More Marvels from Space!

Time to take a breather to recall we're still a magnificent, outward-looking, scientific civilization.  Though I will add a time-sensitive political note, at the end. Especially for all you brainy folks who pin your hopes on salvation by the Electoral College.  Only now...

...on to wonders of Space!

Breathtaking....See this spectacular composite image of Pluto from NASA's New Horizons probe. Then consider: this imagery was taken in blackness deeper than any night you ever knew, amid lifeless, bitter cold. And see more gorgeous Pluto pix and Charon’s mysterious (now explained) red polar caps!

The planet is fully tidal-locked with its big moon, Charon, showing only one face to each other. The heart-shaped region Tombaugh Regio (I once met Clyde Tombaugh) is exactly opposite Charon.  Read what this seems to imply… including a possible sub-surface ocean.

Now take this note of consolation: You are a member of a nation and civilization that does this sort of thing. We did this. We do this.

Remember that. Let it gird and support you.

Water plumes from Europa’s south pole! This suggests that the moon’s vast ocean may be closer to the surface than we thought and might be sampled without having to melt or drill our way down. (At NASA's NIAC we are funding some weird-cool ways to get science done there._

See the latest op-ed by Ed Lu of the B612 Foundation, which aims to detect all the potentially Earth threatening asteroids. An important topic! Especially since we might also mine these for resources! (Disclaimer: I am on their advisory board.) 

Good bye Rosetta!  The Rosetta probe, which has orbited Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko for two years, has collided with the comet. Thanks for proving my doctoral thesis! 

Don't miss this great article from the New Yorker on the OSIRIS-REx mission to sample an asteroid.

== More on Mars and the Moon ==

Hot news from Mars! Radar inspection of Utopia Planitia revealed a deposit of water ice – as much as in Lake Superior – in a relatively flat, low latitude region the size of New Mexico. The layer ranges in thickness from 260 feet to 560 feet (80 to 170 m) and is made up of 50 to 85 percent water ice.  

A fascinating re-examination of results from the 1976 Viking Lander on Mars, the only one to explicitly look for life, which gave us ambiguous results. This new paper suggests that maybe Viking found life, after all.  

Back to the Moon? The Bushes & co. made a repeat of Apollo the centerpiece of their space ambition. It became GOP dogma to join Russia, China, Japan, Europe, India and several billionaires, all flocking to return to a sterile ball without any near-term usefulness or interest by scientists. Now, we see indications that the Trump administration will drop all Obama Era endeavors aimed at the fantastic riches to be found on asteroids, in favor of "been there, done that."

As an adviser to one of NASA's innovative-oriented directorates, I know about all sides of this argument. And there is an overlap of interest in one area, creating a cis-lunar station in orbit above the Moon. It is an ideal spot for both retrieving and studying asteroidal samples and offering services (for pay) to those wannabe copycat nations aiming to brag about being neo-Apollos. That part makes sense. But for that reason, don't expect to see it.

No, what this shows is that the Worst Man in America -- George F. Will -- is wrong in proclaiming Donald Trump to be "a false republican." DT's appointments so far are amplifications, not reversals of standard GOP crazinesses. And his policies toward science and space -- like ending all NASA Earth-science work -- differ from the Fox-propelled line only in being farther to the right.

== Further out in space ==

The most detailed 3D map yet of a billion stars in the Milky Way galaxy includes precise positions and brightness of 1.142 billion stars, plus distances and motions of more than 2 million of them.  You can navigate!  Courtesy ESA’s wonderful GAIA mission.

Space “blobs”! Ten times the diameter of the Milky Way! Glowing! Finally Explained! 

Boyajian’s Star (KIC 8462852) is one of the strangest discoveries of the Kepler mission, which vastly expanded our catalogue of alien planets.  Only in his case, the pattern of light dimming from the star cannot come from planetary eclipses, or even a disk of dust. The star not only dims up to 20% at intervals, it has been secularly dimming across observations spanning a century.  It is hard to accommodate both the long-term dimming and the lack of infrared and submillimeter emission. Explanations (discussed here before) range from internal stellar fluctuations to interstellar blockage of some kind, all the way to vast, alien architectural projects. 

