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August 4th, 2018
Credit: Copenhagen Suborbitals
Copenhagen Suborbitals reports a successful August 4 flight of its suborbital Nexø II rocket, the most advanced rocket built and launched by the group so far.
Credit: Copenhagen Suborbitals
The launch took place from ESD139 in the Baltic Sea 35 kilometers off the coast of the Danish island Bornholm. The rocket lifted off from a sea-based launch platform.
Spica: astronaut-carrying rocket
The Nexø rocket class is a technology demonstrator in advance of building a significantly bigger Spica rocket that will take an astronaut to the edge of space.
Credit: Copenhagen Suborbitals
Space is defined by the Kármán line at 100 km above Earth, so the plan is to fly a space capsule with an astronaut straight up to just over that altitude, from where it will free fall straight back and land by parachute in the sea.
Credit: Copenhagen Suborbitals
Go to this video of the launch at:
For more information on Copenhagen Suborbitals, go to:
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The Congressional Research Service (CRS) has issued an overview on Iran’s Ballistic Missile and Space Launch Programs
As noted by the CRS report, Iran has been acquiring, developing, and testing its ballistic missile capabilities for decades. The United Nations Security Council in 2015 adopted resolution 2231, calling on, but not requiring, Iran to not develop nuclear-capable ballistic missiles and to halt other ballistic missile activity.
Nevertheless, Iran continues to invest in developing ballistic missiles and in building an extensive network of facilities, although missile inventory information is scarce.
Go to this informative August 1 CRS document at:
https://fas.org/sgp/crs/nuke/IF10938.pdf
Curiosity Mastcam Left image taken on Sol 2126, July 30, 2018.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover is now performing 2130 duties.
The robot is currently on its way to a potentially softer rock target to drill in the Pettegrove Point member of Vera Rubin Ridge, reports Lauren Edgar, a planetary geologist at the USGS in Flagstaff, Arizona.
Curiosity Navcam Left B image acquired on Sol 2129, August 2, 2018.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Bedrock workspace
The geology theme group planned several autonomously targeted Autonomous Exploration for Gathering Increased Science (AEGIS) observations of bedrock in the workspace. In addition, plans called for producing a Mastcam mosaic of the workspace and a Navcam mosaic of the Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) targetable region to prepare for targeting in the weekend plan.
Curiosity Mastcam Left image taken on Sol 2126, July 30, 2018.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
The environmental theme group was also to perform two Mastcam tau and crater rim extinction observations, a Navcam line of sight and dust devil movie, and Navcam suprahorizon and zenith movies.
Dust storm assessment
“All of this great environmental monitoring data will help as we continue to assess the ongoing dust storm,” Edgar says.
“Looking ahead, we hope to proceed with science activities and driving in the weekend plan with the help of the Mars Odyssey spacecraft to relay data,” Edgar concludes.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona
Road map
Meanwhile, a new Curiosity traverse map through Sol 2128 has been issued.
The map shows the route driven by NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity through the 2128 Martian day, or sol, of the rover’s mission on Mars (August 02, 2018).
Numbering of the dots along the line indicate the sol number of each drive. North is up. The scale bar is 1 kilometer (~0.62 mile).
From Sol 2126 to Sol 2128, Curiosity had driven a straight line distance of about 146.88 feet (44.77 meters), bringing the rover’s total odometry for the mission to 12.18 miles (19.60 kilometers).
The base image from the map is from the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment Camera (HiRISE) in NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
Credit: OMB
July 31, 2018 Memo from Mick Mulvaney, Director, Office of Management and Budget
FY 2020 Administration Research and Development Budget Priorities: American Space Exploration & Commercialization
“Research and innovation in space have a direct impact on Earth, generating advancements in our basic understanding of the universe and our own planet, and inspiring the next generation of scientists and engineers.
Credit: White House
Research investments should be focused on ensuring American leadership in space for long-duration spaceflight, in-space manufacturing, in-situ resource utilization, longterm cryogenic fuel storage and management, and advanced space-related power and propulsion capabilities.
Agencies should prioritize demonstrations and flight tests to ensure an industrial base for commercial activity in space and on celestial bodies.
Protein crystals grown in microgravity.
Credit: NASA
One area of potential scientific and commercial importance is microgravity-related research that has the potential for near-term breakthroughs in biopharmaceuticals and materials science.
