TWO FORMER AIRMEN HAVE BEEN INDUCTED INTO ASTRONAUT HALL OF FAME

FROM:  U.S. AIR FORCE
Space shuttle astronauts Franklin Chang Díaz, retired Gen. Kevin Chillton and retired Col.Charlie Precourt celebrate their induction into the Astronaut Hall of Fame at the Kennedy Space Center, Fla., May 5, 2012. More than 30 Hall of Fame astronauts and hundreds of guests gathered to witness the annual induction ceremony. Chilton is a 1976 graduate of the Air Force Academy. His wife, Brig. Gen. Cathy Chilton, is the mobilization assistant to the Academy superintendent. (NASA photo) 

Two former Airmen inducted into Astronaut Hall of Fame
5/22/2012 - FORT GEORGE G. MEADE, Md. (AFNS) -- Two retired Airmen were recently inducted into the NASA's Astronaut Hall of Fame during a ceremony May 5 at the Kennedy Space Center, Fla.

Retired Gen. Kevin Chilton and retired Col. Charles Precourt, along with Franklin Chang Diaz, were the 11th group of astronauts inducted, which brings the total number of astronauts in the hall of fame to 81.

"This is a tremendous honor," Precourt said. "It's obviously very humbling and I'm just really thrilled to be here today.

Precourt graduated from undergraduate pilot training at Reese Air Force Base, Texas, in 1978. Initially he flew as an instructor pilot in the T-37 Tweet, and later as a maintenance test pilot in the T-37 and T-38 Talon. In 1985, he attended the United States Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards AFB, Calif. Upon graduation, Precourt was assigned as a test pilot at Edwards AFB, where he flew the F-15E Strike Eagle, F-4 Phantom, A-7 Corsair II, and A-37 Dragonfly until 1989, when he began studies at the United States Naval War College in Newport, R.I. Upon graduation from the War College, Precourt joined the astronaut program.

Precourt served in the space program for 15 years and was a mission specialist on Space Transportation System-55, pilot on STS-71, and commander on STS-84 and STS-91. During those missions he logged a total of 932 hours in space. During the STS-91 mission, which was the ninth and final Shuttle-Mir docking mission, the crew also conducted the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer experiment, which involved first of its kind research of antimatter in space. He retired from the Air Force on March 31, 2000.

"It's incredibly humbling and unexpected," Chilton said. "I kind of had a sense that I didn't belong on the same list as these great folks. As I grew up, they were the ones I looked up to. They were my heroes. I kind of felt out of place, but at the same time incredibly grateful."

Chilton is the former commander of U.S. Strategic Command and a 1976 graduate of the Air Force Academy. He piloted the Space Shuttle Endeavour on its maiden voyage during the STS-49 mission, his first as an astronaut. Highlights of that mission included NASA's first three-person extravehicular activity during an operation to capture and repair a non-functional Intelsat VI satellite. He also piloted the 11-day STS-59 mission aboard Endeavour, which used radar imaging to map parts of the U.S., Europe and Asia for climate research.

The day before the ceremony, the astronauts and their families toured the space center, where Chilton and his wife, Brig. Gen. Cathy Chilton, the Air Force Academy's mobilization assistant, had the opportunity to sit in the cockpit of the Endeavour.

"It was really special being in (the Endeavour) with my wife because she had never been in there before," Chilton said. "She and all the other spouses are the real heroes of the program. They stand three miles away on top of a building at some ungodly hour of the morning with their babies in their arms watching their husband or wife sit on top of four million pounds of high explosives and blast off the planet. They're the really brave ones."

Chilton's career is different than many Airmen turned astronauts because after his career at NASA ended, he came back to the active duty Air Force in 1998.

"I don't think you could have laid it out on a piece of paper beforehand," he said. "To come back to the Air Force ... was something I always wanted to do but didn't think I could because the system wasn't set up to accommodate that, but it miraculously all changed at the right time."

His first duty upon returning to the Air Force was Air Force Space Command's deputy director of operations at Peterson Air Force Base, Colo. It culminated as the commander of U.S. Strategic Command at Offutt AFB, Neb.

