An exoplanet 320 light-years from Earth has been found in a trinary star system, photographed by the ESO Very Large Telescope in Chile. Aside from having the distinction of being one of mere handful of exoplanets that have been directly imaged, the planet, labeled as HD 131399Ab, has a year that lasts 550 Earth years, as it orbits the large central star.
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An Asian studies expert and amateur satellite tracker have voiced their concerns over the possibility that China’s Tiangong-1 space station may be de-orbiting without control from the ground. The station, launched in 2011, was a temporary testbed for the technologies for Tiangong-2, a permanent station scheduled to be launched in September of this year. Beijing’s original plan was to de-orbit the spacecraft in 2013, but Tiangong-1, Chinese for "Heavenly Palace 1", remained in orbit after that date, conducting long-term endurance tests of the now unmanned station’s components.
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The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has announced that June of 2016 was the hottest month of June on record for the contiguous United States, since temperature records began in 1880. The average temperature seen in the Lower 48 over the month was 71.6ºF (22.1ºC), a full 3.3ºF (1.83ºC) above the 20th century average, and breaking the previous record of 71.6ºF (22.0ºC), set in 1933.
Alaska followed the continuing trend of northern regions seeing the largest gains, seeing an average temperature of a whopping 9ºF (5.0ºC) above average, handily beating the 1981 record of 6.5ºF (3.6ºC) over average.
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In this edition of Awakening, Whitley Strieber calls on a powerful and profoundly informative encounter experience he had week before last in Texas to offer a way of creating the legendary "light body" that is at the center of all transformative experience. This is the first time that this has been explained without any symbolism attached to it. In the past, this information has always been transmitted through the filter of religious doctrine and belief.
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