Tag Archives: blog5

A Mission to Smell Mars

Posted on March 15, 2016 by nickwtheastronomer

Exciting news out of the European continent this week, a joint mission to Mars sponsored by Russia and the European Space Agency is successfully underway. Blasting off from its launch pad in Baikonur, Kazakhstan on March 14th, 2016, the first spacecraft in the ExoMars mission began its approximately seven-month trip to Mars’ atmosphere. The main goal […] Continue reading →

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Atmosphere of Mars

Posted on March 15, 2016 by Alex Pratte

  For my 5th blog post, I decided to write about what the atmosphere of Mars is like. All the information I write about can be found in this link. According to Space.com, Mars’ atmosphere is about 100 times thinner than Earth’s atmosphere and is pretty much all carbon dioxide. There are some other elements […] Continue reading →

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Nuclear Fusion: the Energy Source of the Future?

Posted on March 15, 2016 by chasejaeger

Though the power of the Sun is quite amazing, the Sun is simply a giant, burning ball of hydrogen. Due to the immense gravity of the Sun, hydrogen particles at the Sun’s core are under enough pressure that they collide with one another despite the force of the positive charges to repel one another. In […] Continue reading →

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Nuclear Fusion: the Energy Source of the Future?

Posted on March 15, 2016 by chasejaeger

Though the power of the Sun is quite amazing, the Sun is simply a giant, burning ball of hydrogen. Due to the immense gravity of the Sun, hydrogen particles at the Sun’s core are under enough pressure that they collide with one another despite the force of the positive charges to repel one another. In […] Continue reading →

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The Orion Nebula

Posted on March 15, 2016 by annamcc9

Nasa’s website overlays two images of the Orion Nebula, utilizing information from both the Spitzer Telescope and the Hubble Space Telescope. This image shows the cosmic cloud, within which astronomers believe more than a thousand young stars are forming. There are four in particular, found near the center of the cloud, that are particularly monstrously […] Continue reading →

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Radiocarbon Dating

Posted on March 15, 2016 by podolakvandysolarsystem

Radiocarbon Dating is a method of determining how old an object is by the amount of carbon in it. The majority of organic matter contains carbon, and while carbon is not usually radioactive one of its isotopes, 14C is radioactive. This means that 14C will have a defined half-life, the amount of time is takes […] Continue reading →

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Blog #5 (The dangers of climate change)

Posted on March 15, 2016 by astronomer0110

Simply put, when humans pollute the atmosphere, it leads to an increase in greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide. Then, these greenhouse gases slow the release of infrared radiation reflected off of Earth’s surface, and this leads to an increase in temperature. Historically, this issue has caused a large controversy in American culture. Today, the main disagreement […] Continue reading →

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Venus’s Atmosphere

Posted on March 15, 2016 by lawlorsolarsystem

Venus is of a similar size to Earth, but has an incredibly different climate. The main reason for this is Venus’s atmosphere, which is extremely different from Earth’s. Venus’s atmosphere is made up almost entirely of Carbon Dioxide, and has barely any Oxygen. Because of this, Venus has a much greater greenhouse effect than Earth, […] Continue reading →

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These Are Not the Droids We’re Looking For

Posted on March 15, 2016 by evinske

Knowledge is power. We want more and more of it. It’s no surprise, then, that we see the Solar System as a well full of knowledge we’ve never encountered before. So, we send spacecrafts out into the Solar System, looking for information. We want pictures, data, surprises, and (now) sound. We’re obsessed. But we too often […] Continue reading →

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Why We Should All Love Earthquakes

Posted on March 15, 2016 by 2016spaceodyssey

Earthquakes are one of the most obvious consequences of Earth’s plate tectonics.  The crust slowly moves along the with the “current” of the mantle as the Earth surface constantly rearranges itself.  Without plate tectonics, it is very possible that life could not have taken a foothold on Earth.  On Mars, which does not have plate […] Continue reading →

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