Portal:Outer space

The Outer space Portal

Introduction

Because of the hazards of a vacuum, astronauts must wear a pressurized space suit while off-Earth and outside their spacecraft.

Outer space (or simply space) is the expanse that exists beyond Earth's atmosphere and between celestial bodies. It contains ultra-low levels of particle densities, constituting a near-perfect vacuum of predominantly hydrogen and helium plasma, permeated by electromagnetic radiation, cosmic rays, neutrinos, magnetic fields and dust. The baseline temperature of outer space, as set by the background radiation from the Big Bang, is 2.7 kelvins (−270 °C; −455 °F).

The plasma between galaxies is thought to account for about half of the baryonic (ordinary) matter in the universe, having a number density of less than one hydrogen atom per cubic metre and a kinetic temperature of millions of kelvins. Local concentrations of matter have condensed into stars and galaxies. Intergalactic space takes up most of the volume of the universe, but even galaxies and star systems consist almost entirely of empty space. Most of the remaining mass-energy in the observable universe is made up of an unknown form, dubbed dark matter and dark energy.

Outer space does not begin at a definite altitude above Earth's surface. The Kármán line, an altitude of 100 km (62 mi) above sea level, is conventionally used as the start of outer space in space treaties and for aerospace records keeping. Certain portions of the upper stratosphere and the mesosphere are sometimes referred to as "near space". The framework for international space law was established by the Outer Space Treaty, which entered into force on 10 October 1967. This treaty precludes any claims of national sovereignty and permits all states to freely explore outer space. Despite the drafting of UN resolutions for the peaceful uses of outer space, anti-satellite weapons have been tested in Earth orbit.

The concept that the space between the Earth and the Moon must be a vacuum was first proposed in the 17th century after scientists discovered that air pressure decreased with altitude. The immense scale of outer space was grasped in the 20th century when the distance to the Andromeda galaxy was first measured. Humans began the physical exploration of space later in the same century with the advent of high-altitude balloon flights. This was followed by crewed rocket flights and, then, crewed Earth orbit, first achieved by Yuri Gagarin of the Soviet Union in 1961. The economic cost of putting objects, including humans, into space is very high, limiting human spaceflight to low Earth orbit and the Moon. On the other hand, uncrewed spacecraft have reached all of the known planets in the Solar System. Outer space represents a challenging environment for human exploration because of the hazards of vacuum and radiation. Microgravity has a negative effect on human physiology that causes both muscle atrophy and bone loss. (Full article...)

Selected article

The Oort cloud (artist's rendering pictured) is a hypothesized spherical cloud of comets that may lie nearly a light-year from the Sun. It is thought to comprise two separate regions: a spherical outer Oort cloud and a disc-shaped inner Oort cloud, or Hills cloud; the outer extent of the cloud defines the boundary of the Solar System. Objects in the Oort cloud are largely composed of ices, such as water, ammonia, and methane and are thought to have formed close to the Sun, later being scattered into space by the gravitational effects of the giant planets early in the Solar System's evolution. Although no confirmed direct observations of the Oort cloud have been made, astronomers believe that it is the source of all long-period and Halley-type comets entering the inner Solar System, as well as many of the Centaurs and Jupiter-family comets.

Selected picture

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  TRACE image of sunspots

  Sunspot

  Credit: NASA/TRACE

  A TRACE image of sunspots on the surface, or photosphere, of the sun from September 2002, is taken in the far ultraviolet on a relatively quiet day for solar activity. However, the image still shows a large sunspot group visible as a bright area near the horizon. Although sunspots are relatively cool regions on the surface of the sun, the bright glowing gas flowing around the sunspots have a temperature of over one million °C (1.8 million °F). The high temperatures are thought to be related to the rapidly changing magnetic field loops that channel solar plasma.
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  Husband Hill

  Photo credit: Spirit rover

  A 360° panorama taken during the descent from the summit of Husband Hill, one of the Columbia Hills in Gusev crater, Mars. This stitched image is composed of 405 individual images taken with five different filters on the panoramic camera over the course of five Martian days.
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  Order of magnitude

