http://blogs.physicstoday.org/newspicks/2010/12/japans-akatsuki-spacecraft-fai.html
Today I'm posting a link to a small article that is hot off the press from physicstoday.org. Apparently this morning JAXA (Japan's space agency), announced that their spacecraft, the Akatsuki, did not successfully go into orbit around Venus after being launched in May of this year. I thought that this piece of news was very relevent to what we are learning about in class right now: centripetal force and the orbit of planets. Japan was trying to put a scientific spacecraft into orbit around Venus to investigate it's atmosphere and to see whether there is volcanic activity on Venus and lightning in Venus's atmosphere. These inquiries about Venus are no doubt to determine whether life could possibly be sustained in an Earth-like fashion.
So check out the article! It's titled "Japan's Akatsuki Spacecraft Fails to Enter Orbit Around Venus."
