James Webb: Swallowing the biggest space telescope
- 11 July 2017
- From the section Science & Environment
The door has closed on the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST).
The successor to Hubble has been locked tight inside a giant chamber where it will undergo a series of tests to simulate conditions off Earth.
Engineers must first pump out all the air, and then chill down the telescope to fantastically low temperatures.
In about 30 days' time, they should be ready to start the checks that ensure JWST's spectacular mirrors can focus light properly.
"The operational temperature on orbit is about 30 kelvins - 30 degrees above absolute zero; but we're going to test JWST to slightly lower," explains Juli Lander, a US space agency (Nasa) engineer on the project.
Read full article James Webb: Swallowing the biggest space telescope
Antarctic iceberg: Giant 'white wanderer' poised to break free
- 5 July 2017
- From the section Science & Environment
Everybody is fascinated by icebergs. The idea that you can have blocks of frozen water the size of cities, and bigger, sparks our sense of wonder.
British astronaut Tim Peake photographed one from orbit that would just about fit inside Central London's ring road. But at 26km by 13km (16 miles by 8 miles), it was a tiddler compared with the berg that is about to break away from the eastern side of the Antarctic Peninsula.
Read full article Antarctic iceberg: Giant 'white wanderer' poised to break free
The rock that records how we all got here
- 1 July 2017
- From the section Science & Environment
You're going to want to touch it; you're definitely going to want to run your fingers over its wavy lines.
This 2.5-tonne lump of rock will be one of the new star exhibits when London's Natural History Museum re-opens its front entrance-space in a couple of weeks' time.
Satellite mega-constellation production begins
- 27 June 2017
- From the section Science & Environment
Image copyright
ONEWEBB
European aerospace giant Airbus and its partner, OneWeb, have begun the production of a satellite mega-constellation.
The network will comprise at least 600 spacecraft in the first instance, but could eventually encompass more than 2,000.
Read full article Satellite mega-constellation production begins
Whaling's 'uncomfortable' scientific legacy
- 25 June 2017
- From the section Science & Environment
It's a curious thing to see a group of early whale foetuses up close - to see beings so small that have the potential to become so big.
But what really strikes you, especially in those initial developmental stages, is how familiar the forms look. How like an early human foetus, they appear.
Read full article Whaling's 'uncomfortable' scientific legacy
Full thrust on Europe's new Ariane 6 rocket
- 22 June 2017
- From the section Science & Environment
Manufacturers say they are making rapid progress in the development of Europe's new rocket - the Ariane 6.
The vehicle is due to enter service in 2020, gradually replacing the existing workhorse, the Ariane 5.
Read full article Full thrust on Europe's new Ariane 6 rocket
Galileo contract faces Brexit crunch
- 20 June 2017
- From the section Science & Environment
The contract will be signed on Thursday giving a German-UK consortium the go-ahead to build another eight satellites for Galileo - Europe's version of GPS.
OHB System of Bremen and SSTL of Guildford have so far produced all of the fully operational satellites in the constellation.
Whales reached huge size only recently
- 24 May 2017
- From the section Science & Environment
Image copyright
Silverback Films/BBC
Blue whales are the biggest animals that have ever existed on Earth but they only recently* got that way.
This is the extraordinary finding from a new study that examined the fossil record of baleens - the group of filter feeders to which the blues belong.
Decoding Antarctica's response to a warming world
- 19 May 2017
- From the section Science & Environment
Image copyright
T.Ronge/AWI
A tangle of tubes, cables, and actuators - Mebo looks as though it could morph at any moment into one of those Transformer robots from the movies.
The 10-tonne machine is in fact a seabed drilling system, and a very sophisticated one at that.
Read full article Decoding Antarctica's response to a warming world
Tinkering for science on the Irrawaddy
- 12 May 2017
- From the section Science & Environment
Image copyright
Photo (C) TU Delft / Floris Papenhuizen
"Poohsticks" is what you might call entry-level hydrology.
Drop twigs over a bridge on the upstream side and then race over to the downstream side to see which bits of wood appear first.
