#scishowspace

The European Space Agency is searching further back in time than ever before to find the first stars that existed in this universe. They haven’t found any yet, but the absence of these stars is a clue in and of itself.

Why do most rocket launches happen in California? Can't you make it into space from anywhere by just shooting straight up? Well, not exactly. Due the Earth's rotation and axis, some locations are better than others for reaching our orbit.

Scientists have been studying the alignment of planets, not to know more about their personalities and love lives, but to study the past and future of our planet and solar system.

In the quest to build colonies in space, one major hurdle to overcome getting materials for construction to the places they'll be needed. One of the most promising techniques for solving this problem involves some extraordinary space treasure hunts!

Update--this video had a mistake in it and we’re uploading a new one shortly! Thank you to our wonderful SciShow community for catching our mistake and pointing it out to us! Watch for the corrected video in the next few minutes. Thank you!!   The Apollo 11 mission had many opportunities for things to go awry, and they almost did! Find out how a felt-tipped pen may have saved the lives of the first astronauts on the moon, and more!

I recently saw this episode of SciShow Space which showed an alternative form of propulsion that revolutionizes the way we think of traveling through space.  The common model in both science and science fiction has always been a burning fuel which ejects a flame out of the back of the ship, thus propelling it forward.  The one notable exception to this was Star Trek which just had a couple long beams held up behind the main saucer section.  I guess there was a glow on the back of the saucer section itself which was supposed to be part of the impulse drive, but even that didn’t really shoot any flames out the back, and didn’t look like it would be enough to propel the entire vessel.  There had to be something more that was moving it, and I always found that rather curious. Now, it turns out, something like this might wind up being the future.  In this episode of SciShow Space, they talk about a Photonic propulsion system where the ship is propelled by lasers.  There is a whole science behind it involving mirrors and a lot of logistics that would have to be worked out before it becomes a reality, but it completely changes how we think of space flight. It’s yet another example of how hard it is to write science fiction with some sense of science, because just as you think you have something fitting a possible future, your theories become outdated, and scientists start doing things completely differently.

#hobonichichallenge day 25, a #robot . I've been watching a lot of #scishowspace lately so the first robots that came to mind yesterday were the #Mars rovers. I googled for some images then and copied this one of the #opportunity . I used black and blue mildly to add depth to the shadows. I think it came up pretty well.