Our galaxy may be more complex than a regular spiral. It’s already been reclassified as one of those “barred” spirals.  Now it seems the “Orion Spur that we sit amid is more than just a spur, but a complex – if not complete – spiral arm in its own right. 

== Exploring Earth ==

Read a fine and moving review – on Centauri Dreams – of Dr. David Grinspoon’s new book (blurbed by yours truly). In Earth in Human Hands: Shaping Our Planet's Future, David Grinspoon relates the question of our own survival as we deal with the so-called Anthropocene, a time when our technologies are increasingly affecting our planet, creating a new set of challenges to survival.

Thank Heavens. The GOES-R satellite is in orbit, safe from sabotage. It will nail down climate matters with great accuracy. The Bushites canceled almost every program to study climate and while Obama reversed course, it was hard getting money from Congress. This may be all we get for a long time.

This Japanese company's plan for a real world space elevator garners at least a mention... though I expect some cynicism below, in comments. 

A wonderfully inspiring story about the black women engineers and mathematicians who were deeply involved in the early space program. Hidden Figures: The American Dream and the Untold Story of the Black Women Mathematicians Who Helped Win the Space Race, by Margot Lee Shetterly. An except from the interview with the author on the New York Times:

'Some of the white male engineers seemed almost puzzled by the bigotry of the time — they saw a problem that needed to be solved, by the smartest person available. Do you think there’s a connection between the clarity and precision of mathematics and engineering and the ability of NASA and its predecessor, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, to employ people of color? Yes, though at the same time, this institution was also on the front lines of a lot of these conflicts and national emergencies: World War I, World War II, the Cold War, the space race. They needed all hands on deck. Like: “We don’t have enough computers? Where are we going to get them? Oh, there are these black women, at this black school, that’s right across town? Let’s get them in here.” There was a bit of an emergency sensibility a lot of the time."

== METI redux ==

The StarTalk science and astronomy site runs fascinating podcasts. In a recent episode (as of October 18: 7pm EST) host and astrobiology maven David Grinspoon ("Dr. Funkyspoon") interviews astronomer and science fiction author David Brin about a wide range of matters including the Search for ExtraTerrestrial Intelligent civilizations (SETI). They answer fan-submitted Cosmic Queries about communicating with aliens. 

A new book, Waiting for Contact: The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence by Lawrence Squeri offers a cogent, engaging history of humanity's most ambitious quest - seeking outward for other minds. 

This Smithsonian Magazine article by Michael Chorost describes the “Cosmic Call” beaming from the Evpatoria dish in Crimea, in 1999. 

The article does point out (lightly) the fact that dozens of researchers in astronomy, SETI and related fields have protested against stunts such as this "cosmic call." These include former NASA SETI head Dr. John Billingham and former senior US diplomat Michael Michaud, who led the commission that drafted the SETI Protocols. A majority of workers in SETI, in fact, consider such METI stunts -- Messaging to Extra-Terrestrials - to be at-best affronts to grownup scientific process, in which we are expected to vett our projects openly and listen, when peers and others complain about potential for harm. These fellows (and some of them are friends of mine) are so gushy gung-ho that they shrug off every complaint or request to talk it over, before blaring "yoohoo!" into the cosmos.

To be clear, we do not expect these beamings to draw slathering alien invaders tomorrow. But when you aim to alter some principal observable characteristics of our planet, is it too much to ask for an environmental impact statement? And some discussion? For example, examining the history of past HUMAN first contacts between different cultures? Every one of which led to pain?

Those who zealously admire these shout-stunts tend to have the right instincts! To look outward and explore the cosmos. As an astronomer who also has done well with science fiction novels, I approve of the reflex, wholeheartedly! I've spent my whole life pondering the alien. But when people dive into the matter -- as they can do in this article and in this debate...

... they always come away both more informed and more willing to say: "Let's pause and talk over the ramifications, first."

Alas, there are zealots who are so confident in their evidence-free assertions and assumptions that they rush to wager their children -- and yours and mine -- that the universe is nothing but a Sesame Street-Barney wunderland. Oh, please let it be so.

An animated introduction to the Fermi Paradox. A bit simplistic and off by a few factors. But interesting.

Just for fun: SMBC Comix 
re METI: 


We debated whether to send messages to space...

