National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Astronomer Heidi Hammel talks about how the Webb Telescope can be used to study our solar system.

The James Webb Space Telescope will look far back in cosmic time to study the origins of the universe.  But that doesn’t mean the observatory will turn a blind eye to the planets. Yesterday, at a conference at the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore,  noted planetary astronomer Heidi Hammel gave us a quick tour of the solar system from Webb’s (future) point of view.

UPDATE: A webcast video of Hammel’s talk is now available on the STScI website.

The conference, Frontier Science Opportunities with the James Webb Space Telescope (June 6-8), is all about what Webb can and will do once it makes it into space. It’ll be a while: As Matt Mountain, director of STSciI, mentioned in his opening remarks to the conference, Webb won’t see the cold of space, some 1 million miles from Earth, until at least 2017.

Hammel is known to be a great speaker, and she didn’t disappoint. First she took Mercury, Venus, and Earth out of the lineup. Her Powerpoint slides?

Mercury? No.

Venus? No.

Earth? No.



Webb’s orbit and the size and shape of its sunshield leave these planets in an “exclusion zone” hidden from the observatory’s view. (Its planned orbital perch is a point called L2, opposite from Earth with respect to the sun.) Ok, fine. What about Mars?

Yes. According to a March 9, 2010 White Paper about Webb and the solar system, the observatory could measure a number of important things in Mars’ atmosphere, like dust and carbon dioxide gas, that affect its climate.

Hammel speculated that Webb’s infrared eyes could help solve the mysterious nature of methane releases observed on Mars. Where does the methane come from? Webb might help us figure it out.

Jupiter? Saturn? Yes, yes. There is much Webb could learn about the atmospheres of these giant gas planets — which are, by the way, the best nearby examples we have of the scores of giant gaseous exoplanets being discovered in other solar systems.

Titan, Saturn’s largest moon? Yes. Webb could add a decade of observations of Titan’s surface and atmosphere to the work of the Cassini orbiter, and during a time in Titan’s seasonal cycle not yet explored in the infrared band, according to the White Paper.

Uranus and Neptune? An enthusiastic thumbs up from Hammel to the idea of studying these cool, distant bodies with the Webb’s infrared camera and spectrographs. She cited several scientific puzzles that Webb might help solve, including shifts in the wavelengths of light emitted by Uranus as the planet rotates and Neptune’s inexplicably warm polar region.

In general, Hammel said, “Neptune’s atmosphere is so dynamic, and little is known.” Anything Webb contributes will be helpful.

Last but not least, the region beyond Neptune, realm of Pluto and the other icy dwarf planets, is also fair game for Webb.  As the White Paper explains:

“Beyond Neptune, a class of cold, large bodies that include Pluto, Triton and Eris exhibits surface deposits of nitrogen, methane, and other molecules that are poorly observed from the ground, but for which JWST might provide spectral mapping at high sensitivity and spatial resolution difficult to match with the current generation of ground-based observatories.”

And comets, too. At least comets slow enough for Webb to track.

There has been much public hand wringing lately over growth in the Webb budget and slips in the launch date. But in the scientific community, two generations eagerly await the lofting of the giant Webb observatory into orbit. Many of them are up at STScI today sharing their plans.

“There’s a lot of great science that’s going to come out of this and I’m really looking forward to it,” Hammel said. “There is a wide range of interesting planetary phenomena observable by JWST, especially in the outer solar system.”

This NASA video goes into detail about planet studies — here and elsewhere in the universe — and the James Webb Space Telescope:



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OH AND DID I MENTION? All opinions and opinionlike objects in this blog are mine alone and NOT those of NASA or Goddard Space Flight Center. And while we’re at it, links to websites posted on this blog do not imply endorsement of those websites by NASA.

Tsunami Damage, Rikuzentakata, Japan

Japan Earthquake
After the March 12 earthquake and tsunami in Japan, it’s as if the world collectively gasped — and then what followed was almost a feeling of disbelief as the harsh facts begin to register. Entire seaside communities erased from existence. . . tens of thousands of lives feared lost. . . giant ocean swells flooding the coastline. . . cars and houses looking like toys bobbing in the water. And then there are the satellite images, which provide a critical wide-angle perspective.

NASA’s Earth-observing fleet has helped to reveal the full scope and power of the catastrophe. As Mark Imhoff, the Terra satellite project scientist at Goddard, said in a report by West Virginia Public Broadcasting:

“It’s been heart wrenching seeing some of these images because the first set images that we got in on the day after the earthquake on March 12, even though the resolution from of the satellite wasn’t very good, the data from the Miser instrument at Jet Propulsion’s Laboratory showed that there were a large area of coastline that really weren’t there anymore and so you could really get an impression that a lot of villages and agricultural areas had really been severely impacted by the ocean.”

