http://www.physorg.com/ en-us Physorg.com internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Super Earths are named for their size, but these planets - which range from about 2 to 10 Earth masses - could be superior to the Earth when it comes to sustaining life. They could also provide an answer to the ‘Fermi Paradox`: Why haven`t we been visited by aliens? http://www.physorg.com/news178821471.html Space & Earth Mon, 30 Nov 2009 16:38:28 EST news178821471 (PhysOrg.com) -- This morning, mission controllers confirmed that ESA`s comet chaser Rosetta had swung by Earth at 8:45 CET as planned, skimming past our planet to pick up a gravitational boost for an epic journey to rendezvous with comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in 2014. http://www.physorg.com/news177313479.html Space & Earth Fri, 13 Nov 2009 05:48:20 EST news177313479 (PhysOrg.com) -- This spectacular image of our home planet was captured by the OSIRIS instrument on ESA's Rosetta comet chaser earlier today as the spacecraft approached Earth for the third and final swingby. Closest approach is due at 08:45 CET, 13 November 2009. http://www.physorg.com/news177262843.html Space & Earth Thu, 12 Nov 2009 15:50:01 EST news177262843 When Europe's comet chaser Rosetta swings by Earth tomorrow for a critical gravity assist, tracking data will be collected to precisely measure the satellite's change in orbital energy. The results could help unravel a cosmic mystery that has stumped scientists for two decades. http://www.physorg.com/news177245318.html Space & Earth Thu, 12 Nov 2009 10:49:40 EST news177245318 (PhysOrg.com) -- After the trajectory correction manoeuvre on 22 October, Rosetta has lined up on a near-perfect Earth approach path. The manoeuvre was so precise that mission controllers decided not to use the additional manoeuvre slot that was available yesterday. http://www.physorg.com/news176736191.html Space & Earth Fri, 06 Nov 2009 14:10:04 EST news176736191 (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 ESA's comet chaser Rosetta will swing by Earth for the last time on 13 November to pick up energy and begin the final leg of its 10-year journey to comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. ESA's European Space Operations Centre will host a media briefing on that day. http://www.physorg.com/news176551710.html Space & Earth Wed, 04 Nov 2009 10:20:01 EST news176551710 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 (PhysOrg.com) -- This image from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter shows channels to the southeast of Hale crater on southern Mars. Taken by the orbiter's High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera, this view covers an area about 3 kilometers (2 miles) wide. http://www.physorg.com/news175971479.html Space & Earth Wed, 28 Oct 2009 18:10:01 EST news175971479 As Saturn's rings orbit the planet, a section is typically in the planet's shadow, experiencing a brief night lasting from 6 to 14 hours. However, once approximately every 15 years, night falls over the entire visible ring system for about four days. http://www.physorg.com/news175584836.html Space & Earth Sat, 24 Oct 2009 06:34:51 EST news175584836 Earth is currently passing through a stream of debris from Halley's Comet, lighting up the night sky with the "fireworks" of the annual Orionids meteor shower. http://www.physorg.com/news175364339.html Space & Earth Wed, 21 Oct 2009 17:19:37 EST news175364339 ESA's Rosetta comet chaser will swing by Earth on 13 November to pick up orbital energy and begin the final leg of its 10-year journey to the outer Solar System. Several observations of the Earth-Moon system are planned before the spacecraft heads out to study comet 67/P Churyumov-Gerasimenko. http://www.physorg.com/news175258839.html Space & Earth Tue, 20 Oct 2009 12:20:08 EST news175258839 (PhysOrg.com) -- NASA's Galileo spacecraft began what would become a 14-year odyssey of exploration 20 years ago this Sunday, Oct. 18. Galileo was humanity's first emissary to orbit a planet in the outer solar system - Jupiter. http://www.physorg.com/news175199898.html Space & Earth Mon, 19 Oct 2009 19:39:48 EST news175199898 (PhysOrg.com) -- The annual Orionid meteor shower will peak in the hours before dawn on Oct. 21, according to the editors of StarDate magazine, who said the shower could produce up to 20 meteors per hour. http://www.physorg.com/news175187487.html Space & Earth Mon, 19 Oct 2009 16:13:44 EST news175187487 According to a new study by geologists at the University of Toronto and the University of Maryland, the wealth of some minerals that lie in the rock beneath the Earth's surface may be extraterrestrial in origin. http://www.physorg.com/news175092150.html Space & Earth Sun, 18 Oct 2009 13:45:26 EST news175092150 Astronomers using the twin 10-meter telescopes at the W. M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii have explored one of the most compact dust disks ever resolved around another star. If placed in our own solar system, the disk would span about four times Earth's distance from the sun, reaching