Carnival of Space #335
Welcome to the second week of 2014, where Brian Wang of Next Big Future presents the 335th Carnival of Space. Every week, astronomy and space science bloggers from round world submit samples of their best writing to the carnival editor, who compiles them into a weekly list of news and updates for the Carnival of Space. This week isn’t a huge one, so you’ll have time to read the articles extra carefully. First up is Universe Today with their article about asteroid 2014 AA, the first to be discovered of the year and which impacted Eart above the Atlantic ocean very shortly after. Then comes a review of the movie Gravity on RiofrioSpaceTime, and a handy guide from Vega0.0 on calculating the magnfication power of different eyepieces for your telescope.
This week’s carnival host, Next Big Future, offers up four articles. The first takes a look at an attempt to update the old Orion starship concept. The orion starship detonates a series of atomic bombs behind a blast shield, so that the resulting shock waves can push it forward to higher and higher speeds. The second article takes a look at an exotic form of matter which may have existed shortly after the Big Bang, and how it could be used as starship fuel. The third article highlights recent advances in the design of a fusion power reactor and the final article discusses a kickstarted project to design a new propulsion system for cubesates, and looks at some innovate projects that such a system make possible.
Finally we have Universe Today’s second submissions (a prediction on what comets might be visible in 2014), and my own Urban Astronomer article about the powerful jets of water spewing into space from Saturn’s moon Enceladus.