This collection of images was taken by NASA's MESSENGER Mercury spacecraft on it's 3rd flyby of the planet Mercury. The probe is scheduled to enter permanent orbit around Mercury on March 18, 2011. These are just the first images to become available, so check again soon to see more!
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
MESSENGER Flyby Images
Twitter and the MESSENGER Flyby
NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft has had many firsts. Among these firsts (other than the actual science mission) is the impact that social media has had on perception of the mission. Twitter, in particular, has had a large presence in the MESSENGER coverage. Many of the scientists and fellows involved in the actual flyby have been "tweeting" their updates of what's happening, live. Never before have so many people been directly notified of such enormous details of NASA missions. One such Twitter user is @porchdragon. He also has a blog, called DragonPhysics, where he writes:
A crowded room room filled with a large center table. MESSENGER Fellows occupy that table looking at their laptops. People surrounding them eating and talking with each other. The Fellows are introduced to everyone as they come in – and their role in this event is explained.”To broadcast to the world what is happening here at the flyby.”
Click here for the full article
Follow @porchdragon or myself (@VisualAstronomy) on Twitter!
Clear skies!
Monday, September 28, 2009
Video of Earth from MESSENGER
Some of you may have seen this video before, but I just saw it for the first time today. It is a video of Earth, taken by the MESSENGER spacecraft as it made a flyby of Earth on it's journey to Mercury. This is not a CGI, but a real video from the spacecraft. The video comprises one full rotation of the Earth.
Video courtesy of: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington.
Some RSS feed readers may have to click through to the article to see the attached video.
Clear skies!
MESSENGER Nears Mercury for 3rd Flyby
Well, it's almost that time again: time for another MESSENGER Mercury Flyby! Wednesday, at 5:55 PM EST, MESSENGER will make a close approach of 228 kilometers (142 miles) above Mercury. The image below is the first image to come back of the approach. I'll post pics of the approach as soon as I get them!
For pictures from past flybys, click here.
Clear skies!
Sunday, September 27, 2009
SETI@Home and Distributed Computing
If you're like me, you've always wanted to make some kind of contribution to science. Most people though, don't have the time or the position to make a significant contribution. These days, however, anyone can make a contribution, by donating their spare CPU cycles! I've got my computer set up to crunch numbers for SETI, and you can too!
Running SETI@Home is actually quite easy! Basically, you download a program onto your computer, and tell it to attach to the SETI@Home project. The program, called BOINC (Berkeley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing), automatically goes out to the internet and fetches files called work units to your computer. Then, when your computer would otherwise be sitting around doing nothing, it crunches numbers for SETI!That's right, real-life SETI data is being analyzed on home computers all around the world, as I type this! So SETI only runs (by default) when you're not on your computer.
It turns out that the millions of PC's on this BOINC network have FAR more combined computing power than the world's best super-computers. To take advantage of this, SETI splits up it's workload into many small files that can be completed quickly by the average PC. BOINC also awards "credit" for work done, so it kind of becomes a competition to see who can do the most "average credit", and you can even join teams.So How Do I Get SETI@Home?
It's actually quite easy!Is SETI the Only Science I Can Do?
No! There are numerous BOINC applications, all of which run inside the BOINC client! You can run more than one at a time, too. I personally run SETI@Home, and another science project called Einstein@Home. So you can basically pick and choose what organizations to donate CPU cycles to.
For a list of projects you can donate to, check out BOINC's list of programs.Is BOINC Computing For Me?
Well, if you like to contribute to science, and don't want to do the math, BOINC distributed computing is for you! There are a few people who will not want to run BOINC, however. See, BOINC will peg your CPU to 100% for hours on end, when you're not using your computer. So if your computer is on it's last leg, BOINC probably will finish it off. BOINC also heats up the CPU pretty good. So if you have an el-cheapo computer or laptop, BOINC is not for you. Just be aware that your computer's temperature will go up when you run BOINC, and be prepared for any problems that might cause.
Personally, I've run BOINC on 5 or 6 computers. Some of them were very old and shaky, but still ran fine. Just be sure to keep it clean and dust free inside the computer and it should be able to handle it. SETI might also not be for you if you're the kind of person that likes to save every kWh of electricity you can. Your computer will use a little more power while running SETI, so also be aware of that. Also, NEVER install BOINC on a work computer without written permission from your system administrator.
For more details on how SETI@Home works: click here.
Got questions or want to talk about SETI@Home and BOINC? Leave a comment below!
Clear skies!
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Welcome to Autumn!
Well, apparently it's been a while since I've edited the blog. Truth is, I've had a lot of stuff to do recently. On finding no jobs in the electrical engineering field, I decided to go back to grad school at Ohio State University. Today is the first day of classes and I'm just relaxing in the new library. I hope to update the blog more often starting now, as I should have a bit more free time available between classes.
The Autumnal Equinox was yesterday, Sept. 22nd, so it is officially autumn, and it really feels like it at night here in Ohio!
Clear skies!
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