Why are clocks adding an extra second on June 30th

If the day seems a little longer than usual on Saturday, June 30, 2012, that's because it will be. An extra second, or "leap" second, will be added at midnight to account for the fact that it is taking Earth longer and longer to complete one full turn—a day—or, technically, a solar day.

"The solar day is gradually getting longer because Earth's rotation is slowing down ever so slightly," says Daniel MacMillan of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.

June 30 will be one second longer than the typical day. Rather than changing from 23:59:59 on June 30 to 00:00:00 on July 1, the official time will get an extra second at 23:59:60.Credit: NASA

With this antenna at Kokee Park on the Hawaiian island of Kauai, NASA makes regular VLBI (Very Long Baseline Interferometry) measurements that are used in the time standard called UT1 (Universal Time 1). Credit: U.S. Navy/PMRF

Scientists know exactly how long it takes Earth to rotate because they have been making that measurement for decades using an extremely precise technique called Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI). VLBI measurements are made daily by an international network of stations that team up to conduct observations at the same time and correlate the results. NASA Goddard provides essential coordination of these measurements, as well as processing and archiving the data collected. And NASA is helping to lead the development of the next generation of VLBI system through the agency's Space Geodesy Project, led by Goddard.

From VLBI, scientists have learned that Earth is not the most reliable timekeeper. The planet's rotation is slowing down overall because of tidal forces between Earth and the moon. Roughly every 100 years, the day gets about 1.4 milliseconds, or 1.4 thousandths of a second, longer. Granted, that's about 100 or 200 times faster than the blink of an eye. But if you add up that small discrepancy every day for years and years, it can make a very big difference indeed.

"At the time of the dinosaurs, Earth completed one rotation in about 23 hours," says MacMillan, who is a member of the VLBI team at NASA Goddard. "In the year 1820, a rotation took exactly 24 hours, or 86,400 standard seconds. Since 1820, the mean solar day has increased by about 2.5 milliseconds."

By the 1950s, scientists had already realized that some scientific measurements and technologies demanded more precise timekeeping than Earth's rotation could provide. So, in 1967, they officially changed the definition of a second. No longer was it based on the length of a day but on an extremely predictable measurement made of electromagnetic transitions in atoms of cesium. These "atomic clocks" based on cesium are accurate to one second in 1,400,000 years. Most people around the world rely on the time standard based on the cesium atom: Coordinated Universal Time (UTC).

Another time standard, called Universal Time 1 (UT1) is based on the rotation of Earth on its axis with respect to the sun. UT1 is officially computed from VLBI measurements, which rely on astronomical reference points and have a typical precision of 5 microseconds, or 5 millionths of a second, or better.

"These reference points are very distant astronomical objects called quasars, which are essentially motionless when viewed from Earth because they are located several billion light years away," says Goddard's Stephen Merkowitz, the Space Geodesy Project manager.

For VLBI observations, several stations around the world observe a selected quasar at the same time, with each station recording the arrival of the signal from the quasar; this is done for a series of quasars during a typical 24-hour session. These measurements are made with such exquisite accuracy that it's actually possible to determine that the signal does not arrive at every station at exactly the same time. From the miniscule differences in arrival times, scientists can figure out the positions of the stations and Earth's orientation in space, as well as calculating Earth's rotation speed relative to the quasar positions.

Originally, leap seconds were added to provide a UTC time signal that could be used for navigation at sea. This motivation has become obsolete with the development of GPS (Global Positioning System) and other satellite navigation systems. These days, a leap second is inserted in UTC to keep it within 0.9 seconds of UT1.

Normally, the clock would move from 23:59:59 to 00:00:00 the next day. Instead, at 23:59:59 on June 30, UTC will move to 23:59:60, and then to 00:00:00 on July 1. In practice, this means that clocks in many systems will be turned off for one second.

Proposals have been made to abolish the leap second and let the two time standards drift apart. This is because of the cost of planning for leap seconds and the potential impact of adjusting or turning important systems on and off in synch. No decision will made about that, however, until 2015 at the earliest by the International Telecommunication Union, a specialized agency of the United Nations that addresses issues in information and communication technologies. If the two standards are allowed to go further and further out of synch, they will differ by about 25 minutes in 500 years.

In the meantime, leap seconds will continue to be added to the official UTC timekeeping. The 2012 leap second is the 35th leap second to be added and the first since 2008.

Keywords:  - clocks adding extra second on June 30th, NASA makes regular VLBI, quasar, UTC time keeping, 2012 leap second.

Changes in Exoplanet Atmosphere

The scientists conclude the atmospheric variations occurred in response to a powerful eruption on the planet's host star, an event observed by NASA's Swift satellite.

"The multiwavelength coverage by Hubble and Swift has given us an unprecedented view of the interaction between a flare on an active star and the atmosphere of a giant planet," said lead researcher Alain Lecavelier des Etangs at the Paris Institute of Astrophysics (IAP), part of the French National Scientific Research Center located at Pierre and Marie Curie University in Paris.

The exoplanet is HD 189733b, a gas giant similar to Jupiter, but about 14 percent larger and more massive. The planet circles its star at a distance of only 3 million miles or about 30 times closer than Earth's distance from the sun, and completes an orbit every 2.2 days. Its star, named HD 189733A, is about 80 percent the size and mass of our sun.

Astronomers classify the planet as a "hot Jupiter." Previous Hubble observations show that the planet's deep atmosphere reaches a temperature of about 1,900 degrees Fahrenheit (1,030 C).

HD 189733b periodically passes across, or transits, its parent star, and these events give astronomers an opportunity to probe its atmosphere and environment. In a previous study, a group led by Lecavelier des Etangs used Hubble to show that hydrogen gas was escaping from the planet's upper atmosphere. The finding made HD 189733b only the second-known "evaporating" exoplanet at the time.

The system is just 63 light-years away, so close that its star can be seen with binoculars near the famous Dumbbell Nebula. This makes HD 189733b an ideal target for studying the processes that drive atmospheric escape.

"Astronomers have been debating the details of atmospheric evaporation for years, and studying HD 189733b is our best opportunity for understanding the process," said Vincent Bourrier, a doctoral student at IAP and a team member on the new study.

When HD 189733b transits its star, some of the star's light passes through the planet's atmosphere. This interaction imprints information on the composition and motion of the planet's atmosphere into the star's light.

In April 2010, the researchers observed a single transit using Hubble's Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS), but they detected no trace of the planet's atmosphere. Follow-up STIS observations in September 2011 showed a surprising reversal, with striking evidence that a plume of gas was streaming away from the exoplanet.

The researchers determined that at least 1,000 tons of gas was leaving the planet's atmosphere every second. The hydrogen atoms were racing away at speeds greater than 300,000 mph. The findings will appear in an upcoming issue of the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics.

