Sun using Earth’s solar defense to steal its atmosphere

September 17th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Observations by the European Space Agency's (ESA's) Venus Express mission have provided strong new evidence that the solar wind has stripped away significant quantities of water from Venus, which means the planet was more humid and Earth-like in the distant past. The SPICAV and VIRTIS instruments carried by the spacecraft have been used to measure concentrations of water vapor in the Venusian atmosphere at altitudes ranging from the lowest 10 km up to 110 km, high above the cloud tops.

September 16th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Observations by the European Space Agency's (ESA's) Venus Express mission have provided strong new evidence that the solar wind has stripped away significant quantities of water from Earth's twin planet Venus. The SPICAV and VIRTIS instruments carried by the spacecraft have been used to measure concentrations of water vapor in the Venusian atmosphere at altitudes ranging from the lowest 10 km up to 110 km, high above the cloud tops.

September 11th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Atmospheric scientists from the UCLA (University of California, Los Angeles) have discovered a previously unknown basic mode of energy transfer from the solar wind to the Earth's magnetosphere, a finding that could improve the safety and reliability of spacecraft that operate in the upper atmosphere. "It's like something else is heating the atmosphere besides the sun.

September 10th, 2009 LONDON - If engineers have their way, Earth's polar regions would soon have watchmen, in the form of 'sailing' spacecrafts poised above the planet, relaying vital data on polar climate change or solar storms. "Solar sailing" has long been a dream for space engineers, who have envisaged craft exploring the depths of the solar system, propelled only by light.

September 3rd, 2009 WASHINGTON - Melting permafrost in arctic regions, triggered by global warming, will release underground methane. Once released, methane would speed up global warming by trapping the earths heat radiation about 20 times more efficiently than the greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide.

September 2nd, 2009 China tries to calm unease over rare earths curbsBEIJING — A Chinese official tried to calm unease about curbs on exports of rare earths used in clean energy products and superconductors, saying Thursday that sales will continue but must be limited to reduce damage to China's environment. China produces nearly all the rare earths used in batteries for hybrid cars, mobile phones, superconductors, lightweight magnets and other high-tech products.

August 15th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Solar physicists at NASA have confirmed that small, sudden bursts of heat and energy, called nanoflares, cause temperatures in the thin, translucent gas of the sun's atmosphere to reach millions of degrees. The findings were presented by James Klimchuk, an astrophysicist at the Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland on August 6th at the International Astronomical Union General Assembly meeting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

July 22nd, 2009 NEW DELHI - The excitement of the century's longest total solar eclipse was quite evident from the sales of Gnomon Astrotech, a Delhi based firm that sold a record 50,000 solar goggles across India in just two days. The company imported a large number of solar goggles, solar filter films and telescopes from a US-based firm to meet the huge demand during the celestial spectacle.

July 21st, 2009 MUMBAI - Did you know animals and birds often prepare for sleep or behave confusedly during total solar eclipse? Well, here are some other little known facts about solar eclipse. - The longest recorded duration for a total solar eclipse is 7.5 minutes.

July 20th, 2009 SURAT - The Gujarat government Monday launched a website dedicated to the total solar eclipse of July 22, an official here said. The state government launched the website solareclipsesurat.in jointly with the Surat Municipal Corporation and the Southern Gujarat Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

July 18th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A high in solar activity impacts the earth in a way that resembles the devastating El Nio, releasing more energy than a million Hiroshima bombs, according to a new study. The study shows that as the sun reaches maximum activity, it heats cloud-free parts of the Pacific Ocean enough to increase evaporation, intensify tropical rainfall and the trade winds, and cool the eastern tropical Pacific.

April 15th, 2009 WASHINGTON - A NASA spacecraft provided scientists with their very first view of the speed, trajectory and three-dimensional shape of powerful detonations from the sun known as coronal mass ejections (CME). This new capability will dramatically enhance scientists' ability to predict if and how these solar tsunamis could affect the Earth.

March 21st, 2009 LONDON - Scientists have detected vast turbulent waves in the sun's lower atmosphere that at a time spew the energy equivalent of 10 billion nuclear warheads. Queen's University Belfast (QUB) scientists with researchers from the Universities of Sheffield and California State, have shed some light on why the corona, the region around the sun, has a much higher temperature than its surface - something of a puzzle to scientists.

March 20th, 2009 WASHINGTON - New pictures have revealed that mysterious "corkscrew" waves appear to be pushing heat from the sun's surface to its outer atmosphere, which could help solve the mystery of how the sun is able to heat its atmosphere to millions of degrees hotter than its surface. According to a report in National Geographic News, the pictures were taken with the help of the Swedish Solar Telescope in the Canary Islands.

March 6th, 2009 WASHINGTON - Are we alone in the universe? Are there other planets like Earth? Scientists will attempt to answer those questions with a telescope being launched into orbit Friday. The Kepler spacecraft is to launch at 10:49 p.m.