Notes from the Lunar and Planetary Science
Conference: Is there ice at Mercury's poles

post from Planetary Society Blog on 03 May 2012 11:35:14 PM. © Planetary Society Blog

Water ice at Mercury's poles? That's crazy, right? Mercury is so close to the Sun that it seems inconceivable that you could have water ice there. But Mercury's rotational axis has virtually no tilt (MESSENGER has measured its tilt to be less than 1 degree), so there are areas at Mercury's poles, most often (but not always) within polar craters, where the Sun never rises above the horizon to heat the surface.

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http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2012/3429.html

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Notes from the Lunar and Planetary Science
Conference: A little bit of Phobos and Deimos

post from Planetary Society Blog on 03 May 2012 11:30:59 PM. © Planetary Society Blog

I just sat in the "small bodies" session at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, listening to three talks about Phobos. The first was by Abby Fraeman, who looked at data on Phobos and Deimos from the two imaging spectrometers in orbit at Mars. The next talk, by L. Chappaz, was motivated by Phobos-Grunt's mission. It asked: if you grabbed 200 grams of soil from the surface of Phobos, how much of that material would actually have originated on Mars? Then there was a particularly interesting talk that dealt with the question of how Phobos' grooves formed.

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http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2012/3430.html

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Notes from the Lunar and Planetary Science
Conference: Making Cassini's radar images prettier

post from Planetary Society Blog on 03 May 2012 11:26:05 PM. © Planetary Society Blog

One of the more exciting talks last week was given by Antoine Lucas about his work with Oded Aharonson "denoising" Cassini radar images of Titan. Cassini's radar images are superior to the camera photos in revealing fine details and topography on Titan's surface, but they do suffer from a random noise component that makes the pictures look snowy. Antoine and Oded have developed a method for removing much of this noise.

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http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2012/3431.html

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Mars Exploration Rovers Update: Opportunity
Begins to Wrap Winter Science, Mission Celebrates Month 100

post from Planetary Society Blog on 03 May 2012 11:06:43 PM. © Planetary Society Blog

As winter began to retreat in the southern hemisphere of the Red Planet, Opportunity was commanded to finish up her science assignments in April in preparation for leaving its refuge, and the Mars Exploration Rover mission rolled through its 100th month of exploration.

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http://www.planetary.org/blogs/guest-blogs/a-j-s-rayl/mer-update-2012-04.html

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Moon Mappers citizen science project now public,
and statistics show it works!

post from Planetary Society Blog on 03 May 2012 11:04:54 PM. © Planetary Society Blog

Last week, Pamela Gay of CosmoQuest announced that their Moon Mappers citizen science project is out of its beta phase and ready for prime time. Moon Mappers enlists the help of the public to perform the gargantuan task of mapping the sizes and positions of craters photographed on the Moon by Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. Crater counting is the most powerful tool geologists have for figuring out how old planetary surfaces are. But when you have Terabytes of data, it's simply impossible for one scientist to count all the craters

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http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2012/3433.html

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Dawn Journal: Saluting the Sun

post from Planetary Society Blog on 03 May 2012 11:02:44 PM. © Planetary Society Blog

On April 18, Dawn will attain its greatest separation yet from Earth, nearly 520 million kilometers (323 million miles) or more than 3.47 astronomical units (AU). Well beyond Mars, fewer than a dozen spacecraft have ever operated so far from Earth. At this extraordinary range, Dawn will be nearly 1,400 times farther than the average distance to the Moon (and 1,300 times farther than the greatest distance attained by Apollo astronauts 42 years ago). The deep-space ship will be well over one million times farther from Earth than the International Space Station and Tiangong-1.

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http://www.planetary.org/blogs/guest-blogs/marc-rayman/3434.html

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An update on Opportunity, and a plea for some
volunteer desktop publishing help

post from Planetary Society Blog on 03 May 2012 10:56:40 PM. © Planetary Society Blog

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http://www.planetary.org/blogs/emily-lakdawalla/2012/3438.html

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Perigee "Super Moon" On May 5-6

post from Space Tourism, Space Transport and Space Exploration News on 03 May 2012 10:15:54 PM. © Space Tourism, Space Transport and Space Exploration News

Huntsville AL (SPX) May 04, 2012
The full Moon has a reputation for trouble. It raises high tides, it makes dogs howl, it wakes you up in the middle of the night with beams of moonlight stealing through drapes. If a moonbeam wakes you up on the night of May 5th, 2012, you might want to get out of bed and take a look. This May's full Moon is a "super Moon," as much as 14% bigger and 30% brighter than other full Moons of 2012.

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http://www.moondaily.com/reports/Perigee_Super_Moon_On_May_5_6_999.html

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How will the US biotechnology industry benefit
from new patent laws

post from Space Tourism, Space Transport and Space Exploration News on 03 May 2012 10:15:54 PM. © Space Tourism, Space Transport and Space Exploration News

New Rochelle, NY (SPX) May 04, 2012
Passage of the America Invents Act into law led to the most dramatic changes in the U.S. patent system in 60 years. These reforms will have a significant impact on technology innovators such as biotechnology-based businesses, as detailed in two articles in Industrial Biotechnology, a peer-reviewed journal from Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. The articles are available free online on the Industrial Biotec

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http://www.space-travel.com/reports/How_will_the_US_biotechnology_industry_benefi
t_from_new_patent_laws_999.html

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Cassini, Saturn Moon Photographer

post from Space Tourism, Space Transport and Space Exploration News on 03 May 2012 10:15:54 PM. © Space Tourism, Space Transport and Space Exploration News

Pasadena CA (JPL) May 04, 2012
NASA's Cassini spacecraft successfully flew by Saturn's moons Enceladus and Dione during close flybys on May 2, 2012, capturing these raw images. The flybys were the last close encounters of these icy moons that Cassini will make for three years. Cassini flew by Enceladus at an altitude of about 46 miles (74 kilometers). This flyby was designed primarily for the radio science sub-system to

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http://www.saturndaily.com/reports/Cassini_Saturn_Moon_Photographer_999.html