If life is everywhere in the universe, how come we never hear anything?

And from xkcd:

The Fermi Paradox

The first sentient ant colony calls off search for intelligent life

and (almost) finally...XKCD makes fun astronomical comparisons!  

== And for you, who pray to the Electoral College ==

1- Don't expect salvation from the Electoral College. Yes, there'll be more defections-of-conscience than ever before. Some electors are talking out options, as a "college" should. Like matching Clinton and Trump abstainers, or voting for a sane republican, making Paul Ryan take responsibility. There's even a "Kasich Gambit." Ohio's electors could almost do it all by themselves.

I had no success with my own great idea... getting some billionaire to offer an all-expense-paid actual meeting of the Electoral College, at some resort - for the first time in 240 years - letting them talk it out, free of outside interference. Too late, I guess. Ah, judgement, thou art fled...

2- At last, someone offers a $100K reward for anyone bringing forward conclusive evidence of election fraud. I've begged for this. The reward should be 10X larger, (with help from a zillionaire), plus offers of immunity, hero status and talk show gigs.

Oh, and whistleblowers reap 20% of whatever the U.S. gets, when conspiracies are nailed!  

Crowdfund this, asap.

The wonders of space: Mars, comets and more...

Time for an update from… space! For example, the Cassini probe, nearing the end of its remarkable journey, has just passed through the plumes of salty water vapor shooting out into space from Saturn's icy moon Enceladus. 

== The Briney miracle of Mars ==

Recent and recurring water flows on Mars? The secret "sauce" that enables this to happen, despite subzero temperatures and low atmospheric pressures is... brine.  High salt/mineral content enables brine-y fluids to survive surface conditions for short periods and -- possibly underground -- even sustain life?  How cool is that? Well, speaking as someone who is already rather brin-ey....

Now dig these pics of a crater on Mars that reveals that this region of the planet - bigger than Texas - features a huge slab of water ice, very near the surface.

Read a fascinating and well-written popular article on NASA's newly released "Roadmap to Mars." It is so good to see progress in the bureaucracy adapting to ideas some of us were bruiting decades ago -- like in-situ production - on Mars - of the water and fuel and oxygen astronauts will need, instead of expensively hauling them all from Earth. (Note this concept was largely absent from The Martian.) It also includes testing our methods with asteroid retrieval projects that could wind up benefitting humanity and Earth more than the Mars missions would!  Certainly it is good to see the plan almost completely leave out our sterile/useless (for now) moon.  Been there. There's nothing (for now) there. 

A stressed moon: Grooves across the surface of Phobos indicate that this Martian moon is (slowly) starting to crack under pressure... over the next 50 million years.

== Comets and more wonders ==

In my last space posting I commented that this last 12 months might count as humanity's best year out there... ever... including the late sixties.  And it just keeps pouring in.

ESA's Rosetta mission celebrated one year at Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The latest comet images are magnificent. Phil Plait’s Bad Astronomy column on Slate reveals a selection of photos recovered from the Philae lander as it approached the comet. More vivid and detailed, with now-named features as small as a few centimeters, as one of the images was taken from just nine meters away!  See the track-path that they now believe Philae followed when it failed to stick its landing and went bouncing across the surface, like characters did, in Heart of the Comet! 

And Rosetta now shows 67/P finally being comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. And behaving precisely as predicted in my doctoral dissertation, way back in 1981. Take this recent Philae result: “Scientists suspect the surface is partly shaped by a form of hail that occurs when gas ejections from the comet push out coarse particles that then fall back to the ground.” Yep!

“Rosetta has also discovered that the interior of 67P is extraordinarily light. At least 75% of it is empty space. Scientists speculate that much of its interior material may have been vented into space as the comet has warmed up during previous close encounters with the Sun.”   ice, carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide below the surface evaporate and vent into space, carrying with them dust that covers the comet. “Often this produces deep pits into which surface ice and dust collapse, creating sinkholes all over the comet,” said Mark McCaughrean, a senior scientist at the European Space Agency.  

Now, there's the surprising discovery of a high proportion of oxygen molecules in Comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko -- which may have originated early, even before the formation of the solar system.

