I don't know what the flip this is:



Enjoy!

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Cosmic Mother's Day Treat: See Jupiter and the Moon Sunday

Don't forget to call your mothers!

http://www.space.com/21087-jupiter-moon ... s-day.html

Go buy your mommy a star! I mean, its not like she can go there and set up shop. but flowers die a whole lot quicker than starts.

http://starregistry.com/

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Astronauts May Take Emergency Spacewalk to Fix Space Station Leak

http://www.space.com/21066-emergency-sp ... -leak.html

Oh snap! Some serious crap going down at...on...around? the ISS!

Astronauts on the International Space Station are preparing for a possible emergency spacewalk tomorrow (May 11) to fix a serious leak of ammonia coolant on the orbiting laboratory.

I mean, if it were me, I would take any excuse ever to suit up and go dance in space, but this sounds kinda serious. Let's make sure to wish our boys and girls luck.

Chris Hadfield, that handsome, beautiful Canadian, has this to say:

"Good Morning, Earth! Big change in plans, spacewalk tomorrow, Chris Cassidy and Tom Marshburn are getting suits and airlock ready," Hadfield wrote. "Cool!"

That guy rules. Same to Chris Cassidy and Tom Marshburn. You guys are freaking awesome. Forever.

I was kinda worried, but apparently things are more or less cool:

"The crew is not in danger, and the station continues to operate normally otherwise," agency officials wrote today in a statement. "Work is underway to reroute power channels to maintain full operation of the systems normally controlled by the solar array that is cooled by the suspect loop."

This answers some more questions about the ammonia leak:

http://www.space.com/21067-space-statio ... k-faq.html

Just wish them luck and hug your mommies.
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Gany's Galaxy


Guys, let's talk about exoplanets!

So far, astronomers have identified and confirmed over 800 planets outside of our solar system, known as exoplanets. Due to the relative brightness of the stars around which these planets orbit, we usually detect them from either their gravitational effect on the star, or the difference observed in the stars spectrum when the planet passes in front of it. Because of this, we usually only detect large planets that are very close to their host planet, many of which are about the size and composition of Jupiter (but much more dense), and so close to their star that they complete a full orbit in about 10 days. Some rocky terrestrial planets have been discovered too, often much larger than Earth and much closer to the host star. It would seem that the best place to look for these exoplanets would be around stars similar to our own Sun, but recent discoveries show that planets can occur in areas of the galaxy that were previously thought unlikely.

Stars form in clusters, and most of the time, when formation is complete the stars spread out, or sometimes form pairs in a binary system. In some clusters however, especially very young ones, the stars remain close together for a longer period of time. Exoplanets have been detected around individual stars and in binary systems, but were thought to be extremely rare in star clusters, as it was supposed that any material that could form planets would instead be used up in the creation of stars, or devoured or dispersed by nearby stars before planetary formation could occur.

(Here are some sweet exoplanets: http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2013/0 ... sting-life)

But today, astronomers from NASA/ESA announced their findings from studying a selection of White Dwarf stars in the Hyades cluster:



In two cases, evidence of the remains of rocky planets has been found. The spectrum from the stars confirm the presence of silicon in the atmosphere and region surrounding the White Dwarf. Since silicon is a major constituent of terrestrial planets, this would suggest that rocky planets were probably present, and destroyed when the star exploded at the end of its life. There may be discs of matter surrounding these stars containing rocky debris, and it is thought that some terrestrial planets may yet remain.



This discovery has caused quite a stir in the astronomical community (imagine many raised eyebrows, and adjusting of spectacles in astonishment), because the possibility that the formation of planets is common within star clusters opens up a whole new area of investigation in our search to find Earth-like planets, and gives us new insight into the mechanics behind planetary formation and evolution.

http://phys.org/news/2013-05-hubble-dea ... etary.html

Read more about the search for exoplanets: http://planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov/
...and how we detect them: http://phys.org/news/2013-05-sifting-at ... orlds.html
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That was awesome, you guys! Share this on facebook and twitter. Well, unless you HATE SPACE.