This week has been a relatively stressful week, so I deemed it appropriate to discuss something that adds additional stress into my life: Pluto.

I can understand why many officials would argue that Pluto should not be classified as a planet.  For starters, Pluto was discovered in 1930 because of a mathematical error.  Based on calculations, scientists theorized that there must be a large object further away from the Sun than Neptune that was causing the orbital and gravitational patterns of Neptune.  Their calculations, however, contained an error.  Should this error have been fixed, they would have realized that the object they were looking for was not nearly as large as they originally thought.

Pluto!

Regardless, Clyde W. Tombaugh, an astronomer at Lowell University, decided to investigate.  Thankfully, during his search based on incorrect calculations, Tombaugh discovered Pluto!  He discovered Pluto by comparing images called photographic plates.  Taken over the course of weeks, these plates contained images of the night sky that were then compared with one another to make it easier to ascertain whether objects of interest were actually moving throughout the sky.

Almost right after Pluto’s discovery, astronomers started to realize just how small Pluto was.  Having a diameter of approximately 2,400km, Pluto is still one of the larger objects found beyond the orbit of Neptune.  However, this is still considered to be a tiny size for a planet.  For reference, Mercury – currently the smallest planet of the eight remaining planets – has a diameter of nearly 5,000km.  Our own Moon even has a larger diameter of approximately 3,500km.

Unfortunately, the nature of Pluto caused astronomers to question the definition of a planet, and in 2006 they created a new definition of a planet that ruled Pluto out of planet-dom.  According to the International Astronomical Union, a planet is now dictated by the following characteristics:

• Must orbit the sun
• Must have enough mass to become spherical
• Must not be a satellite to another object
• Must remove all debris surrounding its orbit

Many astronomers believe that Pluto does not satisfy the requirement of removing all debris from its surrounding orbit.  This is because of Charon, Pluto’s satellite/moon.  Charon has a diameter of around 1,200km, which makes it roughly half the size of Pluto.  This causes concerns to astronomers believing that Pluto and Charon should be considered a double-planetary system instead of a planet and a satellite.

Also Pluto!

If Pluto and Charon were classified as the solar system’s only double-planetary system, I believe that would be a suitable merit to replace its loss of planet status.

According to my horoscope, Scorpio, Pluto is one of my planets!  Since Pluto has been stripped of its status as a planet, I feel like all the Scorpios in the world have been cheated!  While Leos technically do not have a planet themselves, they have the Sun, which I think compensates for the lack of a planet.  Scorpio, on the other hand, is left with only Mars.  While Mars is definitely a cool planet, I still believe Pluto should be classified as a planet as to not leave the Scorpios with less than the other horoscopes.  I am also very interested in maintaining connection with Pluto the dog.

The universe.  Is it expanding?  Is it shrinking?  Is it a finite space?  If so, what lies beyond the edge of the universe?  If I were to reach my hand past this point, what would I reach into?  These are some of the questions that have always intrigued me, and pushed me to dig deeper into the characteristics of our universe.

Interpretation of the Big Bang

From the very beginning, there have been disputes as to whether the universe is finite or infinite.  For example, Einstein originally argued that the universe was an infinite, yet static universe.  This meant that the universe would continue on forever, but everything – such as our galaxy – would be suspended in space like raisins suspended in an infinite pool of Jell-O.  This was later proved to be false by Edwin Hubble.

Discussed earlier in my post about the Hubble Space Telescope, Edwin Hubble is a famous American astronomer who discovered galaxies other than our own.  While this in itself was a revolutionary discovery, proving there was more to the universe than just our Milky Way, Hubble also detected longer wavelengths of light emitting from these discovered galaxies.  This phenomenon, known as “redshift”, is when light waves appear longer when they are originating from a source that is travelling away from the observer.  By this token, this brought forth the idea that all of the galaxies are flying away from our own galaxy at incredible speeds.

Three different theories of universe expansion

From this idea came three possibilities of expansion: Open Expansion, Flat Expansion, and Closed Expansion.

