Archive for the ‘Space News’ Category
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January 20th, 2020
Courtesy: Michael Masters
Those purported eye-catching and sky-cruising unidentified flying objects over the decades have captured the public’s attention. As exoplanet detection is on the rise, why not consider that star-hopping visitors from afar might be buzzing through our friendly skies by taking an interstellar off-ramp to Earth?
Courtesy: thortful.com https://www.thortful.com/
On the other hand, could those piloting UFOs be us – our future progeny that have mastered the landscape of time and space? Perhaps those reports of people coming in contact with strange beings represent our distant human descendants, returning from the future to study us in their own evolutionary past?
Credit: MUFON
The idea of us being them has been advanced before. But a new book, Identified Flying Objects: A Multidisciplinary Scientific Approach to the UFO Phenomenon takes a fresh look at this prospect, offering some thought provoking proposals.
For more information on this concept, go to my new Space.com story at:
Are the aliens us? UFOs may be piloted by time-traveling humans, book argues
https://www.space.com/aliens-time-traveling-humans-ufo-hypothesis.html
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China’s champion – long duration Yutu-2 rover.
Credit: CNSA/CLEP
China’s Chang’e-4 lander and rover have resumed work for the 14th lunar day on the farside of the Moon after “sleeping” during the extremely cold night, reports the Xinhua news service.
China’s Chang’e-4 lander as viewed by Yutu-2 rover.
Credit: CNSA/CLEP
Both the lander and the rover are in normal working order, according to the Lunar Exploration and Space Program Center of the China National Space Administration (CNSA).
A lunar day equals 14 days on Earth, and a lunar night is the same length. The Chang’e-4 mission elements switch to dormant mode during the lunar night due to the lack of solar power.
Movement of the Chang’e 4 rover, Yutu-2, captured in NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter’s LROC images.
Credit: NASA/GSFC/Arizona State University
The Chang’e-4 mission was launched on December 8, 2018. It made the first-ever soft landing within the Von Kármán crater in the South Pole-Aitken Basin on the farside of the Moon on January 3, 2019.
The Yutu-2, or Jade Rabbit-2 rover, has worked much longer than its three-month design life, becoming the longest-working lunar rover on the Moon.
Chang’e-5 lunar lander.
Credit CCTV Video News Agency/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Sample return: fourth quarter 2020
In related lunar exploration news, the next mission in China’s Moon exploration program — Chang’e-5 — will land a probe on an area never reached by astronauts or spacecraft and is expected to bring back at least 2.2 pounds (1 kilogram) of samples, reports China Daily.
Peng Jing, deputy chief designer of the Chang’e-5 probe at the China Academy of Space Technology, said it is scheduled to be launched atop a Long March-5 carrier rocket.
The mission will depart Wenchang Space Launch Center in Hainan province during the fourth quarter of this year. This mission is targeted for the northwestern part of the Oceanus Procellarum, a lunar mare on the western edge of the Moon’s near side, after flying for dozens of days.
Credit: New China/Screengrab
Sophisticated and challenging
Compared with previous Chinese lunar missions, Chang’e-5 will be more sophisticated and challenging, Peng said.
The 8.2-metric-ton probe has four components: an orbiter, lander, ascender and re-entry module. After the probe reaches lunar orbit, the components will separate into two parts, with the orbiter and re-entry module remaining in orbit while the lander and ascender head toward the lunar surface.
The lander and ascender will make a soft landing. One task is using a drill to collect underground rocks and a mechanical arm to gather lunar soil.
After the surface operations are done, the ascender’s rocket will lift it into lunar orbit to dock with the re-entry module. It will transfer lunar samples to the module, which will carry them back to Earth.
Locations of proposed Chang’e-5 landing sites (marked by red stars) from new study.
Credit: Chisenga, et al.
Quantity of samples
If the mission is successful, China would be the third nation to bring lunar samples back to Earth, after the United States and Russia, and also make Chang’e-5 effort the world’s first lunar sample-return mission in more than four decades.
Chang’e-5 mission is intended to return lunar specimens back to Earth.
Credit: CCTV/Screengrab/Inside Outer Space
“The quantity of samples it will bring back depends on many factors, such as the landing site’s geology. We hope that it can collect at least 1 kilogram, and if everything goes well, it may bring two kilograms or even more,” Peng said in the China Daily story.
“The samples will be distributed to scientists for research on topics including the Moon’s physical composition, geological traits and shallow structures,” Peng added, “which will consequently help with the understanding of the Moon’s evolution.”
