Subscribe free to our newsletters via your
. 24/7 Space News .




STELLAR CHEMISTRY
Stardust Team Reports Discovery of First Potential Interstellar Particles
by Staff Writers
Washington DC (SPX) Aug 15, 2014


The largest interstellar dust track found in the Stardust aerogel collectors was this 35 micron-long hole produced by a 3 picogram speck of dust that was probably traveling so fast that it vaporized upon impact. The other two likely interstellar dust grains were traveling more slowly and remained intact after a soft landing in the aerogel. Image courtesy Andrew Westphal, UC Berkeley.

Seven rare, microscopic interstellar dust particles that date to the beginnings of the solar system are among the samples collected by scientists who have been studying the payload from NASA's Stardust spacecraft since its return to Earth in 2006. If confirmed, these particles would be the first samples of contemporary interstellar dust.

A team of scientists has been combing through the spacecraft's aerogel and aluminum foil dust collectors since Stardust returned in 2006.The seven particles probably came from outside our solar system, perhaps created in a supernova explosion millions of years ago and altered by exposure to the extreme space environment.

The research report appears the journal Science. Twelve other papers about the particles will appear next week in the journal Meteoritics and Planetary Science.

"These are the most challenging objects we will ever have in the lab for study, and it is a triumph that we have made as much progress in their analysis as we have," said Michael Zolensky, curator of the Stardust laboratory at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston and coauthor of the Science paper.

Stardust was launched in 1999 and returned to Earth on Jan. 15, 2006, at the Utah Test and Training Range, 80 miles west of Salt Lake City. The Stardust Sample Return Canister was transported to a curatorial facility at Johnson where the Stardust collectors remain preserved and protected for scientific study.

Inside the canister, a tennis racket-like sample collector tray captured the particles in silica aerogel as the spacecraft flew within 149 miles of a comet in January 2004. An opposite side of the tray holds interstellar dust particles captured by the spacecraft during its seven-year, three-billion-mile journey.

Scientists caution that additional tests must be done before they can say definitively that these are pieces of debris from interstellar space. But if they are, the particles could help explain the origin and evolution of interstellar dust.

The particles are much more diverse in terms of chemical composition and structure than scientists expected. The smaller particles differ greatly from the larger ones and appear to have varying histories. Many of the larger particles have been described as having a fluffy structure, similar to a snowflake.

Two particles, each only about two microns (thousandths of a millimeter) in diameter, were isolated after their tracks were discovered by a group of citizen scientists. These volunteers, who call themselves "Dusters," scanned more than a million images as part of a University of California, Berkeley, citizen-science project, which proved critical to finding these needles in a haystack.

A third track, following the direction of the wind during flight, was left by a particle that apparently was moving so fast -- more than 10 miles per second (15 kilometers per second) -- that it vaporized. Volunteers identified tracks left by another 29 particles that were determined to have been kicked out of the spacecraft into the collectors.

Four of the particles reported in Science were found in aluminum foils between tiles on the collector tray. Although the foils were not originally planned as dust collection surfaces, an international team led by physicist Rhonda Stroud of the Naval Research Laboratory searched the foils and identified four pits lined with material composed of elements that fit the profile of interstellar dust particles.

Three of these four particles, just a few tenths of a micron across, contained sulfur compounds, which some astronomers have argued do not occur in interstellar dust. A preliminary examination team plans to continue analysis of the remaining 95 percent of the foils to possibly find enough particles to understand the variety and origins of interstellar dust.

Supernovas, red giants and other evolved stars produce interstellar dust and generate heavy elements like carbon, nitrogen and oxygen necessary for life. Two particles, dubbed Orion and Hylabrook, will undergo further tests to determine their oxygen isotope quantities, which could provide even stronger evidence for their extrasolar origin.

Scientists at Johnson have scanned half the panels at various depths and turned these scans into movies, which were then posted online, where the Dusters could access the footage to search for particle tracks.