• Open Expansion – theorizes that the universe will continue to expand infinitely
• Flat Expansion – theorizes that the universe will continue to expand, but will do so at a decreasing rate
• Closed Expansion – theorizes that the universe will eventually stop expanding, and will begin collapsing into itself as time goes on.

The idea of a closed expansion model of the universe is worrying to me, since the concept of the universe collapsing onto itself seems scary.  However, I do not believe there exists an open expansion model because it does not make sense that the universe would be continuously expanding at a faster rate over time.  In my opinion, there simply is not enough evidence to suggest that the universe should keep expanding forever.  Eventually, matter will begin to pull everything back together.

Expanding space, not preexisting space

An important addition to this discovery is that due to the galaxies relative positions to each other, it is clear that they are not expanding into preexisting space.  Instead, space itself seems to be the thing expanding.  So if space is currently expanding, if we rewind time, space should appear to be shrinking.  What would happen if we rewound time until all current matter in the universe was condensed into a small area?  This question began the theory of the Big Bang.

Like most theories about space, there is no certain answer for how the universe is behaving, or what the future holds for the universe.  I am always fascinated by the concept of there being an edge to the universe, and am curious to see where new discoveries take our understanding of the universe and our surroundings.

Life on other planets has been a question humanity has been unable to answer.  We have been scanning the night sky for interesting phenomena and the possibility of finding life on other planets for many years.  Within the past month, there has been a surge of mysterious radio waves that scientists have observed flying toward the earth.  Could these waves be produced by an intelligent form of life billions of light years away, or is it simply a new natural phenomenon of space that we have yet to observe in detail until now?

Australia Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder (ASKAP)

Fast Radio Bursts (FRBs) are high frequency radio waves that travel extremely fast and contain immense amounts of energy.  A single FRB can contain more energy than our Sun produces in eight decades.  Unfortunately, these bursts are observable only for a few brief milliseconds, making it very difficult to collect larges amounts of data from a single burst.  As is, the first FRB was recorded in 2007, but it wasn’t until a few years later that scientists confirmed that the FRB was not just a glitch in their instruments.

Since the first FRB’s discovery in 2007, more than 30 FRBs have been recorded.  However, within the past month scientists have discovered another 19 FRBs.  This is thanks to the Australia Square Kilometer Array Pathfinder (ASKAP) telescope.  This powerful network of satellite dishes has been able to quickly identify many incoming radio waves, including these 19 new FRBs.  What makes this phenomenon very mysterious is that these 19 FRBs all arrived at Earth at generally the same time.

While scientists are not entirely sure where these FRBs are coming from, they are confident that their origin is numerous billions of light years away.  Even so, the ability to detect more of these FRBs provides insight as to what matter is present throughout different parts of the universe.  As a radio wave passes through different environments of space, different wavelengths of a radio wave can be slowed more than others.  When these wavelengths arrive at Earth at different times, scientists can estimate the types of environments the radio wave passed through such that it arrived at Earth in it’s current condition.  As a result, we can gather an idea of both where and what kind of environments exist in space.

Another image of a few satellites of the Australia Square Kilometre Array Pathfinder (ASKAP)

Some believe these FRBs are produced by an intelligent form of life as a communication beacon, whereas others believe it may simply be the result of supernovas or black holes.  Personally, I would be thrilled to discover they are from intelligent life forms.  Since the FRBs originate from billions of light years away, I imagine these life forms would be very different than when they first sent the FRB.  While I would still find it fascinating if the FRBs originated from something such as a supernova or a black hole, I think it would be less exciting than learning there is other life out in the universe.

The Hubble Space Telescope has been an inspiring achievement in many of our childhoods.  Launched in 1990, it has been collecting mind-blowing images of the cosmos for nearly three decades.  Unfortunately, on October 5th, 2018, the inevitable happened to the Hubble Space Telescope.

The Hubble Space Telescope is named after Edwin Hubble, an American astronomer known for discoveries such as the Andromeda galaxy and the fact that the universe is expanding at a rate now known as “The Hubble Constant”.  Even though the Hubble Space Telescope was launched in 1990, it had initial issues preventing it from taking effective observations.  After a service mission in 1993, the Hubble began taking wondrous pictures of the cosmos and beyond.

