SOLAR ECLIPSE ON 15 JANUARY 2010

                           

                 On Friday, 2010 January 15, an annular eclipse of the Sun is visible from within a 300-km-wide track that traverses half of Earth. The path of the Moon's antumbral shadow begins in Africa and passes through Chad, Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Kenya, and Somalia. After leaving Africa, the path crosses the Indian Ocean where the maximum duration of annularity reaches 11 min 08s.

                    The central path then continues into Asia through Bangladesh, India, Burma (Myanmar), and China. A partial eclipse is seen within the much broader path of the Moon's penumbral shadow, which includes eastern Europe, most of Africa, Asia, and Indonesia.

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2012 APOCALYPSE -- END OF WORLD

             NASA has launched a rare campaign to dispel widespread rumours fuelled by a new Hollywood movie that the world is coming to an end in 2012.

             The latest big screen offering from Sony Picture, "2012," arrives in theaters on Friday, with a 200-million-dollar production about the end of the world supposedly based on myths backed by the Mayan calendar.
  

               The doomsday scenario revolves around claims that the end of time will come as an obscure Planet X -- or Nibiru -- heads toward or collides with Earth.
  
The mysterious planet was supposedly discovered by the Sumerians, according to claims by pseudo-scientists, paranormal activity enthusiasts and Internet theorists.

  
Some websites accuse NASA of concealing the truth on the wayward planet's existence, but the US space agency denounced such stories as an "Internet hoax."
  
"There is no factual basis for these claims," NASA said in a question-and-answer posting on its website.
  
If such a collision were real "astronomers would have been tracking it for at least the past decade, and it would be visible by now to the naked eye," it added. "Obviously, it does not exist."
  
"Credible scientists worldwide know of no threat associated with 2012," it insisted.
  
After all, "our planet has been getting along just fine for more than four billion years," added NASA.
  
There is another planet, Eris, floating in space. But the dwarf planet similar to Pluto will remain safely lodged in the outer solar system and it can come no closer than four billion miles (6.4 billion kilometers) to Earth, according to NASA.
  
Scores of Internet postings and books delve into the supposed disaster, including "Apocalypse 2012" and "How to Survive 2012."
  
Initial theories set the disaster for May 2003, but when nothing happened the date was moved forward to the winter solstice in 2012 to coincide with the end of a cycle of the ancient Mayan calendar.
  
NASA insisted the Mayan calendar in fact does not end on December 21, 2012, as another period begins immediately afterward. And it said there are no planetary alignments on the horizon for the next few decades.
  
And even if the planets were to line up as some have forecast, the effect on our planet would be "negligible," NASA said.
  
Among the other theories NASA has set out to debunk are that geomagnetic storms, a pole reversal or unsteadiness in the Earth's crustal plates might befall the planet.
  
For example, some myths claim the Earth's rotation and magnetic polarity are related, with a magnetic reversal taking place about every 400,000 years.

  
"As far as we know, such a magnetic reversal doesn't cause any harm to life on Earth," and a reversal in Earth's rotation is "impossible," NASA reassured, adding that a magnetic reversal is "very unlikely" to occur in the next few millenia.
  
And while comets and asteroids have always hit the Earth, "big hits are very rare," NASA noted. The last major impact was believed to be 65 million years ago, spurring the end of dinosaurs.
  
"We have already determined that there are no threatening asteroids as large as the one that killed the dinosaurs," the space agency said.

Indian Scientists Leads Global Team In Astronomy

                        After Chandrayaan-1's discovery of water molecules on the Moon comes another astronomy breakthrough for India. An international grouplead by Sudip Bhattacharyya, a 36-year-old space scientist at Mumbai's Tata Institute of Fundamental research, has discovered a way to measure the size of neutron stars.

                        Before we go any further, what is a neutron star? Speaking to TOI on Monday, Bhattacharyya explained: "To put it simply, it is the final stage of a very massive star. When the massive star burns up its fuel, it collapses to become a neutron star," he said, adding that there are between 100 million and 1,000 million neutron stars in the galaxy.

                   
  On average, a neutron star is very small — approximately 10km in diameter — and 10,000 light years from Earth, thus making it extremely difficult to study and measure. Bhattacharyya and his team's research revealed the unsuspected property of X-ray bursts given off by the stars, which led to the discovery that the pattern of X-rays generated might reveal their true size.