Because X-rays and extreme ultraviolet starlight heat the planet's atmosphere and likely drive its escape, the team also monitored the star with Swift's X-ray Telescope (XRT). On Sept. 7, 2011, just eight hours before Hubble was scheduled to observe the transit, Swift was monitoring the star when it unleashed a powerful flare. It brightened by 3.6 times in X-rays, a spike occurring atop emission levels that already were greater than the sun's.

"The planet's close proximity to the star means it was struck by a blast of X-rays tens of thousands of times stronger than the Earth suffers even during an X-class solar flare, the strongest category," said co-author Peter Wheatley, a physicist at the University of Warwick in England.

After accounting for the planet's enormous size, the team notes that HD 189733b encountered about 3 million times as many X-rays as Earth receives from a solar flare at the threshold of the X class.

Keywords – Changes in Exoplanet Atmosphere, HD 189733b, Swift’s X-ray Telescope, Hubble’s Space Telescope, and hot Jupiter.

NASA Space Launch System Core Stage Moves From Concept To Design

The nations space exploration program is taking the most critical step that are forwarded with the best major technical review to the core stage of the space launch system. This rocket will be taken by the astronauts into the space than ever before. This core stage is the main part of the heavy lift launch vehicle. This will be stand for about 200 feet with a best diameter of 27.5 feet.

In this the engineers from the NASA and The Boeing are presented with a full set of system requirements, designs concepts and production that approaches the technical reviewers and the independent review board. Tony Lavoie said that “This meeting validates our design requirements for the core stage of the nations heavy lift rocket and in the major checkpoint for our team”.

He is the manager of SLS Stages Element at Marshall he also said that “Getting this point will took a lot of hard work and also lam proud of the collaboration between NASA and also by our partners at Boeing. Now that we have completed this review we go from requirements to real blueprints. We are right on track to deliver the core stage for the SLS program”. William Gerstenhaber is the associate and administrator of the Human exploration operations mission.

He is the directorate of the NASA headquarters in Washington he said that “This is a very exciting time for the country and NASA as important achievements are made on the most advanced hardware ever designed for human space flight. In this the first test flight will be having the best feature with a configuration of 77 ton lift capacity in this it will be schedule on 2017.

Keywords: space launch system,Human exploration operations mission,William Gerstenhaber is the associate,NASA headquarters in Washington.

Saturn’s Moons Ocean

Nasa Cassini space craft have relieved the Saturn’s moon that receive data in the titan that are likely harbors the layer of liquid water under the eye shell. The researches have seen the large amount of squeezing and also stretching the moon orbited Saturn. If the titan were composed that can be entirely of stiff rock the gravitational attraction of the Saturn that would cause bulges or solid tides on the moon for 3 feet. Luciano less said that “Cassini’s detection of large tides on Titan leads to the almost inescapable conclusion that there is a hidden ocean at depth”. In this the titan takes about 16 days to orbit the Saturn and also the scientists that were able to study the moon shape at different parts of the orbit. Sami Asmar said that “we were making ultrasensitive measurements, and thankfully casino and the DSN were able to maintain a very stable link”. Jonathan Lunine said that” The presence of the liquid water layer in titan is important because we want to understand how methane is stored in titan interior and how it may outgas to the surface”.

Keywords: Nasa Cassini space craft, liquid water under the eyes, ultrasensitive measurements, titan interior, moon orbited Saturn.

Record Setting Astronaut Topez- Alegria Departs NASA

Michael Lopez-Alegria, NASA's most experienced spacewalker and the American holding the record for the single longest spaceflight mission, has left the agency. 

Lopez-Alegria flew on four missions and performed 10 spacewalks during his career. He most recently served in the Flight Crew Operations Directorate at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston as assistant director for the International Space Station (ISS). 

"Mike has faithfully served the Flight Crew Operations Directorate for many years," said Janet Kavandi, director of Flight Crew Operations at Johnson. "His unique background and diplomatic skills have made him an outstanding FCOD assistant director for space station and lead for the Multilateral Crew Operations Panel. Mike's tireless dedication to the safety and well-being of space station crews is well known. We will miss him and wish him well in his future endeavors." 

During his career, Lopez-Alegria logged more than 257 days in space, including 215 days as commander of the Expedition 14 mission to the ISS, which stands as the single longest spaceflight by an American. Lopez-Alegria also logged more than 67 hours during his 10 spacewalks, more than any other American, and second only in the record books to Russian cosmonaut Anatoly Solovyev. 

"Mike has been a huge asset to the astronaut office during the course of his career," said Peggy Whitson, chief of the Astronaut Office at Johnson. "His contributions in spacewalking, shuttle, space station and Soyuz operations are notable and very distinguished. Personally, we will miss his humor and insights and wish him all the best." 

Lopez-Alegria flew on three space shuttle missions. The first, STS-73 in 1995, focused on science experiments. He then served as NASA's director of operations at the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, Russia, where he was in charge of American astronauts training for flights to the Russian space station Mir and the ISS. Lopez-Alegria later flew on STS-92 in 2000 and STS-113 in 2002, delivering critical truss elements to the station. 

Expedition 14 Commander Lopez-Alegria and his crew launched to the ISS on a Soyuz spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Sept. 18, 2006. This fourth and final mission earned Lopez-Alegria the spaceflight record. The crew conducted a seven-month mission to operate, maintain, build and use the station and its science facilities. During the expedition, two uncrewed Russian Progress cargo vehicles arrived and departed the station and a space shuttle assembly mission reconfigured the station's power supply. Lopez-Alegria's mission ended with a Soyuz landing on the Kazakh steppe on April 21, 2007. 

Keywords - Michael Lopez-Alegria, NASA's most experienced spacewalker departs NASA.

New NASA Book Tells Why Aerospace Accidents Happen

Understanding what causes an accident often is like looking at an iceberg. We see the accident as the tip of the iceberg, but all the missteps, poor decisions and coincidences that led up to it often are missed, hidden just beneath the surface. 

In NASA's newest book, "Breaking the Mishap Chain," that oversight is corrected as some of the most well-known accidents in aviation and space history are remembered with details that reveal the non-technical, human-related events that led to each incident. 

For example, in 1967 an X-15 rocketplane crashed, killing the pilot, Mike Adams. In detailing the events surrounding the mishap, the authors explain how the pilot's history with spatial disorientation – what was generally called vertigo back then – and confusion about what one of his instruments was telling him contributed to the accident. 

"Anybody involved in flying needs to learn the lessons of the past," said Dr. Gregg Bendrick, NASA's chief medical officer at the Dryden Flight Research Center in California. Bendrick is one of the book's three authors. 