"I couldn't have asked for better commands when I came back, and they were all exciting and each one just added on top of the next," Chilton said.  

Chilton was a rated pilot with more than 5,000 flying hours in several airframes, including the F-4 Phantom, F-15 Eagle, B-52 Stratofortress and U-2 Dragon Lady. He retired Feb. 1, 2011.

(Information compiled from NASA and Air Force releases and staff reports.)

A DYING STAR

FROM:  NASA
The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has been on the forefront of research into the lives of stars like our sun. At the ends of their lives, these stars run out of nuclear fuel in a phase that is called the preplanetary or protoplanetary nebula stage. This Hubble image of the Egg Nebula shows one of the best views to date of this brief, but dramatic, phase in a star’s life. During the preplanetary nebula phase, the hot remains of an aging star in the center of the nebula heat it up, excite the gas and make it glow over several thousand years. The short lifespan of preplanetary nebulae means there are relatively few of them in existence at any one time. Moreover, they are very dim, requiring powerful telescopes to be seen. This combination of rarity and faintness means they were only discovered comparatively recently. The Egg Nebula, the first to be discovered, was first spotted less than 40 years ago, and many aspects of this class of object remain shrouded in mystery. At the center of this image, and hidden in a thick cloud of dust, is the nebula’s central star. While scientists can’t see the star directly, four searchlight beams of light coming from it shine out through the nebula. Researchers hypothesize that ring-shaped holes in the thick cocoon of dust, carved by jets coming from the star, let the beams of light emerge through the otherwise opaque cloud. The precise mechanism by which stellar jets produce these holes is not known, but one explanation is that a binary star system, rather than a single star, exists at the center of the nebula. The onion-like layered structure of the more diffuse cloud surrounding the central cocoon is caused by periodic bursts of material being ejected from the dying star. The bursts typically occur every few hundred years. This image is produced from exposures in visible and infrared light from Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3. Image Credit: ESA/Hubble, NASA

NASA TESTS NEW SPACE TELESCOPE

FROM:  NASA
Several critical items related to NASA's next-generation James Webb Space Telescope currently are being tested in the thermal vacuum test chamber at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. This image shows the Optical Telescope Element Simulator, or OSIM, wrapped in a silver blanket on a platform, being lowered into the Space Environment Simulator vacuum chamber via crane to be tested to withstand the cold temperatures of space. Image Credit: NASA/Chris Gunn

SPACE SHUTTLE ENTERPRISE: ITS 36-YEAR MISSION...

FROM:  NASA
The Shuttle Enterprise
In 1976, NASA's space shuttle Enterprise rolled out of the Palmdale manufacturing facilities and was greeted by NASA officials and cast members from the 'Star Trek' television series.
From left to right they are: NASA Administrator Dr. James D. Fletcher; DeForest Kelley, who portrayed Dr. "Bones" McCoy on the series; George Takei (Mr. Sulu); James Doohan (Chief Engineer Montgomery "Scotty" Scott); Nichelle Nichols (Lt. Uhura); Leonard Nimoy (Mr. Spock); series creator Gene Rodenberry; an unnamed NASA official; and, Walter Koenig (Ensign Pavel Chekov).
Image Credit: NASA

WASHINGTON -- Update: NASA's 747 Shuttle Carrier Aircraft (SCA) with space shuttle Enterprise mounted atop have landed in New York City.  

NEW U.S. SPACECRAFT WILL BEGIN GROUND TESTS

FROM:  NASA
The Orion Ground Test Vehicle arrived at NASA's Kennedy Space Center Operations & Checkout (O&C) Facility on April 21. The vehicle traveled more than 1,800 miles from Lockheed Martin's Waterton Facility near Denver, Colo., where it successfully completed a series of rigorous acoustic, modal and vibration tests that simulated launch and spaceflight environments. The ground test vehicle will now be used for pathfinding operations at the O&C in preparation for the Orion spaceflight test vehicle's arrival this summer. The spaceflight vehicle is currently being fabricated at NASA's Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans, La., and is slated for NASA's Exploration Flight Test, or EFT-1, in 2014. Image Credit: NASA

22ND ANNIVERSARY OF HUBBLE SPACE TELESCOPE

FROM:  NASA
To celebrate its 22nd anniversary in orbit, the Hubble Space Telescope has released a dramatic new image of the star-forming region 30 Doradus, also known as the Tarantula Nebula because its glowing filaments resemble spider legs. A new image from all three of NASA's Great Observatories - Chandra, Hubble, and Spitzer - has also been created to mark the event.

