Showing posts with label space. Show all posts
Showing posts with label space. Show all posts

2013-10-10

Diamonds on other planets

Diamonds may be hiding on other planets - CNN.com


(CNN) -- Move over, Lucy: Researchers say Saturn, Jupiter, Neptune and Uranus may also be in the sky, with diamonds.

The atmospheres of these gas-ball planets have the perfect temperature and pressure conditions to host carbon in the form of diamond, say Mona Delitsky of California Specialty Engineering in Pasadena, California, and Kevin Baines of the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Their research was presented Wednesday at the American Astronomical Society Division for Planetary Sciences conference in Denver.



2012-11-10

NASA Planning Deep-Space Outpost Near the Moon

NASA to announce new manned moon missions? | Crave - CNET

It has been almost 40 years since the Apollo 17 mission last landed a man on the moon. It may not take anywhere near that long before we send astronauts back to the moon's neighborhood.

Space.com reports that NASA is seriously looking at sending out a new manned moon mission with the purpose of creating a manned outpost beyond the far side of moon and eventually visiting an asteroid in 2025. This may not physically land a human on the moon, but it would establish a deep space outpost as a base for research and missions.

NASA May Unveil New Manned Moon Missions Soon | Space.com

Artist's concept of astronauts in an Orion capsule helping direct robotic teleoperations on the moon's farside. CREDIT: Lockheed Martin

"NASA has been evolving its thinking, and its latest charts have inserted a new element of cislunar/lunar gateway/Earth-moon L2 sort of stuff into the plan," Logsdon told SPACE.com. (The Earth-moon L2 is a so-called libration point where the two bodies' gravitational pulls roughly balance out, allowing spacecraft to essentially park there.) [Gallery: Visions of Deep-Space Station Missions]


NASA Eyes Plan for Deep-Space Outpost Near the Moon

The Lagrange points for the Earth-moon system. NASA is evaluating an early mission with the Orion capsule placed at Earth-moon L2. Astronauts parked there could teleoperate robots on the lunar farside.
CREDIT: David A. Kring, LPI-JSC Center for Lunar Science and Exploration

Could moon outpost propel space travel? Fmr. Astronaut Leroy Chiao weighs in – Early Start with John Berman & Zoraida Sambolin - CNN.com Blogs

What if astronauts were to return to the moon? Decades after man first landed on the moon, Space.com is reporting that it’s possible.
A space policy expert told the website that plans are in the works by NASA to travel back to the vicinity of the moon and create a manned outpost there in order to learn more about future deep-space travel. The manned outpost could eventually be used as a staging area for future missions to the moon. This morning on "Early Start," fmr. Astronaut and International Space Station Commander Leroy Chiao explains.

NASA to deploy water-seeking robot on Moon in 2017, manned lunar base could be next | The Verge

50 years ago, President John F. Kennedy told the United States that man would go to the moon. Soon, another American president may announce that the same celestial body will serve as a waypoint for manned space exploration. The Verge has learned that NASA intends to deploy a robotic lunar rover on the Moon in 2017 to search for water and other resources necessary for space travel, and that NASA may have secured support from the White House for an actual manned outpost — a space station — floating above the far side of the moon. Rumors of such a deep-space outpost surfaced as early as February of this year, when a leaked memo from a NASA administrator detailed an idea to build a "human-tended waypoint" at Earth-Moon Lagrange Point 2 (EML-2): a point in space where balanced gravitational forces allow an object to remain in stationary orbit relative to both the Earth and the Moon. From there, NASA could launch missions deeper into space — say, to Mars, or a near-Earth asteroid — using the base as a stepping stone.


2012-10-25

Methane on Mars

Mars rover working on methane mystery - Technology & science - Space - Space.com | NBC News

There’s growing buzz about data gleaned by NASA’s Curiosity rover on Mars, specifically over the issue of methane detection on the Red Planet.
On one hand, methane can be geological in origin. But then there’s the prospect that the gas is biotic, or caused by living organisms — meaning it could be the gaseous residue of long-extinct microbes or even the output of Martian organisms alive and well today.

