5 Things to Know About Alien Planet Kepler-186f, 'Earth's Cousin'

A newly discovered planet nicknamed "Earth's cousin" has just been found 490 light-years from Earth.

The planet, called Kepler-186f, is the first Earth-size planet found in the habitable zone of its star. Only about 10 percent larger than Earth, Kepler-186f is the closest planet to Earth in size ever found in the habitable zone of its star. What else do you need to know about the new alien planet discovery?

Here are five things to keep in mind about Kepler-186f:

Kepler-186f is a history-making find

Kepler-186f is the first Earth-size alien planet found in the habitable zone of its star. That means the planet, which is only slightly larger than Earth, is in the part of its star system where liquid water could exist on the planet's surface. [See artist illustrations of alien planet Kepler-186f]

Astronomers have found other planets in the habitable zones of their stars, but this is the first time a planet this close in size to Earth has ever been found in the habitable zone of its star.

"This is an historic discovery of the first truly Earth-size planet found in the habitable zone around its star," University of California, Berkeley astronomer Geoff Marcy, who is unaffiliated with the new research, said. "This is the best case for a habitable planet yet found. The results are absolutely rock solid. The planet itself may not be [rocky], but I'd bet my house on it. In any case, it's a gem."

Scientists discovered the planet in data collected by NASA's Kepler space telescope.

The rocky alien planet Kepler 186f is an Earth-size world that could have liquid water on its surface, and possibly even life. It orbits a star 490 light-years away.See the full details of alien planet Kepler-186f in this Space.com infographic.
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Life could thrive ... maybe

Because of Kepler-186's location in the habitable zone around its star, the planet might be a place where life can thrive. It's possible that the planet has an atmosphere that can help keep water in liquid form on the surface, a prerequisite for life as it is known on Earth.

Kepler-186f is on the outer edge of the habitable zone, so it is possible that the planet's water could freeze. Its larger size, however, could mean the planet has a thicker atmosphere, insulating the planet, San Francisco State University astronomer and study co-author Stephen Kane said in a statement.

Although they know the alien world is in its star'shabitable zone, scientists still aren't sure what the planet's atmosphere consists of, and they cannot say with certainty that Kepler-186f could support life. The planet is Earth-sized, but it might not be Earth-like.

"Some people call these habitable planets, which of course we have no idea if they are," Kane said in a statement. "We simply know that they are in the habitable zone, and that is the best place to start looking for habitable planets."

It is one of five planets in the Kepler-186 star system

Kepler-186f is one of five planets found in the extrasolar system located about 490 light-years from Earth. The newly discovered exoplanet orbits about 32.5 million miles (52.4 million kilometers) from its sun. It takes Kepler-186f about 130 days to orbit its red dwarf star.

The other four planets orbiting the star, however, are not in that "Goldilocks zone."

"The four companion planets — Kepler-186b, Kepler-186c, Kepler-186d and Kepler-186e — whiz around their sun every four, seven, 13 and 22 days, respectively, making them too hot for life as we know it," NASA officials said in a statement. "These four inner planets all measure less than 1.5 times the size of Earth." [10 Exoplanets That Could Host Alien Life]

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Kepler-186f is an "Earth cousin," not twin

Scientists have described Kepler-186f as a cousin to Earth. The Kepler-186 star is dimmer than the sun, so the planet may be somewhat similar to Earth in size, but its star is not the same as the sun.

"This [Kepler-186f] is an Earth-size planet in the habitable zone of a cooler star," Tom Barclay, Kepler scientist and co-author of the new exoplanet research, told Space.com. "So, while it's not an Earth twin, it is perhaps an Earth cousin. It has similar characteristics, but a different parent."

A true Earth twin, which exoplanet hunters have yet to find, would be the same size as Earth, but also orbit a sun-like star.

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Its star is cooler than the sun

The Kepler-186 star is about half the mass of the sun, and the newly discovered planet is far enough away from its star that powerful flares may not greatly affect the planet, scientists have said. Stars like Kepler-186 also have long stellar life spans.

If Kepler-186f were circling the sun, it would travel within the orbit of the planet Mercury, a planet that is not considered habitable. Because Kepler-186 is a relatively cool, red dwarf star, the planet still lies within the star's habitable zone. The star's brightness at noon on the surface of the planet is comparable to that of the sun an hour before sunset on Earth, NASA officials said.

