http://www.physorg.com/space-news/ en-us PhysOrg.com provides the latest news on earth science, astronomy and space exploration. (AP) -- Four years after its first solar sail ended up in the ocean instead of orbit, The Planetary Society announced Monday that by the end of 2010 it will try again to launch a spacecraft that will be propelled by the subtle pressure of sunlight. http://www.physorg.com/news177020675.html Space & Earth Mon, 09 Nov 2009 21:00:01 EST news177020675 Large blooms of tiny marine plants called phytoplankton are flourishing in areas of open water left exposed by the recent and rapid melting of ice shelves and glaciers around the Antarctic Peninsula. This remarkable colonisation is having a beneficial impact on climate change. As the blooms die back phytoplankton sinks to the sea-bed where it can store carbon for thousands or millions of years. http://www.physorg.com/news176986161.html Space & Earth Mon, 09 Nov 2009 10:49:50 EST news176986161 With an average of four mini-earthquakes per day, Southern California's San Jacinto fault constantly adjusts to make it a less likely candidate for a major earthquake than its quiet neighbor to the east, the Southern San Andreas fault, according to an article in the journal Nature Geoscience. http://www.physorg.com/news176908962.html Space & Earth Sun, 08 Nov 2009 13:23:32 EST news176908962 (AP) -- A Seattle team has collected a $900,000 prize in a NASA-backed competition to develop the concept of an elevator to space - an idea spurred by science fiction novels. http://www.physorg.com/news176809468.html Space & Earth Sat, 07 Nov 2009 09:45:52 EST news176809468 The station crew prepared Friday for the arrival of the Russian Mini-Research Module 2 (MRM2) which is scheduled for launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan on Nov. 10. The MRM2 will arrive at the station on Nov. 12 docking to the top port of the Zvezda service module. http://www.physorg.com/news176739140.html Space & Earth Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:40:01 EST news176739140 Astronomers, conducting the broadest survey to date of galaxies from about 800 million years after the Big Bang, have found 22 early galaxies and confirmed the age of one by its characteristic hydrogen signature at 787 million years post Big Bang. The finding is the first age-confirmation of a so-called dropout galaxy at that distant time and pinpoints when an era called the reionization epoch likely began. The research will be published in a December issue of the Astrophysical Journal. http://www.physorg.com/news176737523.html Space & Earth Fri, 06 Nov 2009 13:46:08 EST news176737523 (PhysOrg.com) -- Kepler completed another science data download over October 18-19. In this download, a month's worth of science data was transmitted through the NASA Deep Space Network and into the Science Operations Center at Ames Research Center. After the download was complete, the Kepler spacecraft was returned to its science collection attitude and another cycle of science data collection began. http://www.physorg.com/news176728311.html Space & Earth Fri, 06 Nov 2009 12:00:02 EST news176728311 (PhysOrg.com) -- Mars Express flew over the boundary between Kasei Valles and Sacra Fossae and imaged the region, acquiring spectacular views of the chaotic terrain in the area. http://www.physorg.com/news176721098.html Space & Earth Fri, 06 Nov 2009 09:19:52 EST news176721098 (PhysOrg.com) -- In the Mojave Desert winds howl across this hottest place in North America, blowing sands across Death Valley and through empty ghost towns, swirling across treeless land for hundreds of miles. But even in the otherworldly Mojave, life thrives. The Joshua tree (Yucca brevifolia), an indicator species for this desert, defines the Mojave's boundaries. In spring when the rains come, brightly colored flowers bloom in profusion--nature's paintbrush on an otherwise monotone landscape. http://www.physorg.com/news176660557.html Space & Earth Thu, 05 Nov 2009 17:10:05 EST news176660557 The most probable place to find intelligent life in the galaxy is around stars very similar to our sun, a new study has found. http://www.physorg.com/news176661214.html Space & Earth Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:50:01 EST news176661214 The impact of airborne nitrogen released from the burning of fossil fuels and wide-spread use of fertilizers in agriculture is much greater that previously recognized and even extends to remote alpine lakes, according to a study published Nov. 6 in the journal Science. http://www.physorg.com/news176655560.html Space & Earth Thu, 05 Nov 2009 16:00:01 EST news176655560 (PhysOrg.com) -- An unusual meteorite with an interesting orbit has been tracked to the ground using a photographic observatory that records time-lapse images of fireballs traveling across the sky. http://www.physorg.com/news176657727.html Space & Earth Thu, 05 Nov 2009 15:42:08 EST news176657727 (PhysOrg.com) -- An unusual supernova rediscovered in seven-year-old data may be the first example of a new type of exploding star, possibly from a binary star system where helium flows from one white dwarf onto another and detonates in a thermonuclear explosion. http://www.physorg.com/news176653360.html Space & Earth Thu, 05 Nov 2009 14:33:57 EST news176653360 (PhysOrg.com) -- The spectacular new camera installed on NASA's Hubble Space Telescope during Servicing Mission 4 in May has delivered the most detailed view of star birth in the graceful, curving arms of the nearby spiral galaxy M83. http://www.physorg.com/news176638796.html Space & Earth Thu, 05 Nov 2009 10:20:24 EST news176638796 (PhysOrg.com) -- The first orbiting space hotel is on track to open for its first customers in 2012, but hurry, as bookings are filling