The other authors include Peter Merlin, a NASA aerospace historian at Dryden; and Dr. Dwight Holland, a principal partner in Human Factors Associates who has served as president of the International Association of Military Flight Surgeon Pilots and the Space Medicine Association. 

“This book is unique because it integrates aerospace history, medicine, human factors, and system design issues in a compelling multi-level examination of some truly fascinating stories of aerospace exploration," Holland added. 

Altogether, nine cases are detailed, not all of them resulting in fatalities. Some of the others include:

The infamous "touch and go" double landing of the prototype space shuttle Enterprise at Edwards Air Force Base in California during the Approach and Landing Test program in 1977.

The 1967 crash of the M2-F2 lifting body on the dry lakebed at Edwards, in which film footage of the accident later was used in the opening credits of the television series "The Six Million Dollar Man."

The mid-air collision in 1966 of NASA's XB-70A Valkyrie supersonic test aircraft with an F-104 Starfighter chase plane while flying in formation with other aircraft during a photo opportunity over the California high desert.

The low Earth orbit collision in 1997 of the Russian Progress 234 cargo spaceship with the Russian space station Mir while NASA astronaut Michael Foale was on board the orbiting outpost.

The book offers rich details of the people, machines and history of each case that is easy for the average person to begin to understand why each event occurred. 

"Hopefully, by identifying the underlying causes and lessons learned from past incidents, we will prevent future mishaps," Bendrick said. 

Each case also includes a surgically precise analysis of what happened that is intended for aerospace medicine and air safety professionals to consider – such as understanding how the difference between somatogravic and oculoagravic illusion was important in fully understanding the X-15 accident. 

Read the book to find out what those words mean. 

"This book is designed for anyone interested in aerospace safety issues but, with some of the more complicated topics included, may be of particular interest to aeromedical professionals and those responsible for managing aviation safety programs," Merlin said. "In fact it would make an excellent textbook for related classes." 

Keywords – New NASA book tells why aerospace accidents happen, X-15 accident, future mishaps, Russian Progress 234 cargo spaceship, NASA astronaut Michael Foale, Breaking the Mishap Chain.

Student Airborne Research Program

The SARP had the fourth annual NASA that have been begin in the month june 17th  by the arrival of California and also by celebrating the thirty two college and universities  from across united states. These students are selected by the outstanding performance done in the academic years that are interest in the earth science and career goals. These students are from majoring of STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics).

In this research every student prepared separate posters that was been based on the academic performance. In this ballrooms are fully posted by the student’s performance in the hotel at palmdale. The students after that mingled with each other and discussed about the professional posters and also they discussed with the SARP faculty member, NASA scientists, administrators for better training. Everything has been started successfully and the SARP lecturers have been started on Monday. The students have the first lecturer by the four faculty members and also the research groups have also been arranged. 

In these lecturers students have got the knowledge about eth remote sensing from the jeff Myers Airborne sensor facility. Dr .Henry Fuelburg discussed clearly about the airborne scientists. 

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Hint of fresh air at Dione

NASA's Cassini spacecraft has "sniffed" molecular oxygen ions around Saturn's icy moon Dione for the first time, confirming the presence of a very tenuous atmosphere. The oxygen ions are quite sparse – one for every 0.67 cubic inches of space (one for every 11 cubic centimeters of space) or about 2,550 per cubic foot (90,000 per cubic meter) – show that Dione has an extremely thin neutral atmosphere.

At the Dione surface, this atmosphere would only be as dense as Earth's atmosphere 300 miles (480 kilometers) above the surface. The detection of this faint atmosphere, known as an exosphere, is described in a recent issue of the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

"We now know that Dione, in addition to Saturn's rings and the moon Rhea, is a source of oxygen molecules," said Robert Tokar, a Cassini team member based at Los Alamos National Laboratory, Los Alamos, N.M., and the lead author of the paper. "This shows that molecular oxygen is actually common in the Saturn system and reinforces that it can come from a process that doesn't involve life."

Dione's oxygen appears to derive from either solar photons or energetic particles from space bombarding the moon's water ice surface and liberating oxygen molecules, Tokar said. But scientists will be looking for other processes, including geological ones that could also explain the oxygen.

"Scientists weren't even sure Dione would be big enough to hang on to an exosphere, but this new research shows that Dione is even more interesting than we previously thought," said Amanda Hendrix, Cassini deputy project scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., who was not directly involved in the study. "Scientists are now digging through Cassini data on Dione to look at this moon in more detail."

Several solid solar system bodies – including Earth, Venus, Mars and Saturn's largest moon Titan – have atmospheres. But they tend to be typically much denser than what has been found around Dione. However, Cassini scientists did detect a thin exosphere around Saturn's moon Rhea in 2010, very similar to Dione. The density of oxygen at the surfaces of Dione and Rhea is around 5 trillion times less dense than that at Earth's surface.

Tokar said scientists suspected molecular oxygen would exist at Dione because NASA's Hubble Space Telescope detected ozone. But they didn't know for sure until Cassini was able to measure ionized molecular oxygen on its second flyby of Dione on April 7, 2010 with the Cassini plasma spectrometer. On that flyby, the spacecraft flew within about 313 miles (503 kilometers) of the moon's surface.

Cassini scientists are also analyzing data from Cassini's ion and neutral mass spectrometer from a very close flyby on Dec. 12, 2011. The ion and neutral mass spectrometer made the detection of Rhea's thin atmosphere, so scientists will be able to compare Cassini data from the two moons and see if there are other molecules in Dione's exosphere.

Keywords - Hint of fresh air at Dione, Cassini data, Dione’s exosphere, Hubble Space Telescope, exosphere, Cassini spacecraft.

Dawn Sees Surface Features on Asteroid

NASA's Dawn spacecraft has revealed unexpected details on the surface of the giant asteroid Vesta. New images and data highlight the diversity of Vesta's surface and reveal unusual geologic features, some of which were never previously seen on asteroids.

These results were discussed today at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference at The Woodlands, Texas.

Vesta is one of the brightest objects in the solar system and the only asteroid in the so-called main belt between Mars and Jupiter visible to the naked eye from Earth. Dawn has found that some areas on Vesta can be nearly twice as bright as others, revealing clues about the asteroid's history.

"Our analysis finds this bright material originates from Vesta and has undergone little change since the formation of Vesta over 4 billion years ago," said Jian-Yang Li, a Dawn participating scientist at the University of Maryland, College Park. "We're eager to learn more about what minerals make up this material and how the present Vesta surface came to be."

Bright areas appear everywhere on Vesta but are most predominant in and around craters. The areas vary from several hundred feet to around 10 miles (16 kilometers) across. Rocks crashing into the surface of Vesta seem to have exposed and spread this bright material. This impact process may have mixed the bright material with darker surface material.

