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<ul><li><keyword id="34757" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Jupiter">Jupiter</keyword> and <keyword id="42442" type="COMPANY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Saturn">Saturn</keyword> are set to reunite tonight, on the night of the <keyword id="1324001" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Winter-Solstice">winter solstice</keyword>, for the first time in 800 years.</li><li>On December 21, two of the largest planets in our solar system will come close enough to make it look like they are only a coin’s width apart from Earth. In reality, Jupiter and Saturn will be 400 million miles apart.</li><li>The alignment will create a radiant point of light in the night sky. It is being dubbed as the ‘<keyword id="864236" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Christmas-star">Christmas Star</keyword>’ or the ‘Star of <keyword id="232425" type="CITY" weightage="20" keywordseo="Bethlehem">Bethlehem</keyword>’ due to the proximity of the celestial event to Christmas. In India, the conjunction is likely to be visible between 6:30 pm and 7:30 pm.</li></ul>Two of the biggest planets in our solar system, Jupiter and Saturn, will be reunited for the first time in 800 years on the <keyword id="8475579" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="20" keywordseo="longest-night-of-the-year">longest night of the year</keyword> — or the shortest day — in 2020.<br /><br />The winter solstice, set to occur on December 21, will see these two planets align for the first time since the middle ages. The last time such a December conjunction took place was back in 1226.<br /><br />  <div type="image" title="NASA jupiter saturn alignment_edited" msid="79620093" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;The expected position of Jupiter and Saturn over the horizon in North America on December 21&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div><br />The two planets will inch closer to each other until they’re only a tenth of a degree apart in the night sky, which is roughly the same thickness as a coin, according to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (<a href="https://solarsystem.nasa.gov/resources/2567/whats-up-december-2020-video/">NASA</a>).  They will be visible nearly an hour after sunset in the southwestern sky.<br /><br />In India, the conjunction is likely to be visible between 6:30 pm and 7:30 pm.<br /><br /><strong>The greatest of all great conjunctions<br /></strong>To be fair, Jupiter and Saturn align every 20 years or so. The event is dubbed the ‘great conjunction’. However, this year is the first time they’ll be lining up in the month of December and it’s the closest the planets have been since 1623. <br /><br />According to NASA, it's the ‘greatest’ of all great conjunctions between Jupiter and Saturn. Astronomers and sky gazers will be able to see the two giant planets and their moons within the same field of view by just using a telescope or a pair of binoculars. <br /><br />  <div type="image" title="NASA jupiter saturn alignment 2_edited" msid="79620073" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;Jupiter, Saturn and their moons with be closer than they ever have been in 800 years on 21 December 2020&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div><br />Even though Jupiter and Saturn will be 400 million miles apart, they’ll create a radiant point of light in the night sky from Earth’s point of view. <br /><br />This phenomenon is being called the ‘Christmas Star’ or the ‘Star of Bethlehem’ due to the proximity of the event to Christmas.<br /><br />Amy C Oliver, the spokesperson for the Center of Astrophysics at Harvard and the Smithsonian, told the <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/06/science/space/jupiter-saturn-align-christmas-star.html">New York Times</a> that the next time Jupiter and Saturn would be this close will be in 2080 — 60 years down the line. <br /><br />So while the wait will be shorter this time around, for most adults, this is still a once in a lifetime opportunity.<br /><br /><strong>SEE ALSO:<br /><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/science/space/news/earth-gets-its-first-asteroid-samples-from-300-million-kilometres-away-and-they-could-hold-clues-to-the-origins-of-life/articleshow/79608779.cms">Earth gets its first asteroid samples from 300 million kilometres away — and they could hold clues to the origins of life</a><br /><br /><a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/finance/banks/news/canara-bank-launches-2000-crore-qip-sets-the-floor-price-at-103-50-per-share/articleshow/79617503.cms">Canara Bank’s ₹2,000 crore fundraising plan boosts the share price by over 12% in two days</a><br /></strong><br />

Jupiter and Saturn will reunite after 800 years on the shortest day of the year to form a rare 'Christmas star'

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/press_kits/juno/overview/">NASA/JPL-Caltech</a></span></p><p class="caption">An illustration of NASA's Juno spacecraft flying through the radiation belts of Jupiter.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul><li><strong><a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/juno">Juno</a>, NASA's probe at Jupiter, has orbited the giant planet for nearly two years.</strong></li><li><strong>The $1 billion mission was scheduled to end with a crash into <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/jupiter">Jupiter</a>'s clouds after July 2018.</strong></li><li><strong>However, NASA sources have confirmed that the mission will be extended through July 2021.</strong></li></ul><p>For the past two years, NASA's Juno probe has studied planet Jupiter like no spacecraft before it.</p><p>The $1 billion mission has peeled back the giant planet's <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/juno-jupiter-engine-safe-mode-issues-2016-10">thick cloud layers</a>, searched for an elusive core, and returned <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jupiter-pictures-nasa-juno-spacecraft-2018-4">dazzling images</a> of colossal <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jupiter-pole-storm-pictures-nasa-juno-2018-4">storms</a> and chaotic <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jupiter-clouds-storms-pictures-nasa-juno-mission-perijove-13-2018-5">cloud bands</a>.</p><p>But all good things must come to an end, and Juno is no exception.</p><p>NASA planned to destroy the tennis-court-size robot by <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/the-juno-probe-will-crash-into-jupiter-2016-7">plunging it</a> into Jupiter's clouds sometime after July 2018. The rationale is similar to the Cassini probe's <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-cassini-probe-destroyed-by-saturn-2017-9">recent demise</a>: Jupiter's icy moon Europa <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jupiter-moon-europa-ocean-water-plume-evidence-2018-5">may be habitable to alien life</a>, so carefully and deliberately ending the mission would prevent Juno from accidentally crashing into that moon. This would keep Europa's ocean - which may have <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/earth-water-ice-volume-versus-planets-moons-2016-11">twice as much water</a> as exists on Earth - from getting contaminated by any earthly microbes stuck to Juno.</p><p>However, the probe's fiery end is now pushed back by at least three years to July 2021, according to NASA sources. Scientific work on the mission will continue through September 2022.</p><p>The extension is critical to one of Juno's primary objectives. The probe has been mapping Jupiter as it orbits the gas giant with infrequent close passes called perijoves. Juno builds this map slice-by-slice using a suite of different instruments, including ones that record data about Jupiter's gravitational field.</p><p>But due to lingering engine trouble with Juno, by next month the team will have completed only 14 of the 32 perijoves that it needs to finish mapping Jupiter.</p><h2>Why Juno needs an extension to finish mapping Jupiter</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://informal.jpl.nasa.gov/museum/sites/default/files/conversations/Juno_Bolton_20170726_Juno_Science_Update.pdf">Scott Bolton/Southwest Research Institute</a></span></p><p class="caption">A diagram of Jupiter's orbits.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Spending too much time in Jupiter's powerful radiation field can <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/voyager-kitchen-aluminum-wrap-radiation-short-circuit-2017-9">damage sensitive electronics</a>. As a result, Juno orbits the planet on a highly elliptical path that keeps the probe mostly out of harm's way, yet regularly zooms it over the cloud tops for detailed observations.</p><p>When Juno arrived in July 2016, mission managers had the spacecraft orbit Jupiter once every 53.5 days. In October 2016, they planned to fire up the probe's engines and speed Juno's orbits to once every 14 days - until the team discovered some sticky engine valves. NASA decided to <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-s-juno-mission-to-remain-in-current-orbit-at-jupiter" target="_blank" rel="noopener">play it safe</a> and not risk using the engines, delaying Juno's mapping pace nearly four-fold.</p><p>"During a thorough review, we looked at multiple scenarios that would place Juno in a shorter-period orbit, but there was concern that another main engine burn could result in a less-than-desirable orbit," Rick Nybakken, Juno's project manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said in a 2017 <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-s-juno-mission-to-remain-in-current-orbit-at-jupiter">press release</a>. "The bottom line is a burn represented a risk to completion of Juno's <keyword id="41551" type="ENTERTAINMENT" weightage="100" keywordseo="science">science</keyword> objectives."</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Björn Jónsson</span></p><p class="caption">A map of Jupiter made by merging partial Juno and Cassini spacecraft imaging data.</p></div><p></p></div></div>The Juno mission leaders received a memo authorizing the extension in mid-May, but NASA has not yet publicly announced its decision.</p><p>One representative told Business Insider that the agency hasn't "put anything out yet about that" when asked about the extension.</p><p>"NASA is close to being able to announce a decision on the possibility of continuing the Juno mission at Jupiter," another representative said in an emailed statement. (NASA declined to provide additional information.)</p><p>Extending Juno's flight will help the probe finish mapping Jupiter - a project that primarily focuses on the planet's gravitational field. That data may reveal what is going on deep inside the giant yet mysterious world.</p><p>"It is very exciting for us to be able to complete the mission pretty much as it was originally proposed, except with longer orbits," Frederic Allegrini, a staff scientist at Southwest Research Institute who works on the Juno mission, told Business Insider.</p><p>If Juno stays operational and productive over the next few years, NASA might again decide to keep flying the probe around Jupiter beyond July 2021.</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/spacecraft-cemetery-pacific-ocean-dead-satellites-2017-10">There's a place at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean where hundreds of giant spacecraft go to die</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