30 Doradus is located in the neighboring galaxy called the Large Magellanic Cloud, and is one of the largest star-forming regions located close to the Milky Way . At the center of 30 Doradus, thousands of massive stars are blowing off material and producing intense radiation along with powerful winds. The Chandra X-ray Observatory detects gas that has been heated to millions of degrees by these stellar winds and also by supernova explosions. These X-rays, colored blue in this composite image, come from shock fronts -- similar to sonic booms -- formed by this high-energy stellar activity.

The Hubble data in the composite image, colored green, reveals the light from these massive stars along with different stages of star birth including embryonic stars a few thousand years old still wrapped in cocoons of dark gas. Infrared emission from Spitzer, seen in red, shows cooler gas and dust that have giant bubbles carved into them. These bubbles are sculpted by the same searing radiation and strong winds that comes from the massive stars at the center of 30 Doradus.

Credits: X-ray: NASA/CXC/PSU/L.Townsley et al.; Optical: NASA/STScI; Infrared: NASA/JPL/PSU/L.Townsley et al.

ORION SPACECRAFT TESTED BY PUSHING OUT THE DOOR

FROM:  NASA
A test model of the Orion spacecraft with its parachutes was tested the skies high above the U.S. Army’s Proving Grounds in Yuma, Ariz. on Feb. 29, 2012. This particular drop test examined the wake -- or the disturbance of the air flow behind Orion -- that is caused by the spacecraft. The U.S. Space Launch System, or SLS, will provide an entirely new capability for human exploration beyond Earth orbit and the Orion capsule is a major part of this program. The Orion spacecraft will replace the space shuttle as NASA's vehicle for human space exploration and is designed to accommodate four to six astronauts traveling into space. It also will supplement commercial and international partner transportation services to the International Space Station. Designed to be flexible for crew or cargo missions, SLS will continue America's journey of discovery from the unique vantage point of space. Image Credit: NASA

WHEN GALAXIES COLLIDE, WHAT MATTERS

FROM:  NASA
Using a combination of powerful observatories in space and on the ground, astronomers have observed a violent collision between two galaxy clusters in which so-called normal matter has been wrenched apart from dark matter through a violent collision between two galaxy clusters.

Finding another system that is further along in its evolution than the Bullet Cluster gives scientists valuable insight into a different phase of how galaxy clusters -- the largest known objects held together by gravity -- grow and change after major collisions.

Researchers used observations from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and Hubble Space Telescope as well as the Keck, Subaru and Kitt Peak Mayall telescopes to show that hot, X-ray bright gas in the Musket Ball Cluster has been clearly separated from dark matter and galaxies.

In this composite image, the hot gas observed with Chandra is colored red, and the galaxies in the optical image from Hubble appear as mostly white and yellow. The location of the majority of the matter in the cluster (dominated by dark matter) is colored blue. When the red and the blue regions overlap, the result is purple as seen in the image. The matter distribution is determined by using data from Subaru, Hubble and the Mayall telescope that reveal the effects of gravitational lensing, an effect predicted by Einstein where large masses can distort the light from distant objects.

In addition to the Bullet Cluster, five other similar examples of merging clusters with separation between normal and dark matter and varying levels of complexity, have previously been found. In these six systems, the collision is estimated to have occurred between 170 million and 250 million years earlier.

In the Musket Ball Cluster, the system is observed about 700 million years after the collision. Taking into account the uncertainties in the age estimate, the merger that has formed the Musket Ball Cluster is two to five times further along than in previously observed systems. Also, the relative speed of the two clusters that collided to form the Musket Ball cluster was lower than most of the other Bullet Cluster-like objects.