As for the organic compounds found by the Philae lander: Four out of 16, including acetone, hadn’t been detected on a comet before. “It’s not yet known whether the complex molecules found in 67P were made in the early solar system and then incorporated into the comet or formed there later, he said. “Either way, it seems that comets are pretty good places to find the building blocks of molecules which later on could be used for life.” 

Yes, but so far, there are just those two theories.  Either the stuff cooked before the comet formed… or else on the surface, under solar ultraviolet. No one mentions a third idea.  That early comets contained radioactively-melted interiors, within which lots of liquid organic chemistry might take place.  

Geez, what does it take?  We now know between 6 and 12 worldlets in our system with partly molten water zones. Is it truly so hard to imagine the same thing might have happened, four billion years ago, when fresh aluminum26 cooked a trillion iceballs, turning them into bubbling test tubes? But then, it's just a theory.

As Rosetta orbits at a (relatively) safe distance, it is being pelted by dust grains that also confuse its star tracker. Still, scientists are hopeful that: (1) the exhalations from the surface of 67/P might be strong enough to rock the Philae lander into a better position to absorb sunlight and transmit data… without pushing so strongly that the lander is sent tumbling into space… and…

… (2) that the narrow neck of the 67P “rubber duck” nucleus might even break apart, this round, giving Rosetta a ringside seat for a spectacular show!

The closest view is yet to come: Touchdown next September! The historic Rosetta mission will end when ESA crashes (as gently as possible) the orbiter onto the comet's icy surface.

Stay tuned.

And finally....

NASA is regularly haunted by cases of paranoid pareidolia, or folks "seeing" signs of either technology or living things in pictures returned from outer space, especially Mars.  Occasionally, one of the images makes me go "huh?" and wish I could send the rover back, for another look… the way another look finally debunked the long-infamous "Face" of Cydonia.  Or else to check out something I just don't understand.

Now see this article for an image of the "spoon" whose lengthy shadow certainly does seem to suggest more supporting strength of a cantilever than you normally expect from mere rock-- okay, this one piques my curiosity!  Nevertheless, many of the "aha!" UFO style declarations are 99% silliness.  Especially the premise that NASA would first share with us these images then pooh-pooh and suppress talk of legitimate signs of ET life.  Um… why share with us the image stream so quickly, in that case? 

In fact, that is an eminently practical openness on their part. What they want is many keen eyes pointing out stuff to look at! And some of the amateur anomaly spotters have been truly useful.  Though not (so far) when they have pointed at (imaginary) faces and lizards n' such.

Oh and I know some of these folk. They are paladins of openness.  

Space! Heading out there...

First some fascinating news about how seriously some of our leaders in politics and industry are starting to take Our Future In Space.

Shall we begin “bootstrapping” our space technologies toward the goal of a Solar System Civilization? The idea is no longer science fiction alone. “Right now, the mass we use in space all comes from the Earth. We need to break that paradigm so that the mass we use in space comes from space,” said one NASA official – quoted on a page at the site of the White House. 

Yes, the White House. Tom Kalil is Deputy Director for Technology and Innovation at the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and his page is a down payment on what might become a special program out of the president’s office, aimed at helping spur the techs we'll need, in order to use space resources.  Look it up… and stay tuned.

Pie-in-the-sky?  Well, the potential methods for extracting space resources are looking more and more manageable, starting with the plentiful water contained in some kinds of asteroids.  Probably the most needed-desirable of all materials in space, and the most expensive need we must fulfill, both for life support and fuel, if humans are to live and work out in space.

Unlike the gold and platinum and iron that our children will relish from rocks out there, water may be accessible much sooner, according to the folks at Planetary Resources and Deep Space Industries.  And TransAstra Corp, where Caltech engineering prof Joel Sercel has worked out a plausible method. In optical mining, thin-film inflatable reflectors and containment bags are used to extract, collect, and store water from asteroids, using concentrated sunlight to crack asteroids and extract the water they contain. Once the water is stored in bags it can be used directly as rocket propellent in a type of engine called a solar thermal rocket. Later solar systems will crack and divide H2O into hydrogen and oxygen, allowing even more effective propulsion and portable power.

== More Space! More Space! ==

Um... At risk of making you all howl over the (utterly deserved and necessary) repetition... have I said already this is our best year in space since the seventies… and possibly ever? 

