21 February 2011
ISS Partners Mull Unique Photo-Op
The international space station (ISS) partners are currently discussing a possibility to stage an extraordinary photo opportunity in March that would yield photo and video images of the space station with all current U.S., Russian, European and Japanese spacecraft docked at the outpost, the press service of the Russian Federal Space Agency Roscosmos said.
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18 February 2011
Proposed $18.7 Billion NASA Budget Draws Early Fire from Capitol Hill
U.S. President Barack Obama’s $18.7 billion budget request for NASA in 2012 sets the stage for a showdown with U.S. lawmakers, who last fall approved a hotly debated but ultimately bipartisan authorization bill that recommends $19.5 billion for NASA next year including $4 billion for a new heavy-lift launch vehicle and crew capsule Congress says the agency must build by 2016.
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18 February 2011
SpaceX to focus on astronaut capsule
Commercial space company SpaceX says it has put off development of its Falcon rocket to focus on its Dragon capsule intended to take astronauts into orbit.
The company said the Falcon 1 rocket, which has had five successful test launches, will be temporarily put aside to concentrate the firm's efforts on Dragon, contracted to carry astronauts and supplies to the International Space Station, Florida Today reported Friday.
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18 February 2011
Space Operations Inc Announces First Orbital Manned Commercial Spacecraft Operational By 2012
Space Operations, Inc. has announced plans to build a two-seat manned orbital spacecraft for commercial and government use. The company plans a test launch on February 20, 2012, with a regular flight schedule beginning in late 2012 or early 2013.
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18 February 2011
Southampton Scientists Develop Control System To Allow Spacecraft To Think For Themselves
Professor Sandor Veres and his team of engineers have developed a cognitive software agent control system called 'sysbrain'.
Using natural language programming (NLP), the software agents can read special English language technical documents on control methods. This gives the vehicles advanced guidance, navigation and feedback capabilities to stop them crashing into other objects, agent-based control with mission execution capabilities and the ability to recognise and reconfigure faults.
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18 February 2011
Worldwide Government Spending On Space To Flatten Over The Next Five Years
Euroconsult, the leading international consulting and research and firm specializing in the space and satellite sectors, announced the findings of its just-published report "Government Space Markets, World Prospects to 2020." According to the report, government spending on space hit a number of major milestones in recent years, including a historic peak in combined government spending of $71.5 billion in 2010.
However, after 10 years of spending increases across the globe, this trend is about to come to a halt. According to Euroconsult, public space program financing will slow dramatically in the next five years due to several factors.
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18 February 2011
NASA announces space station crews for 2013, 2014
Space station partner agencies announced Friday the crews who will live and work aboard the orbiting lab in 2013 and 2014, including the outpost's first Japanese commander and the first NASA astronaut from the class of 2009 assigned to fly in space.
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17 February 2011
Shenzhou 8 Mission Could Top Three Weeks
The next flight of China's Shenzhou spacecraft will last somewhere between 20 and 22 days, according to German sources. The information was relayed to SpaceDaily by a communications officer at DLR, Germany's equivalent of NASA. German researchers will fly a collection of biological experiments on the mission, which is expected to launch in the second half of this year.
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17 February 2011
Japan eyes humanoid robot mission in space
The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) plans to carry out feasibility studies before making a final decision to send the robot to the International Space Station (ISS) as early as 2013, the JAXA official said. Under the project, the Japanese-made robot is expected to stay in the ISS to help communicate with Earth while, for example, astronauts are asleep, according to JAXA engineer Satoshi Sano. The robot is also expected to take pictures and send messages through microblog site Twitter, Sano said, adding that it can "tweet" simple words such as "good morning" and "good night" as well as indicate its location above Earth.
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16 February 2011
Europe’s ATV Johannes Kepler supply ship on its way to Space Station
ESA’s second Automated Transfer Vehicle, Johannes Kepler, has been launched into its targeted low orbit by an Ariane 5. The Ariane 5 lifted off from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, at 21:50 GMT (18:50 local) on Wednesday 16 February.
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16 February 2011
Commercial Spaceflight Federation Applauds Boost To Innovative Technology Programs In New NASA Budget
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15 February 2011
Mars, Brought To You By Corporate Sponsors
NASA scientists and their colleagues are now proposing corporate financing for a human mission to Mars. This raises the prospect that a spaceship named the Microsoft Explorer or the Google Search Engine could one day go down in history as the first spaceship to bring humans to the red planet.
The proposal suggests that companies could drum up $160 billion for a human mission to Mars and a colony there, rather than having governments fund such a mission with tax dollars.