nearly to Jupiter's orbit. The compact inner disk is accompanied by an outer disk that extends hundreds of times farther. http://www.physorg.com/news173028897.html Space & Earth Thu, 24 Sep 2009 17:10:02 EST news173028897 (PhysOrg.com) -- Astronomers have witnessed odd behavior around a young star. Something, perhaps another star or a planet, appears to be pushing a clump of planet-forming material around. The observations, made with NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, offer a rare look into the early stages of planet formation. http://www.physorg.com/news172943482.html Space & Earth Wed, 23 Sep 2009 16:52:09 EST news172943482 (PhysOrg.com) -- NASA reported Thursday that its Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or LRO, has successfully completed its testing and calibration phase and entered its mapping orbit of the moon. http://www.physorg.com/news172417835.html Space & Earth Thu, 17 Sep 2009 15:20:01 EST news172417835 Astronomers from the University of California, Los Angeles and the University of Hawaii have discovered multiple fragments ejected during the largest cometary outburst ever witnessed. Images and animations showing fragments rapidly flying away from the nucleus of comet 17P/Holmes will be presented by Rachel Stevenson at the European Planetary Science Congress in Potsdam, Germany, on Wednesday 16 September. http://www.physorg.com/news172306060.html Space & Earth Wed, 16 Sep 2009 09:20:01 EST news172306060 Comet 147P/Kushida-Muramatsu was captured as a temporary moon of Jupiter in the mid-20th century and remained trapped in an irregular orbit for about twelve years. http://www.physorg.com/news172133465.html Space & Earth Mon, 14 Sep 2009 07:51:39 EST news172133465 Argentina can lay claim to the world's largest crater field, a volcanic area in Patagonia known as the "Devil's Slope," according to a study released Tuesday. http://www.physorg.com/news171643252.html Space & Earth Tue, 08 Sep 2009 16:30:03 EST news171643252 (PhysOrg.com) -- NASA scientists have discovered glycine, a fundamental building block of life, in samples of comet Wild 2 returned by NASA's Stardust spacecraft. http://www.physorg.com/news169736472.html Space & Earth Mon, 17 Aug 2009 14:01:57 EST news169736472 (AP) -- NASA is charged with seeking out nearly all the asteroids that threaten Earth but doesn't have the money to do the job, a federal report says. http://www.physorg.com/news169304506.html Space & Earth Wed, 12 Aug 2009 14:02:32 EST news169304506 Splat! There goes another bug on the windshield. Anyone who's ever driven down a country lane has seen it happen. A fast moving car, a cloud of multiplying insects, and a big disgusting mess. http://www.physorg.com/news169135664.html Space & Earth Mon, 10 Aug 2009 15:40:01 EST news169135664 (PhysOrg.com) -- It began with a furrowed brow, a moment of puzzlement, quickly dismissed. http://www.physorg.com/news168529100.html Space & Earth Mon, 03 Aug 2009 14:39:34 EST news168529100 (PhysOrg.com) -- Astronomers have been turning the world's most powerful telescopes toward Jupiter, the solar system's largest planet, ever since Australian amateur astronomer Anthony Wesley discovered a new dark marking on the planet, apparently the scar from an impacting asteroid or comet, on the night of July 19. MIT professor of planetary science Richard Binzel says the impact highlights the role that Jupiter, with its powerful gravitational field, plays in protecting the Earth and other planets from such impacts. http://www.physorg.com/news168187207.html Space & Earth Thu, 30 Jul 2009 15:40:59 EST news168187207 (PhysOrg.com) -- Scientists have debated how many mass extinction events in Earth's history were triggered by a space body crashing into the planet's surface. Most agree that an asteroid collision 65 million years ago brought an end to the age of dinosaurs, but there is uncertainty about how many other extinctions might have resulted from asteroid or comet collisions with Earth. http://www.physorg.com/news168183769.html Space & Earth Thu, 30 Jul 2009 15:30:01 EST news168183769 Comets contained vast oceans of liquid water in their interiors during the first million years of their formation, a new study claims. http://www.physorg.com/news168179623.html Space & Earth Thu, 30 Jul 2009 13:34:46 EST news168179623 For the past several days the world's largest telescopes have been trained on Jupiter. Not to miss the potentially new science in the unfolding drama 580 million kilometres away, Matt Mountain, director of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland, allocated discretionary time to a team of astronomers led by Heidi Hammel of the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado. http://www.physorg.com/news167721373.html Space & Earth Sat, 25 Jul 2009 09:20:01 EST news167721373 An Australian amateur stargazer who spotted a "one in a million" impact on Jupiter Wednesday told of his astonishment as he chanced upon the Earth-sized dent in its gassy atmosphere. http://www.physorg.com/news167460611.html Space & Earth Wed, 22 Jul 2009 07:50:01 EST news167460611