The special environment of galaxy clusters, including the effects of frequent collisions with other clusters or groups of galaxies and the presence of large amounts of hot, intergalactic gas, is likely to play an important role in the evolution of their member galaxies. However, it is still unclear whether cluster mergers trigger star formation, suppress it, or have little immediate effect. The Musket Ball Cluster holds promise for deciding between these alternatives.

The Musket Ball Cluster also allows an independent study of whether dark matter can interact with itself. This information is important for narrowing down the type of particle that may be responsible for dark matter. No evidence is reported for self-interaction in the Musket Ball Cluster, consistent with the results for the Bullet Cluster and the other similar clusters.

The Musket Ball Cluster is located about 5.2 billion light years away from Earth. A paper describing these results was led by Will Dawson from University of California, Davis and was published in the March 10, 2012 issue of The Astrophysical Journal Letters. The other co-authors were David Wittman, M. James Jee and Perry Gee from UC Davis, Jack Hughes from Rutgers University in NJ, J. Anthony Tyson, Samuel Schmidt, Paul Thorman and Marusa Bradac from UC Davis, Satoshi Miyazaki from the Graduate University for Advanced Studies (GUAS) in Tokyo, Japan, Brian Lemaux from UC Davis, Yousuke Utsumi from GUAS and Vera Margoniner from California State University, Sacramento.

NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the Chandra program for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory controls Chandra's science and flight operations from Cambridge, Mass.

THE FINAL FLIGHT OF THE SPACE SHUTTLES WILL BE ON THIS AIRCRAFT

FROM:  NASA
The Shuttle Carrier Aircraft glides down the runway of the Shuttle Landing Facility at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The aircraft, known as an SCA, arrived at 5:35 p.m. EDT to prepare for shuttle Discovery’s ferry flight to the Washington Dulles International Airport in Sterling, Va., on April 17. This SCA, designated NASA 905, is a modified Boeing 747 jet airliner, originally manufactured for commercial use. One of two SCAs employed over the course of the Space Shuttle Program, NASA 905 is assigned to the remaining ferry missions, delivering the shuttles to their permanent public display sites. NASA 911 was decommissioned at the NASA Dryden Flight Research Center in California in February. Discovery will be placed on permanent public display in the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center in Chantilly, Va. Image Credit: NASA/Frankie Martin

NASA SUPPORTED ROBOTICS COMPETITION

FROM:  NASA
2012 FIRST Robotics Competition included more than 50 teams competing for the Regional championship title.
Image credit: NASA Ames Research Center

NASA-Supported FIRST Robotics Teams Advance to International Championship
High school teams from around the San Francisco Bay area demonstrated their engineering, electronics and programming skills as they designed and built robots for this year’s challenge called Rebound Rumble. The championship games for the Silicon Valley FIRST Robotics Regional Competition were held March 29 – 30, 2012 at San Jose State University (SJSU), Calif.

2012 marked the 21st season of the For Inspiration and Recognition of and Science and Technology (FIRST) Robotics Competition, and included more than 50 teams competing for the Regional championship title that would give them a shot at the international championships in April.

“NASA Ames is extremely pleased with the performance of our star teams. Not only did they take first and second in the tournament, but also executed many impressive technologies,” said Mark Leon, manager of the NASA Robotics Alliance Project at NASA’s Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.

More than 2,500 fans attended the competition at the SJSU Event Center, where teams from San Jose, Palo Alto, Cupertino, Mountain View and Saratoga represented the South Bay area. Total team membership included 1,500 students who were highly motivated pursuing science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) academics.

NASA Ames mentored teams Space Cookies #1868 and Cheesy Poofs #254 as part of NASA’s STEM effort, and both teams received NASA grants to support their robotics efforts. This year, both teams won all quarter and semi-finals. The all girl Space Cookies went undefeated until the finals, where they lost to the more experienced Cheesy Poofs. In the past five weeks, NASA-sponsored teams won 232 awards nationwide at FIRST Robotics Regional/District Competitions.