"This planet is modestly illuminated by its host star, a red dwarf," Marcy said. "This planet basks in an orange-red glow from that star, much [like what] we enjoy at sunset."

Katai Putih Terpanas Ditemukan, 45 Kali Lebih Panas dari Permukaan Matahari

Ilustrasi. Kredit: Getty Images

 - Para astronom dari University of Tübingen dan University of Potsdam telah berhasil mengidentifikasi sebuah bintang katai putih terpanas yang pernah ditemukan di galaksi kita. Dengan suhu diperkirakan 250.000 derajat Celcius, bintang sekarat di pinggiran Bima Sakti ini sudah memasuki fase pendinginan.

Ini juga merupaka pengalaman pertama para astronom dari kedua universitas di atas untuk mengamati awan gas intergalaksi yang bergerak menuju Bima Sakti, yang menunjukkan bahwa galaksi mengumpulkan material-material dari luar angkasa, yang dapat digunakan untuk menciptakan bintang baru. Temuan ini telah diterbitkan dalam jurnal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

Bintang katai putih ini relatif memiliki massa yang rendah, seperti Matahari kita, dan memiliki suhu yang sangat panas menjelang akhir kehidupannya. Suhu permukaan Matahari bahkan kalah panas dari katai putih ini, Matahari memiliki suhu permukaan sekitar 6.000 derajat Celcius, sejak kelahirannya 4,6 miliar tahun yang lalu.

Nantinya, beberapa tahun sebelum sumber energi nuklir Matahari habis dalam waktu sekitar lima miliar tahun dari sekarang, Matahari akan mencapai suhu 30 kali lebih panas dari suhunya saat ini, atau sekitar 180.000 derajat Celcius sebelum mendingin sebagai katai putih. Simulasi komputer menunjukkan bahwa sebuah bintang bisa menjadi lebih panas dari suhu Matahari di masa depan. Suhu tertinggi sebuah bintang sekarat bisa mencapai 200.000 derajat Celcius!

Menariknya, evaluasi peneliti dari spektrum ultraviolet yang didata melalui Teleskop Antariksa Hubble, mencatat sebuah rekor baru di mana sebuah bintang sekarat bisa mencapai suhu 250.000 derajat Celcius. Sebuah suhu yang hanya bisa dicapai oleh bintang yang memiliki massa sekitar 5 kali lebih besar dari Matahari kita.

Diagram letak katai putih RX J0439.8-6809. Kredit: University of Postdam

Bintang katai putih, yang bernama resmi RX J0439.8-6809 (ya, kalian boleh abaikan membaca namanya, atau sebut saja "Bunga"), telah memasuki tahap pendinginan. Bintang ini tampaknya telah mencapai suhu maksimum yang mencapai 400.000 derajat Celcius sekitar seribu tahun yang lalu.

Sayangnya, komposisi kimianya belum bisa dipahami para astronom. Sebuah analisis menunjukkan bahwa karbon dan oksigen ternyata hadir di permukaannya, sebuah gas hasil dari fusi nuklir helium, proses yang biasanya berlangsung jauh di dalam inti bintang.

RX J0439.8-6809 pertama kali terlihat manusia Bumi lebih dari 20 tahun yang lalu, muncul bagai titik di langit yang sangat terang dalam citra sinar-X, yang secara tidak langsung menunjukkan sumber panas yang luar biasa pada permukaannya.

Awalnya, bintang katai putih ini melakukan fusi nuklir di permukaannya menggunakan hidrogen yang diambil dari bintang pendampingnya. Para astronom juga mengasumsikan katai putih ini terletak di galaksi tetangga kita, Awan Magellan Besar. Namun, data Hubble yang terbaru menunjukkan bahwa bintang katai putih ini berada di pinggiran Bima Sakti, dan bergerak menjauh dari kita dengan kecepatan 220 kilometer per detik!

Spektrum ultraviolet bintang katai putih ini menandakan sebuah kejutan lain. Spektrum tersebut menunjukkan adanya gas yang bukan milik sang bintang, yang tidak lain merupakan bagian dari awan gas yang terletak di antara Bima Sakti dan katai putih RX J0439.8-6809. Efek Doppler memungkinkan para peneliti untuk menentukan bahwa awan gas ini bergerak menjauh dari katai putih pada kecepatan sekitar 150 kilometer per detik dan bergerak ke arah Bima Sakti.

