Center Briefs Neptune's largest moon is warming up Observations obtained by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope and ground-based instruments reveal that Neptune's largest moon, Triton, seems to have heated up significantly since the Voyager spacecraft visited it in 1989. The scientists are basing a rise in Triton's surface temperature on the Hubble telescope's detection of an increase in the moon's atmospheric pressure, which has at least doubled in bulk since the time of the Voyager encounter. Any nitrogen ice on Triton that warms up a little results in a considerable leap in atmospheric pressure as the vaporized nitrogen gas joins the atmosphere. Because of the unusually strong link between Triton's surface ice temperature and its atmospheric pressure, scientists can infer a temperature rise of three degrees Fahrenheit over nine years.
Sea level is a measure of the heat stored in the ocean.
In the last month or so, the tropical Pacific has been switching from warm to cold. It appears now the central equatorial Pacific Ocean will stay colder than normal for some time to come because sea level is about seven inches below normal, creating a deficit in the heat supply to the surface waters. It is not clear yet, however, if this current cooling trend will eventually evolve into a long-lasting La Nina situation. A NASA technology developed to help astronomers probe the depths of the universe is at work today helping municipalities and private businesses track the movements of vehicles in large fleet operations. Researchers at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, AL, first developed the technology to handle the flow of enormous amounts of information.