Image Credit: NASA
Host: Jorge Salazar
Lead Producer: Mike Brennan
This week’s featured stories:
What makes a star blow up? Jorge Salazar speaks with Dr. Brad Schaefer of Louisiana State University about what causes a type 1a supernovae, and what cosmological lessons the remnants of these explosions have for us.
Global Night Sky Deborah Byrd talks about how the sun has been super active so far in 2012, and about seeing auroras.
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Jupiter, upper left, moon and Venus, lower right. Image via Fay Knight in the UK, earlier today.
If your skies are clear on the evening of January 28, 2012, there’s no way you can miss the dazzling planets Venus and Jupiter. At evening dusk or nightfall, look first for the moon in the western sky. Venus, the thir brightest body after the sun and moon, beams like a lighthouse beneath the moon, while Jupiter, the fourth brightest celestial body, shines mightily above it.
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Most recent Blue Marble image, a composite made from multiple images acquired on January 4, 2012. Credit: NASA/NOAA/GSFC/Suomi NPP/VIIRS/Norman Kuring
This week (January 25, 2012), NASA released what it said is the “most amazing high definition image of Earth” ever. It’s part of NASA’s Blue Marble series. It’s composite image that uses a number of swaths of the Earth’s surface taken on January 4, 2012.
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Read the full articleMales house mice sing songs of individuality and kinship to attract mates, according to a paper in the journal Physiology & Behavior in January 2012. Although the vocalizations are inaudible to human ears, when playbacks of recorded songs are slowed down their similarity to bird song becomes striking.
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Sun and moon appear same size, approximately, as seen from Earth. Image via Gabrielle Wang
At this particular moment in Earth’s history – although the sun’s diameter is about 400 times larger than that of the moon – the sun is also about 400 times farther away. So the sun and moon appear nearly the same size as seen from Earth. And that’s why we on Earth can sometimes witness that most amazing of spectacles, a total eclipse of the sun – or even an annular solar eclipse like the one coming up on May 20, 2012. What are the odds?
Read the full articleDid you know there’s going to be an annular eclipse of the sun visible from the southwestern U.S. on May 20, 2012? Here’s more information about that eclipse. It reminded me of this wonderful video from Hinode, a Japanese satellite that has been orbiting Earth since 2006, of a January 4, 2011 solar eclipse – as seen from space. The eclipse was partial from Earth’s surface, but annular as seen by the satellite. Check out this video:
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Image Credit: USDA
Thousands of wildfires raged across the United States last year, 2011, burning a record amount of land, especially in the southern U.S. In fact, 2011 the third-most-active fire season since 1960 (when this record-keeping began) with respect to acres burned, according to preliminary data released from the National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) in late December 2011. The NIFC will be releasing an official summary report detailing the 2011 wildfire season later in 2012.
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Photo credit: Jolante
Keeping friends close has real physiological and psychological benefits, according to a January 2012 study in the journal Developmental Psychology.
The presence of a best friend directly and immediately benefits children going through negative experiences, says the report. Feelings of self-worth and levels of cortisol, a hormone produced naturally by the adrenal gland in direct response to stress, are largely dependent on the social context of a negative experience.
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Jupiter's Great Red Spot, seen by Voyager spacecraft
Venus and Jupiter are the sky’s two most brilliant planets. In late January 2012, they are the first “stars” to pop out at evening dusk, and they are near the waxing crescent moon in the sky. These evenings views of the moon, Venus and Jupiter – around January 25-31 – aren’t to be missed. But don’t forget the other planets! The other planet that will “wow” you in early 2012 is Mars. It is now gearing up for its opposition to the sun in early March 2012. In other words, in the coming months Mars will become extremely noticeable in our sky – more noticeable than it’s been for two years.
Read the full articleHave you been watching Venus in the evening sky? It’s beautiful – especially when it’s near the moon.
Moon between Venus and Jupiter on January 27
Moon still between Venus and Jupiter on January 28
Venus is so much brighter than any other planet viewed in the sky. Why is it so bright?
Photo credit: James Jordan
Kristin O’Brien is an Associate Professor of Biology University of Alaska Institute of Arctic Biology. She is interested in the unique biochemical and physiological characteristics that have evolved in fishes living in the chronically cold environment of Antarctica’s Southern Ocean. One of the most striking characteristics among the Antarctic fishes of the family Channichthyidae, known…read more »
Kristin O’Brien: Antarctic icefishes have translucent bodies and blood
Sukanya Chakarbarti is faculty member in the physics department at Florida Atlantic University. She researches the dynamical evolution of galaxies, with the goal of developing astrophysical probes of fundamental physics. Chakrabarti works on understanding galaxy evolution by performing hydrodynamical and magnetohydrodynamical simulations of galaxies combined with radiative transfer calculations. Dr. Chakrabarti has co-authored over 30…read more »
Judy Cheng works to learn to about galaxy formation by looking at our own Milky Way. She says that “detailed observations of our galaxy can be used to test predictions made by models of disk formation and evolution, and they complement the large surveys that study galaxies at high redshift. For the Milky Way in…read more »
Gavin A. Schmidt is a climatologist and climate modeler at the NASA GISS. He works on the variability of the ocean circulation and climate, using general circulation models (GCMs). He has also worked on ways to reconcile paleo-data with models. He helped develop the GISS ocean and coupled GCMs to improve the representation of the…read more »
Pamela A. Silver is a Professor in the Department of Systems Biology at Harvard Medical School and a founding core faculty member of the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering of Harvard University. Dr. Silver’s research focus is on building cell-based machines, designing novel therapeutics, and reengineering photosynthetic bacteria to produce hydrogen and other fuels….read more »
Looking to nature to solve human problems
Scientists at Shell talk about energy challenges and solutions
Hear about how satellites are helping scientists understand Earth’s changing environment.
Earth’s population is now 7 billion, with 9 billion projected for 2050. How will humanity handle its crowded future?
Listen to Shell experts talk about how they ensure safety in the oil and gas industry.
