Archive for the ‘Space News’ Category
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July 18th, 2021
Credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Three Chinese astronauts, Nie Haisheng, Liu Boming and Tang Hongbo, have worked and lived in the space station core module for a month since the Shenzhou-12 piloted spacecraft was launched into space.
The astronauts have been in good condition after completing their first extravehicular operations, according to the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA). A second spacewalk is scheduled to take place.
A second spacewalk is scheduled.
Credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
China’s space station is operating smoothly, with the trio of Taikonauts busily carrying out various duties, such as collection of trace elements in the air and performing routine medical examinations.
Exercise regime
According to China Central Television (CCTV), telecommunication facilities on board the core module enable the crew to watch the Xinwen Lianbo (News Simulcast), a domestic news program. Since they are stationed in the core module, the ground support team has been regularly sending them news programs, to keep them up to date on what is occurring on Earth.
Credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
They exercise for about an hour after watching the news, using sports facilities in the core module, such as an exercise bike and a treadmill.
“Their physical fatigue, sleep, eating and drinking water, the whole body metabolism, nutrition, health status, through our comprehensive evaluation, are very good,” Xu Chong, director of the medical supervision and insurance department of China Astronaut Research and Training Center told CCTV.
According to the ground supporting team, the astronauts’ exercise amount and intensity were decided in terms of their own physical conditions. Each of them has their own exercise plan.
Credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
“It’s a daily routine for the astronauts to do exercise. We have formulated different exercise plans for each of the three astronauts, with a training intensity reaching 60 to 80 percent of their maximum capacity. That’s a medium to high intensity for them. As they stay longer in space, we have to increase the intensity of their exercise plans, so that they are able to maintain the physiological effects against weightlessness,” said Li Yinghui, the deputy chief designer of the astronaut system with China Astronaut Research and Training Center.
Space experiments
Starting Saturday, the space travelers put on heart rate and rhythm recording devices as part of experiments in space medicine. For the first time ever, China’s space station used a scientific research cabinet that is capable of conducting space medicine and space life science experiments, setting a total of 49 space experiment projects.
Credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
During the Shenzhou 12 mission in space, the astronauts will complete 14 of them.
“We set three aims for these 14 experimental projects. The first one is that the mission needs the technologies that are able to support advanced development, so the projects were set for making technical reserves to support the mission,” said Li.
“The second one is to set sights on the leading edge, so as to obtain new discoveries and new explorations. The third one is to continuously accumulate long-term flight data,” Li told CCTV.
For a video update on China space station operations issued by CCTV/China National Space Administration (CNSA), go to:
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China has had a long-standing interest in reusable space planes. This photo represents one concept under evaluation. No images released have shown the reusable suborbital carrier that flew late last week.
Courtesy: Jean Deville/China Aerospace Blog
China has flown a reusable suborbital carrier, a craft that touched down at an airport in Alxa League in north China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.
Launched on Friday from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China’s Gobi Desert, the maiden flight of the prototype of a reusable suborbital aerospace plane was declared successful. The suborbital vehicle landed horizontally at the Alxa Right Banner Airport.
The craft was developed by the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC). “The development of reusable space transportation technology is an important symbol of China’s transition to a major space power,” CASC said in a statement.
China’s Alxa Right Banner Airport
Credit: Flightsim.to
Little detail has been made available about the vehicle, its design and overall capabilities. CASC did not say how high the plane flew, or elaborate on its flight path.
Orbital space plane
In a China Daily story, they explained that in September 2020, the company flight-tested a reusable experimental orbital spacecraft from the Jiuquan center. It did not publish detailed information, photos or videos about that test.
Artwork depicts a notional Chinese space plane design.
Credit: CNSA
“China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp, another space contractor, is also working on a reusable aerospace plane and plans to put it to commercial flight by 2030,” China Daily reports. “The company said it has conducted a key flight test by a conceptual demonstration prototype to verify the propulsion shift mechanism between ramjet and rocket engine.”
Designers have said that such a vehicle can be used in a wide range of operations, China Daily adds, such as space tourism, astronaut commuting, satellite deployment, cargo transportation and emergency rescue.
Courtesy: Jean Deville/China Aerospace Blog
Lengthy runway
In related news, NPR has published sets of photos taken by commercial satellites showing construction underway of buildings at a remote airfield supporting a three-mile-long runway. The growing airfield is on the edge of China’s former nuclear weapons test range at Lop Nur.
China’s orbital space plane is believed to have landed at this airfield.
