Space and stuff

[rascal]

Isn't it the perseid meteor shower tonight?

A pronounced peak on 12th.

 

[arch stanton]

Isn't it the perseid meteor shower tonight?

yep although i can never remember to stay up/get up to watch them. I'm off tomorrow so may go out into the garden later armed with a case of 1664

 

[fozzy]

Seeing a lot here.

 

[chazzle_dazzle]

Mystery Object Lies On Fringes Of Our Solar System

Niku spins in the opposite direction to other objects in the solar system, and sits on a wonky plane.

15:42, UK,Thursday 11 August 2016

Niku lies beyond Neptune, on the outskirts of our solar system Pic: NASA

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There's a mystery object in a strange orbit beyond Neptune that cannot be explained.

The object sits beyond the most distant planet in our solar system, and could be less than 120 miles in diameter.

It is an oddity because it is above the plane of the solar system and moving upwards every day.

Its plane is 110 degrees to the plane of the solar system, and swings the opposite way around the sun to other objects.

Because of these features, the team that discovered it call it Niku, which means rebellious in Chinese.

Michele Bannister, an astronomer at Queens University, Belfast, tweeted: "I hope everyone has buckled their seatbelts because the outer solar system just got a lot weirder."

A flat plane is a signature of a planetary system, which makes Niku's movements so unique.

It could have been knocked off course by something else, but scientists aren't quite sure.

Matthew Holman, from the Harvard-Smithsonian Centre for Astrophysics, told the New Scientist: "It suggests that there's more going on in the outer solar system than we're fully aware of."

Niku is around 160,000 times fainter than Neptune and astronomers reckon it is around 11-times smaller than dwarf planet Pluto.

It orbits about 3.25 billion miles from the sun, and is known as a trans-Neptunian object.

These objects are so far from the sun that the gravitational pull of other gas giants can affect their synchronisation with the rest of the solar system.



http://news.sky.com/story/mystery-object-lies-on-fringes-of-our-solar-system-10532009



They're watching.................

 

[DownOnTheUpside]

anyone been watching that cosmos series? I need to get back on with it, starts out a bit slow but gets quite good

 

[rascal]

So this is cool

 

[Seathestars]

So this is cool

There's some clever people out there, the mind boggles.

 

[rascal]

There's some clever people out there, the mind boggles.

There sure is

 

[summerisle]

So this is cool

I like the nomenclature : The European Extremely Large Telescope.

 

[rascal]

I like the nomenclature : The European Extremely Large Telescope.

You wouldn't get that with the Japanese or Chinese.

*snigger*

 

[summerisle]

You wouldn't get that with the Japanese or Chinese.

*snigger*

Now, now, one of the few threads which escapes yer ma's doodahs and the like.

 

[PITA]

Now, now, one of the few threads which escapes yer ma's doodahs and the like.

Correct.

 

[DownOnTheUpside]

It's not. Considering that space is nearly infinite - how much of the total % of materials do you think would be planets? To add to that - nearly all planets have both anyway...

mhmm, the simplest elements are the easiest to form and the most stable

 

[Dylan]

https://www.edx.org/course/introduction-aerospace-engineering-mitx-16-00x-0

MIT run course (course tutor is a former NASA astronaut) on the introduction to Rocket engineering, human spaceflight and life support.

Starts 6 September.

 

[Blues Harp]

Anyone come across Nibiru (aka Planet X) yet?.... Blood red moons etc Does it exist ??