INFORMATION

MSL Curiosity found 7 new organic molecules preserved in Martian sandstone. While they aren't proof that life existed on Mars, they are important. They show that the planet is capable of protecting ancient biosignatures from radiation and preserving them in rock. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/TruA3iq via IFTTT

Scientists have been debating for decades whether Mars once held a vast ocean covering a large part of its northern face. To prove the idea, they’ve been looking for a “bathtub ring” - a distinct, level shoreline that shows where water once stood. But, despite years of looking, they’ve only been able to find a very distorted potential shoreline whose height deviates by several kilometers - not exactly great evidence of a stable water level. But, according to a new paper in Nature from Abdallah Zaki and Michael Lamb of CalTech, what scientists should have been looking for wasn’t a bathtub ring, but a continental shelf. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/pGNwXyl via IFTTT

The search for life beyond Earth has traditionally focused on exoplanets orbiting Sun-like stars, which is a G-type star. However, low-mass stars, which are designated as K-type and M-type stars, have rapidly become a target for astrobiology, primarily due to their much longer lifetimes. This also means the habitable zone (HZ), which is the distance from a star where liquid water could exist, is much smaller than our solar system’s HZ, and is referred to as the liquid water habitable zone (LW-HZ). In contrast, another type of HZ that involves a star’s ultraviolet (UV) radiation potentially enabling life-harboring conditions is known as UV-HZ. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/R20wyrE via IFTTT

As we make our way through the latest solar maximum period, scholars and scientists are looking to similar events in the past to learn more about ancient bouts of solar activity. In particular, they want to know more about solar proton events (SPEs). These outbursts of high-energy particles get triggered by flares and coronal mass ejections. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/IVnzYsG via IFTTT

New research examines 10 different types of global technological civilizations, how they govern themselves, how they use resources, and other factors, to determine which types may endure and which may be doomed to collapse. Simulations show that resource use plays the key role. The simulations also show which types of detectable technosignatures each may generate. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/2nJisd8 via IFTTT

So far, America has remained ahead in the new space race. But its biggest rival is making continual steps to catch up. China announced another step in that direction with the unveiling of its first ever reusable five-meter-wide composite propulsion module, announced in a press release on April 11th. from Universe Today https://ift.tt/MQz70Pw via IFTTT