This week in space

July 3, 2018 4:30 AM

New images of the universe. Beyond our solar system, one team of astronomers imaged the first ever photo of a planet being formed (study). Citizen scientists created this image of Jupiter's northern hemisphere, based on the Juno spacecraft's raw image feed. Meanwhile, the Dawn probe offered a new set of closeups of Ceres.

Previously.

posted by doctornemo (8 comments total)

The colours in that wonderful Jupiter image are, to my eye, disconcertingly reminiscent of (pale) tattooed flesh. I'd not seen any of the previous 'Dawn' images, so was fascinated to see the Ceres pictures too. Many thanks for the links!
posted by misteraitch at 4:43 AM on July 3, 2018

Just what I needed today: sometimes humans do something right, go science!
posted by lydhre at 6:01 AM on July 3, 2018

I'm surprised by how little media attention has been paid to Japan's Hayabusa2 mission to the asteroid Ryugu. The probe arrived last week to begin a year and a half exploration, including landing three rovers in October and then returning samples to Earth in 2020.
posted by fairmettle at 10:12 AM on July 3, 2018 [9 favorites]

"...What men are poets who can speak of Jupiter if he were like a man, but if he is an immense spinning sphere of methane and ammonia must be silent?"
-- Richard Feynman
posted by talos at 3:27 PM on July 3, 2018 [2 favorites]

I've been telling people about it, fairmettle, but few are interested. Perhaps the idea that the space race is largely going to be about China versus India versus Japan doesn't work for western audiences.
(And I should have added some of their amazing work to this post.)
posted by doctornemo at 7:50 PM on July 3, 2018 [2 favorites]

Whoa, I knew generally about Hayabusa, but I had no idea it was going to land three rovers. Wild.
posted by runcibleshaw at 7:55 PM on July 3, 2018 [1 favorite]

Probably more accurate to say US audiences; Canadians at least are as interested in any of these missions as they would be comparable US missions.
posted by Mitheral at 11:26 PM on July 3, 2018 [1 favorite]

Stereo image of asteroid Ryugu by Dr. Brian May.
posted by fairmettle at 12:20 AM on July 18, 2018