Launch of the Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO) satellite from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California on February 24, 2009 (Credit: NASA)

(Updated 10:14am ET)

A new $273 million satellite designed to detect atmospheric carbon dioxide levels and in turn, aid in scientists’ understanding of the human impact on this atmospheric gas, has been lost in space.  It was launched on Tuesday morning from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

This catastrophic loss comes on the heels of another recent space disaster – a collision between Russian and US satellites miles above the earth on February 11th.

The Orbiting Carbon Observatory satellite didn’t reach orbit after its 1:51 a.m. local time launch because the “payload fairing” didn’t separate, NASA said in a statement. The fairing is a protective cover that surrounds the top of the satellite during launch and then is intended to separate from the main vehicle so the satellite can detach from its rocket boosters and enter regular orbit.  For an unknown reason, the fairing failed to separate at the required time.  The added weight of the fairing remaining attached prevented the rocket from obtaining the necessary elevation to reach stable orbit.

The spacecraft did not reach orbit and landed in the Pacific Ocean near Antarctica, said John Brunschwyler, the program manager for the Taurus XL.

“If it’s lost, it’s disappointing because it was giving us novel information to help us move our understanding forward on global warming,” said Alan O’Neill, science director of the Reading, U.K.-based Centre for Earth Observation.

An artist's conception of the Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO). (Credit: NASA)

The lost satellite was NASA’s first spacecraft dedicated to studying atmospheric carbon dioxide.  Carbon dioxide is the leading human-produced greenhouse gas believed to have a contribution to changes in Earth’s climate.  It was hoped that this satellite would further refine scientists’ understanding of how much carbon dioxide is released by humans and how the atmosphere responds to this increase.

“The Orbiting Carbon Observatory’s carbon dioxide measurements will be pivotal in advancing our knowledge of virtually all Earth system land, atmosphere, and ocean processes,” said Michael Freilich, director of NASA’s Earth Science Division in Washington. ”They will play crucial roles in refining our knowledge of climate forcings and Earth’s response processes.”

The solar physics community is abuzz this week. No, there haven’t been any great eruptions or solar storms. The source of the excitement is a modest knot of magnetism that popped over the sun’s eastern limb on Dec. 11th, pictured below in a pair of images from the orbiting Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO).

It may not look like much, but “this patch of magnetism could be a sign of the next solar cycle,” says solar physicist David Hathaway of the Marshall Space Flight Center.

The current minimum may have hit bottom and the end of this lull may be near:

For more than a year, the sun has been experiencing a lull in activity, marking the end of Solar Cycle 23, which peaked with many furious storms in 2000–2003. “Solar minimum is upon us,” he says.

The big question now is, when will the next solar cycle begin?

It could be starting now. New solar cycles always begin with a high-latitude, reversed polarity sunspot,” explains Hathaway. Reversed polarity ” means a sunspot with opposite magnetic polarity compared to sunspots from the previous solar cycle. “High-latitude” refers to the sun’s grid of latitude and longitude. Old cycle spots congregate near the sun’s equator. New cycle spots appear higher, around 25 or 30 degrees latitude.

The region that appeared on Dec. 11th fits both these criteria. It is high latitude (24 degrees N) and magnetically reversed. Just one problem: There is no sunspot. So far the region is just a bright knot of magnetic fields. If, however, these fields coalesce into a dark sunspot, scientists are ready to announce that Solar Cycle 24 has officially begun.

Below: Solar Cycle 23 is coming to an end. What’s next? Image credit: NOAA/Space Weather Prediction Center.

Many forecasters believe Solar Cycle 24 will be big and intense. Peaking in 2011 or 2012, the cycle to come could have significant impacts on telecommunications, air traffic, power grids and GPS systems. (And don’t forget the Northern Lights!) In this age of satellites and cell phones, the next solar cycle could make itself felt as never before.