  Image credit: Dave Jarvis

  An illustration of relative astronomical orders of magnitude, starting with the terrestrial planets of the Solar System in image 1 (top left) and ending with the largest known star, VY Canis Majoris, at the bottom right. The biggest celestial body in each image is shown on the left of the next frame.
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  Astronaut Bruce McCandless using a Manned Maneuvering Unit

  Manned Maneuvering Unit

  Credit: NASA

  A Manned Maneuvering Unit (MMU) is a jet pack (propulsion backpack that snaps onto the back of the space suit) which has been used on untethered spacewalks from NASA's Space Shuttle, allowing an astronaut to move independently from the shuttle. The MMU was used on three Shuttle missions in 1984. It was first tested on February 7 during mission STS-41-B by astronauts Bruce McCandless II (seen here) and Robert L. Stewart.

  
  
  
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  Lunar rover

  Photo credit: Harrison Schmitt

  Astronaut Eugene Cernan makes a short test drive of the lunar rover (officially, Lunar Roving Vehicle or LRV) during the early part of the first Apollo 17 extravehicular activity. The LRV was only used in the last three Apollo missions, but it performed without any major problems and allowed the astronauts to cover far more ground than in previous missions. All three LRVs were abandoned on the Moon.
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  Space Shuttle Atlantis launch plume

  Space Shuttle program

  Credit: NASA/Fir0002

  The launch of Space Shuttle Atlantis on STS-98, February 7 2001, at sunset. The sun is behind the camera, and the shape of the plume is cast across the vault of the sky, intersecting the rising full moon. The top portion of the plume is bright because it is illuminated directly by the sun; the lower portions are in the Earth's shadow. After launch, the shuttle must engage in a pitch and roll program so that the vehicle is below the external tank and SRBs, as evidenced in the plume trail. The vehicle climbs in a progressively flattening arc, because achieving low orbit requires much more horizontal than vertical acceleration.

  
  
  
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  James Webb Space Telescope

  Photo: NASA/MSFC/David Higginbotham/Emmett Given

  Six beryllium mirror segments of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) undergoing a series of cryogenic tests at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. The JWST is a planned space telescope that is a joint collaboration of 20 countries. It will orbit the Sun approximately 1,500,000 km (930,000 mi) beyond the Earth, around the L₂ Lagrange point. It is expected to launch in December 2021.
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  STS-116

  Photo credit: NASA

  NASA astronaut Robert Curbeam (left) and European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Christer Fuglesang participate in STS-116's first of three planned sessions of extra-vehicular activity (EVA) as construction resumes on the International Space Station. The landmasses depicted in the background are the South Island (left) and North Island (right) of New Zealand.
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  Earth

  The Blue Marble

  Credit: The Apollo 17 crew

  "The Blue Marble" is a famous photograph of Earth. NASA officially credits the image to the entire Apollo 17 crew — Eugene Cernan, Ronald Evans and Jack Schmitt — all of whom took photographic images during the mission. Apollo 17 passed over Africa during daylight hours and Antarctica is also illuminated. The photograph was taken approximately five hours after the spacecraft's launch, while en route to the Moon. Apollo 17, notably, was the last manned lunar mission; no humans since have been at a range where taking a "whole-Earth" photograph such as "The Blue Marble" would be possible.
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  Pillars of Creation

  Photograph: NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team

  The Pillars of Creation, a series of elephant trunks of interstellar gas and dust in the Eagle Nebula, are the subject of a famous Hubble Space Telescope photograph taken in 1995. They are so named because the depicted gas and dust, while being eroded by the light from nearby stars, are in the process of creating new stars. Shown here is a 2014 rephotograph, which was unveiled in 2015 as part of the telescope's 25th anniversary celebrations.
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  Kepler's Supernova

  Supernova remnant

  Credit: NASA

  This Supernova remnant of Kepler's Supernova (SN 1604) is made up of the materials left behind by the gigantic explosion of a star. There are two possible routes to this end: either a massive star may cease to generate fusion energy in its core, and collapse inward under the force of its own gravity, or a white dwarf star may accumulate material from a companion star until it reaches a critical mass and undergoes a similar collapse. In either case, the resulting supernova explosion expels much or all of the stellar material with great force.

