Tag Archives: probe

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe Discovers 3I/ATLAS Comet: Key Findings and Insights

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Scientists utilized the WISPR (Wide Field Imager for Solar Exploration) instrument on NASA’s Parker Solar Probe to capture stunning images of the interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS between October 18 and November 5, 2025.

WISPR captures the interstellar comet 3I/ATLAS. Image credit: NRL / NASA / JHUAPL / Guillermo Stenborg, JHUAPL.

Discovered on July 1, 2025, by the NASA-funded ATLAS survey telescope in Rio Hurtado, Chile, 3I/ATLAS, also known as C/2025 N1 (ATLAS) and A11pl3Z, originated from the constellation Sagittarius.

This remarkable interstellar comet approached Mars on October 3 at a distance of just 0.194 AU and reached its perihelion, the closest point to the Sun, on October 30.

On December 19, 3I/ATLAS made its nearest pass to Earth, coming within 270 million kilometers (168 million miles) of our planet.

The spectacular images of 3I/ATLAS were obtained by the WISPR instrument aboard NASA’s Parker Solar Probe during a critical observation window from October 18 to November 5.

“The Parker Solar Probe captured around 10 images of the comet daily,” stated WISPR team members.

“During this observation period, the spacecraft accelerated away from the Sun following its 25th solar flyby on September 15.”

“These initial images are currently undergoing calibration and processing, revealing the comet’s movement behind the Sun from Parker’s vantage point.”

“At that time, the comet was located about 209 million kilometers (130 million miles) from the Sun, just beyond Mars’ orbit.”

“These images offer a rare opportunity to study the comet when it was too close to the Sun for ground-based observations.”

The WISPR team is diligently working to finalize the data by eliminating stray light and adjusting for varying exposure times between images, enhancing the comet’s visibility.

“The final images will significantly advance our understanding of this intriguing interstellar visitor,” researchers concluded.

Source: www.sci.news

Parker Solar Probe successfully completes record-breaking closest approach to the sun

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On December 24, 2024, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe will soar just 6.1 million km (3.8 million miles) above the surface of our home planet and hurtle through the solar atmosphere at 692,000 km (430,000 miles) per hour. I did. This is the fastest speed the spacecraft has ever achieved. An object made by humans. A signal received two days later confirmed that the spacecraft had safely passed the encounter and was operating normally.

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe approaches the Sun. Image credit: Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory.

Near the Sun, the Parker Solar Probe relies on a carbon foam shield to protect the probe from the extreme heat in the upper part of the Sun’s atmosphere, called the corona, which can exceed 500,000 degrees Celsius (1 million degrees Fahrenheit).

The shield is designed to reach temperatures of 1,427 degrees Celsius (2,600 degrees Fahrenheit) while keeping the instruments behind it shaded at a comfortable room temperature.

In the hot but low-density corona, the spacecraft’s shield is expected to warm up to 982 degrees Celsius (1,800 degrees Fahrenheit).

“Flying this close to the Sun is a historic moment in humanity’s first mission to the stars,” said Dr. Nikki Fox, associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate.

“Studying the Sun up close will allow us to better understand its impact on the entire solar system, including the technologies we use every day on Earth and in space, and will also help us understand the workings of stars throughout the universe. We can learn about and help us explore habitable worlds beyond our home planet.

“Parker Solar Probe will venture into one of the most extreme environments in the universe,” said Dr. Noor Rawafi, a researcher at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory and project scientist for the Parker Solar Probe. It has exceeded all expectations.”

“This mission ushered in a new golden age of space exploration and brings us closer than ever to solving the sun’s deepest and most enduring mysteries.”

Parker Solar Probe’s record-breaking distance of 6.1 million kilometers (3.8 million miles) may seem far away, but on a cosmic scale it’s incredibly close. Image credit: NASA/APL.

“Being able to get a spacecraft this close to the sun is monumental,” said John Wurtzberger, a researcher at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory and Parker Solar Probe mission systems engineer. .

“This is a challenge the space science community has wanted to address since 1958, and we’ve spent decades advancing technology to make it possible.”

