MISSION:
To collect dust and carbon-based samples during its closest encounter with Comet Wild 2.
In 1999 NASA launched a Discovery Mission called ‘Stardust’, the main purpose of this mission was to come into contact with the coma of a comet [Wild 2], which it did in January 2004. Under the contact with the comet the spacecraft collected particles with the use of a most strange material called
[Aerogel]. The spacecraft returned to Earth/Utah United states on January 15, 2006.
MISSION Overview - http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov/mission/index.html
WHO:
NASA, Discovery mission - http://discovery.nasa.gov/
THE PLANETARY SOCIETY - http://www.planetary.org/about/
“Phase 1” Begins
Back in the beginning of 2006 I was watching CNN one night, and what a ‘right’ night to be watching. There was a man speaking about a new NASA project, which would be open to everyone who had an internet connection, in the world. The project would start some time after, so I noted the start-date down, and stayed tuned.
The project began a couple of months later, and I added myself as a member on the first day.
I loved it right from the start, I find it both fascinating and inspiring in its own way. But this kind of research is not for everyone, because it takes patience’s, eye for details, eagerness, and some mouse-clicking ;)
I was once asked to do a job in a big airport, and they said that it would be ‘a very boring job’. Eagerly I off course accepted. The job was to Number ‘Each room’ in the whole airport, they said it would probably take me 6 months to do – I was done after 3 months!
“Phase 2” is up and Running
Now we’ve come to the year 2008 and ‘Phase 2’ is in motion, which started around August 2007, almost a year after “Phase 1” had begun.
They have finished 40 % of the scanning process at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, where after these specimens were sent to Stardust@home headquarters in Berkeley, they then turned these into small scannable movies, for us Dusters to study.
-Altogether, 24,000 dusters have so far searched about 40 million(!) movies for interstellar dust grains, meaning that each Stardust@home movie has been viewed more than one hundred times on average.
The Dusters have already identified 50 different places in the Aerogel, which might contain actual interstellar dust particles.
http://www.planetary.org/programs/projects/stardustathome/phase2.html
To read more about this project, please visit this page:
http://stardustathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/index.php
2008©®KarimaL.
WindBlower
2 comments:
I hope you guys figure all this Atrology stuff out, by the way How do Aries and Leo's get along Usually?
The most famous pharaohs of all dynasties of ancient Egypt http://famouspharaohs.blogspot.com
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