Turning to future lunar exploration, Peng said scientists and engineers have proposed that two or three missions could be made to set up a simple scientific outpost on the Moon, which would be able to accommodate astronauts for short-term stays, to carry out experiments and explore the feasibility of long-term visits.
China’s new crewed spaceship. A prototype of this new-generation piloted spacecraft has arrived at the launch site. The test ship is designed for use in China’s space station operations and also crewed lunar exploration. Credit: CCTV
New spaceship
According to Ma Xiaobing, deputy chief designer of China’s new-generation manned spacecraft, which has yet to be named, said that the new spaceship’s prototype will make its debut flight during the first mission of the Long March-5B rocket this year at the Wenchang center.
China’s space station scheduled to be operational in 2020’s.
Photo credit: CMSA
The three-day flight will test and verify several key pieces of equipment on the new spacecraft, which will be bigger than the previous Shenzhou-series manned spaceships, Ma said, noting the new model will be reusable.
Booster’s maiden flight
In a related story, Xinhua news agency reports that China’s Long March-5B carrier rocket has passed testing and examination before leaving the factory and is expected to make its maiden flight in the first half of 2020, according to the China Manned Space Agency.
Credit: CMSA
The Long March-5B is a modified version of Long March-5 and will be used to launch segments of China’s space station. China aims to complete the construction of its space station around 2022.
Weighing 66 tons, the space station will be a T shape with the Tianhe core module at the center and the Wentian and Mengtian lab capsules on each side.
In addition, a capsule holding a large optical telescope will fly in the same orbit as the station, adds the Xinhua news story.
Credit: CCTV Video News Agency/Inside Outer Space screengrab
China’s Long March-5 Y4 rocket completed a 100-second test for its high thrust hydrogen oxygen engine on Sunday afternoon in Beijing.
Credit: CCTV Video News Agency/Inside Outer Space screengrab
“The experiment went on smoothly. In the next few days we will have thorough analysis of data and careful examination of the product,” said Wang Weibin, Long March-5 deputy chief designer.
“If everything is alright, the engine will be sent to Tianjin for Long March-5 Y4 final assembling, which will carry out the mission of sending probe to the Mars,” Wang added in a CCTV Video News Agency interview.
Credit: CCTV Video News Agency/Inside Outer Space
Red planet probing
The successful test means the engine has met required standard and is ready for final assembling.
Credit: CGTN
This is the second high thrust hydrogen oxygen engine in China after the successful launch of Long March-5 Y3 rocket in late December of 2019.
China will launch its Mars lander/rover later this year for arrival on the Red Planet in early 2021. A second Mars mission by China in 2028 is slated to rocket back to Earth samples of the planet.
Go to this CCTV Video News Agency report at:
Chang’e-5 lunar lander.
Credit: CCTV Video News Agency/Inside Outer Space screengrab
A plan released Friday in Beijing by the Space Department of the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) underscores the country’s Moon and Mars plans for 2020.
Credit: CCTV Video News Agency/Inside Outer Space screengrab
China’s current lunar program is divided into three phases: orbiting, landing, and returning, and the first two phases have been accomplished.
China is drawing up a plan for the fourth phase of the lunar exploration program, said Peng Jing, deputy chief designer of the Chang’e-5 probe with the China Academy of Space Technology (CAST).
“We temporarily call the follow-up mission as the fourth phase of the lunar exploration program. The preliminary goal we set is to establish a lunar research base through two to three missions. In the foreseeable future, it will be an unmanned scientific research base for the long term, where people would make a short visit,” Peng said in a CCTV broadcast.
Jia Yang, deputy chief designer of Mars probe with CAST.
Credit: CCTV Video News Agency/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Red planet probe
China is set to launch a robotic probe to Mars this year, landing on the Red Planet in 2021.
The robotic probe will consist of three parts – the orbiter, lander and rover.
Testing facility for China’s Mars lander.
Credit: CGTN
The rover will have six wheels and four large, blue butterfly solar panels. It will carry 13 scientific instruments and weigh more than 440 pounds (200 kilograms) and operate about three months on Mars, notes Jia Yang, deputy chief designer of Mars probe with CAST.
In November 2019, China unveiled an experiment simulating the process of a probe hovering, avoiding obstacles and descending to land on Mars.
The experiment was held on a trial ground, the largest one in Asia for test landing on extraterrestrial bodies, in Huailai County, north China’s Hebei Province.
New crew-carrying spacecraft
In terms of human spaceflight, the just released plan notes that China will test its new generation crewed spacecraft in 2020.