The Parker Solar Probe will fly through the solar corona to help scientists better understand how the region gets hot, track the origins of the solar wind, and discover how energetic particles We can make measurements that will help us discover how it accelerates to half the speed of light.

“This data is extremely important to the scientific community because it gives us new advantages,” said Dr. Kelly Kolek, a program scientist at NASA Headquarters.

“Parker Solar Probe revolutionizes our understanding of the Sun by providing first-hand knowledge of what is happening in the Sun’s atmosphere.”

So far, the rover is only transmitting that it is safe, but it will soon arrive at a location where it can downlink the data it collects on this latest solar pass.

“The data coming down from the spacecraft will provide fresh information about places we humans have never been before. This is an amazing accomplishment,” said Joe, director of NASA’s Heliophysics Division. Dr. Westlake said.

The spacecraft’s next planned solar approaches will take place on March 22, 2025 and June 19, 2025.

Source: www.sci.news

NASA’s solar probe achieves closest approach to the sun of any artificial object

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overview

  • NASA’s Parker Solar Probe is expected to dive extremely close to the sun’s surface on December 24th.
  • The spacecraft will have to fly closer to the Sun than any other man-made object in history, less than 3.86 million miles away.
  • The mission was designed to study the Sun’s outer atmosphere and help researchers learn how solar storms erupt into space.

NASA is preparing to “taste” the sun on Christmas Eve.

The bureau’s Parker Solar Probe is just days away from making its closest approach ever to the Sun on Tuesday, when it will fly closer to our star than any other man-made object in history.

The spacecraft, about the size of a small car, is scheduled to dive to within 3.86 million miles of the sun’s surface at 6:40 a.m. ET on Tuesday. It passes by at approximately 430,000 miles per hour. According to NASA.

“If you think about it, it’s like going 96 percent of the way to the surface of the sun,” said Kelly Kolek, a program scientist in NASA’s heliophysics division.

Because mission controllers cannot communicate with the spacecraft during maneuvers, NASA will have to wait about three days before receiving a signal that the spacecraft has survived its rendezvous with the sun.

The first images of the close encounter will then likely be transmitted to Earth sometime in January, the agency said.

As the Parker Solar Probe swoops toward the Sun, it will likely fly through a plume of solar plasma and potentially fly into the star’s active regions, Kolek said.

The mission was designed to study the outermost part of the Sun’s atmosphere, an extremely hot region known as the corona. Scientists are keen to look at the corona up close because researchers have long puzzled over why the outer layer of the sun’s atmosphere is hundreds of times hotter than the star’s surface.

Observations of the corona will also help researchers study how storms that form on the sun’s surface erupt into space. For example, the spacecraft will be able to observe streams of the most energetic solar particles coming from the Sun and exploding into space at supersonic speeds.

“This is the birthplace of space weather,” Kolek said. “While we have observed space weather from afar, Parker is now living space weather. In the future, we will be able to better understand how space weather forms.” , when we look at solar storms through a telescope, we can understand what they mean for us here on Earth.”

During periods of intense space weather, the Sun can emit huge solar flares and streams of charged particles known as solar wind directly to Earth. When these explosions interact with Earth’s magnetic field, they could not only supercharge the aurora, but also damage satellites and take out power grids.

Kolek said the Parker Solar Probe mission will help researchers better predict space weather and its potential impacts, similar to the work meteorologists and atmospheric scientists do about weather on Earth. said it was helpful.

The Parker spacecraft launched into space in 2018 and has orbited the sun more than 20 times since then. The Christmas Eve flyby will be the first of three final flybys planned for the mission. The spacecraft is named after Eugene Parker, the pioneering astrophysicist at the University of Chicago who first theorized the existence of the solar wind. Mr. Parker passed away in 2022 at the age of 94.

Last month, the spacecraft flew near Venus in a maneuver intended to slingshot its way to the sun. The upcoming approach was timed to coincide with the sun’s most active period in its 11-year cycle. This busy phase is typically characterized by a flurry of solar storms and high magnetic activity and is known as solar maximum.