The roll call of stunning milestones just keeps flowing, with data from Mercury, Venus and Earth… orbiting and mapping Ceres (with its weird white spots and possible underground lakes), tons from Mars (including a comet swooping past the Red planet!), news of a likely Europa mission, wonders from Cassini at Saturn, including amazements from Titan…

…plus landing on a comet!  And of course, New Horizons swooping past Pluto (Watch this beautiful 16 second composite video and remember your civilization did something this competent.)

An article about Pluto Truthers… who claim the New Horizon images are faked, like everything else in the space program.  Eep.

== What more could you want? ==

                                                                                                

Well how about another Mars landing, next year?  InSight (Interior exploration using Seismic Investi­ gations, Geodesy and Heat Transport) is a NASA Discovery Program mission that will place a single geophysical lander on Mars to study its deep inte­rior.

But that’s 2016. Heck we might have a Singularity by then, so let’s stay focused. (Did I elsewhere promise 2014 - 2015 would be transformative?)

Meanwhile, the mavens who gave us spectacular Pluto-Charon images have chosen New Horizons’ next target!  The spacecraft is to make a similar examination of a small, Kuiper Belt object, an icy body known as 2014 MU69 in 2019. Pluto is about three billion miles from the sun; 2014 MU69 is almost a billion miles beyond Pluto. “The New Horizons spacecraft is to adjust course through a series of four thruster firings in late October and early November. New Horizons would also make more distant measurements of 20 other Kuiper belt objects en route to 2014 MU69.”That they can do this at all, with their excellent fuel reserve, is one more checkmark of stunning human competence.  Let’s bring that back into fashion!

Technicians have begun assembling the world's largest radio telescope, with a dish the size of 30 football grounds, deep in the mountains of southwest China's Guizhou Province. Yesterday afternoon, they began to assemble the telescope's reflector, which is 500 meters in diameter, compared to Puerto Rico's Arecibo Observatory, which is 300 meters. "Having a more sensitive telescope, we can receive weaker and more distant radio messages. It will help us to search for intelligent life outside of the galaxy and explore the origins of the universe," Wu Xiangping, director-general of the Chinese Astronomical Society said.

Okay fine. But please read the first few chapters of Liu Cixin’s epic Science Fiction novel (and 2015 Hugo Award winner) The Three Body Problem. That will teach you caution not to press SEND with any “outgoing messages.” Listening is good.

== Other space news? ==

How about a patent on a 20km tall inflated tower from which payloard can be more easily launched into orbit?  This vision from Thoth Technology sounds exciting. Indeed… this is exactly what I described in 1980, in my novel Sundiver. Remember the “Vanilla Needle?” Except that my concept in Sundiver was even grander: an inflated tower that went up past 70,000 feet and was cavernous enough inside so that cargoes would rise up in it using... balloons! 

The Hubble Space Telescope has discovered tiny primordial galaxies, which are estimated to have formed only 600 million years after the universe came into existence.  

                                                                                                         

By now you’ve heard about the discovery of a possibly Earthlike planet orbiting a very sunlike star. And you were wondering… are there aspects of this that I’m not seeing in even the science press?  I wonder what David Brin makes of this!  Did I read your mind? All right, in a nutshell…

… While Kepler-452b is larger than Earth, its 385-day orbit is only 5 percent longer. The planet is 5 percent farther from its parent star Kepler-452 than Earth is from the Sun. Kepler-452 is 6 billion years old, 1.5 billion years older than our sun, has the same temperature, and is 20 percent brighter and has a diameter 10 percent larger.While Kepler-452b is larger than Earth, its 385-day orbit is only 5 percent longer. The planet is 5 percent farther from its parent star Kepler-452 than Earth is from the Sun. Kepler-452 is 6 billion years old, 1.5 billion years older than our sun, has the same temperature, and is 20 percent brighter and has a diameter 10 percent larger. When Earth is that age, it will already be baked by our sun's shifting CUZ or Goldilocks zone. The Kepler 452 CUZ is probably shifting, too.

Astronauts on board the International Space Station (ISS) have tasted space-grown lettuce. The red romaine lettuce leaves were grown entirely by the team and it marks the start of the "veggie project" that will see more food grown in space.

