Have you ever seen pictures of the Amazon rainforest? It’s mostly flat, but in the wildest, most remote parts of the Amazon near the Peruvian border, there’s a mountain that rises half a kilometer above the flat forest. This mountain, known as Cerro El Cono, is believed to be the peak of an extinct volcano….
Europa, the fourth largest of Jupiter’s 95 moons, holds a special place in our solar system. It is the sixth closest moon to Jupiter and, along with Io, Ganymede, and Callisto, was among the first moons discovered beyond Earth. These moons, known as the Galilean moons, were first observed by the Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei,…
Can you imagine a big bird with legs as thick as our wrists that could hunt monkeys and foxes? A bird that stays with only one mate for life and shares all the responsibilities of a parent. That is the harpy eagle. A first-time sighting of a harpy hawk can sometimes mistake it for an…
Want to feel like you’re on another planet? Head straight to the aforementioned archipelago. It is a UNESCO heritage site. Lying between Yemen and Africa. It is believed to have emerged when Arabia separated from Africa 15 to 20 million years ago. It is still with the African plate. About 40% of the plant species…
The first exoplanet we discovered in transit was OGLE-56-b, discovered in 2002. Located 5,000 light-years away from its parent star, this hot Jupiter (because it is a gas giant like Jupiter) is larger than our own Jupiter. Iron precipitation is thought to occur here at a temperature of 1726 degrees Celsius that creates affinity for…
It is a planet located 48 light years away from Earth. This planet was discovered on December 16, 2009. There is something special about this planet. The entire planet is ocean. The planet orbits the star Gliese 1214 in the constellation Ophiuchus.
N = R*•fp•ne•fl•fi•fc•L “In 1961, Carl’s close friend, fellow astronomer Frank Drake, created an equation for calculating the number of intelligent civilizations in the galaxy.” The Drake equation is: N = R*•fp•ne•fl•fi•fc•L where: N = the number of civilizations in our galaxy with which communication might be possible (i.e. which are on our current past…
NASA has launched four probes into space to communicate with extraterrestrials. Along with that it is used for the study of the universe, the planets of the solar system and so on. Voyager 1 and 2 in 1977. Before this, they were Pioneer 10 in 1972 and Pioneer 11 in 1973.(Out of which Voyager 1…
Enceladus is Saturn’s sixth largest moon, only one-seventh the diameter of our Moon. Perhaps the mysterious sphere in the solar system where extraterrestrial life is most likely! In 1789, British astronomer William Herschel was the first to discover Enceladus, one of Saturn’s inner moons. This discovery was made with the 47 inch telescope he built….