Scientists like Kolek are hoping the Parker Solar Probe will have a front-row seat if a storm hits the sun’s surface on Christmas Eve.

Source: www.nbcnews.com

New Hera probe sent to study asteroid target of NASA’s previous experiment

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On Monday, a spacecraft was launched to investigate. Space collision site.

The European Space Agency’s Hera spacecraft was rocket-launched on a two-year journey to the small, harmless asteroid it crashed into. Two years ago, NASA During that day’s dress rehearsal, a killer space stone threatens Earth. The experiment, launched by SpaceX from Cape Canaveral, is the second in a series of planetary defense tests that could one day save the planet.

Crash in 2022 NASA dart spacecraft This shortens Dimorphos’ orbit around its larger brethren, indicating that if a dangerous rock is headed in our direction, it can be thrown off course with sufficient advance notice. I did.

Scientists want to study the impact’s aftermath up close to learn exactly how effective Dart was and what changes are needed to protect the planet in the future.

“The more details we can gather, the more details we can gather because it could be important in planning future deflection missions if they are needed,” University of Maryland astronomer Derek Richardson said before the launch. It’s good enough.”

Researchers want to know whether Dart (short for Double Asteroid Redirection Test) left behind a crater or changed the shape of the 500-foot (150-meter) asteroid more dramatically. Richardson, who participates in the dart mission and supports Hera, said that before the dart was shot, it looked like a flying saucer, but now it may resemble a kidney bean.

ESA’s Hera mission lifted off at 10:52 a.m. Monday aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
S. Korbach / ESA

The flurry of darts sent debris and even rocks flying from Dimorphos, further increasing the force of the impact. The debris trail stretched thousands of miles (more than 10,000 kilometers) into space over several months.

Flight director Ignacio Tanco said rocks and other debris may still be floating around the asteroid, posing a potential threat to Hera.

“We don’t really know what kind of environment we’re going to operate in,” Tanko says. “But the whole point of this mission is to go out there and find out.”

European officials described the $400 million (363 million euro) mission as an “investigation of the accident scene.”

Project manager Ian Carnelli said Hera was “returning to the crime scene and obtaining all the scientific and technical information”.

Hera, which is about the size of a small car and carries more than a dozen scientific instruments, needs to fly past Mars in 2025 to increase its gravity and reach Dimorphos by the end of 2026. This is a satellite of the fast-spinning asteroid Didymos, which means twins in Greek. It’s 5 times bigger. At that point, the asteroid will be 120 million miles (195 million kilometers) from Earth.

Hera, controlled by a flight team in Darmstadt, Germany, will attempt to enter orbit around the pair of rocks as its flight range gradually decreases from 18 miles (30 kilometers) to half a mile (1 kilometer). The spacecraft will study the satellite for at least six months, determining its mass, shape, composition, and orbit around Didymos.

Before impact, Dimorphos circled its larger mate from three-quarters of a mile (1,189 meters) away. Scientists believe the orbit could become tighter and more elliptical, potentially even causing the satellite to fall off.

Source: www.nbcnews.com

NVIDIA’s stock price drops as US ramps up antitrust probe

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Shares in AI chip designer Nvidia have been falling overnight following reports that US authorities are stepping up an investigation into whether the company has violated competition laws.

The company’s shares fell 2.4% in after-hours trading, supplementing a fall of nearly 10% in regular trading, sending its market capitalisation down by $279bn (£212bn) to $2.6trn, the biggest one-day fall ever for a US company.

Bloomberg reported that overnight, the Department of Justice sent subpoenas to Nvidia and other tech companies, taking steps to legally compel recipients to hand over information.

Nvidia executives are said to be concerned that the company is making it difficult for customers to switch to other semiconductor suppliers and penalizing buyers that refuse to give them exclusive use of Nvidia’s AI chips.

The moves mark an intensification of the U.S. antitrust investigation and bring the government one step closer to filing formal charges against Nvidia.