I often mention that I serve on the Board of External Advisers for NASA’s Innovative and Advanced Concepts group… or NIAC… which offers grants for developing far-out-but-plausible concepts for advancing space exploration.  Now see a handy website explaining the criteria used for judging grants!  

A deep astronomical study (the 2015 Space Weather Workshop) found stellar flares on other G-type main sequence stars (of about the same size and rotational period as the Sun) that had far more energy than anything observed by humans coming from the Sun. Combine this with an update on the mysterious "774-775 carbon-14 anomaly," showing that another anomaly happened about the year 993, and the report concludes that superflares 1000 times more energetic than those observed in our historical records of the Sun could be expected to occur about once every 5000 years.  

We need more resilience. 

It’s ALIVE! And it’s in Outer Spaaaace!

Excitement is building for the New Horizons Mission and its hurried swing past Pluto on July 14.  What a terrific way to celebrate Bastille Day!  Watch this terrific video - Fast and Light to Pluto - about New Horizons, created by the NY Times.

I met Pluto discoverer Clyde Tombaugh when I was 15...

Spread the word about this!  Grab lapels and shout at your co-workers. Get neighborhood kids to watch the encounter on SCI or  NASA TV... and remind them to then stand up, remembering they are members of a civilization that does stuff like this! 

Those of our fellow citizens who cannot feel even a little thrill and pride? Alas, pity such impoverished souls.

And see how the IAU and the New Horizons mission team will come up with names for all the great new features the mission will (we hope) reveal. 

Okay, so there's rough news from space, as well... the latest SpaceX launch failed.  With the take home lesson that space is hard. Hang in there, Elon. If failures didn't happen, it would be a sure-fire clue that we aren't pushing hard enough.

Still, there hasn't been a time like this one -- in humanity's exploration of the universe -- since the early seventies.  Daily, you are being yammered-at by dour cynicism addicts of all kinds -- especially of the "left" and of the "right" -- but pay them no attention.  

Dare. Dare to feel some pride.  

== It's aliiiiive! Sinkholes and “signs of life” on comet 67/P ? ==

surface of comet 67P 

The ESA's Philae lander is alive!  Moreover, beaming science from the surface of Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko,  I was at first surprised, since the increased sunshine that roused it back to wakefulness is also making the comet active, with sublimating ice turning into expanding vapor, blowing off dust. In fact, given the comet’s minuscule gravity, I thought the lander might have been - at this point -- also blown tumbling into space. 

Though, now that I think on it, what seemed bad luck, back in November, might instead be fortunate!  According to my doctoral dissertation (1981) activity will wildly vary across a comet's surface, because of accumulated dust layers -- which helps explain 67-P's wildly varied surface features.  (See a blatant sea of dust in the accompanying photo.) This suggests that Philae bounced and plopped into a shaded region where activity is low… and may remain low enough for the little probe to stay put during perihelion passage.  If so, then we may have a monitoring station during that exciting phase.

In fact, fascinating news keeps coming. Like that collapsing sinkholes may be responsible for 200 meter-deep pits on comet 67.  Cameras on Rosetta's OSIRIS instrument have spotted dust jets shooting out of some of the deeper depressions, but those that are more shallow do not seem to be active.

  Scientists “wondered if the pits might have formed as a result of the melting of frozen materials on the comet's surface, also known as sublimation, but computer models nixed this idea as well.  The researchers say that excavating just one of the pits this way would take more than 7,000 years. Although the comet likely formed 4.5 billion years ago, it has only been flying close enough to the sun for sublimation to occur since 1959, when a close encounter with Jupiter changed its orbit.”

Hmm. well, in fact I have an idea about that. And it relates to the other comet-related "news" that media have been raving about.  Chandra Wickramasinghe is a remnant colleague of iconoclast astronomer and sometime science fiction author Fred Hoyle. Chandra does some solid science... but also relentlessly pushes Hoyle's notion of life burgeoning in interplanetary space. “He and colleague Dr Max Wallis, from the University of Cardiff, believe 67P and other comets like it could provide homes for living microbes similar to the “extremophiles” that inhabit the most inhospitable regions of the Earth. Comets may have helped to sow the seeds of life on Earth and possibly other planets such as Mars, they argue.” 

