https://www.centauri-dreams.org/2024/09/05/the-freakish-radio-writings-of-1924/ Centauri Dreams * Home * About * Administrative * Booklist * Contact Select Page [ ] The 'Freakish Radio Writings' of 1924 by Paul Gilster | Sep 5, 2024 | Astrobiology and SETI | 5 comments Mars was a lively destination in early science fiction because of its proximity. When H. G. Wells needed a danger from outer space, The War of the Worlds naturally looked toward Mars, as a place close to Earth and one with the ability to provoke curiosity. Closely studied at opposition in 1877, Mars provoked in Giovanni Schiaparelli the prospect of a network of canals, surely feeding a civilization that might still be alive. No wonder new technologies turned toward the Red Planet as they became available to move beyond visible light and even attempt to make contact with its inhabitants. [Chessmen_of_Mars-1922] All this comes to mind this morning because of an intriguing story sent along by my friend Al Jackson, whose work on interstellar propulsion is well known in these pages, as is his deep involvement with the Apollo program. Al had never heard of the incident described in the story. It occurred in 1924, when at another Martian opposition (an orbital alignment bringing Earth and Mars as close as they'll get during its 26-month orbit), the U. S. Navy imposed radio silence nationwide for five minutes once an hour from August 21 to 24. The plan: Allow observatories worldwide to listen for Martians. Image: The cover of the Edgar Rice Burroughs novel that would have been on Mars enthusiasts' shelves when the 1924 opposition occurred. Burroughs' depiction of Mars was hugely popular in its day. This was serious SETI for its day. A dirigible was launched from the U. S. Naval Observatory carrying radio equipment for these observations, with the capability of relaying its signals back to a laboratory on the ground. A military cryptographer was brought in to monitor the situation, as attested by a provocative New York Times headline from August 23 of that year: "Code Expert Ready for Message.; RADIO HEARS THINGS AS MARS NEARS US." All this was news to me too, and thus I was entranced by the new article, a Times essay from August 20 of this year, written by Becky Ferreira. Because something indeed happened and was reported in August 28 of 1924, again in the Times: "SEEKS SIGN FROM MARS IN 38-FOOT RADIO FILM; Dr. Todd Will Study Photograph of Mysterious Dots and Dashes Recently Recorded." As Ferreira explains:: A series of dots and dashes, captured by an airborne antenna, produced a photographic record of "a crudely drawn face," according to news reports. The tantalizing results and subsequent media frenzy inflamed the public's imagination. It seemed as if Mars was speaking, but what was it trying to say? "The film shows a repetition, at intervals of about a half hour, of what appears to be a man's face," one of the experiment's leaders said days later. You may recall that when Frank Drake began Project Ozma at Green Bank in 1960, he homed in on nearby stars Tau Ceti and Epsilon Eridani. And relatively soon he got a strong signal, causing him to ponder whether detecting other civilizations might be easy if you just pointed your antenna and began to listen. But the signal turned out to be from an aircraft in the skies of West Virginia, an early SETI frustration, for radio frequency interference (RFI) is a source of constant concern, as witness the stir caused briefly in 2019 by what appeared to be a signal from Proxima Centauri, but was not. I don't think the 1960 RFI experience got much media play, if any, though Project Ozma itself received a certain degree of coverage. But the 'face' found in the Mars radio reception of 1924 would have caused newspaper readers in that year to recall Guglielmo Marconi's 1920 claim that he had detected signals "sent by the inhabitants of other planets to the inhabitants of Earth." This was an era bristling with the new exploration of radio wavelengths, which if they could offer communications across a continent or ocean, could