                    "Since these X-rays cannot reach the Earth because of a blanket created by the atmosphere, data was collected of more than 900 bursts from 43 neutron stars through a Nasa satellite and transmitted to us," Bhattacharyya said.

                     The scientist and his colleagues — Coleman Miller of the University of Maryland and Galloway Monash of the University of Australia — modelled how the temperature of the bursts changed as they faded and found it varied in relation to the radius of the star. The team's research has been accepted for publication in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.

Space-based Solar Power

Space-based solar power (SBSP) (or historically space solar power (SSP)) is a system for the collection of solar power in space, for use on Earth. SBSP differs from the usual method of solar power collection in that the solar panels used to collect the energy would reside on a satellite in orbit, often referred to as a solar power satellite (SPS), rather than on Earth's surface. In space, collection of the Sun's energy is unaffected by the day/night cycle, weather, seasons, or the filtering effect of Earth's atmospheric gases.

Average solar power per unit area outside Earth's atmosphere during any given time period is about 136%[citation needed] that available on Earth's surface during direct sunlight (1336 W/m2). A major interest in SBSP stems from the length of time the solar collection panels can be exposed to a consistently high amount of solar radiation. For most of the year, a satellite-based solar panel can collect power 24 hours per day, whereas a land-based station can collect for only 12 hours per day, yielding lower power collection rates around the sunrise and sunset hours.

The collection of solar energy in space for use on Earth introduces the new problem of transmitting energy from the collection point, in space, to the place where the energy would be used, on Earth's surface. Since wires extending from Earth's surface to an orbiting satellite would be impractical, many SBSP designs have proposed the use of microwave beams for wireless power transmission. The collecting satellite would convert solar energy into electrical energy, which would then be used to power a microwave emitter directed at a collector on the Earth's surface. Dynamic solar thermal power systems are also being investigated.

JUPITER'S TEMPORARY MOON

 Jupiter's Temporary Moon For 12 Years:


Jupiter snared a passing comet in the middle of the last century, eventually releasing it 12 years later, astronomers reported on Monday.


Data presented at the European Planetary Science Congress in Potsdam, near Berlin, showed that the biggest planet of the Solar System gained a temporary satellite, a comet called 147P/Kushida-Muramatsu, between 1949 and 1961.

It is only the fifth captured comet to be identified, a press release said.

Comets are lonely wanderers of the Solar System, sometimes taking decades or even centuries to complete a long orbit around the Sun.

On rare occasions, though, these enigmatic bodies of ice and dust can wander into the vicinity of a planet, where they are netted by its gravitational pull.

Sometimes, the comet breaks up and smashes into the planet, as was famously the case with Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9, whose fragments smashed into Jupiter in 1994.

Most of the observed temporary captures have been flybys, in which a comet does not complete a full orbit before wresting itself free.

Kushida-Muramatsu, though, completed two full revolutions of Jupiter, following an irregular orbit, before it gained its freedom, according to calculations led Katsuhito Ohtsuka of the Tokyo Meteor Network.

"The results of our study suggests that impacts on Jupiter and temporary satellite capture events may happen more frequently than we previously expected," said David Asher of Northern Ireland's Armagh Observatory, who presented the data in Potsdam.

The study has a bearing for understanding the risk of a cometary impact on Earth, an event that would wreak catastrophic damage. A colliding asteroid or comet is believed to have ended the long reign of the dinosaurs some 65 million years ago.

Jupiter is often seen as a "goalkeeper" that takes hits from comets that could possibly endanger Earth.
But it can deflect passing comets, too, altering their track around the Sun.

Thus understanding how this process works will help astronomers trying to evaluate the risk to Earth from rogue rocks.
Comet Kushida-Muramatsu appears to have avoided the fate of Shoemaker-Levy 9 "for the foreseeable future," said Levy.

South Korea's Satellite Missing

South Korea's First Satellite Missing After Launch:


SEOUL -- A satellite launched by South Korea's first space rocket is thought to have burnt up in the Earth's atmosphere after missing its designated orbit, officials said Wednesday.

Seoul vowed to press on with its drive to become a space technology leader despite Tuesday's setback, caused by the defective operation of a fairing covering the satellite.

