Top 12 Things About Space You Didn't Know

From smelling like burnt cookies to gigantic clouds of alcohol, here are 12 things you didn’t know about space!!! 

1. Space Has a Smell: Have you ever wondered what space smells like? Of course, since we would die without protective gear out in space to breathe it’s very hard to tell. But when astronauts come back from space walks and take off their gear, they would note a very peculiar smell. They have described it as pretty distinct like metal, welding fumes, gunpowder, seared steak or burnt cookies!! The center of the Milky Way galaxy apparently smells like raspberries. The Max Planck Institute did some research and gathered that the large cloud of alcohol probably has something to do with it! But I’ll tell you more about that in a bit! The Ethyl Formate itself is supposedly responsible for the smell of raspberries and rum. All of these things combined make space not smell so good. But astronauts all say that they can recognize it immediately. We can try to compare it to things we know but it has a smell that is unlike anything else. 

2. The Voyager 1 is Still Going: While it's true that humans haven’t yet traveled to the stars (we can barely reach the moon...), that doesn't mean that our creations haven’t. Numerous satellites, probes, and more have been launched into space, but one of the most famous ones didn't just go far, it's still going!! The Voyager 1 spacecraft, is a vessel that was launched in 1977, and is still out there collecting data and sending it back. That's right, this little craft has been collecting data on the universe for over 40 years. What's more, NASA speculates that it'll keep going until 2025, when its internal generators won't be able to power it anymore. How far has it traveled in 40 years? It’s about 11.7 billion miles (18.8 billion km) from Earth. It’s so far it has left our solar system behind and is now in interstellar space. This object has gone so far and has sent us back amazing information. This is the little spacecraft that could! And it's still sending information about our universe to NASA and the Deep Space Network. Now it will send us back data on how interstellar plasma flows around the heliosphere!! Who else is excited?? 

Image source- Google | Image by-  NASA, JPL

3. The Sun Makes Up 99% Of Our Solar System: So, I know that you know the Sun is important. It lights up our world, gives us just enough warmth to survive, gives us seasons, and structures our time. But I don’t think we really appreciate how big it is!! It is at the center of our solar system and is by far the largest object. The sun hold 99% (ok 99.8% of the solar system’s mass). It is about 109 times the diameter of the Earth and about 1 million Earths can fit inside the sun. It’s very hard to imagine because all these huge comparisons seem very abstract but our sun is very impressive!! It is believed the sun was born around 4.6 billion years ago from a solar nebula. It has enough nuclear fuel to keep burning like it is now for another 5 billion years.  

4. The Moon Is Moving Away: Did you know that the moon is moving away from us? How is this happening? The Moon’s orbit around the Earth is getting larger every year. About 3.8 centimeters (1.5 inches). Somehow it is slowly pulling itself out of Earth's gravitational field. It’s easy to take the moon for granted. Even though it won’t affect us in the immediate future it will eventually affect life on the planet. Without the moon, the Earth could slow down it’s speed and eventually become unstable. But why is the Moon moving away from the Earth? It has to do with the Earth’s tides. The Moon is kept in orbit by the gravitational force the Earth exerts on it but the moon has its own gravitational force which affects the tides. The tidal bulge is slightly ahead of the moon and the movement of all of these factors, causes the tidal bulge to feed a small amount of energy into the Moon. It is actually pushing it outward a little at a time! It’s like when you are spinning around and you start to feel like you are getting pushed outwards. If these things start to get out of control we will get some major temperature swings on Earth. 

5. Jupiter's "Red Spot": Of the nine planets in our solar system (yes, 9 just in case some people are still counting Pluto!!), Jupiter is the biggest!! By a significant margin too. It has been studied for hundreds of years, especially because of its highly recognizable red spot. It's more than JUST a spot, it's actually a storm. Jupiter's Red Spot was first observed in 1830,maybe an earlier form of it as early as the 1600’s and we’ve been watching it ever since!! The largest and most powerful hurricanes ever recorded on Earth spanned over 1,000 miles across with winds gusting up to around 200mph. The Red Spot is twice as wide as the Earth. The winds are estimated to be rushing at 400mph. It's defined as an "anti-cyclonic storm", but we still don’t know what is causing the reddish color. Plus, it is huge!! The spot itself is three times the size of planet Earth. What's more, these anti-cyclonic storms are meant to last around 150 years on average. But this one is nearing its 400th birthday, and the truth is, it could be even older than that. While we have been investigating areas in its lower atmosphere and sent probes and telescopes to get a closer look, the red spot is a mystery. 