Go to these NPR stories:
Satellite Photos Show China Expanding Its Mysterious Desert Airfield
New Chinese Space Plane Landed At Mysterious Air Base, Evidence Suggests
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Univ. of Arizona
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover at Gale Crater is now performing Sol 3179 tasks.
Reports Susanne Schwenzer, a planetary geologist at The Open University; Milton Keynes, U.K., the rover’s Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS) and Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) have been looking at the drill fines of the “Pontours” drill hole – the robot’s 32nd drill hole.
Curiosity Mars Hand Lens Imager photo acquired on Sol 3178, July 15, 2021.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Curiosity is sitting in an “exciting and very interesting looking area,” Schwenzer adds. “Around the drill site, we have spotted many different textures and colors; and as we know from being on Mars for over 3100 sols now, different colors and textures may mean interesting discoveries.”
Curiosity Mars Hand Lens Imager photo acquired on Sol 3178, July 15, 2021.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Colorful features
The decision was made for Curiosity to investigate the more reddish features spotted on a rock close to the rover with its Chemistry and Camera (ChemCam), investigating a target called “Belcayre.” There are also darker features on the same rock.
Curiosity Front Hazard Avoidance Camera Left B image taken on Sol 3178, July 15, 2021.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
The robot’s Mastcam is targeting “La Bastide” as well, adding multispectral information to the dataset. Mastcam is also targeting “Lempzours,” which is a resistant feature in the distance. “The mosaic will expand an existing mosaic to give us even more information on the many textures in this scene,” Schwenzer concludes.
Curiosity Right B Navigation Camera image taken on Sol 3177, July 14, 2021.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Methane spikes
Meanwhile, an intriguing research paper has been published – “Mars Methane Sources in Northwestern Gale Crater Inferred from Back-Trajectory Modeling” — work led by Yangcheng Luo of the California Institute of Technology.
“During its five years of operation, the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) Tunable Laser Spectrometer (TLS) on board the Curiosity rover has detected six methane spikes above a low background abundance in Gale crater. The methane spikes are likely the consequence of nearby surface emission,” Luo and colleagues write.
Curiosity Right B Navigation Camera image taken on Sol 3177, July 14, 2021.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
The paper notes that almost all of the methane in the present-day Earth’s atmosphere can be traced back to biological origins.
“This may invoke a coincidence that we selected a landing site for Curiosity that is located next to an active methane emission site. Another possibility that does not invoke the coincidence is the existence of fast methane removal mechanisms that are unknown to date.”
To read the full paper, “Mars Methane Sources in Northwestern Gale Crater Inferred from Back-Trajectory Modeling,” go to:
Credit: Axiom Space
Thales Alenia Space in Rome and Axiom Space of Houston, Texas have signed the final contract for the development of two key pressurized elements of Axiom Space Station – the world’s first commercial space station.
Scheduled for launch in 2024 and 2025 respectively, the two elements will originally be docked to the International Space Station (ISS), marking the birth of the new Axiom Station segment.
Axiom Station will serve as a central hub for research, manufacturing and commerce in Low Earth Orbit (LEO), expanding the usable and habitable volume of the ISS, attached to the ISS Node 2 module, built also by Thales Alenia Space.
Credit: Axiom Space
Free-flying lab
When the ISS is decommissioned, the Axiom modules will detach and operate as a free-flying, next-generation commercial space station, a laboratory and residential infrastructure in space that will be used for microgravity experiments in-space manufacturing, critical exploration life support testing, and hosting both private and professional institutional astronauts.
The first two elements to be launched will accommodate up to 4 people each.
The welding activities of the primary structure of the first module will start in September 2021, with the assembly process concluding in 2022.
The first module will arrive at Axiom facilities in Houston in July 2023, where Axiom will integrate and outfit the core systems and certify it for flight prior to shipping to the launch facility.
For more information on Axiom Space, go to:
Wonders All Around: The Incredible True Story of Astronaut Bruce McCandless II and the First Untethered Flight in Space by Bruce McCandless III; Greenleaf Book Group Press; 284 pages; Hardcover: $24.95.
We have all seen that iconic image – an astronaut in a snow-white spacesuit, untethered and floating free above Earth. Bruce McCandless II made that milestone-making, Buck Rogers-like space cruise in 1984 during his shuttle mission: STS-41B. As a mission specialist, McCandless controlled his movement above the Earth – and just few meters away from the space shuttle Challenger – during the first-ever spacewalk which didn’t use restrictive tethers and umbilicals.
