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Shuttle delayed to 2006
NASA Administrator Mike Griffin and Associate Administrator for Space Operations Bill Gerstenmaier hold a news conference from Agency Headquarters in Washington on August 18 to announce a delay in the next shuttle flight from September to next March. (38min 02sec)

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Mars probe leaves Earth
The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter lifts off aboard a Lockheed Martin Atlas 5 rocket from Cape Canaveral's Complex 41.

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   Playalinda Beach
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Launch pad demolition
Explosives topple the abandoned Complex 13 mobile service tower at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. This video was shot from the blockhouse roof at neighboring Complex 14 where John Glenn was launched in 1962.

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First tile gap filler
This extended movie shows Steve Robinson riding the station's robot arm, moving within reach of Discovery's underside and successfully pulling out the first protruding tile gap filler. (6min 45sec file)
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Second tile gap filler
This extended movie shows Steve Robinson successfully pulling out the second protruding tile gap filler. (9min 23sec file)
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Storage platform
The External Stowage Platform-2 designed to hold spares and replacement equipment for the space station is attached to the Quest airlock module's outer hull during the spacewalk. (6min 29sec file)
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Station experiments
Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi climbed 60 feet above Discovery's payload bay to the space station's P6 solar array truss to attach the Materials International Space Station Experiment-5 package. (4min 08sec file)
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Opening the suitcase
Noguchi deploys the MISSE-5 package, revealing a host of material samples to the space environment for extended exposure. (3min 43sec file)
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Atop the station
Noguchi's helmet-mounted camera provides a stunning view atop the P6 truss showing Discovery to his right and the Russian segment of the space station on his left. (2min 31sec file)
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Galactic survey reveals a new look for the Milky Way
UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADISON NEWS RELEASE
Posted: August 19, 2005

With the help of NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, astronomers have conducted the most comprehensive structural analysis of our galaxy and have found tantalizing new evidence that the Milky Way is much different from your ordinary spiral galaxy.


The Milky Way, it turns out, is no ordinary spiral galaxy. According to a massive new survey of stars at the heart of the galaxy by Wisconsin astronomers the Milky Way has a definitive bar feature -- some 27,000 light years in length -- that distinguishes it from pedestrian spiral galaxies, as shown in this artist's rendering. Illustration courtesy: NASA/JPL-Caltech/R. Hurt (SSC/Caltech)
 
The survey using the orbiting infrared telescope provides the fine details of a long central bar feature that distinguishes the Milky Way from more pedestrian spiral galaxies.

"This is the best evidence ever for this long central bar in our galaxy," says Ed Churchwell, a UW-Madison professor of astronomy and a senior author of a paper describing the new work in an upcoming edition of Astrophysical Journal Letters, a leading astronomy journal.

Using the orbiting infrared telescope, the group of astronomers surveyed some 30 million stars in the plane of the galaxy in an effort to build a detailed portrait of the inner regions of the Milky Way. The task, according to Churchwell, is like trying to describe the boundaries of a forest from a vantage point deep within the woods: "This is hard to do from within the galaxy."

Spitzer's capabilities, however, helped the astronomers cut through obscuring clouds of interstellar dust to gather infrared starlight from tens of millions of stars at the center of the galaxy. The new survey gives the most detailed picture to date of the inner regions of the Milky Way.

"We're observing at wavelengths where the galaxy is more transparent, and we're bringing tens of millions of objects into the equation," says Robert Benjamin, the lead author of the new study and a professor of physics at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater.

The possibility that the Milky Way Galaxy has a long stellar bar through its center has long been considered by astronomers, and such phenomena are not unheard of in galactic taxonomy. They are clearly evident in other galaxies, and it is a structural characteristic that adds definition beyond the swirling arms of typical spiral galaxies.

The new study provides the best estimates for the size and orientation of the bar, which are far different from previous estimates.

It shows a bar, consisting of relatively old and red stars, spanning the center of the galaxy roughly 27,000 light years in length - 7,000 light years longer than previously believed. It also shows that the bar is oriented at about a 45-degree angle relative to a line joining the sun and the center of the galaxy.

Previously, astronomers debated whether a presumed central feature of the galaxy would be a bar structure or a central ellipse - or both. The new research, the Wisconsin astronomers say, clearly shows a bar-like structure.

"To date, this is the best evidence for a long bar in our galaxy," Benjamin asserts. "It's hard to argue with this data."

The Spitzer Space Telescope was lofted into orbit in August of 2003. It consists of a telescope and three science instruments, including the Infrared Array Camera, the primary instrument used for the new survey, known as GLIMPSE for Galactic Legacy Mid-Plane Survey Extraordinaire.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), Pasadena, Calif., manages the Spitzer Space Telescope mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. Science operations are conducted at the Spitzer Science Center in Pasadena. JPL is a division of the California Institute of Technology.