2020:
May 30
The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying NASA astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley aboard the company’s Crew Dragon spacecraft launched from Kennedy Space Center’s historic Launch Pad 39A at 3:22 p.m. EDT. This is a historic moment for us, as according to NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine, “It’s been nine years since we’ve launched American astronauts on American rockets from American soil, and now we have done it again.”
https://blogs.nasa.gov/commercialcrew/2020/05/30/nasas-spacex-demo-2-launch-a-great-day-for-america/
March 27
Comet NEOWISE, officially known as “C/2020 F3 (NEOWISE)”, is discovered by the infrared-optimized NEOWISE spacecraft (NEOWISE is short for Near-Earth Object Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer). The comet is following a near-parabolic orbit and by July it will be bright enough to be visible to the naked eye to those in the Northern Hemisphere. However, after this time period it will speed away into the deep space not to be seen again for another 6,800 years so make sure to go check it out while you can!
2019:
April 2
The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) will release the first ever image of a black hole. A photo of our Milky Way's own supermassive black hole, Sagittarius A, will be released on April 10th, 2019. "Whatever the announcement is next week, we’ll almost certainly be seeing something no human has ever seen before."
2018:
September 24
Researchers led by Ken Pounds of the University of Leicester clocked a clump of matter falling into the black hole at 30 percent the speed of light — about 56,000 miles per second (90,000 kilometers per second). The observations, which come from the European Space Agency's orbiting XMM-Newton X-ray observatory, came from a 40 million-solar mass supermassive black hole at a center of a Seyfert Galaxy called PG211+143.
August 12
In a historic moment, NASA launched the Parker Space Probe (PSP), a mission aiming to measure how energy and heat move through the solar corona and investigate what accelerates and charges solar particles. Its closest approach to the Sun would be in regions reaching well over 2500 degrees Fahrenheit. On the final three orbits, Parker Solar Probe flies to within 3.8 million miles of the Sun's surface — more than seven times closer than the current record holder - the Helios 2 spacecraft. PSP is also the first ever NASA spacecraft to be named after a living person, Eugene Parker!
July 25
The European Space Agency's Mars Express Spacecraft used radar to detect for the first time a vast underground lake of liquid water on the surface on the Red Planet that extends for 12 miles. It was discovered in the region near Mars' southern ice cap, which is made of water ice covered by a frozen layer of carbon dioxide. Scientists discovered the lake by sending radar pulses from the orbiter to the surface and have it reflect back as they surveyed Planum Australe; a southern polar plain. In fact, this could mean much greater chances of Mars still harboring life!
February 6
SpaceX successfully launches the Falcon Heavy rocket, the most powerful operational rocket in the world with more than 5 million pounds of thrust. This marks a major milestone in spaceflight history, as the only other rocket to deliver more payload to orbit was the Saturn V. The Falcon Heavy contains an initial stage of 3 core rockets with 27 engines, then a second stage with a single engine to help adjust the rocket to orbit. Surprisingly, the payload of this rocket was Elon Musk's own Tesla Roadster! Originally planned with a trajectory to Mars, the rocket overshot and the car is now traveling to the Asteroid belt.
2017:
December 5
"Using X-ray data the Chandra X-ray Observatory and optical data from ground telescopes, astronomers have spotted what they believe is the closest pair of black holes every discovered. Initially thought to be a very odd binary star in the Andromeda Galaxy, research teams were surprised when they realized it was a much more unusual object. "This is the first time such strong evidence has been found for a pair of orbiting giant black holes,” said Dr. Emily Levesque. A paper describing the discovery can be found here: https://arxiv.org/abs/1704.08694
October 27
An asteroid or comet called A/2017 U1 became the first CONFIRMED object to come from elsewhere in the galaxy! When astronomers analyzed the orbit of the object, it turned out to be hyperbolic and on an axis nearly perpendicular to the plane of the Solar System. Objects within the Solar System may end up in hyperbolic orbits if they make a close approach to one of the giant planets. However, after several measurements, astronomers realized it made no close approaches to any of the giant planets. This lead astronomers to believe that the object came from elsewhere in the Milky Way in order for it to have a hyperbolic orbit.
September 15
After 20 years in space, NASA's Cassini spacecraft plunged into Saturn and disintegrated in the atmosphere. Dubbed "The Grand Finale" of Cassini, NASA planned this 'crash' into Saturn so the probe wouldn't contaminate other moons that could have conditions suitable for life. For more than a decade, Cassini sent data about the planet, its moons, the rings, and much much more. In the final orbit. the spacecraft struggled to point its antenna towards Earth before connection was lost. The final image Cassini took can be found on NASA's website. RIP Cassini (1997 - 2017).
