Request for Universal Time Lesson Plans

Map of Earth showing day and nightPeople in many countries throughout the world use satellite images and data. It’s important to be able to determine the exact time a picture was taken or data collected. To meet this need, satellites use a time stamp standard for tagging images and data — Universal Time, referred to as UT; or Zulu Time, designated by the letter Z; or Greenwich Mean Time, abbreviated as GMT. All three designations refer to the same time. The recorded time is the time at the 0º line of longitude, which runs through Greenwich, England.

When a satellite picture is taken or data set collected, it is logged according to traditional military notation for time in the 24-hundred hour notation, based on the time at 0º longitude.

This subject offers the potential for student investigations, mathematics activities and history lessons.

Share with other educators any time-related lesson plans you have used with your students by replying to the UNIVERSAL TIME posting in the Satellite Meteorology forum in NEON. 

NASA Releasing First Ever Spacecraft Orbital Views of Mercury

Artist Concept: MESSENGER in orbit over MercuryNASA will host a news conference at 1 p.m. EDT on Thursday, June 16, to reveal new images and science findings from the first spacecraft to orbit Mercury. The event will be held in the NASA Headquarters. NASA Television and the agency’s website will broadcast the event.

NASA’s MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging, or MESSENGER spacecraft conducted more than a dozen laps through the inner solar system for six years prior to achieving the historic orbit insertion on March 17.

This news conference connects the NASA MESSENGER mission to the MESSENGER content modules on the NASA Explorer Schools Virtual Campus. 

Be sure to watch this exciting news conference and see the new information the MESSENGER satellite is bringing us.

To read more about this amazing mission, visit: http://neon.intronetworks.com/#Forum/forum/2/1335/158/888

Link to the NES Virtual Campus home page.


NES Adding New Teaching Modules to the Virtual Campus

NASA Explorer Schools project logoThe NASA Explorer Schools project is adding 20 new teaching modules throughout the coming year to cover even more science, technology, engineering and mathematics topics across grades 4-12. NES will post the first set of new resources, focused on mathematics for algebra 1, algebra 2 and calculus classrooms later this summer. Other new content modules will focus on concepts in life science, physical science, engineering, chemistry and Earth science.

Be sure to check out all the exciting opportunities and classroom activities coming to the Virtual Campus. And remember, NES staff will be available throughout the summer to answer any questions or to provide additional support in integrating NES resources into your curriculum.

Have a wonderful summer!

Link to the NES Virtual Campus home page.



A Solar Blast

Coronal Mass Ejection on June 7, 2011The sun unleashed an M-2 (medium-sized) solar flare with a spectacular coronal mass ejection, or CME, on June 7, 2011. The large cloud of particles mushroomed up and fell back down looking as if it covered an area of almost half the solar surface.

NASA’s Solar Dynamic Observatory observed the flare’s peak at 1:41 a.m. EDT. SDO recorded these images in extreme ultraviolet light that show a very large eruption of cool gas. It is somewhat unique because at many places in the eruption there seems to be even cooler material — at temperatures less than 80,000° K.

When viewed in NASA’s Solar and and Heliospheric Observatory’s coronagraphs, the event shows bright plasma and high-energy particles roaring from the sun. This Earth-directed CME is moving at 1,400 km/s according to NASA models. Due to its angle, however, effects on Earth should be fairly small. Nevertheless, it may generate space weather effects such as aurora here on Earth in a few days.

To see videos of the CME visit the Solar Dynamic Observatory website.

Link to the NES Virtual Campus home page.



Enroll in NES for 2011-2012 School Year

We are just two weeks away from the close of the NASA Explorer Schools 2010-2011 school year. On June 30, the Virtual Campus will close for a two-week summer recess to update the website and add new resources for the coming year. 

At this time, we would like to remind you to enroll for the 2011-2012 school year. The enrollment process will ensure a seamless transition to the next NES school year, granting you continued access to exclusive NASA educational resources and a log of your NES activities from the previous year.