NASA is giving its $1 billion Jupiter mission a critical new lease on life

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Europa_(moon)#/media/File:PIA19048_realistic_color_Europa_mosaic.jpg">NASA / Jet Propulsion Lab-Caltech / SETI Institute</a></span></p></div><p></p></div></div>NASA on Tuesday issued a cryptic press announcement about Europa, an ice-encrusted moon of Jupiter that likely hides twice as much warm, liquid, and <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/oceans-on-planets-and-moons-infrographic-2015-9">potentially habitable water</a> as Earth.</p><p>The US space agency teased the discovery of some "<a href="http://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-to-hold-media-call-on-evidence-of-surprising-activity-on-europa">surprising activity</a>" out there, 390 million miles from Earth, citing the help of images from the Hubble Space Telescope.</p><p>According to the release, everyone will be filled in on the details via a <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-tv-webcast-2016-3">live video stream</a> on Monday, Sept. 26, at 2 p.m. EDT:</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">Astronomers will present results from a unique Europa observing campaign that resulted in surprising evidence of activity that may be related to the presence of a subsurface ocean on Europa.</p><p>Surprising evidence ... a subsurface ocean ... one of humanity's sharpest eyes in space ... could this be the discovery of extraterrestrial life?</p><p>We <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/no-alien-signal-seti-hd164595-russian-2016-8">wouldn't count on it</a>.</p><p>If history and how <keyword id="41551" type="ENTERTAINMENT" weightage="100" keywordseo="science">science</keyword> works are any indication, what we'll like see on Monday are more Hubble images that look a bit like this:</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/water-vapor-over-europa">NASA/ESA/L. Roth/SWRI/University of Cologne</a></span></p><p class="caption">Hubble's long-distance (and pixelated) view of water vapor around Jupiter's icy moon Europa.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>No, computerized blue aliens are not floating above the south pole of Europa.</p><p>Back in 2012, Hubble used a special (yet very low-resolution) instrument called a <a href="http://hubblesite.org/the_telescope/nuts_.and._bolts/instruments/stis/">spectrograph</a> to sniff out normally invisible plumes of water vapor, shown as blue pixels above the moon. The plumes it found likely rocketed <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/europas-geysers-put-old-faithful-to-shame-2013-12">more than 20 times the height of Mount Everest</a> above Europa.</p><p>NASA <a href="http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/hubble-europa-water-vapor">announced that discovery in December 2013</a>, ruling out a meteorite impact as the cause, since that could have sprayed water everywhere as it vaporized the moon's icy crust.</p><p>Researchers <a href="http://science.sciencemag.org/content/early/2013/12/11/science.1247051">instead determined</a> something huge was going on beneath Europa's surface (our emphasis added):</p><p style="padding-left: 30px;">"By far the simplest explanation for this water vapor is that it erupted from plumes on the surface of Europa," said lead author Lorenz Roth of Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. "If those plumes are connected with the subsurface water ocean we are confident exists under Europa's crust, then this means that <strong>future investigations can directly investigate the chemical makeup of Europa's potentially habitable environment without drilling through layers of ice</strong>. And that is tremendously exciting."</p><p>The announcement follows a <a href="https://www.caltech.edu/news/probing-mysteries-europa-jupiters-cracked-and-crinkled-moon-48593">growing</a> <a href="http://arxiv.org/abs/1106.1409">line</a> <a href="http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v479/n7374/full/nature10608.html">of research</a> that increasingly shows Europa is not a cold, dead world.</p><p>It's surface is likely roiling with giant ice slabs that are cracking, breaking up, sinking, and melting:</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a010000/a011100/a011176/chaos-1024.jpg">NASA</a></span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><h2>And allowing ocean water hidden deep below to spray out into the vacuum of space around Jupiter:</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="http://www.nasa.gov/content/goddard/europa-water-vapor-plume">NASA/ESA/K. Retherford/SWRI</a></span></p><p class="caption">A plume of subsurface ocean water vapor escapes through a crack in the icy crust of Europa, a moon of Jupiter.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Business Insider has contacted several Europa experts for their best guesses on what NASA's announcement might reveal, but we have yet to hear back.</p><p>In the meantime, it stands to reason that we'll move beyond "water is shooting out of Europa" and hear something about what's hitching a ride in those plumes.</p><p>Put another way, chemicals besides water are likely traveling from deep within Europa's global ocean, through the icy crust, and out into space where Hubble can analyze them.</p><p>If the telescope found something really surprising - perhaps chemistry required for or generated by life, which <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/europa-moon-may-have-an-earth-like-ocean-2016-5">we detailed earlier this year</a> - researchers may push NASA to fast-track its <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/this-is-the-space-mission-that-will-get-humans-to-europa-our-best-candidate-for-alien-life-2015-2">Europa Clipper fly-by mission</a>, and ultimately an ambitious scheme to sink a <a href="http://www.universetoday.com/11693/a-submarine-for-europa/">nuclear-powered robot</a> below the ice to seek out signs of life.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container"><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>NASA</span></p></div><p></p></div></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-pyramid-structure-ceres-saturn-moon-nasa-ahuna-mons-2016-9">This mysterious pyramid-shaped mountain in space is actually a gigantic ice volcano</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="ZxMXBuNTE6YV4vv7BLHM13UpaFpNEKsM" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

NASA will soon reveal a 'surprising' discovery about a moon of Jupiter that might support life