August 4
After passing Pluto in a historic flyby in 2015, the New Horizons spacecraft is en route to another icy object: MU69. This chunk of ice is around 20 miles in size lies in the Kuiper Belt. However, the weird thing about this object is its shape. After analyzing MU69 through occultation data, NASA officials have said it may be football-shaped, or even contact binary! Contact binaries are composed of two objects that are so close together that they actually touch! A famous contact binary asteroid is duck-shaped Comet 67P (67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko).
June 14
While on the hunt for Planet X, scientists Scott Shepard, David Tholen, and Chadwick Trujillo discovered many 'lost' moons of Jupiter in addition to two previously unknown moons. Although the 'lost' moons were found in 2003, there wasn't enough information to determine their exact orbits, so astronomers lost track of them as they circled Jupiter. But now, 5 of the 14 lost moons have been rediscovered. The two new moons are called S/2016 J I and S/2017 J I, are a mile wide in diameter, and are about 22 million kilometers from Jupiter. Jupiter's current confirmed moons now stand at 69.
April 6
A team of astronomers at Yale have found an exoplanet, called Kepler-150 f, about 3,000 lightyears from Earth in the Kepler-150 system. This system was known since 2014, but computers somehow missed the Neptune-sized exoplanet. The students at Yale used a mathematical approach to find the exoplanet, and they say it was simply "hiding in plain sight". Since the Kepler mission only lasted 4 years, and the orbital period of the planet was around 2 years, there was not enough evidence for the computer to confirm that the object was a planet, so it discarded the data. Luckily the students found it!
March 21
President Trump signs the NASA Transition Authorization Act, approving $19.5 billion in funding for NASA, for deep space travel and the exploration of Mars. This is an 8.33% increase in the span of one day! Some important facts of the new bill Trump passed include: health care for life for astronauts, relaunching the National Space Council, and reaffirming the goal of NASA to put people on Mars!!!
February 22
Seven Earth-sized planets were found orbiting dwarf star Trappist-1 about 40 light-years from Earth!!! :OOO Some of the exoplanets are even at the right distance to have liquid water, an essential resource needed to harbor life. Since Trappist-1 is a red dwarf, the most common type of stars in the universe, astrophysicists believe that similar discoveries around red dwarfs will follow. Even though the 7 planets are similar to our own, they are orbiting a completely different type of star. It has only 1/12th the Sun's mass and has a surface temperature of 2560 Kelvin; compare that to the sun's 5770 Kelvin. Astronomers in the past have focused their efforts on planets orbiting Sun-like stars; this new major discovery will shift their focus to locating planets orbiting red dwarfs, where the star's glare is no longer a problem (unlike brighter yellow stars).
February 8
The Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics discovered a black hole of 2,200 solar masses harbored in the center of globular cluster 47 Tucanae. This finding might not sound surprising, but until now, black holes were typically found masses of either lower than 100M☉ or greater than 10,000M☉. These intermediate black holes are believed to be the predecessors of supermassive black holes.
January 16
Scientists believe that Proxima Centauri B, the sun's closest stellar neighbor, destroyed it's exoplanet's chances of habitability due to extremely intense solar flares. Adding on to the planet's, Proxima B's lack of a hydrogen rich atmosphere and close distance to its star, astronomers have concluded that there probably isn't any life on the planet. :(
2016:
December 31
New Year's Eve comet, Comet 45P, is visible in the Northern Hemisphere. It will be seen near the crescent moon in the constellation Aquarius. 45P can easily be viewed with a binocular or telescope and is bluish-green in color. Go check it out!
November 14
Today's moon will be a supermoon! This means the moon appears 14 percent bigger and 30 percent brighter to us. The next time a supermoon will appear on Earth will be in 2034. Remember to look up tonight!
October 16
The ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter will release the Schiaparelli lander on Mars. This lander is not at all similar to a rover; in fact, its sole purpose is to demonstrate the capability of ESA to perfom a controlled landing on Mars. Besides this main goal, there will also be a small 'science package' that will operate for 2-4 sols (Martian days).
October 4
Astronomers use pulsation to discover a planet orbiting an A-type star. Due to their large size and luminosity, it is very hard to identify a planet orbiting such bright stars using conventional methods. Instead, the scientists watched the star's pulsation and realized that there was a slight delay in the pulses. This delay is caused by the gravitational tug of the nearby planet.
September 30
The ESA's Rosetta spacecraft ends its mission after twelve years in space and two years orbiting Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Rosetta concluded its journey with a controlled impact on the comet after both passed beyond the orbit of Jupiter (At that distance there is a significant reduction in solar power).
September 25
FAST(Five hundred meter Aperture Spherical Telescope), the world's largest radio telescope, finally begins operating. The $180 million mega project's "potential to discover an alien civilization will be five to 10 times that of current equipment, as it can see farther and darker planets". However, its main goal is to search for gravitational waves and detect radio emissions from stars and galaxies.