They suggest that the comet's black hydrocarbon crust, subsurface ice, flat-bottomed craters, and smooth, icy “seas”—are the result of microbial organisms living beneath the comet’s icy surface. (Alas, their credibility has been self-injured by some cult-like ways their Panspermia Zealot followers have behaved, especially at the tendentiously unscientific so-called "Journal of Cosmology.")
 

To be clear, I have no problem at all with pondering a possibility -- that comets may have been reactor vessels that cooked up the original primordial life-stuff.  There was a period in the early solar system when decaying Aluminum 26 from a recent supernova might have internally heated comets in our newly formed solar system, enough to give them liquid interiors protected by ice-cold shells. Think a trillion micro-Europas. That would be one hell of a lot of test tubes and petri dishes! (A possibility elucidated both in my thesis and in a novel Heart of the Comet.)

Indeed, might this account for the "sink-holes" that the Rosetta Probe seems to have found, at comet 67/P? I’ve not yet seen anyone propose that super-ancient vacuoles and chambers thread cometary interiors, left over from those early, liquidy days – a physical possibility, whether or not organic chemistry produced “life.”

On the other hand, Wickramasinghe (as usual) reaches way too far. The dark, quasi-organic dust seen by Philae and Rosetta is far simpler to explain -- as simply the same stuff as we already observe in carbonaceous chondrites. Please, we get plenty of dustfall from old comets and so far, evidence for actual microbes is scant. I lean toward lots of early-days organic chemistry. But existing and active organisms? Meh.

Okay, okay. Clearly I still care about this scientific field… because it’s fascinating!  

Do I miss being a world-class comet guy, who might have been sitting right now in Darmstadt, poring over data as it comes in?  Well… sure.  You guys are to blame. Bribing me to play hookie, living off speculative blather and SciFi. Yeah, that's the ticket. It's your fault.  Sigh.

== And there's more! ==

Like the continuing stunning effectiveness of our two robot labs on the surface of Mars and four orbiting overhead. Want coolness?  Here are images these emissary labs (paid for with pennies each from you taxpayers) took of Comet Siding Spring as it passed by Mars last year, inside the orbit of Phobos!  (Picture a comet passing Earth at just 1/3 the distance to the Moon. I am so jealous.) 

...as we celebrate the Opportunity rover's completion of a "marathon" having traveled 26.2 miles across the Martian surface on our behalf, doing great science all the way, having lasted more than a decade longer than the originally planned 90 day mission. Watch this terrific video showing a time lapse of Opportunity's journey. (Oh and I served on the commission that chose the names "Spirit" and "Opportunity" proposed by one of several thousand school children.) Be proud of your loyal robots!

And NASA has put money into a Europa mission.  Science instruments have just been selected -- to analyze the surface and subsurface ocean of Jupiter's icy moon -- and look for possible clues to life.

Wow.  Uttergloss!  A video animation: Fly-over the dwarf planet Ceres, based on images taken by NASA's Dawn spacecraft, provides dramatic views of this heavily cratered, mysterious world. Note: YOUR civilization did this.  Just part of the best year in space exploration since the 1970s.

Oh, and we just finished a fabulous orbiter mission to Mercury. And we still have marvelous Cassini, near Saturn and Titan...

Here are some of the latest pics of geological features taken by the DAWN probe, at Ceres. Oh, but there’s no end to fun with “bright patches” (that might be salt, rather than water ice. And now...a 5-mile tall “pyramid” mountain. Take this flyover video! We are SO getting our money’s worth. 

Shall we finish with some cool space miscellany? How about a look at some of the space habitats portrayed in science fiction, from Deep Space 9 to Elysium….are they plausible?

Phil Plait offers up a little allegory about an asteroid heading toward the Earth, and how easy it might be to save ourselves, if not for mistrust of science itself.  And here's hoping you all enjoyed Asteroid Day and decided to support the B612 Foundation!

Did I say we live in fascinating times? It's our mission. We are rising out of kindergarten, at last. Growing up means we're behooved to take more responsibility, for each other and the planet our descendants will inherit.  But it also means recognizing there's a lot more to do, beyond the nursery walls.

Spread the excitement.  And happy Bastille Day.  Allons enfants de la univers...