Tuesday’s sell-off came amid a market-wide sell-off sparked by weak U.S. manufacturing data that raised broader concerns among investors about the outlook for the U.S. economy. Manufacturing contracted at a moderate pace in August, with new orders, production and employment levels declining, according to the Institute for Supply Management’s monthly survey of factories.

That sent the S&P 500 down more than 2%, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index fell nearly 3.3%. Uncertainty spread to Asia, where Japan’s Nikkei fell 4.2% on Wednesday and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 index fell 1.9%.

This has exacerbated recent volatile trading for Nvidia and other AI-related stocks, including Google, Apple and Amazon, as investors worry that the real impact — and tangible benefits — of the much-touted AI revolution may still be a long way off.

Founded in 1993, Nvidia primarily designed chips for video games, but during the cryptocurrency boom it realized its processing technology could be used to mine digital coins. Since then, the company has shifted its focus to artificial intelligence, riding a new wave of excitement about the potential of large-scale language models.

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The company last week reported a 122% increase in second-quarter revenue, but signs of slowing growth, especially around its next-generation AI chip, code-named “Blackwell,” have spooked investors.

An Nvidia spokesman said: “We win on merit, as reflected in our benchmark results and value to customers, so they can choose the solution that’s best for them.”

Source: www.theguardian.com

Chloride-containing deposits found on Mars by ESA’s Trace Gases Probe

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Chloride deposits are indicators of the presence of water on early Mars and have important implications for understanding the Martian climate and habitability. Color and Stereo Surface Imaging Systems Using the spacecraft (CaSSIS) aboard the European Space Agency's (ESA) Mars Trace Gases Explorer (TGO), planetary researchers conducted a planet-wide search for chloride-bearing deposits in Terra Sirenum and other parts of Mars.

This CaSSIS/TGO image shows chloride-bearing deposits (purple-colored scaly waves) in Terra Sirenum on Mars. Image credit: ESA/TGO/CaSSIS.

“Mars is currently a desert world, but around 3.5 billion years ago it was covered by rivers, lakes and possibly oceans,” said University of Bern researcher Valentin Bickel and his colleagues.

“The Cold Period began as Mars lost its magnetic field, could no longer retain its atmosphere, and water evaporated, froze, or became trapped within the surface.”

“Over time, the water disappeared, leaving behind mineral fingerprints on the surface.”

In this study, the researchers used neural networks to map potential chloride-bearing deposits in CaSSIS images across a large portion of Mars.

They identified a total of 965 potential chloride deposits ranging from 300 to 3,000 metres in diameter.

“These salt deposits probably formed from shallow pools or brines that evaporated in the sun,” the scientists said.

“Similar methods are used in saltwater pools on Earth to produce salt for human consumption.”

“Highly salty water could be a haven for life and an indicator of habitable parts of Mars,” the researchers added.

“Due to the high salinity, the water remains liquid even at minus 40 degrees.”

“The presence of chloride deposits, pictured above, and their direct association with liquid water, make areas like Terra Sirenum good targets for future robotic missions to search for signs of life.”

“While chloride-bearing terrains are not noticeable in regular black-and-white images, they show up as a distinct purple color in color infrared images, making CaSSIS a unique tool for studying the distribution of salts across Mars.”

“Our paper contains never-before-seen data that will help us better understand the distribution of water on Mars' distant past,” they said.

“TGO continues to image Mars from orbit to understand the planet's ancient past and potential habitability.”

“Not only will the spacecraft send back stunning images, it will also provide the best inventory of atmospheric gases and map water-rich areas on the planet's surface.”

“Understanding the history of water on Mars and whether it once allowed life to thrive is at the heart of ESA's ExoMars mission.”

Team paper Featured in this month's journal Scientific Data.

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VT Bickel others2024. Global dataset of potential chloride deposits on Mars identified by TGO CaSSIS. Scientific Data 11,845;doi: 10.1038/s41597-024-03685-3

Source: www.sci.news

The Chang’e-6 probe from China successfully returns with the first samples of rocks from the far side of the moon

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The Chang’e-6 probe is recovered in Xiziwang Banner, Inner Mongolia, China.

