A storm's a brewin'

It is our third night here at the summit of Mauna Kea and already the nights are starting to drag by. No matter how important the observations you are making, or how amazing the night time sky or day time views, the slow drag of nightly repetition makes it hard to maintain concentration. This evening, though, our alertness has been raised by the weather. Not, you understand the weather at the summit, and certainly not the rain clouds that always lap against the eastern shores of the Big Island; these weather systems are far below us, looking more like an ocean of cloud from the summit. We are more concerned with the high clouds above us - cirrus.

An image taken from the GOES satellite - taken from the Mauna Kea Weather Center - showing the location of cirrus around the Hawaiian islands.

Cirrus clouds are the bane of an observer's existence, because these high ice clouds can cover over the sky, even when you observe from the top of a mountain as high as Mauna Kea. There's nothing you can do about them, but try and wait them out. Tonight, as you can see in the satellite image, we are riding the edge of a giant mass of cirrus to the south of us. Right now the sky is clear, but we saw our data getting scattered by thin wisps an hour ago. It could easily come back soon. To make matters worse, the even thicker set of cirrus to the north is slowly, day by day, forcing its way towards us and there are rumours of a storm coming. Storms are bad, because they cause hot air to rise much higher than is normal, dragging the water laden clouds with them. If they reach us, then the telescope has to close, in case water starts to condense on the telescope mirror.

So we sit, gripped by satellite imagery, high intensity all-sky cameras and even looking out at the night sky with night-vision goggles, hoping to understand what the weather holds for us.

Observing Saturn at the NASA IRTF

Tom Stallard and I, both from the University of Leicester, arrived here at Mauna Kea in Hawaii a couple of days ago and have already spent a full night observing the aurora of Saturn. On our first night we observed for a whole 12 hours which is great since we can observe a complete rotation of Saturn (10 hours), but it can also be somewhat intense, especially with the effects that 14,000 feet of altitude has on mental aptitude. Luckily, we did get some great observations of Saturn and Tom tested out the live streaming of our observations to the web - more on that later.

We are using an instrument on the NASA IRTF called CSHELL, a high resolution spectrograph that allows us to look emission from a molecular ion called H₃⁺, emitting in the auroral region on the planet. These observations will enable us both to determine how the wind is blowing at these high latitudes and what the shape of the aurora is, which in turn will tell us more about the processes responsible for the emission.

All in all, we are going to observe here at the IRTF for 14 nights, scattered throughout the month of April. At the same time we are observing Saturn here from the IRTF, the Cassini spacecraft, which is in orbit about Saturn, will also observe the aurora, both in the infrared (as we are) and the ultraviolet. During this period the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) will also turn its eye towards the aurora Saturn, and as if all this wasn't enough, Tom will head down to Waimea to operate the Keck II telescope for a copule of nights - the world's largest infrared telescope. All in all, this mounts up to a very exciting and unprecedented series of observations - helping us to better understand how the aurora of Saturn is formed and how it evolves over time.

If you would like to look in on us while we observe, then head to: http://connect.le.ac.uk/maunakea - we are observing for the next week between midnight and 6am, Hawaii time. That's 11am and 5pm BST, or noon and 6pm CET.

Tom monitoring the incoming observations of Saturn's aurora. Note the image of Saturn as seen through the guide camera on the right.

Bill keeping an eye on the 1s and the 2s. Each monitor contains information about the status, health and movement of the 3.0 meter telescope.

The 3m NASA IRTF telescope and the shiny inside of the dome. The prime mirror cannot be seen from this angle, but is located in the base of the orange structure - at the top of which is the secondary mirror that reflects the light back down through a hole in the primary mirror to the CSHELL instrument. The height of the orange telescope truss is about 6 metres.

Observing Saturn

Tom Stallard and Henrik Melin, planetary scientists from Leicester University in the UK, have arrived at  Mauna Kea, Hawaii, for an observing run of Saturn.  They are going to be using the Keck and NASA Infra Red Telescope Facilities to support observations from the Cassini spacecraft's VIMS instrument (to find out all about VIMS, see: http://wwwvims.lpl.arizona.edu/ .  On 12th April, they will be joined by Europlanet's Steve Miller.  Tom, Henrik and Steve will be blogging about their time up the mountain, here on the Europlanet Blog.  We are also going to be setting up some live chats, so you can ask them questions and get live feeds of some of the things that they will be looking at.

