“This incredible image gives us a new perspective of our galaxy, and illustrates the far-reaching discoveries we can make from large sky surveys,” Nick Cross, of the University of Edinburgh, said in a statement. “Having data processed, archived and published by dedicated teams leaves other scientists free to concentrate on using the data, and is a very cost-effective way to do astronomy.”

It all started with a big bang!

Sources: Space.com, InfoWars.com

The Sun has an atmosphere comprised of of hydrogen with helium and some other elements. The Sun does not burn hydrogen like the space shuttle main engines did (burning hydrogen and oxygen giving water vapor), but uses a process of nuclear fusion to make hydrogen into helium. Oxygen is not involved in any kind of combustion on the Sun. The Sun does not have flames like a fire here on Earth — but it is a giant ball of gas that is much hotter than any flame you could make here on Earth.

The Sun is a sphere of gas. In the Sun scientists have found about 2/3 of the elements that are known on the Earth. Helium was found there even before it was found on the Earth. As these elements on the Sun are all light, it is possible that the rest of the known elements which are heavier can be found nearer the centre of the Sun. The outermost layer of the Sun’s atmosphere, the corona, can only be seen with the naked eye during a total solar eclipse. Then, the light from the photosphere is fully masked by the Moon. The corona is a ‘crown of rays’ with a temperature of over a million degrees Celsius, which usually has an asymmetric form – depending on the Sun’s activity.

This morning (March 21, 2012), 1429 produced a solar flare which resulted in a bright Coronal Mass Ejection (CME). The movie below shows the flare as captured by STEREO Behind and also the CME Plasma cloud by STEREO Behind COR2. Because this was a farsided event, the expanding plasma cloud will not be Earth directed.

There were four C-class flares with three of these originating from the newly emerging Region 1440 (S26W24). The largest was a C2 flare that occurred at 1252Z. Region 1440 showed development throughout the day and appears to have a small magnetic delta configuration in the trailing portion of the group. There was a back-sided full halo CME from old Region 1429 that was observed in LASCO C2 imagery beginning at 21/0736Z.
This CME is not expected to be geoeffective. Source: SolarHam.com

Felix Baumgartner (born 20 April 1969 in Salzburg, Austria) is an Austrian skydiver and a BASE jumper who is preparing to jump from the edge of space later this year. On March 15th he took a practice jump and hopes to break the record for the longest freefall. Only one other person has successfully done it back in 1960, his name is Joseph Kittinger who holds the current record for the highest balloon ascent, highest parachute jump, longest free-fall, and fastest speed by man through the atmosphere.

(see video of Joseph Kittinger’s sky jump below)…

Later this year Felix Baumgartner will attempt to break the current record held by Joseph Kittinger when he jumps from an altitude of 21,818 meters (71,581 feet, 21 kilometers, 13.5 miles) from the skies near Roswell, New Mexico. Joseph Kittinger jumped from 31,500 m (31.5 km, 19.5 miles) in 1960. Kittinger is assisting on the mission.

The planet Venus is much like the planet Earth. Both planets are very similar to each other in composition. Earth and Venus have almost the same size and density and scientists speculate that Venus, much like Earth also has a core, mantle, and crust. The only thing that differentiates our planet from Venus is there exists no tectonic plates on Venus. Also, an internal magnetic field is totally absent from Venus.

The distance between Jupiter and Pluto is in a constant state of flux. The distance is always changing when in orbit around the sun. For example… During 2010, the distance went from 4.4451089947 billion kilometers up to 4.8693684720 billion kilometers. On March 11th, it was 4.5232417356 billion km (30.2360034584298 AU = 2.81061211 billion miles). Source: NASA

If you’re searching for distances between planets you can find out the distance between the earth and the red planet in an article we posted a while back…

What is the distance between Earth and Mars?

A glancing blow to our planet’s magnetosphere is possible on March 8th or 9th. This eruption hurled a bright CME into space. First-look data from STEREO-B are not sufficient to determine if the cloud is heading for Earth. Solar storms can bring additional radiation around the north and south poles – a risk that sometimes forces airlines to reroute flights. Satellites can be affected, too. NASA spokesman Rob Navias said the space agency wasn’t taking any extra precautions to protect astronauts on the International Space Station from added radiation. t’s a matter of debate what an epic solar storm would do to the modern electric grid. The strongest events on record — in 1859 and in 1921 — hit before the power grid existed.

On the evening of Sunday Aug. 28, 1859, New Jerseyans saw “one of the most beautiful exhibitions of the northern lights … ever seen. The sky brightened with them and the light furnished was equal to a full moon,” according to the Newark Daily Mercury’s account of the aurora borealis. That storm damaged parts of the telegraph system, and another outburst in 1921 brought the New York Central Railroad to a halt.

NASA models using data from the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO) and the Solar Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) have now provided more information about the two CMEs associated with the two March 6 flares. The first is traveling faster than 1300 miles per second; the second more than 1100 miles per second. NASA’s models predict that the CMEs will impact both Earth and Mars, as well as pass by several NASA spacecraft – Messenger, Spitzer, and STEREO-B. The models also predict that the leading edge of the first CME will reach Earth at about 1:25 AM EST on the morning of March 8 (plus or minus 7 hours). Such a CME could result in a severe geomagnetic storm, causing aurora at low latitudes, with possible disruption to high frequency radio communication, global positioning systems (GPS), and power grids.

Currently so far, so good. No major disturbances recorded or reported.

A major solar flare erupted from the sun late last night (March 4) sending an explosion of plasma and charged particles hurtling toward Earth again. This is classified as a mass coronal ejection that will probably miss earth. Waves of plasma and charged particles were ejected on March 5th. The Solar Flare was an X1.1-class solar flare and exploded from the surface of the sun at 11:13 p.m. EST (0413 GMT March 5), according to the Space Weather Prediction Center operated by the National Weather Service.

categorized as the most powerful type of solar storm, even if the CME misses the earth sky watchers should still be on the look out for auroras in the nights ahead.

News Source: (Space News)