The science and technology ministry said one of the two aerodynamic fairings covering the rocket's tip failed to fall away, after opening in preparation for the satellite's release.
Because of the fairing's weight the second stage of the rocket could not achieve enough thrust to place the satellite in orbit. Its speed fell to 6.2 kilometres per second instead of an optimum eight kilometres per second.

Deputy science minister Kim Jung-Hyun said the extra weight also caused the rocket to steer upwards and the satellite to be released at a higher altitude than planned.
The satellite reached an altitude of 387 kilometres (242 miles).
"After reaching this height, it fell to Earth and was probably destroyed as it re-entered the atmosphere," Kim said.
South Korea had invested more than 500 billion won (400 million dollars) and much national pride in the satellite and the 33-metre (108-foot) rocket.
The first stage was built in collaboration with Russia's Khrunichev space centre. The second stage, including the defective fairings, was constructed by local engineers who also built the 100-kilogram (220-pound) research satellite.
"South Korea was in charge of the separation of fairings while Russia was in charge of overall technical assistance. Therefore the two countries share the responsibility," Kim told reporters.
"Further discussions (with Russia) will be held on this point."
The launch had been delayed seven times since 2005, most notably last week when the countdown was stopped eight minutes before blastoff.
"We can say it was half successful, though the satellite failed to enter orbit," President Lee Myung-Bak told a cabinet meeting Tuesday evening, Lee was quoted by his spokesman as saying.
"We must realise our dream of becoming a leading country in space technology, even if it takes an eighth attempt after seven failures or a ninth attempt after eight failures."
Korea Aerospace Research Institute expert Chae Yeon-Seok was more upbeat.
"Despite the glitch, this was a success as all main systems including the two brand-new first and second-stage rockets operated normally," Chae told AFP.
North Korea, smarting at the UN Security Council's censure of its own April 5 rocket launch, had vowed to closely monitor reaction to its neighbour's launch from Goheung on the south coast.
Washington and its allies said the launch by the nuclear-armed North was a disguised test of a long-range missile. South Korea limits its own missiles to a 300 kilometre range under an accord with its ally the United States.
US State Department spokesman Ian Kelly said Tuesday the South's space programme had been developed "in a responsible manner".
The nation has previously sent 10 satellites into space using launch vehicles from other countries.
In November 2007 it announced an ambitious plan to launch a lunar orbiter by 2020 and to send a probe to the Moon five years after that.
South Korea unveiled the lunar project one month after China launched its first lunar orbiter and two months after Japan did the same.
In April last year Seoul sent its first astronaut into space aboard a Russian Soyuz rocket.

Global Warming Vs Earth's Tilt

Warming oceans could cause Earth's axis to tilt in the coming century, a new study suggests. The effect was previously thought to be negligible, but researchers now say the shift will be large enough that it should be taken into account when interpreting how the Earth wobbles.

The Earth spins on an axis that is tilted some 23.5° from the vertical. But this position is far from constant – the planet's axis is constantly shifting in response to changes in the distribution of mass around the Earth. "The Earth is like a spinning top, and if you put more mass on one side or other, the axis of rotation is going to shift slightly," says Felix Landerer of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

The changing climate has long been known to move Earth's axis. The planet's north pole, for example, is migrating along 79 °W – a line of longitude that runs through Toronto and Panama City – at a rate of about 10 centimetres each year as the Earth rebounds from ice sheets that once weighed down large swaths of North America, Europe, and Asia.

The influx of fresh water from shrinking ice sheets also causes the planet to pitch over. Landerer and colleagues estimate that the melting of Greenland's ice is already causing Earth's axis to tilt at an annual rate of about 2.6 centimetres – and that rate may increase significantly in the coming years.

Now, they calculate that oceans warmed by the rise in greenhouse gases can also cause the Earth to tilt – a conclusion that runs counter to older models, which suggested that ocean expansion would not create a large shift in the distribution of the Earth's mass.

Eye Safety During Solar Eclipses

The Sun can be viewed safely with the naked eye only during the few brief seconds or minutes of a total solar eclipse. Partial eclipses, annular eclipses, and the partial phases of total eclipses are never safe to watch without taking special precautions. Even when 99% of the Sun's surface is obscured during the partial phases of a total eclipse, the remaining photospheric crescent is intensely bright and cannot be viewed safely without eye protection [Chou, 1981; Marsh, 1982]. Do not attempt to observe the partial or annular phases of any eclipse with the naked eye. Failure to use appropriate filtration may result in permanent eye damage or blindness!