Finally, agencies should seek opportunities to work with advanced materials, additive manufacturing, optical communications, and machine learning-capabilities that have broad potential applications in space and on Earth.”
Credit: UNOOSA
The United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs has issued a document: “Near-Earth Objects and Planetary Defence.”
“Addressing such a hazard, including the identification of objects that pose a risk of impact, and planning a corresponding mitigation campaign, require cooperative action in the interest of public safety on the part of the global community,” explains Simonetta Di Pippo, Director of the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs in the document’s foreword.
Warning network
The Office supports and cooperates with two entities established in 2014: the International Asteroid Warning Network (IAWN) and the Space Mission Planning Advisory Group (SMPAG).
These two entities came into being through a series of recommendations for an international response to the risk of near-Earth object impact, endorsed by the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space.
Credit: UNOOSA
Emergency response
The goal of planetary defense is to ensure that all countries, in particular developing nations with limited capacity for predicting and mitigating a Near Earth Object (NEO) impact, are aware of potential risks as well as to ensure effective emergency response and disaster management in the event of a NEO impact.
As this area is crucial to ensuring human security, the United Nations continues to facilitate the processes for developing an international response to a NEO-impact threat, with the Office for Outer Space Affairs playing an active role.
The report is available at:
http://www.unoosa.org/res/oosadoc/data/documents/2018/stspace/stspace73_0_html/st_space_073E.pdf
Credit: NASA/Autodesk
It doesn’t make sense to haul from Earth building supplies on missions to Mars. But 3D-printing robots could help build homes on the Red Planet using dirt and recycled plastic.
NASA’s Swamp Works lab at the Kennedy Space Center is working with Autodesk in experimenting with 3D-printing habitable structures using a process called robotic extrusion, and a composite material made up of loose sediment (soil, dust, broken rock, etc.) and recycled plastic.
Free-form additive manufacturing
Based on NASA specifications, Autodesk’s Advanced Consulting team designed the barrier using tools such as Fusion 360 and PowerMill to comply with structural as well as robotic extrusion requirements while achieving significant weight reduction.
Credit: NASA/Autodesk
In a press statement, Autodesk said it also developed the software to control the industrial robot arm – fit with a specialized end effector designed by NASA – to enable free-form additive manufacturing without the need for outside support or scaffolding.
Take a look at this informative video at:
Curiosity Mastcam Left Sol 2126 July 30, 2018
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
NASA Curiosity Mars rover is now performing Sol 2128 duties.
The search for softer rocks on the Red Planet is on, reports Ryan Anderson, a planetary geologist at the USGS in Flagstaff, Arizona.
Curiosity Front Hazcam Left B image acquired on Sol 2127, July 31, 2018.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Potential drill site
Curiosity is continuing toward a third potential drill site within the Pettegrove Point member of Vera Rubin Ridge, “where we are hoping to find slightly softer rocks,” Anderson notes.
On the plan, the rover is to carry out Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam) observations of the target “Slioch,” which was already analyzed by the Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS), as well as the layered rock “Craignure Bay.”
Curiosity Navcam Left B photo taken on Sol 2127, July 31, 2018.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
The robot’s Mastcam is slated to document both of these targets, using a small mosaic around Craignure Bay to capture images of some of the tilted rocks nearby as well.
Then Navcam is to do atmospheric observations.
Short bump
“After that, the rover will drive toward our next drill site and take some post-drive images. Navcam will do some more atmospheric measurements, and ChemCam will make an auto-targeted observation of the bedrock near the rover,” Anderson points out.
Curiosity Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) photo produced on Sol 2127, July 31, 2018.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
The plan of rover actions will conclude with an 8-frame Navcam “movie” of the sky to look for clouds and measure the wind direction over Gale crater.
“Hopefully,” Anderson concludes, “we’ll be close enough to do just a short bump to the drill site so we can try drilling again this weekend!”
Curiosity Mastcam Left image taken on Sol 2126, July 30, 2018.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover is now wrapping up Sol 2127 dutes.
Meanwhile, a new Curiosity Mars rover traverse map through Sol 2126 has been issued.
The map shows the route driven by NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity through the 2126 Martian day, or sol, of the rover’s mission on Mars (July 30, 2018).
