Bertrand Piccard successfully brings the HB-SIA (SolarImpulse) to Rabat

SolarImpulse Destination Morocco patch.

June 6, 2012

The crowds cheered as the HB-SIA landed in Morocco’s Rabat-Salé international airport at 23:30 (UTC+1) after 19 hours of flight. It was a spectacular site with representatives of the Moroccan Agency for Solar Energy (MASEN), journalists, invitees and, of course, the Solar Impulse team that had impatiently waited to complete this symbolic intercontinental leg of the 2012 Crossing Frontiers mission.

SolarImpulse Rabat landing

“Aside from technical and political reasons behind the decision to fly to Morocco, simply the flight over the Gibraltar straight was a magical moment and represents one of the highlights of my carrier as an aeronaut,” said Bertrand Piccard as the ground crew opened the cockpit.

Since November 2011, both MASEN and the Solar Impulse team have worked very hard to make this event possible. The arrival of the solar airplane is a wonderful apex to the months of preparations and growing expectations.

André Borschberg, Bertrand Piccard winner's of the first intercontinental flight solar

“We are Solar Impulse’s first intercontinental landing and we are ready to host this worldwide premier, this historical moment, as we are also landing with it,” said Mr. Bakkoury, President of MASEN. “It is an important moment for the MASEN. As initiators of another innovative project, the world’s largest thermo-solar power plant, we share a common message with Solar Impulse; a strong one: solar energy no longer restricted to the scientific world but is becoming an integrative part of daily. We will begin production in 2014, coinciding with Solar Impulse’s world tour.”

“This flight marks a new stage in the history of the project because we have reached another continent,” added André Borschberg, in consensus with Mr. Bakkoury’s comments “After almost 20 hours of flight we landed with a full set of batteries. This is extraordinary as it represents an increase in confidence in new technologies.”

SolarImpulse descrption & Flight Plan

Official events for youth and adult audiences, seminars and conferences organized by MASEN will take place throughout the week in Rabat in an effort to raise awareness about the possibilities clean technologies can offer. So don’t miss out on the photos and videos that will be posted daily on our website and the blog throughout the week directly from Rabat!

Flight Report: Madrid - Rabat

Takeoff time: 0322z

LDG: 2230z

Duration: 19:08

Average Ground Speed: 28kts

Battery SOC @ landing: 95%

Total Distance: 448 NM

Altitude over street of Gibraltar: 22616ft

Landing RWY: 03

Crossing of street of Gibraltar: 1435z

Highest Altitude: 27000ft

SolarImpulse website & Mission Control: http://www.solarimpulse.com/

Images, Video, Text, Credits: Solar Impulse / AFP.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

Solar Impulse fly to Morocco, to conquer a new continent

SolarImpulse Destination Morocco patch.

June 5, 2012

The Solar Impulse set sail Tuesday on Morocco after taking off at dawn in Madrid, for the first time to conquer a new continent.

Image above: Technicians and the Swiss driver Bernard Piccard preparing the Solar Impulse before his flight to Morocco, June 5, 2012 in Madrid (AFP Dominique Faget).

The plane, piloted by Bertrand Piccard Switzerland, co-founder of the project, flew smoothly, almost silently, the airport of Madrid-Barajas to 5:22 (3:22 ​​GMT). He headed to the south of Spain, flying, at sunrise, landscapes flooded with light.

For an hour I had a full moon on my right and the sunrise on my left, it's absolutely magical. I had all the colors of the rainbow in the sky and also on land, told from the cockpit Bertrand Piccard, explorer, 54, reached by telephone by AFP.

Solar Impulse is the first aircraft designed to fly day and night without fuel or polluting emissions, thanks to solar energy.

The carbon fiber aircraft is powered by four electric motors, a power of 10 horsepower each, powered by 12,000 photocells covering its huge wing.

Energy is stored during the day in batteries, allowing the aircraft to fly at night.

Image above: The Solar Impulse solar aircraft took off from Madrid, 201 June 5 (AFP Dominique Faget).

Solar Impulse has the wingspan of an Airbus A340 (63.4 meters) but weighs only 1.6 tons, or the weight of an average car.

At sunrise, a camera mounted on the aircraft has released images of the valleys south of Madrid, while the aircraft was en route to Seville in southern Spain.

The goal is not to use solar energy for normal aircraft, the pilot explained.

The goal is to prove that we can achieve outstanding goals, almost impossible with new technologies, without fuel, and make people aware that if we can do in heaven, of course anyone can do it on the ground .

After flying over the south of Spain at 3,600 meters and a speed of about 40 km / hour, Bertrand Piccard should gradually lead his plane at 8,500 meters above the Strait of Gibraltar, before entering the Moroccan airspace and flying over the port of Tangier.

