Category: Other Worlds and Tech

Transit of Venus

Posted on by Inara Pey

Update June 7th: Two additional images added to this article showing the Black Drop and a wonderful sunset view from Greece.

Well, we didn’t get an in-world venue sorted, but on the night of 5th / 6th of June 2012, a bunch of us gathered (with thousands of others) on Twitter to share in the Transit of Venus. Feeds were widely available from NASA and elsewhere, although many of us stayed with http://www.slooh.com, which provided feeds from telescopes right across the world – Norway, Sweden, mainland USA, Japan, Hawaii, the Pacific, New Zealand, Australia – ten locations in all, hoping to ensure the widest possible coverage should inclement weather interfere with things.

The transit itself has been written about rather a lot – so if you want an overview of the historical context, Wikipedia offers a very informative piece, including the sad tale of Guillaume Le Gentil, which was referred to several times in the SLOOH webcast, and which has itself been immortalised in a the play Transit of Venus. The article also touches on James Cook’s role in observing the transit of 1769.

Balu Pulipaka of Indiana captured this image of the “Black Drop” effect as Venus passes through 2nd Contact
Venus imaged by NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory

Today, the Transit is no longer used to help us understand the broader sweep of the solar system per se, but has, in both 2004 and 2012,  been used to assist scientists in the study of exoplanets. In this, the 2012 transit is liable to have been more valuable than 2004, due to increased solar activity as we approach a period of Solar Maximum in the Sun’s (roughly) 11-year cycle.

The view from Greece: Spyros Skikos captures a unique sunset with his camera, Venus prominent against the Sun
A pink-filtered image from the University of Oslo, showing the end of the transit, with Venus between 3rd and 4th contacts. Note the solar prominence on the limb of the sun just below it (image: http://www.slooh.com)

The 2012 event also helped with the calibration of instruments aboard NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory, while observations of the event taken from the Svalbard archipelago coupled with those from the European Venus Express mission in orbit around the planet will also hopefully increase our understanding of the planet’s atmosphere and climatology.

Black & white images from Broome, Australia, showing Venus (left) and sunspots on the face of the sun (image: http://www.slooh.com)

For casual observers, the four periods of contact were perhaps the most enthralling – the points where Venus first “touches” the limb of the sun, then slowly moves inside the sun’s disk until it is entirely “inside) (1st and 2nd Contact) and the point at which it touches the limb of the sun on the other side on its way “out” (3rd Contact), before vanishing entirely (4th Contact).

Of these in turn, the 2nd and 3rd contacts are of interest as they give rise to the so-called “black drop”. This is when light distortion possibly due to sunlight refracting through Venus’ atmosphere  appears to “pull” the edge of Venus to the edge of the sun, elongating it into a tear-like shape, with the limb of the sun appearing to “bend in” towards it.

I’ve compiled a modest slideshow of the event from a number of the SLOOH feeds. The first 10 are from the University of New Mexico feed, while the last ten are from Oahu and the Haleakala volcano observatory, Hawaii. You get the opportunity to see the next transit of Venus live until 2117…

(Click here to see the slideshow full screen)

NASA also offer a composite video of the event using images captured by SDO:

A Dragon of a different kind

Posted on by Inara Pey

As I’ve previously posted here on occasion, and as friends on Twitter will know, I has a soft spot for space exploration. Last year I wrote some pieces about the space shuttle Endeavour, and included some favourite images of her prior to her final return to Earth.

Endeavour and the shuttle fleet have now gone; retired to museums and their missions confined to history. However, the last week or so saw the opening of a new chapter in low-Earth orbit space operations as the Dragon space vehicle, developed by Internet entrepreneur Elon Musk’s SpaceX Corporation, became the first privately funded vehicle to dock with the ISS under NASA’s Commercial Orbital Transportation Services programme.

May 22nd 2012: Dragon lifts-off atop SpaceX’s own Falcon 9 launch vehicle (image: SpaceX)

First flown in 2010, the Dragon space vehicle was put through its paces during May 2012 in an aggressive mission to demonstrate its core capabilities of launching a payload to orbit, rendezvousing with the ISS, where it would be captured by a robotic arm on the station and manoeuvred into a hard dock for cargo transfer, before returning to Earth with a payload from the station (in this case, 590 kilos of items, including “quick return” packages intended to demonstrate that SpaceX could return time-critical experiments from the ISS and deliver them to NASA within 48 hours of the Dragon vehicle detaching from the station).

