Innholdsfortegnelse for January 2022 i Ask Science and Arts Magazine for Kids and Children

NEXT STOP, VENUS! You would really not enjoy a vacation to Venus. Earth’s sunward neighbor is hot enough to melt metal. Its clouds rain acid. But NASA is planning a trip there—two, actually. The two robotic missions will launch between 2028 and 2030. Veritas will fly around the planet to map its rock types and volcanoes. The ball-shaped DAVINCI+ will dive down to sample Venus’s poisonous atmosphere, and to see whether it might have once had oceans. Scientists hope to learn more about how Venus became so hot and why it developed differently from Earth. Sneaky Sponges A sponge is an object that might wipe up spills in your kitchen. It’s also the name of an underwater animal. Sponges in the sea are pretty similar to the kind near your…

Our galaxy spins around a supermassive black hole. How do we know? We went to ask Andrea Ghez, who first figured out it was there. Andrea Ghez studies objects in space and how the universe works. She’s an astrophysicist—and a great one. In 2020, she won the Nobel Prize for finding a huge black hole at the center of our own galaxy. Its edge is the size of a solar system, with the mass of four million suns. What did you like to do as a kid? My dad was a professor in Chicago. He taught economics, or how money works. During the summer, he gave me and my two younger sisters logic puzzles to solve. I found them really fun and was good at them. I also enjoyed doing…

A Black Hole Is Not a Hole by Carolyn Cinami DeCristofano So what is it? This book will answer all your burning questions about these fascinating space objects. How do they form? Why? How do we know they’re there? What’s in the center, and how do we know if we can never see it? My favorite thing about books like this is reading them safe on Earth, in a comfy chair. The Mysterious Universe by Ellen Jackson and Nic Bishop How did the universe begin? Will it end? What is dark matter? And dark energy? Meet cosmologist and supernova-hunter Alex Filippenko, who hopes that supernovas can help answer some of these big questions. But first we’ve got to find them! This book follows Alex and his team as they go…

Before dawn one day in the spring of 1054, astronomers in China were amazed to see a bright new star on the horizon, just under the rising crescent moon. They carefully noted its exact location, near the star Tianguan (in the constellation we call Taurus, the bull). The new star was six times brighter than Venus and lit up a patch of sky nearly the size of the full moon. They watched it intently as the weeks went by, wondering what it meant. Did it foretell some grand or terrible event? They kept exact records, just in case. They called the visitor a guest star, as they would a comet. But they knew this was no comet. It wasn’t moving. The Star Fades The bright new star was visible even…

Our Home in the Universe When you look up at the night sky, many of the twinkling lights you see are stars like our own sun. But some are whole galaxies. Each of those galaxies contains billions of stars. The bright center of this galaxy is the light of millions of stars, circling a massive black hole. Astronomers think that most galaxies, including our own, have a black hole at the center. The Milky Way Spiral galaxies are flat, like a plate. Imagine tilting one sideways. What would you see? A bright band of stars. And that’s what you’ll see in our sky if you look up on a dark night. The Milky Way is the rest of our own galaxy seen edge-on (since we’re inside it). Our sun is…

Out in the depths of space, there’s something pulling. Galaxies far away feel the tug. Stars circle it. Closer in, long spirals of bright gas and dust swirl like water around a drain. And in the very center? Nothing. A perfect, pitchy black, sucking in everything around it. Not a Hole Congratulations! You’ve found one of the strangest objects in the universe—a black hole. But it’s not a hole. In fact, it’s sort of the opposite. Black holes are real, solid objects that move around space just like stars and galaxies. In fact, some used to be stars and galaxies. But in a black hole, all the matter that used to be spread out across millions of miles is packed into a tiny space. If a star collapses into a…

Space is big. So space explorers need somewhere comfy to call home. For this month’s contest, design a spaceship you might like to pilot on a deep-space adventure, or plan a planet of your very own. Send us a picture of your ideal home away from home, and we’ll share a selection of the most spaceworthy in an upcoming issue of Ask. Contest Rules: 1. Your contest entry must be your very own work. Ideas and words should not be copied. 2. Be sure to include your name, age, and address on your entry. 3. Only one entry per person, please. 4. If you want your work returned, enclose a self-addressed, stamped envelope. 5. Your entry must be signed or emailed by a parent or legal guardian, saying it’s your…