May 30
The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carrying NASA astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley aboard the company’s Crew Dragon spacecraft launched from Kennedy Space Center’s historic Launch Pad 39A at 3:22 p.m. EDT. This is a historic moment for us, as according to NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine, “It’s been nine years since we’ve launched American astronauts on American rockets from American soil, and now we have done it again.”
https://blogs.nasa.gov/commercialcrew/2020/05/30/nasas-spacex-demo-2-launch-a-great-day-for-america/
March 27
Comet NEOWISE, officially known as “C/2020 F3 (NEOWISE)”, is discovered by the infrared-optimized NEOWISE spacecraft (NEOWISE is short for Near-Earth Object Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer). The comet is following a near-parabolic orbit and by July it will be bright enough to be visible to the naked eye to those in the Northern Hemisphere. However, after this time period it will speed away into the deep space not to be seen again for another 6,800 years so make sure to go check it out while you can!
2019:
April 2
The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) will release the first ever image of a black hole. A photo of our Milky Way's own supermassive black hole, Sagittarius A, will be released on April 10th, 2019. "Whatever the announcement is next week, we’ll almost certainly be seeing something no human has ever seen before."
2018:
September 24
Researchers led by Ken Pounds of the University of Leicester clocked a clump of matter falling into the black hole at 30 percent the speed of light — about 56,000 miles per second (90,000 kilometers per second). The observations, which come from the European Space Agency's orbiting XMM-Newton X-ray observatory, came from a 40 million-solar mass supermassive black hole at a center of a Seyfert Galaxy called PG211+143.
August 12
In a historic moment, NASA launched the Parker Space Probe (PSP), a mission aiming to measure how energy and heat move through the solar corona and investigate what accelerates and charges solar particles. Its closest approach to the Sun would be in regions reaching well over 2500 degrees Fahrenheit. On the final three orbits, Parker Solar Probe flies to within 3.8 million miles of the Sun's surface — more than seven times closer than the current record holder - the Helios 2 spacecraft. PSP is also the first ever NASA spacecraft to be named after a living person, Eugene Parker!
July 25
The European Space Agency's Mars Express Spacecraft used radar to detect for the first time a vast underground lake of liquid water on the surface on the Red Planet that extends for 12 miles. It was discovered in the region near Mars' southern ice cap, which is made of water ice covered by a frozen layer of carbon dioxide. Scientists discovered the lake by sending radar pulses from the orbiter to the surface and have it reflect back as they surveyed Planum Australe; a southern polar plain. In fact, this could mean much greater chances of Mars still harboring life!
February 6
SpaceX successfully launches the Falcon Heavy rocket, the most powerful operational rocket in the world with more than 5 million pounds of thrust. This marks a major milestone in spaceflight history, as the only other rocket to deliver more payload to orbit was the Saturn V. The Falcon Heavy contains an initial stage of 3 core rockets with 27 engines, then a second stage with a single engine to help adjust the rocket to orbit. Surprisingly, the payload of this rocket was Elon Musk's own Tesla Roadster! Originally planned with a trajectory to Mars, the rocket overshot and the car is now traveling to the Asteroid belt.
2017:
December 5
"Using X-ray data the Chandra X-ray Observatory and optical data from ground telescopes, astronomers have spotted what they believe is the closest pair of black holes every discovered. Initially thought to be a very odd binary star in the Andromeda Galaxy, research teams were surprised when they realized it was a much more unusual object. "This is the first time such strong evidence has been found for a pair of orbiting giant black holes,” said Dr. Emily Levesque. A paper describing the discovery can be found here: https://arxiv.org/abs/1704.08694
October 27
An asteroid or comet called A/2017 U1 became the first CONFIRMED object to come from elsewhere in the galaxy! When astronomers analyzed the orbit of the object, it turned out to be hyperbolic and on an axis nearly perpendicular to the plane of the Solar System. Objects within the Solar System may end up in hyperbolic orbits if they make a close approach to one of the giant planets. However, after several measurements, astronomers realized it made no close approaches to any of the giant planets. This lead astronomers to believe that the object came from elsewhere in the Milky Way in order for it to have a hyperbolic orbit.
September 15
After 20 years in space, NASA's Cassini spacecraft plunged into Saturn and disintegrated in the atmosphere. Dubbed "The Grand Finale" of Cassini, NASA planned this 'crash' into Saturn so the probe wouldn't contaminate other moons that could have conditions suitable for life. For more than a decade, Cassini sent data about the planet, its moons, the rings, and much much more. In the final orbit. the spacecraft struggled to point its antenna towards Earth before connection was lost. The final image Cassini took can be found on NASA's website. RIP Cassini (1997 - 2017).
