Buzz
It's funny how starting a simple research project can lead you down unexpected paths. Take this list, for instance. As I was gathering information for it, I came across details about the Venus transit, and soon realized there was enough fascinating content to dedicate an entire list just to that. To explore that list, click here.
I distinctly recall being about eight years old when I first fell in love with astronomy. I devoured book after book on the subject, always captivated by the stories of Halley’s comet's 1910 return, which put on a breathtaking light show in the night sky for weeks. When I read that the comet would return in 86 years, I thought, 'Will I even be alive to see it?' I quickly did the math and realized that in 1986, I'd be 27. Could I possibly live to see that? At that young age, 27 seemed like an eternity away, but I hoped I’d make it. And I did. Unfortunately, when Halley’s comet came back in 1986, it was best visible in the southern hemisphere. We in the north got a glimpse, but it was underwhelming, to say the least. I only managed to see it once, through a telescope that a kind man allowed me to look through.
Throughout my life, I've read about new frontiers in space exploration – the Viking missions to Mars, the Voyager missions to the outer planets. Every time, I would calculate my age by the time these spacecraft reached their distant destinations. The vastness of space means that traveling to other worlds takes years or even decades. So, in a typical human lifespan, you’re more likely to witness the discoveries made by these missions or catch glimpses of remarkable astronomical events.
Here’s a list of ten upcoming astronomical events that, with any luck, we’ll all be around to witness. Some are just around the corner, while others are still many years away. Regardless, they are all worth the wait.
10. Venus Transit
The first event on our list is one that I sincerely hope all Mytour readers will get to witness. It’s an incredibly rare event, something that might only happen once or twice in a lifetime – if you're lucky enough to be born at the right moment. The transit of Venus across the Sun will be visible on June 5-6 of this year. For more detailed information about the Venus transit, click here.
9. Mercury Transit
While not as rare as Venus transits across the Sun, and certainly more challenging to see due to Mercury’s smaller size and greater distance from Earth, Mercury transits still occur with some frequency. Mercury, being closer to the Sun and having a faster orbit, passes between Earth and the Sun more often. Like the Venus transit, a Mercury transit will appear as a small black dot moving from right to left across the Sun's face. These transits happen a few days around May 8 and November 10. The next one will occur in 2016, with the full transit visible in parts of western Europe, Africa, and the eastern Americas. Interestingly, Mercury transits have gradually shifted later in the year; before 1585, they occurred in April and October.
8. 2015 – A Year Full of Wonders
Astronomy enthusiasts are in for a thrilling ride in 2015. The year will begin with a total solar eclipse on March 20, visible in the central North Atlantic Ocean, moving past Greenland, and ending in northern Siberia. The prime viewing spots will be in the Norwegian Sea, east of Iceland, north of England, and west of Norway. Not exactly the best place for an eclipse, nor one likely to have clear skies, but sometimes you have to take what space gives you. Then, on April 4, a total lunar eclipse will be visible across North and South America, East Asia, and Australia. On July 14, the New Horizons spacecraft will make its closest approach to Pluto.
Later in the year, on September 13, a partial solar eclipse will be visible in parts of Africa, Madagascar, and Antarctica. Then, on September 28, the second total lunar eclipse of the year will light up the skies across much of North and South America, Africa, Europe, and West Asia. October 11 will bring the planet Uranus into opposition, the point where it is closest to the Sun. Although you’ll need a good telescope to see it, Uranus will be fully illuminated by the Sun, making it the best time for observation. The year wraps up with three spectacular conjunctions. On October 26, Venus and Jupiter will align in a conjunction visible in the eastern sky during the early morning. Then, on October 28, Mars joins the duo for a triple conjunction, with the three planets forming a tight triangle in the same sky. Finally, on December 7, Venus will again align with the crescent moon in the early morning sky, making for a lovely celestial display.
Another total solar eclipse will occur early in 2016, on March 9. This time, viewers will be treated to a much more pleasant setting – the South Pacific Ocean and parts of Indonesia, including Sumatra, Borneo, and the islands of Sulawesi and Halmahera.
7. Rosetta
Comets are considered to be the remnants of the universe’s earliest days. Scientists are eager to study them to learn more about their composition and, potentially, about the origins of the universe itself. This is why the Rosetta mission is so significant: it's a literal chase to catch, land on, and travel with a comet as it enters our solar system. No mission has ever done this before. While other spacecraft have visited comets, none have successfully landed on one and traveled alongside it. Rosetta’s goal is to accomplish just that.
