Starship Asterisk*

Recent findings suggest that even Brown Dwarfs may have the capacity to develop planets? (http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n0511/29tiniest/) Directly viewing another star or brown dwarf's planets will have to wait a decade or so... when the 'Planetary Finder' mission is launched. Proxima Centuri i...

The sun can only appear as a cresent duing a conjunction with a planet or moon in the foreground.

I like Dr. Oliver K. Manuel's theory that our star, Mr. Sol, is actually a novae remnant! His proof, if correct, is found in meteoric isotope ratios. He champions the idea that Sol actually has an IRON core! The Hydrogen we see on the surface is a byproduct of degenerative neucleosysnthesis. Also, t...

Here's an interesting addy: http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n0512/03blackhole/ This article chats up findings from the Spitzer Space Telescope concerning black holes. It appears that matter and energy are streaming OUT of the vicinity of a galactic sized black hole. Accretion disk jets escaping f...

In an electro dynamic universe.. supernovae are an expression of interdimensional structures colliding - string generated vortices. As the energy within those vortices generate gravity and slow below light speed, that energy is transformed into radiation and matter. The massive stars seen exploding ...

The dynamics of impact(s) on thin crust 'water-ice' moons is an interesting subject indeed! Extreme low temperatures transform water ice into a 'rocklike' density... further complicating matters? What would the antipolar nodes of a multi-impact event look like? Harmonic resonances anyone? Gravitatio...

Now THAT's a 'ZINGY' image! Cudos' to the Japanese Space Agency for that effort! Indeed.. we are not alone! HO! Apparently ALL theories of comet formation/accumulation may be 'right'? As we are finding that not all comets are solid.. and not all comets (or asteroids) are 'fluff balls' either! Furthe...

WOW! An earlier post by me mentioned the subject: 'Erosion on Mars at every scale': This 'macro' 360° image from the top of the 'Husband Hills', from the MER rover 'Spirit', shows EXACTLY what I mean... Note that all surface features, close by or far away appear rounded and weathered. NOTE the appea...

"The Sun's complex magnetic field creates this cool region by inhibiting hot material from entering the spot." I note that in the very center of the sunspot, there is a feature that looks somewhat like a crater? We've witnessed cryo-volcanoes at Neptune, are there 'plasma volcanoes' on Sol...

My thought was to spray the outside with water vapour, then cover it to protect it from Sol rads. Trick'd be to use a 'Bassard-like' collectors to gather useful matter, i.e. Hydrogen and Oxygen, on-orbit. (nuclear pwr'd Bussards?) Make rad. sheilding as you go along? Robots 'rig' the shelter, collec...

I was thinking more along the lines of low gravity metals manufacturing platform? Pharmacuetical manufacturing platform? Semiconductor manufacturing platform? Or using the tanks at lunar orbit? Spraying ice on the external surface to a thickness of several feet would make those tanks good radiation ...

Here comes lunch!

Good question! My first quess was Southern Calif.? Kind of looks like a dry lake bed somewhere? or a Ground fog?

Second guess is somewhere's over Asia. Russian ground controllers like to have the ISS overhead during their part of the docking sequence?

It would be difficult, at best, getting the intelligence agencies to release enough technical info. to see whether or not anything could be salvaged and recycled from any of their decommisioned platforms? Would it prove economical to use old, 'on-orbit' mirrors, solar panels, motors, sheilding, and/...

"We have our own erosion patterns to examine and see the similarities. These markings on Mars are easily recognized by those that study the effects of water erosion here on earth." Again.. is that 'water erosion' or solids ACTING like liquids? I think its a mix of the two. In which case......

"There once was a lady named 'Bright', whose speed was much faster than light. She went out one day, in a relative way, and came back on the previous night!" Praps gravity appears instantaneously everywhere, without having to travel to get there, because it exists in dimensions beyond our ...

NASA Science Webpage story about Tribo-electric charge on Mars: http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2005/10aug_crackling.htm NASA Science chats up solar electric weather on Mars: http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2005/14jul_dustdevils.htm Bottom line? Evidence is mounting for rethinking massive eros...

There is a remote but interesting possibility, that the 'Canali' that Lovell and others saw... WERE in fact actual features, that is to say.. Supercell Dust Devils in planetary dust storm conditions, may have 'swept up' the Martian surface.. revealing darker underlying materials? Subsequent storms r...

The problem with modeling 'weather' on Mars is that there is a tendancy to 'compare' it to the water cycle weather patterns, here on Earth. Again, Mars gravity is 38% that of Earth. Extreme temperature gradients exist between the surface and immediately above the surface. Mars seems covered with fin...

As proposed in an earlier comment, we see erosion at every scale on Mars Golf balls with indentations fly much better and further than without. Less rounded sand granules may be differentiated in a similar fashion? The 'flight characteristics' of sand and dust particles may be enhanced by their shap...

Enhancing surface magnetic fields on Mars, for use as protection from incoming ionized radiation. Early in the 'age of electricity' Nickoli Tesla performed experiments where he 'injected' electricity into the Earth's magnetic field. His hope was to create a wireless electrical power network. What he...

I note that recent images of Mars Valley Marinaris show that a dust storm is completely filling the trench at present. Starting there, possibly due to higher pressures and temperatures down in the bottom? Mars Habitat.. hmm. Underground volcanic tubes come to mind right away. For Moon bases too. The...

A recent map released by the Mars Globl Surveyor team of Mar's magnetic field(s) is fascinating! (http://www.spaceflightnow.com/news/n0510/17marsmap/) - I hope I'm not breaking any rules posting something from 'brand X'? - The Valley Marinaris appears to be where two tectonic plates have created a '...

Therefore, the erosional agents themselves are at every scale? Most features 'close up' seem to indicate recent and ongoing 'weathering'. The Rover Spirit has found eroded/rounded rock on the tops of the Columbia Hills. The Rover Opportunity found, and continues to find, billions of Hemotite 'Bluebe...

WOW! YOU GO CASSINI! What an awesome image... fractal looking indeed! Looks 'kind of like' an electron microscope image of a dust mote? What I'm wondering is: the large crater, was if formed by an impact? or by collapse thru out-gassing? or both? Can't wait to hear what its made of... spectroscopy a...

Saturn's rings and equator are inclined by 27° while its Inclination to the Solar Ecliptic is 2°29'17". Only Mercury, Venus and Pluto have higher inclinations to the solar ecliptic. Add 27° with 2°29'17" and you get an even higher angular inclination of almost 30°! Uranus' equator is incli...