<ul class="summary-list"><li>"<keyword id="9403" type="ORGANIZATION" weightage="60" keywordseo="Tiger">Tiger</keyword>" co-director <keyword id="10558920" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="matthew-hamachek">Matthew Hamachek</keyword> told Insider how he made the two-part <keyword id="71946" type="COMPANY" weightage="60" keywordseo="HBO">HBO</keyword> documentary on <keyword id="20491" type="PERSON" weightage="60" keywordseo="Tiger-Woods">Tiger Woods</keyword>.</li><li>Hamachek revealed the two-year process to make the movie, which required a lot of time gaining the trust of Woods' inner circle to get them to open up.</li><li>The documentary also features the first-ever interview with Woods' mistress Rachel Uchitel, who details the phone call she made to Woods' then-wife, Elin Nordegren.</li><li>The golfer's first true love, Dina Parr, also revealed how he was once closed-off from the world as a twenty-something.</li><li>Women who partied with him in Las Vegas with Michael Jordan and Charles Barkley also appear.</li><li>Part 1 of "Tiger" airs on HBO and HBO Max on Sunday at 9 p.m. ET. Part 2 airs on January 17.</li></ul><p>Like most <keyword id="6356028" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="60" keywordseo="sports">sports</keyword> superstars, Tiger Woods is insulated by not only a team of agents, managers, and publicists, but also close friends who are so loyal to the golfing great that they would never dare speak publicly about his private life.</p><p>That's why the new two-part HBO documentary "Tiger" is so revealing because directors Matthew Hamachek and Matthew Heineman were able to do just that: get people from Woods' inner circle to talk about him. Many did so for the first time ever.</p><p>Because of the revelations from the people who were standing alongside the golfer, "Tiger" is a roller-coaster ride of ups and downs following Woods' life. This includes the caddie alongside Woods for his glory years, Steve Williams, and Rachel Uchitel, the woman whose face was splashed on tabloids when it was revealed that she was Woods' mistress.</p><p>Hamachek, an editor and producer of documentaries like "Cartel Land" and "Amanda Knox," said it had been an obsession of his to do a documentary on Woods that delved not just into his amazing career, but also his troubled life off the course that included a sex addiction and drug dependency.</p><p>It became a reality for Hamachek more than two years ago when he teamed up with Heineman to co-direct. Oscar-winning filmmaker, Alex Gibney, signed on to produce.</p><p>"So much of Tiger's story is misunderstood and lacks nuance and that's one of the things that Matt Heineman and I set out to correct," Hamachek told Insider. "Everybody has an opinion of Tiger that he's either a hero or villain, and what I think we both wanted to do was make people's understanding of him more complex."</p><div type="image" title="Tiger Woods Steve Williams" height="3264" width="4896" msid="80154380" hostid="261"></div><h2>How the directors gaining the trust of Woods' inner circle</h2><p>Hamachek said the key was gaining the trust of those close to Woods.</p><p>"Our mantra making this film was finding people who intimately knew Tiger Woods," Hamachek said. "Anyone can make a doc where you get experts and people who never met him and just have opinions, but it's different when you have people who spent time with him."</p><p>The starting point was attaching the authors of "Tiger Woods," Armen Keteyian and Jeff Benedict, as executive producers. Their 2018 bestselling biography on Woods delved deep into his youth as a golf phenom thanks to the tutelage of his father, Earl. It also chronicled how Woods' womanizing ways when he became the greatest golfer in the world led to him destroying his image.</p><p>"Their book was the inspiration for the telling of this story," Hamachek said.</p><p>With the authors' participation, the doc landed people like Dina Parr, Woods' first true love who revealed how he was once closed-off from the world as a twenty-something.</p><p>Hamachek recalled having to wait outside the home of Parr, Woods' first love, to finally get her to agree to be interviewed on camera.</p><p>Some of the women who partied with Woods when he became famous and took trips with Michael Jordan and Charles Barkley to Las Vegas also appear in the documentary.</p><p>But Hamachek and Heineman uncovered more on their own. Like getting former pro golfer Joe Grohman to reveal how as a kid Woods witnessed his father having affairs with women; and Woods' former caddie Steve Williams (who was fired in 2011 after he began caddying for Adam Scott while Woods was injured) sharing what it was like to be alongside Woods for many of his most memorable PGA Tour wins.</p><p>However, the biggest get by Hamachek and Heineman was Rachel Uchitel and it took months to secure.</p><div type="image" title="Rachel Uchitel" height="1000" width="1500" msid="80154382" hostid="261"></div><h2>Woods' one-time mistress speaks for the first time ever in the documentary</h2><p>In her first-ever interview, Uchitel gives jaw-dropping details about her affair with Woods, including the phone call she had with Woods' then-wife, Elin Nordegren that led to the now infamous 2009 car accident Woods had outside his Florida mansion over Thanksgiving weekend.</p><p>"Rachel felt strongly that nobody had ever told her side of the story," Hamachek said, "that the media had taken her and turned her into a caricature."</p><p>Soon after that accident, a slew of women went public with their affairs with Woods, but Uchitel, a New York City night club manager, was locked in by the tabloids as the one who broke up his marriage with Nordegren. Woods and Nordegren would go onto divorce in 2010.</p><p>Hamachek said Uchitel was the first interview they filmed and it lasted between seven to eight hours long.</p><p>"She really did tell her entire story of meeting Tiger, up to what happened [on] the night that their relationship came to an end," he said.</p><p>And though there are a lot of moments that show Woods at his lowest points - even the police footage of Woods' 2017 arrest in Jupiter, Florida for driving under the influence of drugs and alcohol - Hamachek said they did have a line they wouldn't go beyond.</p><p>"There were tons of salacious details we could have gotten into, but we wanted to get to the heart of who this guy is and why all this happened to him," he said.</p><div type="image" title="Tiger Woods" height="1051" width="1500" msid="80154383" hostid="261"></div><h2>Even those who have been scorned by Woods are still loyal to him</h2><p>So it begs the question: Why would all these people want to talk for the movie? Did they have an axe to grind?</p><p>Hamachek actually said it was the opposite.</p><p>"Even the people who were scorned by Tiger [or] had a bone to pick with him, they are fiercely protective of him," said Hamachek, who noted that Woods was approached to be in the doc but declined.</p><p>Parr, Williams, and Uchitel somehow they still have an allegiance to Woods even though their relationships didn't end well.</p><p>"That was the most surprising thing," Hamachek said. "The loyalty and caring they still have to this day for him despite breakups or being fired."</p><p>Hamachek believes what finally got everyone to agree to be in the movie was because he and Heineman weren't trying to do a hit piece on Woods. They wanted to weave a story that makes viewers better understand Woods, regardless if you are a fan of him or not.</p><p>"From the minute he was born, he was thrust into this stage and everybody around him - his father, Nike, the public - threw all these expectations onto him," Hamachek said. "The pressure that comes with that was remarkable. I have a great deal of sympathy for him."</p><p><em>Part 1 of "Tiger" airs on HBO and HBO Max on Sunday at 9 p.m. ET. Part 2 airs on January 17.</em></p>

HBO's explosive Tiger Woods documentary features interviews from people who know the golfing legend best including his former mistress- Here's how the directors got them to talk