The craft is different from the previous Shenzhou series and will be a two-cabin structure, will be larger and reusable, according to CCTV. China will carry out full-scale in-orbit flight tests for the new spacecraft to verify the key technologies such as high-speed reentry thermal control.
China’s space station scheduled to be operational in 2020’s.
Photo credit: CMSA
“It is a future-oriented manned space shuttle. We will try to use some new thermal structures and reusable technologies to reduce its operating costs. So basically, with the new technologies, we will expand our capability to carry people to and back from space,” said Ma Xiaobing, deputy chief designer of manned spacecraft at the China Academy of Space Technology (CAST).
Long March-8.
Credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
Booster developments
The CASC released a bluebook for China’s space science and technology activities, outlining new booster development:
— Long March-5B, a smaller variant of the Long March-5, will make its maiden flight in 2020.
— Long March-7A will fill the gap of Chinese launch vehicles with a carrying capacity of 5.5 to seven tons to high orbit. It will be mainly used for launching missions to the geostationary transfer orbit and will also take its first flights in 2020. It is expected to be launched in the first half of this year, said Hu Xiaojun, the deputy chief designer assistant of Long March-7 carrier rocket.
Long March-8 flyback booster.
Credit: CCTV/Inside Outer Space screengrab
— Long March-8, whose payload capability reaches around 4.5 tons to sun-synchronous orbit with an altitude of 700 kilometers, is expected to make its maiden flight in 2020.
A CCTV video shows the Long March-8 having a recoverable first stage, then landing on an ocean-stationed platform, a similar concept to that pioneered by the U.S. company, SpaceX.
“We want to make it a cost-effective carrier rocket which is highly usable and safe to use. We want it to be a vital new force and the main force to compete in the commercial rocket market at home and abroad,” said Wu Yitian, deputy chief engineer of Long March-8 carrier rocket.
Video resources
To view videos of China’s 2020 plans, go to
China to Launch Chang’e-5, Mars Probes in 2020 at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TrshYgZDno4
China is ushering in a phase of super space programs at:
European Space Agency research fellow Alexandre Meurisse and Beth Lomax of the University of Glasgow producing oxygen and metal out of simulated moondust inside ESA’s Materials and Electrical Components Laboratory.
Credit: ESA–A. Conigili
A prototype oxygen plant for the Moon has been set up in the Materials and Electrical Components Laboratory of the European Space Research and Technology Center, ESTEC, based in Noordwijk in the Netherlands.
“Being able to acquire oxygen from resources found on the Moon would obviously be hugely useful for future lunar settlers, both for breathing and in the local production of rocket fuel,” explains Beth Lomax of the University of Glasgow.
The facility’s focus is on oxygen production, extracted from lunar stimulant.
Artist impression of activities in a Moon Base.
Power generation from solar cells, food production in greenhouses and construction using mobile 3D printer-rovers.
Credit: ESA – P. Carril
Oxygen extraction method
According to a European Space Agency statement: “ESTEC’s oxygen extraction is taking place using a method called molten salt electrolysis, involving placing regolith in a metal basket with molten calcium chloride salt to serve as an electrolyte, heated to 950°C. At this temperature the regolith remains solid. But passing a current through it causes the oxygen to be extracted from the regolith and migrate across the salt to be collected at an anode. As a bonus this process also converts the regolith into usable metal alloys.”
The molten salt electrolysis method was developed by UK company, Metalysis, for commercial metal and alloy production.
The ultimate aim of the research is designing a “pilot plant” that could operate sustainably on the Moon, with the first technology demonstration targeted for the mid-2020s.
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover is now performing Sol 2648 duties.
Recent imagery by the robot includes photos of a strange trough while descending from Western Butte. Curiosity drove downhill and parked at the top of the trough, which has been named “Balgy.”
From the ground, Balgy looks like a shallow ditch filled with dark sand. Researchers don’t know what created this feature, or why it happens to be in this location.
Curiosity Left B Navigation Camera image taken on Sol 2645, January 14, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Curiosity Left B Navigation Camera image taken on Sol 2645, January 14, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Curiosity Front Hazard Avoidance Camera Right B image acquired on Sol 2647, January 16, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Curiosity Right B Navigation Camera photo taken on Sol 2646, January 15, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Curiosity Right B Navigation Camera image acquired on Sol 2647, January 16, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Curiosity Mars Hand Lens Imager photo produced on Sol 2647, January 17, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS
Curiosity Right B Navigation Camera photo taken on Sol 2646, January 16, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Development of the world’s first kinetic launch system by SpinLaunch has received new investment.
