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UPI
19 minutes ago
- UPI
NASA teams with India to launch Earth-tracking satellite
The NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar, or NISAR, the first joint satellite of the Indian Space Research Organisation, or ISRO, and NASA, is launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in Sriharikota, India on Wednesday. EPA/Ragul Krishnan July 30 (UPI) -- NASA announced Wednesday it, in a partnership with the Indian Space Research Organization, launched a radar system to map Earth as never before. The NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar, or NISAR, satellite blasted off from Satish Dhawan Space Centre on the island of Sriharikota in the state of Andhra Pradesh in India at 8:10 a.m. EDT Wednesday. NISAR, which NASA described in a press release as "a critical part of the United States-India civil-space cooperation," will orbit from 464 miles above Earth, and use a pair of radar instruments to monitor almost the planet's land and ice-covered surfaces twice every 12 days. The NISAR mission is the first such undertaking between NASA and ISRO, in which the two agencies co-developed hardware for an Earth-observing mission. Intended to keep track of the Earth's forests and wetland ecosystems, it will also note any deformation and motion of the world's frozen surfaces and detect any movement of Earth's crust, down to fractions of an inch. These measurements are key for researchers to better understand how the Earth's surface behaves before, during and following potential geological upheavals such as landslides, earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. NISAR will also provide data that details long-term changes in the Earth's ecological systems, such as wetlands, permafrost, forests and agricultural areas. "Congratulations to the entire NISAR mission team on a successful launch that spanned across multiple time zones and continents in the first-ever partnership between NASA and ISRO on a mission of this sheer magnitude," said NASA's Associate Administrator for the Science Mission Directorate Science Mission Directorate Dr. Nicola Fox in the release. "Where moments are most critical, NISAR's data will help ensure the health and safety of those impacted on Earth, as well as the infrastructure that supports them, for the benefit of all," she added. "With this successful launch, we are at the threshold of fulfilling the immense scientific potential NASA and ISRO envisioned for the NISAR mission more than 10 years ago," said ISRO Chairperson Dr. Vanniyaperumal Narayanan. "The powerful capability of this radar mission will help us study Earth's dynamic land and ice surfaces in greater detail than ever before." The NISAR satellite is the first free-flying space mission to feature both an L-band system and an S-band radar system, which are attuned to recognize features of various sizes and particular attributes, from forest biomass and agricultural ecosystems to soil moisture and the motion of ice and land. "The mission's measurements will be global but its applications deeply local, as people everywhere will use its data to plan for a resilient future," said NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory director Dave Gallagher in the release.
USA Today
2 hours ago
- USA Today
Could comet 3I/ATLAS be alien technology? Controversial Harvard astrophysicist says yes
An interstellar object whizzing through our solar system was widely determined to be a comet. But a trio of researchers led by Avi Loeb recently posed a different idea. One thing about 3I/ATLAS is for certain: It's definitely not from Earth's solar system. But what exactly is the intriguing interstellar object discovered speeding through our cosmic neighborhood? Most astrophysicists widely agree that 3I/ATLAS displays all the tell-tale signs of an icy comet. Now, a trio of researchers led by Avi Loeb, a controversial astrophysicist from Harvard University, are positing a very different theory: What if 3I/ATLAS isn't just some random space rock that incurred upon our solar system by happenstance, but an intelligently controlled alien spacecraft? Even the authors of the recent research paper posing the wild idea aren't completely sold on it, but – hey – extraterrestrial visitors are always fun to think about. Black holes: Physicists detect largest-ever merger of 2 black holes equal in size to 240 suns What is 3I/ATLAS? A comet known as 3I/ATLAS made news earlier in July when it was confirmed to have originated outside of Earth's solar system, making it just one of three known interstellar objects ever discovered in our cosmic neighborhood. What's more, the object, which scientists estimate to be more than 12 miles wide, is whizzing at 37 miles per second relative to the sun on a trajectory that on Oct. 30 will bring it within about 130 million miles of Earth, according to NASA. A telescope in Chile – part of the NASA-funded Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) – was the first to spot what initially looked like an unknown asteroid on a path potentially coming close to Earth's orbit. The observation was reported to the Minor Planet Center, the official authority for observing and reporting new asteroids, comets and other small bodies in the solar system. The object, eventually confirmed as a comet and named 3I/ATLAS, was later confirmed to have interstellar origins after follow-up observations. Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb suggests 3I/ATLAS is alien tech But is 3I/ATLAS definitely an icy comet? A trio of researchers that most prominently includes Avi Loeb, an astrophysicist at Harvard University, recently published a paper speculating about whether the object could be "hostile" alien technology. Loeb, who is renowned for encouraging astrophysicists to have an open mind about extraterrestrials, is the co-founder of the Galileo Project, a research program at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics dedicated to the scientific search for extraterrestrials. The recent paper that Loeb co-authored, uploaded July 16 to the preprint server arXiv, is more a "pedagogical exercise" examining the unusual trajectory of 3I/ATLAS and how fast it is traveling through space than a study meant to offer definitive conclusions. The paper has also, it's important to say, not been peer-reviewed. Loeb further explained the new paper in a blog post on Medium, writing that it was simply an "interesting exercise in its own right, and is fun to explore." "This hypothesis proposes that our cosmic neighborhood is dangerous, filled with intelligent civilizations that are hostile and silent to avoid detection by potential predators," Loeb wrote. However, experts who spoke to science