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Onhell

Onhell

Infinite Dreamer
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071103/ap_on_sc/brighter_comet

KNOXVILLE, Tenn. - A comet that has unexpectedly brightened in the past couple of weeks and now is visible to the naked eye is attracting professional and amateur interest.
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Paul Lewis, director of astronomy outreach at the University of Tennessee, is drawing students to the roof of Nielsen Physics Building for special viewings of Comet 17P/Holmes.

The comet is exploding and its coma, a cloud of gas and dust illuminated by the sun, has grown to be bigger than the planet Jupiter. The comet lacks the tail usually associated with such celestial bodies but can be seen in the northern sky, in the constellation Perseus, as a fuzzy spot of light about as bright as the stars in the Big Dipper.

"This is truly a celestial surprise," Lewis said. "Absolutely amazing."

Until Oct. 23, the comet had been visible to modern astronomers only with a telescope, but that night it suddenly erupted and expanded.

A similar burst in 1892 led to the comet's discovery by Edwin Holmes.

"This is a once-in-a-lifetime event to witness, along the lines of when Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 smashed into Jupiter back in 1994," Lewis said.

Scientists speculate the comet has exploded because there are sinkholes in its nucleus, giving it a honeycomb-like structure. The collapse exposed comet ice to the sun, which transformed the ice into gas.

"What comets do when they are near the sun is very unpredictable," Lewis said. "We expect to see a coma cloud and a tail, but this is more like an explosion, and we are seeing the bubble of gas and dust as it expands away from the center of the blast."

Experts aren't sure how long the comet's show will last, but estimate it could be weeks — if not months. Using a telescope or binoculars help bring the comet's details into view, they said.
 
Let's hope it doesn't happen to Halley's comet, it's not til 2061, and I hope it remains so people have something to look forward to every 76 years. :D
Wonder if collectors are waiting for debris to land on the ground. Unlikely though due to atmospheric disintegration.
 
I was hoping to see it with "the naked eye" but it is rather small actually and with my limit knowledge of the sky I'd probably confuse it with other stars :( I did see venus though... then again I see that one all the time lol. I remember seeing venus, mars and jupiter all lined up with the moon like 4 months ago, cool sight, only lasted a night though
 
Dat iss Französisch, Junge. Dat versteht doch keine Sau, Junge!
 
Don't take it personally, porcnoz. We're just having our traditional piss ;)
 
Since we already have a "space" thread I thought I'd post this here:

Scientists discover planet orbiting star

By ALICIA CHANG, AP Science Writer Tue Nov 6, 5:32 PM ET

LOS ANGELES - A new planet was discovered orbiting a sun-like star 41 light years away, making it the first known planetary quintet outside our solar system, astronomers said Tuesday.
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The newfound planet joins four others circling the nearby star 55 Cancri in the constellation Cancer. Although it resides in the star's so-called habitable zone, a place where liquid water and mild temperatures should exist, it is more like Saturn than Earth and therefore not likely to support life.

Still, scientists have not ruled out the possibility of finding an Earth-like planet within the system as technology improves.

"It's a system that appears to be packed with planets," said co-discoverer Debra Fischer, an astronomer at San Francisco State University.

Ranked fourth from 55 Cancri, the latest planet is about 45 times the mass of Earth and has an orbit of 260 days. It was detected after nearly two decades of observations by ground-based telescopes using the Doppler technique that measures a planet's stellar wobble.

The other planets in the 55 Cancri system were discovered between 1996 and 2004. The innermost planet is believed to resemble Neptune, while the most distant is thought to be Jupiter-like.

Scientists have detected about 250 exoplanets, or planets orbiting a star other than the sun. The 55 Cancri star holds the record for number of confirmed planets. Only one other star is known to have four planets, while several others have three or less.

"We can now say there are stars like the sun that have many worlds around them," said planetary scientist Jonathan Lunine of the University of Arizona, Tucson, who had no role in the discovery.

The research will appear in a future issue of the Astrophysical Journal. It was funded by NASA, the National Science Foundation and the University of California.

The latest discovery shows that our solar system is not unique, scientists said.

"When you look up into the night sky and see the twinkling lights of stars, you can imagine with certainty that they have their own complement of planets," said astronomer Geoff Marcy of the University of California, Berkeley, who was part of the research.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20071106/ap_on_sc/planetary_system
 
I bet your sentience is compromised with one of these:
A. Horrible music
B. Hamsters
C. Bacteria
D. We're doomed

And we're terraforming your planet after we find out about faster than light travel.
 
D. Although we are allergic to pollen. I hope you don't have any around.
 
I for one welcome our new Overlords from Cancri 55, so long as there are no forthcoming anal probings.  Taking cows for your "experiments", however, is acceptable.  Oh, and do not worry about pollinating plants.  I'll make sure they never grow again.  I've just the thing.

On a serious note, it is good news that this new system has been discovered.  After we finish making the world uninhabitable with our toxins, pollutants and climate change we can move to another planet to suit our needs for a few thousand years.
 
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