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/136797589@N04/25480807728/">NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Gerald Eichstadt/Sean Doran</a></span></p><p class="caption">The planet Jupiter.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul><li><strong>NASA's probe at Jupiter, called <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/juno">Juno</a>, has orbited the gas giant since July 2015.</strong></li><li><strong>The $1 billion mission was supposed to crash into <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/jupiter">Jupiter</a>'s clouds in July 2018, but sources told Business Insider that the mission was getting a <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/juno-jupiter-mission-extended-2018-6">three-year extension</a>.</strong></li><li><strong>On Thursday, NASA confirmed that the mission will be extended through July 2021.</strong></li></ul><p>NASA has officially announced that its $1 billion Juno mission is getting a critical life extension to study planet Jupiter.</p><p>Instead of being crashed into the planet's cloud tops next month, Juno will fly until at least July 2021, according to <a href="https://www.missionjuno.swri.edu/news/nasa-replans-junos-jupiter-mission" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a press release</a> issued by the Southwest Research Institute, which operates the pinwheel-shaped, tennis-court-size robot.</p><p>Business Insider <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/juno-jupiter-mission-extended-2018-6">reported on Monday that Juno's mission would be extended</a>, and an official statement about the decision was released today. The probe has orbited Jupiter since July 2015, but engine trouble forced scientists to collect data about four times more slowly than they'd originally hoped.</p><p>"Juno needs more time to gather our planned scientific measurements," Scott Bolton, the Juno mission's leader and a planetary scientist at the SwRI, told Gizmodo <a href="https://gizmodo.com/nasa-to-extend-juno-jupiter-mission-by-three-years-1826581220" target="_blank" rel="noopener">on Tuesday</a>.</p><p>Ever since arriving at Jupiter, the $1 billion mission has peeled back the giant planet's <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/juno-jupiter-engine-safe-mode-issues-2016-10">thick cloud layers</a>, searched for an elusive core, and returned <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jupiter-pictures-nasa-juno-spacecraft-2018-4">dazzling images</a> of colossal <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jupiter-pole-storm-pictures-nasa-juno-2018-4">storms</a> and chaotic <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jupiter-clouds-storms-pictures-nasa-juno-mission-perijove-13-2018-5">cloud bands</a>.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/kevinmgill/39151111202/">NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Kevin Gill</a></span></p><p class="caption">An illustration of NASA's Juno spacecraft flying above the clouds of Jupiter.</p></div><p></p></div></div>But all good things must come to an end, and Juno is no exception.</p><p>NASA planned to destroy the tennis-court-size robot by <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/the-juno-probe-will-crash-into-jupiter-2016-7">plunging it</a> into Jupiter's clouds sometime after July 2018. The rationale is similar to the Cassini probe's <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-cassini-probe-destroyed-by-saturn-2017-9">recent demise</a>: Jupiter's icy moon Europa <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jupiter-moon-europa-ocean-water-plume-evidence-2018-5">may be habitable to alien life</a>, so carefully and deliberately ending the mission would prevent Juno from accidentally crashing into that moon. This would keep Europa's ocean - which may have <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/earth-water-ice-volume-versus-planets-moons-2016-11">twice as much water</a> as exists on Earth - from getting contaminated by any earthly microbes stuck to Juno.</p><p>Now that Juno can fly through July 2021 (and scientific work is funded through September 2022), scientists have a chance to complete the mission's main goal: mapping Jupiter's magnetic and gravitational fields in exhausting detail.</p><h2>Why Juno badly needed a mission extension</h2><p>Spending too much time in Jupiter's powerful radiation field can <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/voyager-kitchen-aluminum-wrap-radiation-short-circuit-2017-9">damage sensitive electronics</a>. As a result, Juno orbits the planet on a highly elliptical path that regularly zooms it at 130,000 mph over the cloud tops for detailed observations - a maneuver called a perijove.</p><p>Each perijove helps protect Juno from harm while enabling it to build a global, slice-by-slice map of Jupiter using a suite of scientific instruments. Tools record data about the planet's gravitational field, magnetism, <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/juno-jupiter-aurora-sounds-2016-9">brilliant auroras</a>, and <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/juno-solves-39-year-old-mystery-of-jupiter-lightning" target="_blank" rel="noopener">lightning</a>.</p><p>But due to lingering trouble with Juno's propulsion system, the team would only have completed 14 of the 32 perijoves that it needs to finish mapping Jupiter by July 2018, the mission's prior end date. </p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://informal.jpl.nasa.gov/museum/sites/default/files/conversations/Juno_Bolton_20170726_Juno_Science_Update.pdf">Scott Bolton/Southwest Research Institute</a></span></p><p class="caption">A diagram of Jupiter's orbits.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>When Juno arrived in July 2016, mission managers had the spacecraft orbit Jupiter once every 53.5 days. In October 2016, they planned to fire up the probe's engines and speed Juno's orbits to once every 14 days - until the team discovered some sticky valves in the engine system's plumbing.</p><p>NASA ultimately <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-s-juno-mission-to-remain-in-current-orbit-at-jupiter" target="_blank" rel="noopener">played it safe</a> by not using the engines to achieve shorter orbits, delaying Juno's mapping pace nearly four-fold.</p><p>"During a thorough review, we looked at multiple scenarios that would place Juno in a shorter-period orbit, but there was concern that another main engine burn could result in a less-than-desirable orbit," Rick Nybakken, Juno's project manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said in a 2017 <a href="https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-s-juno-mission-to-remain-in-current-orbit-at-jupiter">press release</a>. "The bottom line is a burn represented a risk to completion of Juno's <keyword id="41551" type="ENTERTAINMENT" weightage="100" keywordseo="science">science</keyword> objectives."</p><p>The Juno mission leaders received a memo authorizing the extension in mid-May. That decision will help scientists construct a detailed map of Jupiter's gravitational field. That data may reveal what is going on deep inside the giant yet mysterious world.</p><p>"It is very exciting for us to be able to complete the mission pretty much as it was originally proposed, except with longer orbits," Frederic Allegrini, a staff scientist at Southwest Research Institute who works on the Juno mission, told Business Insider on Monday.</p><p>If Juno stays operational and productive over the next few years, NASA might again decide to keep flying the probe around Jupiter beyond July 2021.</p>     <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/images-jupiter-great-red-spot-nasa-juno-2017-7">NASA released the closest-ever images of Jupiter's Great Red Spot</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

NASA has confirmed that its $1 billion Jupiter mission will cheat death for at least 3 more years