Curiosity Mars Rover Will Hunt for Life's Building Blocks | Space.com

The main instrument for the rover’s astrobiology research is the gold-plated Sample Analysis on Mars (SAM), which includes three complex lab tools and is the largest and heaviest (at 88 pounds, or 40 kilograms) on Curiosity. Many of its capabilities are brand-new or significant improvements on the Viking instruments. [5 Bold Claims of Alien Life]
[...]
The principal investigator for SAM is Paul Mahaffy of the Goddard Spaceflight Center, who has worked to put together the instrument for more than eight years.  He and other NASA scientists are quick to explain that finding organics on Mars will be very hard to do, and that it’s difficult to find organic carbon in rock samples even on Earth. But he sees some real opportunities.

Curiosity Rover Finds Clues to the Mystery of Mars’ Methane | The Bunsen Burner

Recent evidence, however, emphasizes that the methane really is there. The Thermal Emission Spectrometer on the Mars Global Surveyor, an orbiting satellite that collected data from 1996 until 2006, detected relatively high levels of methane in Mars’ atmosphere. MGS revealed that Mars’ methane levels vary by location and season: they are highest in summer and autumn, in regions with volcanoes or other geothermal activity. Chris McKay, a Mars specialist at NASA, told SPACE.com, ”Methane on Mars should have a lifetime of 300 years and should not be variable. If it is variable, this is very hard to explain with present theory. It requires unexpected sources and unexpected sinks.”

This makes it sound like the methane is produced by geology, not biology, but scientists are skeptical that geological processes can account for the quantity and variability of methane found. “Methane is really quite a rare gas in hydrothermal/volcanic exhalations,” Dirk Schulze-Makuch, an astrobiologist at Washington State University, said in an interview with SPACE.com.


The Mars' "Methane Mystery" --A Sign of Life or an Earth-Based Illusion? We'll Know Soon

“Based on evidence, what we do have is, unequivocally, the conditions for the emergence of life were present on Mars — period, end of story,” said Michael J. Mumma, a senior scientist for NASA at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., who led one of three teams that have made still-controversial claims of detecting methane in Mars’s atmosphere. “So life certainly could have arisen there.”

2012-10-16

Water on the Moon

Moon Water Made by the Sun?


Long thought to be bone dry, the moon has recently been confirmed as relatively water rich. But a big question remains: Where did the wetor more accurately, icystuff come from?

A new study might have the answer: The moon's water may have, in a sense, sailed in on the solar wind. The discovery hints at a previously unknown method of delivering water to the inner solar systemand a new way to produce water and rocket fuel for future space missions.

Blowin' in the (solar) wind: how the moon got its water

Looking for the source

So where does the water come from? Two main theories have been suggested.
Water could be delivered to the moon by the impacts of meteorites and comets, which can contain large amounts of ice.

Another theory is based on the fact hydrogen atoms reach the moon as a result of the solar wind – the continuous stream of particles ejected from the sun. The theory goes that hydrogen atoms then react with oxygen in the surface minerals to form water and hydroxyl

The new study, published by Yang Liu from the University of Tennessee and colleagues, seeks to distinguish between these two theories by looking at the isotopic composition of the hydrogen.

Moon Made Water From Solar Wind : Discovery News

Analysis of the Apollo moon samples, which began in the 1970s, previously had uncovered the presence of hydrogen inside volcanically produced glass beads in the soil. In 2008, scientists found hydrogen in a phosphate mineral in lunar rocks, and last year found it again inside another mineral, olivine.

Three robotic probes, including NASA's LCROSS experiment, also have found evidence for water ice on the moon. But where the water came from has been a mystery.

Using two new techniques to dig down into chemistry of hydrogen inside lunar soil grains, Liu and colleagues determined that most of it came from the solar wind, a steady stream of charged particles from the sun that permeates and defines the boundaries of the solar system.


The Solar Wind


The solar wind streams off of the Sun in all directions at speeds of about 400 km/s (about 1 million miles per hour). The source of the solar wind is the Sun's hot corona. The temperature of the corona is so high that the Sun's gravity cannot hold on to it. Although we understand why this happens we do not understand the details about how and where the coronal gases are accelerated to these high velocities. This question is related to the question of coronal heating.


