If a Solar Superstorm were to occure today, like the historic one of 1859, the electrical infrastructure of the Earth would completely collaspe - scienstists say. Not only would it damage the Earth’s atmosphere it would destroy most of the world’s artificial satellites, possibly even the ISS or international space station if it is in the wrong place, sending it hurtling towards Earth.  All up it poses a massive risk to human life and the economy. With no satellites that means no Mobile phones and TV would also be effected. The implications could be devastating.

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The Phoenix Lander has discovered that Martian soil is rich in nutrients that could have once supported life. The nutrients are just one of many indicators gleaned from the Phoenix Lander since it began collecting and testing soil samples a few weeks ago. The early findings show the presence of ice crystals and nutrients, which point towards the presence of water - the basis for life. Its clear that the soil has clearly interacted with water in the past but its unknown if the interaction occurred at this area or whether it might have happened elsewhere and blown around Mars as dust. While NASA has said that some work remained before the first wet-chemical analysis was fully complete, it is similar to that found in Antarctica’s upper valleys and the salts it contains are another strong indication of the presence of water.

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The last time a large asteroid hit the Earth it killed off 70-80 per cent of all life on the planet. To meet this threat the Canadian Space Agency is developing a $12-million Near Earth Object Surveillance Satellite called NEOSSat.

To be launched in 2010 the Satellite will track some of the tens of thousands of large asteroids in danger of striking the Earth. The CSA also hopes It will detect space junk in danger of colliding with orbiting satellites. NEOSSat, fitted with a baffle to block the sunlight, will be positioned far above the Earth where its 15-centimetre diameter telescope will beam back images from deep space. Scientists hope that NEOSSat will be able to detect space junk that is up to 50,000 kilometres away, predict collision paths with commercial satellites, or foresee if any will fall to Earth.

NEOSSat is part of the next generation of Satellites to fill a niche in space exploration. It will be the size of a large suitcase, weigh less than 75 kilograms and be designed and built in three years.

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NASA image of M81

Big blackholes are just like small ones according to the latest data from NASA’s Observatory and ground-based telescopes. The discovery supports Einstein’s theory of relativity that black holes of all sizes have similar properties. The conclusion comes from results of the galaxy M81 - 11 million light-years away. The M81 blackhole is millions of times bigger than Sol. One of the implications of Einstein’s theory is that black holes are simple objects and only their masses and spins determine their effect on space-time. This research suggests that this simplicity manifests itself regardless of environmental factors.

Stellar mass black holes have a different source of food and acquire material by pulling gas from an orbiting companion star. But the results show that either big or little, black holes appear to feed similarly and produce a similar distribution of x-rays and radio light. Among the active blackholes the one in M81 is one of the dimmest but also one of the brightest as seen from Earth due to its proximity.

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The Homunculus Nebula

European astronomers have discovered three Earth-like planets” which circle a star and another two solar systems, along with several other small orbiting planets. The results strengthen the argument that the Earth (and possibly life) is not unique. “Each single star could have its planets. The star is 42 light-years away from the Doroto and Pictor constellations. The planets are bigger than Earth (respectively 4.2, 6.7 and 9.4 times) and they orbit their sun in respectively 4, 10 and 20 days, against the 365 days of our planet. Over 270 planets have been discovered outside our own solar system and in most cases they are giant planets, the size of Jupiter and Saturn. The smaller planets, like Earth, are harder to find. “These planets are just the tip of the iceberg. The data of all star systems show that around a third of the stars are similar to Sol and have super-Earths or satellites with a revolution of less than 50 days”.

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The Mars lander Phoenix has finally landed on the red planet and used its robotic arm to test the soil for the building blocks of life. The 2.3m-long titanium extension will dig through the Martian topsoil and into the water-ice which lies just beneath. The next step will be to test the arm’s four joints to be sure it is in working order before digging into the soil.

After a check that tests the robotic appendage at a range of warmer and colder temperatures, a camera on the arm will be used to look under the spacecraft to assess the terrain and underside of the lander. The robotic arm will later dig into the icy layers of Mars’ northern polar region and deliver samples of soil and ice to instruments on the lander’s deck for analysis.Phoenix is set to investigate the planet’s geological history and search for the chemical building blocks which could support life. The spacecraft has also transmitted a 360-degree panorama of its frigid Martian environment.

Phoenix is an apt name for the current mission, as it rose from the ashes of two previous failures. In September 1999, the Mars Climate Orbiter spacecraft crashed into the red planet following a navigation error caused when technicians mixed up imperial and metric units. A few months later, another Nasa spacecraft, the Mars Polar Lander was lost near the planet’s South Pole.Phoenix uses hardware from an identical twin of MPL, the Mars Surveyor 2001 Lander, which was cancelled following the two consecutive failures. The probe was launched on 4 August 2007 on a Delta II rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

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Now scientists have detected a new molecule in space closely related to an amino acid: amino acetonitrile. The organic molecule was found with a 30-meter radio telescope in Spain and two radio interferometers in France and Australia in the Large Molecule Heimat, a giant gas cloud near the galactic center in the constellation Sagittarius. In this source of only 0.3 light-year diameter, which is heated by a deeply embedded newly formed star, most of the interstellar molecules known to date have been found, including the most complex ones such as ethyl alcohol, formaldehyde, formic acid, acetic acid, glycol aldehyde and ethylene glycol.

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The other day I looked out my window and I could see the ‘dark side’ of the moon really well. The Moon was a whopper, swollen by the well-known illusion that makes moons near the horizon seem big. But that wasn’t what grabbed my attention. The wonderful thing was the way the “dark” part of the Moon was faintly glowing. The phase of the Earth changes reciprocally with the moon, so the illumination is greater for thin crescent moons; and specular reflection off the oceans increases the brightness of a near-full Earth in the moon’s sky. The brightness of the sky also has an effect: it can easily drown out the subtle illumination of earthshine. So for thin crescents, there’s a trade-off with the position of the sun below the horizon.

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