surely make possible a signal from one planet to another. The interest was international, as another Times headline makes clear, this one from August 23, 1924: "RADIO HEARS THINGS AS MARS NEARS US; A 24-Tube Set in England Picks Up Strong Signals Made in Harsh Dots. VANCOUVER ALSO FAVORED At Washington the Translator of McLean Telegrams Stands by to Decode Any Message." Back to the 'face' found in the research effort on the American side of the Atlantic, dug out of data relayed from the dirigible. It was an astronomer named David Peck Todd who went to work with inventor Charles Francis Jenkins, using a radio from the National Electrical Supply Company designed to support troops in combat. Jenkins would use it to pick up any signals from Mars as detected by the airship. He had for his part built a 'radio camera' that would convert the radio data into optical flashes that would be imprinted on photographic paper, and it was within the result that what seemed to be a face emerged. But it was one that not everyone saw. Jenkins himself was unimpressed, as I learned from a story titled "Freakish Radio writings on Mars Machine" that ran in the Daily News on August 27. Let me quote the small piece in its entirety: C. Francis Jenkins, Washington inventor, is investigating to ascertain cause of a series of freakish writings received on his special machine designed to record any possible radio signals from Mars. The film record shows an arrangement of dots and dashes and pictures resembling a human face. "I do not think the results have anything to do with Mars," Jenkins said. A little more digging in the newspaper archives revealed that Jenkins told Associated Press reporters, as recorded in the Buffalo Evening Times that same day ("Radio Signals Shown on Films, Puzzle Savants at Capital") that he thought the results came from radio frequency interference, saying what appears to be a face is "a freak which we can't explain." The image was indeed part of a repeating pattern recorded on Jenkins' machine, but people were reading into it what they wanted to see. [32281303] Image: What remains of the 1924 'face on Mars' detection, as captured through photography of the original paper roll produced by Jenkins in his lab. Credit: Yale University Library. So where is the 38-foot long roll of photographic paper that caused the 'detection' of a face from Mars? The original, according to Ferreira's research, seems to have been lost, but Yale University Library lists three images from its collection of materials on David Peck Todd under the title "Martian signals recorded by Jenkins." So we have at least three photographs of Jenkins' work, but to me at least, no face seems apparent. Also in Buffalo, the Buffalo American ran a much longer piece titled "Astronomers Scan Mars To Discover Human Life" for its August 28, 1924 issue, which looks at the whole issue of studying Mars, though without mention of Jenkins' work. It includes this interesting paragraph: ...perhaps Mars does see what is happening on the earth. If you were on Mars and looked at the earth you would see a star twice as large as Mars appears to Buffalo, as the earth is double Mars' size. In the far distance on the same side of the sky would be the sun but it would only be two-thirds as large as it appears here. On the other wise would be discerned a huge mass of vapor 1,300 times as large as the earth. That would be Jupiter, which has not solidified yet. You would also see a couple of moons. They light Mars at night and are responsible for the tides on its oceans. The Buffalo American article takes us right into the Barsoom of Edgar Rice Burroughs' imagination, which at that time had reached, in its 10-book series, The Chessmen of Mars (1922). If you're a hard-core Burroughs fan, you may remember the chess game (known on Mars as Jetan) in which humans play the role of the chess pieces and fight to the death (Burroughs loved chess). Despite the Buffalo American's mention of oceans, even in John Carter's day Barsoom was depicted as a place where water resources were rare and