Topic: Atmosphere

NASA’s Cassini spacecraft sees Ice Clouds forming in atmosphere of Saturn’s moon Titan

April 12, 2013 |

Written by Jia-Rui C. Cook
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Pasadena, CA – An ice cloud taking shape over Titan’s south pole is the latest sign that the change of seasons is setting off a cascade of radical changes in the atmosphere of Saturn’s largest moon.

Made from an unknown ice, this type of cloud has long hung over Titan’s north pole, where it is now fading, according to observations made by the composite infrared spectrometer (CIRS) on NASA’s Cassini spacecraft.

The recently formed south polar vortex stands out in the color-swaddled atmosphere of Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, in this natural color view from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute)

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NASA’s Mars Curiosity rover data reveals remaining atmosphere on Mars is still active

April 9, 2013 |

Written by Guy Webster
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Vienna, Austria – Mars has lost much of its original atmosphere, but what’s left remains quite active, recent findings from NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity indicate. Rover team members reported diverse findings today at the European Geosciences Union 2013 General Assembly, in Vienna.

Evidence has strengthened this month that Mars lost much of its original atmosphere by a process of gas escaping from the top of the atmosphere.

This image shows the first holes into rock drilled by NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity, with drill tailings around the holes plus piles of powdered rock collected from the deeper hole and later discarded after other portions of the sample had been delivered to analytical instruments inside the rover. (NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS)

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NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory studies atmospheric chemistry of Saturn’s moon Titan

April 4, 2013 |

Written by Jia-Rui C. Cook
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Pasadena, CA – A laboratory experiment at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, CA, simulating the atmosphere of Saturn’s moon Titan suggests complex organic chemistry that could eventually lead to the building blocks of life extends lower in the atmosphere than previously thought.

The results now point out another region on the moon that could brew up prebiotic materials. The paper was published in Nature Communications this week.

The colorful globe of Saturn’s largest moon, Titan, passes in front of the planet and its rings in this true color snapshot from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute)

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NASA’s SAGE III to monitor the Earth’s fragile Ozone Layer

March 30, 2013 |

Written by Dr. Tony Phillips
Science at NASA

Washington, D.C. – Ozone stinks. People who breathe it gag as their lungs burn. The EPA classifies ground-level ozone as air pollution.

Yet without it, life on Earth would be impossible.

A fragile layer of ozone 25 km above Earth’s surface is all that stands between us and some of the harshest UV rays from the sun. The ozone molecule O3 blocks radiation which would otherwise burn skin and cause cancer.

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NASA reports Comet could possibly Collide with Mars in 2014

March 28, 2013 |

Written by Dr. Tony Phillips
Science at NASA

Washington, D.C. – Over the years, the spacefaring nations of Earth have sent dozens of probes and rovers to explore Mars.  Today there are three active satellites circling the red planet while two rovers, Opportunity and Curiosity, wheel across the red sands below. Mars is dry, barren, and apparently lifeless.

Soon, those assets could find themselves exploring a very different kind of world.

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NASA’s MAVEN mission to study Mars upper atomosphere

March 27, 2013 |

Written by Claire De Saravia
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

Greenbelt, MD – When the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) mission begins its journey to the Red Planet in 2013, it will carry a sensitive magnetic-field instrument built and tested by a team at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, MD.

Scheduled for launch in late 2013, MAVEN will be the first mission devoted to understanding the Martian upper atmosphere.

The goal of MAVEN is to determine the history of the loss of atmospheric gases to space through time, providing answers about Mars’ climate evolution.

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NASA’s Cassini spacecraft photos reveals the movement of Jupiter’s Hot Spots through it’s atmosphere

March 15, 2013 |

Written by Jia-Rui C. Cook
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Pasadena, CA – In the swirling canopy of Jupiter’s atmosphere, cloudless patches are so exceptional that the big ones get the special name “hot spots.” Exactly how these clearings form and why they’re only found near the planet’s equator have long been mysteries.

Now, using images from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, scientists have found new evidence that hot spots in Jupiter’s atmosphere are created by a Rossby wave, a pattern also seen in Earth’s atmosphere and oceans. The team found the wave responsible for the hot spots glides up and down through layers of the atmosphere like a carousel horse on a merry-go-round.

The dark hot spot in this false-color image from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft is a window deep into Jupiter’s atmosphere. All around it are layers of higher clouds, with colors indicating which layer of the atmosphere the clouds are in. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI/GSFC)

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NASA’s Cassini spacecraft sees Venus from orbit around Saturn

March 5, 2013 |

Written by Jia-Rui Cook
NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory

Pasadena, CA – A distant world gleaming in sunlight, Earth’s twin planet, Venus, shines like a bright beacon in images taken by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft in orbit around Saturn.

One special image of Venus and Saturn was taken last November when Cassini was placed in the shadow of Saturn. This allowed Cassini to look in the direction of the sun and Venus, and take a backlit image of Saturn and its rings in a particular viewing geometry called “high solar phase.” This observing position reveals details about the rings and Saturn’s atmosphere that cannot be seen in lower solar phase.

Peering over the shoulder of giant Saturn, through its rings, and across interplanetary space, NASA’s Cassini spacecraft spies the bright, cloudy terrestrial planet, Venus. The vast distance from Saturn means that Venus only shows up as a white dot, just above and to the right of the image center. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute)

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NASA’s Van Allen Probes find third Radiation Belt around the Earth

March 2, 2013 |

Written by Dr. Tony Phillips
Science at NASA

Washington, D.C. – Earth’s radiation belts were one of the first discoveries of the Space Age. A new finding published in today’s issue of Science shows that we still have much to learn about them. NASA’s twin Van Allen Probes, launched just last August, have revealed a previously unknown third radiation belt around Earth.

“Even 55 years after their discovery, Earth’s radiation belts still are capable of surprising us,” said Nicky Fox, Van Allen Probes deputy project scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics  Laboratory in Laurel, MD. “We thought we knew the radiation belts, but we don’t.”

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NASA explains Explosion over Russia

March 1, 2013 |

Written by Dr. Tony Phillips
Science at NASA

Washington, D.C. – When the sun rose over Russia’s Ural Mountains on Friday, February 15th, many residents of nearby Chelyabinsk already knew that a space rock was coming. Later that day, an asteroid named 2012 DA14 would pass by Earth only 17,200 miles above Indonesia. There was no danger of a collision, NASA assured the public.

Maybe that’s why, when the morning sky lit up with a second sun and a shock wave shattered windows in hundreds of buildings around Chelyabinsk, only a few people picking themselves off the ground figured it out right away. This was not a crashing plane or a rocket attack.

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