Kepler Observes Neptune Dancing With Its Moons

New submitter Liquid Tip writes: NASA's K2 mission has the capability to stare continuously at a single field of stars for months at time. A new video shows K2 observations spanning 70 days from November, 2014 through January, 2015 reduced to a time-lapse of 34 seconds. During this time, we see some distant members of our Solar System passing through the K2 field-of-view. This includes some asteroids and the giant outer planet Neptune, which appears at day 15. A keen-eyed observer will also notice an object circling Neptune: its large moon, Triton, which orbits every 5.8 days. The fainter moon Nereid can be seen tracing Neptune's motion.

Comments

Starlight Glimmer 2016

[Anonymous Coward]

Vote Starlight Glimmer for President in 2016. As the equalist candidate, Starlight invites all of America to experience true friendship for the first time. Starlight believes in an America where people don't flaunt their special talents because they have no special talents to flaunt.

Re:Starlight Glimmer 2016

[Anonymous Coward]

Muslims hate us this we know
As the Qur'an tells us so
Little children all could be
Killed or raped by a muzz-zee

Re:Starlight Glimmer 2016

[Anonymous Coward]

Anal sex.

News?

[rossdee]

I am not sure what is 'newsworthy' about this.

Re:News?

[rockout]

Then stop reading Slashdot. You'll be missed.

Personally, I liked the video.

Re:News?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's just a video of a distant planet swinging around on its orbit, followed by two of its moons, with the celestial sphere in the background like it's painted on the biggest dome in the universe, being watched by a broken satellite we put in orbit of our planet. Who gives a shit, right?

Re: News?

[Anonymous Coward]

Correction, Kepler orbits the sun, trailing the earth, to stay stable. I know this because it's one of the coolest things ever made and everthing it does is flat out fascinating.

Re:News?

[Jhon]

Honestly, I was thinking the same thing. Then I watched it.

It was much more fascinating than I expected. It not only captured Neptune/moons as it crossed the field of view -- it also captured Neptune retrograde.

While I never went beyond basic astronomy classes in college, when I was younger I was very interested in astronomy. I was a member of The Planetary Society when I was 10. I actually met Carl Sagan once (because of my young age and membership). I had a telescope which I spent hours seeing what I can see in my light-polluted skies. I made a "flip book" of nightly sketches of Jupiter and it's moons which when "flipped" showed the moons orbiting Jupiter.

When I watched this I was suddenly 10 years old again and excited about astronomy. If this isn't the definition of "nerdy news" I can't help you.

Re:News?

[schlachter]

perhaps you would prefer to see Uranus dancing with the stars?

Re:News?

[neo-mkrey]

But it is 'cool', and that's good enough for me.

Re: News?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's EVEN BETTER.

Re:News?

[Anonymous Coward]

Space is clearly not news for nerds. Wtf?

Re:News?

[Anonymous Coward]

That's no moon.

Re:News?

[pitchpipe]

I am not sure what is 'newsworthy' about this.

Right!? Like OMG, this is so boring and stuff.

What's up with the Kardashians?

8bit art

[Anonymous Coward]

Looks like 8bit SuperMario to me.

You gotta love retrograde

[Virtucon]

I wonder, is there a backup beep when planets go into retrograde? Beep Beep Beep.

Re:You gotta love retrograde

[Anonymous Coward]

No, that's only for retroHeit, silly.

Done that

[Anonymous Coward]

NASA's K2 mission has the capability to stare continuously at a single field of stars for months at time

Done that. I wish I knew what I'd been smoking.

Re:Comment?

[Anonymous Coward]

I am not sure what is 'commentworthy' about this.