Kepler 22b New Planet Found

KEPLER- 22b

• Kepler-22b is the first confirmed extra solar planet found by NASA's Kepler Space Telescope to orbit within the habitable zone of a Sun-like star. 
• Kepler-22b, a possible super-Earth, is 600 light years away from Earth, in orbit around Kepler-22, a G-type star.
• The discovery was announced December 5, 2011.
• The average distance from Kepler-22b to its host star Kepler-22 is about 15% less than the distance from Earth to the Sun but the luminosity (light output) of Kepler-22 is about 25% less than that of the Sun.
• Even the fastest new horizons spacecraft, which is on its way to Pluto, would take over 6 million years to get there. 
• What makes it really exciting is that its about as far away from its star as the earth is from our sun. Its not so close to be super hot and its not so far to be cold and frozen.
•  It means that Kepler 22b is the first planet found where liquid water and even life might exist on its surface.

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CURIOSITY - The most powerful Rover

• NASA has launched CURIOSITY, the most powerful and advanced robotic rover built to explore Mars. 
• The small car sized rover is equipped with a robotic arm, a drill, two colour video cameras and a tool kit for analyzing the rock contents.
•  "You can operate with solar panels on Mars. You just can't operate everywhere," Stephen Johnson, director of INL's Space Nuclear Systems and Technology Division, said in a statement. 
• This gives you an opportunity to go anywhere you want on the planet, not be limited to the areas that have sunlight and not have to put the rover to sleep at night. 
• The Mars is 56 million km away from the earth.
• Curiosity, which was launched on November 26th, is expected to land on the surface of Mars on August 5, 2012.   

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The Mystery of Aurora lights

NASA EXPLAINS AURORA

An aurora is a natural light display in the sky particularly in the high latitude (Arctic and Antarctic) regions, caused by the collision of energetic charged particles with atoms in the high altitude atmosphere (thermosphere). The charged particles originate in the magnetosphere and solar wind and are directed by the Earth's magnetic field into the atmosphere. Aurora is classified as diffuse or discrete aurora. Most aurorae occur in a band known as the auroral zone.
                          In northern latitudes, the effect is known as the aurora borealis (or the northern lights), named after the Roman goddess of dawn, Aurora, and the Greek name for the north wind, Boreas, by Pierre Gassendi in 1621. Auroras seen near the magnetic pole may be high overhead, but from farther away, they illuminate the northern horizon as a greenish glow or sometimes a faint red, as if the Sun were rising from an unusual direction. The aurora borealis most often occurs near the equinoxes.
                          Its southern counterpart, the aurora australis (or the southern lights), has almost identical features to the aurora borealis and changes simultaneously with changes in the northern auroral zone and is visible from high southern latitudes in Antarctica, South America and Australia.
Source: Wikipedia and NASA

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