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New study of moons of Uranus suggests life

November 14, 2024
MThomas

Note: this is artwork and not an actual image

The planet Uranus and its five biggest moons may not be the dead sterile worlds that scientists have long thought.

Instead, they may have oceans, and the moons may even be capable of supporting life, scientists say.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cgk1333k0ypo

Cue the jokes in five…four…three…

“So, you mean there really is life in…ah…”

Note that this is not from new data. It’s a re-analysis of what Voyager 2 sent back decades ago. Basically, it just had a bad day, with magnetic storms screwing up the scan.

Still…

There could be moons there that could have the conditions that are necessary for life, they might have oceans that below the surface that could be teeming with fish!

I think this is a bit of an exaggeration…

That’s no m…no, wait, sorry, it is!

February 25, 2024
MThomas

Astronomers have found three previously unknown moons in our solar system — two additional moons circling Neptune and one around Uranus.
https://www.nbcnews.com/science/space/astronomers-spot-new-tiny-moons-neptune-uranus-rcna140285

One takes nearly 27 years to circle Neptune.

The “new” moon of Uranus is only 8 kilometers (5 miles) in diameter.

And there are likely many more yet to be discovered.

Spectacular image of Jupiter’s auroras and moons

August 23, 2022
MThomas

Courtesy NASA. Note that the blue, white, green, yellow, and orange colors are artificial, only added to make features revealed by infrared stand out for human eyes. You can see the planet’s rings, aurora, and two “tiny” moons (at left; they’re not really that tiny!).

“We’ve never seen Jupiter like this. It’s all quite incredible,” said planetary astronomer Imke de Pater, of the University of California, Berkeley, who helped lead the observations.

“We hadn’t really expected it to be this good, to be honest,” she added in a statement.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/science/james-webb-space-telescope-shows-jupiters-auroras-tiny-moons

The above is supposed to be in “quote” format, but WP really messed up this feature when they switched to so-called “block” mode (which I can’t stand).

Anyway, the image is fairly spectacular, from the new James Webb Space Telescope which is positioned 1 million miles away from Earth (i.e., in the second LaGrange point, or L2).

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