@mcnees Also, when he said "uphold" he may have meant the physical act of holding a copy above the ground. Needs context.

Working in tandem, NASA's Parker Solar Probe and ESA's Solar Orbiter are making big discoveries about how the Sun works.
One particularly intriguing observation: a strange plasma "snake" slithering all the way across the solar surface.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-03301-1 #astronomy #astrodon #science

NASA's Parker Solar Probe has set a new record as the fastest object ever built, hitting a velocity of 394,736 mph (635,266 kph) relative to the Sun.

That's about 300 times as fast as a speeding bullet. Damn!
https://parkersolarprobe.jhuapl.edu/News-Center/Show-Article.php?articleID=193 #NASA #space #science

For a dose of perspective: Even at the peak speed of the Parker Solar Probe (~180 km/sec), it would take more than 7,000 years to reach Alpha Centauri, the nearest star system.

Interstellar distances are HUGE.
#space #science #travel

I love a science mystery, and this is a good one:
About once a year, a mysterious blue flash appears from a different part of the sky, then fades in a matter of days. Nobody knows what these things are. And the latest one, nicknamed "the Finch," may be the strangest one yet.
https://science.nasa.gov/missions/hubble/nasas-hubble-finds-bizarre-explosion-in-unexpected-place #science #astronomy #astrodon

@mcnees This might become my standard greeting when sending out formulaic emails.

Arthur Walker, Jr, had a big, often-overlooked influence in space science. He pioneered using x-rays to study activity on the Sun, led the Challenger investigation, and opened opportunities for underrepresented groups in astronomy. https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-resources/famous-astronomers/arthur-b-c-walker-ii-x-ray-astrophysicist/ #Juneteenth #BlackInStem

Thought for the weekend:
Our eyes are narrowly adapted to conditions on Earth. To see reality as it truly is, we have to use instruments that go far beyond the limits of human vision.
These images merge visible light with infrared & x-rays to show a bigger universe:
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/chandra/news/nasas-chandra-webb-combine-for-arresting-views.html #NASA #Space

Everything in this image of the Eagle Nebula is invisible to the human eye.
JWST shows the infrared glow of warm gas & dust. Chandra shows x-rays blasting from active young stars. Our technology brings the invisible universe into view.
https://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2023/chandrawebb2/ #perspective #nature

I was a NASA intern in the '80s when I heard that astronomers had discovered a mysterious disk around the nearby star Fomalhaut.
Now JWST has revealed exactly what they are: three enormous, dusty asteroid belts around another star!
https://webbtelescope.org/contents/news-releases/2023/news-2023-109 #JWST #space #astronomy

@mcnees Also, the wonderful early intersection between Terry Hall & Bananarama. https://youtu.be/oOSTKysID68 #terry_hall

@mcnees Then again, it is also possible to *find* a couple glorious hours this way.

@mcnees Great minds!

55 years ago #today Jocelyn Bell discovered the first known pulsar -- a star the size of a city, spinning once a second, whipping up intense radio signals that sounded like the beep-beep-beep of an alien signal.

In her own words: https://www.cam.ac.uk/stories/journeysofdiscovery-pulsars #astronomy #discovery

You may have seen a plot of the radio signal from pulsar B1919+21 without realizing it -- it's the cover image of Joy Division's "Unknown Pleasures" album. https://theconversation.com/joy-division-40-years-on-from-unknown-pleasures-astronomers-have-revisited-the-pulsar-from-the-iconic-album-cover-119861 #space #OTD #joydivision

British designer Peter Saville created the cover for Joy Division's "Unknown Pleasures" inspired by a pulsar radio-wave pattern that astronomer Harold Craft published in his PhD thesis.

Could that be the most widely seen PhD thesis in history?
https://www.typeroom.eu/peter-saville-on-joy-division-unknown-pleasures-stellar-cover-art #art #joydivision #astronomy

A group at Johns Hopkins has created a scrollable, interactive map of the entire universe, from here to the cosmic microwave background.
Extraordinary discoveries at your fingertips for free, unimaginable when I was a kid. https://mapoftheuniverse.net/ #astronomy #space #exploration