Credit: NASA
This book is a wonderful read, written by his son, Bruce McCandless III. It is a very human tale, one that underscores the astronaut’s perseverance, setback, defeat and redemption.
The book features 22 chapters, including an excellent set of notes.
Astronaut McCandless joined NASA in 1966. He was the youngest of the new astronauts selected that year. He was chosen to be Houston’s capsule communicator for Apollo 11’s Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin when they first set foot on the Moon. An astronaut for 24 years, he went on to help design, deploy, and later repair the Hubble Space Telescope.
His son writes: “He was an engineer, a true son of science, a distant nephew of Sir Isaac Newton. He knew the formulas required for achieving orbital velocity, could tell you the fuel mixtures you needed, the stages and timing of rocket-booster separations.”
Former NASA astronaut Bruce McCandless II, mission specialist on the STS-41B and STS-31 missions, passed away on Dec. 21, 2017, at the age of 80.
Credit: NASA
The author adds his thoughts when viewing that classic image of his father suspended in the cosmos, “the ant and the ocean.”
“But I see something else in the picture as well. I see the man who named me. He’s shut off from me now, mute and unattainable, sealed up in his pressure suit, as much a mystery to me in this vision as he ever was. As much a mystery as any man is to his son, who spends his life reading the clues a father left behind and remembering his words as he tries, a hundred times, to invent his own life. I don’t remember all those words, but I do hear one. It resonates to this day. Onward.”
For more information on this book, go to:
Cosmonaut Oleg Novitskiy readies Pirs Module for undocking from the Russian segment of the International Space Station.
Credit: Roscosmos
Work is underway on the International Space Station to receive Russia’s new Nauka Multifunctional Laboratory Module.
The Nauka Module is set for a ride atop a Proton-M booster on July 21.
Meanwhile, crewmembers on the ISS are preparing the Pirs Module for undocking from the Russian segment of the ISS. Pirs is to be undocked from the ISS by the Progress MS-16 cargo vehicle on July 23, then ditched into the Pacific Ocean some 4 hours later.
Pirs module: years of use
Roscosmos cosmonauts Oleg Novitskiy and Pyotr Dubrov worked together with ground controllers to split the hydraulic circuit and docking unit control communications through the Progress MS-16 cargo vehicle, and checked the docking unit and its systems. After that, the crew took readings from all systems and assemblies of the module.
Russian Pirs Module is to be dumped into the Pacific Ocean.
Credit: NASA
The Pirs Module was launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on September 15, 2001; the hardware was docked to the nadir port of the Zvezda Service Module of the ISS Russian Segment. Over the years, Pirs has been used as an additional berthing port for the Soyuz crewed and Progress cargo spacecraft, as well as an airlock for spacewalks under the Russian program.
The Pirs Docking Compartment consists of a sealed hull and features equipment, service systems and structural elements that ensure spacewalks. The outer side of the hull is covered with thick protection panels and screen-vacuum thermal insulation.
Two active and passive docking nodes are located along the longitudinal axis of Pirs. The active docking node is designed for sealed connection with the Zvezda Service Module. The passive docking node on the opposite side is designed for sealed connection with the Soyuz and Progress ships.
Russia’s new Nauka Multifunctional Laboratory Module.
Credit: Roscosmos
Nauka Multifunctional Laboratory Module logo.
Credit: Roscosmos
Nauka logo
At the Baikonur Cosmodrome, active preparations are underway for the July 21 liftoff of the Nauka Module.
Roscosmos has published a Nauka Multifunctional Laboratory Module logo. The module is depicted in its operational configuration: with the European Robotic Arm (ERA) manipulator deployed, open porthole, and an airlock. The Russian tricolor encircling the module is referring to its origin. The name of the module (НАУКА) “science” is placed along the circumference of the emblem together with the year of its launch, the launch site (БАЙКОНУР, the Baikonur Cosmodrome) and the Proton-M carrier rocket (ПРОТОН-М) to take it into near-Earth orbit.
For a detailed look at the Nauka Module, go to this informative site posted by Roscosmos at:
Next up on Mars? One idea is this Mars aerial craft – the Hexacopter.
Credit: Theodore Tzanetos/NASA/JPL-Caltech
Given the highly successful and ongoing flights of the Ingenuity helicopter on the Red Planet at Jezero Crater, engineers are turning their attention to future aerial craft for Mars.
Cave diving on Mars via a Hexacopter.