Luar Angkasa: The Final Frontier

Kredit: Shutterstock

- “Space the final frontier, These are the voyages of the starship Enterprise. Its continuing mission: to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, to boldly go where no one has gone before.”

Begitulah kalimat pembuka film Star Trek yang familiar bagi masyarakat Indonesia, yang dengan imajinasinya menggambarkan pada kita apa itu luar angkasa. Bahwa luar angkasa adalah perbatasan tanpa akhir. Suatu ujung yang membuka perjalanan luas, yang pula tanpa akhir. Pada kenyataannya luar angkasa itu melupakan permulaan setelah lapis demi lapis apa yang disebut sebagai angkasanya Bumi, alias sphere.

Sederhananya, luar angkasa adalah tempat di luar Bumi. Di pikiran Anda, menuju luar angkasa pasti sulit. Dan kenyataannya memang demikian. Anda harus melintasi beberapa lapisan, hingga akhirnya benar-benar ada di luar angkasa.

Lapisan pertama, troposfer sejauh 1-20 km dari lapisan Bumi, selanjutnya stratosfer 50 km, mesosfer 85 km dari lapisan Bumi tempat terbakarnya meteor yang mendekati atmosfer Bumi, lantas thermosfer, lapisan teratas tempat manusia mengorbitkan beragam satelit dan sampah angkasa lainnya, serta tempat orbital space shuttle dengan misi pengetahuan bagi manusia yang terletak 690 km di atas angkasa Bumi, dan inilah yang terakhir eksosfer, gerbang menuju tanpa batas langit, 10.000 km.

Setelah, melewati eksosfer, barulah manusia lenyap di telan luar angkasa, walau batas tentang apa yang dimaksud sebagai luar angkasa itu masih dalam perdebatan yang boleh disengitkan boleh dibuat gampang. Untuk memastikan pula bahwa yang namanya angkasa itu wilayahnya manusia maka dibuat pula serta-merta hukum tentang batas-batas luar angkasa.

Memahami luar angkasa, berupaya untuk membuktikan suatu bentuk keberadaan yang paling imajinatif duluan, sebagaimana dalam film fiksi ilmiah, lalu dicarikan bukti pembenarannya.

Bahwa sesuatu yang berada di luar tanah (Bumi), planet, bintang, matahari, bukanlah ancaman bagi manusia. Oleh karena itulah, tanpa belajar tentang luar angkasa pun, suatu sinkronisasi pemahaman harus diberikan lebih dahulu. Bahwa mempelajari luar angkasa dan benda langit, sama saja dengan menjauhkan diri kita dari mempelajari yang dekat dan begitu intim, misalkan pengelolaan Bumi.

Luar angkasa tidak bisa diklaim oleh suatu negara sebagai bagian dari negaranya. Karena sekali lagi, luar ankasa adalah perbatasan tanpa akhir. Cara manusia belajar alam semesta dan apa yang terjadi di luar angkasa akan selalu evolve, akan selalu berevolusi selalu dengan kepentingan sosial manusianya.

10 Scariest Theories Known To man

1. False Vacuum:

This is, in short, a scientific theory that our universe is in fact in a false phase state as part of a bigger universe, like if it were a momentary thing (think the actual universe is a vessel of boiling water, and we are just within a bubble developing at the bottom of the pot). Ultimately though that false vacuum has to pop, even after billions of years in this false state and we and everything we know in our observable universe will vanish in an instant with no warning whatsoever and there is nothing you can do about it.

2. The Great Filter:

It’s a theory about why the cosmos appears to be filled with potential for life and yet we have not discovered it. It says that somewhere amid pre-life and an advanced civilization that is able to colonize the stars, there is a Great Filter that stops them and ends life. This means we fit into one of these three situations:

• We are exceptional, meaning we have by now passed the Great Filter, unlike other civilizations on other planets.
• We are the first, meaning circumstances in the universe are only now life friendly and we are amongst many on our way to the ability of colonization.
• We have not hit the Filter yet, meaning we are f*cked. If this one is true, it means discovering life or evidence of life on Mars or Europa would be dreadful news as it would nearly surely mean the Filter is still ahead of us instead of behind us.

