Friday, May 17, 2013

Faulty telescope "Kepler", created to keep track of alien worlds - KM.RU

If engineers are not able to repair the telescope, you will lose $ 600 million

telescope “Kepler”, created by NASA, has failed, threatening the implementation of the global problem – the opening of potentially suitable for sustaining life of planets outside the solar system, reports Economic Times.

The problem was discovered on Tuesday, when the telescope itself went to work in safe mode, which occurs when there are any faults. Problem was not a surprise, this happened in the past, but the latest fault is likely to be fatal to a grand mission, “Kepler».

If engineers are not able to repair the telescope, you will lose $ 600 million allocated for the mission to search for extrasolar planets, but the space agency is not ready to concede defeat. The telescope has discovered dozens of planets, but only a few of them may be habitable. “I have not yet named” Kepler “hopeless” – says one of the leading NASA scientist John Grunsfeld.

«Kepler ‘orbits around the sun at a very great distance from Earth – 40 million miles, making it virtually impossible to send astronauts to the telescope as it was a failure of the space telescope” Hubble “.

According to NASA, the spacecraft lost control over one of the four wheels, which control the direction of the telescope in space. Experts tried several times to restart the wheel, but to no avail. At this point the telescope translated into safe mode. Now engineers will attempt to recover the wheel or find another solution. If any, will not be found, then the telescope is likely to be used for other purposes not to search for extrasolar planets. In particular, according to the online edition of NASA Watch, it plans to use to search for asteroids. “While we can not do anything. We have enough information, “- commented, deputy project manager Charles Sobek.

himself astronomy satellite was launched in 2009, its mission – to search for Earth-like planets. At the observatory satellite enormous potential, it is able to track not only the planet, but their companions. Technical difficulties began in 2010: stopped working several photosensitive modules. Then the telescope’s field of view is reduced by about 5%. The first failure of wheels (or motors, flywheels) took place in the summer of 2012 – one of them has ceased to function, but on three wheels telescope was still able to perform its functions.

Scientists believe that the importance of this mission is invaluable, these data represent the astronauts turned on the galaxy. Kepler is able to detect the size of a planet and the moon larger than Jupiter. “Prior to the launch,” Kepler, “we could not even imagine what the planet, equal to the size of Earth, is so widespread in our galaxy,” – says a leading astrophysicist at NASA headquarters in Washington, Paul Hertz.

To date, the telescope discovered 132 planets like Earth, and more than 2,700 planets potentially habitable. According to the original plan, its mission should already have been completed (and its volume “Kepler” performed in full), but in the past, NASA has decided to extend the mission until 2016, and the cost of its maintenance should be about $ 20 million a year.

most important in the life of the telescope was the discovery of three planets most similar to Earth and, therefore, potentially habitable. They were discovered by scientists in the constellation Lyra and were named Kepler 62-f, Kepler-62 and Kepler-to-62-e, respectively. Two of them characteristics similar to literally earth. The planets are located at a distance of 1,200 light-years from Earth.

Scientists suggest that these planets have water, or rather, a huge ice-free ocean. It is assumed and the presence of the atmosphere: fixed cloud. The planet Earth even resemble the color appearance of the color space.

Planet, potentially suitable for life, found in the past, but none yet so did not meet all the criteria proposed by scientists sustain life. Other planets were mostly gas giants. Therefore, the discovery of new exoplanets was made a huge step forward. “A very important barrier has been overcome,” – said David Charbonneau of the Harvard. Researchers have reported an amazing discovery in the journal Science in April of 2013: according to them, on one of the planets temperature “in Hawaii,” and on the other – “cool as Alaska».

Other planets discovered “Kepler”, do not meet all the criteria that would give them the right to be considered planets suitable for life of all kinds of living creatures – from microbes to man.

Terrestrial telescopes are also able to detect planets outside our solar system, but the “Kepler” is much more promising: it is the first space mission, which has set a similar goal.

In the last four years, “Kepler” paid attention mainly to the area the Milky Way, in which the observed brightness fluctuations, which is a sign of planets passing in front of the stars, in this area there are more than 150,000 stars.

According to Sobek, even if the days of the “Kepler” has already numbered, scientists still have work to do: to keep a lot of unexplored data. “I think that the most interesting and exciting discoveries to occur within the next two years. The mission is not yet completed, “- says one of the leading scientists William Borutski. The fact that processing of the data needs to approximately the time period.

«This is one of the saddest days of my life. “Kepler” is now crippled, and although he is able to perform different functions, it is unable to do things for which it was intended, “- said Alan Boss of the Carnegie Institution of Washington.

In 2017, NASA plans to launch a new mission – to transit interplanetary research satellite (TESS – Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite), designed to search for planets around nearby stars.

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