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THE FREE MULTIMEDIA MAGAZINE THAT KEEPS YOU UPDATED ON WHAT IS HAPPENING IN SPACE
Bi-monthly magazine of scientific and technical information
✶
September-October 2018
A possible
subglacial lake
on Mars
A solution to the
mysteries of Uranus
• ESO’s VLT sees `Oumuamua getting a boost
• Stellar corpse reveals origin of radioactive molecule
• First successful test of Einstein’s general relativity near a SMBH
• Supersharp images from new VLT adaptive optics
• First confirmed image of newborn planet caught with ESO’s VLT
Terraforming Mars
is still science fiction
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S U M M A R Y
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September-October 2018
English edition of the magazine
l’
ASTROFILO
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Michele Ferrara
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Prof. Enrico Maria Corsini
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A possible subglacial lake on Mars
Mars, the God of War, is losing the fight to hide its mystery. Leading the charge are orbiters and landers
that have revealed an ancient ocean and a thick atmosphere, both lost over the planet’s history. The story
of the Martian surface is far from over
−
a recent study reports the possible discovery of a subglacial...
ESO’s VLT sees `Oumuamua getting a boost
`Oumuamua — the first interstellar object discovered within our Solar System — has been the subject of
intense scrutiny since its discovery in October 2017. `Oumuamua, pronounced “oh-MOO-ah-MOO-ah”,
was first discovered using the Pan-STARRS telescope at the Haleakala Observatory, Hawaii. Its name...
Hubble and Gaia team up to fuel cosmic conundrum
Combining observations from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope and the European Space Agency’s (ESA)
Gaia space observatory, astronomers further refined the previous value for the Hubble constant, the rate
at which the universe is expanding from the big bang 13.8 billion years ago. But as the measurements...
Stellar corpse reveals origin of radioactive molecules
A team of astronomers led by Tomasz Kami
ń
ski (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge,
USA), used the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) and the NOrthern Extended Milli-
meter Array (NOEMA) to detect a source of the radioactive isotope aluminium-26. The source, known as...
A solution to the mysteries of Uranus
Planetology has made great strides in the last few decades. Thousands of exoplanets have been discov-
ered and the atmospheres of distant worlds have been investigated, to the point of our being able to
make meteorological forecasts. And yet, in our own solar system, there is the planet Uranus, for which...
First successful test of Einstein’s general relativity near a SMBH
Obscured by thick clouds of absorbing dust, the closest supermassive black hole to the Earth lies 26,000
light-years away at the centre of the Milky Way. This gravitational monster, which has a mass four mil-
lion times that of the Sun, is surrounded by a small group of stars orbiting around it at high speed. This...
Supersharp images from new VLT adaptive optics
The MUSE (Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer) instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) works with
an adaptive optics unit called GALACSI. This makes use of the Laser Guide Star Facility, 4LGSF, a subsystem
of the Adaptive Optics Facility (AOF). The AOF provides adaptive optics for instruments on the VLTs Unit...
Terraforming Mars is still science fiction plan
That the destiny of humanity is to colonize other planets is a near-certainty, but this will happen in a future
so far off that the ways by which we might do so are highly speculative. Surely, if the population in-
creases to unsustainable levels, we will reach a point at which either a strict global birth control will be...
First confirmed image of newborn planet caught with ESO’s VLT
Astronomers led by a group at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, Germany have cap-
tured a spectacular snapshot of planetary formation around the young dwarf star PDS 70. By using the
SPHERE instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) — one of the most powerful planet-hunting...
Astronomers uncover new clues to the star that wouldn’t die
What happens when a star behaves like it exploded, but it’s still there? About 170 years ago, astronomers
witnessed a major outburst by Eta Carinae, one of the brightest known stars in the Milky Way galaxy. The
blast unleashed almost as much energy as a standard supernova explosion. Yet Eta Carinae survived. An...
4
PLANETOLOGY
A possible
subglacial
lake on Mars
by Damian G. Allis, Ph.D.
NASA Solar System Ambassador
damian@somewhereville.com
Mars, the God of War, is losing the fight to hide its
mystery. Leading the charge are orbiters and landers
that have revealed an ancient ocean and a thick atmos-
phere, both lost over the planet’s history. The story of
the Martian surface is far from over
−
a recent study
reports the possible discovery of a subglacial liquid
water lake, revealing that a diversity of local environ-
ments may still exist close to the Martian surface.
O
n the back-
ground, a simu-
lated 3-D perspective
view of a Martian
polar cap, created
from image data
taken by the
THEMIS instrument
on NASA's Mars
Odyssey spacecraft.
[NASA/JPL/Arizona
State Univ., R. Luk]
SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2018
PLANETOLOGY
5
F
ew topics in planetary science excite re-
searchers and the public more than the
discovery of water. To geologists and
climatologists, liquid water reveals that
conditions must lie within some reasonable
temperature regime, providing information
about the surface and atmosphere.
For astrobiologists, liquid water is one of
the key requirements needed for life as we
know it. Space engineers see liquid water
less as the stuff of life as they do the stuff
of cost reduction
−
water in liquid form
means a readier source for both propellant
and consumption.
Among the known water-bearing bodies be-
yond Earth, only Mars has combined rapid
scientific discovery with public engagement
and technical capability with economic fea-
sibility. A recent study of Planum Australe
in the southern polar ice cap region using
the Mars Advanced Radar for Subsurface
and Ionospheric Sounding, or MARSIS, in-
strument on the European Space Agency
(ESA) Mars Express Orbiter (MEO) reports
the detection of what might be an active
location of persistent, still-liquid water
−
although not a body of liquid easily ac-
cessible or, for that matter, in a form usable
by future colonists. The Italian research col-
laboration, led by Roberto Orosei at the
Italian National Institute for Astrophysics
in Bologna, published the findings of their
12-year study in the July 25
th
issue of
Science
magazine (DOI:10.1126/science.aar7268).
T
he Mars Express
spacecraft used
its MARSIS experi-
ment to send radio
waves down to
Mars and interpret
the echoes it sent
back. Based on the
data, scientists be-
lieve there is water
below the surface
of Mars. [ESA]
SEPTEMBER-OCTOBER 2018

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