2024

The Sentinel-2C satellite blasting off atop a Vega rocket (Image courtesy ESA-CNES-ARIANESPACE/Optique vidéo du CSG–S. Martin)

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A few hours ago, the Sentinel-2C satellite of the Copernicus / GMES program blasted off from the Kourou base, French Guiana, atop a Vega rocket. After about 57 minutes, the satellite regularly separated from the rocket’s last stage and started sending signals. A few hours later it started deploying its solar panels. After a period of testing, it will replace the Sentinel-2A satellite, launched on June 23, 2015. This is the last launch of the original version of the Vega rocket.

An image from the CEERS survey (Image NASA, ESA, CSA, Steve Finkelstein (UT Austin))

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An article published in “The Astrophysical Journal” reports the results of a study of primordial galaxies that seemed too massive for their age, concluding that it was actually the light generated by the activity of their supermassive black holes that created a wrong impression. A team of researchers led by Katherine Chworowsky, a graduate student at the University of Texas at Austin (UT Austin), examined observations conducted with the James Webb Space Telescope as part of the Cosmic Evolution Early Release Science (CEERS) survey to reach these conclusions.

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An article published in the journal “Nature Astronomy” reports a possible reconstruction of the system of the ultra-cool dwarf star TRAPPIST-1 that led to the current configuration of its seven rocky planets. A team of researchers examined their orbits and in particular their orbital resonances, concluding that the planets formed in two steps in a protoplanetary disk divided into two parts. Initially, this led to the formation of two planetary subsystems and only later did planetary migrations occur with influences between various planets that led to the current situation.

Coma Cluster (Image CTIO/NOIRLab/DOE/NSF/AURA. Image Processing: D. de Martin & M. Zamani (NSF NOIRLab)

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An image captured by the Dark Energy Camera (DECam) depicts the Coma Cluster, also known as Abell 1656, so named because it’s part of the constellation Coma Berenices. DECam was designed to conduct a long-term investigation of dark energy but is also useful for other types of astronomical studies. The Coma Cluster is linked to the study of dark matter since the inconsistency between the estimate of its overall mass and the measurement of its gravitational effects stimulated the research that led to today’s dark matter models.

A cutout of the interior of Mars beneath NASA's InSight lander with the dry upper crust and the mid-crust saturated with water

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An article published in the journal “Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS)” reports the results of an analysis of seismic data collected on the planet Mars by NASA’s InSight lander that concludes that the mid-crust of Mars could be filled with liquid water that saturates a layer of igneous rock. Vashan Wright and Matthias Morzfeld of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography and Michael Manga of the University of Berkeley used models similar to those used to map aquifers and oil fields to try to understand the composition of deep layers of the Martian subsurface.

The best explanation for the data collected by the InSight mission is that between 11.5 and 20 kilometers deep there’s a layer of igneous rock saturated with liquid water. The depth makes it impossible to reach it but if the entire mid-crust of Mars were made like this, there would be enough water to form an ocean between one and two kilometers deep on the surface.