The landing is scheduled in Rabat from 11 p.m. (2200 GMT).

The solar plane had arrived in Madrid on May 25, from Switzerland, for a scheduled stop, but had been off again since because of the wind.

I think the challenge really is to succeed the first intercontinental flight using solar energy, said Bertrand Piccard.

SolarImpulse description

We will leave Europe to come into Africa across the Strait of Gibraltar, bringing a message of support to the Moroccan agency of solar energy, which is preparing a comprehensive solar program, very ambitious for this country, he added driver.

According to the organizers of the flight, it was planned to coincide with the launch of construction of the largest solar thermal plant ever built in Morocco, in the region of Ouarzazate in the south.

The solar plane, then controlled by the co-founder of the project, Switzerland André Borschberg, aged 59, took off on May 24 at Payerne in Switzerland for a journey of 2,500 kilometers in total to Morocco, with a stopover in Madrid .

This is a rehearsal for the world tour of Solar Impulse in 2014.

Seven years of work went to a team of 70 people and 80 partners to build this revolutionary aircraft.

Solar Impulse had entered the history of aviation looping, in July 2010, a first flight of 24 hours without interruption and only powered by its solar panels and batteries.

Solar Impulse Mission Control website: http://live.solarimpulse.com/

Images (mentioned), Text, Credits: AFP / Translation: Orbiter.ch.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Giant Black Hole Kicked Out of Home Galaxy

NASA - Chandra X-ray Observatory patch.

June 6, 2012

Astronomers have found strong evidence that a massive black hole is being ejected from its host galaxy at a speed of several million miles per hour. New observations from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory suggest that the black hole collided and merged with another black hole and received a powerful recoil kick from gravitational wave radiation.

"It's hard to believe that a supermassive black hole weighing millions of times the mass of the sun could be moved at all, let alone kicked out of a galaxy at enormous speed," said Francesca Civano of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA), who led the new study. "But these new data support the idea that gravitational waves -- ripples in the fabric of space first predicted by Albert Einstein but never detected directly -- can exert an extremely powerful force."

Although the ejection of a supermassive black hole from a galaxy by recoil because more gravitational waves are being emitted in one direction than another is likely to be rare, it nevertheless could mean that there are many giant black holes roaming undetected out in the vast spaces between galaxies.

Image above: System CID-42, located about four billion light years away (X-ray: NASA/CXC/SAO/F.Civano et al; Optical: NASA/STScI; Optical (wide field): CFHT, NASA/STScI).

"These black holes would be invisible to us," said co-author Laura Blecha, also of CfA, "because they have consumed all of the gas surrounding them after being thrown out of their home galaxy."

Civano and her group have been studying a system known as CID-42, located in the middle of a galaxy about four billion light years away. They had previously spotted two distinct, compact sources of optical light in CID-42, using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope.

More optical data from the ground-based Magellan and Very Large Telescopes in Chile supplied a spectrum (that is, the distribution of optical light with energy) that suggested the two sources in CID-42 are moving apart at a speed of at least 3 million miles per hour.

Previous Chandra observations detected a bright X-ray source likely caused by super-heated material around one or more supermassive black holes. However, they could not distinguish whether the X-rays came from one or both of the optical sources because Chandra was not pointed directly at CID-42, giving an X-ray source that was less sharp than usual.

Simulation of Black Hole Ejection

"The previous data told us that there was something special going on, but we couldn't tell if there were two black holes or just one," said another co-author Martin Elvis, also of CfA. "We needed new X-ray data to separate the sources."

When Chandra's sharp High Resolution Camera was pointed directly at CID-42, the resulting data showed that X-rays were coming only from one of the sources. The team thinks that when two galaxies collided, the supermassive black holes in the center of each galaxy also collided. The two black holes then merged to form a single black hole that recoiled from gravitational waves produced by the collision, which gave the newly merged black hole a sufficiently large kick for it to eventually escape from the galaxy.

The other optical source is thought to be the bright star cluster that was left behind. This picture is consistent with recent computer simulations of merging black holes, which show that merged black holes can receive powerful kicks from the emission of gravitational waves.

There are two other possible explanations for what is happening in CID-42. One would involve an encounter between three supermassive black holes, resulting in the lightest one being ejected. Another idea is that CID-42 contains two supermassive black holes spiraling toward one another, rather than one moving quickly away.

Both of these alternate explanations would require at least one of the supermassive black holes to be very obscured, since only one bright X-ray source is observed. Thus the Chandra data support the idea of a black hole recoiling because of gravitational waves.