Credit: Theodore Tzanetos/NASA/JPL-Caltech
One concept is the Hexacopter, advocated as a way to greatly expand the exploration zone on Mars – including possible deep dives into Martian caves. Technologists have already gleaned loads of technical information from Ingenuity, steadily pushing its capabilities. Now they want to use that data to push for development of a new aerial system for Mars investigation.
Go to my new Space.com story, “NASA is mapping out plans for bigger, more capable Mars helicopters – The Mars Science Helicopter could do a variety of work on the Red Planet,” at:
https://www.space.com/nasa-designing-future-mars-helicopters
Chang’e-5 return capsule holding lunar specimens.
Credit: National Astronomical Observatories, CAS
The first batch of lunar samples retrieved by China’s Chang’e-5 mission were distributed on Monday to domestic scientific research institutions.
The samples were picked up from the Moon in December 2020 by the Chang’e-5 lunar probe, the first lunar soil sample collection brought back to Earth in more than four decades. The probe returned with 1,731 grams of lunar soil.
More than 17 grams worth of lunar samples brought back by the Chang’e-5 probe were distributed to 13 institutions, including the Chinese Academy of Sciences, China University of Geosciences (Beijing), China University of Geosciences (Wuhan), and the Sun Yat-sen University.
Credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Under the microscope
The lunar soil seen by the naked eye is like dry black sand, but with finer grains. But under the microscope, it is a whole different view.
“This is the lunar soil, the original sample under the microscope that has not been crushed or polished. We can see many rock pieces in the view, which should be part of basalt. After its disintegration, some pieces still retain their original mineral composition, which we call debris. They are just physically smaller but their structure and mineral composition remain the same as the basalt. For other rock pieces, they actually turned into monominerals, that different types of minerals are separated. You can see the yellow ones in the view are generally olivine, brown ones are usually glass, white are normally plagioclase, and some dark ones are generally pyroxene. These are the main mineral components in basalt,” said Li Chunlai, deputy chief designer of the third phase of lunar exploration project, also chief engineer of the ground application system.
Chinese President Xi Jinping inspects Chang’e-5 lunar sample return capsule.
Credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Physical fragmentation
Li told China Central Television (CCTV), unlike the soil on the Earth’s surface, the particles of the lunar soil are relatively small due to the influence of many factors.
“The environment on the Moon’s surface is very harsh. The temperature could reach about 160 degrees Celsius when the sun is shining and drop to minus 180 degrees Celsius when there is no sunlight. With a temperature difference of about 340 degrees Celsius, the rocks constantly undergo thermal expansion and contraction which result in disintegration. This is one factor. Another factor is that the Moon’s surface could be hit by many celestial bodies. The impact could cause physical fragmentation of the rocks,” Li said.
And since the Moon has no magnetic field at present, the solar wind can directly bombard the rocks on the Moon’s surface, which gradually result in the breakdown or even powdering of the rocks.
“The particles could measure a few tenths of a micrometer, a few millimeters or even centimeters. But on average, they are less than 10 microns, which is very, very broken. This is inconsistent with our original cognition and also different from the Apollo sample. It is a very fine lunar soil sample,” said Li.
Credit: CASC
Ensure safety of samples
Liu Jizhong, director of the Lunar Exploration and Space Program Center under the China National Space Agency (CNSA) told CCTV: “Our lunar sample management rules have clear provisions that part of the samples will be used for scientific research and part will be used for public good. After the preliminary study is completed and the re-study would yield little results. We then display them for the public good, letting more people to know more about the Moon.”
Credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
In order to ensure the safety of the lunar samples, the CNSA is planning to store up some lunar samples in Shaoshan, central China’s Hunan Province, in preparedness against disasters.
“We plan to distribute the samples as much as possible for scientific studies. We must also retain some for future sustained studies. We have a base for ex situ conservation of some samples. All these serve as the basic for following up studies,” said Liu.
Go to these China Central Television (CCTV) videos that focus on the lunar samples at:
The Impact of Lunar Dust on Human Exploration, Edited by Joel S. Levine; Cambridge Scholars Publishing; 303 Pages; January 2021; Hardcover: £64.99.
As humans prepare to replant their boots on the Moon, a major lesson from NASA’s Project Apollo is that dealing with lunar dust turned out to be a dilemma. For one, Lunar Module lander descent rockets caused large amounts of surface dust to move into the thin lunar atmosphere, causing obscuration of the lunar surface. That made touchdowns difficult and dangerous.
