Recent Developments

James Lattimer

Department of Physics & Astronomy449 ESS Bldg.

Stony Brook University

September 11, 2017

AST 100: Astronomy Todayjames.lattimer@stonybrook.edu

James Lattimer Recent Developments

Black Holes

I First direct detection of gravitational waves by LIGO,caused by the merger of two massive black holes. Thiswas followed by the detection of two additional mergers.New rumors suggest LIGO/Virgo has now seen themerger of two neutron stars and that this merger wasaccompanied by a gamma-ray burst and/or an opticalsignal. Speculation is that an optical signal could be dueto energy emitted from the formation of heavy elementsin matter tidally ejected during the merger. If so, thiswould confirm a hypothesis I proposed in 1974!

I Detection of what might be the second largest black holein our galaxy, weighing about 100,000 times as much asthe Sun (the largest, at the center, weighs 4.5 millionsolar masses).

James Lattimer Recent Developments

LIGO

James Lattimer Recent Developments

Asteroid

I The large asteroid that came within 4.4 million miles ofus in early September discovered to have two moons.

NASA Goldstone

James Lattimer Recent Developments

Exoplanets

I A planet discovered orbiting Proxima Centauri, thenearest star to the Earth’s sun.

ESO

James Lattimer Recent Developments

MarsI The ESO/Roscosmos probe ExoMars arrived at Mars.

Although its surface lander failed and crashed on Mars,the orbiter remains operational.

I An ice deposit discovered on Mars which is bigger thanLake Superior or New Mexico.

I Plans are announced bySpaceX to send unmannedlanders to Mars in 2018and later.

NASA

James Lattimer Recent Developments

Jupiter

I Water plumes eruptingfrom Jupiter’s moonEuropa.

I The NASA probe Junoarrives at Jupiter andsettled into anelliptical orbit.

NASA

James Lattimer Recent Developments

Saturn

I Cassini probe detectedhydrogen from waterplumes from the moonEnceladus, suggestingthere are hydrothermalvents in the subsurfaceocean it confirmed in2015.

I Cassini spacecraft willtake a death plungeinto Saturn onSeptember 15 after12 years observingthe Saturn system.

NASA

James Lattimer Recent Developments

Outer Solar System

I The dwarf planetMakemake, which orbitsbeyond Pluto, wasdiscovered to have aminiature moon.

I Evidence unearthed for aNeptune-sized planetorbiting beyond Pluto.This proposal remainsunverified andcontroversial.

NASA

James Lattimer Recent Developments

Solar Flares

NASA

James Lattimer Recent Developments

Space X

I Successful landing ofSpace X launch vehicle.

SpaceX

James Lattimer Recent Developments

Other Discoveries

I Fast radio bursts, some of which repeat.

I ESA Gaia’s satellite shows that stellar close encounterscould disturb the cloud of comets distantly orbiting theSun, hurtling some of them towards Earth.

I Failure to discovery the weakly interacting massiveparticle (WIMP) that could possibly explain dark matter.

I Irregular variations in the brightness of a distant star(known as Tabby’s Star, after its discoverer Tabetha“Tabby” Boyajian of Yale) continue to mystifyastronomers, spawning speculation that they originatefrom some kind of alien megastructure.

James Lattimer Recent Developments