Deep Blue’s Checkmate Turns 20.  

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Potassium - Element Art 

Helium - Element Art 

Aluminum - Element Art 

Calcium - Element Art 

Fluorine - Element Art 

Phosphorus - Element Art 

Carbon - Element Art 

Chlorine - Element Art 

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Bom domingo!!

Mitosis vs meiosis comparison? There’s a GIF for that. (⌐■_■)

Be sure to check out all our science GIFs here for your studyblrs, teacher websites, presentations, or general amusement! Just please keep our name on there and don’t sell them! :D

Five Fun Facts for the 2015 Geminid Meteor Shower

The Geminid meteor shower peaks this weekend starting on Sunday, Dec. 13. Here are a few fun facts:

Fact #1:

The Geminid meteor shower can be seen from both the Northern and Southern hemispheres. Because they are pieces of an asteroid, Geminid meteoroids can penetrate deeper into Earth’s atmosphere than most other meteor showers, creating beautiful long arcs viewable for 1-2 seconds.

Fact #2:

Geminids are pieces of debris from an object called 3200 Phaethon. It was long thought to be an asteroid, but is now classified as an extinct comet.

Phaethon’s eccentric orbit around the sun brings it well inside the orbit of Mercury every 1.4 years. Traveling this close to the sun blasts Phaethon with solar heat that may boil jets of dust into the Geminid stream. Of all the debris streams Earth passes through each year, the Geminid shower is the most massive. When we add up the amount of dust in this stream, it outweighs other streams by factors of 5 to 500.

Fact #3:

Because they are usually bright, many people say Geminid meteors show color. In addition to glowing white, they have been described as appearing yellow, green, or blue.

Geminid meteoroids hit earth’s atmosphere traveling 78,000 mph or 35 km/s. That may sound fast, but it is actually somewhat slow compared to other meteor showers.

Fact #4:

Geminids are named because the meteors seem to radiate from the constellation of Gemini. The shower lasts a couple of weeks, with meteors typically seen Dec. 4-17, peaking near Dec 13-14.

Fact #5:

The Geminids started out as a relatively weak meteor shower when first discovered in the early 19th century. Over time, it has grown into the strongest annual shower, with theoretical rates above 120 meteors per hour.

Join In:

This Sunday, Dec. 13, our Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, will host a live tweet chat highlighting the 2015 Geminid meteor shower. This online, social event will occur 11 p.m. EST Dec. 13, until 3 a.m. EST on Dec. 14. To join the conversation and ask questions, use #askNASA or @NASA_Marshall.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

Eventos para Março!!

What’s Up for March 2017?

What’s Up for March? The moon hides red star Aldebaran and crescents dazzle after dusk.

On March 4 the first quarter moon passes between Earth and the star Aldebaran, temporarily blocking our view of the star. This is called an occultation. 

The occultation begins and concludes at different times, depending on where you are when you view it.

The event should be easy to see from most of the U.S., Mexico, most of Central America, the Western Caribbean and Bermuda. 

Observers along a narrow path from Vancouver, British Columbia, to Hartford, Connecticut, will see the moon “graze” the star. The star will disappear and reappear repeatedly as hills and valleys on the moon alternately obscure and reveal it.

As seen from Earth, both Mercury and Venus have phases like our moon. That’s because they circle the sun inside Earth’s orbit. 

Planets that orbit between Earth and the sun are known as inner or inferior planets.

Inferior planets can never be at “opposition,” which is when the planet and the sun are on opposite sides of Earth.

But inferior planets can be at “conjunction,” which is when a planet, the sun and Earth are all in a straight line. 

Conjunction can happen once when the planet is on the opposite side of the sun from Earth and again when it’s on the same side of the sun as Earth. 

When a planet is on the opposite side of the sun from Earth, we say it is at “superior conjunction.” As the planet moves out from behind the sun and gets closer to Earth, we see less and less of the lit side. We see phases, similar to our moon’s phases. 

Mercury is at superior conjunction on March 6. 

A few weeks later, the planet emerges from behind the sun and we can once again observe it. By the end of March we’ll see a last-quarter Mercury.

 On April 20 Mercury reaches “inferior conjunction.”

Brilliant Venus is also racing toward its own inferior conjunction on March 25. Watch its crescent get thinner and thinner as the planet’s size appears larger and larger, because it is getting closer to Earth.

Finally, look for Jupiter to rise in the East. It will be visible all month long from late evening until dawn.

You can catch up on solar system missions and all of our missions at www.nasa.gov

Watch the full “What’s Up for March 2017″ video here: 

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

A salty situation.

Zooplankton may be the smallest species in the freshwater food chain, but they play a big role in preserving our lakes, streams and wetlands. That’s one of the reasons why IBM  joined forces with the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and The FUND for Lake George to create the Jefferson Project at Lake George to understand and protect freshwater ecosystems. Recently they studied the effects road salt has on a species of zooplankton. Road salt usage has increased 50-fold since 1940, and bodies of freshwater are increasing in salinity because of it. Using IBM technology, the researchers monitored zooplankton in varying levels of salinity and found that the organisms were capable of evolving a higher tolerance to the salt. This is good news for the ecosystem since the loss of plankton could have cascading effects throughout the food chain. See, small can be mighty too.

Explore the study’s results  →

A Nossa vida

A Couple of Friends It’s Not Your Grandmother’s Needlepoint

Cores do outono próximo

Tassel

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