Leonard David's INSIDE OUTER SPACE

Archive for the ‘Space News’ Category

As NASA’s Curiosity rover wheels about the Red Planet, the robot is on the lookout for habitable environments – sites that could have supported microbial life in the past.

But new research led by a Brown University researcher suggests that slopes of a giant Martian volcano — once covered in glacial ice — may have been home to one of the most recent habitable environments yet found on Mars.

Arsia Mons is the third tallest volcano on Mars and one of the largest mountains in the solar system. A new analysis of the landforms surrounding Arsia Mons shows that eruptions along the volcano’s northwest flank happened at the same time that a glacier covered the region around 210 million years ago.

The heat from those eruptions would have melted massive amounts of ice to form englacial lakes — bodies of water that form within glaciers like liquid bubbles in a half-frozen ice cube.

Lakes colonized by microbial life?

Kathleen Scanlon, a graduate student at Brown University, led the new research work regarding Arsia Mons, published in the scientific journal, Icarus.

Back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest that the lakes could have persisted for hundreds or even a few thousand years, according to a press statement from Brown University.

That may have been long enough for the lakes to be colonized by microbial life forms, if in fact such creatures ever inhabited Mars.

The fact that the Arsia Mons site is relatively young makes it an interesting target for possible future exploration.

For example, the NASA Mars 2020 mission is a future rover designed to investigate key questions about the habitability of Mars, and assess natural resources and hazards in preparation for future human expeditions to the Red Planet.

The science instruments aboard the rover will enable scientists to identify and select a collection of rock and soil samples that will be stored for potential return to Earth in the future.

Scientists are now reviewing projected exploration sites for the Mars 2020 mission.

For more information on the Icarus paper, go to:

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0019103514002164

Also, go to the Brown University release:

http://news.brown.edu/pressreleases/2014/05/mars

 

The Ad Astra Rocket Company of Webster, Texas has released an intriguing video on the future of their VASIMR engine concept.

Since the 1970s, starting at MIT and then for 25 years at NASA, astronaut Franklin Chang Díaz and his team of scientists have worked to develop a faster propulsion technology for space travel.

The result is the Variable Specific Impulse Magnetoplasma Rocket (VASIMR) engine.

Today, former astronaut Díaz is Ad Astra’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.

Ad Astra also owns and operates Ad Astra Servicios Energéticos y Ambientales (AASEA) and Ad Astra Rocket Company, Costa Rica, respectively supporting research and development subsidiaries in the U.S. and Guanacaste, Costa Rica.

VASIMR is a plasma rocket that can travel 10 times faster than a chemical rocket, uses 1/10th the amount of fuel, and can transport cargo more economically than any existing space technology. This advanced plasma space propulsion system is aimed at the emerging in-space transportation market.

The new video is a Boundless Media and Ad Astra Rocket Company film production and can be viewed here:

http://youtu.be/5ZcVGpyvLZ8

Buzz Aldrin and I had a wonderful day in Denver on Saturday, May 24^th.

In promoting our book — Mission to Mars: My Vision for Space Exploration – we visited both the Barnes and Noble bookstore in Glendale, Colorado as well as the magnificent Wings Over the Rockies Air & Space Museum gala event in Denver that night.

At both events we were welcomed by large and receptive audiences.

As for walking on the Moon, 45 years ago this July, “it’s slow and it’s dusty…but it makes for beautiful boot prints,” Buzz told the Barnes and Noble crowd. But Buzz also had strong words regarding the overall health of the U.S. space program.

At the Wings Over the Rockies gala, Buzz and I were joined on stage by his son, Andy Aldrin, President of Moon Express, Inc. Andy wrote a great foreword to our book and was an invaluable contributor to the entire book project.

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

For a look at part of our day in Denver, go to:

http://www.9news.com/story/news/education/2014/05/25/buzz-aldrin-signs-books-meets-hundreds/9560731/

 

Earth’s Moon as art?

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has busily snagged countless images of the Moon’s landscape and is nearing five years in lunar orbit.

To celebrate that approaching anniversary on June 18, NASA has invited the public to select a favorite orbiter image of the Moon for the cover of a special image collection.

You can vote on the final cover image from five possible candidates selected because of their beauty and/or scientific value by orbiter mission team members.

The winning cover image will be announced June 18 with the release of the full Moon as Art collection of 24 images.

The eye-catching images to select from are titled:

— Starry Night

— Linne Crater

— Clerke Crater

— Diviner North Pole

— Tycho Central Peak

Voting has begun and will close June 6.

