Bellatrix Orionis

LCROSS spacecraft, artist's rendering courtesy of NASA

If you have, then you probably won’t have heard the news.  The LCROSS spacecraft has actually found water ice on the moon in a permanently shadowed crater.  Yes people please note water on the moon.

Despite the lack of an obvious visible plume when the event happend, NASA had declared the mission a success when they started receiving data.  The twin impacts were caused by the LCROSS spacecraft and a companion rocket stage which hit the Cabeus crater on 9 October 2009.  NASA reported that the plume travelled at a high angle beyond the rim of Cabeus and into the sunlight while an additional curtain of debris was ejected more laterally.  Unfortunately it wasn’t visible to us Earth based observers.

Many scientists have contemplated the source of the large quantities of hydrogen which have been observed at both of the lunar poles.  The LCROSS information is giving a new insight in the question of the discovery of water, which is possibly more widespread and in larger quantities than first thought.  It is hoped these polar cold traps could hold the key to the history and evolution of our solar system if they were formed/deposited billions of years ago.  It is also thought that this and other such compounds could be used as potential resources for future exploration of the moon.

Since the impacts the LCROSS team have been ploughing through the massive amounts of data that was collected by the spacecraft.  The data from the satellites spectrometers have provided the most definitive information regarding the presence of water.  A spectrometer is used to identify the composition of an object by examining light that is either emitted or absorbed.  The scientists used the known near-infrared spectral signatures of water as well as other materials and then compared them to the impact spectra that was collected by LCROSS.

Further confirmation was obtained via an emission in the ultraviolet spectrum which was attributed to hydroxyl, which is a product from the break up of water by sunlight.

The data obtained form other LCROSS instrument are being analysed for any further clues regarding the state and distribution of materials at the impact site.  The ultimate goal of the LCROSS science team is to understand the entire impact event as well as the distribution of all materials within the soil at the site of the impact.

The LCROSS spacecraft was launched on 18 June 2009 from Kennedy Space Centre and was a companion mission to LRO (Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter).  LRO observed the impact and continually passes over the site of the impact to provide the LCROSS team with additional information regarding the mechanics of the impact and craters it created.  Scientists from both LCROSS, LRO and other observatories are working together to understand the data from the LCROSS impact.

For further information visit NASA’s LCROSS web pages.

I have to admit to being a huge fan of Twitter.  I’ve found it a great way to connect with individuals from around the globe who have the same hobby (ok, obsession would be a better word) as me.  Twitter has enabled me to renew my love of astronomy, share my frustration of the British weather and also communicate with other people who appreciate a beautiful star filled night.  One of those people is Adrian West (@AdrianWest) who belongs to Newbury Astronomy Society (@NewburyAS) and often can be found tweeting as both, though sometimes Nic Fleet (@nicfleet) takes over tweet duty.  By using Twitter many amateur and some professional observers shared their images and views of the Perseid Meteor Shower during August and by using  Twitter information was shared quickly with a whole host of people, some who had never seen a meteor shower before.

Well they are doing it again, this time we get a #moonwatch and a #meteorwatch.  The Moonwatch is taking place on the 26 and 27 October and they will be joined by the Faulkes Telescope, so there should be some pretty amazing images shared over Twitter. Check out the trailer below, lovingly created by my friend Adrian West and get yourself on Twitter, we’re an amazingly friendly bunch with a love of all things astronomical and there’s always someone to chat to about life, the universe and everything.

Trailer produced by Adrian West

Image courtesy of NASA

NASA has chosen the final destination for LCROSS (Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite) after a journey of almost 5.6 million miles which took in several orbits around Earth and moon.  It’s target is the crater Cabeus (proper) and the impact will take place on 9 October 2009 at 7.30am EDT (12.30 BST,11.30am GMT).  By smashing into the lunar surface LCROSS should be able to evaluate whether water ice exists at the moon’s south pole.

LCROSS will send its spent upper stage Centaur rocket to impact the lunar surface and will then fly into the plume of dust and measure the properties.  LCROSS itself will then collide with the moons surface. 

Dozens of professional astronomers based at international observatories will be aiming telescopes at the moon to maximise the scientific return of the LCROSS impacts.  Hubble will also be training it’s refurbished eyes on the moon to image the impact

For more information about the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite Mission.

The kind people at SLOOH have added two additional feeds which will view the impact as it happens.

Image credit: ISRO/NASA/JPL-Caltech/Brown Univ.

Three separate spacecraft have revealed that water molecules are present in the polar regions of the moon and in greater amounts than predicted.  Hydroxyl was also found which consists of only one oxygen atom and one hydrogen atom.  NASA’s Moon Minerology Mapper, also known as M3 gave these results.  M3 was carried into space on 22 October 2008 aboard the Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft which was launched by the Indian Space Research Organisation.  Data was also collected by the Visual and Infrared Mapping Spectrometer (VIMS) on NASA’s Cassini spacecraft as well as the High Resolution Infrared Imaging Spectrometer on NASA’s EPOXI spacecraft which helped to confirm the presence of water molecules.