“I couldn’t attend the Silicon Valley Regional, but I watched the scores and rankings on my home computer. I was cheering for the Space Cookies team. I was ecstatic to see they had 10 wins and no losses in the qualifier,” said John Bowland, a NASA Ames employee and faithful fan of the Space Cookies since its start in 2006.

NASA is the largest sponsor of the national FIRST program, supporting five regional competitions and more than 280 teams.

CURRENTS ALONG THE KANCHATKA PENINSULA AS SEEN FROM THE INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION

FROM:  NASA 

The vantage point from orbit on the International Space Station (ISS) frequently affords astronauts with the opportunity to observe processes that are impossible to see on the ground. The winter season blankets the Kamchatka Peninsula of Russia in snow, but significant amounts of sea ice can also form and collect along the Pacific coastline. As ice floes grind against each other, they produce smaller floes that can be moved by wind and currents.

The irregular southeastern coastline of Kamchatka provokes large, circular eddy currents to spin off from the main southwestward-flowing Kamchatka current. Three such eddies are highlighted by surface ice floe patterns at image center. The patterns are very difficult (and dangerous) to navigate in an ocean vessel. While the floes may look thin and delicate from the ISS vantage point, even the smaller ice chunks are several meters across. White clouds (image top right) are distinguished from the sea ice and snow cover by their high brightness and discontinuous nature.

The Kamchatka Peninsula also hosts many currently and historically active stratovolcanoes. Kliuchevskoi Volcano, the highest in Kamchatka (summit elevation 4,835 meters) and one of the most active, had its most recent confirmed eruption in June 2011. Meanwhile, Karymsky Volcano (to the south) likely produced ash plumes just days before this image was taken; the snow cover on the south and east sides of the summit is darkened by a cover of fresh ash or melted away altogether (image bottom center). By contrast, Kronotsky Volcano—a “textbook” symmetrical cone-shaped stratovolcano—last erupted in 1923.

Astronaut photograph ISS030-E-162344 was acquired on March 15, 2012, with a Nikon D2Xs digital camera using a 28 mm lens, and is provided by the ISS Crew Earth Observations experiment and Image Science & Analysis Laboratory, Johnson Space Center. The image was taken by the Expedition 30 crew. The image has been cropped and enhanced to improve contrast, and lens artifacts have been removed. The International Space Station Program supports the laboratory as part of the ISS National Lab to help astronauts take pictures of Earth that will be of the greatest value to scientists and the public, and to make those images freely available on the Internet. Additional images taken by astronauts and cosmonauts can be viewed at the NASA/JSC Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth. Caption by William L. Stefanov, Jacobs/ESCG at NASA-JSC.

Instrument: 

ISS - Digital Camera

NASA LOGO FOUND DURING SPACEWALK

FROM NASA
STS-116 astronaut Bob Curbeam met the NASA logo up close on his Dec. 14, 2006, spacewalk, during which he performed tasks to complete the International Space Station. During space shuttle Discovery’s mission to the station, the STS-116 crew added the P5 spacer truss segment and rewired the station’s power system, preparing it to support the station’s final configuration and the arrival of additional science modules. A fourth and final spacewalk was added to allow the crew to retract solar arrays that had folded improperly. Curbeam was selected as an astronaut in 1994 and subsequently flew on three space shuttle missions. During the STS-116 mission, he became the first shuttle astronaut to conduct four spacewalks in a single mission. Curbeam also flew on STS-85 in August 1997 and STS-98 in February 2001. He accumulated 45 hours and 34 minutes of spacewalking time and more than 900 hours in space. Image Credit: NASA

CYCLONE DAPHNE HITS FIJI ISLANDS

FROM:  NASA WEBSITE
NASA Satellite Sees Tropical Storm Daphne Born Near Fiji Islands
Tropical Storm Daphne was born on April Fool's Day in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, as low pressure System 95P consolidated and organized. NASA's Terra satellite passed over Daphne after the storm was named. Daphne had already caused severe flooding in areas of Fiji.

The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument on NASA's Terra satellite captured a visible image of Tropical Cyclone Daphne when it was over the North Fiji Basin on April 1, 2012 at 2300 UTC (7 p.m. EDT).