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<a title_source="Warner Bros. Pictures" title_caption="We're not convinced that Mila Kunis' Jupiter Jones would ever be chosen to control the Earth." class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/54d373aceab8ea0f1a836c98-960/mila-kunis-jupiter-ascending-4.jpg"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span>Warner Bros. Pictures</span></p>
<p class="caption">We're not convinced that Mila Kunis' Jupiter Jones would ever be chosen to control the Earth.</p>
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</div></div>Warning: There are spoilers ahead.&#xa0;</strong></p>
<p class="p1">Last summer, Warner Bros. abruptly <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jupiter-ascending-delayed-2014-6">pushed "Jupiter Ascending" back 10 months</a> only weeks before it was due in theaters.<span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1">The latest sci-fi movie from the Wachowski siblings ("The Matrix" trilogy) supposedly needed to <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jupiter-ascending-delayed-2014-6">complete visual effects</a>. It was expected to be the studio's big summer movie after Johnny Depp's $100 million budget <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/transcendence-bombs-box-office-2014-4">"Transcendence" flopped</a>.&#xa0;<span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1">I think we know the real reason the reported <a href="http://variety.com/2014/film/news/can-jupiter-ascending-benefit-from-the-gravity-strategy-1201221572/">$175 million</a> Channing Tatum and Mila Kunis movie was moved.</p>
<p class="p1">"Jupiter Ascending" is terrible.</p>
<p class="p1">Don't take my word for it. &#xa0;</p>
<p class="p3">In addition to press, there was a number of general audience members in attendance who received free advance tickets to the media screening. (This is normal. You can usually get these through websites like <a href="http://www.gofobo.com/">GoFobo</a>.)<span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p3">Here are some of the things viewers were saying as they headed out of the screening:</p>
<p class="p1" style="padding-left: 30px;">"It wasn't bad ... it was horrible."</p>
<p class="p1" style="padding-left: 30px;">"It was embarrassing."</p>
<p class="p1" style="padding-left: 30px;">"That's what they spent $150 million to $200 million on?"</p>
<p class="p1" style="padding-left: 30px;">"I can't even explain the plot. You kill humans … so you can use their genes?" (more on this in a bit)</p>
<p class="p1">The movie follows Kunis as Jupiter Jones, your not-so-average looking maid who cleans houses for a living with her obnoxious Russian family. One day, she finds out there's a bunch of other species living outside of Earth and that she's actually the ruler of our planet. Two groups of different people, one led by Titus (Douglas Booth) and another by Balem (Eddie Redmayne), are out to capture and murder her so they can have control of the planet.&#xa0;</p>
<p class="p1">Why do they want control of the planet? To harvest humans. The aliens have apparently been using human cells to create a regeneration serum for some time.&#xa0;</p>
<p class="p1">Yep. That's it. The whole movie is about aliens wanting to preserve their youth by killing humans.<span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1"><span style="line-height: 1.5em;"><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table click-to-enlarge"><div>
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<a title_source="Warner Bros. Pictures" title_caption="These two guys want your cells so they can keep on living for thousands of years." class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/54d3769e6bb3f7c005836c98-960/jupiter-ascending-3.jpg"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span>Warner Bros. Pictures</span></p>
<p class="caption">These two guys want your cells so they can keep on living for thousands of years.</p>
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<span style="line-height: 1.5em;">In a point that's sort of glossed over quickly, but better explained in the film's production notes, Jupiter is what is known as a "recurrence." She's born with the exact genetic DNA as a royal that just passed away and for some reason this now makes her the reincarnation of that person.</span></span></p>
<p class="p1">But, unless I missed something, it's not clear how anyone knows Jupiter even exists. It's not like her father or mother were royalty. Jupiter has no clue she's royalty, and once she learns she is, she doesn't find out that she has any secret, magical powers. So the basic premise of the film, where aliens are worried about Jupiter, a lowly, humble, toilet scrubber overthrowing all of them, is pretty thin.&#xa0;<span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1">I don't remember the last time I've said "What is going on right now?" (not in those actual words) so many times during a film screening to myself. This isn't because I couldn't follow the movie's plot, it was just because what was occurring on screen: the dialogue, the acting, the strange-looking characters were all so bizarre at points that there was no other way to react.<span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1">Here are a few of the things I'm talking about:&#xa0;</p>
<p class="p1"><strong>1. There's a ridiculous bee scene</strong></p>
<p class="p1"><strong><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table click-to-enlarge"><div>
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<a title_source="Warner Bros. Pictures" title_caption="The scene looks visually appealing on screen until you know what's going on." class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/54d373f5ecad040e2c592761-960/jupiter-ascending-bees-1.jpg"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span>Warner Bros. Pictures</span></p>
<p class="caption">The scene looks visually appealing on screen until you know what's going on.</p>
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</div></div></strong><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Early on, when Jupiter is learning she's royal, there's a scene where a group of bees start to follow her. (Why are there bees hanging around? Why not?) The group slowly builds until there's a giant swarm surrounding her, but not stinging. When she moves her arms, they move with her. When she asks why they do that, you're sitting there waiting for a good response. Instead, the answer we receive is that the bees sense royalty. The audience cracked up at this in disbelief. To add insult to injury, this was followed up with the line, "Bees don't lie."&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1">I've never wanted to relive the Nicolas Cage bee scene from the 2006 "Wicker Man" remake, but this was all I could think of:&#xa0;</p>
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<p class="embed-spacer">&#xa0;<strong style="line-height: 1.5em;">2. Random egg selling</strong></p>
<p class="embed-spacer"><strong style="line-height: 1.5em;"><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div>
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<p class="source"><span>Warner Bros. Pictures</span></p>
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</div></div></strong><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">There's a crazy subplot early in the film where Jupiter considers selling her own eggs at the behest of her sleazy cousin (you can't make this stuff up) to make some easy cash. He wants to buy a big flat screen TV and Jupiter has her sights on a $4,000 telescope on eBay. What?&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1"><strong>3. Mila Kunis slaps a sanitary pad onto Channing Tatum to patch up a wound.</strong></p>
<p class="p1">I guess this was supposed to be humorous. It's not. It's kind of just gross, especially when Sean Bean, who plays a secondary character, later tears it off on screen, waving it at Kunis.&#xa0;<span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1"><strong>4. Channing Tatum is a half-human, half-wolf</strong></p>
<p class="p1"><strong><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table click-to-enlarge"><div>
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<a title_source="Murray Close/Warner Bros." title_caption="" class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/54d374dc6da8111f5b54bbea-960/channing-tatum-jupiter-ascending-1.jpg"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span>Murray Close/Warner Bros.</span></p>
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</div></div></strong><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">You read that right. He doesn't have a tail, but he does have a keen sense of smell, some pointed ears, and, yes, he does growl a few times in film. Honestly, he looks ridiculous, and because of that, and some added eyeliner, it's difficult to take Tatum, seriously. Even his name is Caine, an obvious reference to canine.&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1"><strong>5. Kunis' character continually hits on half-wolf Tatum, and it makes for the most awkward screen time and dialogue ever</strong></p>
<p class="p1"></p>
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<p class="source"><span>Warner Bros. Pictures</span></p>
<p class="caption">Jupiter tries to appeal to Caine's canine side in the most unappealing way.</p>
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</div></div>The two actors have chemistry; however, the romance between the two feels so overtly forced, even the audience could tell. There's a scene in the movie where Jupiter says she's into Caine. Here's how that conversation goes down.
<p class="p1">Caine: "I have more in common with dogs than I do with you."</p>
<p class="p1">Jupiter: "I love dogs."</p>
<p class="p1">The audience burst out laughing at this. Later in the film, there's even an overt reference to "Beauty and the Beast," to describe their relationship.</p>
<p class="p1"><strong>6. The creatures are terrifying.</strong></p>
<p class="p1"><strong><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table click-to-enlarge"><div>
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<a title_source="Warner Bros. Pictures" title_caption="The creepy ETs can be seen off to the right." class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/54d373256bb3f75c7b836c98-960/jupiter-ascending-aliens-1.jpg"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span>Warner Bros. Pictures</span></p>
<p class="caption">The creepy ETs can be seen off to the right.</p>
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</div></div></strong><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">An early scene in the film shows a group of short aliens trying to abduct a woman. These are some of the creepiest things I've ever seen on screen, and it's probably why you haven't seen a trace of them in marketing. The film's production notes say they're supposed to "resemble classic grey ETs."&#xa0;</span><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1">The same goes for a bizarre lizard/dragon mashup with wings.&#xa0;<span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
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<p class="source"><span>Warner Bros. Pictures</span></p>
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<p class="p1">Some of the characters just look like knockoffs of other sci-fi animals. There's an elephant-looking creature that pops up a few times that looks like a mix between <a href="http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ten_Numb">Ten Numb</a> and <a href="http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Max_Rebo">Max Webo</a> from "Star Wars."</p>
<p class="p1">You can sort of see him here in the background.</p>
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<p class="source"><span>Warner Bros. Pictures</span></p>
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<p class="p1"><strong>7. And then there's Eddie Redmayne's character, Balem Abrasax, who is on a completely different level of crazy in this film.</strong></p>
<p class="p1"><strong><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table click-to-enlarge"><div>
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<a title_source="Warner Bros. Pictures" title_caption="This stance tells you everything you need to know about Redmayne's character in this film." class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/54d372db6bb3f74177836c9f-960/eddie-redmayne-jupiter-ascending-1.jpg"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span>Warner Bros. Pictures</span></p>
<p class="caption">This stance tells you everything you need to know about Redmayne's character in this film.</p>
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</div></div></strong><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">After a masterful Oscar-nominated performance in 2014's "The Theory of Everything," Redmayne gives a pitifully poor performance as a spoiled brat. He comes across as a fragile, strange creature, who speaks in eerily calm, creepy whispers. Then there would be these disjointed moments when he would scream out loud at people. Audiences laughed every time this occurred.&#xa0;</span><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1">It was as if Redmayne was actually channelling the awkwardness of Michael Sheen's vampire character Aro in the "Twilight" movies. It was essentially the same role.&#xa0;</p>
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<p class="embed-spacer"><span class="s1" style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="embed-spacer"><span class="s1" style="line-height: 1.5em;">The Wachowski's</span><span style="line-height: 1.5em;"> said they wanted to put together a bunch of genres -- a sci-fi film mixed with a thriller, an "action epic," and a "love story," but in doing so, it's hard to figure out what this film wants to be.</span></p>
<p class="p3">There's no question that it's a sci-fi flick, but other than the ridiculous premise, the entire film doesn't feel original. It has the feel of "The Fifth Element," for its elaborate and outlandish space creatures and ship designs, and "Ender's Game" (for same space visuals). However, unlike "The Fifth Element," I doubt we'll be seeing re-runs of this on cable television anytime soon.</p>
<p class="p1"><strong>There were three good things about this film:</strong></p>
<p class="p1"><strong>1. There's a point near the end where Kunis (sort of) beats the crap out of Redmayne's character.</strong><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1">I was waiting for Kunis to be this break-out strong female character, and other than a few small parts in the film, she's not. She's whiny (she complains about how she hates her life in the beginning of the film), she's insanely gullible (she's convinced to marry a guy she just met in practically seconds even though he plans to kill her), and, except for a brief part in one of the film's climactic moments, she plays the D.I.D. (damsel in distress) to Tatum's character for most of the film. Sigh.</p>
<p class="p1"><strong>2. Channing Tatum's gravity boots</strong></p>
<p class="p1"><strong><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div>
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<p class="source"><span>Warner Bros. Pictures</span></p>
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</div></div></strong><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Caine soars through the streets and skies of Chicago and other worlds with these special anti-gravity shoes. Imagine using a hoverboard turns your shoes into flat roller skates and you have the idea. It was probably the most entertaining part of the film.&#xa0;</span></p>
<p class="p1"><strong>3. The visuals.</strong></p>
<p class="p1"><strong><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table click-to-enlarge"><div>
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<a title_source="Warner Bros." title_caption="One of many gorgeous shots of other-worldly planets in " jupiter="" ascending.="" class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/54d36f256bb3f77368836c99-960/jupiter-ascending-scenery.jpg"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span>Warner Bros.</span></p>
<p class="caption">One of many gorgeous shots of other-worldly planets in "Jupiter Ascending."</p>
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</div></div></strong><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">There's no question that there was an incredible amount of time devoted to making sure the film was visually beautiful. The film's production notes mention that to get the right shades of purple, indigo, and gold into the film's background at one point, they shot the film at a specific point of the year in Chicago between 5:15 and 5:45 a.m. That's dedication, but it's something viewers won't appreciate because most moviegoers aren't going to know that going in to the film.</span></p>
<p class="p1">18 months were spent visualizing costumes and hundreds of alien looks and hybrid human/animals for the movie before filming began.<span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span></p>
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<p class="source"><span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fOvITFK98gg&amp;list=PLVfin74Qx3tV8bgAhzbfDpnfPoGmJWAcn">Warner Bros./YouTube</a></span></p>
<p class="caption">This gown had Swarovski crystals sewn into the fabric.</p>
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</div></div>However, t<span style="line-height: 1.5em;">his is the downfall of "Jupiter Ascending." There's too much attention to detail and too little focus on the big picture. If the Wachowski siblings spent as much time on the story as they obviously did on the film's aesthetics, the movie may have had some potential. However, the visuals alone are not going to sell me on a movie. There needs to be some meat and potatoes with my gravy.</span><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">&#xa0;</span>
<p class="p1">Right now, BoxOffice.com is tracking the film to make <a href="http://pro.boxoffice.com/statistics/movies/jupiter-ascending-2014?q=jupiter%20ascending">$19 million opening weekend</a>. The duo's last film, 2012's "Cloud Atlas," starring Tom Hanks and Halle Berry, debuted to <a href="http://boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=cloudatlas.htm">$9.6 million</a>. Instead, Paramount's "Spongebob Squarepants" sequel, which has been over a decade in the making, is expected to dominate the weekend <a href="http://variety.com/2015/film/news/spongebob-movie-box-office-jupiter-ascending-seventh-son-1201423635/">making $35 million</a>.</p>
<p class="p1">One thing's clear.&#xa0;</p>
<p class="p1">There's <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/magic-mike-xxl-trailer-channing-tatum-kevin-nash-2015-2">one must-see Channing Tatum movie this year from Warner Bros.</a>, and it's not going to be "Jupiter Ascending."</p>
<p class="p1">"Jupiter Ascending" is in theaters Fri. Feb. 6.</p>
<p class="p1">Watch a trailer below.</p>
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'Jupiter Ascending' is one of the worst movies you will see this year