3. Brain in a Vat

The brain in a vat is an element used in a range of thought experiments projected to draw out certain features of our thoughts of knowledge, reality, truth, mind, and meaning. It assumes the following:

• The brain is the centre of all consciousness.
• The brain functions on electrical impulses.
• External motivations can influence the way the brain works.
• Any external incentives to the brain can be simulated to a degree that the brain can’t differentiate these simulated stimuli from natural stimuli.

The point is that you could be a brain in a jar, being fed false impulses for your whole life by an external source, or you (still a brain in a vat) could be hallucinating your whole life from lack of stimuli. 

4. Higher Dimensional Beings:

Visualize if there was a 2D person. If you gaze at them in a specific way, they can’t see you. All you have to do is look from a top view and they would not know you are there, and they would never know. Living their life as 2D, they would never be capable of comprehending how something could be viewing down on them.

Now visualize a 4D person. They could be observing you from a 4 dimensional angle, an angle that you will never comprehend. They could be right alongside you, but you would not know, and you would never know. Just as we could interact with the 2D person, the 4D person could interact with us. But as long as they do not want us to, we could never interrelate with them or not even know of them.

5. Fermi Paradox:

Let’s say we there is an ant hill in the mid of the forest. And right next to the ant hill, we are constructing a ten-lane super-highway. And the question is “Would the ants be capable of comprehending what a ten-lane super-highway is? Would the ants be capable of comprehending the technology and the purposes of the beings constructing the highway next to them?

So it is not that we cannot pick up the signals from Planet X using our technology, it is that we cannot even understand what the beings from Planet X are or what they are trying to do. It is so beyond us that even if they actually wanted to educate us, it would be like trying to teach ants about the internet.

When Pizarro entered into Peru, did he stop for a while at an anthill to attempt to communicate? Was he generous, trying to help the ants in the anthill? Did he become aggressive and slow his original mission down in order to smash the anthill apart? Or was the anthill of complete and utter and eternal insignificance to Pizarro? That might be our condition here.

6. Roko’s Basilisk:

Roko’s basilisk is a proposal that states an all-powerful artificial intelligence from the future may retroactively punish those who did not contributed in bringing about its existence. It looks like a futurist form of Pascal’s wager; an argument proposing that people should take into account specific singularitarian ideas, or even donate money, by weighing up the view of punishment versus reward. Additionally, the proposition states that only knowing about it incurs the risk of punishment (Now you know about it. You know who to thank while you will be tortured). It is also mixed with an ontological argument, to propose this is even a reasonable threat.

7. Terror Management Theory:

Everything that humankind has ever achieved other than basic survival has been driven by a basic and irreducible fear of non-existence. Our conception of self and self-esteem normally is a buffer against the anxiety that comes with knowing that we will cease to be. Culture is just a massive shared illusion to mitigate our fear of the unknown and eventually of death. Thus we want to visualize certain works of art as timeless or to place value in family lines and offspring, to project ourselves beyond death. We take ease in our value systems and the structures that arise from them, whether that’s through conceptions of biological kinship, national/ political identity, religious faith, etc.

This includes belief in the inherent value of safeguarding the future of humanity by scientific development. Indeed much of modern western life is devoted to the escaping of death, the various euphemisms and stock phrases in mourning, the whole funeral home industry that serves to remove death from the ordinary course of life, from the home and onto the embalming table or into the crematorium. We build up the artifice to evade the brutal truth. In short, everything that we have ever done and will ever do is driven by nothing more than our existential terror in challenging death.

8. Quantum Suicide/Quantum Immortality:

A man sits down before a gun, which is pointed at his head. This is no regular gun; i­t’s assembled with a machine that calculates the spin of a quantum particle. Each time the trigger is pulled, the spin of the quantum particle — or quark — is calculated. Depending on the measurement, the gun will either fire, or it won’t. If the quantum particle is observed as spinning in a clockwise motion, the gun will fire. If the quark is spinning counter clockwise, the gun won’t go off. There will only be a click.

Anxiously, the man takes a breath and pulls the trigger. The gun clicks. He pulls the trigger again. Click. And again: click. The man will continue to pull the trigger again and again with the same outcome: The gun will not fire. However it is working properly and loaded with bullets, no matter how many times he pulls the trigger, the gun will never fire. He will continue this process for eternity, becoming immortal.

Go back in time to the start of the experiment. The man pulls the trigger for the very first time, and the quark is now measured as spinning clockwise. The gun fires and the man die.