NASA released a web feature on March 17, five days after the quake, showing tsunami after-effects documented by Landsat 7.

NASA Earth Observatory has compiled a gallery of earthquake-related images from various NASA spacecraft, including EO-1, Terra, Aqua, and astronaut photos from the International Space Station.

As usual, EO’s in-depth captions provide context and explanations for the various destructive effects of the earthquake on coastal Japan. An even larger selection of imagery is available in this NASA web feature about the disaster.




New LRO Data
On March 15, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter mission released the final set of data from the mission’s exploration phase, along with the first measurements from its new life as a science satellite. The press release explains the details. The slideshow below takes a look back at some of the coolest imagery from the mission so far. All the images in the slideshow, and many more, are archived here on the NASA LRO website, which includes detailed captions.




Messenger Makes It
The third major story out of Goddard this week was the arrival in Mercury orbit of the Messenger spacecraft. After three spectacular fly-bys earlier (see slideshow below), Messenger is now in position to really dig into its science mission to reveal the nature and history of the first rock from the sun. An earlier post discusses some of the research being conducted on Mercury’s thin “exosphere” of atoms and ions wispily clinging within the planet’s gravity.


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OH AND DID I MENTION? All opinions and opinionlike objects in this blog are mine alone and NOT those of NASA or Goddard Space Flight Center. And while we’re at it, links to websites posted on this blog do not imply endorsement of those websites by NASA.

A visualization of the sodium "exosphere" around Mercury courtesy of Matthew Burger at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.



In the space exploration racket, there is no sweeter word than “first.” And so it was last night that a NASA spacecraft made an important First in planetary exploration:

“NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft successfully achieved orbit around Mercury at approximately 9 p.m. EDT Thursday. This marks the first time a spacecraft has accomplished this engineering and scientific milestone at our solar system’s innermost planet.”


We flung the Mariner 10 spacecraft past Mercury in fly-by missions in 1974-75. And Messenger itself did three fly-bys as it got into position for the final “orbital insertion.” Now it is the first space probe to park in orbit around the first rock from the sun.





Rosemary Killen, a researcher at Goddard, is one of the many scientists who will reap rewards from this so-far spectacularly successful mission. Her target is the thin “exosphere” of sodium, potassium, and calcium knocked off Mercury’s barren rocky surface by the “solar wind” streaming from the sun.

If you want all the scientific details, read a short explanation below by Rosemary Killen about her work And also read about some of the instruments that Goddard scientists and engineers helped to put on the spacecraft.

Otherwise, enjoy the slide show of Messenger images, 2004-2011, and an informative video by Tom Watters (below), a geologist in the Center for Earth and Planetary Studies at the Smithsonian Institution. He explains the goals of Messenger.





Rosemary Killen:

“I am a Participating Scientist on the MESSENGER mission and a member of the MASCS (Mercury Atmospheric and Surface Composition Spectrometer) team. MASCS is a spectrometer covering ultraviolet, visible, and near-infrared wavelengths. The MASCS ultraviolet and visible channel is designed primarily to observe the exosphere, or the very tenuous atmosphere about Mercury, by scanning over selected, diagnostic wavelength ranges.

“Our goals are to determine the composition of the exosphere (which is only partially known at present), and, over the mission lifetime, to determine its spatial and temporal variability. We do this by observing emission lines from atoms (and a few ions) in the exosphere above Mercury’s surface. In so doing we hope to determine the processes that eject atoms from the surface into the exosphere and that lead to the loss of material from the Mercury system.

“Important factors include the relationships among the exosphere and the solar ultraviolet flux, the solar wind and interplanetary magnetic field, and the planet’s intrinsic magnetic field. We hope to be able to determine the effects (if any) of meteor streams that may intersect Mercury’s orbit.

“One intriguing question is the nature of the deposits seen by Earth-based radar (specifically that at the Arecibo Observatory) in polar craters on Mercury, and what that tells us about the sequestration of volatiles. The visible and near-infrared channel of MASCS is primarily designed to measure the reflectance spectrum of the surface in order to determine the mineralogy of surface materials. Ultimately the goal is to unravel the history of the planet: its origin and evolution to the state it occupies today.”

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OH AND DID I MENTION? All opinions and opinionlike objects in this blog are mine alone and NOT those of NASA or Goddard Space Flight Center. And while we’re at it, links to websites posted on this blog do not imply endorsement of those websites by NASA.

Hey kids — got a science report due on the solar system? Do I have a video for you: a guided tour of the inner rocky planets by Goddard’s James Garvin.

Chief Scientist of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Dr. Jim Garvin, takes us on a journey of Earth, the moon, and our neighboring planets. Why does space matter? Why is exploring the inner solar system so crucial? Where will humans venture to next? In this video lecture, Dr. Garvin answers these questions and discusses NASA’s past, present, and future of discovery on our nearest neighbors in the solar system.