2012-09-10

Early Mars not Hospitable?

New Mars theory cast doubt on planet's habitability - latimes.com

A study of clays suggests they might have been formed in hot magma rich in water — too hot to support microbial life. A Caltech planetary geologist is coauthor.

A standing theory about water on Mars is linked to blueberry-shaped formations in the Martian soil, such as this one in an image captured by the rover Opportunity and released in 2004. An alternate theory published Sunday in the journal Nature Geoscience argues, however, that Martian water's source water would have been far too hot to support microbial life. (NASA/JPL/U.S. Geological Survey/AFP/Getty Images)

Early Mars Maybe Not So Wet : Discovery News

In 2008, NASA's Phoenix Mars lander landed in the Martian arctic region and uncovered evidence for water ice.

[...]
A new study presents an alternative explanation for the prevalence of Mars' ancient clay minerals, which on Earth most often result from water chemically reacting with rock over long periods of time. The process is believed to be a starting point for life.

The clays, also known as phyllosilocates, are among the strongest pieces of evidence for a Mars that once was warmer, wetter and much more like Earth than the cold, dry, acidic desert which appears today.

Data collected by orbiting spacecraft show Mars' clay minerals may instead trace their origin to water-rich volcanic magma, similar to how clays formed on the Mururoa atoll in French Polynesia and in the Parana basin in Brazil. That process doesn't need standing bodies of liquid water.

Early Mars may not have been hospitable after all: study

Alain Meunier of France's Universite de Poitiers and a team studied clay minerals at Mururoa atoll in French Polynesia that seem similar to martian examples, and showed they were formed from precipitation of lava.

The same process has also occurred at other locations on Earth, including the Parana basin in Brazil, said the study in Nature Geoscience.

"To crystallise, clays need water but not necessarily liquid water. In other words, clays are not exclusively typical of soils or altered rocks; they may crystallise also directly from magmas," Meunier told AFP by email.

"Magmatic clays have no climatic significance. Consequently, they cannot be used to prove that the planet was habitable or not during its early history."

If the theory is correct, it "would imply that early Mars may not have been as habitable as previously thought at the time when Earth's life was taking hold," University of Colorado geologist Brian Hynek wrote in a comment.

[...]
Hynek said only on-the-spot examination of Mars' clay minerals can provide conclusive proof of their origin.

Two rovers that humans have placed on Mars, Opportunity which landed in 2004 and Curiosity earlier this year, may contribute such evidence.

Mars Clays May Have Volcanic Source - Science News

The team says cooling lava can account for the most geographically abundant Noachian clay minerals. But that doesn’t mean water didn’t flow on the surface during brief episodes, as evidenced by the planet’s ancient river valleys, says coauthor Alain Meunier of the University of Poitiers in France.

Ehlmann says scientists need to find a spot on Mars where Nochian-aged clay is found so that all three proposed clay-forming mechanisms can be tested. Unfortunately, NASA’s Curiosity is not a good test location because the clays there are slightly younger and are clearly part of a sedimentary rather than volcanic deposit.

2012-07-29

NASA's new Space Launch System (SLS)

Space Launch System - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Space Launch System, or SLS, is a United States Space Shuttle-derived heavy launch vehicle being designed by NASA. It follows the cancellation of the Constellation Program, and is to replace the retired Space Shuttle.

[...}

SLS is to take astronauts and hardware to such destinations as near-Earth objects like asteroids, Lagrange points, the Moon, and Mars. SLS may also to support trips to the International Space Station, if necessary. The SLS Program is integrated with NASA's Orion Program, providing a multipurpose crew vehicle. SLS will use the ground operations and launch facilities at NASA's Kennedy Space Center, Florida.

Giant deep-space rocket passes key test - Technology & science - Space - Space.com - NBCNews.com


NASA's next-generation rocket, a behemoth of a booster expected to launch astronauts deeper into space than ever before, has passed a major design milestone, space agency officials announced Wednesday.

The new mega-rocket, called the Space Launch System, passed a series of reviews that laid out the technical, performance, cost and schedule requirements for the heavy-lift booster. The completion of the so-called System Requirements Review and System Definition Review allows program managers to proceed into the rocket's preliminary design phase, NASA officials said.