Numbering of the dots along the line indicate the sol number of each drive. North is up. The scale bar is 1 kilometer (~0.62 mile).
From Sol 2120 to Sol 2126, Curiosity had driven a straight line distance of about 225.30 feet (68.67 meters), bringing the rover’s total odometry for the mission to 12.14 miles (19.54 kilometers).
The base image from the map is from the High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment Camera (HiRISE) in NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter.
Mars imagery
Several new images have documented the robot’s latest actions:
Curiosity Mastcam Left photo acquired on Sol 2126, July 30, 2018.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Curiosity Front Hazcam Left B image taken on Sol 2127, July 31, 2018.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
NASA astronaut Tracy Caldwell Dyson, Expedition 24 flight engineer, looks through a window in the Cupola of the International Space Station. Credit: NASA
NASA’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) has released a report that assesses NASA’s progress in maximizing utilization of the International Space Station to accomplish its human exploration objectives and examines the challenges associated with transitioning the Station to commercial operations and its eventual retirement.
The report, NASA’s Management and Utilization of the International Space Station, questions whether a sufficient business case exists under which private companies will be able to develop a self-sustaining and profit-making business independent of significant Federal funding within the next 6 years.
International Space Station
Credit: NASA
Annual dollars
The OIG reports points out that any extension of the ISS past 2024 would require continued funding in the neighborhood of $3-$4 billion annually to operate and maintain the Station – a significant portion of which could otherwise be redirected to develop systems needed for NASA’s cislunar or deep space ambitions.
In addition, the OIG explains that extending the Station’s life would challenge NASA to manage the risks associated with continued operation of the Station’s aging systems and infrastructure. Furthermore, any extension will require the support of NASA’s international partners, whose continued participation hinges on issues ranging from geopolitics to differing space exploration goals.
NASA currently does not have the capability to ensure the ISS will reenter the Earth’s atmosphere and land in a targeted location in the South Pacific Ocean.
Credit: NASA
ISS deorbit
Lastly, at some future date NASA will need to decommission and deorbit the ISS either in response to an emergency or at the end of its useful life. However, the Agency currently does not have the capability to ensure the ISS will reenter the Earth’s atmosphere and land in a targeted location in the South Pacific Ocean.
For a copy of the OIG report, NASA’s Management and Utilization of the International Space Station, go to:
Pluto framed by New Horizons’ historic flight through the Pluto system on July 14, 2015.
Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute/Alex Parker
A heady group of space scientists are ringing a bell concerning how to define the word “planet.”
The reminder has been targeted at The International Astronomical Union (IAU), the group that in 2006 voted to demote Pluto from planet status.
Titled, “On the Insensitive Use of the Term “Planet 9” for Objects Beyond Pluto,” the reminder is posted in the July 29th issue of the Planetary Exploration Newsletter.
Far from universally accepted
“We the undersigned wish to remind our colleagues that the IAU planet definition adopted in 2006 has been controversial and is far from universally accepted. Given this, and given the incredible accomplishment of the discovery of Pluto, the harbinger of the solar system’s third zone – the Kuiper Belt – by planetary astronomer Clyde W. Tombaugh in 1930, we the undersigned believe the use of the term “Planet 9” for objects beyond Pluto is insensitive to Professor Tombaugh’s legacy.”
Clyde W. Tombaugh at the door of the Pluto discovery telescope at the Lowell Observatory in Arizona.
Credit: Lowell
Observatory Archives
“We further believe the use of this term should be discontinued in favor of culturally and taxonomically neutral terms for such planets, such as Planet X, Planet Next, or Giant Planet Five.”
Signed by:
Paul Abell
Michael Allison
Nadine Barlow
James Bauer
Gordon Bjoraker
Paul Byrne
Eric Christiansen
Rajani Dhingra
Timothy Dowling
David Dunham
Tony L. Farnham
Harold Geller
Alvero Gonzalez
David Grinspoon
Will Grundy
George Hindman
Kampalayya M. Hiremath
Brian Holler
Stephanie Jarmak
Martin Knapmeyer
Rosaly Lopes
Amy Lovell
Ralph McNutt
Phil Metzger
Sripada Murty
Michael Paul
Kirby Runyon
Ray Russell
John Stansberry
Alan Stern
Mike Summers
Henry Throop
Hal Weaver
Larry Wasserman
Sloane Wiktorowicz