  
  
  
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  Jupiter

  Image credit: NASA

  An animated view of Voyager I's approach to Jupiter. One frame of this image was taken each Jupiter day (approximately 10 hours) between January 6 and February 9, 1979, as the space probe flew from 58 million to 31 million kilometers from Jupiter during that time. The small, round, dark spots appearing in some frames are the shadows cast by the moons passing between Jupiter and the Sun, while the small, white flashes around the planet, are the moons themselves.
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  Andromeda Galaxy

  Photo: Adam Evans

  The Andromeda Galaxy is a spiral galaxy approximately 2.5 million light-years away. The image, created using a hydrogen-alpha filter, also shows Messier objects 32 and 110, as well as NGC 206 and the star Nu Andromedae. On December 15, 1612, German astronomer Simon Marius became the first person to describe the galaxy using a telescope.
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  Needle Galaxy

  Photograph: Ken Crawford

  NGC 4565 (also known as the Needle Galaxy) is an edge-on spiral galaxy about 30 to 50 million light-years away in the constellation Coma Berenices. NGC 4565 is a giant spiral galaxy more luminous than the Andromeda Galaxy, and has a population of roughly 240 globular clusters, more than the Milky Way.
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  Europa (moon)

  Photo credit: NASA/JPL

  Realistic-color mosaic of images of Jupiter's moon Europa taken by NASA's Jupiter orbiter Galileo in 1995 and 1998. This view of the moon's anti-Jovian hemisphere shows numerous lineae, linear features created via a tectonic process in which crustal plates of water ice floating on a subsurface ocean (kept warm by tidal flexing) shift in relative position. Reddish regions are areas where the ice has a higher mineral content. The north polar region is at right. (Geologic features are annotated in Commons.)
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  NGC 4414

  Photograph: Hubble Heritage Team (AURA/STScI/NASA)

  NGC 4414 is an unbarred spiral galaxy about 62 million light-years away in the constellation Coma Berenices. It is a flocculent spiral galaxy, with short segments of spiral structure but without the dramatic well-defined spiral arms of a grand design spiral. NGC 4414 is a very isolated galaxy, with no signs of past interactions with other galaxies.
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  Astronaut Steve Robinson on a spacewalk, August 2005

  Extra-vehicular activity

  Credit: NASA

  Extra-vehicular activity (EVA) is work done by an astronaut away from the Earth and outside of his or her spacecraft. EVAs may be made outside a craft orbiting Earth (a spacewalk) or on the surface of the Moon (a moonwalk). Shown here is Steve Robinson on the first EVA to perform an in-flight repair of the Space Shuttle (August 3 2005).
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  Geology of Venus

  Image credit: NASA

  A radar image of the surface of Venus, centered at 180 degrees east longitude. This composite image was created from mapping by the Magellan probe, supplemented by data gathered by the Pioneer orbiter, with simulated hues based on color images recorded by Venera 13 and 14. No probe has been able to survive more than a few hours on Venus's surface, which is completely obscured by clouds, because the atmospheric pressure is some 90 times that of the Earth's, and its surface temperature is around 450 °C (842 °F).
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  The Day the Earth Smiled

  Photograph: NASA/JPL-Caltech/SSI

  The Day the Earth Smiled refers to the date July 19, 2013, on which the Cassini spacecraft turned to image Saturn, its entire ring system, and the Earth from a position where Saturn eclipsed the Sun. Cassini imaging team leader and planetary scientist Carolyn Porco called for all the world's people to reflect on humanity's place in the cosmos, to marvel at life on Earth, and to look up and smile in celebration. The final mosaic, shown here, was released four months later and includes planets Earth, Mars, and Venus, and a host of Saturnian moons.
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  Earthrise, as seen by Apollo 8

  Apollo 8

  Credit: William Anders

  "Earthrise," the first occasion in which humans saw the Earth seemingly rising above the surface of the Moon, taken during the Apollo 8 mission on December 24, 1968. This view was seen by the crew at the beginning of its fourth orbit around the Moon, although the very first photograph taken was in black-and-white. Note that the Earth is in shadow here. A photo of a fully lit Earth would not be taken until the Apollo 17 mission.

