Chang'e 4 concludes work for 26th lunar day following new findings
23 January 2021
Chang'e 4 has switched to dormant mode after concluding the operations for the 26th lunar day on the Moon's far side. The lander switched to stand-by on 20 January at 21:10 BJT and the Yutu 2 rover at 14:06 BJT the same day. The pair has been working for 749 Earth days, with the rover traveling a total distance of 628.47 meters.
A new publication in Geophysical Research Letters presents the results of VNIS data: Using Yutu's Visible-Near Infrared Spectrometer (VNIS) local measurements of "thermal emission ... at short wavelengths and temperature variations at centimeter scales were retrieved during the 1st, 2nd, and 10th day of rover operations on the lunar surface. These in situ observations are an important complement to the existing large‐scale measurements taken from orbit and reveal that the millimeter scale roughness plays an important role when deriving temperatures and physical properties of the lunar surface regolith."
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link to the publication in Geophysical Research Letters
iSpace achieves major breakthrough for reusable launcher
17 January 2021
iSpace announced a key breakthrough in its reusable launch system ahead of a planned IPO, a boost for the nation's commercial space sector, experts said. iSpace successfully completed a landing buffer test of its reusable rocket Hyperbola-2, marking an important breakthrough in reusable launch technology. The company also has a plan to issue shares on the Science and Technology Innovation Board, which would make it China's first listed commercial space firm, media reported.
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also compare latest Dongfang Hour Podcast
China collects 100PB of Earth observation data
22 January 2021
A recent report on China's Earth observation data resources development written by the national Earth observation data center and the National Science and Technology Infrastructure states that China has collected around 100PB (about 100 million GB) of Earth observation data from its Earth observation satellites. The collected data resources have been used for both free and commercial use to serve more than 300,000 users, inducing significant social and economic benefits, according to the report. Both run by the Aerospace Information Research Institute (AIR) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS))
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Dongfang Hour - the 16th China Aerospace News Roundup (11 January 2021 - 17 January 2021)
19 January 2021
Blaine Curcio of Orbital Gateway Consulting and Jean Deville of The China Aerospace Blog are reporting for SpaceWatch.Global on China's main aerospace events of the last week. They are giving details about iSpace' plans for an IPO on China's Star Board, on the status of CASC's propulsion technology development and talk about the U.S. adding Chinese aircraft manufacturer COMAC and Air China Group to a DoD blacklist, which lists companies which have ties with the Chinese military. .
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