So now there's at least two experiments that are hinting that there's something odd going on with muons. Still needs more supporting data - and a testable hypothesis about what's going on would be nice as well - but it already seems pretty solid.

What we know now, what we'd like to know, and some ideas for learning more about TNOs, KBOs, and dwarf planets in the outer solar system...

While I'm excited to see people working on these sorts of things I have to say, ESA, you need to work a bit harder on picking your names.

Not quite The Expanse but good practice for converting all those other dwarf planets in the outer solar system into habitats. If the field of such bodies extends out into the Oort cloud as well then we have a LOT of habitat-building to do. https://arxiv.org/abs/2011.07487

This is painful to watch. I just hope this is the catalyst for building a new radio telescope that's even better.

Oh no!

That's being worked on too. A fully-fueled Starship in orbit is halfway to anywhere in the solar system. Speaking of which, there's currently something of a 24/7 watch on Elon's little Boca Chica project at the moment. They've done a number of engine test-firings with the Starship prototype (serial number 8 ) in the past couple weeks and the FAA has given clearance to 15km altitude for the next "hop", which is expected to happen any day now. Elon has said there's about a 1 in 3 chance of everything going smoothly. We'll see. Should be exciting either way. And after that there's SN9 already being built in the nearby high-bay.

I considered that actually when the Pluto flyby happened and we saw that Pluto had an atmosphere. That said, I think we should focus on getting established on Mars first before we dream too far ahead. Right now all eggs are in the Blue Planet's basket and a single planetwide extinction event will end us all. One colony at a time

"There is a case that habitability on Pluto may be just as good as on the closer icy moons. In fact, if Pluto is the standard for dwarf planets found in the Kuiper Belt generally there may be many more habitable worlds out there." https://youtu.be/GMIbZ2k_OtQ There's a lot of real estate out there in dwarf planets too. Even just in our Solar system there are hundreds of known dwarf planets, and probably hundreds more that we haven't seen yet. (Even Hubble couldn't see much further than the inner bit of the Kuiper Belt.) Yes, I said hundreds of planets in our own system, and each able to be the resource base for its own swarm of habitats. How about this for another thought.. If the Kuiper Belt isn't enough then there is also the Oort cloud. No reason to expect there not to be thousands of more planets - dwarf and otherwise - out in the Oort cloud, which some models say extends out to over 120,000 AU. 64,000 AU is 1 light-year. The nearest star system to our own is less than 4 LY away. If it is similarly constructed then by the time we're reaching the limits of our system we should be inside the outer edges of the next system over. Up the side of one gravity well and down the other. All accessible without having to resort to magic technology like "warp" drives, though building all those colonies and expanding the frontier that far might take us a while. Rome wasn't built in a day after all.

Looks like the cabling situation is more precarious than realized, meaning it is no longer considered safe to repair the antenna as was first hoped.

Ok, so not a lot of astrophysics or science in this one but I thought it was cool nevertheless...

“The TAGSAM head performed the sampling event in optimal conditions. Newly available analyses show that the collector head was flush with Bennu’s surface when it made contact and when the nitrogen gas bottle was fired to stir surface material. It also penetrated several centimeters into the asteroid’s surface material. All data so far suggest that the collector head is holding much more than 2 ounces of regolith.” So much in fact that the plastic flap that was supposed to close and seal the sample inside is stuck open, leaking the material that was collected inside the TAGSAM head. There was no hard deceleration on impact either. The surface material at least is extremely loosely bound together. Someone at work said it was like hitting a big, fluffy pillow full of gravel. https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-s-osiris-rex-spacecraft-collects-significant-amount-of-asteroid

LIGO and Virgo gravity wave detectors detect biggest wave to date. “The new signal likely represents the instant that the two black holes merged. The merger created an even more massive black hole, of about 142 solar masses, and released an enormous amount of energy, equivalent to around 8 solar masses, spread across the universe in the form of gravitational waves.”

16 Psyche to be precise... “The Psyche mission will be the first mission to investigate a world of metal rather than of rock and ice. Deep within rocky, terrestrial planets—including Earth—scientists infer the presence of metallic cores, but these lie unreachable below planets' rocky mantles and crusts. Because scientists cannot see or measure Earth's core directly, Psyche offers a unique window into the violent history of collisions and accretion that created terrestrial planets.” This ought to be a cool mission.

Currently... https://www.whereisroadster.com/ Eventually: The random walk of cars and their collision probabilities with planets And here's an Ars Technica article on efforts to track and predict the location of Starman and his roadster.

Interesting article in Astrobiology mag... Photobiological Effects at Earth's Surface Following a 50 pc Supernova

That reminds me of another one... A biologist, an engineer, and a mathematician were observing an empty building. They noted two people entering the building and sometime later observed three coming out. The biologist remarked, “Oh, they must have reproduced.” The engineer said, “Our initial count must have been incorrect.” The mathematician stated, “Now if one more person goes into the building, it will be completely empty.”

Having studied astronomy this is pretty funny This is not really a joke, but I still think it's pretty funny

Ah yes I remember seeing this video when it came out. It is pretty neat! Ever since I discovered the nature of chaotic systems I've always been intrigued by them and their connection to seemingly unrelated mathematics.

TFW you rotate the mandelbrot plot through the third dimension. Kind of like a Flatlander being visited by Mr Sphere.

Geology is without a doubt one of the fields I find most intriguing, personally. It seems to be very much related to astronomy. I believe I've watched the PBD documentary before, they make up possibly half of the total of documentaries I watch every week, hehe. What inspired you first you study geology in particular?

Seeing how it was requested you share some history of yourself/any projects you've worked on and what not...well unfortunately I am not really qualified, I suppose, to be here That being said I do have vast interests and enjoy these sorts of discussions, and thus far have really enjoyed reading previous topics in this club. Soo a bit of background - I was basically a third year Geology student (2.5 years in) until oil and gas tanked in Canada and then just quit school. I have the option to go back but haven't decided (long personal excerpt could go here but I won't bore you). My sister and her husband are both geologists though. My brother in law has a masters in sedimentary rock and my sister was a geo-engineer (she's now a teacher though because...jobs). Geology is still a big interest of mine though. One thing that stuck with me from an intro course, which I thought to be super fascinating, was discussing how we are due for a geomagnetic reversal sometime soon ...by soon I mean eventually (this is not a doomsday type of topic) the reversal would create issues, but not like mass extinction issues. You might have seen articles last year that discussed the need to updating the magnetic polar north much more earlier than planned and then they will have to do it again pretty soon here in 2020 as it is still moving quite fast. But, this process is still slow. Anyways, I thought it was neat and wanted to discuss it (not sure if others knew about the phenomenon). But, you all seem to be very well versed in natural sciences Quick PBS video for anyone who does not know what I am talking about Seriously, I suck at spoiler tags =-=

Oh wow, the animation! How cu...u...ttee? 0_0;;;;;;; Bye bye earth. Hello nuclear winters. This video made me start thinking about if Yellowstone exploded and the ash fall that would basically consume most of America and south Canada. Add in wind. Funtimes. Also, I enjoyed how they pulled a rubber duct from the rock bedding.