So cast an eye, cast your vote at:

http://lro.gsfc.nasa.gov/MoonArt

A modern satellite was on the receiving end of a hypervelocity destructive impact – not in space, but here on Earth. The experiment was designed to help scientists better understand the effects of space collisions.

The spacecraft was destroyed at an Arnold Engineering Development Complex (AEDC) in Tennessee. This appraisal teamed involved NASA, the U.S. Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center, the University of Florida and the Aerospace Corporation.

The spacecraft – dubbed “DebriSat” — was designed and fabricated by the University of Florida and supplied to AEDC for purposeful destruction. DebriSat was a non-functional, full-scale representation of a modern satellite.

Target tank

DebriSat was mounted within a “target tank” with a Range G light gas launcher capable of firing projectiles over one pound at speeds of more than 15,500 miles per hour.

The Range G launcher fires into a sealed test chamber that can be conditioned to simulate the low pressure environment of outer space. Destroying the satellite inside the chamber also allows the debris to be easily recovered for analysis.

That launcher gives a projectile enough kinetic oomph to cause the catastrophic destruction of the test satellite.

“We were well above the necessary impact energy to have a catastrophic destruction of the DebriSat, which resulted in a very successful test,” said J.C. Liou from the NASA Orbital Debris Program Office at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas.

Soft-catch

In addition to the DebriSat, AEDC Range G also helped the Department of Defense, NASA and the Aerospace Corporation perform hypervelocity impact experiments involving an upper stage of a launch vehicle dubbed “DebrisLV” and a spacecraft protection device commonly called a Whipple Shield.

David Woods, Range G installation engineer, noted the characteristics of the shooting gallery that is the target tank:

“Inside the chamber we line the walls with foam to stop the debris fragments from impacting the sides of the tank,” said Woods in an AEDC press statement.

“We call this debris recovery method ‘soft-catch’ since it prevents the debris from being further damaged by impacting the walls of the test chamber,” Woods said.

The DebriSat test results are meant to eliminate discrepancies in the breakup models of older spacecraft contrasted to present-day designs of satellites.

Data from the recent tests are expected to be of great benefit to specialists focused on the menacing issue of understanding and dealing with Earth orbiting debris.

An international center focused on better understanding of the issue of orbital debris has been established at the University of Maryland.

The Center for Orbital Debris Education and Research (CODER) is to look into technology, space policy and economics, as well as legal and sociological issues.

A long-term goal of CODER is the development of policies, laws and space systems “that will lead to the efficient remediation and control of space environmental pollutants,” according to a CODER brochure.

CODER will be an international clearing house for research and educational programs on the orbital debris situation.

With over 60 countries operating in space, the exponentially growing problem of orbital debris will take international collaboration and partnership to research and develop innovative solutions and strategies.

A founding faculty has been established at the University, under the A. James Clark School of Engineering.

“CODER is the first academically led center established to address the full range of issues surrounding the orbital debris problem,” said founding faculty member and Associate Professor of Aerospace Engineering Raymond Sedwick. “Most existing organizations focus on just one aspect of the problem—tracking, modeling, remediation, mitigation, policy, etc.—but CODER will serve as a research collective to provide expertise in all of these areas.”

For detailed information on CODER, go to: www.coder.umd.edu

Future Moon exploration and exploitation of lunar ice can benefit greatly by the use of a range of small satellites, according to a new study. Furthermore, university involvement will be essential to rein in costs.

The research findings are contained in the report – “New Approaches to Lunar Ice Detection and Mapping” – sponsored by Caltech’s Keck Institute for Space Studies (KISS).

The primary objective of the study was to explore innovative, low-cost mission concepts for detecting and mapping “operationally useful” ice deposits on the Moon, defined as those accessible to surface landers or rovers.

Orbiting spacecraft, impactor probes, penetrator probes, as well as landers and rovers were appraised.  

Study participants found that small satellites were particularly well suited to the envisioned orbiter and impactor mission designs.

“While fulfilling these priorities will be an ambitious undertaking, we conclude that cost should not be prohibitive, as long as university involvement remains strong,” the report explains.

Recent advances

In releasing the report, study leaders, Paul Hayne (Jet Propulsion Laboratory), David Paige (University of California, Los Angeles), and Andrew Ingersoll (California Institute of Technology), and on behalf of 33 co-authors from 15 separate institutions, said that the study began in July 2013, with a closing workshop held in November.

The study was motivated by recent advances in two areas:

— Remote sensing data and models provide compelling (though sometimes conflicting) evidence for the presence of concentrated volatiles on the Moon.

— Small, low-cost spacecraft have emerged as a potentially viable means of planetary exploration and science.

Innovative, low-cost

The study team leaders observed: “We therefore sought to identify key measurements for lunar ice detection and mapping that could be accomplished through innovative, low-cost mission concepts.”