Chandra X-ray Observatory. Credit: NASA

These results will appear in the June 10 issue of The Astrophysical Journal.

NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the Chandra Program for the agency's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Mass., controls Chandra's science and flight operations.

For Chandra images, multimedia and related materials, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/chandra

For an additional interactive image, podcast, and video on the finding, visit: http://chandra.si.edu

Images (mentioned), Video, Text, Credits: NASA/J.D. Harrington/Marshall Space Flight Center/Janet Anderson/Chandra X-ray Center/Megan Watzke.

Cheers, Orbiter.ch

CERN adopts new scheme for easy access to intellectual property

CERN - European Organization for Nuclear Research logo.

4 May 2012

The challenges of CERN's scientific research programme push technical boundaries and drive innovative technologies and know-how in many fields. Image: David Merle/CERN

CERN has adopted a new approach to knowledge transfer. CERN Easy Access IP is an initiative to make it easier for businesses and entrepreneurs to access intellectual property generated at CERN in the course of its research programme.

Note:

CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is one of the world’s largest and most respected centres for scientific research. Its business is fundamental physics, finding out what the Universe is made of and how it works. At CERN, the world’s largest and most complex scientific instruments are used to study the basic constituents of matter — the fundamental particles. By studying what happens when these particles collide, physicists learn about the laws of Nature.

The instruments used at CERN are particle accelerators and detectors. Accelerators boost beams of particles to high energies before they are made to collide with each other or with stationary targets. Detectors observe and record the results of these collisions.

Founded in 1954, the CERN Laboratory sits astride the Franco–Swiss border near Geneva. It was one of Europe’s first joint ventures and now has 20 Member States.

More information:

CERN Easy Access IP: http://knowledgetransfer.web.cern.ch/technology-transfer/external-partners/easy-access-ip

Press release: CERN adopts new scheme for easy access to intellectual property: http://press.web.cern.ch/press/PressReleases/Releases2012/PR15.12E.html

CERN Knowledge Transfer: http://knowledgetransfer.web.cern.ch/

Image (mentioned), Text, Credit: CERN.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

Hubble Sees a Celestial Swan and Butterfly

NASA - Hubble Space Telescope patch.

June 4, 2012

This image from the Hubble Space Telescope shows planetary nebula NGC 7026. Located just beyond the tip of the tail of the constellation of Cygnus (The Swan), this butterfly-shaped cloud of glowing gas and dust is the wreckage of a star similar to the sun.

Planetary nebulae, despite their name, have nothing to do with planets. They are, in fact, a relatively short-lived phenomenon that occurs at the end of the life of mid-sized stars. As a star's nuclear fuel runs out, its outer layers are puffed out, leaving only the hot core of the star behind. As the gaseous envelope heats up, the atoms in it are excited, and it lights up like a fluorescent sign.

Fluorescent lights on Earth get their bright colors from the gases with which they are filled. Neon signs, famously, produce a bright red color, while ultraviolet lights (black lights) typically contain mercury. The same is true for nebulae: their vivid colors are produced by the mix of gases present in them.

This image was produced by the Wide Field and Planetary Camera 2 aboard the Hubble Space Telescope. A version of it was entered into the Hubble’s Hidden Treasures Competition by contestant Linda Morgan-O'Connor. Hidden Treasures is an initiative to invite astronomy enthusiasts to search the Hubble archive for stunning images that have never been seen by the general public.

Notes:

The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between ESA and NASA.

ESA Hubble website: http://www.spacetelescope.org/

NASA Hubble website: http://hubblesite.org/

Image Text,  Credit: ESA / NASA.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

ESA missions gear up for transit of Venus

ESA - Venus Express Mission patch.

4 June 2012

ESA’s Venus Express and Proba-2 space missions, along with the international SOHO, Hinode, and Hubble spacecraft, are preparing to monitor Venus and the Sun during the transit of Earth’s sister planet during 5-6 June.

ESA’s Venus Express is the only spacecraft orbiting Venus at the moment and while the transit is being watched from Earth, it too will use light from the Sun to study the planet’s atmosphere.

As sunlight filters through the atmosphere it reveals the concentration of different gas molecules at different altitudes.

Stellar occultation at Venus

This technique is also used to probe the atmospheres of planets outside our Solar System – exoplanets – to determine their potential habitability.

Simultaneous measurements are planned during the transit from ground-based observatories around the world to compare with the Venus Express results. 

Exoplanet scientists can then test their techniques for looking at the characteristics of rocky Earth-sized planets.

