Sternula’s Post

The Enigmatic World of Rogue Planets Imagine a planet drifting through the vast expanse of space, untethered to any star. These mysterious celestial bodies, known as rogue planets, offer a glimpse into the most extreme and awe-inspiring aspects of our universe. Rogue planets challenge our understanding of planetary formation. Traditionally, we believe planets form around stars, held in their orbits by gravity. However, rogue planets either formed in isolation or were ejected from their original systems. Studying these cosmic vagabonds helps scientists piece together the dynamic processes that shape our galaxy. But beyond science, rogue planets capture the imagination. They evoke a sense of wonder and mystery—worlds that have no sun, yet still exist. Could they harbor life? Do they experience the same geological processes as Earth? These are the questions that push us to explore further. Detecting rogue planets is no easy feat. They don't emit light like stars, and they don’t have the reflective glow of planets orbiting stars. Enter gravitational microlensing—a phenomenon predicted by Einstein’s theory of relativity. This technique works much like a lens in your camera. When a rogue planet passes between Earth and a distant star, its gravity bends the light from that star, causing it to briefly brighten. This “lensing” effect can be detected by telescopes here on Earth, allowing astronomers to infer the presence of the planet. Gravitational microlensing has several advantages: No light required: Unlike other methods, microlensing doesn’t rely on the rogue planet emitting or reflecting light. Precise detection: The brightening of the star’s light provides precise information about the planet’s mass and distance. This technology opens the door to finding many more rogue planets and other cosmic apparitions hidden from view. The study of rogue planets is still in its infancy, but the potential for discovery is immense. Scientists believe there may be as many rogue planets as there are stars in our galaxy—a staggering thought. So next time you look up at the night sky, consider that there may be countless planets drifting unseen, waiting to be discovered. Rogue planets remind us that the universe is far more mysterious and complex than we ever imagined. Check out my newsletter for an in-depth analysis.

Our new blog post is about "ESA's Planetary Science Archive (PSA)" To read full blog in detail follow below link https://lnkd.in/dmY8dFUT #iaga #iagablogs #esa #science #trending #trendingnow #now #planets #space

INTERESTING FACT!!! New, immersive visualizations produced on a NASA supercomputer let anyone take a trip into a black hole’s point of no return. In this flight toward a supermassive black hole, labels highlight many of the fascinating features produced by the effects of general relativity along the way. This supercomputer visualization tracks a camera as it approaches, briefly orbits, and then crosses the event horizon — the point of no return — of a supersized black hole similar in mass to the one at the center of our galaxy. Here’s an interesting fact you should know about this supercomputer simulation of the black hole: Do you know this project generated about 10 terabytes of data — equivalent to roughly half of the estimated text content in the Library of Congress — and took about 5 days running on just 0.3% of NASA’s Supercomputer 129,000 processors. #ACADEMICSWORLD #SCIENCE #NASA #FACTS #UNIVERSE #PROCESSORS #BLACKHOLE #GALAXY

Sun Releases Largest Flare in Nearly a Decade | NASA Goddard FriendsofNASA.org: On May 14, 2024, the Sun emitted a strong solar flare. This solar flare is the largest of Solar Cycle 25 and is classified as an X8.7 flare. X-class denotes the most intense flares, while the number provides more information about its strength. A solar flare is an intense burst of radiation, or light, on the Sun. Flares are our solar system’s most powerful explosive events. Light only takes about 8 minutes to travel from the Sun to Earth, so that’s how long it would take the energy from a flare to reach our planet. Stronger solar flares—those rated class M5 or above—can have impacts on technology that depends on Earth’s ionosphere (our electrically charged upper atmosphere), like high-frequency radio used for navigation and GPS. NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) captured these images of the flare, which peaked at 12:51 p.m. ET on May 14. The X8.7 flare appears on the lower right edge of the Sun. (A small eruption appears afterward in the upper left.) SDO sees the Sun in more than 10 distinct wavelengths of light, showing solar material at different temperatures. Different wavelengths are shown in this video to highlight different features of the flare. Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scientific Visualization Studio Scott Wiessinger (MORI Associates): Producer Abbey Interrante (ADNET Systems, Inc.): Writer Tom Bridgman (Global Science and Technology, Inc.): Visualizer Duration: 1 minute, 12 seconds Release Date: May 15, 2024 #NASA #Astronomy #Space #Science #Earth #Moon #SpaceWeather #Sun #Star #Solar #SolarFlares #Ultraviolet #Plasma #MagneticField #Heliophysics #Physics #Spacecraft #Satellites #ElectricalGrids #SDO #SolarSystem #NASAGoddard #GSFC #UnitedStates #STEM #Education #HD #Video

The three-body problem is one of the most intriguing and unsolved challenges in classical mechanics. It involves predicting the movement of three celestial bodies, like stars or planets, which are affected by their mutual gravitational pull. Unlike simpler two-body problems, where solutions are predictable and well-defined, the three-body problem exhibits chaotic and highly sensitive behaviors, making its solutions complex and infinite. This visualization by Simon Lancaster demonstrates just 20 of the infinite possible solutions to this problem. Each path represents a unique configuration of motion, influenced by the initial conditions of the bodies. What makes this problem so fascinating is its unpredictability—small changes in initial conditions can lead to vastly different outcomes, a concept that resonates deeply with chaos theory. Understanding the three-body problem isn't just a theoretical exercise; it's crucial for fields like astrodynamics, orbital mechanics, and space exploration. It helps us better grasp the dynamics of star systems, the stability of planetary orbits, and even the trajectories of spacecraft. Explore this visualization to see how complex and captivating the dance of celestial bodies can be. It’s a beautiful reminder of the mysteries our universe holds and the endless opportunities for discovery and innovation. #Physics #Visualization #ThreeBodyProblem #Astrodynamics #ChaosTheory #ScienceCommunication #DataScience #SpaceExploration #CelestialMechanics #STEM #Research #Innovation #Learning #OrbitalMechanics