But, wait. The man already pulled the trigger the first time — and an infinite amount of times following that — and we by this time know the gun did not fire. How can the man be dead? The man is unaware, but he is both alive and dead. Each time he pulls the trigger, the cosmos is split in two. It will carry on splitting, again and again, each time the trigger is pulled. This thought experiment is named quantum suicide.

9. Transcension Hypothesis:

The hypothesis suggests that once civilizations saturate their local area of space with their intelligence, reach microscopic technological singularity, construct a black hole and leave our visible, macroscopic cosmos in order to carry on exponential growth of complexity and intelligence, and vanish from this universe, thus clarifying the Fermi Paradox. Developments in astrobiology make this a testable hypothesis. It suggests space, time, energy and matter compression, as a driver of accelerating change, which must lead cosmic intelligence to a future of highly-miniaturized, accelerated, and local “transcension” to extra-universal domains, rather than to space-faring expansion within our current universe.

10. Sixth Mass Extinction:

We are at present living through what many biologists consider to be the sixth mass extinction that the world has ever experienced. This is going to be a stimulating puzzle for the species that comes after us. It was not until around the year 1800 that humanity touched a population of 1 billion after thousands and thousands of years. In the 215 years since then, the world population has raised to ~7.2 Billion. That exponential growth has very big and long lasting negative effects on our planet, and will continue to do so until we reach carrying capacity or die off. 

Badai Hujan Besi Cair Terjadi Di Bintang Gagal

Ilustrasi ini menunjukkan cuaca yang mungkin terlihat pada objek bintang gagal (dingin) yang dikenal sebagai Katai Coklat.Bola gas raksasa ini memulai hidup seperti bintang tetapi tidak memiliki massa untuk mempertahankan fusi nuklir di inti mereka, dan sebagai gantinya, mereka memudar dan mendingin seiring berjalannya waktu.

   
   Penelitian baru menunjukkan bahwa awan badai yang luar biasa dan hujan besi cair mungkin menjadi fenomena umum pada bintang-bintang gagal yang dikenal sebagai katai coklat.

Para astronom menggunakan teleskop inframerah Spitzer untuk mengamati katai coklat.Mereka menemukan perubahan kecerahan yang mereka percaya menandakan adanya awan badai. Badai ini tampaknya berlangsung setidaknya beberapa jam, dan mungkin dapat sedahsyat badai Great Red Spot yang terkenal di Jupiter.

"Sebuah fraksi besar katai coklat menunjukkan variabilitas siklus dalam kecerahan, menunjukkan awan atau badai," kata peneliti studi Aren Heinze dari Stony Brook University yang mengatakan dalam konferensi pers di 223rd meeting of the American Astronomical Society.

Brown dwarf adalah objek yang dingin, objek ini seperti bintang tapi tidak memiliki cukup massa untuk meleburkan hidrogen menjadi helium, sumber energi utama bagi bintang. Mereka dapat dianggap sebagai sepupu planet raksasa seperti Jupiter.

Heinze dan rekan-rekannya mengukur kecerahan 44 katai coklat sampai 20 jam, sebagai bagian dari program Spitzer "Weather on Other Worlds".

Penelitian sebelumnya menunjukkan bahwa katai coklat memiliki cuaca berbadai 5 sampai 10 persen saat itu, sehingga para ilmuwan berharap untuk melihat beberapa variasi kecerahan. Namun yang mengejutkan, hampir setengah dari katai coklat yang diamati menunjukkan variasi tersebut.Dengan mempertimbangkan fakta bahwa sekitar setengah katai coklat berorientasi sedemikian rupa sehingga badai bisa tersembunyi, atau hanya berubah, data ini menunjukkan bahwa badai turbulen pada katai coklat sangat umum.

"Kita berbicara tentang awan yang memiliki massa lebih besar dari bumi yang membentuk dan menghilang dalam skala waktu hanya beberapa jam pada katai coklat," kata Heinze.

Awan ini jauh terlalu panas bagi air.Sebaliknya, para astronom percaya bahwa mereka terdiri dari pasir dan besi cair.

Spitzer memantau badai kurang dari satu hari, sehingga para astronom tidak tahu apakah badai bertahan selama berbulan-bulan atau bertahun-tahun, seperti Jupiter Great Red Spot. Dalam beberapa kasus, badai bisa dinamis dan cepat berubah, kata Heinze.

