A new generation of NASA satellites has captured an unforgettable image of Earth and its moon. The two Mars Cube Ones, also referred to as MarCOs, are Mars-bound satellites launched on May 5th, 2018 (https://www.nasa.gov/feature/jpl/a-pale-blue-dot-as-seen-by-a-cubesat). They are part of a class of satellites known as Cube Sats with a smaller size and rectangular shape, different in form from traditional satellites, and were developed to teach students about satellite design and production.
The photo was captured on May 9th from a distance of 620,000 miles, four days after launch, by the satellite MarCO-B. NASA sometimes refers to MarCO-B by the pet-name Wall-E as a reference to the Disney movie of the same name in which an endearing robot explores a deserted world. This image was taken to test that the satellite’s antenna was fully functional. The antenna can be seen on the periphery of the photo.
In the image, Earth appears as a tiny blue speck alongside an even tinier moon. NASA has said that it is a tribute to the first picture ever taken of Earth by the Voyager 1 spacecraft in 1989 (https://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA00452). Carl Sagan, a well-known astrophysicist and part of Voyager 1’s imaging team, insisted on turning the ship’s camera towards Earth before it left the solar system, 3.7 billion miles from home.
This led to Sagan’s iconic naming of Earth as “a pale blue dot,” both cosmically insignificant yet incredibly significant to those who call it home. In 1994, he released a book called “Pale Blue Dot: A Vision of the Human Future in Space.” Included in this book was the powerful statement that “everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.” (http://www.businessinsider.com/pale-blue-dot-carl-sagan-2016-1)
While the Cube Sat’s photo may have been captured from as great a distance as Voyager 1’s, this is still the farthest that Cube Sats have traveled into space. Previously launched Cube Sats have stayed within Earth’s orbit, but this new development suggests that they are capable of handling increasingly remote trips into deep space (https://phys.org/news/2018-05-pale-blue-dot-cubesat.html).