  
  
  
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  Pale Blue Dot

  Photo credit: NASA/JPL

  Pale Blue Dot is the name given to this 1990 photo of Earth taken from Voyager 1 when its vantage point reached the edge of the Solar System, a distance of roughly 3.7 billion miles (6 billion kilometres). Earth can be seen as a blueish-white speck approximately halfway down the brown band to the right. The light band over Earth is an artifact of sunlight scattering in the camera's lens, resulting from the small angle between Earth and the Sun. Carl Sagan came up with the idea of turning the spacecraft around to take a composite image of the Solar System. Six years later, he reflected, "All of human history has happened on that tiny pixel, which is our only home."
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  Planum Boreum

  Photo credit: Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter

  False-color Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter image of a side of the Chasma Boreale, a canyon in the polar ice cap of the Planum Boreum (north pole of Mars). Light browns are layers of surface dust, greys and blues are layers of water and carbon dioxide ice. Regular geometric cracking is indicative of higher concentrations of water ice.
  
  The Planum Boreum's permanent ice cap has a maximum depth of 3 km (1.9 mi). It is roughly 1200 km (750 mi) in diameter, an area equivalent to about 1½ times the size of Texas. The Chasma Boreale is up to 100 km (62.5 mi) wide and features scarps up to 2 km (1.25 mi) high. For a comparison, the Grand Canyon is approximately 1.6 km (1 mi) deep in some places and 446 km (279 mi) long but only up to 24 km (15 mi) wide.

Space-related portals

General images

The following are images from various outer space-related articles on Wikipedia.

