Monthly Archives: March 2022

Solar Sailing Through The Sea of Space

Posted on March 20, 2022 by josephmaquino9

As an imaginative mind might ask: can we use the Sun’s light to propel a spacecraft through space? Surprisingly, this avenue of spacecraft propulsion has, and is being, explored. Figure 1 displays the Japanese IKAROS satellite that was deployed on May 21, 2010. The spacecraft was equipped with a 14 m x 14 m solar […] Continue reading →

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Mercury and its core | blog IV

Posted on March 20, 2022 by clviggiano

Measuring just over one-third of Earth’s diameter, Mercury is the smallest terrestrial planet in the solar system. However, relative to other worlds, Mercury’s core constitutes a very large part of its volume. Despite the vast difference in their scale, “Mercury’s inner core is indeed solid [and] very nearly the same size as Earth’s inner core,” […] Continue reading →

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Black Holes!

Posted on March 20, 2022 by Emily Bertram

Black holes are regions of spacetime where gravity is so strong that nothing can escape. I have always found the idea of black holes because they can be hard to understand or conceptualize. A weird fact about black holes is how hot they are on the outside and how incredibly freezing they are on the […] Continue reading →

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Climate Change

Posted on March 20, 2022 by Emily Bertram

We have all heard of climate change but what does it really mean? Climate change can be explained by the change in temperature and weather patterns that are occurring over long periods of time. Humans are at fault for climate change because we continue to burn fossil fuels like oil and coal. Burning fossil fuels […] Continue reading →

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The Expanding Universe

Posted on March 20, 2022 by parallaxHubble

The Universe is expanding – and expanding at a rate that is accelerating. Based off simple knowledge of physics, one would assume that this would be the opposite. The Universe should be shrinking over time as gravity slowly pulls billions of galaxy clusters, galaxies, stars, and solar systems towards each other on an inevitable collisionContinue reading “The Expanding Universe” Continue reading →

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Star Fuel – Nuclear Fusion

Posted on March 20, 2022 by parallaxHubble

The sun has been around for 4.603 billion years, about one third of the entire duration of the universe. With a mass 330,000 times greater than Earth and a radius 108 times larger (source), the sun is a very massive object (though not that large when compared to other stars). Have you ever wondered whatContinue reading “Star Fuel – Nuclear Fusion” Continue reading →

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Rock Samples from Mars

Posted on March 19, 2022 by jesszhang782

Mars has been of interest because of evidence that it may have once supported life. NASA’s latest rover, Perseverance, has been sent to Mars to look for signs of ancient life. A big part of this endeavor is sending samples from Mars back to Earth for m… Continue reading →

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Nuclear Fusion For Rocket Propulsion

Posted on March 19, 2022 by josephmaquino9

Nuclear fusion-where the nuclei of two atoms combine to establish a new atom-serves as the primary process that powers main sequence stars (like our Sun). For stars, nuclear fusion most commonly occurs with two hydrogen atoms fusing to form a helium atom. The result of such fusion processes is the output of great amounts of […] Continue reading →

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White Holes

Posted on March 19, 2022 by evang914

Most people by now are familiar with the term “black hole”- a body of high mass with a gravitational pull so strong that nothing which enters can escape from it. The idea of a black hole was born from Einstein’s general theory of relativity. Also born from Einstein’s mathematical equations, however, is the much lesser-knownContinue reading “White Holes” Continue reading →

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Theories of Moon Formation

Posted on March 19, 2022 by evang914

In class we discussed one potential theory of the moon’s formation that is the favorite within the scientific community: the giant impact hypothesis. The theory states that a Mars-sized body (Theia) crashed into the Earth ejecting pieces of a young Earth’s rocky crust into space. Gravity from the remainder of Theia’s core drew these particlesContinue reading “Theories of Moon Formation” Continue reading →

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