Archive for November, 2022
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November 19th, 2022
Curiosity’s location as of Sol 3655. Distance driven 18.04 miles/29.04 kilometers.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover at Gale Crater is now performing Sol 3657 duties. Here are some new images that show the robot’s scenic and geologically eye-catching surroundings:
Curiosity Left B Navigation Camera image taken on Sol 3655, November 17, 2022.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Curiosity Left B Navigation Camera image taken on Sol 3655, November 17, 2022.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Curiosity Mast Camera Right photo taken on Sol 3655, November 17, 2022.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Curiosity Mast Camera Right photo taken on Sol 3655, November 17, 2022.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Curiosity Mast Camera Right photo taken on Sol 3655, November 17, 2022.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
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Credit: CMS/CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Fresh from this week’s third round of spacewalks, China is ready to stage major extravehicular activity (EVA) events in the near-future.
The next planned spacewalking task is transferring the space station’s large solar wings, now attached to the Tianhe core module, and fixing them to the recently-aligned Wentian and Mengtian lab modules, which now form the station’s T-shape configuration.
Credit: CMS/CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Wing work
“For the follow-up work, astronauts will perform more extravehicular activities, and each crew need to carry out these spacewalks,” said Wang Xin, a deputy commander responsible for the space station system under the China Academy of Space Technology.
Credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
“We will next mainly complete the installation and maintenance of the outboard load. At the same time, an astronaut has to exit the module to transfer the solar wings on the core module to the end of the Wentian and Mengtian lab modules,” Wang told China Central Television (CCTV).
The flexible solar panels on both the Wentian and Mengtian lab modules each have a total length of around 180 feet (55 meters) and a combined area of nearly 280 square meters. These four large solar wings will generate nearly 1,000 kWh of electricity for the China Space Station per day, notes CCTV, which is equivalent to the average electricity consumption of an ordinary family for nearly half a year.
Artwork depicts current T-shape configuration of China space station.
Credit: CNSA/CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Crew handover
On Thursday, China’s Shenzhou-14 astronauts — Chen Dong and Cai Xuzhe – installed an out-of-cabin bridge, the unlocking of a panoramic camera, and the installation of mounted assistance handles for a small mechanical arm. Taikonaut colleague Liu Yang stayed onboard to support the spacewalkers from inside the orbiting complex.
The three Shenzhou-14 crew members were sent to orbit in June to begin a six-month stint in space. They will see the arrival of the Shenzhou-15 crewed spacecraft at the space station later this month and carry out the space station’s first-ever crew handover, another key step to complete the final phase of the construction by the end of the year.
For videos detailing China’s spacewalking work, go to:
Credit: White House
The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy has released the first National Cislunar Science and Technology (S&T) Strategy.
A November 17 White House fact sheet on the strategy notes that in the decade ahead, NASA estimates that human activity in cislunar space will be “equal to or exceed all that has occurred in this region since the Space Age began in 1957. Many more countries and other actors are planning to travel to this new sphere of human activity.”
Key objectives
The National Cislunar S&T Strategy addresses future opportunities and lays out four key S&T objectives:
Credit: NASA
— Support research and development to enable future growth in Cislunar space. American technological endeavors begin with a positive, expansive vision of the future, led by a diverse science and engineering workforce.
— Expand international S&T cooperation in Cislunar space. International S&T cooperation can foster peace, develop responsible practices, and create the foundations for new institutions to enable enduring human and robotic presence in Cislunar space.
— Extend U.S. space situational awareness capabilities into Cislunar space. Space situational awareness enables transparency and safe operations for all entities operating in Cislunar space. This objective also contributes to early warning for potentially hazardous asteroids.
Credit: NASA
— Implement Cislunar communications and positioning, navigation, and timing capabilities with scalable and interoperable approaches. Communications and positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) are the common information capabilities needed for all activities in Cislunar space, including in Lunar orbit and on the Lunar surface.
To access the fact sheet, go to:
To access the full White House report, go to:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/11-2022-NSTC-National-Cislunar-ST-Strategy.pdf
Artwork depicts T-shape configuration of China space station.
Credit: CNSA/CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Two China spacewalkers carried out a third extravehicular activity on Thursday, a five-hour long stint as the country’s space station continues to evolve.
This new spacewalk by Chen Dong and Cai Xuzhe was the first to be completed since the orbiting complex took on its T-shape look.
Shenzhou-14 crewmate, Liu Yang, supported the spacewalkers from inside the module.