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  Conventional anti-satellite weapons such as the SM-3 missile remain legal under the law of armed conflict, even though they create hazardous space debris (from Outer space)
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  A wide field view of outer space as seen from Earth's surface at night. The interplanetary dust cloud is visible as the horizontal band of zodiacal light, including the false dawn (edges) and gegenschein (center), which is visually crossed by the Milky Way (from Outer space)
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  Saudi officials inspect a crashed PAM-D module in January 2001. (from Space debris)
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  A computer-generated animation by the European Space Agency representing space debris in low earth orbit at the current rate of growth compared to mitigation measures being taken. (from Space debris)
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  Tupan Patera on Jupiter's moon Io (from Space exploration)
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  Cosmic dust of the Horsehead Nebula as revealed by the Hubble Space Telescope. (from Cosmic dust)
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  Space debris identified as WT1190F, burning up in a fireball over Sri Lanka. (from Space debris)
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  Major elements of 200 stratospheric interplanetary dust particles. (from Cosmic dust)
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  Illustration of Earth's atmosphere gradual transition into outer space (from Outer space)
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  Surface of Mars by the Spirit rover (2004) (from Space exploration)
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  Cosmic dust of the Andromeda Galaxy as revealed in infrared light by the Spitzer Space Telescope. (from Cosmic dust)
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  Self-portrait of Curiosity rover on Mars's surface (from Space exploration)
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  Comet 103P/Hartley (2010) (from Space exploration)
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  A micrometeoroid left this crater on the surface of Space Shuttle Challenger's front window on STS-7. (from Space debris)
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  Reconstruction of solar activity over 11,400 years. Period of equally high activity over 8,000 years ago marked. (from Space climate)
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  Artist's impression of dust formation around a supernova explosion. (from Cosmic dust)
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  Infographic showing the space debris situation in different kinds of orbits around Earth (from Space debris)
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  A drifting thermal blanket photographed in 1998 during STS-88 (from Space debris)
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  Model of Vostok spacecraft (from Space exploration)
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  Astronomers used the James Webb Space Telescope to image the warm dust around a nearby young star, Fomalhaut, in order to study the first asteroid belt ever seen outside of the Solar System in infrared light. (from Cosmic dust)
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  View of an orbital debris hole made in the panel of the Solar Max satellite. (from Space debris)
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  Debris density in low Earth orbit (from Space debris)
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  V-2 Rocket in the Peenemünde Museum (from Space exploration)
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  The sparse plasma (blue) and dust (white) in the tail of comet Hale–Bopp are being shaped by pressure from solar radiation and the solar wind, respectively.
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  NASA computer-generated image of debris objects in Earth orbit, c. 2005. (from Space debris)
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  Interstellar medium and astrosphere meeting (from Interstellar medium)
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  Artistic image of a rocket lifting from a Saturn moon (from Space exploration)
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  Earth and the Moon as seen from cislunar space on the 2022 Artemis 1 mission (from Outer space)
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  Zodiacal light caused by cosmic dust. (from Cosmic dust)
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  Smooth chondrite interplanetary dust particle. (from Cosmic dust)
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  Illustration of a satellite breaking up into multiple pieces at higher altitudes. (from Space debris)
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  Growth of tracked objects in orbit and related events; efforts to manage outer space global commons have so far not reduced the debris or the growth of objects in orbit (from Space debris)
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  Asteroid 4 Vesta, imaged by the Dawn spacecraft (2011) (from Space exploration)
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  Objects in Earth orbit including fragmentation debris, November 2020, NASA: ODPO (from Space debris)
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  After reentry, Delta 2 second stage pieces were found in South Africa. (from Space debris)
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  Buzz Aldrin taking a core sample of the Moon during the Apollo 11 mission (from Space exploration)
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  Map showing the Sun located near the edge of the Local Interstellar Cloud and Alpha Centauri about 4 light-years away in the neighboring G-Cloud complex (from Interstellar medium)
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  Spatial density of LEO space debris by altitude, according to 2011 a NASA report to the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (from Space debris)
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  Known orbit planes of Fengyun-1C debris one month after the weather satellite's disintegration by the Chinese ASAT (from Space debris)
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  A computer-generated map of objects orbiting Earth, as of 2005. About 95% are debris, not working artificial satellites (from Outer space)
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  Because of the hazards of a vacuum, astronauts must wear a pressurized space suit while outside their spacecraft.
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  Timeline of the expansion of the universe, where visible space is represented by the circular sections. At left, a dramatic expansion occurs in the inflationary epoch, and at the center, the expansion accelerates. Neither time nor size are to scale. (from Outer space)
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  The distribution of ionized hydrogen (known by astronomers as H II from old spectroscopic terminology) in the parts of the Galactic interstellar medium visible from the Earth's northern hemisphere as observed with the Wisconsin Hα Mapper (Haffner et al. 2003). (from Interstellar medium)
