In case you are keeping track:
Extraterrestrials lurking in our solar system, says top astronomer
The lingering question of whether humans are alone in the universe is a topic of hot debate, with Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb reaffirming his belief that extraterrestrials have recently passed through our solar system in a vessel shaped like a "comet".
A mysterious cigar-shaped object that zipped through the Milky Way at lightning pace in 2017 was largely deemed by scientific bodies, including the European Space Agency, to be a comet, ejected from another star system.
Children's museum solar system campaign continues despite theft of display | WCLO
Janesville police are investigating the theft and damage to a local non-profit's educational display.
The Children's Museum of Rock County is running a Rock The Solar System Campaign all of February, but their light-up display of the sun was stolen Friday night.
With the help of the public, Janesville police found the sun damaged in a yard on the 400 block of Centerway Street Saturday afternoon.
Museum president Claire Gray said the plastic dome was assembled by volunteers and cost more than $2,000. The Janesville Art League has volunteered to create a replacement.
Oldest Carbonates in the Solar System – Heidelberg Ion Probe Used to Date Flensburg Meteorite
Flensburg meteorite with black fusion crust: Parts of the fusion crust were lost during the flight through the atmosphere. The small fragment, weighing 24,5 grams, is about 4.5 billion years old. Credit: A. Bischoff / M. Patzek, University of Münster
Carbonates are ubiquitous rocks on Earth. They can be found in the mountain ranges of the Dolomites, the chalk cliffs on the island of Rügen, and in the coral reefs of the oceans. They remove large amounts of the greenhouse gas CO2 from the atmosphere, making them relevant for the climate. Unlike the Earth of today, there were no carbonate rocks during the formation of primordial earth, when our planet was blazing hot.
Other things to check out:
Sun stolen from Rock Co. Children's Museum's solar system exhibit found damaged
JANESVILLE, Wis. (WMTV) - A lighted dome depicting the sun was found at 10 a.m. Saturday, but badly damaged after being stolen from the Children's Museum of Rock County's solar system exhibit just hours after being erected, police say.
The light display was erected around 9:30 p.m Friday as part of the Rock the Solar System exhibit—a solar system scavenger hunt created for kids in the community.
Officials said a witness saw a man in a blue letterman jacket physically dragging the dome across the Centerway Bridge around 11 p.m. Friday.
The Beginning to the End of the Universe: Our solar system's origins | Astronomy.com
It came from a giant molecular cloud — a collection of gas up to 600 light-years in diameter with the mass of 10 million Suns — which had been circling the Milky Way for who knows how many years. The pull of gravity caused some of this cloud to collapse, until it heated up enough to emit light.
That much astronomers know. But what caused this gas cloud to collapse in the first place remains the subject of vigorous debate.
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As the central mass grew, so too did the strength of gravity compacting it. This raised the pressure inside and heated it, causing it to emit infrared radiation. This clump of mainly hydrogen and helium was now a protostar — a phase that, for stars like the Sun, lasts about half a million years. The protostar continued to accrete mass as material from the cloud — which by this time had formed a disk around the central object — rained onto its surface.
Could The Surface Of Phobos Reveal Secrets Of Mars' Past? - SpaceRef
The Martian moon Phobos orbits through a stream of charged atoms and molecules that flow off the Red Planet's atmosphere, new research shows.
Many of these charged particles, or ions, of oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, and argon, have been escaping Mars for billions of years as the planet has been shedding its atmosphere. Some ions, scientists predict, have been smashing into the surface of Phobos and could be preserved in its uppermost layer, according to a paper published on Feb. 1 in the journal Nature Geoscience.
Three exciting alien moons to get first look up close in nearly 20 years
Jupiter's moon Io—a volcano world orbiting the planet once every 42 hours—casts its shadow on the Jovian clouds in this image from NASA's Juno spacecraft.
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After five years orbiting Jupiter, NASA's Juno spacecraft is spiraling into the heart of the Jovian system.
The four-year, 42-orbit journey will plunge the craft into a treacherous, brutal environment—while offering new, dramatic views of three alien worlds. But Juno, sheathed in titanium armor that protects it from harsh radiation, is ready for its mission. And its team back on Earth is eager to follow it from afar during this daring voyage.
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