19 October 2012
'Unprecedented' Budget Environment Drives Change across Space Industry
Declining U.S. federal budgets and the looming threat that things could get much worse before they get better are forcing government space agencies and contractors to rethink the way they do business, and according to some officials, that is not such a bad thing.
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19 October 2012
How Space Station Can Help Humans Follow Curiosity to Mars and Beyond
Taking the guess work out of long-duration exploration, however, is one of the benefits of the International Space Station. This orbiting laboratory serves as a test bed for technology and helps researchers understand how to prepare for extended trips in space.
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19 October 2012
Preventing infection on long flights
The cabin of a spacecraft halfway to Mars would be the least convenient place - one cannot say "on earth" - for a Salmonella or Pneumococcus outbreak, but a wide-ranging new paper suggests that microgravity and prolonged space flight could give unique advantages to germs.
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18 October 2012
Orbital’s Cygnus Debut Pushed to March or April
Orbital Sciences Corp. on Oct. 18 said its new Antares rocket will not launch its Cygnus cargo freighter on a demonstration flight to the international space station until around March or April, assuming that two preceding rocket tests occur without a hitch.
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18 October 2012
Proof at last: Moon was created in giant smashup
It's a big claim, but Washington University in St. Louis planetary scientist Frederic Moynier says his group has discovered evidence that the Moon was born in a flaming blaze of glory when a body the size of Mars collided with the early Earth. The evidence might not seem all that impressive to a nonscientist: a tiny excess of a heavier variant of the element zinc in Moon rocks.
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17 October 2012
ULA Wraps Up Year-Long Study on Crewed Atlas 5
Completion of a yearlong joint study with NASA has brought the United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas 5 rocket a step closer to being certified to launch crew-carrying vehicles to the international space station starting later this decade, the space agency said. NASA announced Oct. 15 that ULA had completed its work on an unfunded Space Act Agreement during which it examined, among other things, possible failure modes for the proven Atlas 5. Denver-based ULA, a Boeing-Lockheed Martin joint venture, fulfilled the fifth and final milestone of the agreement, awarded in 2011 as part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Development (CCDev) 2 program, in August.
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16 October 2012
UNH scientists provide window on space radiation hazards
Astrophysicists from the University of New Hampshire's Space Science Center (SSC) have created the first online system for predicting and forecasting the radiation environment in near-Earth, lunar, and Martian space environments. The near real-time tool will provide critical information as preparations are made for potential future manned missions to the moon and Mars.
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16 October 2012
University of Tennessee study confirms solar wind as source for moon water
Last year Larry Taylor, distinguished professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, confirmed comets as the source for water inside the moon. This year, Yang Liu, research assistant professor, and Taylor have confirmed solar wind as the source for water on the outside-by depositing positively charged hydrogen atoms, or protons, onto its surface, allowing it to combine with the moon's oxygen to create water.
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16 October 2012
NASA's Ironman-Like Exoskeleton Could Give Astronauts, Paraplegics Improved Mobility and Strength
NASA and The Florida Institute for Human and Machine Cognition (IHMC) of Pensacola, Fla., with the help of engineers from Oceaneering Space Systems of Houston, have jointly developed a robotic exoskeleton called X1. The 57-pound device is a robot that a human could wear over his or her body either to assist or inhibit movement in leg joints.
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15 October 2012
Baumgartner feat boosts hopes for imperilled astronauts
Daredevil Felix Baumgartner's record-breaking jump raises hopes that pilots and even astronauts can be saved from accidents in the stratosphere, experts said on Monday. Michel Viso, an expert in exobiology at France's National Centre of Scientific Research (CNRS), said Baumgartner's leap from 39,045 metres (128,100 feet) "has operational potential" for manned flight at extreme heights.
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15 October 2012
Russia to launch lunar mission in 2015
The goal of the unmanned moon landing mission was to prove that the country is able to land on other space objects, Viktor Khartov, general director of the Lavochkin Research and Production Association told local media.
