DawgTalkers.net Forums DawgTalk Everything Else... James Webb Space Telescope

Thought we already had a thread... can't find it. Getting pretty excited here.


NASA Invites Media, Public to View Webb Telescope’s First Images ~ July 12th

NASA, in partnership with ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency), will release the James Webb Space Telescope’s first full-color images and spectroscopic data during a televised broadcast beginning at 10:30 a.m. EDT on Tuesday, July 12, from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.

Released one by one, these first images from the world’s largest and most powerful space telescope will demonstrate Webb at its full power, ready to begin its mission to unfold the infrared universe.

Each image will simultaneously be made available on social media as well as on the agency’s website at:

nasa.gov/webbfirstimages

NASA SITE

well, that's a tease.... gotta wait like 4 more weeks??!

Lol. I know... WTH?

So excited !!

Thank you for bringing this up !!

A 'JuMBO' Discovery

Dozens of pairs of free-floating, Jupiter-sized objects were identified in the nearby Orion Nebula in what scientists are describing as a never-before-seen celestial body unexplained by current theories of planet formation. Composite images of the phenomenon—captured by the James Webb Space Telescope—were released concurrently with studies that have not yet been peer-reviewed.

The 150 objects, located roughly 1,300 light-years away within the "sword" of the Orion constellation, don't meet current definitions for any celestial category. Although they are the size of planets, they don't orbit a star; instead, many of them are in binary orbit, where each is gravitationally bound to the other. Their novelty prompted astronomers to carve out a new category: Jupiter Mass Binary Objects, or JuMBOs, indicating their singular combination of planetary mass and starless orbit.

The new phenomenon challenges current frameworks explaining how stars and planets form within nebula, with astrophysicists claiming such objects should not exist. Read the studies here.

This should keep Neil deGrasse Tyson busy for a while. That's some pretty fascinating information. For all of the things man thinks he knows, it's amazing all of the things the species has no clue about. Thanks!

Crazy how we've 'mapped the universe'... taken things down to a micro-molecular level. And still have these 'oh, what do we have here?' moments all the time. This one, not all that far away.

Maybe they're not natural. They could totally be recently constructed alien observation posts and megastructures.

...I've played too much Stellaris.

Though sometimes it does make one wonder.

Indeed. It also shows how many times what we thought we knew turns out to be wrong. As we learn more, we learn we have been wrong about things, and as we learn more, we realize new discoveries lead to even more questions. The universe is an ever expanding jigsaw puzzle.

Once we solve 1 question, it leads to 5 more and disproves 1 other you though you knew.

This might be getting a little deep, but I think the problem we face is we have to build things from the inside out concerning the universe because that is the only way we can do it. If we could build from the outside in, we would solve more. Thus the quest to see deeper and deeper.

When you build a house you don't install a toilet and then build outward from there. You probably could but would encounter many difficulties. When looking at the universe and physics in general, we are forced in to the difficult task of building from the inside out.

It just goes to show that we only think we know what we know because it's all we've seen so far or been able to even guess at. We're still neophytes stuck in the "we don't even know how much we don't know" phase.


Stellaris.... I installed it, I think, but have yet to dive into it. I keep wanting to, but I'm a bit leery of getting sucked into a game and never being seen again as has happened to so many I used to know with World of Warcraft and the likes.

There are worse things to get sucked into (Browns football at times,) but yeah, I've lost track of time a few times messing about with Stellaris. I probably should set myself timers for games and the board.

NASA's Newest Mission

NASA is set to launch its Psyche spacecraft this morning from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, a new mission aiming to study a metal-rich asteroid believed to be the ancient core of a protoplanet. View the 10:15 am ET livestream here (weather permitting).

The 16 Psyche asteroid (see rendering), located over 2 billion miles from Earth in the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter, is composed primarily of iron and nickel rather than the ice or rock comprising most asteroids. Theorists speculate the 173-mile-wide, potato-shaped object is the core of an early-solar system planet that could provide more direct insights into the Earth's unobservable core.

The van-sized spacecraft will deploy highly efficient solar-powered ion propulsion technology—where electromagnetic fields charge xenon ions to generate thrust—to reach the asteroid's orbit in 2029 and will spend 26 months capturing images, measuring magnetic fields, and more.

Separately, NASA revealed rock samples harvested from the asteroid Bennu yesterday.

Not Webb related but lost in space. This is what happens when you let a company from Pittsburgh mess around and mix up with NASA. Let's just say yinzer gonna lose your payload.


Peregrine Malfunctions

A NASA-funded robotic lunar mission that would have returned the US to the moon's surface for the first time since 1972 appears to be in jeopardy due to a fuel leak that developed shortly after the private spacecraft's successful launch.

The 202-foot-tall Vulcan Centaur rocket—developed by the United Launch Alliance—blasted off yesterday from Cape Canaveral, Florida, successfully sending the Peregrine moon lander—developed by Astrobotic Technology—on its way (see video; see photos). Roughly seven hours into the flight, Peregrine's propulsion system malfunctioned, depleting the spacecraft's propellant and preventing a solar panel from properly pointing toward the sun. Peregrine was carrying NASA scientific equipment and human remains from two commercial space burial companies. The lander was previously expected to reach the moon's surface Feb. 23.

Peregrine was the first mission under NASA's 2018 Commercial Lunar Payload Services initiative (see overview), which has awarded billions of dollars to private companies to help land their spacecraft on the moon. Houston-based Intuitive Machines is expected to launch its own lander with a SpaceX rocket next month.

https://www.theverge.com/2024/1/8/2...moon-lander-vulcan-centaur-rocket-launch