“We hope that this report will serve as a resource for the lunar (and broader planetary) science and exploration community. In particular, the report summarizes the current state of knowledge about lunar volatiles, and identifies future measurement approaches that could clarify their abundance, composition, and distribution. The mission concepts presented are a small subset of those considered in the study, and are those we found most compelling and/or technically mature,” they concluded.

For access to the full report, go to:

http://kiss.caltech.edu/study/lunar-ice/KISS_lunar_report.pdf

NASA’s Mars Curiosity rover has swallowed for analysis bits and pieces of powdered rock collected by drilling into a sandstone target.

The material has been delivered to laboratory instruments inside the robot. Study of those powdered sample materials will be performed during pauses in the rover’s ongoing trek across the Martian terrain.

Controllers of the one-ton mobile machine are readying the robot to soon move on toward its long-term destination on a mountain slope, driving toward Mount Sharp, the layered mountain at the middle of Mars’ Gale Crater.

Sharpshooting

Other instruments on the rover have inspected the target rock’s interior exposed in the hole and in drill cuttings heaped around the hole.

The instrument that fires a laser from atop the rover’s mast – ChemCam — zapped a series of points inside the hole with sharpshooter accuracy.

Camera and spectrometer inspection of the cuttings has also been done.

The mission’s two previous rock-drilling sites – done at mudstone targets — yielded evidence last year of an ancient lakebed environment with key chemical elements and a chemical energy source that long ago provided conditions favorable for microbial life.

 

The series of measures taken by the U.S. in response to Russia’s actions in the Crimea has stirred up Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister, Dmitry Rogozin.

Rogozin has stated that Russia intends to reject a U.S. request to prolong the use of the International Space Station (ISS) beyond 2020. He also suggested that Russia could use the ISS without the United States.

These comments by the Russian leader have sparked a letter to NASA’s Charles Bolden from Science, Space, and Technology Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Texas), Space Subcommittee Chairman Steven Palazzo (R-Miss.) and Space Subcommittee Vice Chairman Mo Brooks (R-Ala.).

Political division

“Our international space partnerships, including our partnership with Russia, have historically endured political division,” the Congressmen wrote. “But Deputy Prime Minister Rogozin’s statements raise serious concerns about the strength of those partnerships.”

With the retirement of the Space Shuttle and the cancellation of the Constellation program, the United States currently has no domestic capability to transport our astronauts to and from the ISS. 

“As we move forward, it is important that we fully understand our nation’s independent capabilities with regard to ISS operations,” the letter states.

“While this new development is not related to access to the ISS for our astronauts in the next few years, it certainly pertains to the strength of our partnership with Russia. If Mr. Rogozin’s statement proves to be accurate, we will have to take a step back and evaluate the costs and benefits of maintaining ISS beyond 2020 without our Russian partners.”

To read the full letter from the lawmaker to NASA’s Bolden, go to:

http://science.house.gov/sites/republicans.science.house.gov/files/documents/Letters/051514_Russia_Sanctions.pdf

Comet Siding Spring will make a very close approach to Mars this October.

That comet flyby comes just four weeks after NASA’s newest and now en route Mars probe – the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN spacecraft, or MAVEN – nudges into orbit around the Red Planet.

Researchers are busy examining the dust risk to the Mars probe given particles that will spew from comet Siding Spring.

“We are concerned about the risk, and have been identifying mitigations that we can take in order to minimize the potential impact on MAVEN,” said MAVEN principal investigator, Bruce Jakosky, of the University of Colorado, Boulder.

Before and after looks

Jakosky told me that a group led by Jet Propulsion Laboratory’s (JPL) Mars Program Office is examining the dust risk. They have not yet finalized their report and recommendations.

“We have a plan and schedule to complete the analysis and make preliminary decisions in June,” Jakosky advised. Also being examined is the potential to make observations of both the comet and of Mars at the time of the comet’s closest approach. 

“The interest in the comet should be obvious. But we’re also interested in before and after looks at Mars, given that the dust and gas has the potential to affect the upper atmosphere that is the centerpiece of our science,” Jakosky said.

Bottom line

“We’ve identified possible observations, and are in the midst of working through the implications for our transition phase [once MAVEN is in Mars orbit] and for the observations,” Jakosky said. “Again, no decisions have been made, and we expect preliminary decisions to be made hand in hand with our mitigations,” he added.

For Jakosky there is a bottom line in all the MAVEN versus comet Siding Spring deliberations.

“In all of our analysis, spacecraft and instrument health and safety come first. We won’t take any actions that we believe jeopardize our own science mission,” he concluded.