Two Shenzhou-14 crewmen carry out spacewalk tasks.
Credit: CNSA/CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
It was the first round of EVAs for the crew since the assembly of the station’s basic T-shape configuration earlier this month, and the third overall spacewalk since the current crew began their mission in June.
In the big picture, this new spacewalk was the seventh round of EVAs to be conducted as part of the China’s space station construction process, with two previous crewed missions also fulfilling spacewalk tasks.
Current occupants of China’s station – the Shenzhou-14 crew. Credit: China National Space Administration (CNSA)/China Central Television (CCTV)
Bridge building
Chen and Cai worked together to install a connection “bridge” between the three station modules that could assist astronauts when crawling outside the module and better stabilize the station’s T-shaped structure. Cai attempted the first cross-module walk using this newly-built bridge, according to China Central Television (CCTV).
Cai, who made his first spacewalk in September, attempted the first cross-module walk using this newly-built bridge.
The astronauts also lifted and fixed a panoramic camera outside the Wentian lab module and added a special mounted assistance handle on the station’s small robotic arm.
Credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Robotic arms
“This time, Shenzhou-14 set a record of carrying out extravehicular activities in one mission,” said Chen Shanguang, deputy chief designer of the China Manned Space Program.
Credit: CNSA/CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
“For the first time, we used two robotic arms, namely the big arm and the small arm to form a combined arm to support the task of extravehicular activities. As the single arm is already very long, so the combined arm will be longer, and its flexibility and rigidity is also different from that of a single robotic arm. And it is our first verification of completing extravehicular activities in such a case,” said Wang Yanlei, director of the astronauts selection and training department of the China Astronaut Research and Training Center told CCTV.
Next crew, handover
The three-person Shenzhou-14 crew members were lofted into Earth orbit last June to start their six-month trek in space, the longest duration for any Chinese manned mission.
Credit: CMG/CCTV/CASC/Inside Outer Space screengrab
During the second half of their six-month stay in orbit, the Shenzhou-14 taikonauts oversaw the arrival of the Mengtian lab that formed the three-module T-shape structure: the core module Tianhe, along with lab modules, Wentian and Mengtian.
The Shenzhou-14 crew will welcome the arrival of the Shenzhou-15 crewed spacecraft at the space station later this month. Once arrived at the station site, the Shenzhou-15 crew members will join the Shenzhou-14 colleagues to complete the facility’s first-ever crew handover, according to CCTV.
The Tiangong space station is on track to be fully up and operating by the end of this year.
To view a new video detailing the third spacewalk of the Shenzhou-14 mission, go to:
Real-time DNA sequencing in a lab installed in the Corona Lava Tube (Lanzarote, Canary Islands, Spain) in the framework of the ESA PANGAEA-X 2017 Astronaut training program. ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer is inside the lab module with co-author Ana Miller.
Credit: ESA
Until the last two decades, the potential for caves beyond Earth was principally theoretical.
Today, databases of subsurface access points (SAPs) exist for the Moon and Mars.
Across the solar system, 3,545 SAPs have been identified on 11 planetary bodies with “speleogenic processes” identified on another four bodies. Speleogenesis is the origin and development of caves.
Cave-forming processes
A new research paper – “Planetary Caves: A Solar System View of Processes and Products” – showcases six cave-forming processes beyond Earth that have been identified.
These processes include volcanic (cryo and magmatic), fracturing (tectonic and impact melt), dissolution, sublimation, suffusion, and landslides.
“As more orbiter and fly-by platforms with high-resolution instrumentation probe the solar system, our knowledge regarding caves beyond Earth will become more robust—culminating with the robotic and perhaps human exploration of caves on the Moon and Mars,” the paper notes.
Location of candidate caves in the Tharsis region on Mars.
Credit: USGS
Mars underground
According to Jut Wynne, assistant research professor of cave ecology at Northern Arizona University and lead author of the paper:
“Caves on many planetary surfaces represent one of the best environments to search for evidence of extinct or perhaps extant lifeforms,” Wynne said in a university statement.
“For example, as Martian caves are sheltered from deadly surface radiation and violent windstorms, they are more likely to exhibit a more constant temperature regime compared to the surface, and some may even contain water ice. This makes caves on Mars one of the most important exploration targets in the search for life,” Wynne said.
To view the paper – “Planetary Caves: A Solar System View of Processes and Products” – go to:
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2022JE007303
Credit: Airbus
The thought of solar power-beaming satellites churning out gobs of gigawatts of clean energy from space to an energy-hungry Earth has been in cogitation phase for many decades. In fact, Nikola Tesla experimented with the scheme of wireless power near the end of the nineteenth century.