NASA - NASA's Space Launch System Passes Major Agency Review, Moves to Preliminary Design



The first test flight of NASA's Space Launch System, which will feature a configuration for a 70-metric-ton (77-ton) lift capacity, is scheduled for 2017. As SLS evolves, a three-stage launch vehicle configuration will provide a lift capability of 130 metric tons (143 tons) to enable missions beyond low Earth orbit and support deep space exploration.
An expanded view of an artist rendering of the 70-metric-ton configuration of NASA's Space Launch System. (NASA)

An expanded view of an artist rendering of the 130 metric ton configuration of NASA's Space Launch System. (NASA)

NASA - Multimedia - Video Gallery



Space Launch System: Future Frontier

Featuring NASA Marshall’s Foundations of Influence, Relationships, Success & Teamwork (FIRST) employees and student interns, "Future Frontier" discusses the new Space Launch System (SLS) heavy-lift launch vehicle and its importance to furthering NASA's exploration mission. NASA FIRST is the Agency's leadership program for promising young professionals. (NASA/MSFC)


2012-07-27

The Smell of Space

What does space smell like? Astronauts say raspberries, rum and seared steak | Alaska Dispatch

Astronauts coming back from spacewalks have some surprising descriptions of what space smells like.

According to The Atlantic, some say the smell reminds them of seared steak, or maybe something metallic. Some describe it as sweet, like raspberries or rum.


What Space Smells Like - Megan Garber - The Atlantic

Our extraterrestrial explorers are remarkably consistent in describing Space Scent in meaty-metallic terms. "Space," astronaut Tony Antonelli has said, "definitely has a smell that's different than anything else." Space, three-time spacewalker Thomas Jones has put it, "carries a distinct odor of ozone, a faint acrid smell."

Space, Jones elaborated, smells a little like gunpowder. It is "sulfurous."

Add to all those anecdotal assessments the recent discovery, in a vast dust cloud at the center of our galaxy, of ethyl formate -- and the fact that the ester is, among other things, the chemical responsible for the flavor of raspberries. Add to that the fact that ethyl formate itself smells like rum. Put all that together, and one thing becomes clear: The final frontier sort of stinks.

Second EVA Highlights Flight Day 7 - YouTube


Spacewalkers Steve Bowen and Al Drew installed and swapped out several pieces of equipment and repaired or removed thermal insulation outside the International Space Station. They also "filled" a special bottle with space for a Japanese education payload. The bottle will be part of a museum exhibit for public viewing.

HSF - International Space Station

The Smell of Space

Few people have experienced traveling into space. Even fewer have experienced the smell of space.

[...]

It is hard to describe this smell; it is definitely not the olfactory equivalent to describing the palette sensations of some new food as "tastes like chicken." The best description I can come up with is metallic; a rather pleasant sweet metallic sensation. It reminded me of my college summers where I labored for many hours with an arc welding torch repairing heavy equipment for a small logging outfit. It reminded me of pleasant sweet smelling welding fumes. That is the smell of space.

Space smells like seared steak, hot metal, astronauts report (+video) - CSMonitor.com



Astronauts who have gone on spacewalks consistently speak of space's extraordinarily peculiar odor.

They can't smell it while they're actually bobbing in it, because the interiors of their space suits just smell plastic-y. But upon stepping back into the space station and removing their helmets, they get a strong, distinctive whiff of the final frontier. The odor clings to their suit, helmet, gloves and tools.

Fugitives from the near-vacuum — probably atomic oxygen, among other things — the clinging particles have the acrid aroma of seared steak, hot metal and welding fumes. Steven Pearce, a chemist hired by NASA to recreate the space odor on Earth for astronaut training purposes, said the metallic aspect of the scent may come from high-energy vibrat

NASA Asks Chemist to Make the Smell of Space: Discovery Space

Scent of Space Being Recreated by Chemist

NASA recently asked Steve Pearce, a chemist at Omega Ingredients and Maverick Innovations, to reproduce and bottle the smell of outer space.