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>©Alan Friedman/ avertedimagination.com</span></p></div><p></p></div></div>How do you go about hunting for life on <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/exoplanets">another planet</a> elsewhere in our galaxy? A useful starting point is to imagine looking from afar for signs of life on Earth.</p><p>In a telescope like those we have on Earth, those aliens would likely just see the Earth and sun merged together into a single pale yellow dot.</p><p>If they were able to separate the Earth from the sun, they'd still only see a pale blue dot.</p><p>There would be no way for them to image our planet's surface and see life roving upon it.</p><p>However, those aliens could use <a href="http://loke.as.arizona.edu/~ckulesa/camp/spectroscopy_intro.html">spectroscopy</a>, taking Earth's light and breaking it into its component colours, to figure out what gases make up our atmosphere. Among these gases, they might hope to find a "biomarker", something unusual and unexpected that could only be explained by the presence of life.</p><p>On Earth, the most obvious clue to the presence of life is the abundance of free oxygen in our atmosphere. Why oxygen? Because it is highly reactive and readily combines with other molecules on Earth's surface and in our oceans. Without the constant resupply coming from life, the free oxygen in the atmosphere would largely disappear.</p><h2>Biomarkers</h2><p>But the story isn't quite that simple. Life has existed on Earth for <a href="https://theconversation.com/no-australias-new-fossils-are-not-the-oldest-but-their-value-is-set-in-stone-2994">at least 3.5 billion years</a>. For much of that time, however, oxygen levels were far lower than those seen today.</p><p>And oxygen alone is not enough to indicate life; there are many abiological processes that can contribute oxygen to a planet's atmosphere.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Wikimedia</span></p><p class="caption">The concentration of oxygen in the Earth's atmosphere over the last billion years. As a reference, the dashed red line shows the present concentration of 21%.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>For example, ultraviolet light could produce abundant oxygen in the atmosphere of a world covered with water, even if it was devoid of life.</p><p>The upshot of this is that a single gas does not a biomarker make. Instead, we must instead look for evidence of a chemical imbalance in a planet's atmosphere, something that can not be explained by anything other than the presence of life.</p><p>Here on Earth, we have one: our atmosphere is not just rich in oxygen, but also contains significant traces of methane. While abundant oxygen or methane could easily be explained on a planet without life, we also know that methane and oxygen react with each other strongly and rapidly.</p><p>When you put them together, that reaction will cleanse the atmosphere of whichever is least common. So to maintain the amount of methane in our oxygen-rich atmosphere, you need a huge source of methane, replenishing it against oxygen's depleting influence. The most likely explanation is life.</p><h2>Observing exoplanetary atmospheres</h2><p>If we find an exoplanet sufficiently similar to our own, there are several ways in which we could study its atmosphere to search for biomarkers.</p><p>When a planet passes directly between us and its host star, a small fraction of the star's light will pass through the planet's atmosphere on its way to Earth. If we could zoom in far enough, we would actually see the planet's atmosphere as a translucent ring surrounding the dark spot that marks the body of the planet.</p><p>How much starlight passes through that ring gives us an indication of the atmosphere's density and composition. What we get is a "<a href="https://theconversation.com/explainer-seeing-the-universe-through-spectroscopic-eyes-37759">transmission spectrum</a>", which is an absorption spectrum of the planetary atmosphere, illuminated by the background light of the star.</p><p>Our technology has only now become capable of collecting and analysing these spectra for the first time. As a result, our interpretation remains strongly limited by our telescopic capabilities and our burgeoning understanding of planetary atmospheres.</p><p>Despite the current challenges, the technique continues to develop with great success. In the past few years, astronomers have discovered a wide variety of different chemical species in the atmospheres of some of the biggest and baddest of the known transiting exoplanets.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>NASA/JPL-Caltech</span></p><p class="caption">Many exoplanets may have no atmosphere at all.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><h2>Eclipses</h2><p>Another approach involves observing a transiting planet and its star as they orbit one another. The goal here is to collect some observations when the planet is visible (but not in transit), and others when it is eclipsed by its star.</p><p>With some effort, astronomers can subtract one observation from the other, effectively cancelling the hugely dominant contribution of light from the star. Once that light is removed, what we have left is the day-side spectrum of the planet.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>NASA/JPL-Caltech/R. Hurt (SSC/Caltech)</span></p><p class="caption">Star + Planet] - [Star] = [Planet]</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><h2>The future</h2><p>Astronomers are constantly developing new techniques to glean information about exoplanetary atmospheres. One that shows particular potential, especially for the search for planets like our own, is the use of <a href="http://web.gps.caltech.edu/~vijay/Papers/Polarisation/Planetary%20Atmospheres/bailey-07.pdf">polarised light</a>.</p><p>Most of the light we receive from planets is reflected, originating with the host star. The process of reflection brings with it a subtle benefit - the reflected light gains a degree of polarisation. Different surfaces yield different levels of polarisation, and that polarisation might just hold the key to finding the first oceans beyond the solar system.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Wikimedia, CC BY-SA</span></p><p class="caption">By rotating a polarising filter, we can block light of certain polarisation. This is how polarised sunglasses cut the glare from puddles and the ocean on a sunny day.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>These methods are still severely constrained by two factors: the relative faintness of the exoplanets, and their proximity to their host star. The ongoing story of exoplanetary science is therefore heavily focused on overcoming these observational challenges.</p><p>Further down the line, advances in technology and the next generation of telescopes may allow the light from an Earth-like planet to be seen directly. At that point, the task becomes (slightly) easier, in part because the planet can be observed for far longer, rather than just relying on eclipse/transit observations.</p><p>But even then, spectroscopy will be the way to go; the planets will still be just pale blue dots.</p><h2>What we have seen so far</h2><p>The exoplanets we have discovered to date are highly inhospitable to life as we know it. None of the planets studied so far would even be habitable to the most extreme of <a href="http://oceanservice.noaa.gov/facts/extremophile.html">extremophiles</a>.</p><p>The planets whose atmospheres we have studied are primarily "hot Jupiters", giant planets orbiting perilously close to their host stars. As they skim their host's surface, they whizz around with periods of just a few days, yielding transits and eclipses with every orbit.</p><p>Because of the vast amounts of energy they receive from their hosts, many of these "hot Jupiters" are enormous, inflated far beyond the scale of our solar system's largest planet. That size, that heat and their speed, make them the easiest targets for our observations.</p><p>But as our technology has improved, it has also become possible to observe, through painstaking effort, some smaller planets, known as "super-Earths".</p><h2>Atmospheres of distant planets…</h2><p>The hot Jupiter <a href="http://exoplanet.eu/catalog/hd_189733_b/">HD189733</a> has one of the best understood planetary atmospheres beyond the solar system.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>NASA, ESA, M. Kornmesser</span></p><p class="caption">Artists impression of the broiling blue marble, HD 189733 b.</p></div><p></p></div></div>Observations by the Hubble Space Telescope, in 2013, suggest a deep-blue world, with a thick atmosphere of silicate vapour. Other studies have shown its atmosphere to contain significant amounts of water vapour, and carbon dioxide.</p><p>Overall, however, it appears to be a hydrogen-rich gas giant like Jupiter, albeit super-heated, with cloud tops exceeding 1,000 degrees. Beneath the cloud turps lies a widespread dust layer, featuring silicate and metallic salt compounds.</p><p>The young giant planets in the <a href="http://www.space.com/20231-giant-exoplanets-hr-8799-atmosphere-infographic.html">HR8799</a> system appear to have hydrogen-rich but complex atmospheres, with compounds such as methane, carbon monoxide and water. They are likely larger, younger, and hotter versions of our own giant planets - with their own unique subtleties.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Ben Zuckerman</span></p><p class="caption">A direct image of the four planets known to orbit the star HR 8799.</p></div><p></p></div></div>For the super-Earth <a href="http://www.space.com/14634-alien-planet-steamy-waterworld-gj1214b.html">GJ1214b</a> the lesson is to be careful about making conclusions. Early suggestions that this might be a "water world" or have a cloudless hydrogen atmosphere have since been superseded by models featuring a haze of hydrocarbon compounds (like on <a href="http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/cassini/whycassini/cassini20130605_prt.htm">Titan</a>), or grains of potassium salt or zinc sulphide.</p><p>While the search for Earth-like planets continues using ground- and space-based telescopes, exoplanetary scientists are eagerly awaiting the launch of the James Webb Space Telescope <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/james-webb-telescope">JWST</a>.</p><p>That immense telescope, scheduled for launch in around October 2018, could mark the true beginning of the exciting search for distant atmospheric biomarkers and exoplanetary life.</p><p><em>Brad Carter, Amanda Bauer and Jonti Horner contributed to this post for The Conversation.</em></p><p></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/what-like-eat-food-grown-space-nasa-2015-11">This is what it's like to eat food grown in a 'space garden'</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="l5eWh2eDrtdBaSYSf1RiuC1DKIbTcscZ" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