The Hubble has a total of six gyroscopes, all of which assist in turning and stabilizing the telescope when it is observing distant objects.  These six gyroscopes were installed in a service mission in May of 2009.  Three of these gyroscopes were standard operating gyroscopes, but the other three were structurally enhanced to provide longer operating times without failure.  While these six gyroscopes were only supposed to last until 2015, the Hubble still had all three enhanced gyroscopes operational as of this fall.

However, last Friday, one of the three remaining gyroscopes failed inside of the Hubble Space Telescope.  While the Hubble is still operational, it brings to the table serious concerns about the long-term uses of the telescope.  

Death of a Star – The Rotting Egg

When this gyroscope shut down, the Hubble entered a safe mode where the telescope flies freely through space without rotating.  The current plan is to work with the failed gyroscope to determine whether it can be reactivated.  Fortunately, even if this gyroscope does not come back online, there is still hope for the Hubble in the near future.

If the malfunctioning gyroscope cannot be salvaged, the current plan of operation for the Hubble is to use just a single gyroscope at a time.  While it operates ideally with at least three gyroscopes, the Hubble is technically able to operate with just a single gyroscope without losing a significant amount of scientific data.  NASA wishes to take this approach to squeeze as much life out of the remaining gyroscopes as possible.

While the James Webb Space Telescope is designed to be the Hubble’s replacement, I personally believe it is valuable to keep the Hubble operational.  To start, the James Webb Space Telescope already had issues which delayed its launch until 2021.  It is impossible to know what obstacles could inhibit the correct deployment of the James Webb Space Telescope, and the Hubble is already positioned correctly in orbit.  The Hubble – specifically the gyroscopes – have already been repaired before, and the telescope has provided countless amazing discoveries.  Like the saying “a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush”, I think is more effective to repair something we have already repaired before instead of scrapping it entirely and moving to something different.

“The notion of transwarp beaming is like trying to hit a bullet with a smaller bullet, whilst wearing a blindfold, riding a horse” – Montgomery Scott (Star Trek)

JAXA’s post of a picture taken by MINERVA – 11A

This is the quote that comes to mind when thinking about the feasibility of this event.  In June 2018, a Japanese space probe called the Hayabusa2 finally intercepted the asteroid Ryugu.

Ryugu is a near-Earth object (NEO) that can come as close as 95,000 kilometers from the Earth.  NEOs are objects that are pushed by the gravitational effects of other bodies until they are very close to the Earth.  For reference about the proximity of Ryugu, the Moon is approximately 384,000 kilometers away from the Earth.  So if Ryugu is so close to Earth, it must be pretty straightforward getting there to study its composition, right?  Not quite, and the process of getting technology there is still an amazing feat of humankind.

Here is a bit of rough math to paint the picture of this scenario.  Ryugu orbits our Sun at an average distance of approximately 1.2 Astronomical Units (AU).  This is about 1.795e+11 meters.  For simplicity, if we assume Ryugu’s orbit is roughly circular, the circumference of its orbit is near 1.13e+12 meters.  Since Ryugu orbits the Sun once every 16 months, it travels at an average speed of about 27,000 meters per second!  To keep things in perspective, a rocket ship has to be travelling at 11,200 meters per second (7 miles per second) in order to break the Earth’s atmosphere.

MINERVA – 11 Rovers

The idea that we could launch a probe a distance of almost 100,000 kilometers, and have it intersect with an object travelling over twice the speed of a rocket is incredible.

Japan is the one to thank in this magnificent feat.  The Hayabusa2 is Japan’s second asteroid space probe.  The first probe was the Hayabusa, which successfully delivered samples of the asteroid Itokawa back to Earth in 2010.  The Hayabusa2 was launched in December of 2014, and did not meet with Ryugu until June of 2018.  Once in orbit of the asteroid, on September 21st, 2018, the space probe launched two rovers to land on the surface of the asteroid to record data, collect samples, and take pictures!