Before Daphne had even become a tropical storm, warnings were in force throughout Fiji. The Fiji Meteorological Service noted today, April 2, that a gale warning remains in force for Viti Levu, Yasawa And Mamanuca Group, Southern Lau Group, Kadavu and Nearby Smaller Islands. Strong wind warnings are up for the other Fiji islands. In addition, a severe flood warning is in effect for all major rivers, streams and low-lying areas of Viti Levu. For additional warning information, visit: http://www.met.gov.fj/aifs_prods/20020.txt.

Sky news reported four people were killed from flash flooding in Fiji on April 1, and a state of emergency was declared.n The Australian Broadcasting Corporation reported that there were about 8,000 people in evacuation shelters and that air travel has resumed today after being grounded yesterday.

On April 2 at 0300 UTC (April 1, 11 p.m. EDT), Tropical Storm Daphne had maximum sustained winds near 35 knots (40 mph/64 kph). Those tropical-storm-force winds extend as far as 200 nautical miles (230 miles/370 km) from the center, making Daphne a good-sized storm, more than 400 nautical miles (460 miles/741 km) in diameter. Daphne's center was located about 340 nautical miles (391 miles/630 km) west-southwest of Suva, Fiji, near 19.8 South and 172.7 East. Daphne was moving to the east-southeast near 18 knots (20.7 mph/ 33.3 kph).

Forecasters expect Daphne to continue moving to the east-southeast and maintain strength over the next day or two.

Text Credit: Rob Gutro
NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

BUZZ AND LORI ADDRESS THE SMITHSONIAN

The following photo and excerpt are from the NASA website:
NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver addresses the audience with Buzz Lightyear, left, of the film "Toy Story" at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum's Moving Beyond Earth Gallery, Thursday, March 29, 2012, in Washington. Launched May 31, 2008 aboard the space shuttle Discovery (STS-124) and returned on Discovery 15 months later with STS-128, the 12-inch action figure is the longest serving toy in space and became part of the museum's popular culture collection. Image Credit: NASA/Paul E. Alers

WISPY TENDRILS OF HOT DUST

This photo and excerpt are from the NASA website:
Wispy tendrils of hot dust and gas glow brightly in this ultraviolet image of the Cygnus Loop Nebula, taken by NASA’s Galaxy Evolution Explorer. The nebula lies about 1,500 light-years away, and is a supernova remnant, left over from a massive stellar explosion that occurred 5,000-8,000 years ago. The Cygnus Loop extends more than three times the size of the full moon in the night sky, and is tucked next to one of the 'swan’s wings' in the constellation of Cygnus. The filaments of gas and dust visible here in ultraviolet light were heated by the shockwave from the supernova, which is still spreading outward from the original explosion. The original supernova would have been bright enough to be seen clearly from Earth with the naked eye. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

BIG FLARE FROM AN OLD SOL

The photo and excerpt are from the NASA website:
NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) captured this image of an M7.9 class flare on March 13, 2012 at 1:29 p.m. EDT. It is shown here in the 131 Angstrom wavelength, a wavelength particularly good for seeing solar flares and a wavelength that is typically colorized in teal. The flare peaked at 1:41 p.m. EDT. It was from the same active region, No. 1429, that produced flares and coronal mass ejections the entire week. The region has been moving across the face of the sun since March 2, and will soon rotate out of Earth view. A solar flare is an intense burst of radiation coming from the release of magnetic energy associated with sunspots. Flares are our solar system’s largest explosive events. They are seen as bright areas on the sun and last from mere minutes to several hours. Scientists classify solar flares according to their x-ray brightness. There are 3 categories: X-, M- and C-class. X-class flares are the largest of these events. M-class flares are medium-sized; they can cause brief radio blackouts that affect Earth's polar regions. Compared to X- and M-class, C-class flares are small with few noticeable consequences on Earth. Image Credit: NASA/SDO