news website LiveScience cast serious doubt on Loeb's sensational theory. "Any suggestion that it's artificial is nonsense on stilts, and is an insult to the exciting work going on to understand this object," Chris Lintott, an astronomer at the University of Oxford who was part of the team that simulated 3I/ATLAS's galactic origins, told Live Science. Even Loeb admits that 3I/ATLAS being alien technology is unlikely. "By far, the most likely outcome will be that 3I/ATLAS is a completely natural interstellar object, probably a comet," he wrote in the blog post. Loeb previously claimed metallic spheres were extraterrestrial This is far from the first time that Loeb had theorized that an object in our solar system could be not only interstellar, but an extraterrestrial artifact. Loeb made headlines in August 2023 when he claimed that remnants of a meteor he and a team recovered in the Pacific Ocean were interstellar in origin. An unusual meteorite Loeb and his team named IM1 had crashed into Earth's atmosphere in 2014. The researchers then retrieved suspected remnants of the meteor in June 2023 off the coast of Papua New Guinea. By August, Loeb announced that early analysis suggested the metallic spherules were composed of substance unmatched to any existing alloys in our solar system. At the time, Loeb did not yet have an answer to the question of whether the metallic spheres were either artificial or natural in origin. Loeb also theorized that comet Oumuamua was alien spaceship In 2017, the comet Oumuamua, Hawaiian for 'scout' or 'messenger,' became the first interstellar object ever detected flying through the solar system, puzzling scientists with its strange shape and trajectory. But Loeb posited that the comet − as long as a football field and thin like a cigar − was able to accelerate as it approached the sun by harnessing its solar power as a "light sail," not unlike the way a ship's sail catches the wind. Because no natural phenomenon would be capable of such space travel, Loeb was essentially suggesting Oumuamua could have been an alien spaceship. A study in March explained the comet's odd orbit as a simple physical mechanism thought to be common among many icy comets: outgassing of hydrogen as the comet warmed in the sunlight. The only other time an interstellar object has been spotted traveling through our solar system occurred in 2019 when comet Borisov passed by. Contributing: Mary Walrath-Holdridge, USA TODAY Eric Lagatta is the Space Connect reporter for the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at elagatta@
Yahoo
2 hours ago
- Yahoo
India and US launch 'first-of-its-kind' satellite
Indian and US space agencies have launched a new satellite which will keep a hawk's eye on Earth, detecting and reporting even the smallest changes in land, sea, and ice sheets. Data from the joint mission by Indian Space agency Isro and Nasa will help not just the two countries but the world in preparing and dealing with disasters. The 2,392kg Nasa-Isro Synthetic Aperture Radar (Nisar) was launched at 17:40 India time (12:10 GMT) on Wednesday from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in south India. The satellite comes close on the heels of the Axiom-4 mission which saw an Indian astronaut going to the International Space Station for the first time. Nasa, which already has more than two dozen observation satellites in space, says Nisar is the "most sophisticated radar we've ever built" and that it will be able to spot the "minutest of changes anywhere in the world". The "first-of-its-kind satellite" will be the first in space to watch Earth using two different radar frequencies - Nasa's L-band and Isro's S-band. The satellite will be shot into the "sun-synchronous polar orbit", which means it will pass over the same areas of Earth at a regular interval, observing and mapping changes to our planet's surface, former Nasa scientist Mila Mitra told the BBC. Nasa and Isro say Nisar will revisit the same spot every 12 days. It will detect changes and land, ice, or coastal shifts as small as centimetres, says Ms Mitra. Repeated scans will generate rich data, helping Nasa and Isro ground stations support disaster preparedness and track climate change impacts, she added. Scientists say Earth's surface is constantly changing due to natural and human activities, and even small shifts can impact the planet. "Some of these changes happen slowly, some abruptly, some are small while some are subtle," Nasa's director of Earth Sciences Karen St Germain, who is in India for the launch, told a pre-launch press conference. "With Nisar, we'll see the precursors to natural hazards such as earthquakes, landslides and volcanoes; we'll see land subsidence and swelling, movements and deformations, melting of glaciers and ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctica; and we'll see forest fires. "We'll also be able to spot human-induced land changes caused by farming and infrastructure projects such as buildings and bridges," she said. The satellite will take 90 days to fully deploy and will start collecting data once tests on all its systems are complete. The $1.5bn joint mission, over a decade in the making, features India's payload, rocket, and launch-pad facilities. Nasa's St Germain said the satellite was special as it was built by scientists "who were at the opposite ends of the globe during the Covid-19 pandemic". Isro chairman V Narayanan told NDTV news channel that the "life-saving satellite" is a symbol of India's rising leadership in space. Talking about Wednesday's launch, he said: "This is going to be yet another great day for India." Indian Science Minister Jitendra Singh has called the mission a defining moment in India-US space cooperation and a boost to Isro's international collaborations. India makes historic landing near Moon's south pole Aditya-L1: India's Sun mission reaches final destination "Nisar is not just a satellite; it is India's scientific handshake with the world," the minister said. The joint mission comes just weeks after astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla travelled to the International Space Station on the AX-4 mission, led by former Nasa veteran Peggy Whitson. India has been making big strides in its space programme recently. In August 2023, the country made history as its Moon mission became the first to land in the lunar south pole region. And last year, it commissioned its first solar observation mission. Isro has announced plans to launch Gaganyaan - the country's first-ever human space flight - in 2027 and has ambitious plans to set up a space station by 2035 and send an astronaut to the Moon by 2040. Follow BBC News India on Instagram, YouTube, Twitter and Facebook Solve the daily Crossword