The Rosetta spacecraft is on a decade-long mission to catch up with the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (C-G), land on it, and accompany it as it enters the inner solar system, heating up as it nears the Sun and creating the iconic tail we often observe from Earth. This mission is a collaboration between the European Space Agency and NASA.
Launched in 2004, Rosetta has already made history by visiting an asteroid. On July 10, 2010, it flew within 3,000 kilometers of asteroid Lutetia, studying it with its scientific instruments. Now, Rosetta is venturing through the farthest reaches of our solar system, almost a billion kilometers away from the Sun. At such a distance, the solar panels generate minimal power, so the spacecraft is in hibernation until January 2014. When comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko (CG) passes by during its return orbit toward the Sun, the spacecraft will reawaken, fire its engines, and move closer to the comet. Rosetta aims to 'harpoon' the comet and land the Philae robot on its surface. Philae will transmit scientific data back to Earth as the comet enters the solar system and heads toward the Sun again.
6. Juno
Thanks to the Voyager and Galileo missions, our knowledge of Jupiter, the largest planet in the solar system, has expanded significantly. These missions have provided a close-up look at Jupiter’s moons, its ring system, and other essential features. With the Juno mission, scientists aim to uncover how Jupiter formed and evolved into the massive gas giant it is today. Juno will measure the amount of water in the planet’s atmosphere and delve into its clouds to investigate temperature, composition, motion, and more. The mission will also study Jupiter’s powerful magnetic and gravitational fields, along with the auroras at the planet's poles. By doing so, Juno will shed light on the formation of the solar system, as Jupiter is often referred to as our 'second sun' that never ignited. Juno will also help scientists understand why gas giants like Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune exist, in contrast to the rocky inner planets like Earth and Mars.
Launched on August 5, 2011 (the day my father would have turned 80), Juno is scheduled to arrive at Jupiter in July 2016. The spacecraft will orbit and study the planet for about one year.
5. Dawn
The Dawn mission is the first to visit and orbit the two largest objects in the asteroid belt, situated between Mars and Jupiter. Dawn has already completed its first phase by visiting the asteroid Vesta. Launched in 2007, Dawn arrived at Vesta on July 16, 2011, and it continued to orbit and conduct scientific research until around July of this year. At that point, the spacecraft will use its innovative ion propulsion engine to head toward its next destination: the dwarf planet Ceres. Dawn is expected to reach Ceres in February 2015 and continue scientific operations throughout the year before the mission concludes.
Dawn was the first spacecraft to employ ion propulsion. Ion propulsion or ion thruster engines generate thrust by accelerating ions. This propulsion method uses electrostatic or electromagnetic ions to generate a small but highly efficient thrust by expelling ions from the engine. Though the thrust is modest, it is extremely efficient and requires very little propellant. Ion engines are most effective in environments with minimal ionized particles, making space the ideal setting for this technology.
While Ceres and Vesta share the distinction of being large objects in the asteroid belt, they are vastly different in composition. These two objects provide a snapshot of the early solar system, and studying them closely could offer valuable insights into the conditions that existed during the solar system's formation.
4. Mars Science Observatory – Curiosity
Following its successful launch on November 26, 2011, the Mars Science Laboratory’s Curiosity rover is journeying smoothly towards Mars. The journey from Earth to Mars will take approximately 36 weeks (254 days). Upon reaching Mars orbit, the spacecraft will release the Curiosity rover, which is expected to land on the Martian surface on August 5-6, 2012.
Curiosity was designed to exceed the capabilities of previous Mars Exploration Rovers, like Opportunity, which continued its mission for eight years. Equipped with an advanced set of scientific tools, Curiosity's mission is to explore whether Mars has ever hosted an environment that could support life. The key question is whether Mars has been habitable in the past or might still be capable of supporting life today.
