[Spacetalk] https://www.nasa.gov/index.html https://spaceflightnow.com

Gabe Gabrielle gabe at educatemotivate.com
Mon Mar 2 06:28:13 CST 2020


Hi all,

 A new month, how exciting…I simply can not comprehend how fast time is going…but, to me, that means things are going well…I believe when we are happy each day, time goes fast, when we are negative, for any reason…it slows down…the challenge is to find positives in everything we do…it is possible and it is all mental. 
 Tomorrow I am leaving for 5 weeks in Brazil…it is the most challenging trip I have ever taken…last year, over a 2 month period, I was home a total of 7 days which was really crazy as I would come back from an international trip, stay 1 day then leave on another…my goal is to not be away from home for more than 2 weeks at a time, occasionally 3 but then be home for at least 2 as I have so much I am trying to do at home…the key will be to stay positive and only focus on the day I am in, as is my goal every day. With the complication of the Coronavirus, international travel is suspect but this visit, with 10 cities throughout Brazil, has been so challenging I will go, keeping an eye on US advisories for Brazil…at this time, there are none, as far as I know…for all my friends in Brazil, I will include the itinerary…I hope you can come by to say hi...
 I know it has been a while since I have written, I am still trying to find out why the pictures come through as a link…I am sending this from my desktop computer, to verify it isn’t the lap top…

So many great things happening in the space program….visit the subject links to get the latest info

Time for me to pack…I leave in 4 hours…wishing you a wonderful day...we have to remember to always do our best, enjoy everything we do, live in the present, make each day special, let those we care about most know, smile and have fun… :-) :-)   love ya, Gabe



Tiny star's violent outburst catches astronomers' attention — years later

An artist's depiction of a stellar flare from an L dwarf star.
(Image: © ESA)



The little star, which is only about 8% of the sun's mass, belched a huge "superflare <https://www.space.com/massive-stellar-flare-detected-from-distant-star.html>" of X-rays. It's a strange thing to observe for astronomers, who thought a star that small couldn't create such a large emission in that wavelength of light. This star is very diminutive by cosmic standards. Known as J0331-27, the star is an L dwarf, the category of star so small that each star's mass is just barely enough to allow for nuclear fusion. ("Failed stars" that don't meet the mass threshold are called brown dwarfs <https://www.space.com/42790-brown-dwarfs-coolest-stars-hottest-planets.html>.
Related: Our X-ray universe: amazing photos by NASA's Chandra X-Ray Observatory <https://www.space.com/17075-pictures-chandra-x-ray-observatory-space-telescope.html>



Falling Fireballs Crashed in Chile Last Week. They Weren't Meteorites, Experts Say.

(Image: © Shutterstock)
Chilean officials are investigating a curious collection of burning objects that fell onto parts of the country last week. Goodness gracious! Great balls of fire rained from the sky in Chile last week, and officials are still trying to figure out what they were and where they came from. One thing is certain: The mysterious burning objects were not meteors <https://www.livescience.com/33346-when-space-attacks-6-craziest-meteor-impacts-history.html>, according to news reports.


Mars is a seismically active world, first results from NASA's InSight lander reveal

This image, the second selfie captured by NASA's InSight Mars lander, is a mosaic of 14 photos taken between March 15 and April 11, 2019.
(Image: © NASA/JPL-Caltech

InSight has recorded about 450 marsquakes to date. Mars may be cold and dry, but it's far from dead.
The first official science results from NASA's quake-hunting InSight Mars lander <https://www.space.com/40067-mars-insight-lander.html> just came out, and they reveal a regularly roiled world. "We've finally, for the first time, established that Mars <https://www.space.com/47-mars-the-red-planet-fourth-planet-from-the-sun.html> is a seismically active planet," InSight principal investigator Bruce Banerdt, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, said during a teleconference with reporters Thursday (Feb. 20)

Martian seismicity falls between that of the moon <https://www.space.com/55-earths-moon-formation-composition-and-orbit.html> and that of Earth, Banerdt added. "In fact, it's probably close to the kind of seismic activity you would expect to find away from the [tectonic] plate boundaries on Earth and away from highly deformed areas," he said. Related: Mars InSight in photos: NASA's mission to probe Martian core <https://www.space.com/17199-nasa-mars-insight-lander-mission-gallery.html>
Hubble telescope test inspires changes to combat gender bias in some NASA programs

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope launched in 1990 and has been a crucial scientific instrument.
(Image: © NASA)

Stars don't see gender, and now, NASA <https://www.space.com/38700-nasa-history.html> is working to not see it either when allocating telescope time to scientists, inspired by a successful experiment with the Hubble Space Telescope <https://www.space.com/15892-hubble-space-telescope.html>. That experiment tested the hypothesis that if proposals are evaluated without knowledge of who wrote them and strictly on the merit of the science they proposed to do, the astronomers who received highly coveted observing time would end up being a more diverse group <https://www.space.com/35302-astronomers-ask-for-diversity-decadal-survey.html>. That's the principle behind dual-anonymous review, in which reviewers don't know who submitted which proposals and proposers don't know who reviewed their submissions. Dual-anonymous review is an attempt to reduce the warping power of implicit bias in the traditional review system, in which reviewers are anonymous but proposals include scientists' names. "We have noticed that in many of our proposal selections, there appears to be a bias in favor of one gender of proposer over another," NASA Astrophysics Division Director Paul Hertz said during a town hall conversation held last month at the 235th meeting of the American Astronomical Society <https://www.space.com/topics/american-astronomical-society>, in Honolulu.