As the sun gains more significance in the eyes of researchers examing the possible causes of terrestrial climate change (see more On Solar Variability and Global Warming), these three dimensional imaging techniques stand to provide a wealth of data that could assist researchers in understanding the complex, natural cycles of the sun’s energy output.

A link to the images (if not the images themselves) will be posted to this page as soon as they become available. For more on the plans, check out this article:

NASA scientists said 3-D images of the sun taken by the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory are expanding our understanding of solar physics.

The images, to be released Monday on the Internet, television and at museums, are also expected to help improve space weather forecasting.

The observatory, called STEREO, is part of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Solar Terrestrial Probes program. That 2-year mission involves two nearly identical observatories — one ahead of Earth in its orbit, the other trailing behind — that will trace the flow of energy and matter from the sun to Earth.

The observatories are expected to reveal the 3-D structure of coronal mass ejections — violent eruptions of matter from the sun that can disrupt satellites and power grids — and help scientists understand why they occur.

NASA said STEREO will become a key addition to the fleet of space weather detection satellites by providing more accurate alerts for the arrival time of Earth-directed solar ejections.

Technorati Tags: Astronomy, Solar Variability, Sun, NASA, Space Weather

“Man-made greenhouse warming has made a small contribution to the warming seen on Earth in recent years, but it cannot compete with the increase in solar irradiance,” Abdussamatov said.

By studying fluctuations in the warmth of the sun, Abdussamatov believes he can see a pattern that fits with the ups and downs in climate we see on Earth and Mars.

Abdussamatov is not alone in citing solar variability – fluctuating energy output from the sun – as a major factor in the Earth’s climate. Just last month, research published by NewScientist explores evidence of a relationship between solar variability and the ice age cycles on Earth (Sun’s fickle heart may leave us cold). Work completed by George Ehrlich of Geoge Mason University concludes:

There’s a dimmer switch inside the sun that causes its brightness to rise and fall on timescales of around 100,000 years – exactly the same period as between ice ages on Earth. So says a physicist who has created a computer model of our star’s core…

The article discusses many of the oscillations that control the temperature of the sun’s surface:

Ehrlich’s model shows that whilst most of these oscillations cancel each other out, some reinforce one another and become long-lived temperature variations. The favoured frequencies allow the sun’s core temperature to oscillate around its average temperature of 13.6 million kelvin in cycles lasting either 100,000 or 41,000 years. Ehrlich says that random interactions within the sun’s magnetic field could flip the fluctuations from one cycle length to the other.

These two timescales are instantly recognisable to anyone familiar with Earth’s ice ages: for the past million years, ice ages have occurred roughly every 100,000 years. Before that, they occurred roughly every 41,000 years.

For details, check out the full text of Ehrlich’s research. While recent work has explored a correlation between solar variability and terrestrial climate cycles, none have explored the potential mechanism until now, writes Ehrlich in his abstract:

A theory is described based on resonant thermal diffusion waves in the sun that appears to explain many details of the paleotemperature record for the last 5.3 million years. These include the observed periodicities, the relative strengths of each observed cycle, and the sudden emergence in time for the 100 thousand year cycle. Other prior work suggesting a link between terrestrial paleoclimate and solar luminosity variations has not provided any specific mechanism. The particular mechanism described here has been demonstrated empirically, although not previously invoked in the solar context.

Work published in Science Magazine in 2001 (Persistent Solar Influence on North Atlantic Climate During the Holocene) cites specific influences of solar variability on the climate of the North Atlantic:

Surface winds and surface ocean hydrography in the subpolar North Atlantic appear to have been influenced by variations in solar output through the entire Holocene.

Bond et al. confirm the likelyhood that the particular influence on the North Atlantic may have been transmitted globally:

The surface hydrographic changes may have affected production of North Atlantic Deep Water, potentially providing an additional mechanism for amplifying the solar signals and transmitting them globally.

Given that the sun has a profound impact on the climate of the globe, it naturally follows that any solar variability to influence the Earth’s climate in one location will have its affects felt throughout the globe.