To accommodate all its scientific instruments, Curiosity is the largest rover ever sent to another planet, weighing over 2,000 pounds and roughly the size of a small car. Because of its size, landing Curiosity on Mars required a new and delicate approach. Previous rovers, like Opportunity and Spirit, used airbag technology, which involved bouncing the robots inside giant airbags until they came to a stop. For Curiosity, however, a more precise landing technique is necessary. This will be achieved through a 'sky crane' system, where Curiosity will descend with the help of rockets to slow its descent and a parachute for added control. The final phase will involve further rockets to slow the rover’s descent and a crane-like device lowering the rover gently to the surface on a tether. This method allows for a much more accurate landing, with Curiosity expected to land within a zone of just 12 miles, as opposed to the 93 by 12 mile zone used by its predecessors.
Curiosity's spacecraft also carries a unique item – a Lincoln penny placed beside the color calibration chart. This chart is used to adjust the cameras on the spacecraft, ensuring accurate color representation of Mars' surface. The penny serves as a scale reference, a common practice among geologists who place familiar objects in photographs to give a sense of size. This coin, small yet iconic, will be visible to the public as it travels across Mars with the rover. Will it weather the harsh conditions of Mars? Will it tarnish or become coated with Martian dust? Could a Martian one day pick it up and add it to their collection? To learn more about this penny and see its journey, go here (warning – may need a fast Internet connection).
3. New Horizons
I’ve chosen this as my number one, for personal reasons – it’s my most awaited mission. Why? Because in my lifetime, humanity has successfully explored and gathered scientific data from every planet in our solar system, as well as from other celestial bodies like comets, asteroids, and even the Sun itself. The only one left is Pluto. I’ve been fascinated by Pluto and space exploration since I was ten, when I read "The Search for Planet X," about the discovery of Pluto by Clyde Tombaugh. To honor the discovery of Pluto, the spacecraft carries a small portion of Clyde Tombaugh's ashes, and one of the science instruments, a dust counter, is named after Venetia Burney, the young girl who suggested the name 'Pluto' after its discovery.
As many are aware, Pluto was recently reclassified from a full planet to a 'minor planet.' This seems odd to me, especially since we know Pluto has moons, an atmosphere, and possibly even rings, much like Saturn. How can that not be considered a planet? I’m still puzzled. Regardless, the New Horizons mission excites me because it will mark the completion of mankind’s first full reconnaissance of our solar system, essentially exploring our own 'backyard' in space. This is an extraordinary achievement for humanity, something we all should be proud of. And we accomplished this in just about 50 years.
Launched in 2006, New Horizons has already traveled an impressive 2 billion miles, with another billion miles still ahead. However, the spacecraft is past the halfway point in its journey to Pluto, having crossed the orbit of Uranus and now in the final stretch (a very long final stretch). How far is New Horizons from Earth? It currently takes 3 hours for light to travel from Earth to the spacecraft, meaning that communication between the two takes over 6 hours round-trip. New Horizons is expected to arrive at Pluto on July 14, 2015. If you were aboard and looked out the rear view window toward the Sun and the planets you left behind, what would you see? You can view an artist's depiction of this here.
New Horizons holds the record as the fastest man-made object, traveling at a speed of 34,000 miles per hour, covering a million miles of space in just one day. At this astonishing pace, it could travel from Earth to the Moon in the time it takes to fly from the East Coast to the West Coast of America – about 5 hours. So, what will New Horizons encounter when it reaches Pluto? An artist has created a visualization of how our Sun will appear to an observer standing on the planet. You can watch the video here (warning – a fast Internet connection is required).
Once it has passed by Pluto and its moons, New Horizons will continue on to the Kuiper Belt – a region at the farthest reaches of our solar system where countless asteroids and comets reside. These objects can occasionally be drawn toward the planets by the Sun’s gravity, leading them to either impact Earth or other planets, or be drawn into the Sun itself. To witness such an event, you can watch an incredible video that captured a comet plunging into the Sun here (warning – a fast Internet connection is required).
Similar to the Voyager spacecraft, after New Horizons completes its exploration of the Kuiper Belt, it will continue on its journey, heading out into the vast expanse of outer space.
2. Voyager
In the 1960s, scientists recognized a rare opportunity for space exploration that would unfold in the 1970s, when the four giant gas planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune) would align in such a way that a spacecraft launched from Earth could visit all four in succession. These alignments are extremely rare, and to capitalize on this chance, the United States launched Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 in 1977. Both spacecraft visited Jupiter and Saturn, with Voyager 1’s trajectory specifically designed to avoid Uranus and Neptune in favor of heading out of the solar system after passing Saturn. Voyager 2, however, continued its mission to make historic encounters with Uranus and Neptune.