tightly controlled. And just why study Mars in the first place? The newspaper article explains: They want to know if the earth is the only celestial globe on which the Creator put human beings and if the planets and stars beyond were designed merely for the people on Earth to admire. The Mars of the day was an extraordinary place. In researching this piece, I came across this from an article on the 1924 opposition by Rowland Thomas that ran in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch: For some time astronomers all over the world have been preparing to get close-ups of Mars with their telescopes. The observers at Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff, Ariz., where the late Percival Lowell carried on his lifelong study of the planet which confirmed his belief that intelligent life exists on it, reported that on the southern hemisphere of Mars, where the polar ice cap is now melting under the rays of what is there a spring-tide sun, vast areas of what may be continents, marshland, prairies and the beds of dired-up oceans are constantly changing in appearance. [lowell2] Image: Mars as conceived by astronomer Percival Lowell (1855-1916) and discussed by him in three books: Mars (1895), Mars and Its Canals (1906), and Mars As the Abode of Life (1908). The canals are here shown filled, with the vegetation in vigorous growth. Painting by H. Seppings Wright (1850-1937). We're still fourteen years from Orson Welles' "War of the Worlds" broadcast in October of 1938, which gave plenty of time for early SETI interest to grow along with magazine science fiction, which in the US began in the pages of Hugo Gernsback's radio magazines starting with The Electrical Experimenter and moving on to Science and Invention, but would soon claim its own dedicated title in Amazing Stories, whose first issue appeared in April of 1926. A nod as well to a sprinkling of earlier SF stories in Street & Smith's pulp The Thrill Book. Ferreira's article is terrific, and I'm glad to hear that she is working on a book on SETI. It took Mariner 4's flyby in 1965 to finally demonstrate what the surface of Mars was really like, and by then the interstellar SETI effort was just beginning to get attention. I wonder how the Mars enthusiasts of 1924 would have reacted to the news that despite the SETI efforts of the ensuing 100 years, we still have no proof of intelligence or indeed life of any kind on another world? [tzf_img_post] 5 Comments 1. Henry Cordova on September 5, 2024 at 10:56 Only a hundred years ago...these reports and speculations must have sounded very convincing to our parents. And a century is trivial in the great scheme of things, both of my parents were born over a hundred years ago. I recall reading reports of visual astronomers documenting green vegetation spreading from the Martian poles as the icecaps melted in spring-and of spectroscopy hinting at the presence of chlorophyll!. These observations were from way before my time, but were still being cited and debated as evidence of the canals when I was a student. I also recall reading about one astronomer glimpsing a huge white "W" shaped feature on the Martian surface during a moment of exceptionally clear seeing during a particularly close opposition. Was this the Martians trying to signal us by lighting fires, or using smoke? Serious proposals were made to light forest fires in the Siberian taiga to answer this signal We must remember, that Mars is faint through the telescope, and only a time exposure could reveal detail on the slow photographic emulsions of that time. But the planet rotates, and long exposures were blurred! The planet is close enough for visual examination only at opposition, for a few weeks every few years, and our own atmosphere is turbulent and cloudy. Even back then, we knew dust storms frequently obscured the Martian surface, and these often seemed to coincide with the times the planets were in best alignment for telescopic inspection. Mars was always at the extreme limit of possible observation, always at the very edge of wonder. None