MARS EXPLORATION ROVER OPPORTUNITY TAKES SELF-PORTRAIT

This self portrait from NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity shows dust accumulation on the rover's solar panels as the mission approached its fifth Martian winter. The dust reduces the rover's power supply, and the rover's mobility is limited until the winter is over or wind cleans the panels. This is a mosaic of images taken by Opportunity's panoramic camera (Pancam) during the 2,111th to 2,814th Martian days, or sols, of the rover's mission (Dec. 21 to Dec. 24, 2011). The downward-looking view omits the mast on which the camera is mounted. The portrait is presented in approximate true color, the camera team's best estimate of what the scene would look like if humans were there and able to see it with their own eyes. Opportunity has worked through four Martian southern hemisphere winters since it landed in in January 2004 about 14 miles (23 kilometers) northwest of its current location. Closer to the equator than its twin rover, Spirit, Opportunity has not needed to stay on a sun-facing slope during the previous winters. Now, however, Opportunity's solar panels carry a thicker coating of dust, and the team is using a strategy employed for three winters with Spirit: staying on a sun-facing slope. The sun will pass relatively low in the northern sky from the rover's perspective for several months of shortened daylight before and after the southern Mars winter solstice on March 30, 2012. Opportunity is conducting research while located on the north-facing slope of a site called "Greeley Haven." Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell/Arizona State Univ.

JUPITER JET STREAMS

This photo and excerpt are from the Department of Defense Armed with Science website:  
Following the path of one of Jupiter's jet streams, a line of V-shaped chevrons travels west to east just above Jupiter's Great Red Spot. Most of the planet is unfolded here in a single, flat map made on December 11 and 12, 2000, when NASA's Cassini spacecraft flew past Jupiter. At the left, the chevrons run into another storm called the South Equatorial Disturbance (SED). Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

New movies of Jupiter are the first to catch an invisible wave shaking up one of the giant planet’s jet streams, an interaction that also takes place in Earth’s atmosphere and influences the weather.

The movies, made from images taken by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft when it flew by Jupiter in 2000, are part of an in-depth study conducted by a team of scientists and amateur astronomers led by Amy Simon-Miller at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., and published in the April 2012 issue of Icarus.

“This is the first time anyone has actually seen direct wave motion in one of Jupiter’s jet streams,” says Simon-Miller, the paper’s lead author. “And by comparing this type of interaction in Earth’s atmosphere to what happens on a planet as radically different as Jupiter, we can learn a lot about both planets.”
Like Earth, Jupiter has several fast-moving jet streams that circle the globe. Earth’s strongest and best known jet streams are those near the north and south poles; as these winds blow west to east, they take the scenic route, wandering north and south. What sets these jet streams on their meandering paths — and sometimes makes them blast Florida and other warm places with frigid air — are their encounters with slow-moving waves in Earth’s atmosphere, called Rossby waves.

The photo at left of Jupiter is from the NASA website: 

NASA RELEASES NEW VIEW OF THE ORION NEBULA

The photo and excerpt below are from the NASA website:
This new view of the Orion Nebula highlights fledgling stars hidden in the gas and clouds. It shows infrared observations taken by NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and the European Space Agency's Herschel mission, in which NASA plays an important role. Stars form as clumps of this gas and dust collapses, creating warm globs of material fed by an encircling disk. These dusty envelopes glow brightest at longer wavelengths, appearing as red dots in this image. In several hundred thousand years, some of the forming stars will accrete enough material to trigger nuclear fusion at their cores and then blaze into stardom. Spitzer is designed to see shorter infrared wavelengths than Herschel. By combining their observations, astronomers get a more complete picture of star formation. The colors in this image relate to the different wavelengths of light, and to the temperature of material, mostly dust, in this region of Orion. Data from Spitzer show warmer objects in blue, with progressively cooler dust appearing green and red in the Herschel datasets. The more evolved, hotter embryonic stars thus appear in blue. Infrared data at wavelengths of 8.0 and 24 microns from Spitzer are rendered in blue. Herschel data with wavelengths of 70 and 160 microns are represented in green and red, respectively. This image was released on Feb. 29, 2012. Image Credit: NASA/ESA/JPL-Caltech/IRAM