees elongation from the Sun. The comet makes a second evening reappearance mid-month, which will most likely be less than favorable as it heads away from us and back out of the inner solar system. We could, however, see something interesting in late October (if the comet survives perihelion) as the tail precedes ahead of the outbound comet.

Chris Schur caught the comet from Payson, Arizona (with a narrow 10 minute window!) on the morning of September 23rd. Credit: Chris Schur.

How the Comet is Performing Now

The comet seemed to be headed towards the long rolls of ‘great comets that weren’t’ this past summer, as it stalled at +10^th magnitude. Now, the trend seems to have shifted, as the comet is over-performing versus expectations. As of writing this, the comet stands at +3^rd magnitude and is rapidly brightening.

We’re already seeing signs of two tails (one dust and one ion) forming in this week’s images of the comet. Forward scattering may help boost the visibility of the comet next week, as all those dust particles reach a maximum illumination angle as seen from our Earthly vantage point in early October. The comet’s orbit passes edge-on from our vantage point on October 14^th. The comet will seem to hang stationary low in the dawn next week, as it loops towards us, and then crosses between the Earth and the Sun.

Comet T-ATLAS as imaged from Tivoli Farm, Namibia on September 22nd (note the fan of the comet’s second tail off to the left). Credit: Gerald Rhemann.

How to See the Comet

The October apparition will be a tricky one for sure. A good strategy is to use binoculars and start sweeping low to the eastern horizon about an hour before local sunrise. The +1^st magnitude star Regulus (Alpha Leonis) will make a good ‘guide star’ to find the comet. The star will be about an outstretched hand’s width to the observer’s lower right. The comet pairs with the slim waning crescent Moon on the morning of September 30^th, making for a grand photo-op. That same Moon is headed towards an annular solar eclipse on October 2^nd.

The view on the morning of September 30th. Credit: Starry Night Edu Software.

Clouded out? We feel your frustration here in eastern Tennessee, as clouds from approaching hurricane Helene move inland this coming weekend. Astronomer Gianluca Masi will also carry the comet live on the evening of October 9^th.

Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS from September 24th. Credit: The Virtual Telescope Project.

“It (Comet T-ATLAS) survived and so far, it looks brighter than expected.” Astrophotographer Eliot Herman told Universe Today. “I still don’t think it will be amazing when it can be seen when dark enough… I am thinking maybe March 2013 Comet (C/2011 L4) PanSTARRS level – which was visible to the eye and pretty nice with a camera.”

We can only hope for a bright comet as depicted by astronomer Charles Piazzi Smyth’s painting of the Great Daytime Comet of 1843:

Smyth’s painting, at the Greenwich Maritime Museum. Credit: Dave Dickinson.

The Comet From the ISS

Astronauts aboard the International Space Station already caught the comet from their vantage point in low Earth orbit this week. NASA astronaut Matthew Dominick produced this fine animation:

Comet A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS is teasing us with the recent memories of two other dawn comets. Remember P1 McNaught in 2006-2007 and W3 Lovejoy in 2011-2012? Both beat the odds, and went on to become fine comets, ahead of expectations.

Comet McNaught imaged from Villa Alemana, Chile in January 2007. Credit: Garcia Ruben/Wikimedia Commons/Public Domain.

As always with comets, a caveat is in order: several factors will conspire against your cometary quest. First: as noted, the comet will appear very low to the horizon. This means it will fight against the thick murk of the atmosphere and the brightening twilight sky. Secondly, comets are intrinsically dark objects, with a low surface brightness or albedo… remember Rosetta’s views of Comet 67P Churumov-Gerasimenko? Lastly, like deep sky objects, all of that precious magnitude gets dispersed over an apparent surface area. This makes a +2 magnitude comet much fainter looking versus a +2^nd magnitude star. During F3 NEOWISE’s 2020 apparition, I could juuuust start to convince myself that it was naked eye when it reached around +1^st magnitude.

Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS) is finally here ! ???I captured this image this morning at 09:22 UTC from @LCOAstro in Atacama desert in Chile ?? The view was absolutely spectacular ! The clouds were constantly moving just above the horizon, but we got really lucky when the… pic.twitter.com/AoClHkatFr

— Yuri Beletsky (@YBeletsky) September 24, 2024

NEOWISE… or Nishimura?

We had two recent comets perform very similar to Comet A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS. In 2020, Comet F3 NEOWISE became a fine naked eye comet at dawn, wowing early morning observers. On the flip side, 2023’s Comet P1 Nishimura flirted with naked eye brightness, but never really became a general crowd pleaser.

Clear skies on your hunt this coming week, to see what’s most likely to be the best comet of 2024.

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