Europlanet at the European Parliament

Britta Thomsen MEP welcoming
guests to the Dinner Debate

The Europlanet team had a fascinating evening last night at the European Parliament with a dinner debate on “Europe’s challenge: to lead the New Age of Space Exploration”.  The event was co-hosted by Europlanet and the MEPs Britta Thomsen and Teresa Riera Madurell MEP.  We are indebted to Ms Thomsen and to her assistant, Thomas Larsen for the enthusiasm and assistance that they have given us in organising the debate.



Michel Blanc and Reinhard
Schulte-Braucks



Europlanet's aim in organising the event was to raise the profile of planetary science within the framework of the European Space Policy.  We were delighted with the turn-out for the debate.  Seven MEPs attended for at least part of the evening, with some others represented by their assistants. Although it is not clear at this stage how space exploration will fit into Framework 8, there seems to be some good support within the Parliment for ensuring that Europe maintains the leading role it has carved out for itself in planetary science in recent years.



David Southwood





We had six speakers during the dinner.  Ms Thomsen welcomed the guests and set the scene, then Michel Blanc, Europlanet's coordinator talked about the need for a strong network of space agencies, research institutes and industry involved in planetary research.  David Southwood, the Director of Science and Robotic Exploration at ESA gave us the long view and highlighted some of Europe's recent successful missions, then Anja Andersen gave a truly inspirational talk on how space exploration affects European Citizens in answering some of the most fundemental questions.  Joel Poncy reviewed of the role of planetary exploration in industry and job creation in Europe.  Finally Reinhard Schulte-Braucks of DG Enterprise, European Commission gave an overview of space exploration projects funded under the Commissions current Framework Seven Programme and outlined the steps the Commission is taking to prepare for Framework Eight.

Anja Andersen

There were various recurring themes through the speeches - firstly how the interdisciplinary nature of planetary science provides fertile ground for innovation, leading to new research areas and new technologies.  Secondly, collaboration is a vital part of planetary exploration - whether between scientists and engineers, academics and industry, or between nations and continents - individuals can't do it alone.  The added value that space exploration brings was highlighted in every talk.  Thirdly, Europe has really come of age in the last decade and is a major player now in the field of planetary exploration.  There are many exciting opportunities to partner with other space agencies in the years ahead.  Finally, the inspirational value of exploration - all of us involved have a responsibility to ensure that European citizens can engage and participate in the adventure of exploring our Solar System.

2011 - A Busy New Year for Europlanet!

Europlanet has a busy time coming up in early 2011.  Starting on Monday 17th January, Europlanet will be holding a workshop at the Lorentz Centre in Leiden on landing sites for exploration missions.  Sixty scientists from around the world will be attending. The process by which landing sites are selected for such missions typically involves collaboration between people with diverse expertise and backgrounds, both in science and engineering.  Delegates to the workshop will run simplified simulated landing site selection procedures to explore and test a variety of relevant tools. The workshop will be followed by a short conference at ESTEC on Thursday afternoon and Friday, where the workshop results will be presented and there will be further key-note lectures, discussions and debates.

On 2nd February, Europlanet will be co-hosting a dinner debate at the European Parliament where MEPs, members of the European Commission and representatives from the planetary science community and industry can discuss opportunities for Europe to play a leading role in planetary exploration in decades to come.

In March, Europlanet will be announcing the winner of the 2011 Prize for Public Engagement with planetary science.  In April there will be a spectacular field trip to test a prototype spacesuit at the Mars analogue site at Rio Tinto in Southern Spain...

We will be providing regular updates here from the Europlanet outreach team, planetary scientists and our network of outreach nodes.