Dragon is designed to be a highly versatile workhorse vehicle, capable of delivering some 3,310kg of cargo to the ISS and returning up to 2,500kg safely to Earth. What’s more the vehicle’s heat shield is designed to withstand re-entry velocities from possible lunar and Mars missions.

Russia’s Progress (l), Europe’s ATV (c) and Japan’s HTV (r)

The ability to make a return to Earth places Dragon is a league of its own compared to the other cargo vehicles currently operating to resupply the ISS. The Russian Progress vehicle, European ATV and Japan’s HTV all burn-up in the upper reaches of the Earth’s atmosphere after departing the space station.

Nor will Dragon be limited to cargo flights: development is under way of the DragonRider variant – a vehicle capable of lifting up to seven people to  / from the ISS. Two further variants of the vehicle are under development: DragonLab, which will see the vehicle operate commercially on its own as an unmanned orbital research platform, with full return-to-Earth capabilities; and RedDragon, which has been proposed as a NASA Discovery mission slated for 2018, which would see a modified version of the unmanned Dragon fly to Mars and deliver a 1-tonne payload to the surface in order to try to sample subsurface water reservoirs.

Dragon approaching the ISS, May 25th 2012 (NASA)

Dragon was launched on its initial COTS mission on May 22nd, 2012. Once successfully in orbit, it commenced a 2-day “chase and rendezvous” flight with the ISS, gradually easing its way up to the space station, where it performed a series of check-out manoeuvres, prior to making its final approach to the station ready for capture and docking on May 25th.

The ISS captured by Dragon’s thermal camera prior to final rendezvous and capture (SpaceX)

Rather than docking directly with the station, as with the likes of the Shuttle, Progress and Europe’s ATV, Dragon gently manoeuvres up close to the station prior to a robotic arm on the ISS itself being used to “grab” the vehicle and then gently ease it into a berthed positioned against the station’s Harmony module.

May 25th capture: “Houston, we have a Dragon by its tail!” Astronaut Don Petit reported upon successfully grappling the vehicle with a robot arm (NASA)

Once successfully docked, Dragon spent several days mated to the ISS while the station crew off-loaded some 460kg of food, water and other items, then packed the vehicle with 560kg of equipment and items for the return to Earth.

Docked! (NASA)

Return operations commenced on May 31st, when the robot arm was used to detach Dragon from the ISS and move it to a distance of some 10 metres before releasing it. Manoeuvring thrusters then gently backed the vehicle away from the ISS prior to it commencing a series of manoeuvres that moved it ahead of the station by a few hundred kilometres, and started the de-orbit process.

Departure (NASA)

After successfully re-entering the Earth’s atmosphere, the main capsule having been detached from the orbital “trunk” of the craft, Dragon safely deployed its parachutes and splashed-down on-target a little under 900 kilometres off the coast of California, where it was recovered by waiting support ships, bringing the flight test phase of the mission to a successful conclusion.

A Dragon in the water (SpaceX)

Dragon is due to fly to the ISS once more in September 2012 in the first official Cargo Resupply Mission, which will see it carry a full load into space. This will be followed in October by Orbital Science’s Cygnus vehicle (which, like Progress et al, is designed to burn-up on re-entry), to mark the further expansion of the COTS programme.

Orbital Sciences’ Cygnus vehicle

For now, however, all eyes remain on SpaceX and their remarkable – and potentially highly versatile – Dragon vehicle; here’s to a successful mission in September! In the meantime, I’ve put together a little slideshow of images from NASA and SpaceX images highlighting the mission.

(Click here to see the slideshow full screen)

Annular eclipse

Posted on by Inara Pey

May 20/21 2012 saw an annular eclipse of the Sun. This is when the disk of the Moon comes between the Earth and the Sun, but the Moon is moving towards apogee in its orbit (the point at which it is furthest from the centre of the Earth), so that while the Sun, the Moon and the Earth are all aligned in syzygy, the disc of the moon is not large enough to cover that of the Sun to leave only the solar atmosphere visible (as with a total eclipse), but instead sits “inside” the disk of the Sun, creating what is called a “ring of fire”.

The eclipse was observable from China through Japan, Canada and much of the US from the west coast through to Texas. Images of the event were carried via a number of streams across the Internet, allowing thousands more to share in it.

I watched the event on-line (the sun having set in the UK a long time before the eclipse took place), along with a number of other SL friends who are also interested in astronomy, leading to a lively discussion about the eclipse itself and the possibility of hosting similar events in-world in the future. Our main stream for watching the event was provided by SLOOH Space Camera, which had cameras active in both California and New Mexico, although I was also keeping an eye on another feed from Reno, Nevada, which was transmitting via Ustream.