In 1968, the notion of a solar power satellite (SPS) was detailed by U.S. aerospace engineer, Peter Glaser. It would harvest energy from sunlight using solar cells and beam it down to Earth as microwaves to receiving antennas (rectennas), which would convert those microwaves to electrical energy for input into electrical power grids.
However, over the ensuing years, SPS remained a bright light proposal whose time never came.
Peter Glaser, the father of the solar power satellite concept.
Credit: Arthur D. Little Inc.
Economically viable?
But now the notion of space-based solar power is garnering new looks – both in the U.S. and abroad, including Chinese technologists, experts in Japan, and researchers within the European Space Agency and the United Kingdom’s space agency. In addition, NASA has reactivated a look into SPS.
Why so? For one, advancements in technology needed for SPS do appear to make the idea more realistic today. That said, there remains a lingering, burning question: Is SPS anywhere close to becoming economically viable?
For detailed information, go to my new Scientific American story – “Is Space-Based Solar Power Ready for Its Moment in the Sun? Around the world, researchers are betting that beamed power from space could be the next big thing for clean energy on Earth” – at:
Curiosity Front Hazard Avoidance Camera Left B image acquired on Sol 3650, November 12, 2022.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover at Gale Crater is now performing Sol 3651 duties.
“Curiosity is continuing to climb towards a Gediz Vallis ridge viewing spot, and we can already get a glimpse of it rising in the distance,” reports Abigail Fraeman, a planetary geologist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Curiosity Chemistry & Camera Remote Micro-Imager (RMI) photo taken on November 12, 2022.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/LANL
A recent plan listed collection of a large stereo Mastcam mosaic of the parts of Gediz Vallis ridge. This image combined with the ones Mars researchers hope to collect from an end-of-drive location on Monday, Fraeman adds, “will help the team decide if we want to get even closer.”
Fraeman adds that the Curiosity science team is trying to understand how Gediz Vallis ridge formed, in particular what kind of watery settings may or may not have been involved.
Curiosity Chemistry & Camera Remote Micro-Imager (RMI) photo taken on November 12, 2022.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/LANL
Relationships
“We also want to understand how it relates to the rest of the rocks that make up Mount Sharp and Gediz Vallis channel in order to better constrain when the events that built it happened,” Fraeman notes.
A plan has the team investigating the area much closer to Curiosity over the weekend.
Being collected are Mastcam images of some rocks that have interesting textures that are unofficially named “Uruca,” “Tikwah Mine,” and “Prata.”
Curiosity Right B Navigation Camera image taken on Sol 3650, November 12, 2022.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Large sand ridge
“We’re also snapping a photo of a large sand ridge that is right behind the rover,” Fraeman reports, and the Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) instrument will zap two rock targets, “Cotingo,” and “Boca da Mata,” as well as an automatically selected target using the AEGIS (Autonomous Exploration for Gathering Increased Science) – a software suite that permits the rover to autonomously detect and prioritize targets.
Curiosity Mast Camera Right image taken on Sol 3650, November 12, 2022.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Curiosity Mars Hand Lens Imager photo of brushing. Image produced on Sol 3650, November 12, 2022.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
The robot’s Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS) and Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) will get in on the science action as well, with observations of targets named “Jutai” and “Raposa.”
A Dust Removal Tool (DRT) is to brush dust away from the Raposa target before the APXS and MAHLI observations, “so we’ll also take a Mastcam multispectral image of this less dusty area,” Fraeman adds.
Observations to model the environment around Curiosity and a drive of 164 feet (50 meters) was slated to round out the plan.
Credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA
Where is everybody?
If you’re an ET contact faithful take into account a new paper led by Jonathan Jiang of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
“The silence of the universe beyond Earth reveals a pattern of both human limitation and steadfast curiosity,” Jiang and colleagues write.
What they postulate is that an existential disaster may lay in wait as our society here on Earth advances exponentially towards space exploration.
That disaster doubles as a “Great Filter” – a phenomenon that wipes out civilizations before they can encounter each other.
Perhaps a reason for the cosmic cold shoulder?
Allen Telescope Array dedicated to astronomical observations and a simultaneous search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI).
Image credit: Seth Shostak/SETI Institute
Possible scenarios
In the research paper, Jiang and co-authors propose several possible scenarios, including anthropogenic and natural hazards, both of which can be prevented with reforms in individual, institutional and intrinsic behaviors.
