Thehkr - 無標題

人生を、いかに楽しむか ということも、 また『試練』のひとつなのだ。

Dreaming of going to space? – Astronaut Victor Glover has you covered. 

In his first video from space, take a look at our home through the window of SpaceX’s Crew Dragon “Resilience” spacecraft. Victor arrived to the International Space Station alongside his fellow Crew-1 astronauts on Nov. 16, 2020. 

This is his first trip to space and his first mission on the orbital lab! 

Follow his Instagram account HERE to stay up-to-date on station life and for more behind-the-scenes content like this. 

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

Black Holes Dine on Stellar Treats!

See that tiny blob of light, circled in red? Doesn’t look like much, does it? But that blob represents a feast big enough to feed a black hole around 30 million times the mass of our Sun! Scientists call these kinds of stellar meals tidal disruption events, and they’re some of the most dramatic happenings in the cosmos.

Sometimes, an unlucky star strays too close to a black hole. The black hole’s gravity pulls on the star, causing it to stretch in one direction and squeeze in another. Then the star pulls apart into a stream of gas. This is a tidal disruption event. (If you’re worried about this happening to our Sun – don’t. The nearest black hole we know about is over 1,000 light-years away. And black holes aren’t wild space vacuums. They don’t go zipping around sucking up random stars and planets. So we’re pretty safe from tidal disruption events!)

The trailing part of the stream gets flung out of the system. The rest of the gas loops back around the black hole, forming a disk. The material circling in the disk slowly drifts inward toward the black hole’s event horizon, the point at which nothing – not even light – can escape. The black hole consumes the gas and dust in its disk over many years.

Sometimes the black hole only munches on a passing star – we call this a partial tidal disruption event. The star loses some of its gas, but its own gravity pulls it back into shape before it passes the black hole again. Eventually, the black hole will have nibbled away enough material that the star can’t reform and gets destroyed.

We study tidal disruptions, both the full feasts and the partial snacks, using many kinds of telescopes. Usually, these events are spotted by ground-based telescopes like the Zwicky Transient Facility and the All-Sky Automated Survey for Supernovae network.

They alert other ground- and space-based telescopes – like our Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory (illustrated above) and the European Space Agency’s XMM-Newton – to follow up and collect more data using different wavelengths, from visible light to X-rays. Even our planet-hunting Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite has observed a few of these destructive wonders!

We’re also studying disruptions using multimessenger astronomy, where scientists use the information carried by light, particles, and space-time ripples to learn more about cosmic objects and occurrences.

But tidal disruptions are super rare. They only happen once every 10,000 to 100,000 years in a galaxy the size of our own Milky Way. Astronomers have only observed a few dozen events so far. By comparison, supernovae – the explosive deaths of stars – happen every 100 years or so in a galaxy like ours.

That’s why scientists make their own tidal disruptions using supercomputers, like the ones shown in the video here. Supercomputers allow researchers to build realistic models of stars. They can also include all of the physical effects they’d experience whipping ‘round a black hole, even those from Einstein’s theory of general relativity. They can alter features like how close the stars get and how massive the black holes are to see how it affects what happens to the stars. These simulations will help astronomers build better pictures of the events they observe in the night sky.

Keep up with what’s happening in the universe and how we study it by following NASA Universe on Twitter and Facebook.

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The Path to High Adventure Begins With Scouting!

Former NASA astronaut and Girl Scout alumna Jan Davis eating Girl Scout Cookies inside the shuttle Endeavour on Sept. 12, 1992. Image credit: NASA

Leadership, service, being prepared and doing your best – these qualities are exemplified by our astronauts, but are also shared by the Girl Scouts! Our astronaut corps has many scout alumnae, and over the years they’ve been breaking barriers and making names for themselves at NASA.

Today marks the 108th birthday of Girl Scouts in the United States, which has been inspiring generations of girls through leadership and STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) activities to empower the explorers of today and tomorrow. To celebrate, we’re highlighting some of our Girl Scout alumnae over the years!

NASA astronaut and Girl Scout alumna Sunita Williams, who served as an International Space Station commander and spent 322 days in space during two spaceflight expeditions.

Former Scouts have served as crew members on numerous spaceflight missions.

From left: Susan Helms, the first female International Space Station crew member; Eileen Collins, the first woman to pilot and command a space shuttle; and Dr. Kathy Sullivan, the first American woman to perform a spacewalk.