While scientists had seen some brightness variations in previous images of Vesta from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, Dawn scientists also did not expect such a wide variety of distinct dark deposits across its surface. The dark materials on Vesta can appear dark gray, brown and red. They sometimes appear as small, well-defined deposits around impact craters. They also can appear as larger regional deposits, like those surrounding the impact craters scientists have nicknamed the "snowman."

"One of the surprises was the dark material is not randomly distributed," said David Williams, a Dawn participating scientist at Arizona State University, Tempe. "This suggests underlying geology determines where it occurs."-

The dark materials seem to be related to impacts and their aftermath. Scientists theorize carbon-rich asteroids could have hit Vesta at speeds low enough to produce some of the smaller deposits without blasting away the surface.

Higher-speed asteroids also could have hit Vesta's surface and melted the volcanic basaltic crust, darkening existing surface material. That melted conglomeration appears in the walls and floors of impact craters, on hills and ridges, and underneath brighter, more recent material called ejecta, which is material thrown out from a space rock impact.

Vesta's dark materials suggest the giant asteroid may preserve ancient materials from the asteroid belt and beyond, possibly from the birth of the solar system.

"Some of these past collisions were so intense they melted the surface," said Brett Denevi, a Dawn participating scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Md. "Dawn's ability to image the melt marks a unique find. Melting events like these were suspected, but never before seen on an asteroid."

Dawn launched in September 2007. It will reach its second destination, Ceres, in February 2015.

Keywords – Dawn sees surface features on Asteroid, Dawn spacecraft, giant asteroid, ejecta thrown out from a space rock impact, Vesta.

Galaxy with split personality

While some galaxies are rotund and others are slender disks like our spiral Milky Way, new observations from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope show that the Sombrero galaxy is both. The galaxy, which is a round elliptical galaxy with a thin disk embedded inside, is one of the first known to exhibit characteristics of the two different types. The findings will lead to a better understanding of galaxy evolution, a topic still poorly understood.

"The Sombrero is more complex than previously thought," said Dimitri Gadotti of the European Southern Observatory in Chile and lead author of a new paper on the findings appearing in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. "The only way to understand all we know about this galaxy is to think of it as two galaxies, one inside the other."

The Sombrero galaxy, also known as NGC 4594, is located 28 million light-years away in the constellation Virgo. From our viewpoint on Earth, we can see the thin edge of its flat disk and a central bulge of stars, making it resemble a wide-brimmed hat. Astronomers do not know whether the Sombrero's disk is shaped like a ring or a spiral, but agree it belongs to the disk class.

"Spitzer is helping to unravel secrets behind an object that has been imaged thousands of times," said Sean Carey of NASA's Spitzer Science Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. "It is intriguing Spitzer can read the fossil record of events that occurred billions of years ago within this beautiful and archetypal galaxy."

Spitzer captures a different view of the galaxy than visible-light telescopes. In visible views, the galaxy appears to be immersed in a glowing halo, which scientists had thought was relatively light and small. With Spitzer's infrared vision, a different view emerges. Spitzer sees old stars through the dust and reveals the halo has the right size and mass to be a giant elliptical galaxy.

While it is tempting to think the giant elliptical swallowed a spiral disk, astronomers say this is highly unlikely because that process would have destroyed the disk structure. Instead, one scenario they propose is that a giant elliptical galaxy was inundated with gas more than nine billion years ago. Early in the history of our universe, networks of gas clouds were common, and they sometimes fed growing galaxies, causing them to bulk up. The gas would have been pulled into the galaxy by gravity, falling into orbit around the center and spinning out into a flat disk. Stars would have formed from the gas in the disk.

"This poses all sorts of questions," said Ruben Sanchez-Janssen from the European Southern Observatory, co-author of the study. "How did such a large disk take shape and survive inside such a massive elliptical? How unusual is such a formation process?"

Researchers say the answers could help them piece together how other galaxies evolve. Another galaxy, called Centaurus A, appears also to be an elliptical galaxy with a disk inside it. But its disk does not contain many stars. Astronomers speculate that Centaurus A could be at an earlier stage of evolution than the Sombrero and might eventually look similar.

The findings also answer a mystery about the number of globular clusters in the Sombrero galaxy. Globular clusters are spherical nuggets of old stars. Ellipticals typically have a few thousand, while spirals contain a few hundred. The Sombrero has almost 2,000, a number that makes sense now but had puzzled astronomers when they thought it was only a disk galaxy.

Keywords – Galaxy with split personality, Sombrero galaxy, disk galaxy, Sombrero, puzzled astronomers.

Dark heart of a cosmic collision

Infrared and X-ray observations from two space telescopes have been combined to create a unique look at violent events within the giant galaxy Centaurus A. The observations strengthen the view that the galaxy may have been created by the cataclysmic collision of two older galaxies.

The infrared light was captured by the European Space Agency's Herschel Space Observatory, a mission with important NASA contributions. The X-ray observations were made by the European Space Agency's XMM-Newton space telescope.

Centaurus A is the closest giant elliptical galaxy to Earth, at a distance of around 12 million light-years. It stands out because it harbors a massive black hole at its core and emits intense blasts of radio waves.

While previous images taken in visible light hinted at the complex inner structure in Centaurus A, combining the output of two orbiting observatories working at almost opposite ends of the electromagnetic spectrum has revealed the unusual structure in much greater detail.

The galaxy was observed by astronomer Sir John Herschel in 1847 during his survey of the southern skies. Now, more than 160 years later, the observatory bearing his family name has played a unique role in uncovering some of its secrets.

With the Herschel observatory, the giant black scar of obscuring dust crossing the center of Centaurus A all but disappears when viewed at long infrared wavelengths. The images show the flattened inner disk of a spiral galaxy, the shape of which scientists believe is due to a collision with an elliptical galaxy during a past epoch.

The Herschel data also uncover evidence for intense star birth toward the center of the galaxy, along with two jets emanating from the galaxy's core -- one of them 15,000 light-years long. Newly discovered clouds co-aligned with the jets can also be seen in Herschel's view.

The XMM-Newton X-ray observatory recorded the high-energy glow from one of the jets, extending more than 12,000 light-years away from the galaxy's bright nucleus. XMM-Newton's view shows not only the way that the jet interacts with the surrounding interstellar matter, but also the galaxy's intensely active nucleus, and its large gaseous halo.

The jets seen by both satellites are evidence of the supermassive black hole --10 million times the mass of our sun -- at the center of the galaxy.

This unique collaboration, along with observations from the ground in visible light, has given us a new perspective on the drama in objects like Centaurus A, with a black hole, star birth and the clashing of two distinct galaxies all rolled into one.

Keywords – Dark heart of cosmic collision, Centaurus A, XMM-Newton X-ray, Herschel’s view collision with an elliptical galaxy.