Once several Dusters tag a likely track, Andrew Westphal, lead author of the Science article, and his team verify the identifications. In the one million frames scanned so far, each a half-millimeter square, Dusters have found 69 tracks, while Westphal has found two. Thirty-one of these were extracted along with surrounding aerogel by scientists at Johnson and shipped to UC Berkeley to be analyzed.

.


Related Links
Stardust mission
Stellar Chemistry, The Universe And All Within It






Comment on this article via your Facebook, Yahoo, AOL, Hotmail login.

Share this article via these popular social media networks
del.icio.usdel.icio.us DiggDigg RedditReddit GoogleGoogle








STELLAR CHEMISTRY
Astronomers measure weight of galaxies, expansion of universe
Vancouver, Canada (SPX) Jul 31, 2014
Astronomers at the University of British Columbia have collaborated with international researchers to calculate the precise mass of the Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies, dispelling the notion that the two galaxies have similar masses. While it was previously thought that the two galaxies weighed the same because of their similar size and structure, researchers found that neighboring Androm ... read more


STELLAR CHEMISTRY
China to test recoverable moon orbiter

China to send orbiter to moon and back

August supermoon will be brightest this year

Manned Moon Mission to Cost Russia $2.8 Bln

STELLAR CHEMISTRY
Curiosity Mars Rover Prepares for Fourth Rock Drilling

Tall Boulder Rolls Down Martian Hill, Lands Upright

Opportunity Heads to 'Marathon Valley'

NASA Mars Curiosity Rover: Two Years and Counting on Red Planet

STELLAR CHEMISTRY
Yi So-yeon, Korea's first and only astronaut, resigns

XCOR Lynx Spacecraft Lands at Monterey Jet Center

Study Compiles Data on Problem of Sleep Deprivation in Astronauts

Aerojet Completes CST-100 Work for Commercial Crew Work

STELLAR CHEMISTRY
China's first private rocket firm aims for market

China Sends Remote-Sensing Satellite into Orbit

More Tasks for China's Moon Mission

China's Circumlunar Spacecraft Unmasked

STELLAR CHEMISTRY
ISS Spacewalkers Deploy Nanosatellite, Install and Retrieve Science

Orbital cargo ship makes planned re-entry to Earth

Russian Cosmonauts Carry Out Science-Oriented Spacewalk Outside ISS

The ISS just dumped 3,300 lbs of space trash to burn up in Earth's atmosphere

STELLAR CHEMISTRY
Aerojet Rocketdyne Supports Fifth Successful Launch in Six Weeks

Optus 10 delivered to French Guiana for Ariane 5 Sept launch

SpaceX to build world's first commercial rocket launch site in south Texas

Ariane 5 is readied for Arianespace's September launch with MEASAT-3b and Optus 10

STELLAR CHEMISTRY
Rotation of Planets Influences Habitability

Planet-like object may have spent its youth as hot as a star

Young binary star system may form planets with weird and wild orbits

Hubble Finds Three Surprisingly Dry Exoplanets

STELLAR CHEMISTRY
The Future of CubeSats

Lockheed taps GenDyn unit for Space Fence ground equipment structures

Canada's MDA receives radar antennas for satellite use

Disney develops method to capture stylized hair for 3-D-printed figurines




The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2014 - Space Media Network. All websites are published in Australia and are solely subject to Australian law and governed by Fair Use principals for news reporting and research purposes. AFP, UPI and IANS news wire stories are copyright Agence France-Presse, United Press International and Indo-Asia News Service. ESA news reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement, agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by Space Media Network on any Web page published or hosted by Space Media Network. Privacy Statement All images and articles appearing on Space Media Network have been edited or digitally altered in some way. Any requests to remove copyright material will be acted upon in a timely and appropriate manner. Any attempt to extort money from Space Media Network will be ignored and reported to Australian Law Enforcement Agencies as a potential case of financial fraud involving the use of a telephonic carriage device or postal service.