Pengamatan kecerahan dimungkinkan karena Spitzer berada di atas atmosfer bumi, di mana kilau panas planet kita tidak mengaburkan mereka.

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Kejutan lain dari pengamatan Spitzer adalah kanap putaran katai coklat melambat.Pemikiran konvensional menyatakan bahwa katai coklat berputar dengan cepat ketika mereka terbentuk, tanpa melambat seiring bertambahnya usia. Tim tidak tahu mengapa katai coklat berputar begitu lambat. Mereka mungkin telah terbentuk dalam cara yang tidak biasa, atau mereka dapat diseret oleh gravitasi dari planet yang tidak diketahui yang mengorbit dekat.

Mempelajari cuaca pada katai coklat bisa memperluas pemahaman para ilmuwan untuk mempelajari cuaca di planet raksasa di luar tata surya kita, yang lebih sulit untuk dilihat karena silau dari bintang induknya, kata para peneliti.

WR 102 : Bintang Terpanas Yang Diketahui Saat Ini

Ilustrasi bintang Wolf-Rayet

  WR 102 adalah bintang Wolf-Rayet yang berjarak 9.800 tahun cahaya di konstelasi Cygnus, sebuah bintang yang sangat langka dan masuk dalam bintang deret oksigen WO. Baca disini (Spectral type : WO).

WR 102 masuk dalam klasifikasi bintang spektral WO2 dan salah satu dari sangat sedikit bintang yang diketahui masuk dalam klasifikasi bintang Wolf-Rayet deret oksigen, hanya empat di galaksi Bima Sakti dan lima di galaksi luar yang ditemukan saat ini. Bintang ini juga merupakan bintang terpanas yang dikenal saat ini dengan suhu permukaan sekitar 210.000 kelvin (209.726 C). Bandingkan dengan suhu permukaan Matahari yang mencapai hanya 5.778 kelvin (5.505 C)

Pemodelan atmosfer memperkirakan bahwa luminositas bintang ini 282.000 lebih terang dari Matahari, sementara perhitungan dari kecerahan dan jarak memberikan luminositasnya hampir 500.000 kali lebih terang dari Matahari walaupun jarak pastinya belum diketahui.

WR 102 adalah bintang padat yang sangat kecil, memiliki radius kurang dari 40% dari radius Matahari tapi hampir 20 kali lebih masif. Angin bintangnya sangat kuat, dengan kecepatan terminal 5.000 kilometer per detik yang menyebabkan WR 102 kehilangan massanya 10⁻⁵ massa Matahari / tahun. Sebagai perbandingan, Matahari kehilangan (2-3) x 10⁻¹⁴ massanya per tahun karena angin bintang, beberapa ratus juta kali lebih kecil dari WR 102.

Bintang Wolf-Rayet jenis WO adalah evolusi terakhir dari bintang paling masif sebelum meledak menjadi supernova, mungkin disertai ledakan sinar gamma. Hal ini sangat mungkin karena WR 102 berada pada tahap terakhir dari fusi nuklirnya, dekat atau akhir pembakaran helium. Bintang ini akan segera meledak sebagai supernova dalam hal astronomi, dalam beberapa ribu tahun kedpea. Massa dan rotasi cepatnya mungkin akan menghasilkan semburan sinar gamma.

Nama Lain bintang ini adalah V3893 Sagittarii, LS 4368, ALS 4368, Sand 4

Mars Spacesuit

The Martian surface is not very welcoming for humans. The atmosphere is cold and there is barely any breathable air. An astronaut exploring the surface must wear a spacesuit to survive outside of a habitat while collecting samples and maintaining systems.

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Left: Actor Matt Damon plays NASA astronaut Marc Watney in "The Martian." Right: NASA invited the public to vote on three cover layer designs for the Z-2 prototype suit, the next step in NASA's advanced suit development program.

Credits: Giles Keyte/NASA

Mark Watney spends large portions of his Martian sols (a sol is a Martian day) working in a spacesuit. He ends up having to perform some long treks on the surface, so his suit has to be flexible, comfortable, and reliable.
NASA is currently developing the technologies to build a spacesuit that would be used on Mars. Engineers consider everything from traversing the Martian landscape to picking up rock samples.
The Z-2 and Prototype eXploration Suit, NASA’s new prototype spacesuits, help solve unique problems to advance new technologies that will one day be used in a suit worn by the first humans to set foot on Mars. Each suit is meant to identify different technology gaps – features a spacesuit may be missing – to complete a mission. Spacesuit engineers explore the tradeoff between hard composite materials and fabrics to find a nice balance between durability and flexibility.
One of the challenges of walking on Mars will be dealing with dust. The red soil on Mars could affect the astronauts and systems inside a spacecraft if tracked in after a spacewalk. To counter this, new spacesuit designs feature a suitport on the back, so astronauts can quickly hop in from inside a spacecraft while the suit stays outside, keeping it clean indoors.

