Amendment 71: New Opportunity: A.16 Cryosphere - NASA Science (.gov)

New Program Element A.18 Geosphere solicits proposals addressing one or more of the following sub-elements: Forecasting of geohazards and/or assessment of their impact on the Earth System. Proposals focused on this subelement may explore one or more geohazard types, and proposals that seek to characterize process-based connections between hazard cascades (for example, earthquake triggers leading to tsunami or landslides) are strongly encouraged. Proposals seeking to explore forecasting of geohazards could include volcanic deformation analyses or monitoring and modeling of pre-seismic activity. For proposals incorporating analyses of how hazards impact infrastructure or populations, proposers should seek to connect to societal impacts to align with Earth Science to Action objectives.

Milky Way’s first microblazar candidate sits 12,000 light-years away, offering a rare ground-level lab for studying relativistic jetsA black hole 12,000 light-years away is firing a jet of plasma almost directly toward Earth. At that distance, no known or expected danger to Earth has been identified by the researchers or the institutions involved. What astronomers have actually found is rarer and more interesting than a threat. Researchers have identified IRAS 18293-0941 as a compelling candidate for the Milky Way’s first microblazar, a class of object that gives astrophysicists a close-up laboratory for studying some of the most violent physics in the galaxy. What Astronomers FoundThe discovery centers on a binary system whose black hole expels plasma jets at close to three-quarters the speed of light, pointed almost directly toward Earth. The system pairs a hot, massive star with a black hole that completes a full orbit roughly every 11.38 days. Material drawn from the companion star feeds the black hole, and some of that matter gets expelled outward as opposing jets traveling at approximately three-quarters the speed of light. Terminology matters here.