of us is immune to this sort of self-deception. I once recall seeing (through a telescope) a huge rectangular structure on the surface of the moon, like an immense bridge spanning a miles- wide crater! Of course, the next night it wasn't there, just a trick of light and shadow and perspective. But these reports can tell us more about ourselves than they do about the Martians. Someone could see a "face" in those Martian scans in 1924, but what makes us think Martians would even have faces? And we are still seeing humanoid faces on Mars today. Victorian UFOs looked like balloons and gliders...we tend to see what we expect to see. Reply + Paul Gilster on September 5, 2024 at 12:23 As witness the 'phantom airship' of 1897. Reply 2. Alex Tolley on September 5, 2024 at 11:19 Initially, I was wondering how the 1924 signal was converted from a 1D stream to a 2D face. How would they know to think of breaking it up into lines like a tv signal that had not been invented yet? But with the image of the signal, I do see what was meant by faces. The top stream can be seen as "hair", with 2 "eyes" (and sometimes "eyebrows" below it). then a smudge that could be a "nose", and a smudge below that is a "mouth". In at least one case that smudge mouth looks like it is smiling. So lots of repeating "faces" in the signal. An appropriate example of humans seeing things that are not there, just as Lowell saw canals and vegetation, and with them he "logically" built a dying civilization, not unlike the scenario Wells had used for his "War of the Worlds". It is a lot easier to see the faces in that signal, than the compounds encoded in the "A Sign from Space" signal that took a long time to interpret successfully. In 1924 there was enough radio equipment and probably unscreened electrical motors, that the US Navy could not enforce true radio silence even in the USA, let alone any signals from a distance bouncing off the ionosphere. A repeating signal like that received was mostly likely RFI from a machine. It would be ironic if the signal emanated from something on board the dirigible itself, such as a generator on the engines to power the radio equipment. Reply 3. LJK on September 5, 2024 at 14:40 Here is a collection of good articles on the Mars broadcasts of 1924, with the first ones having many relevant links on the subject. None of these are simple rehashes on the topic and all contain something of unique value to this fascinating essay: https://www.atlasobscura.com/articles/radio-signals-from-mars https://www.thehenryford.org/explore/blog/ listening-to-mars-celebrating-the-100th-anniversary-of-the-1924-mars-opposition https://www.earlyradiohistory.us/mars.htm https://airandspace.si.edu/air-and-space-quarterly/issue-11/ search-for-extraterrestrial-intelligence https://www.shorpy.com/node/12482 https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/nation/2024/08/24/ 100-years-ago-the-big-listen-tuned-in-to-messages-from-mars/ 74924170007/ https://artdaily.com/news/173197/ Scientists-seeking-life-on-Mars-heard-a-signal-that-hinted-at-the-future https://www.washingtonpost.com/history/2024/08/23/ 1924-search-for-aliens-mars/ Do not be too concerned with the moniker of UFO in these next two titles: https://www.denofgeek.com/culture/ real-ufo-history-radio-signals-aliens/ https://ufopast.com/2016/12/28/ martian-signals-and-the-national-radio-silence-day-of-1924/ Here is the unbroken link from Yale library archives: https://findit.library.yale.edu/catalog/digcoll:4345925 Here is an article from 1920 on the subject of radio signals to and from Mars: https://onetuberadio.com/2020/01/28/ 1920-radio-communications-with-mars/ As usual, Tesla was ahead of the game: https://teslauniverse.com/nikola-tesla/articles/talking-planets I am reminded, among other things, of the discourse on the famous Wow! Signal of 1977 and how our limited technology of the day has led to debates on what it was ever since. I highly recommend this video on the event: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjQUucV83w4 Reply 4. LJK on September 5, 2024 at 