More exciting news:

http://www.universetoday.com/88928/s...ace-telescope/


So they have seen sense!

Yes, I too have been Jupiter watching - out of my kitchen window. It shines very brightly. It is beautiful.

Might go outside and look at it through my binoculars tonight.

You should see four of it's moons through binoculars...

Unfortunately the buggers pulled the plug on the X-38 and its beautiful Aerospike engines!

You know that scene Lucas added into Star Wars IV, of the Falcon climbing up and out from Mos Eisley? we could have had that...

Indeed. I've seen them before.

A couple oy years ago, I helped to organise a public astronomy for members of the public event which comprised of an illustrated talk followed by an outdoor telescope observation session.

Both the Moon and Jupiter were on display that night and many people got to see craters close up and the moons and clouds belts of Jupiter for the first time and many were awed by what they saw . I am pleased my council has continued these events annually so that others can experience the wonders of the heavens.

...and here they are:

http://www.khanacademy.org/#cosmology-and-astronomy

Frontiers and Controversies in Astrophysics
http://oyc.yale.edu/astronomy

http://www.openculture.com/freeonlinecourses
http://www.openculture.com/category/astronomy-2

http://www.cam.ac.uk/video/contribute/
http://sms.cam.ac.uk/media/650158

http://www8.open.ac.uk/europe/key-fa...ning-resources
http://openlearn.open.ac.uk/mod/ouco....php?id=399366
http://www.open.ac.uk/openlearn/
http://www.open.ac.uk/openlearn/scie...ths-technology

They do vary in detail and complexity but I am sure that many people can benefit from them.

That's great. Astronomy is a fascinating subject.

One day I hope to go out into the sticks where there is no light pollution and take a better look at the night sky. I haven't yet had that privilege.

Tatooine really does exist! (sort of))

Luke Skywalker's home planet with two suns was fictional...up until now:

Tatooine may have been a harsh desert world, but Kepler-16b is positively uninhabitable. Still, like Tatooine, it orbits a dual-star system.
http://www.time.com/time/health/arti...#ixzz1Y8ipJ4C5
http://www.newscientist.com/article/...-universe.html

Super-Earth discovered in a habitable zone

Called a super-Earth because it is only 3.6 times more massive than Earth and possibly rocky rather than gaseous, it resides in a 58-day orbit on the inner edge of its orange star's habitable zone.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/...able-zone.html
From what has been said elsewhere http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00k17lc#synopsis, this world be steaming hot given its proximity to its home star so it might be a home to robust bacteria but not humans .

NASA officially unveils the Space Launch System

The SLS Space Launch System is new a heavy duty
launch vehicle that's scheduled to have its first launch in late 2017. It'll be Earth's most powerful rocket since the Saturn V and it will be able to send crews to the Moon, Mars and the asteroids. Whilst the initial version is less powerful than a Saturn V, the planned uprated version would exceed the Saturn V's thrust capability to become Earth's most powerful rocket ever.

NASA has officially unveiled the plan for their next large-scale rocket: the Space Launch System, or SLS, will provide heavy-lift capabilities for cargo and spacecraft to go beyond low-Earth orbit and is proposed as a safe, sustainable and efficient way to open up the next chapter in US space exploration.
http://www.universetoday.com/88941/s...ext-big-thing/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Launch_System

Pluto's icy exterior may conceal an ocean

PLUTO could hide a liquid ocean beneath its icy shell. Indeed, other bodies on the solar system's frigid fringe could also harbour subsurface oceans, and these could provide the conditions to sustain life.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/...-an-ocean.html

I think we're entering a very exciting period for both astronomy and space flight. If I was a student today, I'd definitely be trying to get on a space/planetary science or a space systems engineering course despite all the maths and physics involved!!

I really hoped by now to be typing a reply from space,
and meet the people on this thread in space.

I really belived that in the 1970's, now back to artist's impressions & crossing fingers.

...and this year's astronomy education event is 5th on this list here http://www.southglos.gov.uk/NR/exere...7-96eb299381b4 and l've already put in motion some extra press publicity for it as well.

And now for some spaceflight news...

Spaceship Company Opens Assembly Facility in Mojave

The Spaceship Company (TSC), the aerospace production joint venture of Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic and Scaled Composites, achieved a significant milestone in making commercial space travel a reality with today’s opening of its Final Assembly, Integration and Test Hangar, or FAITH, at Mojave Air and Space Port.
http://www.parabolicarc.com/2011/09/...ity-in-mojave/

China takes first step towards space station

China is about to take the first step towards building its own space station with the launch of Tiangong 1, or Heavenly Palace, in a further sign of its race to catch up with the US and Russia.
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/c863c828-e...#axzz1YbwGqBNB

