As the NASA New Horizons team waited expectantly for “the biggest planetary unveiling in a quarter-century,” space exploration was definitely high on our readers’ mind this week. Our top most-visited stories included mysterious plasma waves in the Van Allen Radiation Belts, discovery of a remarkable class of particles known as pentaquarks, news that our Sun’s irregular “heartbeat” is driven by a double dynamo, an awe-inspiring image of flaring, active regions of our Sun, and an eight-minute time-lapse video of Opportunity’s Epic Mars Marathon.
Time-lapse! 8-minute NASA Video shows Opportunity’s Epic Mars Marathon
NASA has released a new video in which a compilation of images taken by the Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity’s hazard-avoidance cameras between January 2004 and April 2015 reveals an awe-inspiring rover’s-eye-view of the 26.2-mile marathon from its landing location, as a corresponding map of the rover’s path appears alongside. Audio is derived from vibration measurements from the rover’s accelerometer.
Flaring, Active Regions of our Sun
Flaring, active regions of our sun are highlighted in this new image combining observations from several telescopes. High-energy X-rays from NASA’s Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) are shown in blue; low-energy X-rays from Japan’s Hinode spacecraft are green; and extreme ultraviolet light from NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) is yellow and red. All three telescopes captured their solar images around the same time.
Sun’s Irregular Heartbeat driven by Double Dynamo
A new model of the Sun’s solar cycle is producing unprecedentedly accurate predictions of irregularities within the Sun’s 11-year heartbeat. The model draws on dynamo effects in two layers of the Sun, one close to the surface and one deep within its convection zone. Predictions from the model suggest that solar activity will fall by 60 percent during the 2030s to conditions last seen during the ‘mini ice age’ that began in 1645.
After 50-year Search, Large Hadron Collider discovers Pentaquarks
CERN’s Large Hadron Collider announced July 14, 2015, that researchers discovered a remarkable class of particles known as pentaquarks that could reshape scientists’ understanding about the properties of matter. Physicists have been searching pentaquarks for almost 50 years.
Mysterious Plasma Waves in Van Allen Radiation Belts Explained
In the 1960s, NASA launched six satellites to study the Earth’s atmosphere, magnetosphere and the space between Earth and the moon. Using observations from those satellites, a UCLA graduate student detected mysterious plasma waves in the Van Allen radiation belts, the donut-shaped rings surrounding the Earth that contain high-energy particles trapped by the planet’s magnetic field. Now, after nearly a half century…