14:55 Percival Lowell may have been off about the Canals of Mars. He may even have not been the best draftsman when attempting to reproduce what he saw through the telescope, but he was a very good writer. Check out this sample from his 1895 book Mars as the Abode of Life here: https://avalonlibrary.net/ebooks/ Percival%20Lowell%20-%20Mars%20As%20The%20Abode%20of%20Life.pdf As for mind beyond the confines of our tiny globe, modesty, backed by a probability little short of demonstration, forbids the thought that we are the sole thinkers in this great universe. That we are the only minds in space it takes indeed a very small mind to fancy. Our relative insignificance commonly escapes us. If we reduce the universe to a scale on which we can conceive it, that on which the earth shall be represented by a good-sized pea, with a grain of mustard seed, the moon, circling about it at a distance of seven inches, the sun would be a globe two feet in diameter, two hundred and twenty feet away. Mars, a much smaller pea, would circle round the two-foot globe, three hundred and fifty feet from its surface; Jupiter, an orange, at a distance of a quarter of a mile; Saturn, a small orange, at two fifths of a mile; and Uranus and Neptune, good-sized plums, three quarters of a mile and a mile and a quarter away, respectively. The nearest star would lie two hundred and thirty thousand miles off, or at about the actual distance of our own moon, and the other stars at corresponding distances beyond that; that is, on a scale upon which the moon should be but seven inches off, the nearest star would still be as far from us as the moon is now. When we think that each of these stars is probably the centre of a solar system on a grander scale than our own, we cannot seriously take ourselves to be the only minds in the universe. But improbable as the absence of ultra-terrestrial life in a general way is, up to the present time we have had no proof of its particular existence in worlds beyond our own. Whether the observations I am now to describe have revealed something on the point I shall leave the reader himself to judge, after laying the facts before him; for it is with this in view that the present papers will deal with Mars, since any answer on this point is the most generally interesting outcome of a study of the planet. That the observations also disclose the fact that the hitherto accepted period of its rotation proves to be too small by the hundredth of a second is a matter of far greater moment, of course, but one which leaves the average man comparatively cool. That Mars, however, should be peopled by intelligent beings, although physically they be utterly unlike us, more goblins than men or animals, is a suggestion which appeals romantically, at least, to everybody. To determine whether a planet be the abode of life, two questions about it must be answered in turn: first, are its physical conditions such as to render it habitable? and secondly, are there any signs of its actual habitation? Unless we can answer the first point satisfactorily, it were futile to seek for evidence of the second. And here is the online version of Lowell's work from 1906 titled Mars and Its Canals, complete with illustrations: https://www.gutenberg.org/files/47015/47015-h/47015-h.htm Reply Submit a Comment Cancel reply Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked * [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] Comment * [ ] Name * [ ] Email * [ ] Website [ ] [ ] Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. [Submit Comment] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] [ ] D[ ] Search [ ]Search Charter In Centauri Dreams, Paul Gilster looks at peer-reviewed research on deep space exploration, with an eye toward interstellar possibilities. For many years this site coordinated its efforts with the Tau Zero Foundation. It now serves as an independent forum for deep space news and ideas. In the logo above, the leftmost star is Alpha Centauri, a triple system closer than any other star, and a primary target for early interstellar