Researchers at MIT have discovered how “greenhouse gases are impacting Earth’s upper atmosphere and, in turn, the objects orbiting within it,” reports Grace Snelling for Fast Company. “If we don’t take action to be more responsible for operating our satellites, the impact is that there are going to be entire regions of low Earth orbit that could become uninhabitable for a satellite,” says graduate student William Parker.
MIT researchers have discovered that increased greenhouse gas emissions in the Earth’s upper atmosphere can “potentially cause catastrophic satellite collision in low-Earth orbit,” reports Bruce Dorminey for Forbes. “When the thermosphere contracts, the decreasing density reduces atmospheric drag — a force that pulls old satellites and other debris down to altitudes where they will encounter air molecules and burn up,” Dorminey explains. “Less drag therefore means extended lifetimes for space junk, which will litter sought-after regions for decades and increase the potential for collisions in orbit.”
MIT researchers have found that high levels of greenhouse gas emissions in the atmosphere may increase the risk of satellite collisions, reports Sachi Kitajima Mulkey for Grist. “The environment is very cluttered already. Satellites are constantly dodging right and left,” says graduate student William Parker. “As long as we are emitting greenhouse gases, we are increasing the probability that we see more collision events between objects in space.”
Associated Press reporter Seth Borenstein writes that MIT scientists have found that climate change could “reduce the available space for satellites in low Earth orbit by anywhere from one-third to 82% by the end of the century, depending on how much carbon pollution is spewed.” Graduate student William Parker explains: “We rely on the atmosphere to clean up our debris. There’s no other way to remove debris. It’s trash. It’s garbage. And there are millions of pieces of it.”
A new study by MIT researchers finds that “climate change could threaten the future use of satellites and significantly reduce the number of spacecraft that can safety orbit Earth,” reports Julia Jacobo for ABC News. The researchers found “global warming is causing space debris to linger above the planet for longer periods of time, leaving less space for functioning satellites and posing a growing problem for the long-term use of Earth’s orbital space,” Jacobo explains. “Reducing greenhouse gas emissions doesn't just help us on Earth, it also has the potential to protect us from long-term sustainability issues in space,” explains graduate student William Parker.
A study by MIT scientists has found that increased greenhouse gas emissions will shrink the Earth’s upper atmosphere causing a “drop in the satellite-carrying capacity of low Earth orbit,” repots Passant Rabie for Gizmodo. “Without an atmosphere, most space debris would remain in orbit indefinitely,” Parker said. “As the atmosphere thins, debris lingers longer, increasing the risk to active satellites. With the growing consequences of space debris, we can accommodate fewer debris-generating events.”
Researchers at MIT have found that climate change could raise the risk of satellite collisions, reports Justine Calma for The Verge. “We’ve really reached the end of that era of ‘space is big,’ and I think we should stop saying that,” says graduate student, William Parker. “People don’t realize that the space sustainability issue is really an issue that impacts them directly.”
USA Today reporter Eric Lagatta writes that a new study by MIT researchers finds that X-ray flashes emanating from a supermassive black hole located 270 million light-years from the Milky Way could be caused by a dead stellar remnant, or white dwarf. The researchers believe that the white dwarf could be “spinning precariously on the edge of the black hole, causing the explosions of high-energy light.”
MIT astronomers have detected X-ray flashes erupting from a supermassive black hole that seem to be caused by a nearby white dwarf, reports Will Dunham for Reuters. “It is probably the closest object we've ever observed orbiting around a supermassive black hole,” says graduate student Megan Masterson. “This is extremely close to the black hole's event horizon.”
MIT astronomers have witnessed flashes of X-rays shooting out of a black hole and believe that a dead star, or white dwarf, passing close by the black hole could be causing the eruptions, reports Mark Kaufman for Mashable. “The astronomers ran simulations of what could drive these unusual bursts of energy,” writes Kaufman. “The most plausible outcome is this brazen white dwarf (the spent core of a sun-like star), which is about one-tenth the mass of our sun. It's shedding its dense, outer layer and triggering these pulses of X-rays.”
Space.com reporter Robert Lea writes that using the XMM-Newton X-ray telescope, MIT astronomers have observed bursts of X-rays erupting with increasing frequency from a supermassive black hole, a behavior they think could be caused by a “dead stellar core, or white dwarf, daringly teetering on the edge of the black hole.” Lea explains that “if the source of these strange episodes is a finely balanced white dwarf, the researchers theorize that it could be detected using ripples in space and time called gravitational waves emitted from the system.”
Graduate student William Parker SM '22 has discovered that two geomagnetic storms have “affected the orbits of thousands of satellites, resulting in an unprecedented mass migration,” reports Passant Rabie for Gizmodo. “Geomagnetic storms are disturbances in Earth’s magnetosphere—a large bubble of magnetic field around our planet—caused by solar wind,” explains Rabie.
New research by graduate student William Parker SM '22 has found that two geomagnetic storms have led to the mass migrations of thousands of satellites in low Earth orbit, reports Jeff Foust for Space News. “This is a significant impact,” says Parker. “This is critical infrastructure to all of our space operations moving forward, and it will only become more important as time goes on.”
MIT researchers have analyzed tiny particles from a distant asteroid and found that a weak magnetic field may have helped form the outer planets in our solar system, reports Sabrina Lam for The Boston Globe. In the future, the researchers hope to use samples from other celestial bodies to identify magnetic fields in our universe. “An exciting thing that’s probably going to happen in the next few decades,” says Prof. Benjamin Weiss, “is that we’re going to start bringing samples back from comets.”
The final round of the Zero Robotics competition at the MIT Media Lab featured high school students from around the country facing off in a programming challenge using the SPHERES satellites aboard the International Space Station, reports Glenn Jones for NBC Boston. The event “welcomed about 70 middle schoolers from diverse backgrounds to participant in the finals of a robotics competition that featured live dialogue with astronauts on the International Space Station.”