The launch system utilizes a large mass accelerator to provide on demand launches of small satellites in virtually any weather at an order of magnitude lower cost and higher frequency than any existing or proposed launch system, according to the group that’s headquartered in Long Beach, California.
SpinLaunch Headquarters, Long Beach, California, USA.
Courtesy: SpinLaunch
SpinLaunch also has a flight test facility at New Mexico’s Spaceport America.
Mass accelerator
Jonathan Yaney, Founder and CEO of SpinLaunch, Inc. stated in a press statement: “Later this year, we aim to change the history of space launch with the completion of our first flight test mass accelerator at Spaceport America.”
Credit: New Mexico Economic Development Department
The company has received an additional investment of $35 million for continued development of the concept, bringing total investment to date to $80 million.
Investors include Airbus Ventures, GV, KPCB, Catapult Ventures, Lauder Partners, John Doerr and Byers Family.
Credit: New Mexico Economic Development Department/Screengrab Inside Outer Space
Reimagining space launch
The funds from this investment will be used to scale the SpinLaunch team and technology, and continue to build out SpinLaunch’s new corporate headquarters in Long Beach, California, and complete the flight test facility at Spaceport America in New Mexico.
In January 2019, SpinLaunch relocated to a new 140,000 square foot facility in Long Beach, California.
Groundbreaking for SpinLaunch facility at New Mexico’s Spaceport America.
Credit: Credit: New Mexico Economic Development Department/Screengrab Inside Outer Space
According to the company’s just-issued statement: “SpinLaunch is reimagining space launch by revisiting fundamental physics and leveraging proven industrial technologies to create a system that accelerates the launch vehicle to hypersonic speeds using ground-based electricity. Applying the initial performance boost from a terrestrial-based launch platform will enable the company to provide a substantially lower cost launch to orbit, multiple times per day.”
Curiosity Left B Navigation Camera image taken on Sol 2643, January 12, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover is now performing Sol 2645 duties.
“While descending from Western Butte, Curiosity has stopped to investigate a strange trough along the way,” reports Melissa Rice, a planetary geologist at Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington.
Curiosity Front Hazard Avoidance Camera Left B photo acquired on Sol 2644, January 13, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
“In the images from orbit, it looks like someone drew a thick straight line with a dark felt marker on the southeastern side of the butte. From the ground, it looks like a shallow ditch filled with dark sand,” Rice adds. “We don’t know what created this feature, or why it happens to be right here, so it’s worth stopping for a closer look.”
Curiosity Front Hazard Avoidance Camera Right B photo acquired on Sol 2644, January 13, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
Downhill driving
Over the weekend, Curiosity drove downhill and parked at the top of the trough, which we named “Balgy.”
The rover is slated to take a large Mastcam stereo mosaic covering both sides of Balgy Trough. Mars scientists are also taking a smaller Mastcam stereo mosaic of laminated rocks nearby called “Baljaffray,” and grab a quick set of Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) and Alpha Particle X-Ray Spectrometer (APXS) observations on the bedrock target “Kennedys Pass.”
Curiosity Right B Navigation Camera image taken on Sol 2644, January 13, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
“After that, Curiosity will finish descending from Western Butte and will head south,” Rice concludes.
Dates of planned rover activities described in these reports are subject to change due to a variety of factors related to the Martian environment, communication relays and rover status.
Curiosity Rear Hazard Avoidance Camera Right B image taken on Sol 2644, January 13, 2020.
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech
European Space Agency (ESA) astronauts training in terrestrial lava tubes located on Spain’s Canary Island of Lanzarote.
Credit: L. Ricci/ESA
The use of lava tubes on Mars as emergency shelters and storage has been advanced by researchers at the Antarctic Institute of Canada.
Lava tubes are formed from fast moving lava which later cools and forms roomy caves that might serve various functions for future human expeditions to the Red Planet.
Svetozar Zirnov, Daniel Polo, and Austin Mardon of the institute floated the idea at this week’s Seventh International Conference on Mars Polar Science and Exploration being held in Ushuaia, Tierra del Fuego, Argentina.
Levels of radiation
“There are many issues that astronauts may face while on a space exploration mission to Mars, which include but are not limited to fatal levels of radiation, exposure to rapidly changing extreme temperatures, as well as falling micrometeorites,” the research team explains.
While on Mars’ surface, radiation levels are much higher than those on Earth, they add, and exposure to such fatal levels of radiation is both harmful to the human body, and even deadly.
