NASA DAWN Mission: Near-True Colour Image of Vesta impact craters

Image credit: NASA /JPL-Caltech /UCLA /MPS /DLR /IDA

Three impact craters of different sizes, which some have said are arranged in the shape of a snowman, make up one of the most striking features on Vesta, as seen in this view from NASA's Dawn mission.

In this view the three "snowballs" are upside down, so that the shadows make the features easily recognizable.

North is to the lower right in the image, which has a resolution of 230 feet (70 meters) per pixel.

The image is composed of many individual photographs taken between October and December 2011 by Dawn's framing camera.

The NASA Dawn space probe is equipped with two identical European designed cameras, Framing Camera 1 (FC1) and Framing Camera 2 (FC2). 

Should one of the cameras fail during the mission, the other can replace it. 

The mission itself would not be endangered.

Credit: Max Planck Institute

They were obtained during the high-altitude mapping orbit, at about 420 miles (680 kilometers) above Vesta's surface.

The largest of the three craters, Marcia, has a diameter of about 40 miles (60 kilometers). The central crater, which is about 30 miles (50 kilometers) in diameter, is named Calpurnia, and the lower crater, named Minucia, has a diameter of about 14 miles (22 kilometers).

Marcia and Calpurnia are possibly the result of an impact by doublet asteroids, whereas Minucia was formed by a later impact.

To derive the colour information, scientists combined images acquired by the framing camera in two near-infrared channels (0.917 microns and 0.749 microns) and an ultraviolet channel (0.438 microns).

The true colours of the surface of Vesta differ somewhat from what is displayed here, but this mode of reproduction allows subtle changes in material properties across the craters and material ejected from impacts to be detected.

In both Marcia and Calpurnia, landslides can be seen; also, dark material has been exposed below the rim of Marcia.

The Dawn mission to Vesta and Ceres is managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington.

UCLA is responsible for overall Dawn mission science. The framing camera project is funded by the Max Planck Society, DLR and NASA/JPL.

More information about the Dawn Mission is online at: .

ESA Rosetta: First colour image of Comet 67/P

Scientists superimposed images taken with three different filters.

Credit: ESA

The first colour image from the ESA Rosetta spacecraft shows that Comet 67P is even more dark and monochrome than expected.

Despite being carefully assembled from three images taken with red, green and blue filters, the shot still looks effectively black-and-white.

It comes from the Osiris camera, which is on board the orbiting craft that last month made history by dropping a lander onto the comet's surface.

The Osiris team says 67P is "as black as coal" and surprisingly uniform.

The image was released by the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research, which leads the consortium behind the camera.

"We like to refer to Osiris as the eyes of Rosetta," said the instrument's principal investigator Dr Holger Sierks.

But the camera is unlike human eyes, and so the colour image had to be produced by combining three separate shots.

This was no easy task. Rosetta is constantly moving and the comet beneath is spinning, so various changes in angle had to be accounted for.

The result is an image that looks remarkably similar to previous, greyscale views of 67P.

"As it turns out, 67P looks dark grey, in reality almost as black as coal," Dr Sierks said.

By the time the image is brightened enough for us to see the comet's features, it looks much lighter grey - but not what anyone would call colourful.

Using observations from the ground, scientists had already observed that Comet 67P, like many other small bodies in our Solar System, appeared to be grey "on average".

But the new results reveal that it seems to be this dark, coal colour all over - with little variation.

That suggests that its surface composition is fairly uniform and shows no sign of ice patches, which would appear bluish.

The comet's ice is presumably hidden below its dusty, boulder-strewn surface.

Rosette Nebula Blooms with Colour

Terry Hancock sent Space.com this image of the Rosette Nebula taken under a full moon on March 16, 2014 from western Michigan. 

Credit: Terry Hancock | Down Under Observatory

The Rosette Nebula stars blooms with cosmic color in a stunning new image by an amateur astronomer.

Avid astrophotographer Terry Hancock carefully timed this beautiful shot of the Rosette Nebula, shooting for nearly three hours under a full moon to create the nebula view.

"This is work in progress. Normally we wouldn't think of trying to shoot color under a full moon," Hancock wrote Space.com in an email.

"However I have a lot of catching up to do this year due to poor weather and sky conditions and out of desperation."

Hancock captured this Rosette Nebula view on March 16 from western Michigan. For astrophotography fans, this photo is the result of 3x2 minute exposures each RGB bin 1x1 (no luminance) and a total of 18 minutes added to the h-alpha data, which he captured using the QHY11S camera and Takahashi Epsilon-ED180 telescope. The total exposure time 2 hours, 48 minutes.

ESA Herschel Image: Andromeda's Colourful Rings

The ring-like swirls of dust filling the Andromeda galaxy stand out colourfully in this new image from the Herschel Space Observatory, a European Space Agency mission with important NASA participation.

The glow seen here comes from the longer-wavelength, or far, end of the infrared spectrum, giving astronomers the chance to identify the very coldest dust in our galactic neighbor.

These light wavelengths span from 250 to 500 microns, which are a quarter to half of a millimeter in size.

Herschel's ability to detect the light allows astronomers to see clouds of dust at temperatures of only a few tens of degrees above absolute zero.

These clouds are dark and opaque at shorter wavelengths. The Herschel view also highlights spokes of dust between the concentric rings.

The colours in this image have been enhanced to make them easier to see, but they do reflect real variations in the data. The very coldest clouds are brightest in the longest wavelengths, and coloured red here, while the warmer ones take on a bluish tinge.

These data, together with those from other observatories, reveal that other dust properties, beyond just temperature, are affecting the infrared color of the image.

Clumping of dust grains, or growth of icy mantles on the grains towards the outskirts of the galaxy, appear to contribute to these subtle color variations.

These observations were made by Herschel's Spectral and Photometric Imaging Receiver (SPIRE) instrument. 

The data were processed as part of a project to improve methods for assembling mosaics from SPIRE observations.

Light with a wavelength of 250 microns is rendered as blue, 350-micron is green, and 500-micron light is red. Color saturation has been enhanced to bring out the small differences at these wavelengths.

Image credit: ESA/NASA/JPL-Caltech/NHSC

The Mandrill using colour to attract a partner

A photo of a mandril, which can use body odour to identify potential mates, researchers have found, in a study which lends new support to the theory that humans also have the ability to 'sniff out' suitable partners.

The findings, which are reported by an international team of scientists in a paper today, suggest that scent and smell play a far more pivotal role in primates' mate selection than previously thought

Gene therapy cures colour-blind monkeys - health - New Scientist

Gene therapy cures colour-blind monkeys - health - 16 September 2009 - New Scientist

Two colour-blind monkeys nicknamed Dalton and Sam have been "cured" through gene therapy.

The breakthrough could be a prelude to new gene treatments for human vision disorders that currently result in blindness. And because the treated monkeys were "middle aged", it challenges the assumption that gene therapies cannot work in adults because their brain connections are too set in their ways to change beneficially.

A human gene injected into the monkeys' eyes enabled them for the first time to produce Clong-wavelength opsin" the pigment sensitive to red and green light. "That gave them a retina like that of a normal person with full colour vision," says Jay Neitz at the University of Washington in Seattle.

The team used squirrel monkeys because the males are known to be colour-blind, whereas females have full colour vision. Males do have a full set of colour-sensing "cone" cells in their eyes, but they only make pigments for detecting blue and yellow light, making them blind to red and green.

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