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The Tomato That NASA Astronaut Lost in Space 8 Months Ago was Found

The tomato that NASA astronaut Frank Rubio lost on the International Space Station in March 2023 was found 8 months later.At that time, the astronaut lost the tomato he had harvested during the “Veg-5 experiment” and became the subject of jokes at the station. NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli: “We have been accusing our friend Frank, who returned home, of eating this tomato for a long time. “Now we can exonerate him,” he said. Rubio spent 18 to 20 hours of his free time searching for the missing tomatoes, all to no avail. He returned to Earth on September 27, breaking the record for the longest time spent in space (371 days), but there was still no sound from the tomato. However, in a live broadcast on December 6, good news came from the station residents… “We found it!”
Moghbeli said: “We can exonerate him, we found the tomatoes.”
At the end of a research period, the tiny tomatoes were in their Ziploc containers in the safest shape possible after a long time.

NASA’s Mars Helicopter Made Its Last Flight

NASA stated in a statement on January 25, 2024 that the rotors of Ingenuity, the first space helicopter, were damaged during its last flight and could no longer fly. NASA Administrator Bill Nelson stated, “The historic journey of Ingenuity, the first aerial vehicle on another planet, has come to an end.

This extraordinary helicopter flew higher and farther than we had imagined, helping NASA achieve the impossible and do what we do best.” He emphasized that the helicopter exceeded expectations.

The vehicle, which landed on the surface of Mars in February 2021 along with the Perseverance Rover, was designed to weigh 1.8 kilograms.

Its mission was to serve as a reconnaissance vehicle for Perseverance and a test vehicle for future projects.

Although its operation was initially targeted for 30 days, the helicopter served for approximately 3 years. With a total of 72 flights on Mars, it stayed airborne for 129 minutes and covered a distance of 11 miles.

During its last flight on January 18, communication with the Perseverance Rover was lost before landing. Although the connection was later re-established, according to the images collected during the landing, it was determined that at least one of the helicopter’s four rotors was damaged during the landing. Since Mars’ atmosphere is 99% less dense than Earth’s atmosphere, the rotors on the vehicle had to rotate very quickly and obtain strong thrust. Ingenuity’s propellers could rotate 2300-2900 times per minute (5 times that of Earth’s helicopters) and each propeller weighed 35 grams. Ingenuity, the first man-made aircraft outside Earth, will enable more advanced prototypes to be made thanks to the data it obtains.

The First Black Hole Photographed

Black holes are formed by unloaded collapse. All properties can be determined when the electric charges and masses are known. We do not make them because they cannot reflect any visible light source to us, so we call them a black hole. This Black hole we are talking about was captured on camera in 2019. This was a photograph of the black hole at the center of the Messier 87 (M87) galaxy, which is 53-55 million light years away from us. Here is a photo of how it was photographed; The beam reflected from the element continued successfully as a result of reduction to a durable digital sensor, but the situation changed slightly when photographing this black hole. The black hole was the result of the beam being reduced by a sensor. A complicated process was created as a result of the combination of data obtained by observing many telescopes around the world for days. 8 radio telescopes from different points around the world came together. Since the fall of a single radio telescope was low, the desired efficiency could not be achieved with a single radio telescope. Therefore, multiple sources were used. They were recorded from 8 observatories on 6 mountains spread over 4 continents and observed for 10 days. A 2-year analysis process took place. This project went down in history as the Event Horizon Telescope.

Observable Universe

When we look in any direction from any point in the universe, the sphere formed by the farthest distances we can see is our “observable universe” depending on where we are. According to research, the period from the beginning of the universe to today is 13.82 billion years and the speed of light is constant. If we had telescopes advanced enough to observe the beginning of the universe and the universe was not expanding, the maximum distance we could see when looking from any point on Earth is the distance that light would travel in a radius of 13.82 billion light years. Since there is nothing in the universe that goes faster than light, and if we ignore that the universe is expanding, we cannot see further than this distance. Additionally, what the observable universe includes may vary depending on where we look from. By looking from Earth, we can observe a sphere with a radius of 13.82 billion light years. This is also true for the Andromeda Galaxy, but the distance between Andromeda and Earth is 2.5 million light years. Therefore, our observable universe and Andromeda’s observable universe are not exactly the same.

It is known that this distance is larger when we take into account the expansion of the universe, and since this growth is continuous, there is a constantly increasing distance. Therefore, our observable universe turns out to be larger than we thought. Accordingly, the diameter of the observable universe is thought to be 93 billion light years.
The universe itself is probably larger than the universe we can observe. According to modern physics theories, it is possible that the universe does not have any boundaries. To give an example on Earth, no matter where we go in the two-dimensional plane, we stay within the boundaries of the Earth, but when we move to the third dimension, that is, the vertical plane, we exceed the boundaries of the Earth. When we think about this for the universe, it can be an unlimited structure in 3 dimensions.

You can also watch the video below to make what we are talking about more concrete.

This Week In Our Art Corner

Solar Opposites

Solar Opposites, an adult animated series written by Rick and Morty co-creators Justin Roiland and Mike McMahan, was released on May 8, 2020. It is about the adventures of four aliens who leave their planet and settle in an unknown region on Earth. Aliens will begin to argue about whether life on Earth or the unknown on planets is better. We recommend you give this series, which consists of 3 seasons, a chance.