Stardust capsule returns to Earth

[DoYouEverWonder]

15 January 2006



A capsule containing dust collected from stars and a comet has landed on Earth after a seven-year space mission.

The US probe Stardust released the capsule as it flew past Earth after a 3 billion-mile (4.7 billion km) trip.

The capsule plunged through the atmosphere and touched down in the Utah desert at 0312 (1012 GMT).

Scientists believe the pristine particles snatched from a comet and interstellar space will give insights into the origins of the Solar System.

<snip>

The main parachute opened at about 3km (10,000ft), and brought the capsule down to land on a military base southwest of Salt Lake City.

"All stations, we have touchdown," an announcer declared to a jubilant control room.

It is the first time in history that a space mission has brought back such material.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4614222.stm



This is so cool. This is the sort of thing we should be putting our brightest and best on instead of spending billions trying to find bigger and better ways to kill people.


Believe it or not, we are stardust.

[jody]

1. The scientific and engineering knowledge and skills required to do

the job is mind-boggling.

[psychopomp]

2. Fantastic!

I am sure that the capsule will contain some surprises!

[soothsayer]

6. Germs and viruses that will wipe out humanity

Bet that's what's in there...!

[nodehopper]

10. maybe if this were a Jerry Bruckheimer movie...but it's not!

[Peace Patriot]

3. DoYouEverWonder, you are so right!

his is the sort of thing we should be putting our brightest and best on instead of spending billions trying to find bigger and better ways to kill people.

Throw Diebold and ES&s election theft machines into 'Boston Harbor' NOW!

We can do it! We can have transparent, verifiable elections once again! And I guarantee you, everything will change when we do. This great, progressive, creative country will rise again! It was never really absent. It is still here. We just have to COUNT ALL THE VOTES!

[DoYouEverWonder]

4. LOL, we can go to outer space

collect stardust and come back to earth, but we can't count votes. What's wrong with this picture?

[DoYouEverWonder]

5. Recruits needed to sift stardust

This sounds really cool:

Recruits needed to sift stardust

15 January 2006

Members of the public are being asked to help study cosmic dust samples returned by the Stardust space mission.

A capsule containing dust from stars millions of light years away landed in the Utah desert on Sunday.

The particles are buried in gel that was exposed to the interstellar dust stream during the probe's seven-year voyage around the Solar System.

Scientists need volunteers to sift through millions of pictures of the gel to locate the few dozen tiny grains.

The project, known as Stardust@home, has been set up by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley.

"No-one has ever had a contemporary interstellar dust particle in the lab, ever, to study," senior fellow Andrew Westphal told the BBC News website. "It is really a unique opportunity."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4607318.stm


Sounds better then playing spider solitaire.

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

11. I've signed my computer up for the project

Currently I have two computers working on three different distributed computing projects- when Stardust goes online in March, that'll be four projects I'm on.

Don't waste your computer! Join up! Help out! http://boinc.berkeley.edu/

[drm604]

12. You can pre-register for stardust@home now.

http://stardustathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/prereg.html

[Toots]

7. Is this the first time we had a landing on land instead of water?

I am not talking about space shuttles, I am talking about space capsules that use parachutes for landing..I think this is quite interesting in that they had a pin point landing on earth and not somewhere out in the South China Sea or elsewhere...

[DoYouEverWonder]

8. The Russians do it all the time

However, the last time we tried to bring back samples from somewhere the parachute failed and smushed all the data.

[Wilms]

9. Very good to hear.

http://stardust.jpl.nasa.gov/home/index.html

[Moochy]

13. "Cosmic Booty"

The news anchors just love saying this, referring to the star dust. Upon examination, I too like saying it. Cosmic bootay!