Click the image above to see the entire 55-minute presentation on Blip TV. This version, compressed to play in a continues clip, is a little grainy. That short-changes you a bit on the fantastic computer simulations and images packed into Garvin’s talk. You have the option of watching the presentation in six higher-resolution YouTube clips (below). Or you could download the high-res files from Goddard’s Scientific Visualization Studio site.

Garvin covers Mercury, Venus, the moon, asteroids, Earth (a wee bit), and then Mars (quite a bit). He covers the detailed history of what we’ve done and what we still want to do. Garvin scores big points with his enormous energy and enthusiasm, deep knowledge of the subject (he’s a planetary scientist), and a humorous touch.

Check it out if you want an update from the bleeding edge of NASA planetary science from a true insider. It’s watchable and packed with interesting science/tech tidbits.

If you have a fast Internet connection, set the video segments below to play back at 720p for the maximum High Def data blast.


















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OH AND DID I MENTION? All opinions and opinionlike objects in this blog are mine alone and NOT those of NASA or Goddard Space Flight Center. And while we’re at it, links to websites posted on this blog do not imply endorsement of those websites by NASA.

snakey clouds

SUNDAY AUGUST 1: The Modis Image of the Day shows serpentine vortices of air flow around and over the island of Tristan de Cunha in the South Atlantic.

STORMY SUN: NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory and STEREO spacecraft observe a complex disturbance on the sun. This releases a blast of magnetically charged plasma, heading toward Earth.



MONDAY AUGUST 2: Hubble Gotchu Guy “Milky J” airs his new video on the Jimmy Fallon show. Filmed at Goddard’s massive Building 7-10-15-29 complex, the video features gang-signing NASA scientists and Milky J’s signature dry wit as he confronts the looming threat of the Webb Telescope to his beloved Hubble.

AWESOME-O-LICIOUS: NASA Blueshift’s Weekly Awesomeness Round-Up sports a cool video tour of the lunar surface based on Clementine data and other morsels of image and video from NASA.



TUESDAY AUGUST 3: A coronal mass ejection from the sun slams into Earth’s magnetic field, igniting a significant geomagnetic storm. Aurora spotters in Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Maine, Canada, and Alaska report Northern Lights shows. The show continues the following night.

Milky J posse

MILKY J PIX: A NASA Blueshift blog post by Maggie Masetti features a gaggle of behind-the-scenes photos of the filming of Milky J’s new Hubble Gotchu Guy video. . . ME TOO! And on the (ahem) Geeked On Goddard blog, writer and NASA web commando Robert Garner provides another perspective on Milky J’s history making visit to Goddard.

EGYPTIAN SKIES: Pyramids, the space station, the moon, and planets grace today’s Earth science picture of the day.

HERMEAN HOLIDAY: Six years ago today, NASA launched the MESSENGER spacecraft to Mercury.



WEDNESDAY AUGUST 4: Earth Observatory posts a Terra satellite image of the Pakistani city of Kheshgi, “awash in floodwater,” like other devastated areas of the country’s Northwest.



THURSDAY AUGUST 5: The Pinoy Achiever’s blog spotlights Josefino Comiso, a senior scientist at the Cryospheric Sciences Branch of the Goddard Space Flight Center. The blog celebrates the successes of Philippinos. (“Pinoy” is a word Philippinos use to refer to themselves.)

80 SMALL LEAPS: Happy 80th birthday, Neil Armstrong. On this day in 1930, you were born in Wapakoneta, Ohio. And during a notable field trip on July 20, 1969, you said: “That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.”

mash-up

COSMIC MASH UP: A new video simultaneously shows two galaxies colliding, seen through the eyes of NASA’s three surviving “great” space observatories: the Chandra X-ray Observatory, the Hubble Space Telescope, the Spitzer Space Telescope. (Compton Gamma Ray Observatory, R.I.P., was the fourth.)



FRIDAY AUGUST 6: Spaceweather.com wraps up this week’s wild solar shenanigans this way:

THE SHOW IS OVER . . . FOR NOW: Geomagnetic activity has subsided to low levels and the aurora show of August 3rd and 4th has come to an end. At the height of the display, Northern Lights descended as far south as Wisconsin and Iowa in the United States.

DON’T MISS the latest mindblowing SDO image of the August 1 solar disturbance — in fact, here it is below! This space observatory is truly living up to its promise as the Hubble Space Telescope of solar astronomy.



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OH AND DID I MENTION? All opinions and opinionlike objects in this blog are mine alone and NOT those of NASA or Goddard Space Flight Center. And while we’re at it, links to websites posted on this blog do not imply endorsement of those websites by NASA.