6. Galactic Years: Time, can’t stop it and there never seems to be enough of it. But Time is a curious concept and is relative. On Earth, a year is 365 days. 366 days on Leap Years. But you might be surprised to learn that there are also Galactic Years (aka cosmic years). How do we calculate that? Well, it's the time it takes our Sun (or any planet, solar system, or star) to complete one revolution around the center of the galaxy or the Milky Way. This "trip" takes about 230 million years. The sun is believed to have completed 17-18 revolutions around the center of our Milky Way Galaxy which is black hole Sagittarius A. So unless you're an immortal, you're not going to be able to celebrate the new galactic year. But hey! If you are have a drink for the rest of us, ok? 

Image source- Google | Image by-  Vanessa Ravencroft

7. 10 Billion Trillion Stars and Counting: When you look up into the night sky, you see a menagerie of stars to greet you, and if you aren’t surrounded by light pollution, or live in Las Vegas, then if you're lucky, you’ll see even more and more stars and planets. The stars in the sky show off the grandness of the universe. For every star in the sky is a place that we can only imagine. Seeing all the stars in the sky, it’s hard not to wonder how many there are. You could count stars forever because at best guess, there are about 10 billion trillion stars in our universe. Yes, that's a real measurement, and yeah, that's a lot. But it gets even better, because scientists estimate that every day, 275 million new stars are born. 

8. Cruithne: I know what you're thinking, "What the heck is a Cruithne?" Well, it's actually described as a "minor planet", and it's something that has a very interesting connection with Earth. Mainly, they share the same orbit around the Sun. Didn't see that coming, did you? Well to be fair, the discovery of Cruithne was only made 30 years ago, which goes to show just how much we still have to learn about our own universe, let alone other ones!! We're not in any danger of hitting Cruithne...o rat least not at the moment, but it's fascinating to think that there's a massive entity right next to us as we journey through our solar system. 

9. Earth's Rotation is Changing: How many hours are in a day? We’ve always been told that a day is equal to 24 hours. It’s the truth but it isn’t as precise as it could be. One of the many mysteries of our universe is how certain timings and measurements came to be. The concept of a day on Earth being 24 hours is because that’s how long it takes the Earth to go around the sun. Or is it? However, technically, the Earth's rotation is a little over 24 hours long. In fact, it's 24 hours and 2.5 milliseconds long. It's true! While that number may seem insignificant, it matters in the long term. Scientists have deduced that every century, Earth's rotation slows down a little bit, which extends how long it takes to make a full rotation. Tracing back in time, this means that when the dinosaurs were on Earth, the average day was 23 hours long. And so in the future, it could be 25 hours, or 26 hours and on and on unless something changes. But, more recently scientists have started to notice that the Earth’s core is speeding up, while the mantle-crust on the surface is slowing down. So fun fact, time is slowing on our planet’s surface even as technically it is spinning more quickly. 

10. More and More Planets Are Being Discovered: One of the biggest questions of humanity is “Is there anybody out there??” And yes, many, MANY, people have speculated that not only are we not alone out there, but we have already most likely been visited by them! But based on scientific evidence, so far, we’re alone. But as we discover more and more planets that could have similar conditions to ours, the possibilities are growing. The first planet that was discovered to be orbiting a sun outside of our solar system, was in 1995. But since then, numerous other planets have been discovered. Just in 2014, 900 planets were discovered, and it's been continuing ever since. This year, 2018, 95 new exoplanets have been discovered using NASA’s Kepler telescope. To be clear, not all of these planets are habitable, or able to support intelligent life, at least that we know of. But there are a few that have been discovered that could be potential places for life, including us if we were ever to make it that far. And who knows? Maybe one day we will find a planet with life outside of our own. Kind of a scary thought. 

11. Cloud of Alcohol in Space: This is NOT within our reach by any stretch of the imagination, but it's too cool to not talk about it. I mean it’s at least about 6,500 light years away. In the constellation of Aquila, there is a full-on cloud of methyl alcohol. Don’t get too excited! It’s not suitable for drinking!! Although there is a some ethyl alcohol in it too which would be drinkable. In terms of size, this cloud is 1,000 times larger than our solar system in regards to diameter. That's a lot of alcohol. Why are there alcohol clouds in space you ask? There’s a lot of complex molecular chemistry that goes on between the molecular clouds and dust in outer space.

12. The Mysteries Continue: Truly the greatest mystery of our universe is that there are countless questions that we still don’t know the answers too. The mystery is that there are soooo many mysteries!! Many scientists over the centuries have dedicated their lives to try and discover more and more about our universe. It still seems that we haven’t even come close to figuring it all out. Scientists recognize that we are limited with our technology and we can’t detect everything that's out there. But they are using whatever they can to break the barriers so we can learn more about the universe and how it works and our place inside it. When they started using things like X-Rays, radio waves, infrared and other frequencies to try and map out the universe, they found that there were areas that these frequencies could not penetrate. Meaning that many parts of our universe are still unknown. There are many theories as to why these signals don't bring anything back, but a common one is that this is proof of Dark Matter in the universe. But is this the case?

Were you surprised by any of these? Let me know in the comments below!!