Readying Orion for flight

The exciting NASA teams at the Michoud Assembly facilityin New Orleans have been completed with final weld on the first space found of the Orion capsule. The Orion will be shipped in the Kennedy space center for final assembly and check out for the operations.

This EFT-1 flight will be taken with Orion to an attitude of more than 3,600 miles for more than 15times farther away from the earth than the international space station. This Orion will return at the speed of 25,000 miles that will be almost 5000 miles per hour faster than any of the human spacecraft. 

It will also mimic the conditions that can be return from the conditions of the astronauts experience beyond the earth’s low orbit.  It will also endure the earth’s temperature of about 4,000 degrees F, which is higher than the human spacecraft so that since astronomers returned from the moon. 

Keywords: Michoud Assembly facilities in New Orleans, international space station, mimic the conditions that can be return, human spacecraft.

Satellite Sees Western Us Fires

A NASA satellite captured images of several wildfires burning in the western United States, including the Poco Fire burning in Central Arizona and the Fox Fire burning east of Tucson. 

NASA’s Aqua satellite captured smoke and heat signatures from several large fires. The largest fire seen here, Colorado’s High Park Fire, has burned 68,200 acres and destroyed 189 homes as of June 22, according to the U.S Forest Service. The High Park Fire is located in the Roosevelt National Forest, about 15 miles west of Fort Collins, Colo. and was started by a lightning strike.

Smoke and heat signatures from the Poco Fire are clearly visible in the image. The Poco Fire is now 25 percent contained after burning 11,950 acres. Firefighters will continue to patrol for spot fires, reinforce fire lines, and mop up.

As of the latest update, the lightning-caused Fox Fire has burned about 7,500 acres and is now 75 percent contained. The Fox Fire is burning in a rugged part of the Rincon Wilderness east of Tucson.

Keywords – NASA satellite sees western us fires, Rincon Wilderness, Tucson, Colorado’s High Park Fire, and U.S Forest Service.

Forecast of Hurricane Chris

Infrared satellite imagery from NASA’s Aqua satellite have revealed that the clouds around Hurricane Chris eye have reached a cold peak early on June 21 when it was first designated a hurricane, and have since warmed. The thunderstorms that surround Chris eye are now between -60 and -70 Celsius. The temperatures indicate strong high thunderstorms with the potential for heavy rainfall.

The forecasters at the National Hurricane Center expect Chris to become a post-tropical cyclone on Friday, June 22. The weakening is expected because Chris is moving into stable air and cooler waters.

NOAA’s GOES-13 satellite captured a visible image of Chris on June 21. Chris is expected to turn in the Atlantic over the next couple of days. First a turn to the north and then northwest and finally south. Chris is moving around a large mid-to-upper level low pressure area and will eventually become absorbed within the upper level low in the next couple of days.

Keywords :– Infrared satellite imagery from NASA, Hurricane Chris, forecasters at the National Hurricane Center, expected to turn in the Atlantic.

NASA Launch Control Center Tours

After 30 years NASA for the first time NASA is allowing the Kennedy space center visitor complex guests to be allowed inside the launch control center. 

In this incident all the engineers supervised the 152 launches in the space shuttle and also the Apollo programs.

In this Launch control center Tour the Kennedy space center’s 50th anniversary was celebrated the rare series of the tours that takes place in the visitors getting firing room 4 led by the trained space experts. 

This tour will be offered greatly at the end of the year.

Keywords: tour will be offered, trained space experts, launch control center, 152 launches in space shuttle, trained space experts.

Space Station’s Robotic Crew Member

NASA’s first humanoid robot has successfully hitched a ride to the International Space Station. Built for the specific purpose of working on the space station, its robotic hands work like human hands with the ability to use human tools to assist astronauts with tasks that are simple, repetitive or potentially dangerous. The technology development demonstration will serve as a springboard to help explore and evolve new robotic capabilities in space and on Earth. Robonaut is a joint project of NASA and General Motors (GM) to improve robotic technology and capabilities for future space exploration platforms along with advanced vehicle safety systems and manufacturing plants.

GM expects Robonaut to validate manufacturing technologies that will improve the health and safety of GM team members throughout the world.

“This is one of the first payloads ever on the space station that can actually impart forces in its environment” said Nic Radford, Robonaut deputy project manager from NASA’s Johnson space center. Radford added that an ultra-sensitive, built-in safety system can automatically power down Robonaut if it makes unexpected contact with astronauts or equipment on the station.

During the interview, Radford talks about Robonaut shaking hands with Expedition 30 commander Dan Burbank, as well as what the future holds for the robot aboard the International Space Station. With human-like hands and arms, Robonaut is able to use the same tools station crew members use.

Keywords – Space Station’s Robotic Crew Member, Robonaut, NASA and General Motors, NASA’s Johnson space center, astronauts, Robonaut shaking hands with commander.

Amateur Astronomers to Target Asteroid

A new NASA outreach project will enlist the help of amateur astronomers to discover near Earth objects (NEOs) and study their characteristics. NEOs are asteroids with orbits that occasionally bring them close to the Earth.

Amateur astronomers will help better characterize the population of NEOs, including their position, motion, rotation and changes in the intensity of light they emit. OSIRIS-REx is scheduled for launch in 2016 and will study material from an asteroid. Professional astronomers will use the information to refine theoretical models of asteroids, improving their understanding about asteroids similar to the one OSIRIS-Rex will encounter in 2019, designated 1999 RQ36.

OSIRIS-REx will map the asteroid’s global properties, measure non-gravitational forces and provide observations that can be compared with data obtained by telescope observations from Earth. In 2023, OSIRIS-REx will return back to Earth with at least 60 grams of surface material from the asteroid.

 “Although few amateur astronomers have the capability to observe 1999 RQ36 itself, they do have the capability to observe other targets,” said Jason Dworkin, OSIRIS-REx project scientist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.

Amateur astronomers long have provided NEO tracking observations in support of NASA’s NEO Observation Program. A better understanding of NEOs is a critically important precursor in the selection and targeting of future asteroid missions.

OSIRIS-REx is the third mission in NASA’s New Frontiers Program. “For well over 10 years, amateurs have been important contributors in the refinement of orbits for newly discovered near-Earth objects” said Edward Beshore, deputy principal investigator for the OSIRIS-REx mission at the University of Arizona in Tucson.

Keywords – Amateur Astronomers to target asteroid, Near Earth Objects (NEO), OSIRIS-REx mission, University of Arizona in Tucson, 1999 RQ36.

Analyzing Ice Content of Moon’s Crater

The team of NASA and university scientists using laser light from LRO’s laser altimeter examined the floor of Shackleton crater. They found the crater’s floor is brighter than those of other nearby craters, which is consistent with the presence of small amounts of ice. The information will help researchers understand crater formation and study other uncharted areas of the moon. The findings are published in Thursday’s edition of the journal Nature.