Related: Women in space: A gallery of firsts <https://www.space.com/16143-women-space-firsts-gallery.html>

With eye on moon, NASA to seek new astronaut applicants in March




NASA will again accept applications for new astronauts beginning March 2 through March 31, 2020. The new recruits, members of NASA's 23rd class of astronaut candidates, will train for expeditions to the space station and Artemis flights to the moon. (Image credit: NASA)

As NASA prepares to launch American astronauts this year on American rockets from American soil to the International Space Station – with an eye toward the Moon and Mars – the agency is announcing it will accept applications March 2 to 31 for the next class of Artemis <http://www.nasa.gov/artemis> Generation astronauts. Since the 1960s, NASA has selected 350 people to train as astronaut candidates for its increasingly challenging missions to explore space. With 48 astronauts in the active astronaut corps, more will be needed to crew spacecraft bound for multiple destinations and propel exploration forward as part of Artemis missions and beyond. “We’re celebrating our 20th year of continuous presence aboard the International Space Station in low-Earth orbit this year, and we’re on the verge of sending the first woman and next man to the Moon by 2024,” said NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine. “For the handful of highly talented women and men we will hire to join our diverse astronaut corps, it’s an incredible time in human spaceflight to be an astronaut. We’re asking all eligible Americans if they have what it to takes to apply beginning March 2.” The basic requirements to apply include United States citizenship and a master’s degree in a STEM field, including engineering, biological science, physical science, computer science, or mathematics, from an accredited institution. The requirement for the master’s degree can also be met by:

Two years (36 semester hours or 54 quarter hours) of work toward a Ph.D. program in a related science, technology, engineering or math field;
A completed doctor of medicine or doctor of osteopathic medicine degree;
Completion (or current enrollment that will result in completion by June 2021) of a nationally recognized test pilot school program.
Candidates also must have at least two years of related, progressively responsible professional experience, or at least 1,000 hours of pilot-in-command time in jet aircraft. Astronaut candidates must pass the NASA long-duration spaceflight physical. Americans may apply to #BeAnAstronaut at: www.usajobs.gov <http://www.usajobs.gov/> 
As part of the application process, applicants will, for the first time, be required to take an online assessment that will require up to two hours to complete. After completing training, the new astronauts could launch on American rockets and spacecraft developed for NASA’s Commercial Crew Program to live and work aboard the International Space Station, 250 miles above Earth, where they will take part in experiments that benefit life at home and prepare us for more distant exploration. They may also launch on NASA’s powerful new Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft, docking the spacecraft at the Gateway in lunar orbit before taking a new human landing system to the Moon’s surface. After returning humans to the Moon in 2024, NASA plans to establish sustainable lunar exploration by 2028. Gaining new experiences on and around the Moon will prepare NASA to send the first humans to Mars in the mid-2030s.NASA expects to select the new class of astronaut candidates in mid-2021 to begin training as the next class of Artemis Generation astronauts.
For more information about a career as a NASA astronaut, and application requirements, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/astronauts <http://www.nasa.gov/astronauts>

    																	"Pale Blue Dot"

NASA/JPL-Caltech


It's hard to be simultaneously one of the most and least dramatic pictures ever taken, but the celebrated "Pale Blue Dot" image achieves that curious distinction. Taken on Feb. 14, 1990 by the Voyager 1 probe, when it was 6 billion km (3.7 billion miles) from Earth, the picture captures the home planet as nothing but a pinpoint, serendipitously lying within a bright band that was an artifact of sunlight interacting with the camera's optics. NASA released an updated and sharpened version of the image this week to celebrate its 30th anniversary. Voyager 1's camera was shut off shortly after the picture was taken to conserve energy for the long journey ahead—a journey which continues. Three decades on, Voyager 1 has entered interstellar space and is now 22.2 billion km (13.2 billion miles) from Earth.


10 brilliant discoveries NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory made in its first decade in space <https://futureplc.slgnt.eu/optiext/optiextension.dll?ID=_CD_A0OhpzU4uCsxJp1OR%2BEpHRSDqzCoi3pb7DPl5ykWLc_UMfWC%2B7krsbSIJv%2BVmnYB1UczsagbEiVKR5CPsXSHfg%2BnlSb2Stj4h7yJ8NVs7NmS2e> (go to this link)



This week, NASA is celebrating the 10th anniversary of its Solar Dynamics Observatory <https://www.space.com/22081-solar-dynamics-observatory.html> (SDO), a sensitive spacecraft that has shown the world never-before-seen imagery of the sun. 

The mission launched <https://www.space.com/7902-nasa-launches-spacecraft-study-sun.html> on Feb. 11, 2010, and during the spacecraft's first decade in orbit, it has viewed planets crossing in front of the sun, studied the activity of sun's scorching outer atmosphere (known as the corona <https://www.space.com/40886-total-solar-eclipse-timelapse-video.html>) and witnessed nearly an entire 11-year solar cycle <https://www.space.com/new-sunspot-solar-cycle-begins.html>.

To celebrate 10 years of solar science from SDO, NASA has highlighted the top 10 most amazing discoveries to come out of the data and scientific imagery collected by the spacecraft over the past decade. 

Video: Amazing sun views and science delivered in 10 Years of NASA SDO <https://videos.space.com/m/qig5n7hK/amazing-sun-views-and-science-delivered-in-10-years-of-nasa-sdo?list=9wzCTV4g>
Related: Scientists' favorite photos from the Solar Dynamics Observatory <https://www.space.com/28328-solar-dynamics-observatory-favorite-sun-photos.html>





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