probes. To its right is Beta Centauri (not a part of the Alpha Centauri system), with Beta, Gamma, Delta and Epsilon Crucis, stars in the Southern Cross, visible at the far right (image courtesy of Marco Lorenzi). Now Reading [kaltenegger] Recent Posts * The 'Freakish Radio Writings' of 1924 * Pumping Energy into the Solar Wind * Our Earliest Ancestor Appeared Soon After Earth Formed * Are Interstellar Quantum Communications Possible? * The Odds on an Empty Cosmos * The Final Parsec Paradox: When Things Do Not Go Bump in the Night * The Search for Things that Matter * On Ancient Stars (and a Thought on SETI) On Comments If you'd like to submit a comment for possible publication on Centauri Dreams, I will be glad to consider it. The primary criterion is that comments contribute meaningfully to the debate. Among other criteria for selection: Comments must be on topic, directly related to the post in question, must use appropriate language, and must not be abusive to others. Civility counts. In addition, a valid email address is required for a comment to be considered. Centauri Dreams is emphatically not a soapbox for political or religious views submitted by individuals or organizations. A long form of the policy can be viewed on the Administrative page. The short form is this: If your comment is not on topic and respectful to others, I'm probably not going to run it. Follow with RSS or E-Mail RSS Follow by Email Follow by E-Mail Get new posts by email: [ ] [Subscribe] Advanced Propulsion Research Beginning and End Exoplanet Projects (Earth) * AFOE * Amateur Exoplanet Archive * Anglo-Australian Planet Search * APACHE Project * ASTEP: Antarctic Search for Transiting Extrasolar Planets * ASTRA * Astro Gregas * Atacama Large Millimetre Array * Automated Planet Finder * Berlin Exoplanet Search Telescope * California & Carnegie Planet Search * Carl Sagan Institute (Cornell) * CARMENES * Carnegie Astrometric Planet Search * CBA Belgium Observatory * CHIRON * CLEVER Planets * CODEX * Colossus * Coralie * DayNight * DEMONEX (DEdicated MONitor of EXotransits) * Dispersed Matter Planet Project * East Asian Planet Search Network * Elodie * ESO Coude Echelle Spectrometer * ESPRESSO (Echelle SPectrograph for Rocky Exoplanet and Stable Spectroscopic Observations) * European Extremely Large Telescope * Evryscope * Exoplanet Tracker * Externally Dispersed Interferometry * Fabra-ROA * GAPS (Global Architecture of Planetary Systems) * Gemini Planet Imager * GEMSS: Global Exoplanet M-dwarf Search-Survey * Geneva Extrasolar Planet Search * Habitable Zone Planet Finder * HARPS North * HARPS-N * HATNet Exoplanet Survey * High Accuracy Radial velocity Planetary Search * Hobby-Eberly Telescope * Italian Search for Extraterrestrial Life * ITASEL * Keck Interferometer * Keck Planet Finder * KELT North * KELT South * KMTNet (Korea Microlensing Telescope Network) * KOBE: K-dwarfs Orbited By habitable Exoplanets * Large Binocular Telescope * Las Cumbres Global Telescope Network * Low Frequency Array * LYOT Project * MACHO * Magdalena Ridge Optical Interferometer * Magellan Telescope * MARVELS * MARVELS (Multi-object APO Radial Velocity Exoplanet Large-area Survey) * MASCARA * Maunakea Spectroscopic Explorer * McDonald Observatory * MEarth * METIS (Mid-Infrared E-ELT Imager and Spectrograph) * MicroFUN Microlensing Follow-Up Network * Microlensing Planet Search Project * MINERVA (MINiature Exoplanet Radial Velocity Array) * MOA * MONET * N2K * Nancay Decametric Search * NEAR * NEID Spectrograph * New Mexico Exoplanet Spectroscopic Survey Instrument * NGTS (Next-Generation Transit Survey) * NIRPS (Near Infrared Planet Searcher) * Okayama Planet Search Program * Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment * OWL * PARAS (PRL Advanced Radial-velocity Allsky Search) * Permanent All Sky Survey * PHASES * PIRATE (Physics Innovations Robotic Astronomical Telescope Explorer) * PISCES (Planets in Stellar Clusters Extensive Search) * PLANET * PLANETS * Precision Radial Velocity Spectrometer * PRIMA-DDL * Project 1640 * Pulsar Planet Detection * QES (Qatar Exoplanet Survey) * Radio Interferometric Planet Search * RoboNet (Microlensing) * SAINT-EX * Search for Trojan Extrasolar Planets * SEEDS (Subaru Strategic Exploration of Exoplanets and Disks) * SHINE * Solaris * Sophie * Spectrashift * SPECULOOS * SPHERE * SPOTS: (Search for Planets Orbiting Two Stars * Square Kilometer Array * STARE * STELLA * SuperWASP * Systemic * Tennessee Automatic Photoelectric Telescope * TEP * Thirty Meter Telescope * TransitSearch * Transitsearch * TRAPPIST (TRAnsiting Planets and PlanetesImals Small Telescope) * TrES: The Transatlantic Exoplanet Survey * TRESCA Project * United Kingdom Infrared Telescope * University of St. Andrews Planet Search * UNSWEPS Project * UVES * Very Large Telescope Interferometer * VIDA * WASP (Wide Angle Search for Planets) * WHAT * XO Project Exoplanet Projects (Space) * ACEsat * Aragoscope * ARIEL: (Atmospheric Remote-Sensing Infrared Exoplanet Large-survey) * ASTERIA * Astro-1 * ATLAST (Advanced Technology Large-Aperture Space Telescope) * CHEOPS - CHaracterising ExOPlanet Satellite * CoRoT * CubeSat * Darwin * Dual Use Exoplanet Telescope * ECHO (Exoplanet Characterization Observatory) * Eddington * EPOXI (Extrasolar Planet Observation and Deep Impact Extended Investigation) * Euclid * EXCEDE * ExoplanetSat CubeSat * FINESSE * Gaia * GEST * HabEx * HEK (Hunt for Exomoons with Kepler) * High Etendue Multiple Object Spectrographic Telescope (THE MOST) * High-Definition Space Telescope * HST Astrometry * James Webb Space Telescope * Kepler * Kilometer Space Telescope * Laser Interferometer Space Antenna * LISE Hypertelescope * LUVOIR * MOST (Microvariability and Oscillations of STars) * Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope * NEAT * New Worlds Imager * Origins Billion Star Survey * Origins Space Telescope * Pegase * Planet Imaging Concept Testbed * Plato * PlaVi (PlanetVision) * Project Blue * SISTINE * Space Interferometry Mission * SPICES (Spectro-Polarimetric Imaging and Characterization of Exo-planetary Systems) * Spitzer Space Telescope * SUPER-SHARP * SWEEPS * Terrestrial Planet Finder * TESS (Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite) * TOLIMAN * Twinkle * UMBRAS Further Astronomical and Astronautical Resources * 100 Year Starship * Acta Astronautica * ADS Abstract Service * Alternative Earths Astrobiology Center * American Astronomical Society * American Geophysical Union * American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics * astro-ph preprint server * AstroArt of David A. Hardy * AstroBetter * Astrobiology Magazine * Astrobites * Astrometry.net * Astronautics Now * Astronomical Journal * Astronomy & Astrophysics * Astronomy Picture of the Day * Astrophysical Journal * Beyond NERVA * British Interplanetary Society * Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society * Cosmic Ancestry * Division for Planetary Sciences * European Federation of Biophysics * Event Horizon Telescope * Exoplanet Transit Database * Exploring the Universe with Andrew Fraknoi * Extrasolar Planets and Astrobiology * Extrasolar Planets Encyclopedia * Galaxy Forum * Galileo Project * Google Scholar * Icarus Interstellar * Institute for Interstellar Studies * Interstellar Journey * Interstellar Research Centre * Interstellar Studies Bibliography * James Benford * L'Institut de l'Information Scientifique et Technique * Lunar and Planetary Institute * Meteoritics and Planetary Science * NASA Technical Reports Server * Nature * Orbital Index * Orbital Index * Overview Institute * Physics * Planetary and Life Science Community Meetings Calendar * Planetary and Space Science * Principium (Journal of I4IS) * ResearchGATE * RocketSTEM * Science * Scitizen * SDSS SkyServer * SETI News * SFSU Exoplanet Group * SIMBAD Astronomical Database * Space Agenda * Space Sailing * Space Telescope Science Institute * Space Transport and Engineering Methods * spaceweather.com * The neighborhood * Trans-Neptunian Automated Occultation Survey * Troy Project Weblogs, Discussions, Commentaries * Adam Crowl (Crowlspace) * Airminded * Alien Life * Ancient Solar System * Antimatter * Apparent Brightness * AstroBlog * AstroEngine.com * Astrogator's Logs (Athena Andreadis) * Astronautical Evolution * Astronomist * Astronomy Blog * Astronomy.com Blog * astroPT * Astroquizzical * Asymptotia * Atlas of the Universe * B612 Foundation * Bad Astronomy * Beyond Earthly Skies * Beyond Impossible * Billion Year Plan * Buran Space Shuttle * Captain Interstellar (Paul Titze) * Celestial Matters * Cheap Astronomy * Cocktail Party Physics * collectSPACE * Colony Worlds * Comets & Asteroids: Small Bodies of the Solar System * Cosmic Diary * Cosmic Mirror * Cosmic Tusk * Cosmic Variance * Cosmic Visions * CosmoCoffee * Cumbrian Sky * Dad2059 * Deep Sky Blog * Dialogos of Eide * Dick's Rocket Dungeon * Dragon's Gaze * Dream of the Open Channel * Dreams of Space - Books and Ephemera * Dreams of Space: Books and Ephemera * Drew Ex Machina (Andrew LePage) * DSFP's Spaceflight History Blog * Dynamics of Cats * Eternos Aprendizes * Eureka * Eureka (Daniel Marin) * Ex Space * ExoClimes.com * Exoplanetology * Exoplanets Channel * Extrasolar Visions II * Final Frontier * Finding Pluto * Flank Speed * Fly Me to the Moon * Fraknoi's Universe * Future & Cosmos * Future Incredible * Future Planetary Exploration * Futurismic * Galactic Journey * Gregory Benford * Habitable Worlds * Habitable Zone * Hop's Blog * Il Tredicesimo Cavaliere * In the Dark (Peter Coles) * Innovation Watch * Innumerable Worlds * Invitation to ETI * Isaac Arthur (videos) * James Essig * James Randi Educational Foundation Forum * Jatan's Space * John Cleary Creations * Jon Lomberg * Kentucky Space * Know the Cosmos * Last Word on Nothing * Laurel's Pluto Blog * Leonard David's Inside Outer Space * Letters to Nature * Lifeboat Foundation * Lone Mind * Long Bets Foundation * Long Now Foundation * Lost in Transits * Magellan AO * Many Worlds (Marc Kaufman) * Martian Chronicles * Meridiani Journal * Music of the Spheres * Nano Age * NASA Watch * NASA-UC Eta-Earth Survey * New Papyrus * Next Big Future * NGTS (Next-Generation Transit Survey) * On the Path to Space * One-Minute Astronomer * OrbitalHub * Orion's Arm * Our Universe in 202 Notations * Out of the Cradle * Overcoming Bias (Robin Hanson) * Patrick McCray * peregrinus interstellar * PHASES (Palomar High-precision Astrometric Search for Exoplanet Systems) * Physics arXiv Blog * PI Club * Planet/Planet * PLANETPLANET (Sean Raymond) * Polymath (Robert Clark) * Posthuman Blues * Potentia Tenebras Repellendi * Profiles of Our Future in Space * Project Icarus Weblog * Project Rho (Winchell Chung) * Quasar9 * Real Science * Remote Central * Rick Costello Space Art * Riding with Robots * Robot Explorers * Robot Guy * Rymden i Dag * Science Meets Fiction * Science News * SciTech Journal * Scitizen * Simostronomy * Singularity Institute * Slacker Astronomy * SolStation * Sorting Out Science * Space Archaeology * Space Elevator Blog * Space FTW * Space Law Probe * Space Pragmatism * Space Review * Space Transport News * Space Travel Blog UT Tartu Observatory * Spaceflight History * Spacewriter's Ramblings * Stan Erickson's Alien Civilization Blog * Star Bright? * Star Stryder * Starts with a Bang * Strange Paths * Sufficiently Advanced * Supernova Condensate * This Is Rocket Science * This Week's Finds in Mathematical Physics * Tiny Mantras * Titan Exploration * Tom Barclay/Planet Hunter * Tomorrow Is Here * Trevor Paglen * Ultratech Memes * Universe Today * Unmanned Spaceflight * Velcro City Tourist Board * Visions 2200 * Visual Astronomy * Visualizing Science * Wanderingspace * Watered Down Physics * Where's The Flux (Tabby's Star) * Will Gater * Woodward Effect * Worlds of David Darling * Wow! Signal Podcast * Written Worlds Archives * 2024 (63) * 2023 (102) * 2022 (104) * 2021 (181) * 2020 (188) * 2019 (191) * 2018 (225) * 2017 (235) * 2016 (237) * 2015 (247) * 2014 (242) * 2013 (232) * 2012 (251) * 2011 (244) * 2010 (268) * 2009 (275) * 2008 (314) * 2007 (382) * 2006 (327) * 2005 (330) * 2004 (131) Copyright (c) 2023 Centauri Dreams. All Rights Reserved.