Annularity captured by the SLOOH camera in New Mexico, May 20/21 2012

SLOOH is a superb resource for people interested in astronomy and space exploration, regularly hosting events like observing the eclipse and their images are really excellent. I took the liberty of capturing screen shots of the event, as seen through both of the SLOOH cameras and have put them together in a Flickr slideshow (together with some initial images from the Reno feed and a brilliant photo obtained via the BBC) to try to capture the event.

A closer view through the SLOOH New Mexico camera. Note the sunspot close to the black disk of the Moon

The next major astronomical event SLOOH will be covering is the Transit of Venus next month, and if technology allows, there may be a chance people will be meeting-up in Second Life to witness the event, which will not occur again for another 105 years. If this can be arranged, I’ll be carrying information on the gathering on this blog nearer the dates of the transit (June 5/6).

In the meantime, the slideshow:

(Click here to view the slideshow full-screen)

ETA: found this amazing shot of the Moon’s shadow on Earth, seen from the ISS (click to enlarge & enjoy):

Transit of Venus

Posted on by Inara Pey

SunAeon has added a new model to their website: Transit of Venus. As the name suggests, it tracks the forthcoming transit of Venus across the disk of the sun which will occur on the 5th / 6th June 2012, and allows you to experience the transit, even if it is not visible from your location at the time the event occurs.

Transits of Venus across the disk of the Sun are among the rarest of planetary alignments. Only seven have occurred since the invention of the telescope (1631, 1639, 1761, 1769, 1874, 1882 and 2004). Such transits are only possible during early December and early June when Venus’s orbital nodes pass across the Sun, and have a pattern of recurrence at intervals of 8 and 121.5 years, then 8 and 105.5 years. This means that the next close pairing of transits will occur over a century from now in December 2117 (105 years from this year’s transit) and December 2125.

According to NASA, “The entire transit (all four contacts) is visible from northwestern North America, Hawaii, the western Pacific, northern Asia, Japan, Korea, eastern China, Philippines, eastern Australia, and New Zealand. The Sun sets while the transit is still in progress from most of North America, the Caribbean, and northwest South America. Similarly, the transit is already in progress at sunrise for observers in central Asia, the Middle East, Europe, and eastern Africa,. No portion of the transit will be visible from Portugal or southern Spain, western Africa, and the southeastern 2/3 of South America.”

The SunAeon Transit of Venus model

The SunAeon model is an animated representation of the transit, showing all four contacts together with a timeline of events at the bottom. Starting the model with advance the animation through the entire transit sequence, with annotations clearly showing if / when any portion of the transit is visible from your geographic location – making it a handy tool for determining if you want to observe the transit for yourself (and if you do, please observe safe methods of doing so).

For those running astronomy websites, the model also includes a tool for generating code which can be used to embed it in your site.

Venus in transit and the four contacts (circled) in the model

About SunAeon

SunAeon is an educational / immersive project being run by a small team based in Slovakia. It presents an interactive model of the solar system users can explore at leisure, visiting worlds examining data, etc. The team is planning to add further models to the main SunAeon portal, together with other features, including opportunities for social interaction.

Related Links

Kitely adds more features

Posted on by Inara Pey

Kitely, the on-demand grid, and effectively my second virtual world home, today adds several new features that increase the grid’s appeal and capabilities.

Profiles

Kitely now has full profile capabilities, allowing you to supply information on yourself and your interests, set picks, and so on, a-la other grid-based VWs.

Profiles now available in Kitely

Groups

Groups are now also featured within Kitely, with all the capabilities you’d expect: Group chat / IMs, Notices, Roles, etc. Kitely follows the OpenSim standard for Groups, so I’m unclear on what the upper number of allowable Groups per avatar is (42 being the maximum number a person can join in Second Life).

Doubtless Ilan or Oren will drop by and overcome my ignorance in this :). Creating and participating in Groups follows the usual process, but if you’re new to the whole thing, the Kitely blog post provides a link to some instructions.

The arrival of Groups also adds further granularity to controlling who can access your world(s) in Kitely. Until now, the levels of access have been based on Facebook and / or Twitter. However, you can now additionally define access in terms of the Groups you create / join, again using the through the Settings for each of your Worlds.

Setting Avatar Group access to worlds (Credit: Kitely Ltd)

Kitely offers significant flexibility here, as you can assign access to multiple Group of which you are a member / you create, including defining how the time Group members spend in your world is paid for.

