Current Events

  • Kansas Legislator Proposes Bill to Outlaw Sustainability Education
    A bill has been introduced in the Kansas legislature this week that would prohibit the promotion of ...Read more

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    Kansas Legislator Proposes Bill to Outlaw Sustainability Education

    A bill has been introduced in the Kansas legislature this week that would prohibit the promotion of sustainability. Here is a link to the one-page bill: http://www.kslegislature.org/li/b2013_14/measures/documents/hb2366_00_0000.pdf. See report on Bloomberg News.
  • Earth's Center Is 1,000 Degrees Hotter Than Previously Thought, Synchrotron X-Ray Experiment Shows
    Scientists have determined the temperature near the Earth’s center to be 6000 degrees Celsius, 1000 ...Read more

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    Earth's Center Is 1,000 Degrees Hotter Than Previously Thought, Synchrotron X-Ray Experiment Shows

    Scientists have determined the temperature near the Earth’s center to be 6000 degrees Celsius, 1000 degrees hotter than in a previous experiment run 20 years ago. These measurements confirm geophysical models that the temperature difference between the solid core and the mantle above, must be at least 1500 degrees to explain why the Earth has a magnetic field. For more information about this study, see the press release from the European Synchrotron Radiation Facility.
  • Ocean Volcanic Rocks Contain Samples of Recycled Crust
    Scientists have long believed that lava erupted from certain oceanic volcanoes contains materials fr...Read more

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    Ocean Volcanic Rocks Contain Samples of Recycled Crust

    Scientists have long believed that lava erupted from certain oceanic volcanoes contains materials from the early Earth’s crust. But decisive evidence for this phenomenon has proven elusive. New research from a team including Carnegie’s Erik Hauri demonstrates that oceanic volcanic rocks contain samples of recycled crust dating back to the Archean era 2.5 billion years ago. Their work is published in Nature. Oceanic crust sinks into the Earth’s mantle at so-called subduction zones, where two plates come together. Much of what happens to the crust during this journey is unknown. Model-dependent studies for how long subducted material can exist in the mantle are uncertain and evidence of very old crust returning to Earth’s surface via upwellings of magma has not been found until now. For more information about these results, see the press release from the Carnegie Institution.

Comet Image List



Comets

Hale-Bopp

(108K GIF)
This is a full view of Comet Hale-Bopp. Image provided courtesy of the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan.

Halley

(1,324K GIF)
This image shows the ray structure of Halley's Comet. (Courtesy of NASA)

(68K JPG)
This is an image of Comet P/Halley taken with the Halley Multicolor Camera on the ESA mission Giotto. (Courtesy of NASA/NSSDC)

Hyakutake

(11K JPG)
This is a full view of Comet Hyakatuke. Image provided courtesy of Hal Weaver (Applied Research Corp.), HST Comet Hyakutake Observing Team and NASA

(64K JPG)
This shows Comet Hyakatuke on 3/22/96. Image provided courtesy of Night of the Comet and NASA

Linear

(45K JPG)
This image shows Comet Linear brightening when it blew off part of its crust. Image provided courtesy of the Hubble Space Telescope, NASA, and H. Weaver at Johns Hopkins University.

Shoemaker-Levy 9

(29K JPG)
This is an image of Shoemaker-Levy 9 taken with the Wide-Field/Planetary Camera on the Hubble Space Telescope. (Courtesy of NASA/NSSDC and the Space Telescope Science Institute)

(84K GIF)
This sequence shows the A impact of July 16, 1994. (Courtesy of NASA/NSSDC, Tom Herbst, Max-Planck-Institut fuer Astronomie, Heidelberg, Doug Hamilton, Max-Planck-Institut fuer Kernphysik, Heidelberg, Hermann Boehnhardt, Universitaets-Sternewarte, Muenchen, and Jose Luis Ortiz Moreno, Instituto de Astrofisica de Andalucia, Granada)

(136K GIF)
This is an image after the impact of fragment A by the Hubble Space Telescope on July 16, 1994. (Courtesy of NASA/NSSDC)

(60K GIF)
This is a near-infrared image of the G and D impacts on Jupiter taken from the Apache Point Observatory on July 19, 1994. (Courtesy of Mark Marley and Nancy Chanover, Department of Astronomy, New Mexico State University)

(14K GIF)
This is a near-ifrared image showing the sequence of fragment G. (Courtesy of NASA/NSSDC, David Crisp, Vikki Meadows, Stuart Lumsden, Jonathan Pogson, and Steven Lee)

(108K GIF)
This is an infrared color image of the fragment G impact taken on July 18, 1994. (Courtesy of NASA/NSSDC)

(155K GIF)
This is a color image of the fragment G impact site taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. (Courtesy of Hubble Space Telescope Jupiter Imaging Team)

(53K GIF)
This is an infrared color composite showing fragments A, E and F, H and G impacts and the Red Spot on Jupiter. This was taken on July 19, 1994. (Courtesy of NASA/NSSDC)

(86K GIF)
This is an illustration of Comet P/Shoemaker-Levy 9 and Jupiter. (Courtesy of H.A. Weaver, T.E. Smith (Space Telescope Science Institute) and J.T. Trauger, R.W. Evans (Jet Propulsion Laboratory), and NASA/NSSDC)

(46K GIF)
This is a sequence showing the impact of fragment A on Jupiter. (Courtesy of Tom Herbst, Kurt Birkle, Ulrich Thiele, Max Planck Institut fuer Astronomie (Heidelberg, Germany), Doug Hamilton, Max Planck Institut fuer Kernphysik (Heidelberg, Germany), Hermann Boehnhardt, Alex Fiedler, Karl-Heinz Mantel, Universitaets-Sternwarte Muenchen (Muenchen, Germany), Jose Luis Ortiz, Instituto de Astrofisica de Andalucia (CSIC Granada, Spain), Giovanni Calamai, Andrea Richichi, Astrophysical Institute Arcetri (Florence, Italy), and NASA/NSSDC)

Kohoutek

(228K GIF)
This is an image of Comet Kohoutek. (Courtesy of NASA)

Miscellaneous

(40K GIF)
This is a drawing of what the surface of a comet might look like. (Courtesy of JPL)

Missions


This image shows CONTOUR breezing past a comet nucleus (artist's rendition). (Courtesy of NASA)

(14K JPG)
An artist's conception of Deep Space 1. (Courtesy of NASA)


This is a picture of the Giotto spacecraft. (Courtesy of NASA)

Go back to Mars , Pluto, Mercury, Saturn, Neptune, Venus , Moon , Earth, Asteroids, Jupiter , Sun , Missions, Uranus, Astrophysical Objects

Last modified December 13, 2000 by Jennifer Bergman.

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