Help Shape the Future of Space Exploration

Join our eNewsletter for updates & action alerts

Blogs

Blog Archive

Pluto on the Eve of Exploration by New Horizons meeting, July 2013

Pluto on the Eve of Exploration by New Horizons: A problem of cartography

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/07/30 05:44 CDT | 6 comments

Last Thursday at the Pluto Science Conference there was a surprising and interesting talk by Amanda Zangari, who pointed out a serious problem with Pluto cartography.

Asteroids and comets visited by spacecraft as of December 2012, in color, excepting Vesta

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2012/12/18 04:26 CST | 9 comments

My collage of all the asteroids and comets visited by spacecraft is probably the single most popular image I have ever posted on this blog. I've now updated it to be in color and to include Toutatis.

365 Days of Astronomy Podcast: Stardust at Tempel 1

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/02/28 11:45 CST

Yesterday the 365 Days of Astronomy podcast aired my contribution, Stardust at Tempel 1: The First Second Trip to a Comet.

Stardust update: last image taken today

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/02/24 05:50 CST

According to the Stardust website, the spacecraft has continued taking navigational camera images of Tempel 1 since last Monday's flyby. But "This will end with a Navcam calibration that will take place [today]. This will be the end of the official Tempel 1 encounter activities. Planning is under way for the decommissioning of the spacecraft."

Sounds of Stardust, and a cool morphed Tempel 1 video

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/02/18 01:26 CST

Here's two more items from Tuesday's flyby of comet Tempel 1 by the Stardust spacecraft to add to my previous roundup of Tempel 1 data. The first represents data from a dust counting instrument, portrayed as sound, and the second is a terrific morph animation of the flyby produced by Daniel Macháček.

Some early scientific impressions of Stardust's Tempel 1 flyby

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/02/16 03:20 CST

I've spent a day with the Stardust images from Tempel 1, and had a chat with co-investigator Jessica Sunshine, so here are a bunch of images with some preliminary scientific commentary.

Crossed-eye stereo view of Tempel 1 from Stardust

Highlights from today's Stardust Tempel 1 press briefing

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/02/15 03:10 CST

It was a very happy science team at this afternoon's press briefing following the Stardust encounter with Tempel 1.

Stardust's flight past Tempel 1 (version 3)

Quick-and-dirty animation of Stardust Tempel 1 images through closest approach

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/02/15 11:05 CST

Here's a quick-and-dirty animated GIF of the 39 images of Tempel 1 that have arrived on Earth so far from Stardust. I've put a big watermark on this animation because it's not a final product.

Stardust view of Tempel 1, just before closest approach

High-res images of Tempel 1 from Stardust now arriving

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/02/15 10:09 CST

I really didn't expect these images to look so good! I'd prepared myself for blurry images and a lot of squinting to try to match up features in pictures between Deep Impact and Stardust views of Tempel 1, but in fact the resemblance is obvious and you can clearly see that they successfully imaged the area in which Deep Impact's Impactor craft collided with the comet.

Stardust's first close-approach image of Tempel 1

First image from Stardust! ...but a delay for the close-approach ones

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/02/15 02:25 CST

Here it is, the first image from Stardust of Tempel 1 during the close-approach phase!

Tempel 1, 42 hours before Stardust's flyby

Stardust flies by Tempel 1 in 5 hours, and I'll be watching!

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/02/14 04:42 CST

Stardust is very close to the last major act of its mission: the flyby of Tempel 1, which will take place at 20:40 PST (04:40 UTC). Here's a summary of the recent and current status of the mission, and how to follow the events over the next 24 hours.

Stardust update: Almost to Tempel 1

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/02/10 11:06 CST

We're coming up on the final days of Stardust's approach to Tempel 1. The flyby takes place on February 15 at 04:56 UTC (February 14 at 20:56 PST).

Stardust update: Tempel 1 Ahoy!

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/01/26 08:37 CST

It is with great relief that I now report that JPL announced this evening the sighting of Tempel 1 by Stardust, a mere month before the planned flyby.

Stardust update: Tempel 1 not yet spotted by spacecraft, hopefully next week

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/01/22 03:13 CST

A new update has been posted to the Stardust website: The spacecraft continues to operate as expected and all subsystems are healthy on approach to comet Tempel 1.

Stardust prepares for first second look at a comet: Tempel 1 on February 14

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/01/19 02:53 CST

A press briefing was held at NASA Headquarters this morning to preview the planned February 14 encounter by Stardust with Tempel 1. There aren't often lots of questions from media after these "preview" briefings, but today there were zero. That's not good.

365 Days of Astronomy Podcast: Unmanned Space Exploration in 2011

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/01/12 10:32 CST

Today the 365 Days of Astronomy podcast aired my contribution, Unmanned Space Exploration in 2011, about what to look forward to in solar system exploration this year.

Stardust mission update: 38 days to Tempel 1

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/01/07 10:25 CST

Stardust is healthy after performing a "cold boot" to clear a memory address problem (a "memory address latch-up") that occurred late last year and caused the spacecraft to go into safe mode three times.

Deep Impact Sets a New Course as Tempel 1 Returns to Normal

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2005/07/20 05:53 CDT

With its mission at Tempel 1 over, the Deep Impact spacecraft has altered its course in order to allow a future mission at another comet.

Deep Impact Data Surprises Scientists

Posted by A.J.S. Rayl on 2005/07/12 11:00 CDT

When Deep Impact crashed into the nucleus of Tempel 1 at 23,000 miles per hour on July 4, it sent a huge, bright cloud of stuff upward and outward from the comet, providing a spectacular image that is already assured a place in the space history books, and may well be seared into the brains of all those who watched the event.