GRcade

Planet Earth is the most special, shared home to all of us. But Earth is one tiny speck in an infinite universe.

Space
The Known Universe - 100 billion (ish) galaxies

Our Galaxy - The Milky Way
Approximately 300 billion stars orbiting around a massive black hole at it's centre, with several smaller 'satellite' galaxies orbiting around it the Milky Way itself.

Our Solar System:
Our sun
Eight planets (9 theorised)
Nine dwarf planets
657 known natural satellites
1,199,224 known minor planets
4,402 known comets

Links - http://www.newsnow.co.uk/h/Science/Space+Exploration
Recommended Apps - Google Sky Map, NASA, Meteor Shower Calendar
Documentaries - Wonders of the Universe, Wonders of the Solar System, Carl Sagan's Cosmos

Original Post: Has anyone else been following this comet? I was surprised not to find a topic. So it's widely believed that the comet has not survived it's trip around the sun and wont be putting on a show on it's return. Whilst I'm gutted that it wont be the comet of the century, I think this image is epic:

http://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/u ... a_anim.gif

That is pretty good

I was hoping it would survive its encounter with the sun, so that I might try and get some good photos of it, but alas it did not last.

That damn sun, always screwing us.

Praise the sun!

Lady Gaga will be performing a concert in space in 2015: Link

We're through the looking glass here, people.

Alvin Flummux wrote:Lady Gaga will be performing a concert in space in 2015: Link

We're through the looking glass here, people.

Gaga confirmed that she will be the first artist to perform in space

Incorrect on her part there.

NASA to grow lettuce on the moon in 2015. An important step towards the human race colonizing other planets, possibly starting a decade away from now.

You know the "one way trip" idea of a Mars visit. I can envisage a time in the future where people, that have been so astounded by the achievement of colonising another planet, would attempt to retrieve the "one way trip" colonists because they believe it can be done. Mars is infectious, people love hearing news about it, especially to do with human visits. I think attention to Mars would balloon to the extent that any successful one-way-ticket colonists could realistically look to return to Earth after 20/30 years. Folk would salvage them just to prove that it could be done, which again would increase people's fascination with the red planet.

Growing plants on a planet is not a viable way to colonize a plant though. That would take, literally hundreds of thousands of years to create an atmosphere rich in oxygen...It's 19th century science being applied to a 22nd century problem.

We need to figure out how to substantially speed up that process.

Pontius Pilate wrote:Growing plants on a planet is not a viable way to colonize a plant though. That would take, literally hundreds of thousands of years to create an atmosphere rich in oxygen...It's 19th century science being applied to a 22nd century problem.

We need to figure out how to substantially speed up that process.

Growing plants on a planet is a viable way to grow plants on a planet, though, which is also important (because we need food).

Ah. Agreed. I just assumed he was referring to the production of oxygen.

SillySprout or myself?

Sprouty is actually a vegetable and would do anything to promote the growth of sprouts on any planet! No solar body is safe, Jupiter will be covered in onions before 2050

If you were replying to me; I wasn't thinking of terra-forming Mars (although that would be awesome) just growing what we need to sustain colonists for such a time as is necessary. Their diet would be quite limited though, they'd soon grow sick of cabbage.

Growing gooseberry fool on the moon is such a cool idea.

I want to eat moon food.

Pontius Pilate wrote:That would take, literally hundreds of thousands of years to create an atmosphere rich in oxygen...

And you have to make sure that the atmosphere won't be stripped away by the solar winds, i.e. it requires that the world's gravity be strong enough to hold it down, and the cover of a magnetic field generated either by a nearby gas giant, or its own internal heat engine. This is why terraforming Mars would take a lot more resources than we can bring to bear.

Aayule1 wrote:Growing gooseberry fool on the moon is such a cool idea.

I want to eat moon food.

Make cheese on the moon, and sell it at a 100 pounds a block.