Here's how to search for alien life on distant planets

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/Andrew Kelly</span></p><p class="caption">A woman walks in falling snow during a winter nor'easter in New York City on March 2, 2018.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><ul><li><strong>Winter Storm Riley is hammering the East Coast with rain, sleet, and intense winds.</strong></li><li><strong>The nor'easter is undergoing the rapid intensification process known as "bombogenesis": the term meteorologists use to describe storms that become bomb cyclones.</strong></li><li><strong>This isn't uncommon for nor'easter storms, but this one is expected to be particularly bad.</strong></li><li><strong>Record flooding in Boston is possible for the second time this winter.</strong></li></ul><p><br />At the start of 2018, a <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/category/noreaster">nor'easter</a> winter storm intensified so quickly that it became what meteorologists call a "bomb cyclone."</p><p>It appears that's happening again. <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/noreaster-winter-storm-riley-new-england-flooding-evacuations-2018-3">Winter storm Riley</a>, as <a href="https://weather.com/storms/winter/news/winter-storm-names-2017-2018">the Weather Channel</a> has named it, is bringing potentially record-setting flooding to the Northeast, dumping rain and snow, and whipping the East Coast with wind gusts that are expected to reach hurricane force.</p><p>The storm is now undergoing a <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/what-bomb-cyclone-and-polar-vortex-mean-term-origin-2018-1">rapid intensification process called "bombogenesis,"</a> which means its central pressure is dropping quickly (an indicator of a storm's strength). Such <a href="https://weather.com/storms/winter/news/2018-03-01-winter-storm-riley-noreaster-high-winds-coastal-flooding-heavy-snow">bomb cyclone</a> conditions are not uncommon for nor'easter storms. But this one could be even more intense than the storm earlier this year, and could cause record flooding and intense damage.</p><p>According to the Boston branch of the National Weather Service (NWS), this storm is on par with the most intense nor'easters in recent history, including the December 1992 and April 1997 storms.</p><p>"Many have asked how this event will compare to January 4. Our thinking is there will likely be more structural damage in this event given the larger waves and occurring over multiple tide cycles. Many neighborhoods will likely become isolated, some for extended period of time," the <a href="https://twitter.com/EricHolthaus/status/969583236673351687">Boston office said in a statement</a>.</p><p><a href="https://twitter.com/NWSBoston/status/969323991616884737">On Twitter</a>, NWS Boston warned: "Take this storm seriously! This is a LIFE &amp; DEATH situation for those living along the coast." </p><p>Those in affected areas should listen to local authorities and heed advice to stay indoors or evacuate as requested.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://twitter.com/EricHolthaus/status/969563717875720192">Eric Holthaus/Twitter/NOAA</a></span></p><p class="caption">A satellite image of the nor'easter hitting the East Coast on the morning of March 2, 2018.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><h2>What to expect</h2><p>Wind gusts exceeding 70 mph have already hit the Washington DC area and snow is falling in New York and the Northeast, <a href="https://twitter.com/GregPostel/status/969585795563745282">with more to come</a>.</p><p>By 10 a.m., the storm had already knocked out power to more than 500,000 and caused more than 2,000 flight cancellations.</p><p>"Riley will be a Nor'easter with major impacts on many different scales across a large area," Tom Niziol, a winter storm expert with the Weather Channel, said in a statement to Business Insider.</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Reuters</span></p><p class="caption">The January 4 storm caused water to overtop seawalls. This one could have even more flooding.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>The heavy winds are expected to batter the coasts and inland mountain regions, knocking down trees and power lines. They're also expected to exacerbate coastal flooding. In Boston, experts are predicting moderate to major flooding for three tide cycles.</p><p>A 3-foot storm surge is already coming into the city on top of approximately 11-foot high tides, with <a href="https://www.boston.com/weather/weather/2018/02/28/boston-noreaster-march-2018">two high tides today and one tomorrow</a>.</p><p>The projected flooding could set records in the city and be worse than the January 4 storm, during which parts of Boston were <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/noreaster-bomb-cyclone-boston-floods-2018-1">inundated with freezing, icy water</a>.</p><p>Massive waves at sea currently stretch down to Bermuda. </p><p>"All in all, Winter Storm Riley will bring in the month of March like a roaring lion," Niziol said.</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/what-would-happen-if-humans-tried-landing-on-jupiter-space-2018-2">What would happen if humans tried to land on Jupiter</a></h3>        <div>                    </div>    </div>

