This week we're talking about NASA's Kepler mission that heads out in 2009 and celebrates the Year of Astronomy. Specifically, the Kepler mission is searching for other Earth sized and smaller planets that reside in the habitable zone of other star systems. In essence, we are looking for Earth 2.
NASA lists the following scientific objectives:
- Determine the percentage of terrestrial and larger planets there are in or near the habitable zone of a wide variety of stars;
- Determine the distribution of sizes and shapes of the orbits of these planets;
- Estimate how many planets there are in multiple-star systems;
- Determine the variety of orbit sizes and planet reflectivities, sizes, masses and densities of short-period giant planets;
- Identify additional members of each discovered planetary system using other techniques; and
- Determine the properties of those stars that harbor planetary systems.
The interesting thing is that we are truly looking for habitable planets and, in turn, alien life.
A cool part of the mission is that you can put your name on a DVD that will be launched with the satellite. Sign up and you can get a nice certificate that show your participation.
Check it out at http://kepler.nasa.gov/
Do you have a cool website or piece of software we should talk about? Drop me an email at ron.techteacher@gmail.com and let me know.
2 comments:
Ron,
Great stuff as always. Did you happen to catch the Mars rover landing on NASA tv this weekend?
Space exploration is a fun topic for a lot of kids. A teacher in my school is doing a unit on space exploration. You can see what he and his students are working on at http://spacecolony.wikispaces.com
Richard
Richard,
That looks pretty cool. I love space exploration and I think this latest mission to Mars is very important.
Thanks for the link.
Ron
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