Generally, the same equipment, techniques and precautions used to observe the Sun outside of eclipse are required for annular eclipses and the partial phases of total eclipses [Reynolds & Sweetsir, 1995; Pasachoff & Covington, 1993; Pasachoff & Menzel, 1992; Sherrod, 1981]. The safest and most inexpensive of these methods is by projection, in which a pinhole or small opening is used to cast the image of the Sun on a screen placed a half-meter or more beyond the opening. Projected images of the Sun may even be seen on the ground in the small openings created by interlacing fingers, or in the dappled sunlight beneath a leafy tree. Binoculars can also be used to project a magnified image of the Sun on a white card, but you must avoid the temptation of using these instruments for direct viewing.
The Sun can be viewed directly only when using filters specifically designed for this purpose. Such filters usually have a thin layer of aluminum, chromium or silver deposited on their surfaces that attenuates ultraviolet, visible, and infrared energy. One of the most widely available filters for safe solar viewing is a number 14 welder's glass, available through welding supply outlets. More recently, aluminized mylar has become a popular, inexpensive alternative. Mylar can easily be cut with scissors and adapted to any kind of box or viewing device. A number of sources for solar filters are listed below. No filter is safe to use with any optical device (i.e. - telescope, binoculars, etc.) unless it has been specifically designed for that purpose. Experienced amateur and professional astronomers may also use one or two layers of completely exposed and fully developed black-and-white film, provided the film contains a silver emulsion. Since all developed color films lack silver, they are always unsafe for use in solar viewing.
Unsafe filters include color film, some non-silver black and white film, medical x-ray films with images on them, smoked glass, photographic neutral density filters and polarizing filters. Solar filters designed to thread into eyepieces which are often sold with inexpensive telescopes are also dangerous. They should not be used for viewing the Sun at any time since they often crack from overheating. Do not experiment with other filters unless you are certain that they are safe. Damage to the eyes comes predominantly from invisible infrared wavelengths. The fact that the Sun appears dark in a filter or that you feel no discomfort does not guarantee that your eyes are safe. Avoid all unnecessary risks. Your local planetarium or amateur astronomy club is a good source for additional information.
In spite of these precautions, the total phase of an eclipse can and should be viewed without any filters whatsoever. The naked eye view of totality is completely safe and is overwhelmingly awe-inspiring!

PERSEIDS METEOR SHOWER

The Perseids are a prolific meteor shower associated with the comet Swift-Tuttle. The Perseids are so called because the point they appear to come from, called the radiant, lies in the constellation Perseus.

Meteor showers occur when Earth moves through a meteor stream. The stream in this case is called the Perseid cloud and it stretches along the orbit of the Comet Swift-Tuttle. The cloud consists of particles ejected by the comet as it passed by the Sun.




Most of the dust in the cloud today is approximately a thousand years old. However, there is also a relatively young filament of dust in the stream that was pulled off the comet in 1862.


The rate of meteors originating from this filament is much higher than for the older part of the stream. The Perseid meteor shower has been observed for about 2000 years, with the first known information on this meteor shower coming from the Far East. In early medieval Europe, the Perseids came to be known as the "tears of St. Lawrence."

The shower is visible from mid-July each year, with the greatest activity between August 8 and 14, peaking about August 12. During the peak, the rate of meteors reaches 60 or more per hour.

They can be seen all across the sky, but because of the path of Swift-Tuttle's orbit, Perseids are primarily visible in the northern hemisphere.

Year	Perseids active between	Peak of shower
2009	14 July - ...[1]	Expected: 11 August - 12 August [2]
2008	25 July - 24 August [3]	13 August (ZHRmax 116) [3]
2007	19 July - 25 August [4]	13 August (ZHRmax 93) [5]
1972		12 August: reported to be the most active shower in recorded history

JUPITER VISIBLE TO NAKED EYE

It is said that Jupiter and Neptune comes in a straight line with Earth.So that Jupiter can be viewed directly by naked eye, by around 7:30 pm on 17th August 2009 .





Since Neptune is some what farther from Earth , it can be viewed by telescope or binocular etc .,