View from the Press Room - EPSC Day 1

The Angelicum Centre, the venue for EPSC 2010

We've had a busy couple of days at EPSC.  Yesterday (Monday) began with two opening ceremonies.  The first was an opportunity to showcase Europlanet activities.  A lot has happened in the past year, with a particular highlight being the field trips organised to planetary analogue sites - places on Earth that resemble other places in the Solar System.  You can find out more about the visits on the Europlanet outreach website: http://www.europlanet-eu.org/outreach/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=261&Itemid=2

During Opening Ceremony No.1, Jean-Pierre Lebreton (the man behind the Huygens probe, the mission that holds the record for touching down on the most distant planetary body to date - Saturn's moon Titan) presented the inaugural Europlanet Prize for Public Engagement with Planetary Science was awarded to Jean Lilensten. 

Lilensten is a real inspiration in the outreach community.  He has spent over 10 years developing an aurora simulator called the 'planeterrella'.  The idea came from experiments at the turn of the last century by a Norwegian physicist called Kristian Birkeland.  Not only has Lilensten developed a robust portable version of Birkeland's kit, but he has adapted it to show the different kinds of aurora that are generated at large gas giants, as well as smaller planets like Earth.



The Planeterrella. Credit: Cyril Simon

Lilensten has brought the planeterrella to Rome and will be sharing the magic of auroras on Thursday with the public and students at the Faculty of Engineering at the San Pietro in Vincoli of the Sapienza Università degli Studi di Roma.  On Friday, he will be on site with the planeterrella at EPSC, hopefully inspiring a few more of the planetary community to think about sharing their enthusiam for their subject with the rest of the world.  One of the things that made Lilensten the outstanding candidate for the 2010 Prize was his generosity in sharing the plans for the planeterrella with anyone who wants to make a copy.  Hence, planeterrella will soon be finding their way into science centres and museums across Europe (a copy will soon be on display at the Palais de la Découverte in Paris and others are under development in the UK, Italy and Switzerland).

Opening Ceremony No. 2 was a celebration of EPSC's arrival in Rome.  Europlanet's head, Michel Blanc, as well as Jean-Pierre Lebreton and Manuel Grande (EPSC's co-ordinator) all pointed out that Europlanet owes it's existance to the Cassini-Huygens mission, many parts of which were led by Italians.  Our host institution in Rome, the Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF), has done an amazing job in organising the conference and making everyone feel welcome.  Maria Teresa Capria, chair of the Local Organising Committee (and co-ordinator of Europlanet's Virtual Observatory activity, IDIS) is owed an enormous debt of gratitude (and from the Press Room, we should also thank Livia Giacomini, who has done an amazing amount to help us make sure that the fascinating science discussed at the conference reaches a much wider audience in the public and the media).

 

The Herschel Space Telescope. Credit: ESA

And then, the science started flowing.  Unfortunately the press officers don't get to go to many of the talks, however, we have read through each and every one of the 918 abstracts submitted for the meeting!  Our main stories for Monday were:
- A new golden age of sailing in space, where solar sail-powered 'data clippers' would carry vast quantities of high-resolution data back from heavy-weight missions exploring our Solar System.
- The first Mars observations by ESA's Herschel Space Telescope.  These give some intriguing insights into the martian atmosphere.
- Evidence is mounting up that the martian moon, Phobos, formed in orbit around Mars out of debris from a catastrophic impact with the surface of the Red Planet.

It was a long and tough day.  However, there appears to be lots of interest in the meeting from the outside world, so it is all worth while.

View from the EPSC Press Room

Another European Planetary Science Congress (EPSC) is about to begin - this time in the beautiful location of the Angelicum Centre in Rome (although just for today we are down the road in the Cavour conference centre). The organising team are expecting up to 700 people to attend the conference, making it by far the biggest EPSC to date - it should be a great meeting and a showcase for planetary science in Europe.

In the press room, we are busy getting all the press releases together for the week.  We have a good range of stories over the week, which will be coming out day by day. We'll be posting updates on each day's news here.

It's now time for 5pm the "ice-breaker" reception, where there is a chance for old friends and new to meet and catch up socially before the main conference begins.  Time too for us to talk to the authors presenting the main news stories this week...