Xinhua/Shutterstock

China’s Chang’e-6 spacecraft has returned to Earth, bringing back the first chunk of space rock from the far side of the moon.

The capsule separated from the orbital container at around 1:20 p.m. local time, 5,000 kilometers above the Atlantic Ocean, and landed in Xiziwang Banner, Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, China on June 25.

The sample, which should contain about 2 kilograms of lunar material, descended the final 10 kilometres by parachute, landing at 2:07pm and being retrieved by scientists from the China National Space Administration.

Landing on the far side of the moon is difficult because it always faces away from Earth and there is no direct communication line, and this area’s surface remained unexplored until a Chinese spacecraft landed there earlier this month.

The landing and recovery operations relied heavily on autonomous processes and robotic tools, but Chinese engineers were able to send messages to the spacecraft through the Queqiao-2 relay satellite, which was launched in March this year and is still orbiting the moon.

The samples include surface and two meters of material scooped up by Chang’e-6 drilling into its landing site in Apollo Crater, which is within the larger South Pole-Aitken Basin. Scientists hope that this material will help explain how and when these basins formed, and may enable understanding of the origins of other similar lunar craters.

The rocks may indicate the amount of water ice in the region, which could be a key resource for a manned mission that China hopes to send to the moon by 2030.

Before embarking on its crewed mission, China plans to send two more spacecraft, Chang’e-7 and Chang’e-8, to the lunar south pole to gather information on a potential site for a base to be called the International Lunar Research Station. China is leading the mission in collaboration with Russian space agency Roscosmos.

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Source: www.newscientist.com

Is an aging NASA probe redefining the limits of our solar system?

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NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft is hurtling out of our solar system at incredible speed. It’s currently about 8 billion kilometers from the Sun, and by the time you finish reading this article, it will be thousands of kilometers further into the frigid darkness. Space is lonely; even the giant planet Jupiter is just a tiny speck.

New Horizons is best known for getting the first proper glimpses of the dwarf planet Pluto in 2015, which it had previously only seen as a faint smudge. It also taught us a lot about the outer solar system and the tiny frozen worlds that float there. “It’s really been an Alice in Wonderland kind of story,” says Alan Stern, the mission’s principal investigator. “It’s been a magical experience, and we’ve made some amazing discoveries.”

But the dream isn’t over yet, because New Horizons may make a surprise final move. In early 2024, one of New Horizons’ detectors recorded an unexpected increase in the amount of dust it encountered. That material could have been created by collisions between rocky fragments, and astronomers now suspect that there may be many objects beyond the rubble-strewn Kuiper Belt, often considered the edge of the solar system. If so, the boundaries of the solar system would need to be redrawn, calling into question models of the formation of the solar system.

Stern and his colleagues are clearly hoping to take advantage of the rover’s unique location to learn more about this unexplored wilderness while they still can. “This is…

Source: www.newscientist.com

The US moon probe landing today carries five incredibly unusual objects

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Intuitive Machines is preparing to create history as the first private company to land on the moon following last week’s launch from Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The Nova-C lander named Odysseus (affectionately nicknamed “Odie”) is scheduled to touch down at 5:30pm ET (10:30pm GMT) and everything is proceeding as planned. This will be the first instance of an American-led mission reaching the moon since the end of the Apollo program over 50 years ago.

The mission is part of NASA’s Artemis Commercial Lunar Payload Service (CLPS) initiative, aiming to return humans to the moon by the end of this decade, led by a private company.

Since NASA’s Apollo 11 landed in 1969, several countries including the former Soviet Union, China, India, and Japan have successfully placed equipment on the moon.

Today’s “space race” is different not only because more countries are involved but also due to the private sector having a central role on the forefront. It is now possible for an individual or company with sufficient funds to place something on the moon.

The mission includes all of NASA’s key experiments, with a total of six experiments collecting data critical to NASA’s crewed Artemis missions later this decade. This leaves room for additional unique additions.

1. Puffer jacket

Columbia Sportswear has developed a lining for the Omni-Heat Infinity Jacket, designed to keep explorers warm in harsh environments, to be used on the Odie during the mission to protect the lander’s equipment from extreme temperatures.