Moreover, once out and about, moonwalkers coped with very fine, tiny particles composed of sharp, glassy material. Indeed, lunar dust stuck to everything it came in contact with; dust eroded their spacesuits, caused overheating on equipment and instrumentation, compromised seals on their spacesuits and on lunar sample collecting boxes, as well as irritated the eyes and lungs of moonwalkers.
This excellent volume summarizes what we know about lunar dust, its structure and chemical composition, its impact on human health, and how to reduce/mitigate its effects on future human exploration. The four dozen contributors to the 14 chapters in the book are planetary scientists, engineers, mission planners, medical researchers and physicians from NASA and the European Space Agency (ESA), as well as universities and industry from the United States, Australia, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal and Sweden.
Rich in detail, the reader will find a treasure trove of lessons from Apollo and a look ahead to what future expeditions will face. There’s a bounty of data here, be it the history and future perspectives for the evaluation of the toxicity of celestial dust to lunar dust mitigation strategy and testing through simulation and analogs.
Editor Joel S. Levine is a research professor in applied science at the College of William and Mary, USA, and a consultant to NASA’s Engineering and Safety Center at the NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. This compilation of excellent and fact-filled papers is a must-have for researchers and general readers too.
For more information about this book, go to:
Curiosity Chemistry & Camera Remote Micro-Imager (RMI) photo acquired on Sol 3173, July 10, 2021. Laser blasts are visible inside the drill hole.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/LANL
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover at Gale Crater is now performing Sol 3173 tasks.
The rover is working with the latest drill sample from the 32nd hole on Mars, “Pontours.”
Ken Herkenhoff, Planetary Geologist at the USGS Astrogeology Science Center in Flagstaff, Arizona, reports that the robot’s Chemistry & Mineralogy X-Ray Diffraction/X-Ray Fluorescence Instrument (CheMin) assessed some of the drill sample.
The CheMin team decided to dump the sample and clean out the cell in preparation for future mineralogical analyses, Herkenhoff adds.
Curiosity’s Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) Instrument Suite was to undergo preconditioning to analyze the Pontours drill sample.
Curiosity Front Hazard Avoidance Camera Left B image taken on Sol 3173, July 10, 2021.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Weekend workout
“Once the path forward was agreed upon and the high-priority CheMin and SAM activities scheduled, the uplink team turned to planning other activities, of which there are many,” Herkenhoff notes.
On Sol 3173, Mastcam is set to acquire multispectral images of “Chanterac,” a potential Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS) target, before the robot’s Chemistry and Camera uses its laser to analyze the wall of the Pontours drill hole and acquires spectra of freshly disturbed sand at “Cendrieux.”
Curiosity Rear Hazard Avoidance Camera Left B image acquired on Sol 3173, July 10, 2021.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
The rover’s Mastcam is documenting the Laser Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) holes in Pontours, Herkenhoff reports, and take a 12×2 stereo mosaic of fractured and lineated terrain dubbed “Le Coly.”
Finally, CheMin is set to dump the drill sample.
Nodule target
Also on tap, Sol 3174 observations with Navcam searching for dust devils and measuring dust in the lower part of the atmosphere.
Then Mastcam is to acquire a 10×1 stereo mosaic of possible alteration features at “Bussac” before ChemCam uses LIBS again, this time on a bedrock block with lots of nodules called “Archignac.”
Curiosity Mast Camera Right photo taken on Sol 3172, July 9, 2021.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
ChemCam will also acquire spectra of another nodular target called “Fergeas” and the Right Mastcam will document the LIBS spots on Archignac. The rover will then take a nap before the SAM preconditioning in the evening, Herkenhoff points out.
A Sol 3175 plan begins with a Navcam dust devil movie and Mastcam measurements of dust in the atmosphere above the rover.
ChemCam will then fire its laser again, this time at “Augignac,” another nodular bedrock target, followed by Right Mastcam documentation of the LIBS spots.
Mt. Sharp layering
Later in the afternoon, when lighting of targets east of the rover will be better, the ChemCam Remote Micro-Imager (RMI) will take a 10×1 mosaic of layering in the flank of Mt. Sharp.
Curiosity Right B Navigation Camera image taken on Sol 3172, July 9, 2021.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Mastcam will then acquire a 4×1 stereo mosaic of the layering, and Navcam will survey the sky.
“Early in the morning of Sol 3176, Navcam will search for clouds and again measure the dust in the lower part of the atmosphere. Finally, Mastcam will also measure dust at various levels in the atmosphere,” Herkenhoff concludes. If all goes well, Curiosity will be very busy this weekend!