🌌 Lecture 1: Kepler's Laws of Planetary Motion 🛰️ Today, let's delve into the profound insights of Johannes Kepler, whose laws laid the foundation for our understanding of planetary orbits. Here's a quick overview: 1️⃣ First Law (Law of Ellipses): Planets orbit the Sun in elliptical paths, with Sun at one focus of the ellipse. 2️⃣ Second Law (Law of Equal Areas): A line segment joining a planet and the Sun sweeps out equal areas during equal intervals of time. This means planets move faster when closer to the Sun and slower when farther away. 3️⃣ Third Law (Harmonic Law): The square of the orbital period of a planet is proportional to the cube of the semi-major axis of its orbit. Kepler's Laws revolutionized our understanding of celestial mechanics, paving the way for modern space exploration and satellite orbits. 🚀✨ Reference: https://lnkd.in/ggAc7Wiu Stay tuned for more insights into orbital mechanics and space science! #keplerslaws #planetarymotion #spaceexploration #astronomy #linkedInlearning

WHAT WOULD KEPLER DO? Copernicus (1543) and Kepler (1605) made some interesting observations concerning planetary orbits that were useful. However, it was not until Newton (1687) that we truly understood the reason that planets orbit the Sun. The result of his work was an equation that described the force of gravity acting on a planet orbiting the Sun or a satellite orbiting Earth. Using this gravity and his laws of mechanics, orbits could be described using an ordinary 2nd-order differential equation. However, a method for solving this equation was not yet known. In 1768 Euler developed a numerical method for solving ordinary differential equations suggesting a method for solving the equation of motion for orbiting objects. However, the numerical integration required hand calculations, and it could take months to solve the equation for significant time spans. In fact, NASA originally used this method to design lunar orbiter missions. Now that personal computers are ubiquitous, we can easily and quickly solve this equation of motion. If you don’t know the location of the Moon, Sun, and planets, you must solve an n-body equation of motion with accurate initial positions for all sources of gravity. However, we now have equations that allow you to quickly find the location of these other gravity source for any date and time. This information greatly simplifies orbital calculations by allowing all other gravity sources, other than Earth, to be included as simple gravity perturbations. All these advancements allow us to now teach orbital mechanics for near-Earth satellite orbits using software and relatively little mathematics. Have I oversimplified the subject matter, or is this a revolution in how we teach orbital mechanics? paperback version: https://lnkd.in/gPeYCkGx kindle version: https://lnkd.in/gZWcCzNB software: https://lnkd.in/gRs7k_at #space #spaceFlight #spacePhysics #orbits #orbitalMechanics #astrodynamics #astronomy #spaceScience #spaceEducation #spaceIndustry #computerSimulations #spaceBooks #spaceCraft #teachingMethods #scienceEducation #SOS #SatelliteOrbitSimulator

Those swirls… Intricate swirls of dark brown, tan, orange, off-white, cream, and dark orange form a jet stream region in Jupiter’s northern hemisphere. The mass of swirls come together, forming a line from the top left diagonally toward the lower right. As the patterns meet in the center, a bright splash of white forms. These intricate swirls may look like coffee and cream, but they’re actually a jet stream region in Jupiter’s northern hemisphere. The science that stirs this celestial latte? The gas giant’s cloud tops don’t form a simple flat surface. Instead, the bands in the atmosphere extend deep into the planet at a depth of about 1,900 miles (3,000 kilometers). That patch of white to the right is a bright “pop-up” of high-altitude clouds rising above the surrounding atmosphere. Citizen scientist Gerald Eichstadt created this color-enhanced image using data from the Juno spacecraft’s JunoCam imager. The original photo was taken on May 29, 2019, when the orbiter performed its 20th close flyby of Jupiter about 6,000 miles (9,700 kilometers) above the planet’s cloud tops. Image Credit: Enhanced image by Gerald Eichstädt based on images provided courtesy of NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS

I 💕 😘 a challenge "... But often, the orbits of the three bodies never truly stabilize, and the three-body problem gets "solved" with a bang. The gravitational forces could cause two of the three bodies to collide, or they could fling one of the bodies out of the system forever — a possible source of "rogue planets" that don't orbit any star, Quarles said. In fact, three-body chaos may be so common in space that scientists estimate there may be 20 times as many rogue planets as there are stars in our galaxy. When all else fails, scientists can use computers to approximate the motions of bodies in an individual three-body system. That makes it possible to predict the motion of a rocket launched into orbit around Earth, or to predict the fate of a planet in a system with multiple stars. With all this tumult, you might wonder if anything could survive on a planet like the one featured in Netflix's "3 Body Problem," which — spoiler alert — is trapped in a chaotic orbit around three stars in the Alpha Centauri system, our solar system's nearest neighbor. "I don't think in that type of situation, that's a stable environment for life to evolve," Ross said. That's one aspect of the show that remains firmly in the realm of science fiction.""" https://lnkd.in/eMZnTJk5