The winter storm slamming the East Coast is becoming a 'bomb cyclone' - and the National Weather Service says it could be a 'life or death' situation

<ul class="summary-list"><li>The gravitational pull Mars exerts on Earth may be strong enough to impact ocean currents.</li><li>The red planet can cause deep-sea currents to change over a 2.4 million-year cycle, a study said.</li></ul><p><a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-seeking-applicants-mars-simulation-habitat-live-year-2024-2">Mars</a> may be 140 million miles away, but its gravitational pull could be impacting Earth's oceans.</p><p>Scientists at the University of Sydney in Australia believe the red planet's tug is creating "giant whirlpools" in the <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/moons-pull-may-trigger-earthquakes-on-earth-scientists-say-2023-6">oceans</a> called eddies, which can shift the deep-sea floor.</p><p>This, they claim, is part of a 2.4-million-year climate "grand cycle" on Earth that has been ongoing for at least 40 million years.</p><p>"We were surprised to find these 2.4-million-year cycles in our deep-sea sedimentary data," said Adriana Dutkiewicz, a geosciences researcher at the University of Sydney</p><p>"There is only one way to explain them: they are linked to cycles in the interactions of Mars and Earth orbiting the sun."</p><div type="image" title="a gif shows whirpools in the oceans off the coast of Japan." height="338" width="600" msid="108469567" hostid="261" sizebytes="68480"></div><h2>Tiny changes can have huge effects</h2><p>If the climate crisis has taught us one thing, it's that seemingly insignificant events — such as humans picking carbon-based fuels to power their industry — can <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/what-climate-change-crisis-extreme-weather-is-costing-you-2023-9">unleash catastrophic impacts </a>on our delicately balanced climate down the line.</p><p>How humans are <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/category/climate-change">causing the rapid warming</a> of the planet today is very clear.</p><p>But what scientists are increasingly figuring out is how even smaller changes to the planet, like tweaks to its position in the solar system, can influence long-term trends in the climate.</p><p>Previous studies have suggested that <a target="_blank" href="https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2948/milankovitch-orbital-cycles-and-their-role-in-earths-climate/">tiny wobbles of our Earth's axis</a> can tip the scales for the climate on the scale of tens of thousands of years.</p><p>Now, scientists are proposing an "astronomical grand cycle" on the scale of millions of years, which they say is caused by the subtle effect of Mars's gravitational pull.</p><p>"Mars's impact on Earth's climate is akin to a butterfly effect," said study author Dietmar Müller, a professor of geosciences at the University of Sydney, to <a target="_blank" href="https://www.newscientist.com/article/2421730-marss-gravitational-pull-may-be-strong-enough-to-stir-earths-oceans/">New Scientist</a>.</p><h2>Earth resonates with Mars, and that slowly shifts the climate and oceans</h2><p>The evidence for this theory lies in almost 300 cores deep-sea cores tracking ocean sediments back more than 65 million years.</p><p>These revealed that sediment deposits follow a very long period, ebbing and flowing every 2.4 million years.</p><p>This suggests something weird is happening on that time scale, which lines up suspiciously with periods of a warmer climate, Müller, Dutkiewicz, and their co-author said in <a target="_blank" class="" href="https://affiliate.insider.com?h=9487842ccb0dce3640b41a7f70ba09654109ce89c30d3231e725fbee67893109&amp;postID=65f16ea033d9389aad4ceaa2&amp;postSlug=mars-gravity-earth-giant-whirpools-oceans-climate-megacycle-million-years-2024-3&amp;site=bi&amp;u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nature.com%2Farticles%2Fs41467-024-46171-5%3Futm_medium%3Daffiliate%26utm_source%3Dcommission_junction%26utm_campaign%3DCONR_PF018_ECOM_GL_PHSS_ALWYS_DEEPLINK%26utm_content%3Dtextlink%26utm_term%3DPID100052172%26CJEVENT%3D011ed993e11b11ee825f00330a18b8f8%23Sec2">a study</a> published Tuesday.</p><p>For the scientists, there's one culprit: <a target="_blank" href="https://www.businessinsider.com/elon-musk-plan-colonize-mars-plan-unrealistic-scientists-explain-2023-10">Mars</a>.</p><p>The red planet's orbit and ours are locked in an intricate dance, and every so often, these line up so that Mars' gravitational pull on Earth is just a little more intense — this is called resonance.</p><p>This, in turn, could pull Earth ever so slightly toward the sun, increasing the surface temperature and solar radiation.</p><p>That can have a knock-on effect on the climate through the seas. Oceans are known to create giant whirlpools ahead of warming climates.</p><p>This effect wouldn't upheave the climate on its own, but it could nudge our planet toward a slightly warmer system by tweaking the Atlantic current that regulates the Gulf Stream, for instance.</p><p>The findings were published in the peer-reviewed journal Nature Communications.</p><div type="image" title="An image of Mars" height="640" width="640" msid="108469569" hostid="261" sizebytes="21454"></div><h2>More evidence is needed</h2><p>Not everybody agrees that the case is closed on these million-year variations.</p><p>Matthew England at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, told New Scientist he was "skeptical" given Mars's weak gravitational pull.</p><p>"Even Jupiter has a stronger gravitational field for Earth," he said.</p><p>Still, if correct, this theory would add precious understanding to these "megacycles." This information is crucial when refining models helping us see how our planet's intricate climate will progress over time.</p><p>"Many of us have seen these multi-million-year cycles in various different geological, geochemical and biological records — including during the famous explosion of animal life in the Cambrian Period," Benjamin Mills a biogeochemist at the University of Leeds who wasn't involved in the study told New Scientist.</p><p>"This paper helps cement these ideas as key parts of environmental change," said Mills.</p>

You Searched For "jupiter life line" and got 9 results

Jupiter and Saturn will reunite after 800 years on the shortest day of the year to form a rare 'Christmas star'

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NASA is giving its $1 billion Jupiter mission a critical new lease on life

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NASA will soon reveal a 'surprising' discovery about a moon of Jupiter that might support life

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HBO's explosive Tiger Woods documentary features interviews from people who know the golfing legend best including his former mistress- Here's how the directors got them to talk

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NASA has confirmed that its $1 billion Jupiter mission will cheat death for at least 3 more years

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'Jupiter Ascending' is one of the worst movies you will see this year

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Here's how to search for alien life on distant planets

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The winter storm slamming the East Coast is becoming a 'bomb cyclone' - and the National Weather Service says it could be a 'life or death' situation

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Mars could be creating 'giant whirlpools' deep within our planet's oceans

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