Astro Blog

Source: By Lee Billings, Scientific American           Excerpt: ...search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI) ...has yet to detect any signals that withstand close scrutiny. Even if brimming with life, to us, the galaxy seems to be a very quiet, rather lonely place. Now, new results suggest this loneliness may extend out into the universe far beyond our galaxy.... After examining some 100,000 nearby large galaxies a team of researchers lead by The Pennsylvania State University astronomer Jason Wright has concluded that none of them contain any obvious signs of highly advanced technological civilizations. ...they looked for the thermodynamic consequences of galactic-scale colonization, based on an idea put forth in 1960 by the physicist Freeman Dyson.  ...the team searched for type 3 civilizations in an all-sky catalogue from NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE). They looked for objects that were optically dim but bright in the mid-infrared—the expected signature o

Source:   NASA Excerpt: After extraordinary science findings and technological innovations,  ...NASA’s MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft launched in 2004 to study Mercury will impact the planet’s surface, most likely on April 30, after it runs out of propellant. ...Although Mercury is one of Earth’s nearest planetary neighbors, little was known about the planet prior to the MESSENGER mission. “For the first time in history we now have real knowledge about the planet Mercury that shows it to be a fascinating world as part of our diverse solar system,” said John Grunsfeld, associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington.  ...One key science finding in 2012 provided compelling support for the hypothesis that Mercury harbors abundant frozen water and other volatile materials in its permanently shadowed polar craters. Data indicated the ice in Mercury's polar regions, if spread over an