Astronauts returning from lengthy spacewalks consistently report a strange odor that dances the lines between seared steak, piping-hot metal and arc welding smoke. To acclimate their astronauts to it during training, NASA has asked chemist Steve Pearce to reproduce this "smell of space."


2012-07-03

Excalibur Almaz: Fly Me to the Moon

Company promises flights to the moon aboard recycled Soviet space station - CSMonitor.com

The moon may soon be a tourist destination for millionaires with Excalibur Almaz, a British spaceflight firm, preparing to sell $150,000 tickets aboard a 1970s Soviet space station retrofitted with new thrusters



Excalibur Almaz



Excalibur Almaz plans to use its Salyut-Class Spacecraft and RRVs as an orbital and cislunar transportation system. These components unlock the potential to accomplish the most ambitious private space missions to date. Cislunar missions will explore the limitless, cyclical orbital pathways that lead to a vast array of destinations including the moon, near-Earth asteroids and gravity-stable destinations called Libration (or Lagrange) Points. These orbits will take travelers farther from Earth than any human has ever traveled before. EA can also take travelers close to the lunar surface. Asteroids could eventually be visited, explored and mined. These exciting mission profiles will inspire humanity to live, work and thrive in space!



Space Tourism's Next Destination May Be the Moon | News & Opinion | PCMag.com


Moon trips would begin as early as 2015. Dula said last month that his company could sell in the neighborhood of 30 tickets over the following decade for a a $4.5 billion haul, making half of its investment back in the first three years alone.

Excalibur Almaz plans to insert the space station cores into low Earth orbit atop a Proton rocket, while using the Soyuz-FG rockets that ferry crews up to the ISS to take passengers in Almaz RRVs up into space. The company is also open to using alternative rockets for its manned flights, such as the SpaceX Falcon 9 booster, according to the Christian Science Monitor.

Once in low Earth orbit, the Almaz spacecraft would dock with the space station cores, which would serve as the long-haul vehicles for the trip to the Moon and back. The reusable Almaz capsules would come along for the trip and then be used to travel back down to Earth.


2012-06-04

Mars One: Human Settlement on Mars

New 'Mars One' mission aims to establish first human colony on Red Planet by 2023 | Mail Online


An independent space launch company aims to put four people on Mars by April 2023 - and the team will not be coming back.

Mars One claims that a new crew of four will join every two years as the explorers build their settlement, and that by 2033 there will be 20 people living on Mars.

The company has been in talks with independent space suppliers such as Space X, which recently launched the first privately owned rocket to the Space Station.


Home - Mars One

Human settlement of Mars in 2023

Mars One will establish the first human settlement on Mars in 2023. A habitable settlement will be waiting for the settlers when they land. The settlement will support them while they live and work on Mars the rest of their lives. Every two years after 2023 an additional crew will arrive, such that there is a real living, growing community on Mars. Mars One has created a technical plan for this mission that is as simple as possible. For every component of the mission we have identified at least one potential supplier. Mars One invites you to join us in this next giant leap for mankind!


Mars One: Dutch Mission Wants To Establish First Human Settlement On The Red Planet

A new team of four explorers will join the settlement every two years, following the initial 2023 space landing.

"By 2033 there will be over twenty people living, working and flourishing on Mars, their new home," Mars One's mission objective states.

Living on Mars may sound like an astronomical joke as well as a scientific impossibility, but these Dutch space raiders are apparently serious.

Headed by scientist and entrepreneur Bas Lansdorp, a Nobel Prize-winning professor has also added credibility to the campaign.

As a mission ambassador, Dr Gerard 't Hooft insists that the project "seems [to me] to be the only way to fulfil dreams of mankind’s expansion into space."

And if plans like these sound exciting, Mars One is holding auditions for aspiring astronauts, beginning next year.


2012-05-10

NuSTAR: NASA's Black-Hole Hunter

NuSTAR NASA Black Hole Hunter with X-RAY Eyes - YouTube

A large number of galaxies are hiding black holes that we can't detect, and NASA's NuSTAR will use X-ray vision to find them.



