BEIJING -- A Chinese probe was orbiting the moon on Monday in preparation for the returning of samples of the lunar surface to Earth for the first time in almost 45 years.
The ascent module of the Chang'e 5 spacecraft transferred a container with 2 kilograms (4.4 pounds) of samples after docking with the robot spacecraft on Sunday and was then cut free.
The orbiter and reentry vehicle will circle the moon for another week awaiting a narrow time window to make the roughly three-day, 383,000-kilometer (238,000-mile) journey back to Earth. It will first "bounce" off the Earth's atmosphere to slow its speed before the reentry vehicle separates and floats down on parachutes to land on the vast steppes of Inner Mongolia, where China's Shenzhou crewed spaceships have also made their landings.
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Not an asteroid after all: Object orbiting Earth is 54-year-old rocket, NASA’s JPL confirms
A mysterious object temporarily orbiting Earth is a 54-year-old rocket, not an asteroid after all, astronomers confirmed Wednesday.
Observations by a telescope in Hawaii clinched its identity, according to NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.
The object was classified as an asteroid after its discovery in September. But NASA's top asteroid expert, Paul Chodas, quickly suspected it was the Centaur upper rocket stage from Surveyor 2, a failed 1966 moon-landing mission. Size estimates had put it in the range of the old Centaur, which was about 32 feet long and 10 feet in diameter.
News | Follow Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich in Real Time As It Orbits Earth
When Sentinel-6 Michael Freilich was encapsulated in the payload fairing of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, it was the last time human eyes would have a close-up look at the satellite. But now that the spacecraft is in orbit after launching from Vandenberg Air Force Base in central California on Nov. 21, NASA's Eyes on the Earth is keeping track.
The app provides a 3D visualization of the sea-level-monitoring satellite, letting you see where it is right now as it glides over the cloud-covered globe.
Chang'e-5: China's unmanned moon probe delivers samples to orbiting spacecraft | Science | The
A Chinese probe carrying samples from the lunar surface has successfully docked with a spacecraft orbiting the moon, in another space first for the nation, state media reported.
The manoeuvre on Sunday was part of the ambitious Chang'e-5 mission – named after a mythical Chinese Moon goddess – to bring back the first lunar samples in four decades.
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The capsule transferred the moon samples to the orbiter, which will separate and return to Earth, Xinhua said.
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Australian scientists have released the first 'weather report' for planets orbiting Proxima
Astronomers recently detected two rocky planets orbiting Proxima Centauri, a red-dwarf star and the closest star to our sun.
One of those planets was considered to be within the potentially habitable 'Goldilocks zone', where any water could be in liquid form.
But new research suggests the planet may be exposed to extreme weather events, including stellar flares and plasma ejections.
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'This habitable zone is very close to the star; much closer in than Mercury is to our sun,' University of Sydney researcher Andrew Zic said.
Bloomberg - Are you a robot?
Exoplanet around distant star resembles our reputed 'Planet Nine' | Berkeley News
Artist's impression of the exoplanet HD 106906 b located a great distance away from the central binary star and the disk of dusty material that surrounds it (Image courtesy of ESA/Hubble, M. Kornmesser).
Astronomers are still searching for a hypothetical "Planet Nine" in the distant reaches of our solar system, but an exoplanet 336 light years from Earth is looking more and more like the Planet Nine of its star system .
Planet Nine, potentially 10 times the size of Earth and orbiting far beyond Neptune in a highly eccentric orbit about the sun, was proposed in 2012 to explain perturbations in the orbits of dwarf planets just beyond Neptune's orbit, so-called detached Kuiper Belt objects. It has yet to be found, if it exists.
Astronomers Just Found Cosmic 'Superhighways' For Fast Travel Through The Solar System
Invisible structures generated by gravitational interactions in the Solar System have created a "space superhighway" network, astronomers have discovered.
These channels enable the fast travel of objects through space, and could be harnessed for our own space exploration purposes, as well as the study of comets and asteroids.
By applying analyses to both observational and simulation data, a team of researchers led by Nataša Todorović of Belgrade Astronomical Observatory in Serbia observed that these superhighways consist of a series of connected arches inside these invisible structures, called space manifolds - and each planet generates its own manifolds, together creating what the researchers have called "a true celestial autobahn".
Happening on Twitter
The Hunter Biden Criminal Probe Bolsters a Chinese Scholar's Claim About Beijing's Influence With the Biden Adminis… https://t.co/EK9X93Tg2t ggreenwald (from GlennGreenwald@gmail.com) Thu Dec 10 00:35:10 +0000 2020
Hunter Biden's association with Chinese nationals linked to CCP resulted in millions of dollars in cash flow. https://t.co/U3JjWkDovN IngrahamAngle (from DC) Thu Dec 10 10:51:43 +0000 2020
Swalwell wants a probe into who leaked his relationship with the spy but not that he had one https://t.co/mg5R8gmtB5 DLoesch (from Texas, USA) Wed Dec 09 22:49:09 +0000 2020
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