Plant Farm

Today, astronauts on the International Space Station have an abundance of food delivered to them by cargo resupply vehicles, including some from commercial industries. On Mars, humans would not be able to rely on resupply missions from Earth – even with express delivery they would take at least nine months. For humans to survive on Mars, they will need a continuous source of food. They will need to grow crops.

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Left: In a scene from "The Martian," astronaut Mark Watney employs some ingenious methods to plant crops on Mars. Right: Real-life NASA astronaut Kjell Lindgren harvests lettuce grown from the Veggie experiment while on board the International Space Station.

Credits: Peter Mountain/NASA

Watney turns the Hab into a self-sustaining farm in “The Martian,” making potatoes the first Martian staple. Today, in low-Earth orbit, lettuce is the most abundant crop in space. Aboard the International Space Station, Veggie is a deployable fresh-food production system. Using red, blue, and green lights, Veggie helps plants grow in pillows, small bags with a wicking surface containing media and fertilizer, to be harvested by astronauts. In 2014, astronauts used the system to grow “Outredgeous” red romaine lettuce and just recently sampled this space-grown crop for the first time. This is a huge step in space farming, and NASA is looking to expand the amount and type of crops to help meet the nutritional needs of future astronauts on Mars.

Water Recovery

There are no lakes, river or oceans on the surface of Mars, and sending water from Earth would take more than nine months. Astronauts on Mars must be able to create their own water supply. The Ares 3 crew does not waste a drop on Mars with their water reclaimer, and Watney needs to use his ingenuity to come up with some peculiar ways to stay hydrated and ensure his survival on the Red Planet.

On the International Space Station, no drop of sweat, tears, or even urine goes to waste. The Environmental Control and Life Support System recovers and recycles water from everywhere: urine, hand washing, oral hygiene, and other sources. Through the Water Recovery System (WRS), water is reclaimed and filtered, ready for consumption. One astronaut simply put it, “Yesterday’s coffee turns into tomorrow’s coffee.”

Liquid presents some tricky problems in space. The WRS and related systems have to account for the fact that liquids behave very differently in a microgravity environment. The part of the WRS that processes urine must use a centrifuge for distillation, since gases and liquids do not separate like they do on Earth.

NASA is continuing to develop new technologies for water recovery. Research is being conducted to advance the disposable multifiltration beds (the filters that remove inorganic and non-volatile organic contaminants) to be a more permanent component to the system. Brine water recovery would reclaim every drop of the water from the “bottoms product” leftover from urine distillation. For future human-exploration missions, crews would be less dependent on any resupply of spare parts or extra water from Earth.

The technology behind this system has been brought down to Earth to provide clean drinking water to remote locations and places devastated with natural disasters.

Behind the science of The Martian

Illustration by Astronomy: Chuck Braasch from a Aidan Monaghan photo

Self-proclaimed science geek Andy Weir never thought The Martian would be published. Now, the New York Times best-seller is about to put NASA's Red Planet plans in the limelight.

By Eric Betz

A small white sprinter van kicks up red dust as it slides across the “martian” sand toward a yurt-like astronaut habitat. Its path winds past the scorched remains of a Mars Ascent Vehicle built to launch crew to orbit. Above this fictional Mars-scape, a ceiling vaults some six stories tall, placing the cavernous soundstage among the largest in the world. Small blimps bolster legions of lights. Green screen sheets line the stadium-sized walls. Eventually, images of blue Mars sunsets and butterscotch evening skies captured by NASA’s rovers will become a backdrop, along with shots of Wadi Rum, Jordan — a red desert stand-in for Mars.
But for now, it’s more like a surreal sandbox here at the last day of filming on set at The Martian. And a group of young Hungarian men are stepping out of the van to start the long disassembly process. Their present task, removing laboratory equipment from the astronaut habitat, or Hab, is easy in comparison to the one to come — someone has to remove all 1,200 tons of this carefully color-matched Mars dirt.
For 12 weeks, this movie set, through suburbs and past Hungarian countryside homes on the outskirts of Budapest, has seen many of Hollywood’s biggest stars and most celebrated filmmakers.

