September 2019

Artist's concept of tidal destruction event (Image NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center)

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An article published in “The Astrophysical Journal” reports the study of an event cataloged as ASASSN-19bt in which a supermassive black hole destroyed a star that came too close to it. A team of researchers led by Patrick Vallely and Tom Holoien discovered the start of the event thanks to the ASAS-SN network, obtained observations thanks to the NASA TESS space telescope, which was aimed at that area, and conducted follow-up observations using NASA’s Swift and ESA’s XMM-Newton space telescopes and the network of ground-based Las Cumbres Observatories.

The HTV-8 cargo spacecraft captured by the International Space Station's Canadarm2 robotic arm (Image NASA TV)

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A little while ago the HTV-8 “Kounotori” spacecraft was captured by the International Space Station’s Canadarm2 robotic arm, operated by Christina Koch with the assistance of Andrew Morgan. The Japanese space cargo ship, which blasted off last Tuesday, carries a huge amount of supplies and experiments. After its capture, the HTV-8 got slowly moved to its berthing location on the Harmony module, where it was safely installed.

The HTV-8 cargo spacecraft blasting off atop a H-IIB rocket (Image JAXA / NASA TV)

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A little while ago the HTV-8 spacecraft blasted off atop a H-IIB rocket from the Tanegashima space center in Japan for a resupply mission to the International Space Station. About fifteen minutes after the launch, the cargo spacecraft separated regularly from the rocket’s last stage, entered its preliminary orbit and deployed its solar panels and navigation antennas.

The AFGL 4104, or Roberts 22, protoplanetary nebula (Image NASA, ESA, and R. Sahai (Jet Propulsion Laboratory))

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An article published in the journal “Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society” reports a study on the importance of the ejection of materials by stars in the last stages of their life in the formation of life forms such as those on the Earth. Professor Michael Smith and PhD student Igor Novikov of the British University of Kent performed a series of computer simulations of processes in protoplanetary nebulae obtaining results that offer important clues concerning the recycling of materials generated in stars and ejected into interstellar space.