Missions - NuSTAR - NASA Science

The Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array is an Explorer mission that will allow astronomers to study the universe in high energy X-rays. Launching in 2012, NuSTAR will be the first focusing hard X-ray telescope to orbit Earth and is expected to greatly exceed the performance of the largest ground-based observatories that have observed this region of the electromagnetic spectrum. NuSTAR will also complement astrophysics missions that explore the cosmos in other regions of the spectrum.
X-ray telescopes such as Chandra and XMM-Newton have observed the X-ray universe at low X-ray energy levels. By focusing higher energy X-rays, NuSTAR will start to answer several fundamental questions about the Universe including:
  • How are black holes distributed through the cosmos?
  • How were heavy elements forged in the explosions of massive stars?
  • What powers the most extreme active galaxies?



NASA's newest X-ray telescope will have a lengthy structure that unfolds in space, allowing it to see high-energy objects like feeding black holes. To view the video of mast deployment in space animation please click here.


Artist's concept of NuSTAR on orbit. NuSTAR has a 10-m (30') mast that deploys after launch to separate the optics modules (right) from the detectors in the focal plane (left). The spacecraft, which controls NuSTAR's pointings, and the solar panels are with the focal plane. NuSTAR has two identical optics modules in order to increase sensitivity. The background is an image of the Galactic center obtained with the Chandra X-ray Observatory. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

2012-04-24

The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope needs World’s Largest Digital Camera

World's largest 3.2 billion-pixel digital camera project passes critical milestone


The LSST camera will be the largest digital camera ever constructed. Its size of roughly five feet by 10 feet is similar to that of a small car and it will weigh over three tons. It is a large-aperture, wide-field optical imager designed to provide a 3.5° field of view with better than 0.2 arcsecond sampling. The image surface is flat with a diameter of just over two feet. The detector format will be a mosaic of 16 megapixel silicon detectors providing a total of approximately 3.2 billion pixels. Credit: Image Courtesy of the LSST Corporation

symmetry breaking » Blog Archive » World’s largest digital camera one step closer to reality


A digital rendering of the LSST instrument, with human figures for scale. (Image courtesy LSST Corporation/NOAO)

Perched high atop Cerro Pachón in the Chilean Andes, the Large Synoptic Survey Telescope will take the largest, fastest, most detailed pictures of the Southern Hemisphere’s night sky. With these images, researchers around the world will seek to reveal the nature of dark matter and dark energy—and to answer a host of other questions in astronomy and physics.

To do all this, LSST needs the largest digital camera ever built: a 3.2 billion-pixel behemoth that stands 6 feet tall and weighs more than 6000 pounds. Now, this impressive instrument has taken a significant step toward reality by receiving the Department of Energy’s “Critical Decision 1” approval.

The New Sky | LSST

LARGE:

A large primary mirror, the world’s largest digital camera, images that cover 49 times the area of the Moon in a single exposure, the largest public data set in the world—LSST takes advantage of new technologies to provide a qualitatively new capability for astronomy.

SYNOPTIC:

A color movie of the universe.
A view of the whole visible southern sky and its changes over ten years.

SURVEY:

Orbits of asteroids as small as 100 meters that might impact the Earth, properties of the dark energy that powers the accelerating expansion of the universe, 3-D mass maps of dark matter, how the Milky Way formed, the nature of rare, explosive events—all will be products of the LSST survey.

TELESCOPE:

Work on the telescope and its Chilean site are underway.


CAMERA | LSST



LSST camera


with 6' person for scale


Source: CAMERA | LSST


2012-04-18

Earth From Space

Earth as Art – Through the Lens of NASA

Space, from the human point of view, has always been filled with wonder, ever since hominids first squinted into the sky. Now the age of technology allows us to peer incredibly deeply through the stretched realm of space, and as new images are made known, new questions emerge.

Further, in the past 50 years, we have been able to not only look out into space, but we now view our own planet from space; its ever-changing environment, including the presence of humankind, and we are filled with that same wonder.

As technology makes more known to us, once again, questions emerge. Questions of time and age, of life, composition and fragility.

Tassili n’Ajjer is a United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage Site, and covers 27,800 square miles (72,000 sq. km) in southeastern Algeria in the Sahara Desert.