August 4
After passing Pluto in a historic flyby in 2015, the New Horizons spacecraft is en route to another icy object: MU69. This chunk of ice is around 20 miles in size lies in the Kuiper Belt. However, the weird thing about this object is its shape. After analyzing MU69 through occultation data, NASA officials have said it may be football-shaped, or even contact binary! Contact binaries are composed of two objects that are so close together that they actually touch! A famous contact binary asteroid is duck-shaped Comet 67P (67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko).
June 14
While on the hunt for Planet X, scientists Scott Shepard, David Tholen, and Chadwick Trujillo discovered many 'lost' moons of Jupiter in addition to two previously unknown moons. Although the 'lost' moons were found in 2003, there wasn't enough information to determine their exact orbits, so astronomers lost track of them as they circled Jupiter. But now, 5 of the 14 lost moons have been rediscovered. The two new moons are called S/2016 J I and S/2017 J I, are a mile wide in diameter, and are about 22 million kilometers from Jupiter. Jupiter's current confirmed moons now stand at 69.
April 6
A team of astronomers at Yale have found an exoplanet, called Kepler-150 f, about 3,000 lightyears from Earth in the Kepler-150 system. This system was known since 2014, but computers somehow missed the Neptune-sized exoplanet. The students at Yale used a mathematical approach to find the exoplanet, and they say it was simply "hiding in plain sight". Since the Kepler mission only lasted 4 years, and the orbital period of the planet was around 2 years, there was not enough evidence for the computer to confirm that the object was a planet, so it discarded the data. Luckily the students found it!
March 21
President Trump signs the NASA Transition Authorization Act, approving $19.5 billion in funding for NASA, for deep space travel and the exploration of Mars. This is an 8.33% increase in the span of one day! Some important facts of the new bill Trump passed include: health care for life for astronauts, relaunching the National Space Council, and reaffirming the goal of NASA to put people on Mars!!!
February 22
Seven Earth-sized planets were found orbiting dwarf star Trappist-1 about 40 light-years from Earth!!! :OOO Some of the exoplanets are even at the right distance to have liquid water, an essential resource needed to harbor life. Since Trappist-1 is a red dwarf, the most common type of stars in the universe, astrophysicists believe that similar discoveries around red dwarfs will follow. Even though the 7 planets are similar to our own, they are orbiting a completely different type of star. It has only 1/12th the Sun's mass and has a surface temperature of 2560 Kelvin; compare that to the sun's 5770 Kelvin. Astronomers in the past have focused their efforts on planets orbiting Sun-like stars; this new major discovery will shift their focus to locating planets orbiting red dwarfs, where the star's glare is no longer a problem (unlike brighter yellow stars).
February 8
The Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics discovered a black hole of 2,200 solar masses harbored in the center of globular cluster 47 Tucanae. This finding might not sound surprising, but until now, black holes were typically found masses of either lower than 100M☉ or greater than 10,000M☉. These intermediate black holes are believed to be the predecessors of supermassive black holes.
January 16
Scientists believe that Proxima Centauri B, the sun's closest stellar neighbor, destroyed it's exoplanet's chances of habitability due to extremely intense solar flares. Adding on to the planet's, Proxima B's lack of a hydrogen rich atmosphere and close distance to its star, astronomers have concluded that there probably isn't any life on the planet. :(
2016:
December 31
New Year's Eve comet, Comet 45P, is visible in the Northern Hemisphere. It will be seen near the crescent moon in the constellation Aquarius. 45P can easily be viewed with a binocular or telescope and is bluish-green in color. Go check it out!
November 14
Today's moon will be a supermoon! This means the moon appears 14 percent bigger and 30 percent brighter to us. The next time a supermoon will appear on Earth will be in 2034. Remember to look up tonight!
October 16
The ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter will release the Schiaparelli lander on Mars. This lander is not at all similar to a rover; in fact, its sole purpose is to demonstrate the capability of ESA to perfom a controlled landing on Mars. Besides this main goal, there will also be a small 'science package' that will operate for 2-4 sols (Martian days).
October 4
Astronomers use pulsation to discover a planet orbiting an A-type star. Due to their large size and luminosity, it is very hard to identify a planet orbiting such bright stars using conventional methods. Instead, the scientists watched the star's pulsation and realized that there was a slight delay in the pulses. This delay is caused by the gravitational tug of the nearby planet.
September 30
The ESA's Rosetta spacecraft ends its mission after twelve years in space and two years orbiting Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Rosetta concluded its journey with a controlled impact on the comet after both passed beyond the orbit of Jupiter (At that distance there is a significant reduction in solar power).
September 25
FAST(Five hundred meter Aperture Spherical Telescope), the world's largest radio telescope, finally begins operating. The $180 million mega project's "potential to discover an alien civilization will be five to 10 times that of current equipment, as it can see farther and darker planets". However, its main goal is to search for gravitational waves and detect radio emissions from stars and galaxies.