Proba-2 observes partial solar eclipse

Because Venus Express is in orbit around the planet, it will not notice any difference while the transit is being observed from Earth. But the spacecraft will be watching the Sun setting through the atmosphere of Venus, and its data will be compared to measurements made at the Earth at the same time.

These will include data from ESA’s Proba-2 microsatellite and Japan’s Hinode solar satellite, which will have ringside seats in low-Earth orbit to watch as Venus passes in front of the Sun.

“Proba-2 is expected to see a dip in the solar brightness as soon as the thick atmosphere of Venus makes first contact with the solar disc, which is an important measurement for exoplanet scientists,” says Joe Zender, ESA’s Proba-2 mission manager.

There is also the possibility that if Venus passes exactly in front of an active region on the Sun we can obtain information about the energy emitted by that region.

“This is important for space weather studies that help us to understand the Sun and its influence on Earth.”

Venus approaches Sun

Hinode will be watching the transit in visible, X-ray, and ultraviolet wavelengths to study phenomena such as the ’black drop effect’ – the small black teardrop shape that appears to connect Venus to the limb of the Sun just after it has fully entered the solar disc and again later, when it begins to leave the disc.

It will also observe the aureole, an arc of light seen around the planet’s disc during the first and last minutes of the transit.

“The most spectacular images and movies should come from Hinode’s Solar Optical Telescope, which has by far the highest resolution of any solar instrument in space,” says Bernhard Fleck, ESA’s Hinode and SOHO project scientist.

“Unfortunately, SOHO will not be well placed to observe the transit. However, it has one thing that no other spacecraft can provide: views of Venus as it approaches the Sun days before the actual transit, and then moves away from the Sun for several days after the transit.”

Meanwhile, NASA/ESA’s Hubble Space Telescope will use the Moon as a giant mirror to capture diffuse, reflected sunlight: a small fraction of that light will have passed through the atmosphere of Venus en-route to the Moon.

This will test techniques aimed at measuring the atmospheres of Earth-sized rocky exoplanets that could potentially reveal traces of life on planets outside our Solar System.

Related links:

Venus Transit Monitor: http://www.rssd.esa.int/index.php?project=VENUSEXPRESS&page=venus_transit

ESA's 2004 transit activities: http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/object/index.cfm?fobjectid=35189

SOHO sees 2004 transit: http://soho.nascom.nasa.gov/hotshots/2004_06_08/

Venus Express operations: http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Operations/SEM7QMQJNVE_0.html

Venus Express and the 2012 transit: http://venus.aeronomie.be/en/transit/groundbased_sandor.htm

Image, Animation, Video, Text, Credits: ESA (Animation by AOES Medialab) / ROB / NASA / SOHO.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Blowing bubbles in the Carina Nebula

ESA - HERSCHEL Mission patch.

4 June 2012

 Blowing bubbles in the Carina Nebula

Giant bubbles, towering pillars and cascading clouds of dust and gas fill the star-forming nursery of the Carina Nebula seen here in a stunning new view from Herschel to launch ESA Space Science’s image of the week feature.

The Carina Nebula is some 7500 lightyears from Earth and hosts some of the most massive and luminous stars in our Galaxy, including double-star system eta Carinae, which boasts over 100 times the mass of our Sun.

The total amount of gas and dust traced by ESA’s Herschel space observatory in this image is equivalent to some 650 000 Suns. Including warmer gas not well traced by Herschel, the total mass may be as high as 900 000 Suns.

Surrounding pillars of gas and dust point towards the bright central region of nebulosity – home to eta Carinae and numerous other massive stars.

The pillars are carved by intense stellar winds and radiation blasted out by these stars, eating away at the surrounding material.

Above and to the left is a chaotic web of bubbles and broken bubble arcs molded by individual regions of star formation that have swept up shells of dense clouds around them.

At top right is the Gum 31 nebula, which has blown a giant bubble out of the surrounding dense clouds thanks to winds and radiation emitted by the young stellar cluster NGC 3324 that sits at its heart.

Herschel spacecraft (Artist's view)

This latest Herschel image launches ESA Space Science’s new image of the week series, which will present a variety of images and animations capturing all aspects of space science from the Sun, planets, stars, and galaxies to the edge of the Universe, along with the spacecraft that provide us with these spectacular views.

Every week, look to the top right of the Space Science homepage and prepare to be amazed!

Related links:

Herschel: ESA's giant infrared observatory: http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Herschel/index.html

Herschel overview: http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Herschel/index.html

Online Showcase of Herschel Images OSHI: http://oshi.esa.int/

Images, Text, Credits: ESA/PACS/SPIRE/Thomas Preibisch, Universitäts-Sternwarte München, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Germany.

Cheers, Orbiter.ch