The Latest Articles in history
On August 12, 1978, the International Cometary Explorer (ICE) was launched. The ICE was a part of the Internation Sun-Earth Explorer (ISEE) program which consisted of 3 satellites: ISEE-1 and ISEE-3 (the principal US contribution to the International Magnetospheric Study), and ISEE-2 (built and managed by ESA). On October 22, 1977, ISEE-1 and -2 were launched into almost coincident orbits. The orbital period was 57 hours. On August 12, 1978, ISEE-3 was launched and inserted into a "halo" orbit between the Earth and Sun. Later, ISEE-3 was renamed the International Cometary Explorer (ICE) after the completion of its mission in 1982 when it was used to intercept the comet P/Giacobini-Zinner. On September 11, 1985, the spacecraft flew through the tail of the comet.
Read more at:
https://heasarc.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/heasarc/missions/isee3.html
On August 5, 1962, the observation of a distant radio source led to the identification of what was first known as a quasi-stellar astronomical object, or quasar. Up until the 1940s, knowledge of the universe beyond the solar system was primarily based on objects that emitted light in or near the visible spectrum. During the 1940s, this changed as astronomers started to discover objects that gave off radio waves and objects that gave off both visible light and radio waves. Allan Sandage and Thomas Matthews, both astronomers, were working in 1960 when they came across a blue star-like object that emitted intense radio waves. In 1962, radio astronomer Cyril Hazard used his method of observation (lunar occultation) while he was at the University of Sydney using the Parkes Radio Telescope to observe radio sources. After he took the wrong train and missed the chance at studying said sources, observatory director John Bolton and his staff took over. The object they were looking at was called 3C 273 and emitted a huge amount of energy with a very unusual spectrum. Finally, the following year, Maarten Schmidt used the Hale optical telescope at California's Mount Palomar observatory and analyzed the spectrum's strange wide emission lines. He realized that the wide emission lines were hydrogen lines shifted 16 percent toward the red. A red shift of this magnitude led him to realize that the object was moving away from Earth at almost 30,000 miles per second (one-sixth the speed of light) and was 3 billion light-years away; it was farther away and brighter than most known galaxies. Astronomers named this object quasi-stellar radio sources, which a NASA scientist later shortened to quasars. Today, because not all of them emit radio waves, they're called quasi-stellar objects or QSOs.
Read more at:
https://www.wired.com/2010/08/0805first-quasar-located/
On July 25 1978, Louise Joy Brown, the world’s first test tube baby, was born. After trying for nine years to conceive, John Brown and his wife Lesley met obste trician Dr Patrick Steptoe and his research partner Dr Robert Edwards in 1977. Steptoe and Edwards’s were working in the experimental field of invitro fertilization and were able to successfully implant an embryo into Ms Brown (notably from a petri dish, rather than a test tube). Nine months later, Louise Brown was delivered through a planned cesarean section at Oldham (England) District General Hospital. She weighed five pounds and 12 ounces. Public reaction in relation to the success of in vitro fertilization was mixed. The term “Frankenbabies” was later coined. On the day of her birth, the institution’s halls were lined with police officers and when the new family arrived home 100 reporters blocked the streets.
Image Credits:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/health/first-test-tube-baby-is-40-1.4736847
Read more at:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/test-tube-baby-40th-anniversary-world-first-reaction-ivf-louise-brown-a8454021.html
On July 1, 1858, the Wallace-Darwin theory of evolution was presented to the Linnaean Society in London. Darwin started his theory in 1837, after his journey abroad on the HMS Beagle. His original intent to classify plants and animals turned into a desire to explain how variation came to be. Years later, Darwin received a letter from an English naturalist known as Alfred Russel Wallace. The letter detailed a theory similar to Darwin’s own. After sending Wallace’s paper to Scottish geologist Charles Lyell and English botanist Joseph Hooker (both who had already read Darwin’s paper) a joint paper reading was arranged at a meeting of the Linnaean Society of London. An excerpt from Darwin's unpublished draft was read (part of a chapter titled "On the Variation of Organic Beings in a State of Nature; on the Natural Means of Selection; on the Comparison of Domestic Races and True Species") as well as Wallace's manuscript "On the Tendency of Varieties to Depart Indefinitely From the Original Type." The paper was accepted for publication in the society's Proceedings later that year.
Read more at:
https://www.wired.com/2011/07/0701darwin-wallace-linnaean-society-london/
On June 19, 1963, Valentina Tereshkova (the first woman in space) returned to Earth after spending almost three days in space. Valentina piloted the Vostok 6 and orbited Earth 48 times. She never made a second trip to space. Upon her return, she was given the title Hero of the Soviet Union. She later received the Order of Lenin and the Gold Star Medal. In 1969, Tereshkova graduated with distinction from the Zhukovsky Military Air Academy. She later became a member of the Communist Party, and proceeded to represent the USSR at numerous international events, including the United Nations conference for the International Women’s Year in 1975. From 1968-1987, Tereshkova headed the Soviet Committee for Women, was pictured on postage stamps, and had a crater on the moon named after her.
Read more at:
https://www.space.com/21571-valentina-tereshkova.html
The planet Haumea, the 3rd largest trans-Neptunian dwarf planet, was identified as having a ring around it. This discovery was made, as o...
Image Credit: Lukas Panzarin / Andrea Cau A new dinosaur, Halszkaraptor escuilliei, that had lived 75 million years ago in what...
Image: Artist's concept via NRAO / AUI/ NSF; D. Berry. Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/millimeter Array (ALMA) in C...
According to a new long-term study of Saturn using data collected by the Cassini spacecraft, a warming, high-altitude vortex with a h...