“The brightness measurements have been puzzling us since two summers ago” said Gregory Neumann of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt. “While the distribution of brightness was not exactly what we had expected, practically every measurement related to ice and other volatile compounds on the moon are surprising, given the cosmically cold temperatures inside its polar crater”.

The spacecraft mapped Shackleton crater with unprecedented detail using a laser to illuminate the crater’s interior and measure its albedo or natural reflectance. The laser light measures to a depth comparable to its wavelength, or about a micron. The team also used the instrument to map the relief of the crater’s terrain based on the time it took for laser light to bounce back from the moon’s surface. The longer it took, the lower the terrain’s elevation.

In addition to the possible evidence of ice, the group’s map of Shackleton revealed a remarkably preserved crater that has remained relatively unscathed since its formation more than three billion years ago. The crater’s floor is itself pocked with several small craters, which may have formed as part of the collision that created Shackleton.

Keywords – Analyzing Ice Content on Crater, examined floor of Shackleton crater, polar crater, spacecraft mapped Shackleton crater, crater interior, laser light, collision created Shackleton.

Forecast calls for Amazon Fire Season

Forests in the Amazon Basin are expected to be less vulnerable to wildfires this year, according to the first forecast from a new fire severity model developed by university and NASA researchers.

Fire season across most of the Amazon rain forest typically begins in May, peaks in September and ends in January. The new model, which forecasts the fire season’s severity from three to nine months in advance, calls for an average or below-average fire season this year within 10 regions spanning three countries: Bolivia, Brazil and Peru.

“Tests of the model suggested that predictions should be possible before fire activity begins in earnest,” said Doug Morton, a co-investigator on the project at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. “This is the first year to stand behind the model and make an experimental forecast, taking a step from the scientific arena to share this information with forest managers, policy makers, and the public alike.”

The model was first described last year in the journal Science. Comparing nine years of fire data from NASA’s Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on the Terra satellite, with a record of sea surface temperatures from NOAA, scientists established a connection between sea surface temperatures in the Pacific and Atlantic oceans and fire activity in South America.

“There will be fires in the Amazon Basin, but our model predictions suggest that they won’t be as likely in 2012 as in some previous years,” said Jim Randerson of the University of California, Irvine, and principal investigator on the research project.

Specifically, sea surface temperatures in the Central Pacific and North Atlantic are currently cooler than normal. Cool sea surface temperatures change patterns of atmospheric circulation and increase rainfall across the southern Amazon in the months leading up to the fire season.

“We believe the precipitation pattern during the end of the wet season is very important because this is when soils are replenished with water,” said Yang Chen of UC Irvine. “If sea surface temperatures are higher, there is reduced precipitation across most of the region, leaving soils with less water to start the dry season.”

Without sufficient water to be transported from the soil to the atmosphere by trees, humidity decreases and vegetation is more likely to burn. Such was the case in 2010, when above-average sea surface temperatures and drought led to a severe fire season. In 2011, conditions shifted and cooler sea surface temperatures and sufficient rainfall resulted in fewer fires, similar to the forecast for 2012.

Building on previous research, the researchers said there is potential to adapt and apply the model to other locations where large-scale climate conditions are a good indicator of the impending fire season, such as Indonesia and the United States.

Amazon forests, however, are particularly relevant because of their high biodiversity and vulnerability to fires. Amazon forests also store large amounts of carbon, and deforestation and wildfires release that carbon back to the atmosphere. Predictions of fire season severity may aid initiatives – such as the United Nation’s Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation program – to reduce the emissions of greenhouse gases from fires in tropical forests.

“The hope is that our experimental fire forecasting information will be useful to a broad range of communities to better understand the science, how these forests burn, and what predisposes forests to burning in some years and not others,” Morton said. “We now have the capability to make predictions, and the interest to share this information with groups who can factor it into their preparation for high fire seasons and management of the associated risks to forests and human health.”

Keywords:- Forecast calls for Amazon fire season, Amazon forests, United States, Amazon Basin.

NuSTAR in Orbit

A NASA orbiting telescope able to view the cosmos through the lens of hard x-rays has been launched. Its rocket ignited in the night skies south of Kwajalein Atoll after being dropped from the underbelly of a Lockheed L-1011 plane. The Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) was developed by a team of scientists and engineers under the leadership of Fiona Harrison from the California Institute of Technology. It will use an innovative system of nested x-ray mirrors to open a new window onto the cosmos. It focuses the light into images 10 times sharper and 100 times more sensitive than any previous high-energy x-ray telescope.

“Every time there is a new instrument with significantly better sensitivity than any previous instrument, significant discoveries are bound to follow” said SLAC astrophysicist Greg Madejski.

Probable contributors that NuSTAR is suited to view are the innermost regions of black hole event horizons, where particles being slurped up by black holes are boosted to near-light speeds, like too many race cars jammed onto a too-small track, with cosmic fireworks as the result.

NuSTAR will team up with other telescopes to study the high-energy universe. It will use its x-ray eye to examine jets of particles blasting out of active galactic nuclei that already have been pinpointed by the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope.

With NuSTAR, the cosmic rainbow will be one step closer to complete.

Keywords:- NuSTAR orbiting telescope, Lockheed L-1011 plane, high-energy universe, Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope.

      

Cassini Spacecraft Made its Closest Approach to Saturn’s tiny Moon Methone

NASA's Cassini spacecraft made its closest approach to Saturn's tiny moon Methone as part of a trajectory that will take it on a close flyby of another of Saturn's moons, Titan. The Titan flyby will put the spacecraft in an orbit around Saturn that is inclined, or tilted, relative to the plane of the planet's equator. The flyby of Methone took place on May 20 at a distance of about 1,200 miles (1,900 kilometers). It was Cassini's closest flyby of the 2-mile-wide (3-kilometer-wide) moon. The best previous Cassini images were taken on June 8, 2005, at a distance of about 140,000 miles (225,000 kilometers), and they barely resolved this object.

Also on May 20, Cassini obtained images of Tethys, a larger Saturnian moon that is 660 miles (1,062 kilometers) across. The spacecraft flew by Tethys at a distance of about 34,000 miles (54,000 kilometers).

Cassini's encounter with Titan, Saturn's largest moon, on May 22, is the first of a sequence of flybys that will put the spacecraft into an inclined orbit. At closest approach, Cassini will fly within about 593 miles (955 kilometers) of the surface of the hazy Titan. The flyby will angle Cassini's path around Saturn by about 16 degrees out of the equatorial plane, which is the same plane in which Saturn's rings and most of its moons reside.

