Empty space

[Dean]

I was going to post :vacuum of space: to the "Somebody Post somethin'" thread, so I was googleing for an image of "Empty Space", and found some interesting stuff...

This one sounded like a "B" Movie title, so had to link to it...
A Force from Empty Space: The Casimir Effect

And then there is this one... Maybe space ain't so empty after all...



"Explanation: Sometimes staring into empty space is useful. Pictured above is a region of sky that was picked because it had, well, nothing: no bright stars, no bright galaxies, and no picturesque nebulas. What could not be avoided, however, were a few stars in our own Galaxy , and many distant galaxies strewn across the universe. Now the more distant galaxies have their light slightly deflected by the gravity of more nearby galaxies, causing them to appear slightly distorted. By analyzing these ~gravitational lens distortions, nearby mass concentrations can be found, regardless of how bright they appear. Using this method, astronomers can now weigh entire clusters of galaxies and search for large groupings of relatively dark matter. Circled in the lower right of the above image is a cluster of galaxies that was found not by its light, but by its mass."

[sperry]

There are orders of magnitude more galaxies in our universe than there are stars in our galaxy.

We are very, very, very, small.

[AtomicLabMonkey]

It really makes you wonder what all is out there.

I want to believe...

[Dean]

Now my brain is in NASA mode, and I don't mean the car club.

The Mars rovers have now returned over 60,000 images of the red plannet, and January 3rd was their first anaversary on the planet. If I recall, they were only supposed to last 90 sols. There is some amazing stuff on www.NASA.gov if you haven't checked it out recenlty.

How about the first color picture of the moon..... Titan that is...

I guess from what I read, they never expected to actually get pictures after landing, much less enough battery life to get back spectral data...

[Kevin M]

I'm guessing they had a real good idea how long the batteries would last, but were very conservative in what they told the public to expect.

[Dean]

Originally Posted by BAN SUVS

I'm guessing they had a real good idea how long the batteries would last, but were very conservative in what they told the public to expect.

No, they have just gotten very smart with power management, "Deep Sleeping" at night, and driving so they rover stays tilted towards the sun, etc.. The vehicles are also falling apart to some extent, but they have devised engenious ways to overcome the failures like driving backwards, and turning to go straight.... Go read about them...

[sperry]

Originally Posted by Dean

No, they have just gotten very smart with power management, "Deep Sleeping" at night, and driving so they rover stays tilted towards the sun, etc.. The vehicles are also falling apart to some extent, but they have devised engenious ways to overcome the failures like driving backwards, and turning to go straight.... Go read about them...

I think he was talking about the Titan lander that was expected to last only a few minutes on the surface, but ended up transmitting for like 5 hours instead. :shock:

[Dean]

Originally Posted by sperry

I think he was talking about the Titan lander that was expected to last only a few minutes on the surface, but ended up transmitting for like 5 hours instead. :shock:

Ah, good point. My mind was on the rovers, and what they have done to keep them alive,

[Kevin M]

Originally Posted by sperry

I think he was talking about the Titan lander that was expected to last only a few minutes on the surface, but ended up transmitting for like 5 hours instead. :shock:

No, I wasn't talking about anything in particular.