The Rosetta space probe has just completed the last series of maneuvers that brought it into the orbit of the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. This stage of the Rosetta mission started some time ago and in recent weeks it sent images and other data that were very interesting but now, after more than 10 years of traveling, the main phase of its mission is starting.
Io, the innermost of the Jupiter’s large satellites called the Galilean moons because they were discovered by Galileo Galilei, is the object with the greatest geological activity in the solar system with over 400 active volcanoes. Now new images of Io have been published from almost exactly a year ago, when there were two weeks of activity intense even by the standards of Io, with three massive eruptions.
The novel “Golden Fleece” by Robert J. Sawyer was published for the first time in 1990. It won the Prix Aurora Award given annually to the best Canadian science fiction or fantasy novel.
Diana Chandler is a scientist aboard starship Argo, traveling to the planet Eta Cephei IV. She discovered something that would totally change the meaning of the mission but Jason, the artificial intelligence that assists the crew in many operations during the journey, wants to prevent Diana from revealing her discovery. For this reason, he kills her and stages a suicide.
Aaron Rossman, Diana’s ex-husband, is shocked when Jason tells him the news of her alleged suicide. Almost everyone accepts that it was suicide even though there are oddities in the level of radiation in the spaceship in which Diana died but Aaron wants to investigate to uncover the truth. Jason wants to stop him at all costs.
Clifford Donald Simak was born on August 3, 1904, in Millville, Wisconsin, in a rural community that influenced the setting of many of his stories. He was a journalist but he’s especially famous as a science fiction writer. In years in which aliens were generally villains, Simak saw them in a more positive way. Among his many famous novels, there are “City” and “Way Station”. Simak died on April 25, 1988.
ESA’s Rosetta space probe is continuing its approach to the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko and the photos that are coming are more and more decomaed. In July, the images of the comet’s nucleus had revealed its binary nature, now scientists but also merely curious people can see it in a much better quality. Its coma begins to show an interesting activity too and Rosetta has provided more surprising data.