Cassini's onboard thrusters don't have the capability to place the spacecraft into orbits so inclined. But mission designers have planned trajectories that take advantage of the gravitational force exerted by Titan to boost Cassini into inclined orbits. Over the next few months, Cassini will use several flybys of Titan to change the angle of its inclination, building one on top of the other until Cassini is orbiting Saturn at around 62 degrees relative to the equatorial plane in 2013. Cassini hasn't flown in orbits this inclined since 2008, when it orbited at an angle of 74 degrees.

This set of inclined orbits is expected to provide spectacular views of the rings and poles of Saturn. Further studies of Saturn's other moons will have to wait until around 2015, when Cassini returns to an equatorial orbit.

"Getting Cassini into these inclined orbits is going to require the same level of navigation accuracy that the team has delivered in the past, because each of these Titan flybys has to stay right on the money," said Robert Mitchell, Cassini program manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. 

"However, with nearly eight years of experience to rely on, there's no doubt about their ability to pull

 this off."

Cassini discovered Methone and two other small moons, Pallene and Anthe, between the orbits of Mimas and Enceladus between 2004 and 2007. The three tiny moons, called the Alkyonides group, are embedded in Saturn's E ring, and their surfaces are sprayed by ice particles originating from the jets of water ice, water vapor and organic compounds emanating from the south polar area of Enceladus.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. JPL manages the mission for the agency's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The California Institute of Technology in Pasadena manages JPL for NASA.

Keywords – Cassini-Huygens mission, Cassini discovered Methone, Titan Saturn’s largest moon, Saturn ‘s E ring, JPL.

Parts of Arctic Ice Cap Melting Faster

A new NASA study revealed that the oldest and thickest Arctic sea ice is disappearing at a faster rate than the younger and thinner ice at the edges of the Arctic Ocean’s floating ice cap.

The thicker ice, known as multi-year ice, survives through the cyclical summer melt season, when young ice that has formed over winter just as quickly melts again. The rapid disappearance of older ice makes Arctic sea ice even more vulnerable to further decline in the summer, said Joey Comiso, senior scientist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., and author of the study, which was recently published in Journal of Climate.

The new research takes a closer look at how multi-year ice, ice that has made it through at least two summers, has diminished with each passing winter over the last three decades. Multi-year ice "extent" – which includes all areas of the Arctic Ocean where multi-year ice covers at least 15 percent of the ocean surface – is diminishing at a rate of -15.1 percent per decade, the study found.

There’s another measurement that allows researchers to analyze how the ice cap evolves: multi-year ice "area," which discards areas of open water among ice floes and focuses exclusively on the regions of the Arctic Ocean that are completely covered by multi-year ice. Sea ice area is always smaller than sea ice extent, and it gives scientists the information needed to estimate the total volume of ice in the Arctic Ocean. Comiso found that multi-year ice area is shrinking even faster than multi-year ice extent, by -17.2 percent per decade.

"The average thickness of the Arctic sea ice cover is declining because it is rapidly losing its thick component, the multi-year ice. At the same time, the surface temperature in the Arctic is going up, which results in a shorter ice-forming season," Comiso said. "It would take a persistent cold spell for most multi-year sea ice and other ice types to grow thick enough in the winter to survive the summer melt season and reverse the trend."

Scientists differentiate multi-year ice from both seasonal ice, which comes and goes each year, and "perennial" ice, defined as all ice that has survived at least one summer. In other words: all multi-year ice is perennial ice, but not all perennial ice is multi-year ice (it can also be second-year ice).

Comiso found that perennial ice extent is shrinking at a rate of -12.2 percent per decade, while its area is declining at a rate of -13.5 percent per decade. These numbers indicate that the thickest ice, multiyear-ice, is declining faster than the other perennial ice that surrounds it.

As perennial ice retreated in the last three decades, it opened up new areas of the Arctic Ocean that could then be covered by seasonal ice in the winter. A larger volume of younger ice meant that a larger portion of it made it through the summer and was available to form second-year ice. This is likely the reason why the perennial ice cover, which includes second year ice, is not declining as rapidly as the multiyear ice cover, Comiso said.

Multi-year sea ice hit its record minimum extent in the winter of 2008. That is when it was reduced to about 55 percent of its average extent since the late 1970s, when satellite measurements of the ice cap began. Multi-year sea ice then recovered slightly in the three following years, ultimately reaching an extent 34 percent larger than in 2008, but it dipped again in winter of 2012, to its second lowest extent ever.

For this study, Comiso created a time series of multi-year ice using 32 years of passive microwave data from NASA's Nimbus-7 satellite and the U.S. Department of Defense's Defense Meteorological Satellite Program, taken during the winter months from 1978 to 2011. This is the most robust and longest satellite dataset of Arctic sea ice extent data to date, Comiso said.

Younger ice, made from recently frozen ocean waters, is saltier than multi-year ice, which has had more time to drain its salts. The salt content in first- and second-year ice gives them different electrical properties than multi-year ice: In winter, when the surface of the sea ice is cold and dry, the microwave emissivity of multiyear ice is distinctly different from that of first- and second-year ice. Microwave radiometers on satellites pick up these differences in emissivity, which are observed as variations in brightness temperature for the different types of ice. The “brightness” data are used in an algorithm to discriminate multiyear ice from other types of ice.

Comiso compared the evolution of the extent and area of multi-year ice over time, and confirmed that its decline has accelerated during the last decade, in part because of the dramatic decreases of 2008 and 2012. He also detected a periodic nine-year cycle, where sea ice extent would first grow for a few years, and then shrink until the cycle started again. This cycle is reminiscent of one occurring on the opposite pole, known as the Antarctic Circumpolar Wave, which has been related to the El Nino-Southern Oscillation atmospheric pattern. If the nine-year Arctic cycle were to be confirmed, it might explain the slight recovery of the sea ice cover in the three years after it hit its historical minimum in 2008, Comiso said.

Keywords:- Arctic Ocean’s floating ice cap melting faster, Arctic Ocean, Nimbus-7 satellite, historical minimum in 2008.

Diary of a Space Zucchini

January 5, 2012

I sprouted, thrust into this world without anyone consulting me.  I am not one of the beautiful. I am not one that by any other name instills flutters in the human heart.  I am the kind that makes little boys gag at the dinner table thus being sent to bed without their dessert.  I am utilitarian, hearty vegetative matter that can thrive under harsh conditions.  I am zucchini - and I am in space.

January 7

I became aware of my fellow crewmates for the first time.  It takes a sprout a few days before grasping your surroundings.  One is my gardener who waters my roots every day.  I overheard that we are in a spacecraft orbiting Earth and are part of a long space mission.  As crew, I am not sure of my role but am ready to contribute what I can.

