Astronomy
- See Asteroid Vesta With Your Naked Eyes
Mark the date 17 Feb, 2010 as you might see Asteroid Vesta with binoculars or if you are lucky can even see it with your naked eyes as it will shine at a magnitude of 6.1 . Vesta is not the largest asteroid but it will be brightest as it will be opposite...
- Did Life Need Asteroid Bombardment?
A period 3.9 billion years ago when Earth was peppered with impacts by large asteroids may have created an environment in which primitive life could take hold, rather than destroying that life. This is the bold new claim by astrobiologists at the University...
- Hunting For Ceres In The Pipe Nebula
Ceres is the largest asteroid in the solar system, and is usually bright enough to be visible with telescopes and even binoculars (at around a magnitude of 7). However, unlike the brighter planets, it is not so bright to be able to be distinguishable...
- Asteroids
There is a lot of exciting stuff going on in the stars above us that make astronomy so much fun. The truth is the universe is a constantly changing, moving, some would say ?living? thing because you just never know what you are going to see on any given...
- Asteroid Facts
There is a lot of exciting stuff going on in the stars above us that make astronomy so much fun. The truth is the universe is a constantly changing, moving, some would say ?living? thing because you just never know what you are going to see on any...
Astronomy
Solar wind tans young asteroids
Unlike human skin which is damaged by prolonged exposure to sunlight over a lifetime, an asteroid's surface is aged in the first instances of its life.
Of course, the time scales of the exposure are much different: for an asteroid the damage is done over a period of one million years, but this is still a very short timeframe compared with the 4.6 billion year age of the Solar System itself.
New observations conducted using ESO's New Technology Telescope at La Silla and the Very Large Telescope at Paranal, astronomers have shed some light on this mystery. The astronomers looked at freshly exposed asteroid surfaces (caused by the collision of two asteroids) and noticed that they change colour in less than a million years.
The charged, fast moving particles in the solar wind damage the asteroid's surface at an amazing rate.The solar wind contains highly energetic particles that bombard the exposed surfaces of asteroids, eroding the molecules and crystals on the surface and rearranging them into different configurations with distinct colours and properties.
- See Asteroid Vesta With Your Naked Eyes
Mark the date 17 Feb, 2010 as you might see Asteroid Vesta with binoculars or if you are lucky can even see it with your naked eyes as it will shine at a magnitude of 6.1 . Vesta is not the largest asteroid but it will be brightest as it will be opposite...
- Did Life Need Asteroid Bombardment?
A period 3.9 billion years ago when Earth was peppered with impacts by large asteroids may have created an environment in which primitive life could take hold, rather than destroying that life. This is the bold new claim by astrobiologists at the University...
- Hunting For Ceres In The Pipe Nebula
Ceres is the largest asteroid in the solar system, and is usually bright enough to be visible with telescopes and even binoculars (at around a magnitude of 7). However, unlike the brighter planets, it is not so bright to be able to be distinguishable...
- Asteroids
There is a lot of exciting stuff going on in the stars above us that make astronomy so much fun. The truth is the universe is a constantly changing, moving, some would say ?living? thing because you just never know what you are going to see on any given...
- Asteroid Facts
There is a lot of exciting stuff going on in the stars above us that make astronomy so much fun. The truth is the universe is a constantly changing, moving, some would say ?living? thing because you just never know what you are going to see on any...