The imaging spectrometers on the spacecraft made it possible to map lunar water more effectively than before.

Due to the confirmation of high levels of water molecules and hydroxyl at these concentrations in the moon’s polar regions this now raises new questions about its origin and effect on the mineralogy of the moon.

Whilst in lunar orbit, M3’s  spectrometer measured light reflecting off the moon’s surface at infrared wavelengths, splitting the spectral colors of the lunar surface into small enough bits to reveal a new level of detail in the surface composition.  When the M3 science team analysed the data they found the wavelengths of light being absorbed were consistent with the absorption patterns for water molecules and hydroxyl.

The M3 team found water molecules and hydroxyl at diverse areas of the sunlit region of the moon’s surface, but the water signature appeared stronger at the moon’s higher latitudes.  Water molecules and hydroxyl previously were suspected in data from a Cassini flyby of the moon in 1999, but the findings were not published until now.

Image Credit: ISRO/NASA/JPL-Caltech/Brown Univ./USGS

For additional confirmation, scientists turned to the EPOXI mission while it was flying past the moon in June 2009 on its way to a November 2010 encounter with comet Hartley 2.  The spacecraft not only confirmed the VIMS and M3 findings, but also expanded on them.

For additional information and images from the instruments, visit:

NASA

For more information about the Chandrayaan-1 mission, visit:

Chandrayaan

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

The Lunar Reconisance Orbiter has taken it’s first images of the areas where the Apollo lunar modules landed.

Normally I’d post the pictures here for you to look at but this time I’d suggest going to the source as you can zoom in see what is there

Credits: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

Salty ice has been discovered on Saturn’s moon Enceladus.  The moon replenishes the ring with material from discharging jets and it’s thought that the moon could harbor a reservoir of liquid water, perhaps an ocean, beneath its surface.

The Cassini spacecraft discovered the water ice jets in 2005 on Enceladus.  These jets eject tiny ice grains and vapour, some of which escape the moon’s gravity and form Saturn’s outermost ring.  Cassini’s cosmic dust analyser has examined the composition of those grains and found salt within them.

The scientists working on Cassini’s cosmic dust detector  conclude that liquid water must be present because it is the only way to dissolve the significant amounts of minerals that would account for the levels of salt detected.  The process of sublimation, the mechanism by which vapour is released directly from solid ice in the crust, cannot account for the presence of salt.

The outermost ring particles are almost pure water ice, but nearly every time the dust analyser has checked for the composition, it has found at least some sodium within the particles.

However, researchers doing ground-based observations did not see sodium, an important salt component.  The ground-based observation team notes that the amount of sodium being expelled from Enceladus is actually less than observed around many other planetary bodies.  These scientists were looking for sodium in the plume vapour and could not see it in the expelled ice grains.  They argue that if the plume vapour does come from ocean water the evaporation must happen slowly deep underground rather than as a violent geyser erupting into space.

Determining the nature and origin of the plume material is a top priority for Cassini during its extended tour, called the Cassini Equinox Mission.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency.

You can find out more information at either ESA or NASA

Credit: NASA

NASA’s last mision to the moon, Clementine produced images like this (on the left).

Unfortunately a malfunction in one of the onboard computers cut short the mission which ended on June 1994 due to the telemetry from the spacecraft being inteligible.

Credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center/Arizona State University

This is one of the latest images sent back by NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO).  The orbiter has taken images of a region in the lunar highlands south of Mare Nubium (Sea of Clouds)

As the moon rotates beneath the orbiter photographic maps of the lunar surface will be gradually built up.

The first images have been taken along the moonsdividing line between day and night (it’s terminator) and because of the deep shadow subtle topograpy has been exaggerated.

If you’re looking for an online Moon atlas, look no further than here.

For anyone interested, if it rains, theres a full Moon and it’s really dark where you are you may be lucky enough to see a ‘Moonbow’ or ‘lunar rainbow’.  This phenomena is fairly difficult to see because the colours are very pale, hence it sometimes being called a ‘white rainbow’, but the colours will appear in a photograph.

The best time to view a Moonbow is when the Moon is near to full and is low in the sky (it’s suggested less than 42 degrees or lower) and the sky must be dark.  There must also have been rainfall opposite the Moon, though there have been very rare instances of Moonbows appearing around the Moon itself in foggy weather.

Did you know that tonights full Moon is called the Worm Moon?  It’s the full Moon before the spring equinox and with the spring come the worms.

I’m not sure anyone told the weather that it should be spring like though.