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  Gabbard diagram of almost 300 pieces of debris from the disintegration of the five-month-old third stage of the Chinese Long March 4 booster on 11 March 2000 (from Space debris)
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  Concept for a space-based solar power system to beam energy down to Earth (from Outer space)
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  Concept art for a NASA Vision mission (from Space exploration)
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  The Long Duration Exposure Facility (LDEF) is an important source of information on small-particle space debris. (from Space debris)
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  Spatial density of space debris by altitude according to ESA MASTER-2001, without debris from the Chinese ASAT and 2009 collision events (from Space debris)
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  The first image of Earth taken by a person. South is up. (from Outer space)
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  Bow shock formed by the magnetosphere of the young star LL Orionis (center) as it collides with the Orion Nebula flow
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  Baker-Nunn cameras were widely used to study space debris. (from Space debris)
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  Vanguard 1 is expected to remain in orbit for 240 years. (from Space debris)
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  The original Magdeburg hemispheres (left) used to demonstrate Otto von Guericke's vacuum pump (right)
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  Porous chondrite dust particle (from Cosmic dust)
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  For the first time, the NASA / ESA / Canadian Space Agency / James Webb Space Telescope has observed the chemical signature of carbon-rich dust grains at redshift z ≈ 7, which is roughly equivalent to one billion years after the birth of the Universe, this observation suggests exciting avenues of investigation into both the production of cosmic dust and the earliest stellar populations in our Universe. (from Cosmic dust)
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  Apollo 16 LEM Orion, the Lunar Roving Vehicle and astronaut John Young (1972) (from Space exploration)
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  Astronaut Buzz Aldrin had a personal Communion service when he first arrived on the surface of the Moon. (from Space exploration)
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  A laser-guided observation of the Milky Way Galaxy at the Paranal Observatory in Chile in 2010 (from Outline of space science)
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  Delta-v's in km/s for various orbital maneuvers (from Space exploration)
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  Astronaut Piers Sellers during the third spacewalk of STS-121, a demonstration of orbiter heat shield repair techniques (from Outline of space science)
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  Large-scale matter distribution in a cubic section of the universe. The blue fiber-like structures represent the matter, and the empty regions in between represent the cosmic voids of the intergalactic medium (from Outer space)
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  The diversity found in the different types and scales of astronomical objects make the field of study increasingly specialized. (from Outline of space science)
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  Perseverance's backshell sitting upright on the surface of Jezero Crater (from Space debris)
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  Debris impacts on Mir's solar panels degraded their performance. The damage is most noticeable on the panel on the right, which is facing the camera with a high degree of contrast. Extensive damage to the smaller panel below is due to impact with a Progress spacecraft. (from Space debris)
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  A MESSENGER image from 18,000 km showing a region about 500 km across (2008) (from Space exploration)
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  A proposed timeline of the origin of space, from physical cosmology (from Outline of space science)
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  Herbig–Haro object HH 110 ejects gas through interstellar space. (from Interstellar medium)
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  Crew quarters on Zvezda, the base ISS crew module (from Space exploration)
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  This light-year-long knot of interstellar gas and dust resembles a caterpillar. (from Interstellar medium)
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  The International Space Station is an orbiting laboratory for space applications and habitability. Visible in the background is yellow-green airglow of Earth's ionosphere and the interstellar field of the Milky Way. (from Outer space)
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  Spent upper stage of a Delta II rocket, photographed by the XSS 10 satellite (from Space debris)
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  Voyager 1 is the first artificial object to reach the interstellar medium. (from Interstellar medium)
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  Apollo Command Service Module in lunar orbit (from Space exploration)
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  Three-dimensional structure in Pillars of Creation. (from Interstellar medium)
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  Space Shuttle Endeavour had a major impact on its radiator during STS-118. The entry hole is about 5.5 mm (0.22 in), and the exit hole is twice as large. (from Space debris)
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  Near-Earth space showing the low-Earth (blue), medium Earth (green), and high Earth (red) orbits. The last extends beyond the radius of geosynchronous orbits (from Outer space)
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  A dusty trail from the early Solar System to carbonaceous dust today. (from Cosmic dust)
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  First television image of Earth from space, taken by TIROS-1 (1960) (from Space exploration)
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  Atmospheric attenuation in dB/km as a function of frequency over the EHF band. Peaks in absorption at specific frequencies are a problem, due to atmosphere constituents such as water vapor (H₂O) and carbon dioxide (CO₂). (from Interstellar medium)

Did you know (auto-generated)

• ... that, for the Space 220 Restaurant, Disney reached out to NASA engineers to understand what a space elevator might look like?
• ... that some severe environmental impacts of the invasion of Ukraine can be seen from space?
• ... that the space industry of India has supported the launch of more than 100 domestic satellites and more than 300 foreign satellites?
• ... that Nature's Fynd, producer of microbe-based meat substitutes, is working with NASA to develop a bioreactor for use in space travel?
• ... that Louis W. Roberts was among the highest ranking African-American space program staff at NASA while the Apollo program was underway?

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