The scene is what every crazed Moon landing conspiracy theorist imagines Stanley Kubrick doing half a century earlier. Some of NASA’s most senior scientists believe that when The Martian hits big screens October 2, the movie’s obsessive adherence to science fact will be enough to make their nonfictional “Journey to Mars” real for millions of Americans. Because in contrast to the silver screen space agency of the same name, NASA’s actual program is nowhere near ready for prime time.
If humanity is to put astronauts on Mars, NASA is going to need a surge in support to levels unseen in generations. That’s an unlikely achievement for a Hollywood film, but The Martian is just one part of NASA’s growing publicity machine.

Inilah Perbandingan Kecepatan Boing 747 Vs Pesawat Siluman SR-71 Blackbird Vs NASA New Horizons

   Ada pesawat ruang angkasa kecil yang melaju sangat cepat menuju tempat paling jauh di tata surya. Pesawat ini dikenal sebagai New Horizons, dan memulai perjalanannya hampir satu dekade lalu.

Diluncurkan pada bulan Januari 2006, New Horizons telah membuka sudut pandang kita tentang alam semesta. Selama perjalanan panjang, ia perlahan-lahan mendekati Pluto, bergerak semakin dekat tiap hari. Namun, ketika akhirnya mencapai planet kerdil kecil ini, pesawat ruang angkasa ini tidak melambat. Ia melintasi Pluto dan bulan-bulannya (Charon, Nix, Hydra, Kerberos, dan Styx) dengan kecepatan menakjubkan 43.000 km / h (26.700 mph).

Sejak itu, ia terus melakukan perjalanan ke arah sabuk Kuiper, wilayah berbentuk cakram yang mengandung volatil es (seperti metana, amonia, dan air)- rumah dari komet.

Jadi, seberapa cepat pesawat ini bergerak sekarang?

GIF ini diciptakan oleh pengembang produk Google Clay Bavor untuk membantu kita lebih memahami kecepatan yang terlibat, memberikan kita sedikit perspektif. Ini membandingkan kecepatan pesawat kita bersama wahana NASA New Horizons, yang membuat pesawat kita melaju seperti siput.



Pesawat 747 melaju dengan kecepatan 885 km / h (550 mph), dan pesawat siluman SR-71 Blackbird dapat mencapai kecepatan tertinggi 4.345 km / h (2.700 mph), namun New Horizons saat ini bergerak dengan kecepatan mengejutkan 57.936 km / h (36.000 mph).

Pada akhirnya, dengan kecepatan yang berlebihan ini justru menyebabkan New Horizons tidak berhenti di Pluto untuk mengambil beberapa orbit di sekitar planet kerdil ini. Sebaliknya, berlari melewatinya (secara harfiah) dengan kecepatan sangat tinggi. Jika memang ingin berusaha untuk memperlambatnya agar masuk orbit, ia memerlukan untuk mengurangi kecepatan sampai 90%, yang akan membutuhkan bahan bakar jauh lebih banyak dari yang dibawanya.

Tapi semua ini tidak hilang, karena misi selanjutnya akan memungkinkan kita untuk lebih memahami rumah komet di sabuk kuiper.

Dengan mempelajari objek Sabuk Kuiper (KBO) dari dekat, para ilmuwan berharap untuk mendapatkan wawasan yang lebih baik ke dalam sejarah tata surya kita. Para ilmuwan tidak ada yang benar-benar yakin terbuat dari apa KBO itu atau bahkan berapa banyak mereka. Mungkin ada ribuan KBOs terdeteksi nongkrong dekat tepi tata surya, dan beberapa perkiraan menempatkan jumlahnya dalam triliun. Beberapa KBO yang dikenal, seperti Quaoar dan Sedna, akhirnya bisa menjadi cukup besar untuk mendapatkan status planet kerdil.

Power supply New Horizons 'harus menjaga kamera dan instrumennya berjalan selama tahun-tahun mendatang, membuat studi dekat setidaknya satu lagi objek jauh. Jika terbang lintas berikutnya berhasil, New Horizons 'akan menetapkan rekor baru tentang objek terjauh yang pernah dipelajari dari dekat.