If you have any questions regarding the enrollment process or the 2011-2012 NES school year, please contact the NES Help Desk

We hope you’ll join us for the 2011-2012 school year. Log on and enroll today.  


NASA's Two Lunar-Bound Spacecraft

Articst concept: GRAIL spacecraft in orbit around the moon.NASA’s two Gravity Recovery And Interior Laboratory, or GRAIL, spacecraft have completed all assembly and testing prior to shipment to Florida.

The GRAIL mission is scheduled for launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida late this summer. The GRAIL-A and GRAIL-B spacecraft will fly in tandem orbits around Earth’s moon for several months to measure its gravity field in unprecedented detail. The mission also will answer longstanding questions about the moon and provide scientists with a better understanding of how Earth and other rocky planets in the solar system formed.

To read more about the GRAIL mission, go to the GRAIL article in NEON.

This story directly relates to On the Moon Educator’s Guide: On Target and Feel the Heat content modules, available on the NASA Explorer Schools Virtual Campus.

GRAIL also carries MoonKAM, a unique and exciting activity for middle school students, hosted by Sally Ride Science. Read the NES Teachers Corner article about getting your students involved in MoonKam.

Link to the NES Virtual Campus home page.



A Big Surprise from the Edge of the Solar System

NASA’s Voyager probes are truly going where no one has gone before. Gliding silently toward the stars, 9 billion miles from Earth, they are beaming back news from the most distant, unexplored reaches of the solar system.

Mission scientists say the probes have just sent back some very big news indeed.

It’s bubbly out there.

According to computer models, the bubbles are large, about 100 million miles wide, so it would take the speedy probes weeks to cross just one of them. Voyager 1 entered the “foam-zone” around 2007, and Voyager 2 followed about a year later. At first researchers didn’t understand what the Voyagers were sensing–but now they have a good idea.

Author: Dr. Tony Phillips | Credit: Science@NASA

Read more about this amazing discovery at Science@NASA or watch the video on YouTube.


NASA Now: Mars Excavation

NASA Now logoIn this episode, Kurt Sacksteder, Chief of the Space Environments and Experiments Branch at NASA’s Glenn Research Center talks about the importance of water on other planets and the tools being developed to mine water from Martian soil. NASA is working with a Canadian mining and space technology company to test designs for excavating natural resources from the surface of planets like Mars. They take measurements of forces applied to excavation devices, the traction of evacuation vehicles and even the flow of sand during simulated digs. 

Watch a preview of this episode below. Previews of other NASA Now episodes are on the NASA Explorer Schools channel on YouTube.

Link to the NES Virtual Campus home page.


NASA Now Minute: Mars Excavation



Exploring the Environment: Weather or Not

Weather or Not website logo

“Weather or Not” is a lesson based on predicting the weather. Students download current Earth weather images taken by various NASA and NOAA satellites, interpret the images, and make local forecasts. This website is an excellent resource for real-time satellite imagery and archived weather and satellite data.


To find out more about the lesson “Weather or Not,” read through the “Exploring the Environment” article in NEON.

Link to the NES Virtual Campus home page.



NASA Mission to Observe Earth's Salty Seas for Climate Clues

Person completing final checks of AquariusPreparations continue for the June 9, 7:20 a.m. launch of the international Aquarius/SAC-D observatory satellite from NASA’s Space Launch Complex at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Ca. The satellite will study connections between ocean circulation, the water cycle and climate by measuring ocean surface salinity. Global ocean salinity has been an area of much scientific uncertainty. Past measurements of salinity have been limited mostly to summertime observations in shipping lanes. Aquarius will map the entire ocean every day for at least three years from an altitude of 657 km (408 miles). The measurements will help scientists understand how salinity changes over time. Because ocean surface salinity varies from place to place and over time, scientists can use it to trace the ocean’s role in Earth’s water cycle. Aquarius will reveal how salinity variations influence ocean circulation and the water cycle, which help determine the Earth’s climate.

For information and activities about Earth observing satellites and Earth’s weather and climate, check out the NASA Explorer Schools module, Earth Climate Course.
For more information about Aquarius visit the mission website.