High Resolution Stereo Camera on the European Space Agency’s Mars Express captured this image of Pavonis Mons, the central volcano of the three ‘shield’ volcanoes that comprise Tharsis Montes. Researchers believe these are lava tubes, channels originally formed by hot, flowing lava that forms a crust as the surface cools.
Credit: ESA/DLR/FU Berlin (G. Neukum), CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO
“Radiation comes in many ways on Mars’ surface such as solar flares which are constituted similarly to the solar wind, but the individual particles hold higher energies, and galactic cosmic rays which are composed of very high energy particles, mostly protons and electrons. Lava tubes may help to protect astronauts from such levels of radiation, while on a space mission,” they report.
Credit: NASA
Temperature swings
In their paper, Zirnov and colleagues note that exposure to extreme temperatures on Mars must also be taken into account.
They point out that the average daytime temperature on Mars in the winter season is about -80 degrees Fahrenheit, or -60 degrees Celsius in the daytime, while about -195degrees Fahrenheit, or -125 degrees Celsius at night.
In the summer time, the average daytime temperature heats up to about 70 degrees Fahrenheit and 20 degrees Celsius.
Apollo 15 image captures landing locale of China’s Chang’e-5 Moon lander – the Mons Rümker region in the northern part of Oceanus Procellarum, away from previous sampling sites.
Credit: NASA
Later this year, China is slated to attempt the first Moon-sample return to Earth mission in over four decades.
The candidate landing region for China’s Chang’e‐5 lunar sample return mission is the Rümker region, located in the northern Oceanus Procellarum. The area is geologically complex and known for its volcanic activity.
There’s great science to be had according to a new research paper, led by Chikondi Chisenga of the State Key Laboratory of Information Engineering in Surveying, Mapping and Remote Sensing at Wuhan University in Wuhan, China.
Locations of proposed landing sites (marked by red stars) from new study.
Chisenga, et al.
Chikondi and colleagues (including experts from the U.S. and Sweden) report the Mons Rümker region on the Moon features evidence for multiple volcanic episodes, including some of the youngest lunar mare basalts known to date.
NASA’s twin Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) probes.
Credit: NASA
Underground bodies
Chinese lunar researchers have analyzed gravity data from NASA’s Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory (GRAIL) mission. Also used were geophysical tools to study both shallow and deep subsurface structures. The assessment also utilized data from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter’s Lunar Orbiter Laser Altimeter (LOLA) and Japan’s Terrain Camera that flew on the Kaguya Moon orbiter.
China’s Chang’e 5 lunar sample return mission.
Via China Space website
Credit: New China/Screengrab
“Our results suggest that the Mons Rümker region features multiple small and large high‐density underground bodies, some of which breach the surface,” the research team reports. In particular, there could be a large magmatic body at a depth of roughly 3.7-11.2 miles (6–18 kilometers) that fed the surface volcanoes. Their analyses also revealed another circular feature at roughly 4.3-10.5 miles (7‐ 17 kilometers depth with high‐density values.
Maximum scientific return
As China prepares to send the Chang’e‐5 mission to collect drill‐hole samples, the research team combined the results from their study with remote sensing and geological analyses to propose four candidate landing sites that “satisfy the geological and geophysical criteria for maximum scientific return.”
The Chang’e-5 mission will retrieve and return to Earth up to 4.4 pounds (2 kilograms) of lunar surface and subsurface samples. Chang’e-5 is comprised of four parts including the orbiter, ascender, lander, and Earth reentry module containing the lunar specimens.
Following a circumlunar voyage in 2014, a return capsule parachuted to Earth. This test was a prelude to China’s Chang’e-5 lunar mission being readied for its return sample mission now scheduled for 2020.
Courtesy: China Space
The former Soviet Union successfully executed three robotic sample return missions: Luna 16 returned a small sample (101 grams) from Mare Fecunditatis in September of 1970; February 1972, Luna 20 returned 55 grams of soil from the Apollonius highlands region; Luna 24 retrieved 170.1 grams of lunar samples from the Moon’s Mare Crisium (Sea of Crisis) for return to Earth in August 1976.
The last Apollo mission to bring back to Earth lunar collectibles was the Apollo 17 expedition in 1972.
Go to this China Central Television (CCTV) video that spotlights the Chang’e-5 mission at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VJrmmWnU8HE
To view the paper — “Geology and Scientific Significance of the Rümker Region in Northern Oceanus Procellarum: China’s Chang’e-5 Landing Region” — go to the American Geophysical Union’s Journal of Geophysical Research – Planets at:
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1029/2019JE005978
