| Friday, February 14, 2025
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New and exciting activities in the
McDonnell Center for the Space Sciences
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Recent News From MCSS Fellows
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Exploring Venus may require exotic tech like balloons and 'aerobots'
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| Despite being a hellish world, the hot, cloud-enveloped world Venus is a tantalizing target for scientists eager to learn more about its history, evolution and present state.
"But the next step for Venus exploration must be in situ … exploration of the sky by aerial vehicles, and of the ground by landers and, one day, rovers," said Paul Byrne, a planetary scientist at WashU. Byrne is lead on the VEXAG Strategic Plan Study Analysis Workgroup.
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The lessons learned from ephemeral nuclei
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Lee Sobotka has written an article in Physics Today explaining that recent experimental analyses of fleeting clusters of protons and neutrons put the notion of the atomic nucleus in a new light.
Atomic nuclei can be divided into those that are stable and those that are not. The latter often are labeled radioactive. But this binary classification fails to capture the range of nuclear lifetimes, from those that last less time than it takes for light to cross atomic dimensions to those that dwarf the age of the universe.
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New complexity emerges in Earth’s ‘boring’ middle region
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Earth’s middle depths are dull, or so geophysicists thought. The crust is fractured and convulsed by plate tectonics; in the core, churning liquid iron generates the planet’s magnetic field. In between is the mantle, 2900 kilometers of hot, pressurized rock, convecting feebly like a superslow lava lamp.
Meanwhile, differences between the isotopic ratios of noble gases emitted at hot spots, which vent the deep mantle, and at midocean ridges, which tap shallower depths, also suggest something is inhibiting mantle convection in this depth, adds Rita Parai.
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Understanding the workings of the vast universe and taking science beyond Earth
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MCSS postdocs Chris Cappiello, Andrea Gokus, Wolfgang Zober, and Abhay Vidwans answered questions for a "Brews and Brains" session for the WashU Postdoc Society where they talked about their research, how it can help mankind, the skills they need for their position, and more.
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Recent Publications by MCSS Fellows
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Rheology of hydrous minerals in the subduction multisystem
Horn, CM and Skemer, P
Earth and Planetary Science Letters 651 119171
Feb 1 2025
Low-Temperature Aqueous Alteration of Chondrites
Lee, MR; Pravdivtseva, O; et al.
Space Science Reviews 221 (1) p. 11 Feb 2025
Diverse and highly differentiated lava suite in Jezero crater, Mars: Constraints on intracrustal magmatism revealed by Mars 2020 PIXL
Schmidt, Mariek E.; Knight, Abigail L.; VanBommel, Scott J.; Christian, John R.; et al.
Science Advances 11 (4) 24 Jan 2025 eadr2613
The iron and nickel spectra measured with CALET on the international space station
Binns, W.R.; Israel, M.H.; Krawczynski, H.S.; Rauch, B. F.; Zober, W.V.; et al.
International Journal of Modern Physics A 2020 Article 2443019
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Mass reconstruction of heavy neutral leptons from stopped mesons
Alves, GFS; Dev, PSB; et al.
Physical Review D 111 (1) 015017 Jan 22 2025
Broadband multi-wavelength properties of M87 during the 2018 EHT campaign including a very high energy flaring episode
Algaba, JC; Nowak, M.; Errando, M.; et al.
Astronomy & Astrophysics 692 A140 Dec 13 2024
Beyond modified Urca: The nucleon width approximation for flavor-changing processes in dense matter
Alford, MG; Haber, A; and Zhang, ZY
Physical Review C 110 L052801 Nov 12 2024
Cygnus X-3 revealed as a Galactic ultraluminous X-ray source by IXPE
Veledina, A; Krawczynski, H.; Cavero, NR; et al.
Nature Astronomy 8 (8) p. 1031- Aug 2024
New physics at a neutron beam dump
Dev, PSB; et al.
Physical Review D 110 (5) L051703 Sep 23 2024
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FINESST: Future Investigators in NASA Earth and Space Science and Technology
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| FINESST solicits proposals from accredited U.S. universities and other eligible organizations for graduate student-designed and performed research projects that contribute to SMD's science, technology, and exploration goals.
Application Deadline Extended: February 26, 2025
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Submit Videos for the New 3D Monitor
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Have you seen the new holographic fan on the first floor of Rudolph Hall? It's located in an alcove across from the Grossman Mineral Museum.
Thanks to a generous donation from Jerrold and Marsha Grossman, EEPS has acquired this advanced technology. The plan is to highlight students engaged in research.
We would love to have your help with video creation!
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Volcanism on Io and the Prometheus Mission
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EEPS Colloquium
Bill McKinnon & Ryan Ogliore
WashU
Thursday, February 20
11:30am, Rudolph 301
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Square Kilometer Array (SKA), the Next Big Thing in Radio Astronomy
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St. Louis Astronomical Society February Meeting
Michael Malolepszy
St. Louis Astronomical Society
Friday, February 21
7:30pm, McDonnell 162
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Chaos from Order, Order from Chaos
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Saturday Science Lecture
Michael Ogilvie
Washington University
Saturday, February 22
10:00am, Crow 201
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Subscribe to the MCSS Messenger
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| McDonnell Center Contacts |
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Compiled and edited by Alison Verbeck. Please send any contributions to alison@wustl.edu.
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