They also take into account multiple calamity candidates: nuclear warfare, pathogens and pandemics, artificial intelligence, meteorite impacts, and climate change.
“If extraterrestrial intelligence does exist,” they write, “humanity must self-improve on nearly all accounts to meet and even surpass such others.”
On the other hand, if intelligent life does not appear and perhaps never was “out there” in the first place, “we have some other more philosophical difficulties to juggle – but no less daunting. Our lives are not expendable. We have been treating casualties as casual, nukes as necessary, and large-scale death as inevitable events.”
To read the full paper – “Avoiding the “Great Filter”: Extraterrestrial Life and Humanity’s Future in the Universe” – go to:
https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/2210/2210.10582.pdf
Artistic depiction of NASA astronauts at the lunar south pole carrying out early work to establish an Artemis Base Camp.
Image credit: NASA
As multiple nations plot out their Moon exploration strategies, how best to survive the lunar night gives space engineers the cold sweats.
The Moon’s lunar day/night cycle at most locations on the surface includes fourteen Earth days of continuous sunlight followed by fourteen days of constant darkness and intense cold.
Due to the lack of a moderating atmosphere, temperatures on the lunar surface can range from +120 ℃ during the day to -180 ℃ during the night. Permanently shadowed regions on the Moon can be even colder, plunging down to -240 ℃.
Shown here is a rendering of 13 candidate landing regions for NASA’s Artemis III mission. Each region is approximately 9.3 by 9.3 miles (15 by 15 kilometers). A landing site is a location within those regions with an approximate 328-foot (100-meter) radius.
Image credit: NASA
Pluses and minuses
All those pluses and minuses add up to one of the most demanding environmental challenges that future Moon expeditions will face. Attaining and gaining longer and longer human stays – perhaps gaining permanent status — will mean coming to grips with the moon’s vicious environment.
For more information on this topic, please go to my new Space.com story – “Surviving the lunar night can be a challenge for astronauts on the Moon – The Moon’s lunar day/night cycle means fourteen days of continuous sunlight followed by fourteen days of constant darkness” – go to:
https://www.space.com/moon-missions-artemis-challenges-overnight
OTV-6 outfitted with service module.
Image credit: Staff Sgt. Adam Shanks
That fresh from Earth orbit X-37B space plane was outfitted for the first time with a service module, released from the craft prior to its landing after 908 days of flight.
The Boeing-built space plane set a new long-duration record –- with this latest flight, dubbed Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV-6) — surpassing the program’s previous record of 780 days.
“Since the X-37B’s first launch in 2010, it has shattered records and provided our nation with an unrivaled capability to rapidly test and integrate new space technologies,” said Jim Chilton, senior vice president, Boeing Space and Launch.
“With the service module added, this was the most we’ve ever carried to orbit on the X-37B and we’re proud to have been able to prove out this new and flexible capability for the government and its industry partners,” Chilton added.
Boundaries of experimentation
Adding his voice to the utility of the space plane’s add-on module, Lt. Col. Joseph Fritschen, Department of Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office’s X-37B Program Director:
OTV-6 – On the ground at Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
Image credit: Staff Sgt. Adam Shanks
“The X-37B continues to push the boundaries of experimentation, enabled by an elite government and industry team behind the scenes,” said Fritschen. “The ability to conduct on-orbit experiments and bring them home safely for in-depth analysis on the ground has proven valuable for the Department of the Air Force and scientific community. The addition of the service module on OTV-6 allowed us to host more experiments than ever before.”
Ring toss
The service module is a ring attached to the rear of the vehicle expanding the number of experiments that can be hosted during a mission. That hardware was left in space prior to the space plane’s dive back to Earth on November 12th.
The first X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle waits in the encapsulation cell of the Evolved Expendable Launch vehicle on April 5, 2010 at the Astrotech facility in Titusville, Fla.
Credit: U.S. Air Force
Whether or not experiments within that service module remain active is an unknown.
In the coming weeks, the service module will be disposed of in accordance with “best practices” – seemingly indicating a propulsive push to purposely de-orbit the module in a controlled way.
On this point, Secretary of the Air Force Frank Kendall said: “The deliberate manner in which we conduct onorbit operations-to include the service module disposal-speaks to the United States’ commitment to safe and responsible space practices, particularly as the issue of growing orbital debris threatens to impact global space operations.”
Meanwhile, the U.S. Space Force has issued a first-time-seen image of the hefty-looking service module, pre-liftoff back in May 2020.
