Watch NASA's Colorful Simulation of Space Weather All The Way Out to Pluto

• Scientists from NASA have released a computer rendering of how space weather occurs that was constructed using data collected through the New Horizons mission in the Pluto system.

• Compared to weather occurrences on Earth such as torrential rains or clear skies, weather patterns in space consist of plasma released by the sun that travels to the different corners of the solar system.

• In the latest NASA video created by the American space agency's Scientific Visualization Studio, the temperature in space is represented by the color red, density is represented by the color green and shock waves passing through the plasma field are represented by the color blue.

• Areas that show more than one trait is represented in the visualization using color combinations such as those in purple, which depicts portions with low density and hot shock waves.

• Robert Steenburgh, a researcher at the Space Weather Prediction Center of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), explained that space weather is composed of a combination of plasma, energetic particles, solar wind and flares that are released by the sun.

• Steenburgh makes use of a scientific model known as Enlil to monitor the behavior of space weather in order to predict disruptive occurrences such as radio blackouts that could severely damage satellites in orbit.

• NASA and NOAA researchers use the Enlil model to determine the impact of space weather on Earth. The reach of the model, however, only extends to just past the planet Mars. Weather patterns beyond that point remain a mystery to scientists.

Keywords: mission in the Pluto system, hot shock waves, radio blackouts.

Aspiring Astronauts, You Have Two Months to Send Your Resume to NASA

• NASA has good news for you. This morning, the agency kicked off its latest open call for astronaut candidates, complete with the above recruitment video and a Reddit AMA with NASA astronaut Shannon Walker and selection manager Anne Roemer, scheduled for 4PM EST.

• Applications will be accepted on this website until February 18, 2016, and the new class of would-be spacefarers will be announced in mid-2017. But before you shoot off your resume, be sure that you meet the minimum qualifications. Eligibility is contingent on US citizenship and a bachelor’s degree in engineering, biological science, physical science, computer science, or mathematics. It will also help your odds to have racked up at least 1,000 hours piloting a jet aircraft, or at least three years of comparable experience, according to the official announcement.

• While pursuing an off-Earth career is perennially exciting, now is a particularly interesting time to get in the running. Hopefully, NASA’s Commercial Crew Program (CCP) will be debuting within the next few years, which will return crewed launches to American soil after a long stint of dependence on Russia for astronaut transport.

• Moreover, NASA’s Orion spacecraft is currently in development for ambitious future deep space missions—including crewed trips to Mars. Perhaps some of the candidates recruited by this call will end up taking those momentous first steps on another planet.

Keywords: US citizenship and a bachelor’s degree in engineering, biological science, physical science, computer science, or mathematics.

NASA to attempt rocket launch, but foul weather persists

• The United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket carrying Orbital ATK's Cygnus craft, should liftoff from Cape Canaveral, Florida at 5:33 p.m. ET Friday, zooming on its way to deliver more than 7,300 lbs. of much-needed experiments, food and other supplies to the astronauts aboard the Space Station.

• The Orbital ATK launch originally was scheduled for Thursday evening, but rain and heavy cloud cover forced postponement. Orbital contracted with ULA to use the Atlas for two missions in order to resume flight operations as quickly as possible after the mishap. But if the spacecraft launches later in its 30-minute launch window, its rendezvous with the station will slip to Tuesday (Dec. 8), 

• Today's weather outlook does not appear to be much better, with only a 30 percent chance of favorable conditions at launch time.

• An unmanned Atlas rocket was poised to lift off at sunset with about 3,550 kilograms of supplies for the International Space Station.

• The rocket and Orbital ATK Cygnus cargo ship began rolling just after 10 a.m. Wednesday atop a transporter about one-third of a mile from a processing tower to the pad.

• The Deke Slayton II is the first ISS-bound spacecraft that had been previously worked on inside the space station. The original S.S. Deke Slayton was the cargo craft lost in last year's explosion.

• This is an important launch for Orbital after its failed launch in October of past year, when its Antares rocket exploded 15 seconds from launch, turning the cargo into a fireball and damaging Wallops Island's launchpad.

• More attention than usual is focused on the Orbital CRS-4 mission because of three recent failures involving resupply efforts.

• Also aboard the newest Cygnus capsule: clothes, toiletries, spacewalking gear, air-supply tanks and science experiments. SpaceX will now launch its Falcon 9 rocket, equipped with Crew Dragon spacecraft, at the launch site in Florida.

Keywords: Launch Window, cargo craft, cargo, Orbital CRS-4 mission 

NASA releases coloured images of Pluto

•  NASA has released an enhanced colour mosaic that combines some of the sharpest views of Pluto which the US space agency's New Horizons spacecraft obtained during its historic flyby of the icy-dwarf planet. The pictures are part of a sequence taken near New Horizons' closest approach to Pluto on July 14 this year, with resolutions of about 77-85 metres per pixel showing features smaller than half a city block on Pluto's surface.

• Lower resolution colour data (at about 630 metres per pixel) were added to create the new image. The images form a strip 80 kilometres wide, trending from the edge of 'badlands' northwest of the informally named Sputnik Planum, across the al-Idrisi mountains, onto the shoreline of Pluto's 'heart' feature, and just into its icy plains.