Former Girl Scouts flew on more than one-third of the space shuttle missions and were pioneering forces as women began making their mark on human spaceflight. The first female crew member to serve on the International Space Station, the first to pilot and command a space shuttle and the first American woman to spacewalk were all Scout alumnae. 

They continue to break records, such as the first three all-woman spacewalks… 

Girl Scout alumnae and NASA astronauts Christina Koch and Jessica Meir made history when they conducted the first ever all-woman spacewalk on Oct.18, 2019. They went on to complete two more spacewalks, successfully completing their task of upgrading the space station’s battery charge/discharge unit. Christina and Jessica’s historic spacewalk was a testament to the growing number of women (and Girl Scouts) joining our astronaut corps; it is a milestone worth celebrating as we look forward to putting the first woman on the Moon with our Artemis Program! 

….and the longest spaceflight ever by a woman!

NASA astronaut Christina Koch smiles for a selfie while completing tasks during a spacewalk outside the International Space Station.

Koch went on to seal her name in the record books by surpassing Peggy Whitson’s record for the longest single spaceflight in history by a woman!

Understanding how the human body adjusts to things like weightlessness, radiation and bone-density loss is crucial as we look forward to embarking on long-duration spaceflights to the Moon and Mars. Thanks to former astronaut Scott Kelly’s Year in Space mission, we’ve been able to observe these changes on a biological male. Now, thanks to Christina’s mission, we are able to observe these changes on a biological female. 

Girl Scout alumnae will also help lead human exploration farther than ever before as members of our Artemis generation!

 From left: NASA astronauts Kayla Barron, Jessica Watkins and Loral O’Hara

On January 10, 2020 we welcomed 11 new astronauts to our ranks – including three Girl Scout alumnae! As part of the first-ever class of astronauts under our Artemis lunar exploration program, Kayla Barron, Jessica Watkins and Loral O’Hara are now qualified for assignments including long-duration missions to the International Space Station, the Moon and Mars.

They took a moment after graduation to share inspiration and insight for current and future Scouts!

Q: A question from the Girl Scouts: What inspires you?

A: “Being a part of an awesome team has always been what inspires me. Whether it’s your Girl Scout troop, a sports team, your class – I think for me always the people around me who push me to succeed and support me when I make mistakes and help me become my best self is what inspires me to show up and do my best.” - NASA astronaut Kayla Barron 

Q: How has being a Girl Scout helped you in becoming an astronaut?

A: “Being in the Girl Scouts when I was younger was really cool because, well, first it was just a group of my friends who got to do a lot of different things together. But it really gave us the opportunity to be exposed to a lot of different areas. Like we’d get to go camping. We’d get to ride horses and learn all of these different skills, and so that variety of skill set I think is very applicable to being an astronaut.” - NASA astronaut Loral O’Hara 

Q: What would your advice be for the next generation of Girl Scout astronauts?

A: “My advice would be to find something that you’re passionate about. Ideally something in the STEM fields: Science, Technology, Engineering or Mathematics, and to pursue that thing that you’re interested in. Pursue that passion, whatever it is. And don’t give up on your dreams, and continue to follow them until you arrive where you want to be.” - NASA astronaut Jessica Watkins 

To all the Girl Scouts out there, keep reaching for the stars because the sky is no longer the limit! 

Astronaut applications are OPEN until March 31 for the next class of Artemis generation astronauts who will embark on missions to the International Space Station, the Moon and Mars. If you’re interested in applying to #BeAnAstronaut or just want to learn more, click HERE. 

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Angie Varona

Every next level of your life will demand a different you.

Leonardo DiCaprio (via quotemadness)

Guy Bluford Changed the Course of Space History

On Aug. 30, 1983, Guion Bluford, better known as Guy, became the first African American to fly to space. An accomplished jet pilot and aerospace engineer, Bluford became part of NASA’s 1978 astronaut class that included the first African American, the first Asian American, and the first women astronauts.

He and the other crew members of mission STS-8 were aboard the orbiter Challenger as it lifted off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida; it was the first nighttime launch and landing of the Space Shuttle program. While aboard, he and the other crew members deployed the Indian National Satellite (INSAT-1B), operated a Canadian-built robot arm, conducted experiments with live cell samples, and participated in studies measuring the effects of spaceflight on humans.

Guy Bluford chased his childhood dream of becoming an aerospace engineer, and in doing so, changed history and encouraged other Black astronauts to follow in his footsteps.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space—and for milestones like this!