January 9

I discovered that my roots are bound in a ziplock bag.  This bag has a canoe shaped piece of closed cellular foam wedged in the opening that retains the needed moisture.  My stem is held in place by a piece of scrap spongy material called pigmat.  Used for absorbent packing for spacecraft supplies, pigmat will soak up spillage from liquid containers.  It makes a nice transition between the stuffy closed cell foam and my green parts and will keep nasty mold away from my stem.

This is most definitely not hydroponics; my roots are not submerged in a bag of water.  This bag is mostly filled with air and only has a small amount of water neatly tucked in the corners from the action of capillary forces in weightlessness.  This is aeroponics, a rather new method for raising plants without soil and without large volumes of water.  Only a small amount is needed, just enough to keep my roots at 100 percent humidity and make up for what I drink.  My roots are not hermetically sealed in this bag, they have access to gas exchange with the cabin air.  My roots are thus exposed in this transparent bag, naked to the universe.  Embarrassed, it took me a few days to get over the idea that anyone can see my roots without any dirt covering them.

January 10

I reach for the light.  It burns brightly and makes my cotyledons a happy vibrant green.  There is a small plastic bag loosely set over my top that keeps the humidity high for my tender new leaves.  My roots are another matter.  They sense sourness, the kind that makes one want to tip-toe across the floor for fear of getting something on your feet. But for now it does not matter.  I am living off the nutrients in my seed pod.

January 12

My cotyledons, like a drogue chute in a parachute deployment sequence, provide the photosynthetic nourishment until my real leaves can form.  Now I stretch my first leaf and orient it towards the light.  My cotyledons, having served their purpose, will soon wilt.  The plastic bag cover was removed by my gardener.

January 14

My gardener fusses with me several times a day.  He checks that I have water, light, and with a hypodermic syringe, injects this tea concoction into the ziplock bag.  It bathes my roots with a not so tasty drink however it does seem to contain the nutrients I need.  I won’t complain on expeditions into the frontier the food is often this way.

January 15

My gardener fusses with my leaves.  I am not sure if I like that.  I now have four and I do not quite understand why he behaves this way.  He sticks his nose up against them.  Does he take me for some sort of a handkerchief? Apparently he takes pleasure in my earthy green smell.  There is nothing like the smell of living green in this forest of engineered machinery.  I see the resultant smile.  Maybe this is one of my roles as a crewmember on this expedition.

January 18

I am about 15 centimeters high now but still only have four leaves.  I am vibrant green and happy.  My roots still drink this sour tea but it seems to have everything I need.  I am reluctant to ask my crewmate where this comes from.

  

January 19

I found out what the tea is made from.   Apparently we have a space compost pile.  A plastic food bag is filled with a mixture of paper scraps, orange peels, garlic skins, apple cores, and other various food leftovers.  Nobody eats the packets of freeze dried green beans and these seem to compost well.  To this was added a teaspoon of dirt from Mother Earth.  When kept wet, it stays warm to the touch.  Liquid tea, extracted from this mess is what I have to drink.  It makes me gag not unlike what my kind does to little boys at the dinner table.  I suppose this is orbital Karma but hey, I am in space and part of this mission and am standing tall and green.

January 20

Light comes in different flavors.  Currently I have only one kind.  It is becoming boring to my leaves and my stems are reluctant to keep them properly oriented.  And it stays on continuously for 24 hours a day.  I heard my crewmates discussing this.  It is a special light fixture with a flavor balanced to help crews sleep shift.  It works for me as well but this constant intensity all with the same flavor is getting to me.

January 21

Oh glorious day!  I discovered a window with a view - and my leaves sing.  It is a small out of the way window tightly packed with stowage.  It looks directly at Earth which reflects bright diffuse sunlight off the wintertime clouds.  This reflection is so bright that my crewmates need to wear sunglasses else their eyes begin to tear.  

January 24

I am becoming quite popular.  I heard one say that he would vacuum the HEPA filters for my gardener if he could have five minutes with his nose close to me. 

January 25

I have a call sign.  I guess a call sign is a fighter pilot thing and was surprised that I could earn such a title.  At first someone suggested “Four-Leaf”.  I was a bit embarrassed when I heard this since I still only sport four leaves and feel a bit sensitive to this fact.  My gardener intervened and said that would not do.  He gave me my call sign - “Rose”.

January 30

I am becoming confused.  These 16 short periods of day and night every 24 hours are making me jet-lagged.  My photosynthesis activity just gets going and then abruptly shuts down.  Repeating this cycle is putting me into a dither. My leaves do not sing as loud.

January 31

My gardener is now moving me around this spacecraft and I can get a better view of the place.  By crew work day, I am moved under the sleep shift light.  During crew sleep I am placed by the window.  This schedule works much better for me.  I get the pleasure of basking in real sunlight as well as the steady glow from the lamp. 

February 1

I am making flowers.  I do not know if this is from the light or the nutrients in my tea.  I currently have four little flower buds, all neatly tucked under my four leaves.  It seems that I should be making more leaves, not flowers. Maybe it is because I am in space and this is what zucchinis are supposed to do.

February 3

I learned that my gardener has a gardener too.  Only his gardener does not water him but speaks to him from a panel on the wall.  His gardener must be very important.  They stop whatever they are doing whenever he calls.

February 8

My flower buds are developing.  I will soon be in full orange bloom.  My gardener is behaving like an expecting father.  There is excitement in the air.

February 13

One of my buds opened today and is in full bloom.  Surprisingly, it does not open all the way but looks more like an inverted orange umbrella that got stuck at the halfway point.  My spherical shaped stamens give off a tantalizing essence.  My gardener did not tell his crewmates about this and kept me all to himself.

February 14

My gardener made special arrangements for a two way video conference with a special Earth-flower.  When all the arrangements had been made, he took me from my window and placed me center stage in front of the video camera.  She was a very attractive flower all neatly dressed.  He said to her, “I can not offer you much; I can only give you a space zucchini.”  The image of my orange blossom was beamed across the void between spacecraft and Earth.  Her heart melted.  I felt as much a rose as any rose could ever be.  He picked my flower and opened a large book, an atlas.  Placing my bloom on the map of Texas, over Houston town, he closed the book and clamped it shut with a piece of Kapton tape.  He said come July, when our mission is over, he will present this to her in person.  I thought that something must be wrong for both of them had tears.  In space, tears do not run down your cheeks but remain as a glob in the corner of your eye.

February 16

There was excited talk about my blossoms today.  They were all looking forward to seeing little zucchinis in space.  I did not have the heart to tell them one small detail.  I make two kinds of flowers male flowers with only stamens and female flowers that produce zucchinis.  Being part of this all man-crew, it was fitting for me to make only male flowers.

Keywords:- Space Zucchini, Gardener, Flower buds, spacecraft, photosynthesis activity, Flower Buds, and Crew Mate Video Camera.