The two rovers sent to the surface are the MINERVA – 11A and the MINERVA – 11B.  These rovers are small, weighing only 2.4 pounds each.  According to officials from the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), “Gravity on the surface of Ryugu is very weak, so a rover propelled by normal wheels or crawlers would float upwards as soon as it started to move”.  For this reason, Japan designed their rovers to hop.  Each time one of the rovers hops, it can leave the ground for up to 15 minutes, and can cover a distance of about 15 meters.

While only being on the surface for a few days, the MINERVA rovers have sent back numerous pictures, giving everyone back on Earth a fascinating view of the surface of Ryugu.  Looking towards the future, JAXA hopes to have these rovers collect samples of the asteroid, and return to Earth in late 2020.

Concept Art of Gliese 436 b and its parent star, Gliese 436 – NASA

Typically, when we think of ice, we think of a frozen cube, perhaps in a glass of lemonade.  Many wouldn’t appreciate having ice pressed against their neck because the ice is cold.  But what if ice was almost 1000 degrees Fahrenheit?  Strange to think about, right?  Amazingly enough, the exoplanet Gliese 436 b has exactly that.

Gliese 436 b was discovered in 2004 by scientists R. Paul Butler and Geoffrey Marcy.  They used a method called the Radial Velocity method, which locates an extraterrestrial body by observing how its gravitational pull makes the parent star appear to shift and bend.

Gliese 436 b is one of the closest known exoplanets at a distance of about 30 light years away from the Earth.  This exoplanet is about the size of Neptune, and is a mere 2.5 million miles away from its respective star, Gliese 436.  For reference, Mercury is a staggering 35 million miles from the sun.  Much of the composition of Gliese 436 b is unknown, but scientists have discovered an Earth-like core surrounded by large amounts of water with an atmosphere composed of mostly hydrogen.

Essentially, Gliese 436 b is a massive planet positioned right next to a star.  But what about that burning ice?

Typically, one might believe that since the exoplanet is so close to a star, the atmosphere would be dissolved and any water would evaporate into space.  In smaller planets like Mercury, this is true.  However, Gliese 436 b is the size of Neptune, so its gravitational field is so large that it not only maintains an atmosphere, but it compresses the water on its surface into a solid state.  This results in the water remaining in an ice-like state, while also reaching extreme temperatures from the proximity to Gliese 436, the parent star.

Basic composition of Gliese 436 b

However, the ice on the surface of Gliese 436 b is not normal ice.  Unlike the ice on Earth, which is put into a solid state due to temperature, the ice on Gliese 436 b is in a solid state simply due to pressure.  After all, the surface of the planet is close to 1000 degrees Fahrenheit.  According to Frederic Pont of Geneva University, “Under very high pressure, water turns into other solid states denser than both ice and liquid water, just as carbon transforms into diamond under extreme pressures.”  As wild as it might seem, this suggests that if water is subjected to enough pressure, it can take on a completely new form that might not exist on Earth.

But wait there’s more!  The gravitational pull of the exoplanet’s parent star is strong enough that it is slowly pulling off layers of hydrogen from the dense atmosphere of the planet.  While it is believed that the atmosphere is in no danger of being completely stripped away, the planet leaves behind a large cloud of hydrogen.  When viewed through an ultraviolet lens, the immense cloud of hydrogen can be seen swirling around the planet.

While this is just one fantastical scenario in the infinite wonders of space, it’s a great start to promote the idea that any concept, no matter how wild, is always possible.

Hey everyone!

I changed my passion blog idea again.  I felt too much stress tying the complex nature of learning the guitar to my CAS grade.  Instead, I chose something I felt more casually comfortable with – SPACE!

I hope to populate my blog with interesting endeavors into the wonderful world of space, heavenly bodies, theories, and beyond!

Hey world!  I believe I found the passion I will write about this semester.  I’ve had a guitar for many years, but I never found the time or the inclination to learn how to play.  I’m hoping that will all change this semester!

My current skill level is very limited; currently, I can play a few chords, and pick a single song.  I don’t know how quickly I will learn, but I found many Penn State students who also play guitar, so I am hoping to learn a lot.

I’m passionate about something – I just have to figure out what it is…  Stay tuned