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15 February 2011
Obama administration proposes flat NASA budget for FY 2012
NASA announced Monday an $18.7 billion budget request for fiscal year 2012 that supports a reinvigorated path of innovation, technological development and scientific discovery. The budget supports all elements of NASA's 2010 Authorization Act, which was passed by a strong bipartisan majority of Congress and signed into law by President Obama and calls for a five-year freeze on spending levels at the US space agency.. "This budget requires us to live within our means so we can invest in our future," NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said. "It maintains our commitment to human spaceflight and provides for strong programs to continue the outstanding science, aeronautics research and education needed to win the future."
The NASA budget includes $4.3 billion for the Space Shuttle and International Space Station programs, $5 billion for science, $3.9 billion for future exploration systems and $569 million for aeronautics research.
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related...
15 February 2011
NASA Deputy Administrator Visits Colorado Innovation Sites
NASA Deputy Administrator Lori Garver visited Boulder, Colo. recently to meet with entrepreneurs and discuss innovations in space exploration and technology development critical to America's future in space.
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14 February 2011
Mars mission participants walk on 'Red Planet'
Participants in the simulation of a manned mission to Mars completed on Monday the first of three scheduled walks on a mock-up of the surface of the Red Planet.
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11 February 2011
Lockheed Martin Ships Out First Orion Spacecraft
The Lockheed Martin Orion team shipped out the first Orion crew module spacecraft structure from NASA's Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans, La.
The spacecraft is headed to Lockheed Martin's Denver, Colo., facilities where it will undergo a series of rigorous tests to confirm Orion's ability to safely fly astronauts through all the harsh environments of deep space exploration missions.
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FOR FURTHER READING
21 February 2011
The flight of the Big Bird (part 3)
Dwayne Day continues his history of the KH-9 HEXAGON reconnaissance satellite program with an examination of spacecraft operations, including the deep sea recovery of one of the first film capsules returned by a KH-9.
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21 February 2011
Taking the initiative: SLI and the next generation
While there’s been a recent surge in interest in reusable spacecraft, including both capsules and winged vehicles, work on reusable launch vehicles has languished. Stewart Money argues that it’s time to revisit making launch vehicles at least partially reusable.
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21 February 2011
When the Sun sneezes
Last week the Sun produced the most powerful solar flare in four years, a reminder that the Sun is approaching another peak in activity that could pose hazards to modern-day civilization. Jeff Foust reports on the steps scientists and government agencies are taking to predict and prepare for solar storms.
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21 February 2011
The case for international cooperation in space exploration
ESA is currently weighing which major space science mission it should pursue in the coming decade, a decision that will rest in part on the role of international cooperation on this missions. Lou Friedman suggests that this could be a model for broader cooperation in space exploration.
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21 February 2011
Review: Voyages of Discovery
Later this week the space shuttle Discovery is scheduled to launch on what will almost certainly be its final mission. Jeff Foust reviews a book that provides a history of Discovery and the over three dozen missions it’s flown.
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18 February 2011
As US cuts back, China aims to be top at science
China has its eye on becoming the top science nation in the world, overtaking the United States and European nations, researchers at a US science conference said Friday.
After being the world's main source of cheap manufactured goods, China is investing heavily in science and technology.
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14 February 2011
Commercial crew and NASA’s tipping point
The release this week of a new budget proposal will again stoke debate about NASA policy, including its commercial crew development plans. Jeff Foust reports that agency officials and company officials alike are seeing commercial crew as both increasingly likely and critical to NASA’s future.
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14 February 2011
The beginnings of planetary exploration: the first probes to Venus
Fifty years ago this month the Soviet Union launched its first missions to Venus, although neither spacecraft reached its destination. Andrew LePage examines the rushed Soviet effort to send a spacecraft to Venus.
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14 February 2011
American leadership
In debates about space policy, the term “American leadership” is often used without discussion about what it actually means. Lou Friedman argues that such leadership involves not going it along in space but leading cooperative space ventures with other countries.
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14 February 2011
In rod we trust
Fans of The Simpsons may remember the “inanimate carbon rod” as a highlight of a particular space-themed episode. Michael A. Shoemaker notes that similar rods played a minor role in space history as well.
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14 February 2011
Review: Reopening the Space Frontier
Space has long been perceived as a frontier, but in terms of human spaceflight there’s been little progress in pushing back that frontier for decades. Jeff Foust reviews a book that examines why that’s been the case and what can be done to reopen that frontier.
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... and what else happened...
17 February 2011
Former Spy Chapman May Participate In Creation Of Uniform For Space Industry
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