blue marble space institute of science

Crushing Rocks and Records – IODP Expedition 399

“Core on deck!” The call, which normally would have elicited a flurry of excitement and urgency from scientists to get ready to receive a new core, instead brought about a groan of fatigue from the scientists sitting around me trying to catch a small break at the picnic table. We were well underway on IODP Expedition 399, aboard the ocean drilling research vessel JOIDES Resolution. Our research team, composed of 51 scientists and technicians, had been selected from around the […]

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From Earth, With Love.

Written by Sarah Treadwell – BMSIS Science Communication and Education Affiliate In 1977, NASA launched two of the most iconic and beloved spacecraft of all time. When Voyager 1 & 2 launched, they set on a course to sail past the outer planets of our solar system. Now 46 years later, Voyager 1 continues to sail outward, presently 50 billion miles away into interstellar space, Voyager 2 is at 20.3 billion miles away. Unfortunately, we now await word of the […]

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The Art of Communication

Written by Sarah Treadwell – BMSIS Science Communication and Education Affiliate. Shock rippled through the space community this past February 6th when it was announced that JPL would be letting go 530 of its employees. Of course, first my heart goes out to people going through such difficult circumstances. However, upon hearing this news, it gave me reminiscent feelings of a reaction to a similar shocking announcement; occurring just months before I set sail as an on-board communicator on the […]

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Oxygen on Mars? Don’t hold your breath.

Sarah Treadwell – BMSIS Science Writer Astrobiology asks three fundamental questions: How does life begin, could there be life beyond Earth and, if so, how can we detect it? For decades, NASA’s sights have been set towards Mars for answers. Previous research presented evidence of an oxygen-rich atmosphere in its ancient past; however a new paper released challenges this. A study from researchers at Washington University suggests that we may need to look for signs of life with a new […]

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Why Space Exploration Matters

By Sarah Treadwell – BMSIS Science Writer Recently, several aerospace companies and billionaires have sent their own rockets up to space. The debates started before lift off… What is the definition of astronaut? What counts as “going to space”? The conversations were fast and furious, with many expressing frustration of billionaires using their money on what seemed as joy rides, rather than spend it on other Earth based causes. With all of the new recent launches, a long standing question […]

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Outreach: The Rise of Artificial Intelligence in Astronomy

BMSIS Young Scientist Sumeet Kulkami gave a talk at the British Council’s “Cafe Scientifique.” Read his reflections below. I started with a brief history of the development of Artificial intelligence, and highlighted the difference in how a regular computer algorithm works as opposed to a machine learning algorithm, using the popular Towers of Hanoi toy. I also talked about how the development of computing power and AI was best reflected in how they conquered two games: chess and GO respectively. […]

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Outreach: Inspiring the Younger Generation

Blue Marble Space Institute of Science Young Scientist Participants at NASA Ames, Genesis Berlanga and Stephanie Meursing, conducted an outreach workshop with four and five-year-old students at Stanford Madera Grove Childcare Center which was facilitated by their instructor, Vanya Chandra. We spoke about planetary science, geology, our X-ray diffraction work, and spectroscopy work at NASA, in support of the Mars Science Laboratory Curiosity rover and the CheMin instrument. The activity included talking about rocks, rover instruments, and passing around various […]

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Outreach: Society lives by faith and develops by science

BMSIS Young Scientist Grishma Gupte led an outreach event at the University of Mumbai, India. The Young Scientist Program (YSP) of BMSIS gave me the opportunity to promote science in the society. On 25th February, 2018 I conducted an outreach event for students of a certificate course in Astronomy and Astrophysics at the University of Mumbai. The topic of my presentation was Astrobiology, and it consisted of various aspects ranging from the basic definition of life to exoplanets. I always […]

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The Ethics of Reproducibility in Computational Research

Sumeet Kulkarni shares his ethics & society case study, which he completed as part of our Young Scientist Program. I was motivated to choose this topic for study since my own BMSIS YSP project involved the computational modelling of bubbles growing in lava. The vesicles they leave behind when the lava solidifies into rock are important proxies in determining the atmospheric pressures at that epoch. This method has already been put into use in field studies of vesicle size distributions in […]

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Afshin Khan & SustainSpace Win Overall Prize at ESA Contest

BMSIS scientist Dr. Afshin Khan, along with her team member Mark Ciotola, was selected as the overall winner for the 2017 Space Exploration Masters competition. The contest was initiated by the European Space Agency (ESA) as well as other government and private space organizations. The team’s project was titled “Plant germination during spaceflight to test for adaptability of crops in long term space missions.” Dr. Khan and colleagues plan to continue developing their idea for improving plant yield through space […]

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