67P | KitGuru https://www.kitguru.net KitGuru.net - Tech News | Hardware News | Hardware Reviews | IOS | Mobile | Gaming | Graphics Cards Mon, 15 Jun 2015 11:40:34 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.4.3 https://www.kitguru.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/cropped-KITGURU-Light-Background-SQUARE2-32x32.png 67P | KitGuru https://www.kitguru.net 32 32 Philae comet lander space probe wakes up https://www.kitguru.net/channel/science/jon-martindale/philae-comet-lander-space-probe-wakes-up/ https://www.kitguru.net/channel/science/jon-martindale/philae-comet-lander-space-probe-wakes-up/#comments Mon, 15 Jun 2015 08:08:52 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=254561 It's been seven long months since anyone has heard from the Philae lander, which was touched down on a comet, hundreds of millions of miles from earth, in a descent that was fraught with nail biting triumphs. After 60 hours though, its batteries ran dry, as it had managed to land in an area of near consistent …

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It's been seven long months since anyone has heard from the Philae lander, which was touched down on a comet, hundreds of millions of miles from earth, in a descent that was fraught with nail biting triumphs. After 60 hours though, its batteries ran dry, as it had managed to land in an area of near consistent shade. However, now that it's closer to the sun, its brief periods of sunlight are enough to power it back up and the European Space Agency has begun communicating with it once again.

There had been no guarantee that even as Philae drew closer to its power source, that it would be able to turn back on, but the decade+ old hardware did its just admirably and re-established contact with its parent craft Rosetta, which in turn beamed back its confirmed reinvigoration to Earth, where the ESA informed the world. It's now hoped that Philae will be able to transmit some of the scientific data it still had on board when it shut down last year and also carry out new experiments and take photographs as the comet reaches its closest point to the sun.

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It's expected that as 67P nears the great stellar body, it will continue to heat up and that may cause some strange activity aboard the comet, potentially sending up jets of gas, or even parts breaking off to form the tail. It will reach its closest approach to the sun in August and will be at a distance of 127 million miles from it at that time.

The only worry is, that as it gets closer, Philae itself may overheat, though at this time, it's racing through space at a comfortable – relatively – minus 35 degrees celsius.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: It's great to see Philae come back online, if for no other reason than the ESA does a great job of making all of its space craft feel as if they are talking to one another. 

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Rosetta data suggests comets didn’t seed Earth’s water https://www.kitguru.net/channel/science/jon-martindale/rosetta-data-suggests-comets-didnt-seed-earths-water/ https://www.kitguru.net/channel/science/jon-martindale/rosetta-data-suggests-comets-didnt-seed-earths-water/#comments Thu, 11 Dec 2014 09:51:31 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=225852 As smart as humans like to think they are, we have only been kicking around this planet in our current form for 200,000 years or so. When compared with the age of the universe, or even our own little rock within it, that's not even a minute on the cosmic calendar. Still, we did manage …

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As smart as humans like to think they are, we have only been kicking around this planet in our current form for 200,000 years or so. When compared with the age of the universe, or even our own little rock within it, that's not even a minute on the cosmic calendar. Still, we did manage to land a probe on a comet several hundred million miles away and thanks to it and its orbiting parent's scientific experiments we now know, probably, that Comets didn't seed our planet with water. At least not on their own.

The idea that water on Earth came from comets was a theory that has been bandied around for some time, but based on the chemical composition of the water found within the 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko comet, that now seems unlikely. Why? Because water on earth is almost entirely H20, that is, two hydrogen molecules combined with an oxygen molecule. However, very occasionally, say one in ever 10,000 water molecules, instead of the Hydrogen-1 isotope (protium) there is instead, a Hydrogen-2 isotope, known as deuterium. Otherwise known as “heavy water.”

On earth, that sort of molecule is very rare, but not in 67P.

Speaking with the BBC's Radio 4 Inside Science programme, professor Kathrin Altwegg of the University of Bern – who was the principle investigator of the instrument used to measure water on Rosetta – said:
“It is the highest-ever measured ratio of heavy water relative to light water in the Solar System.

“It is more than three times higher than on the Earth, which means that this kind of comet could not have brought water to the Earth.”

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Formed billions of years ago, 67P could hold all sorts of secrets about our solar system's formation

As convinced as she is however, it's worth noting that we have only analysed water on two comets that come from the Kuiper belt, a region of space within our solar system that extends beyond the planets. On top of that, the comet other than 67P that we looked at, the much more easy to pronounce, Hartley 2, did contain water profiles much more like our oceans on Earth.

Altwegg believes these differences account for different regions in the formation of the belt during the early life of the solar system. Instead of these comets seeding a young Earth's water, she believes that asteroids are more likely to be responsible. Her reasoning, was that in samples of asteroids – metorites – that we've studied, their “characteristics… are very much like our water.”

She also noted that they orbit closer to the Sun and are therefore far more likely to impact the Earth.

Not everyone agrees of course, with some still holding on to the comet-water theory. Those who do, want us to study comets from closer to the Earth, those currently orbiting between Mars and Jupiter, in what's known as the “main-belt.”

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: This is some real time machine stuff guys. Comets are time capsules from billions of years ago and we just dug this one up. 

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Rosetta successfully releases Philae Lander for comet descent https://www.kitguru.net/channel/science/jon-martindale/rosetta-successfully-releases-philae-lander-for-comet-descent/ https://www.kitguru.net/channel/science/jon-martindale/rosetta-successfully-releases-philae-lander-for-comet-descent/#comments Wed, 12 Nov 2014 09:15:47 +0000 http://www.kitguru.net/?p=221528 Update: The confirmation has come through. Philae has successfully separated from the Rosetta Probe “flawlessly” and now begins its multiple hour descent. This is quite an emotional moment for the Probe's crew back here on Earth, as Philae and Rosetta have travelled through space inseparably for over 10 years and now begin the next stage …

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Update: The confirmation has come through. Philae has successfully separated from the Rosetta Probe “flawlessly” and now begins its multiple hour descent. This is quite an emotional moment for the Probe's crew back here on Earth, as Philae and Rosetta have travelled through space inseparably for over 10 years and now begin the next stage of their journeys alone.

Original Story: Just two days ago we learned the news that the Rosetta probe, currently in orbit around a comet named 67P hundreds of millions of miles away, was readying to separate its lander Philae. It was initially thought that by now we'd have the lander portion of the space craft on the surface of 67P, but a problem with the lander's thrusters (designed to prevent it bouncing off of the surface) caused a slight delay. However the European Space Agency has given it the go ahead to land anyway, using just the harpoons and feet screws to secure it in place.

At the time of writing, the Rosetta team is waiting on confirmation that the probe has released the lander and that the descent has begun. The signal of any movements made or steps taken by Rosetta can take up to half an hour to reach us, so we're just playing the waiting game right now.

You can watch the live steam of it here.

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The ESA's team is quiet, but clearly confident while they wait for confirmation

Beyond the separation, there is the descent stage to consider, which once begun will take around seven hours to complete. Confirmation of a landing on 67P will hopefully appear around 4PM this afternoon. From there, Philae can begin taking pictures and studying the structure of a comet for the first time, hopefully giving us a unique insight into how parts of our solar system were formed, potentially even giving us a hint of how planets are seeded with life.

Discuss on our Facebook page, HERE.

KitGuru Says: Congratulations to the ESA team and fingers crossed for the next steps. 

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