The Voyager spacecraft remain operational and are positioned to help answer fundamental questions about our solar system – specifically, where does our solar system end, and where does 'outer space' begin? If all goes as planned, answers to these questions may be within reach in the coming years. In 1998, Voyager 1 surpassed Pioneer 10 to become the farthest manmade object from Earth. Traveling much faster than Pioneer 10, Voyager 1 is set to maintain that title unless it collides with something in space. As of February 2012, Voyager 1 is 180 billion kilometers from Earth, traveling at a speed of 32,000 miles per hour. It is moving 10% faster than Voyager 2, but even at this speed, it will take 73,600 years to approach another star (Proxima Centauri). Though not heading in any particular direction, in about 40,000 years, Voyager 1 will come within 100 million miles of the star AC+79 3888.
The Sun has an influence on deep space that extends well beyond the planets due to the solar wind – a stream of radiation and charged particles emitted by the Sun, spreading outward in all directions like ripples on water. This forms the heliosphere. However, there’s a boundary to how far the solar wind can travel before it encounters and is neutralized by the stellar winds of surrounding space. This boundary, known as the heliopause, is the area the Voyager spacecraft are attempting to locate. While no one knows the exact location of the heliopause, scientists anticipate Voyager will reach it between 2012 and 2015 and will continue to measure the termination zone, provided its instruments remain operational (which they are expected to do until around 2025). Voyager has already passed two significant regions.
In 2004, Voyager crossed the termination shock, marking the point within the heliosphere where the solar wind slows down to subsonic speed due to interactions with the local interstellar medium. After passing this shock, Voyager entered the heliosheath – a region of chaotic interaction between the Sun’s influence and the vastness of outer space, where both forces battle for supremacy. Voyager has made remarkable and surprising discoveries within this unknown area. In the coming months or perhaps years, one of the Voyager spacecraft, likely Voyager 1, will break free from the heliosheath, cross the heliopause, and become the first object launched from Earth to truly enter interstellar space.
1. James Webb Space Telescope
James Webb Space Telescope, often referred to as JWST, is poised to take over from the highly successful Hubble Space Telescope, which continues to operate. Named after James Webb, the second NASA administrator and a key figure in the Apollo space program, the JWST is designed to capture both visual and infrared images. Continuing Hubble's mission, it will look for and observe the most distant objects in the universe—those too far away for Earth-based telescopes to detect. What sets JWST apart is its unique positioning at Lagrange Point 2 (LG2), making it the first large manmade object to be stationed permanently at a Lagrange point.
A Lagrange point refers to one of five unique locations in space where a small object can be placed in a stable position without drifting. These points occur where the gravitational forces of two large bodies, like the Sun and Earth or Earth and the Moon, balance out and provide the necessary centripetal force to keep an object in place. By positioning JWST at Lagrange Point 2, it will remain free from interference from Earth and orbital debris, allowing it to focus on its mission in the deep reaches of space.
However, this location also presents challenges: it’s much farther from Earth, which means astronauts will have to travel much further to service or repair the telescope if necessary. In 2011, there were significant concerns about funding cuts for the JWST project, but Congress reversed this decision, and the project moved forward. Parts of the telescope are currently being constructed, and one day—hopefully soon—JWST will be in space, capturing even more stunning and detailed images of deep space than Hubble ever did.
+ Betelgeuse Super Nova
Although we won’t be around to witness it, Betelgeuse is a fascinating star that captures the attention of even the casual stargazer. It stands out due to its size, color, and position in the sky. As the eighth brightest star, it is relatively easy to spot, especially since it's the second brightest star in the constellation Orion. If you can locate Orion’s belt, you’ll see Betelgeuse as the reddish star. This red supergiant is one of the largest and most luminous stars known. If it were placed in our solar system, its outer edge would reach all the way to the orbit of Jupiter. It lies about 640 light years away from the Sun.
Astronomers consider Betelgeuse to be a young star, but its immense size makes it a ‘runaway star’ racing toward an explosive end. Within the next million years, it is expected to go supernova. When this happens, the explosion will be the brightest ever recorded in human history. From Earth, the Betelgeuse supernova would outshine the moon and be visible during the day for several months. It’s a cosmic event I’d love to witness, even though it’s far beyond our lifetime!
