Meteor Showers!

So, seeing as this is the last "official" blog, I thought I'd talk about one of my absolute favourite things: Meteor Showers! First of all:

What is a Meteor? A common misconception is that meteors are shooting stars. In reality, they are broken pieces of asteroids or comets. They are generally rather dull in appearance, basically looking like big chunks of rock. The reason they look so bright when they flash across the sky is because they are burning up as they enter earth's atmosphere. So in reality, when you watch a meteor shower, you are watching burning rocks... If a meteor is not completely burned up and manages to land on earth, it is then called a meteorite.

When can you watch a Meteor Shower: There are various meteors throughout the year. My personal favourite falls around the 12th-13th of August, the Perseids. This is one of the best showers of the year, sometimes producing up to 60 meteors an hour! The next upcoming meteor shower will be the evening of April 21st, and because of the lack of moonlight, it should be a good one! :)

Tips for Better Viewing: Leave town! If you go out somewhere in the countryside, the bright city lights and smog will not affect your view of the stars! Not to mention it will be quieter and overall, more enjoyable. If you can, shut off any lights nearby, and situate yourself in a spot without any tall objects that might obstruct your view. Wide open fields are ideal :)

Things you probably didn't know about space:

So instead of doing a longer in-depth blog this week, I've decided to a bunch of "mini-blogs," to discuss some really cool astronomical things that don't really need a whole blog to explain :)

1) In space, if 2 pieces of metal will become permanently stuck together if they touch! (If they do not have any special coating on them...) This is because of the vacuum in space that exists because of the lack of oxygen... This is called "Cold Welding." On earth, the oxygen in our atmosphere prevents this from happening.

2) Earth almost has more than one moon! There are 4 other asteroids that are orbiting around the sun in exactly the same revolution period as earth... making it look like we're following each other! The first one was discovered in 1986 by Duncan Waldrom. People sometimes actually refer to this object, which was officially named Cruithne, as Earth's second moon. The image to the right shows the orbits of Earth and Cruithne.

3) It wouldn't actually be overly dangerous to fly through an asteroid field! This is because asteroids in asteroid fields are actually pretty far apart and most of them are very small. In our asteroid belt, there are hundreds of thousands of miles between the objects, and most of them are only about the size of a tennis ball... So despite all the cartoons we see that show us otherwise, flying through an asteroid belt would be a relatively safe endeavour.

4) Apparently the USA once planned on blowing up the moon with a nuclear weapon! No apparent reason for this, just to prove their superiority during the space race with Russia. The project was called "A Study of Lunar Research Flights" or Project A119. They wanted the general public to believe that the United States was doing better in the Space Race, but felt that shooting the moon (literally) would probably not go over too well with anyone...

Emigrating from Earth?

The idea that humans might be able to live on other planets has interested scientists for a while now. With the increasing population growth on Earth, accompanied by a finite resource base, as well as the environmental problems surrounding climate change, the idea of moving to a new planet and starting over is appealing for a lot of people. But is this possible? Would another planet actually be able to sustain human life? Mars had been an area of interest for some time, because of evidence of water and its proximity to earth. The moon had also been a plausible option at one time... but both these ideas have been dismissed. Human life is very fragile, and we would not be able to withstand the extreme temperatures of either planet. On Mars, temperatures can go down to as low as -140°C, while on the moon, temperates can range from 130°C to -170°C! Humans must maintain a body temperature of around 37°C, and with a climate like this, this would be pretty much impossible.
Another major issue is transportation. How would everyone get to this other planet? It is one thing to take a few astronauts for a temporary visit to the moon, but for a mass exodus to occur, some kind of new technology would be needed. If we were to bring enough supplies to construct some kind of shelter, as well as provisions and other basic necessities, as well as the people who were going to be living there, the spacecraft would be much to heavy to actually go anywhere... So although the idea is really cool, the reality of living in space is probably not something that will be realised any time soon...
However, if you've always dreamt of living in space, don't give up hope yet! NASA's Kepler Satellite is orbiting the sun, scouring the universe for signs of other possible earth-like planets. There is a pretty good chance with all of the celestial bodies in our solar system, that there is at least one out there that is comparable to Earth... However, the transportation would still be an issue... so for the time being, I guess we better stick to Earth!

The Kuiper Cliff and Planet X

There have been ideas floating around the scientific community about the possibility of a 10th planet existing in the outer region of our solar system. Although this idea has received much criticism, there are also many who acknowledge the possibility as a realistic one. At the furthest edges of our solar system, far beyond Pluto (not a planet :(...) is what is called the Kuiper Cliff. This is an area in the Kuiper Belt extending from 30-50 AU from the sun, composed of thousands of "ice rocks." The Cliff is a region where, suddenly, there is nothing; the density of "ice rocks" in the region decreases dramatically. In the above picture, the green dots represent the Kuiper Belt. It is obvious that there is something going on in the area at the bottom of the screen, where suddenly, there are no more "ice rocks." This is the area where some people believe our solar system's 10th planet (for now, termed "Planet X") is located. This planet is supposed to be between the masses of Earth and Mars, located beyond 48 AU.

A planet would explain the sudden decrease in the amount of "ice rocks" in the Kuiper Belt because it would create a major gravitational force, sweeping up any nearby objects. There have been theories of a 10th planet somewhere outside Neptune's orbit ever since the discovery of Neptune, but when Pluto was discovered, people thought that this is what they were looking for. However, with the recent declassification of Pluto as a planet, other theories are starting to become more prevalent.
NASA has launched a probe (New Horizons) to check out Pluto, but it will not arrive until 2015, and since we do not yet have the technology to view this possible planet from earth, we'll have to wait another 3 years before we get any concrete answers.

Dark Energy

So I've already talked a bit about Dark Matter... but something even more crazy and mysterious is Dark Energy. It accounts for an enormous 74% of our universe! When combined with Dark Matter, this means that around 86% of our universe has not been seen/discovered yet! According to NASA, "more is unknown [about dark energy] then is known." We know that our universe is continually expanding, and has been since it was formed. What is, perhaps, even more surprising is that this expansion has actually grown faster over time! Previously it had been thought that the expansion rate would slow down, and eventually stop due to gravity. So what is causing this expedited expansion? Scientists call this Dark Energy. When the universe first came into existance, it was affected primarily by dark matter. In present times, however, dark energy has a much greater effect. 
If you look at this "cup-shaped" figure, the bottom represents the formation of the universe, which is expanding, but at a much slower rate than the top of the cup. With the switch over to dark energy (occuring slightly more than half-way up), expansion sped up dramatically. Today, we are at the brim of the glass, and possibilities for expansion are endless! Many scientists actually believe that once day, as the universe as ripped apart even more, our Milky Way Galaxy will be its own little island, with all the other Galaxies and other celestial bodies we can see today being pulled even further away.
Dark energy, of course, is only one of 3 theories about the expansion of the universe, but it is the most weidely believed theory in today's scientific society.