In 2020, astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope watched Neptune's mysterious dark vortex wider than the Atlantic Ocean some 30 years after NASA’s Voyager 2's observations after a nearly 3-billion-mile odyssey.
In 2020, astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope watched Neptune's mysterious dark vortex wider than the Atlantic Ocean some 30 years after NASA’s Voyager 2's observations after a nearly 3-billion-mile odyssey.
In 2020, astronomers using NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope watched a mysterious dark vortex wider than the Atlantic Ocean on Neptune abruptly steer away from a “likely death” on the giant ice planet, some 30 years after NASA’s Voyager 2 probe flew past in 1989 after a nearly 3-billion-mile odyssey, snapping images of two giant storms brewing in Neptune’s southern hemisphere. NASA scientists dubbed the storms “The Great Dark Spot” and “Dark Spot 2.” Five years later, Hubble revealed both the Great Dark Spot and the smaller Dark Spot 2 had vanished.
Or so they thought
Hubble first observed he formation of a Great Dark Spot on Neptune in 2018. Like Jupiter’s 350-year-old Great Red Spot, Neptune’s Great Dark Spots are storms that form in areas of high atmospheric pressure. Scientists have seen a total of six dark spots on Neptune over the years. Voyager 2 identified two storms in 1989. Since Hubble launched in 1990, it has viewed four more of these storms.
astrophysicist at the hubble space science institute and the author of brilliant blunders. let s start there. why blunders? why are they productive? what was the goal of the book? so there were three goals to the book. one is to make us all feel a little bit better. namely that even the biggest geniuses make some serious blunders. second is to correct the misconception that some people think that science marches on a straight line from a to b when in fact it is really a zig zag path that encounters many, many blunders. and third to convey this notion that if you want to think outside the box, be prepared to meet some blunders along the way. chars darwin didn t know any genetics and we cannot blame him