*** The Official Astronomy & Universe Thread ***

Using data from NASA's Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope and other facilities, scientists have found the first gamma-ray binary in another galaxy and the most luminous one ever seen. The dual-star system, dubbed LMC P3, contains a massive star and a crushed stellar core that interact to produce a cyclic flood of gamma rays, the highest-energy form of light.


More:

http://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard...s-record-breaking-binary-in-galaxy-next-door/
 
what a cool project, hope this actually happens, and they get a picture however poor resolution, it would still be a masisve step forward.

http://www.projectblue.org/the-mission/
Project Blue will place a state-of-the-art exoplanet imaging telescope into orbit. The instrument will be equipped with advanced high contrast imaging technologies embedded in a coronagraph with a deformable mirror, multi-star wavefront control, and specialized post-processing techniques. Together they can efficiently suppress the light from both stars (Alpha Centauri A and B) separately, thus allowing any planets to be seen. Our team has extensive experience developing and testing these technologies — now it’s time to get them into space!

Why Alpha Centauri?
Quite simply, we believe Alpha Centauri is the best target for direct imaging an Earth-like planet in coming years.
Unusual proximity: At only 4.37 light years distance, Alpha Centauri is the closest star system to us, and contains not just one, but two stars similar to our Sun. The next Sun-like star is located 2.5x further away and would require a telescope 2.5 times larger in size.*
Accessible Habitable Zone: Its proximity allows us to observe the habitable zone of each star for Earth-like planets with a modest space telescope with a powerful coronagraph, while any other star requires telescopes of at least 1 meter in size.
Fertile ground: Proxima Centauri, which is thought to be part of the same system, is now known to have a potentially habitable planet. We are acting on a new scientific urgency to investigate our nearest Sun-like stars!

Timeline
2016: *Form partnerships & initiate fundraising
2017: * Preliminary design, proof of concept prototypes, integration, and initial instrument prototype
2018: * Final mission design, fabrication, assembly & testing; incorporate lessons learned from related balloon-borne flights
2019: * Final construction and launch to low-Earth orbit
2020 - 2022: Science and mission operations
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Continuing from above.

The look back into the distant, early Universe. While the modern Universe contains in average larger galaxies, the early Universe is dominated by many tiny galaxies.


The local, modern Universe with large and evolved galaxies can be seen to the left. The distant, early Universe with many tiny and primordial galaxies can be seen to the right. These galaxies grew through mergers to the galaxies we see today.


The evolution of galaxy size and number over cosmic time. It starts with the modern Universe with rather few and large galaxies — as they can be seen in our cosmic neighbourhood — and ends with a view of the early Universe with many tiny galaxies.


Panning across the southern field of the Great Observatories Origins Deep Survey (GOODS). GOODS is a large galaxy census, a deep-sky study by several observatories to trace the formation and evolution of galaxies.

 
Partial timelapse of the James Webb Space Telescope being lifted by crane in the giant cleanroom at NASA Goddard. It was then moved over to a different stand and rotated into view:

 
I've just had a text from Jessops saying my Skywatcher 200p will be delivered tomorrow.

I only ordered it this morning, web site says out of stock in store and for home delivery so I used the text chat thing to ask whether they'd be getting any more (at 249 it's well below anyone else) and they said it's a special order item they don't stock, they order one from their suppliers only if you place the order, but it will take up to 28 days.

If it arrives it took 1 day. We'll see what happens.
 
MAVEN's Imaging UltraViolet Spectrograph (IUVS) reveals Mars cloud formation:


The movie uses four MAVEN images to show about 7 hours of Mars rotation during this period, and interleaves simulated views that would be seen between the four images. Mars' day is similar to Earth’s, so the movie shows just over a quarter day. The left part of the planet is in morning and the right side in afternoon.

Mars’ prominent volcanoes, topped with white clouds, can be seen moving across the disk. Mars’ tallest volcano, Olympus Mons, appears as a prominent dark region near the top of the images, with a small white cloud at the summit that grows during the day. Olympus Mons appears dark because the volcano rises up above much of the hazy atmosphere which makes the rest of the planet appear lighter.

Three more volcanoes appear in a diagonal row, with their cloud cover merging to span up to a thousand miles by the end of the day.

These images are particularly interesting because they show how rapidly and extensively the clouds topping the volcanoes form in the afternoon. Similar processes occur at Earth, with the flow of winds over mountains creating clouds. Afternoon cloud formation is a common occurrence in the American West, especially during the summer.
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A visualization of the supernova remnant known as SNR 0509-67.5, THe Red Bubble:


The delicate sphere of gas, photographed by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, is the result of gas that is being shocked by the expanding blast wave from a supernova. The bubble is the visible remnant of a powerful stellar explosion in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), a small galaxy about 160,000 light-years from Earth. Ripples in the shell's surface may be caused by either subtle variations in the density of the ambient interstellar gas, or possibly driven from the interior by pieces of the ejecta. The bubble-shaped shroud of gas is 23 light-years across and is expanding at more than 11 million miles per hour (5,000 kilometers per second).

The unique three-dimensional view of the visualization reminds us that the objects in Hubble images are not all at the same distance, but rather spread across light-years of space. The stars and the shell of glowing gas from the Hubble two-dimensional image have been separated using both scientific knowledge and artistic license to create the depth in the movie. Of note, the relative distances between stars and the nebula have been greatly compressed.

Credit: NASA, ESA, and G. Bacon, T. Borders, L. Frattare, Z. Levay, and F. Summers (STScI)
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Updated timelapse of the of the James Webb Space Telescope in the cleanroom at NASA Goddard:


The telescope was moved via crane to a rotating stand to prep and position it for center of curvature testing. Precise measurements of the mirrors will be done via laser interferometer both before and after environmental testing. (i.e. vibration testing to simulate a rocket launch)
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STEREO Mission Turns 10:


Launched ten years ago, on Oct. 25, 2006, the twin spacecraft of NASA’s STEREO mission – short for Solar and Terrestrial Relations Observatory – have given us unprecedented views of the sun, including the first-ever simultaneous view of the entire star at once. This kind of comprehensive data is key to understanding how the sun erupts with things like coronal mass ejections and energetic particles, as well as how those events move through space, sometimes impacting Earth and other worlds. Ten years ago, the twin STEREO spacecraft joined a fleet of NASA spacecraft monitoring the sun and its influence on Earth and space – and they provided a new and unique perspective.

The two STEREO observatories, called STEREO-A and STEREO-B – for Ahead and Behind, respectively – were sent out from Earth in opposite directions. Using gravitational assists from both the moon and Earth, the STEREO spacecraft were accelerated to Earth-escape velocities.

STEREO-A was inserted into an orbit slightly smaller, and therefore faster, than Earth’s. For STEREO-B, the reverse happened: It was nudged into an orbit slightly larger than Earth’s so that it traveled around the sun more slowly, falling increasingly behind the Earth. As the spacecraft slowly fanned out away from the centerline between Earth and the sun – where every other sun-watching spacecraft is located – they revealed more and more new information about our closest star.
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More:

http://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2016/stereo-10-years-of-revolutionary-solar-views
 
The science aims of the ExoMars 2016 mission which will test key exploration technologies and search for evidence of methane and other rare gases in the Martian atmosphere:

 
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