Technologies

Catch a Rare Planetary ‘Smiley Face’ in the Stars This Week: Here’s How

Look to the eastern sky late Thursday, and a clear horizon will show you this unusual, grinning planet alignment.

A rare celestial event on April 24-25 will give skygazers a creative way to see a smiley face in the early morning sky. Though it’s not exactly an emoji, this interesting grouping will show a crescent moon plus two rising planets, Venus and Saturn, close to the horizon. Together they’ll form a quirky sideways «smile» for watchful viewers, creating plenty of potential for amateur photographers with the right angles.

«Find Venus, Saturn, and the crescent moon gathered low in the east as dawn warms the morning sky. Mercury is also visible below them for those with a clear view to the horizon,» NASA said in this month’s skywatching tips.

This isn’t quite a lunar occultation, where the moon fully obscures the planets, but the event is very close to one. If you want the best chance of seeing this interesting convergence, you should head out before twilight.

When CNET reached out to Amateur Astronomer’s Association for advice, they let us know, «Thank you for reaching out! Stargazers all across the US will be able to see this conjunction in the early morning hours. They should look towards the eastern sky just before sunrise, local time. … All stargazers need is an open view of that eastern horizon and clear skies» The club also recommended using the Stellarium Web site as a tool to calculate the exact best time to view for your location.

When you’re ready, start with a few simple steps:

Go out while it’s still fully dark, well before dawn in your location.
Ensure you have a clear view of the eastern horizon (where the sun rises). Clouds or morning fog may obscure the event.
Find a higher spot with a clear view of the horizon. Nearby hills or mountains could hide the event, so the clearer, the better.
Find the moon’s crescent at the bottom of the horizon.
Look to the upper right of the crescent and watch for two bright lights to shine. You may think they’re stars, but they’re planets. Venus should be significantly brighter than Saturn, giving the smile a fun, lopsided look.
If you’re taking photos, wait until the brightening twilight has started to obscure nearby stars while the planets still remain easily visible.

The smiley face is part of Venus’ continual shift from an evening spectacle to a morning event throughout April. Mercury will also be making an appearance if you have a horizon view that includes especially low stars.

Technologies

Researchers Shoot Lasers At People’s Eyes To Help Them See A New Color

The new color, olo, is described as a «blue-green of unprecedented saturation.»

Think you’ve seen all the colors that exist? Maybe not. Researchers at the University of California at Berkeley and the University of Washington have created a new system that controls the eye’s photoreceptors to help it see new colors, as reported in the journal Science Advances last week.

Researchers didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.

The system, called Oz, works by activating cone cells in the retina — in short, firing laser pulses at researchers’ eyes — to push the eye past «spectral sensitivities» and to «elicit a color beyond the natural human gamut.»

In this case, respondents described the color as a «blue-green of unprecedented saturation.»

Even those who worked on the research were impressed.

«We predicted from the beginning that it would look like an unprecedented color signal but we didn’t know what the brain would do with it,» said Ren Ng, an electrical engineer at the University of California, Berkeley, in an interview with The Guardian. «It was jaw-dropping. It’s incredibly saturated.»

The researchers say it’s impossible to fully convey this color over a monitor, but a swatch they shared with The Guardian resembles a bright turquoise.

Technologies

Amazon Sets New Rocket Launch Date for Its Starlink Satellite Service Rival

The weather hampers Project Kuiper’s original planned launch, but a new date has been set for next week.

Amazon has revealed a new launch date for its 27 low-Earth orbit satellites as part of Project Kuiper to provide satellite broadband. The new date is set for Monday, April 28 between 7p.m. and 9 p.m. ET (4-6 p.m. PT), barring weather or other factors impacting launch.

The original rocket launch was set for Wednesday, April 9, between 7 and 9 p.m. ET (4 to 6 p.m. PT), but poor weather forced the rocket launch to be scrubbed for the day.

«Weather is observed and forecast NO GO for liftoff within the remaining launch window at Cape Canaveral this evening, according to Launch Weather Officer Brian Belson,» United Launch Alliance said in its live updates Wednesday night. «The stubborn cumulus clouds and persistent winds make liftoff not possible within the available window.»

You can watch the rocket launch live on the mission page or on YouTube.

The launch mission, KA-01 or Kuiper Atlas 1, will be on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket and will take place at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.

It’ll be a big step forward for the project, which Amazon announced in 2019 with promises of a $10 billion investment. Now the company is poised to enter the race to provide satellite internet service, a space currently dominated by SpaceX’s Starlink, which has about 7,000 satellites. Amazon’s plans call for 3,200 satellites to be deployed over 80 launches. The company intends to provide internet service with this technology later this year.

More competition could improve internet services

The literal space race, which includes Starlink, Amazon and other companies such as Viasat, Hughesnet, Eutelsat and China’s SpaceSail, could mean more internet service availability in far-flung and rural areas with limited broadband options. Though Starlink is the leader in space, some of these other companies are continuing to launch satellites and working to deploy high-speed internet in more markets, such as Brazil. With more players in the market, that could mean faster and cheaper internet in more areas, although whether that actually bears out for consumers remains to be seen.

Mahdi Eslamimehr, executive vice president at Quandary Peak Research and adjunct professor at the Department of Computer Science at USC, said Amazon is well poised to compete with Starlink. «Amazon has made extensive launch agreements with major providers such as ULA, Arianespace, Blue Origin, and even SpaceX itself, positioning Kuiper as a major challenger due to its expansive infrastructure and significant resources.»

He said, «While Starlink currently enjoys clear market leadership, it faces increasing competition from well-capitalized and strategically agile competitors, specifically from China, suggesting the market will become considerably more competitive in the near future.»

So far, Eslamimehr said, Amazon’s satellite efforts have been promising and successful, at least in the prototype stages. The company has also been testing Amazon Web Services in space. «These developments collectively underscore Amazon’s robust entry into the satellite internet market and reflect positive early momentum in its overall space strategy.»

Beyond how it fares against Starlink and other companies, the Amazon satellite launches are significant in other ways. Eslamimehr said, «Project Kuiper isn’t just about competition; it’s positioned as a critical step toward closing the global digital divide, promising to deliver high-speed internet to underserved communities worldwide.»

Correction, April 4: An earlier version of this story misspelled the name of the USC professor and Quandary Peak Research executive vice president. His name is Mahdi Eslamimehr.