• NASA combined pictures from the telescopic Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) taken approximately 15 minutes before New Horizons' closest approach to Pluto (from a range of only 17,000 kilometres) with colour data gathered by the Ralph/Multispectral Visible Imaging Camera (MVIC) 25 minutes before the LORRI pictures.

• The wide variety of cratered, mountainous and glacial terrains seen in the images give scientists and the public alike a breathtaking, super-high-resolution colour window into Pluto's geology. 
•  

Keywords: icy-dwarf planet, telescopic Long Range Reconnaissance Imager.

More lousy launch weather as NASA tries to restart commercial space station Sacred Heart

• SCIENCE More lousy launch weather as NASA tries to restart commercial space station Israel Montgomery 05 December 2015, 05:06 

• A rocket launch to supply cargo to the International Space Station (ISS) by American aerospace manufacturer Orbital ATK has been pushed back due to adverse weather conditions. 

• The United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket with Orbital ATK's Cygnus spacecraft onboard seen shortly after arriving at Space Launch Complex 41 on December 2, 2015, at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. However, the weather forecast for Friday is only 30 percent favorable for takeoff, the United States space agency said. Times may change if the launch is delayed. 

• While NASA's worldwide partners have helped keep supplies flowing to astronauts aboard the station, this will be the first U.S.-based attempt since then. The United Launch Alliance rocket will transport 7,400 pounds of space station supplies packed into the Cygnus capsule. 

• As per the contract the Orbital company is required to carry at least 44,000 pounds of cargo to the International Space Station (ISS) by the end of 2016. The improvements come after the October 2014 accident, when an Orbital ATK Antares rocker that was to deliver a Cygnus spacecraft to the ISS crashed six seconds after launch. Russian Federation and Japan have managed to fill the gap since April's USA resupply mission, but the 250-mile-high pantry isn't as full as it should be. 

• NASA's other contracted supplier, SpaceX, also remains stuck on Earth. The last time Orbital launched, its rocket exploded seconds after liftoff from Wallops Island, Virginia, destroying the Cygnus cargo carrier and damaging the pad. Sacred Heart.

Keywords - Restart commercial space station Israel Montgomery, United Launch Alliance rocket, Orbital ATK Antares rocker.

Nasa and Orbital ATK set to launch a Cyngus rocket to International Space Station today

• The latest in a series of private-sector space missions will be launched today, in another effort to restock the International Space Station (ISS). 
• Space technology company Orbital ATK is due to launch a Cyngus rocket packed with supplies from Cape Canaveral in Florida just after 5.30pm UK time.
• The craft will deliver 3.5kg of food, clothes, supplies and technology for science experiments to the ISS. The equipment will prepare Nasa for studies it will carry out during up-coming missions.
• The launch was supposed to happen yesterday, but had to be postponed to today due to adverse weather conditions.
• But the success of this mission is far from certain if previous space launches by private companies are anything to go by. Last year, Orbital' Antares rocket exploded just seconds into its launch to the ISS.
• Additionally, SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket blew up shortly after leaving the ground in June this year. That said both companies have completed a series of successful missions with Nasa in recent years.
• If this mission is successful, it will revive Nasa's effort to commercialise its resupply missions to the ISS. Together, Orbital and SpaceX have a split deal worth $3.6bn with Nasa, and are currently competing for a further $3.5bn contract that will be awarded in January.

Keywords - Nasa and Orbital ATK set to launch a Cyngus rocket, SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket blew up shortly.

NASA team explains how water escapes from Saturn

• Researchers have found how water ions escape from the Saturn's environment after locating a point from where the ions exhaust out of the planet's atmosphere.

• Daniel Reisenfeld, a professor at theUniversity of Montana in US, is a member of the Cassini research team, a NASA-managed probe that studies Saturn. Cassini has been in orbit continuously collecting data since 2004. One of the instruments on Cassini measures the planet's magnetosphere - the charged particles, known as plasma, that are trapped in the space surrounding Saturn by its magnetic field.

• One of Cassini's past discoveries is that Saturn's plasma comprises water ions, which are derived from Saturn's moon Enceladus, which spews water vapours from its Yellowstone-like geysers. Knowing that the water ions would not be able to accumulate indefinitely, researchers set out to explain how the water ions escape from Saturn's magnetosphere.

• The researchers said that the plasma found a place to exhaust out of the magnetosphere at a reconnection point - where magnetic fields from one environment disconnect and reconnect with magnetic fields from another environment. In the case of Saturn, researchers discovered the reconnection point was located at the back of the planet, where the magnetotail was connecting with the solar winds' magnetic field.

• Reisenfeld likens the situation to a rotary or a traffic circle. Once you get into the rotary you have limited exit points. "If you can't find the exit, you keep going around in circles," he said. "So, the plasma around Saturn is basically trapped to go around the rotary. We assumed it had to escape somehow and somewhere, but actually finding the jettison point is pretty cool," he said.

• The discovery will help scientists understand the physics of how other rapid rotators such as Jupiter, stars and pulsars expel their materials and the details of how it works. "It's very exciting to have discovered this reconnection location because reconnection is one of the holy grails of plasma physics," Reisenfeld said.

Keywords - Saturn's plasma comprises water ions, Yellowstone-like geysers, magnetotail, jettison point is pretty cool.