From: Craig Tupper (dtupper@hq.nasa.gov)
What’s new this week at http://spacescience.nasa.gov/ :
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Astro-E, a joint Japanese – U.S. x-ray astronomy mission, is scheduled for
launch on February 8. It will carry a new kind of x-ray detector,
developed for the mission. These detectors will be cooled to within a
fraction of a degree of absolute zero, in order to measure the heat from
individual x-ray photons.
detector story at ftp://ftp.hq.nasa.gov/pub/pao/pressrel/2000/00-018.txt
Astro-E: http://lheawww.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/xray/astroe/astroe.html
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Our Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous spacecraft is closing in on the asteroid
Eros, and the pictures are getting interesting! Orbiting such a small rock
(about 40 x 14 x 14 kilometers), with its minimal gravity, will be quite a
feat. A 100-pound (45-kilogram) object on Earth would weigh about 1 ounce
on Eros. February 14th is the rendezvous date; everything is looking good,
although an engine firing scheduled for today has been postponed until
tomorrow. NEAR home page, with recently updated pics, is at
http://near.jhuapl.edu/
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By compiling all the solar wind data gathered in the space age, NASA
scientists have concluded that even though the solar magnetic field is
constantly changing, it always returns to its original shape and position.
Weird. JPL press release at
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/releases/2000/sunmagfield.html
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A new set of images from Mars Global Surveyor have been released, showing
both “active” and “inactive” Martian sand dunes. Makes me want to head to
the beach. Pics at the MGS page: http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/mgs/
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Cassini performed a flyby of a main belt asteroid last week, as it makes
its way towards Saturn. Although the spacecraft got no closer than about
1.5 million kilometers, there’s still something to be learned about
asteroid 2685 Masursky. Story at
http://www.spaceviews.com/2000/01/29b.html , Cassini page at
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/cassini/
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“New findings support prospect of life on Jupiter’s moon Europa” — sure,
there may be water under Europa’s icy crust, but where’s the energy source
that could power life? The sun may be too far away; this new paper argues
that charged particles raining down from Jupiter’s magnetic field could
provide the necessary juice.
http://www.stanford.edu/dept/news/pr/00/000126Europa.html