I was reading yesterday that scientists now beleive the solar system had a fifth gas giant planet in it's early history, some 4 billion years ago. Up until recently computer simulations of the early solar system failed to expalin the eventual configuration of the planets as we know them. Basically Jupiter is too big and in simulations one of Urunus or Neptune is always ejected from the solar system. Now by adding a fifth planet into the equation scientists have found that the simulation often comes up with a very good analogy of the solar system as we see it. The ejection of a large body 4 billion years ago also explains the 'late heavy bombardment' which is responsible for much of the cratering on bodies like our Moon, as a large planet being thrown out of the solar system would have disrutped the Oort Cloud and Kuiper Belt as it went.

p.s. I always knew Einstein was an idiot

p.p.s if anyone can find the systematic error in my conclusion above, please PM me

It's a pity though that while we can see stuff on the web, the skies in many of our cities are so washed out by night time lighting that all you see in the sky is an orange glow. with the occasional bright star poking through.

Interesting that the planets circling the sun....... are all in the same plane

as thought they were all positioned on a gigantic LP with the sun in the middle... then the LP was removed to leave them all in the same plane !

It's an inevitable consequence of the way a gas cloud condenses to for a new system with a star at it's heart. As it condenses it rotates and because of various laws about angular momentum etc... it forms a disk. Planetary bodies will then form out of that disk and to start with at least will all orbit the star in the same direction and will all rotate in the same direction. As these bodies then interact with each other you will get some variations in their orbits and roations hence anomolies such as Venus' rotation, Uranus' inclination, Pluto's orbit.

It really has been a bit of a week for news...

I may have misread what I read recently, but the Sun is a third generation star?
EG.It died reformed started again, might have missed the memo on this one?

More or less... sort of. Our sun and all the planets formed from a cloud of interstellar gas whch itself was formed from the remenants of older stars which had died in a super-nova. This accounts for the presence of the heavy elements we find on Earth - super-nova are the only place these heavy elements are formed then blown out into space.

2 things suggest our sun is at least a 3rd generation star (the third star to exist in this location of the galaxy). Firstly super nova have very short life-sp[ans so if a 1st generation star formed shortly after the start of the univers 13 billion years ago and died soon after there wuld be a 8 - 9 billion year wait until our sun formed which is rather unlikley, so the chances are at least one other star has been born and died in the same location. Secondly the ratio of the heavy elements is too high for a single super-nova to have produced them meaning the material our solar system is made out of is likely to have been recycled through at least 2 super-nova. However there is a good chance the sun is actually a 4th generation star as the time factor - 2 short lived super-nova over 8 or 9 billion years - seems unlikely. most likely there have been 2 super nova and at least one smaller star like our own sun.

This cycle will continue, over and over, until all of the light elements, mainly hydrogen and helium, which are used as fusion fuel in stars is used up. In around 100 trillion years it is estimated that the last stars, very small, dim, cold stars will eventually burn out and all the light in the universe will be gone. Eventually all of the material in the universe will disperse into a uniform medium and will cool to absolute zero. At this point time will cease to exist and the universe will have died (a theory called heat death). This will take an unimaginably long time.

It's quite a somber thought until you realise that if the entire life time of the universe was a day, we have not even reached the smallest fraction of time known to man past midnight yet.

Thank you Assa2,
The Sun is not my strong point
maybe a little out of date,,,,,

Once again thanks.

China is due to launch it's first 'space laboratory' in the next few days. Based on Russian technology (which I assume means it's a derivative of Mir as I assume Russia's ISS partners wouldn't allow Russia to sell ISS technogoy to China) the small module will spend several months in automated mode while China sends up two unmanned capsules to attempt automatic docking before manned missions start next year.

All pretty impressive stuff given China's manned space programme started less than 10 years ago. My concern is that it's all bought and re-engineered technology from Russia, is all vbetween 40 & 20 years old and as with anything that is reproduced will not be as good as the original. That said I've been impressed how China has taken thing slow and steady rathetr than throwing Taikonauts up at every opportunity. They seem to have a definite plan for progressing towards a permenant space station and moon missions and are sticking to it.

There is a comet diving towards or at the Sun right now

http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/...24/latest.html

Its in the 4 o'clock position in those images currently with a small tail, it will grow brighter and longer as it approaches the sun.

Then it will appear in these images:

http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/...24/latest.html

It will likely disappear on the 1st of October

Have you seen the naked eye sun spot yet? It is just about visible with eclipse glasses, but be very careful.

Not looking!!

Yes, they're doing pretty well. Enjoying the current space race.

I looked, but it must be beyond my acuity.

I looked with binoculars too, there are a few nice spots on the face of the Sun today.

**Note****Important**
NEVER look at the Sun through binoculars unless you have proper filtration AND you know how to use it safely.
I use this stuff for casual viewing of Sunspots and surface granulation:
http://www.firstlightoptics.com/sola...ilm-nd-50.html
One of those A4 sheets will make filters for a 4" to 6" telescope, a pair of binoculars, and a coupla pairs of 'eclipse glasses'