Image credit: Intuitive Machines

2. Photos for the gram

Intuitive Machines CEO Steve Altemus challenged students back in 2019 to capture photos of the landing from a third-person perspective, leading to the creation of the EagleCam which is poised to capture snapshots of the lunar landing.

The EagleCam is the first third-person photo camera for a landing and also serves as the first moon landing project built by a college student, it also uses WiFi on the moon.

3. Miniature satellite

Renowned American artist Jeff Koons has created 125 stainless steel sculptures depicting the moon as seen from Earth, along with an array of scientific equipment to be placed on the moon.

4. (Almost) All Human Knowledge

The Arch Mission Foundation is sending a permanent archive of human information along with the lander, ensuring that human knowledge is safely stored for posterity.

According to Intuitive Machines, the repository includes archives like the Rosetta Project, Long Now Foundation content, Project Gutenberg content, and other cultural archive datasets, and an English version of Wikipedia.

5. A very stylish file cabinet

Lone Star Data Holdings has secured a location for the Independence data center within the IM-1 mission, allowing the safe storage and transmission of documents on the moon.

When can we see the moon landing?

Coverage of the Intuitive Machine’s moon landing can be followed live through NASA’s web services from 4pm ET (9pm GMT). Live videos and comments can be accessed through NASA TV, NASA+ streaming service, or the NASA app.

About our experts

Science writer and journalist Joel Renstrom and computer scientist and author Peter Bentley provided insights for this story.

Source: www.sciencefocus.com

EU initiates probe into TikTok concerning online content and child safety

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The EU is launching an investigation into whether TikTok has violated online content regulations, particularly those relating to the safety of children.

The European Commission has officially initiated proceedings against a Chinese-owned short video platform for potential violations of the Digital Services Act (DSA).

The investigation is focusing on areas such as safeguarding minors, keeping records of advertising content, and determining if algorithms are leading users to harmful content.


Thierry Breton, EU Commissioner for the Internal Market, stated that child safety is the “primary enforcement priority” under the DSA. The investigation particularly focuses on age verification and default privacy settings for children’s accounts.

In April last year, TikTok was fined €345 million in Ireland for violating EU data law in its handling of children’s accounts. Additionally, the UK Information Commissioner fined the company £12.7 million for unlawfully processing data from children under 13.

Companies that violate the DSA can face fines of up to 6% of their global turnover. TikTok is owned by Chinese technology company ByteDance.

TikTok has stated that it is committed to working with experts and the industry to ensure the safety of young people on its platform and is eager to brief the European Commission on its efforts.

The commission is also examining alleged deficiencies in TikTok’s provision of publicly available data to researchers and its compliance with requirements to establish a database of ads shown on the platform.

A deadline for the investigation has not been set and will depend on factors such as the complexity of the case and the degree of cooperation from the companies being investigated.

This investigation of TikTok is the DSA’s second, following a December 2021 formal investigation into Elon Musk’s social media platform X, which was previously known as Twitter. The case against X focuses on failure to block illegal content and inadequate measures against disinformation.

Apple is reportedly facing a substantial fine from the EU for its conduct in the music streaming app market. The European Commission is investigating whether US tech companies blocked music distributors from informing users about cheaper subscription options outside of their own app stores.

According to the Financial Times, the city of Brussels plans to fine Apple 500 million euros, marking a significant decision following years of complaints from companies offering services through iPhone apps.

Apple was previously fined 1.1 billion euros by France in 2020 for anti-competitive agreements with two wholesalers, a fine that was later reduced by an appeals court.

Big technology companies like Apple and Google have come under increased scrutiny due to competitive concerns. Google is appealing against fines of more than 8 billion euros imposed by the EU in three separate competition investigations.

Apple has successfully defended against a lawsuit by Fortnite developer Epic Games alleging that its app store was an illegal monopoly. In December, Epic won a similar lawsuit against Google.

Last month, Apple announced that it would allow EU customers to download apps without using its own app store, in response to the EU’s digital market law.

Source: www.theguardian.com