Security and Other Updates

Alongside these updates, Kitely has also:

  • Implemented off-line messaging for the receipt of IMs while not in-world
  • Updated world security settings so that only the world manager to build in them. “Pushing” is also now disabled by default. Worlds can still be opened for anyone to build, but the recommended practice is to enable build rights via a trusted Group
  • OAR export format has been updated to save a world’s telehub, if one is set.

Finally, this update also sees an optional (but recommended) update to the Kitely web browser plug-in. You’ll be prompter to update (if you haven’t done so) when you click ENTER WORLD from any World Page.

Related Links

“All these worlds are yours…”: the majestic vision of SunAeon

Posted on by Inara Pey

Immersive, virtual environments come in many forms – and those developing them are seeking some novel approaches to developing such spaces that can be interactive on both an individual and a social footing.

Last year, I explored The Blu, which took this idea into the oceans of the world, allowing people to explore water, collect fish, interact with one another and create content with which to populate the various oceans.

Yesterday, I was pointed to another immersive environment which is still in what might be called a “beta” (or at least, start-up) phase, one which takes a far grander setting in which to immerse users: the cosmos around us.

SunAeon is an amazing educational / immersive project being run by a small team based in Slovakia, who have already cut their teeth producing a number of 3D interactive services including Sun / Moon Scope (which shows the current position of the sun and Moon (with the current phase of the latter) from your location, at either the current time or any given time of day) and Astrology Scope (which is an interactive guide to astrology).

The team’s latest project is the Solar System, a fabulous interactive model of the Solar System that is still under development, and which builds on much of the experience the team gained in building Solar System Scope, itself a unique and immersive study of the solar system and the stars around us.

The SunAeon portal

Solar System is the first step in a new SunAeon portal site that will present various elements of astronomy and space exploration aimed at the astronomy / space enthusiast, the armchair hobbyist and at education. As well as providing a unique means of learning about our solar system and the cosmos as a whole, the overall aim of the portal is to eventually include a rich diversity of content, including multi-player games and a range of social engagement options. No special software is required and nothing needs to be downloaded or installed. Everything runs directly on your browser, making accessing the portal a simple matter of clicking on the URL.

Solar System, as its name suggests, is a beautifully rendered 3D model of the solar system that provides users with an immersive means to discover and explore the worlds around us. The solar system itself is presented in two views: “model” and “real”, the key difference between the two being that of relative scale (see below). There is also a “cinematic” mode that takes you on a tour of the “model” view of the Solar system, the camera sweeping from planet to planet.

SunAeon “model” view (click to enlarge)
SunAeon’s “real” view of the solar system (click to enlarge)

In either view, you can use the mouse to scroll around the solar system and view it from different angles. You can also zoom in/out using the vertical slider on the right of the display. To zoom in on a planet, hover the mouse pointer over it so it is outlined (easier in “model” view) and double-click.

Once zoomed-in on a planet, you can either orbit around it using the mouse, viewing it from the “day” or “night” sides or even across the terminator – or you can use a set of media controls to observe the planet as it rotates about its axis. Relative rotations are in “real time” comparative to one another, meaning that there is a marked difference between the observable rotation of say, Jupiter (which completes one rotation every 10 hours), and Venus (which completes one rotation every 243 days). Buttons on the media control panel allow you to speed-up planetary rotation if you wish.

Earth by day … (click to enlarge)
…and by night (click to enlarge)

The media controls are also available from the main Solar System page, where you can view all the planets currently modelled and set them rotating about their axes and travelling in their orbits around the sun. In the model view, and seen from overhead, this offers a very visual means of demonstrating “close approaches” between planets.

At the moment, Earth is the most animated of the planets: as you orbit it / allow it to rotate, you can see cloud swirling and moving through the atmosphere on the day side, and the myriad lights of population centres across the night side of the globe. Other planets are currently more static in nature, although the team are working to change this with a module called Planetary Explorer, which will present the planets more dynamically.

The first phase of this tool was rolled out as this article was in preparation: alongside each planet is a clickable drop-down window that displays basic data on the planet. Over time, the capabilities of the Explorer will be enhances, as SunAeon team member Mito Sadlon explained to me, “You’ll be able to use it to observe the surface and atmosphere of each planet. We’ll have a more extended version of the Explorer available in the coming weeks.”

Phase one of the Planetary Explorer – launched while this article was being prepared

Also missing, as the keen-eyed will observe, are key elements of the solar system – such as Pluto and our own Moon. The team are working on adding these, and also the two captured Moons of Mars: Deimos and Phobos and the four Galilean moons of Jupiter: Callisto, Ganymede, Europa and Io.

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