fast. http://www.physorg.com/news176632968.html Space & Earth Thu, 05 Nov 2009 10:20:03 EST news176632968 (PhysOrg.com) -- Winter images of NASA's Phoenix Lander showing the lander shrouded in dry-ice frost on Mars have been captured with the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment, or HiRISE camera, aboard NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. http://www.physorg.com/news176629880.html Space & Earth Thu, 05 Nov 2009 07:52:02 EST news176629880 (AP) -- A robot powered by a ground-based laser beam climbed a long cable dangling from a helicopter on Wednesday to qualify for prize money in a $2 million competition to test the potential reality of the science fiction concept of space elevators. http://www.physorg.com/news176545232.html Space & Earth Thu, 05 Nov 2009 04:34:56 EST news176545232 (PhysOrg.com) -- Before our planets found their way to the stable orbits they circle in today, they wiggled and jostled about like unsettled children. Now, NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope has found a young star with evidence for the same kind of orbital hyperactivity. Young planets circling the star are thought to be disturbing smaller comet-like bodies, causing them to collide and kick up a huge halo of dust. http://www.physorg.com/news176576185.html Space & Earth Wed, 04 Nov 2009 16:56:58 EST news176576185 The MESSENGER spacecraft's third flyby of the planet Mercury has given scientists, for the first time, an almost complete view of the planet's surface and revealed some dramatic changes in Mercury's comet-like tail. http://www.physorg.com/news176575356.html Space & Earth Wed, 04 Nov 2009 16:43:05 EST news176575356 (PhysOrg.com) -- Evidence for a thin veil of carbon has been found on the neutron star in the Cassiopeia A supernova remnant. This discovery, made with NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, resolves a ten-year mystery surrounding this object. http://www.physorg.com/news176567767.html Space & Earth Wed, 04 Nov 2009 14:37:05 EST news176567767 (PhysOrg.com) -- When small earthquakes shake the central U.S., citizens often fear the rumbles are signs a big earthquake is coming. Fortunately, new research instead shows that most of these earthquakes are aftershocks of big earthquakes (magnitude 7) in the New Madrid seismic zone that struck the Midwest almost 200 years ago. http://www.physorg.com/news176564939.html Space & Earth Wed, 04 Nov 2009 13:49:32 EST news176564939 (PhysOrg.com) -- Astronauts may in future be wearing spacesuits equipped with artificial intelligence (AI) and digital eyes, turning them into what the researchers call cyborg astrobiologists. http://www.physorg.com/news176552331.html Space & Earth Wed, 04 Nov 2009 11:10:01 EST news176552331 A Peruvian scientist has called on his country to help slow the melting of Andean glaciers by daubing white paint on the rock and earth left behind by receding ice so they will absorb less heat. http://www.physorg.com/news176526912.html Space & Earth Wed, 04 Nov 2009 03:15:32 EST news176526912 Volcanic activity may split the African continent in two owing to a recent geological crack in northeastern Ethiopia, researchers said on Tuesday. http://www.physorg.com/news176486243.html Space & Earth Tue, 03 Nov 2009 16:30:01 EST news176486243 (PhysOrg.com) -- Following the launch of ESA's SMOS satellite on 2 November, the French space agency CNES, which is responsible for operating the satellite, has confirmed that the instrument's three antenna arms have deployed as planned, and that the instrument is in good health. http://www.physorg.com/news176482776.html Space & Earth Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:30:01 EST news176482776 (PhysOrg.com) -- Astronomers have tracked down a gigantic, previously unknown assembly of galaxies located almost seven billion light-years away from us. The discovery, made possible by combining two of the most powerful ground-based telescopes in the world, is the first observation of such a prominent galaxy structure in the distant Universe, providing further insight into the cosmic web and how it formed. http://www.physorg.com/news176449128.html Space & Earth Tue, 03 Nov 2009 05:40:02 EST news176449128 By travelling to the outer solar system, the two Voyager spacecraft allowed us to see amazing details of far-distant planets and moons. http://www.physorg.com/news176412079.html Space & Earth Mon, 02 Nov 2009 19:22:16 EST news176412079 Dust samples collected by high-flying aircraft in the upper atmosphere have yielded an unexpectedly rich trove of relicts from the ancient cosmos, report scientists from the Carnegie Institution. The stratospheric dust includes minute grains that likely formed inside stars that lived and died long before the birth of our sun, as well as material from molecular clouds in interstellar space. This "ultra-primitive" material likely wafted into the atmosphere after the Earth passed through the trail of an Earth-crossing comet in 2003, giving scientists a rare opportunity to study cometary dust in the laboratory. http://www.physorg.com/news176400764.html Space & Earth Mon, 02 Nov 2009 17:00:02 EST news176400764 The remaining ice fields atop famed Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania could be gone within two decades and perhaps even sooner, based on the latest survey of the ice fields remaining on the mountain . http://www.physorg.com/news176399304.html Space & Earth Mon, 02 Nov 2009 16:40:01 EST news176399304 Deep-sea ecosystems occupying 60% of the Earth's surface could be vulnerable to the effects of global warming warn scientists writing in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. http://www.physorg.com/news176398686.html Space & Earth Mon, 02 Nov 2009 15:38:48 EST news176398686