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12 October 2012
NASA Budget Fundamentals Supercede Campaign Rhetoric
NASA will continue to face a mismatch between available funding and programmatic mandates regardless of who wins the White House in November, space policy experts here said. Republican challenger Mitt Romney has criticized the current civil space program for its lack of direction, but with the election just three weeks away has yet to articulate an alternative vision. Romney has, however, hinted that he will not seek to boost NASA’s roughly $17 billion annual budget. “A strong and successful NASA does not require more funding,” Romney said in a space policy white paper released Sept. 22. “It needs clearer priorities.”
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10 October 2012
ChangE-2 Mission To Lagrange L2 Point
Chang'e-2 was launched two years ago, on Oct 1st 2010. It primary mission was to maintain a lunar orbit for several months, which was successful. That mission was completed by April 2011 and an additional mission to L2 was initiated in June 2011. Thus, Chang'e-2 escaped from its lunar orbit and made the transfer to the Lagrange point. Again, the Chinese spacecraft succeeded, this time to establish a Lissajous orbit in August of last year.
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10 October 2012
Singer Sarah Brightman to become space tourist
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10 October 2012
China to collect samples from Mars by 2030: Xinhua
China is planning to collect samples from the surface of Mars by 2030, according to the chief scientist of the country's lunar orbiter project, state media reported Wednesday. Ouyang Ziyuan said the mission would have three stages - remote sensing, soft-landing and exploration, and return after automatic sampling, Xinhua news agency quoted him as saying in a lecture organised by the Chinese Society of Astronautics.
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01 October 2012
Rogozin: Russian Space Industry Confronts Inherent Problems
Dmitry Rogozin, Russia’s deputy prime minister for space and defense, says the Russian space industry’s recent failures were created five to 10 years ago, the ITAR-Tass news agency reported. “All the equipment that malfunctioned over the past 18 months was made not today or yesterday but much earlier,” Rogozin said in a live interview televised Sept. 30. “At present, we unfortunately encounter problems which were inherent in the space industry five, six, seven and 10 years ago.” He said the biggest problem the Russian space industry faces is a “technological backwardness of enterprises,” ITAR-Tass reported.
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FOR FURTHER READING
15 October 2012
Is it time to create a Mars Exploration Mission Directorate?
A recent report by an independent group for NASA outlined several future directions for the agency’s Mars exploration program. Chris Carberry argues that NASA should use this opportunity to consolidate its Mars exploration efforts, both robotic and human, into a separate division within the agency.
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15 October 2012
A space policy to-do list for after the election
Election Day next month doesn’t mark the end of politics, or space policy discussions, for this year. Jeff Foust reports on two little-known but key issues regarding space that Congress will have to address after the elections.
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15 October 2012
Future exoplanet missions: NASA and the world (part 2)
A wide variety of spacecraft missions, both proposed and under development, can support the discovery and study of extrasolar planets. Philip Horzempa concludes his two-part look at these missions, and the need to better organize and fund exoplanet research at NASA.
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15 October 2012
Review: Visionary
Sir Arthur C. Clarke was one of the great science fiction authors of the 20th century who also served as a guide to the emerging Space Age, but whose personal side was less well known. Jeff Foust reviews a book that provides a comprehensive look at Clarke’s life.
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08 October 2012
Commercial spaceflight gets down to business
The promise of commercial cargo and crew transportation has been just that: a promise, as yet not fully realized. Jeff Foust reports that may have changed Sunday night with the launch of the first commercial cargo mission to the International Space Station.
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08 October 2012
Future exoplanet missions: NASA and the world (part 1)
The search for extrasolar planets, particularly those similar in size and orbit to the Earth, has become one of the hottest fields in astronomy. In the first of a two-part article, Philip Horzempa examines some of the planned and proposed missions that can support those searches.
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08 October 2012
Perception vs. reality in NASA’s commercial crew and cargo program
The current leadership at NASA and the White House gets much of the credit for supporting commercial crew and cargo ventures at the space agency. However, Christopher Stone argues that these programs are based on a foundation of policy that stretches back over multiple administrations and Congresses of both parties.
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