The International Space Station. Credit: NASA
Tuesday, July 31, 2012
Monday, July 30, 2012
Sunday, July 29, 2012
COLD WAR RIVALS MEET IN SPACE CIRCA 1975
FROM: NASA
On
July 17, 1975, something momentous happened: two Cold War-rivals met in space.
When their respective spacecraft rendezvoused and docked, a new era of
cooperative ventures in space began. For more than a decade, American astronauts
and Russian cosmonauts have been regularly living and working together in Earth
orbit, first in the Shuttle-Mir program, and now on the International Space
Station. But, before the two Cold War-rivals first met in orbit in 1975, such a
partnership seemed unlikely. Since Sputnik bleeped into orbit in 1957, there had
been a Space Race, with the U.S. and then-Soviet Union driven more by
competition than cooperation. When President Kennedy called for a manned moon
landing in 1961, he spoke of "battle that is now going on around the world
between freedom and tyranny" and referred to the "head start obtained by the
Soviets with their large rocket engines." But by the mid-70s things had changed.
The U.S. had "won" the race to the moon, with six Apollo landings between 1969
and 1972. Both nations had launched space stations, the Russian Salyut and
American Skylab. With the space shuttle still a few years off and the diplomatic
chill thawing, the time was right for a joint mission. The Apollo-Soyuz Test
Project would send NASA astronauts Tom Stafford, Donald K. "Deke" Slayton and
Vance Brand in an Apollo Command and Service Module to meet Russian cosmonauts
Aleksey Leonov and Valeriy Kubasov in a Soyuz capsule. A jointly designed,
U.S.-built docking module fulfilled the main technical goal of the mission,
demonstrating that two dissimilar craft could dock in orbit. But the human side
of the mission went far beyond that. Image Credit: NASA
Thursday, July 26, 2012
Wednesday, July 25, 2012
Monday, July 23, 2012
Sunday, July 22, 2012
SHOCK-WAVE
Using observations from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, researchers have obtained the first X-ray evidence of a supernova shock wave breaking through a cocoon of gas surrounding the star that exploded. This discovery may help astronomers understand why some supernovas are much more powerful than others. On Nov. 3, 2010, a supernova was discovered in the galaxy UGC 5189A, located about 160 million light years away. Using data from the All Sky Automated Survey telescope in Hawaii taken earlier, astronomers determined this supernova exploded in early October 2010. This composite image of UGC 5189A shows X-ray data from Chandra in purple and optical data from Hubble Space Telescope in red, green and blue. SN 2010jl is the very bright X-ray source near the top of the galaxy. A team of researchers used Chandra to observe this supernova in December 2010 and again in October 2011. The supernova was one of the most luminous that has ever been detected in X-rays. In the first Chandra observation of SN 2010jl, the X-rays from the explosion's blast wave were strongly absorbed by a cocoon of dense gas around the supernova. This cocoon was formed by gas blown away from the massive star before it exploded. In the second observation taken almost a year later, there is much less absorption of X-ray emission, indicating that the blast wave from the explosion has broken out of the surrounding cocoon. The Chandra data show that the gas emitting the X-rays has a very high temperature -- greater than 100 million degrees Kelvin – strong evidence that it has been heated by the supernova blast wave. In a rare example of a cosmic coincidence, analysis of the X-rays from the supernova shows that there is a second unrelated source at almost the same location as the supernova. These two sources strongly overlap one another as seen on the sky. This second source is likely to be an ultraluminous X-ray source, possibly containing an unusually heavy stellar-mass black hole, or an intermediate mass black hole. Image Credit: X-ray: NASA/CXC/Royal Military College of Canada/P.Chandra et al); Optical: NASA/STScI
Sunday, July 15, 2012
NASA MARS PROGRAM OFFICAL DISCUSSES NEW ERA OF SPACE EXPLORATION
WASHINGTON -- Media representatives are invited to a briefing on
Tuesday, July 10 at 9 a.m. BST at the 2012 Farnborough International
Airshow in Farnborough, England. NASA and industry officials will
discuss the importance of the space program and the role of
cost-efficient product development in the emerging new era of space
travel and exploration.
Doug McCuistion, director of NASA's Mars Exploration Program at NASA
Headquarters, Washington, and Siegfried Russwurm, CEO of Siemens
Industry Sector, Erlangen, Germany, will provide details and answer
questions about the importance of government and industry
collaboration to maximize productivity and efficiency in space
exploration. The briefing will take place the Hendon Room in the
airshow's media center.
Siemens software contributed to the development of NASA's most
advanced planetary rover, Curiosity, which will land on the surface
of Mars on Aug. 6 at 1:31 a.m. EDT. This mobile science laboratory
will assess whether the past or present Martian environment could
support life. The software was used for modeling during development
of the rover.
Tuesday, July 10, 2012
Monday, July 9, 2012
Thursday, July 5, 2012
Tuesday, July 3, 2012
Sunday, July 1, 2012
HOUSTON WORKSHOP: FINDING WAYS TO EXPLORE THE RED PLANET
Photo: The Famous Face On Mars. Credit: NASA.
FROM: NASA
WASHINGTON -- A recent workshop conducted for NASA by the Lunar and
Planetary Institute (LPI) in Houston, marked a key step in the
agency's effort to forge a new Mars strategy in the coming decades. A
report that summarizes the wide range of cutting-edge science,
technology and mission concepts discussed is available online.
Held in Houston June 12-14 and attended by scientists and engineers
worldwide, the meeting was held to seek ideas, concepts and
capabilities to address critical challenge areas in exploring the Red
Planet. Discussions provided information for reformulating NASA's
Mars Exploration Program (MEP) to be responsive to high-priority
science goals and the challenge of sending humans to Mars orbit in
the 2030s.
Participants identified a number of possible approaches to missions
that can be flown to Mars in the coming decade that would make
progress toward returning Martian samples -- a top priority of the
Planetary Science Decadal Survey -- and make significant advances in
scientific understanding of the planet, developing key technologies
and advancing knowledge necessary for human exploration on and around
Mars.
NASA's Mars Program Planning Group (MPPG), tasked with developing
options for a reformulated MEP, will consider the workshop inputs in
addition to budgetary, programmatic, scientific and technical
constraints.
"Scientists and engineers came together to present their most creative
ideas for exploring Mars," said John Grunsfeld, an astronaut,
astrophysicist and associate administrator for NASA's Science Mission
Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "Great ideas come
from challenging the best and brightest and igniting their passion
and determination to succeed."
The MPPG reports to Grunsfeld, who chairs the agency-wide Mars
reformulation effort along with William Gerstenmaier, NASA's
associate administrator for Human Exploration and Operations Mission
Directorate, Chief Scientist Waleed Abdalati and Chief Technologist
Mason Peck. The official draft MPPG report is expected to be
delivered to NASA for review at the end of the summer.
Concepts put forth tapped into significant benefits that could be
gained from technology investments by NASA's Science Mission
Directorate, Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate,
and Office of the Chief Technologist. The participants also stressed
the importance of establishing international collaboration early in
the planning process and sustaining it throughout future missions.
"Future Mars exploration missions will require new concepts and
technologies," said Michael Gazarik, director of NASA's Space
Technology Program. "There were many innovative and transformational
concepts presented at the workshop. With continued investments in
cutting-edge technology, these will lead to increased capability,
reduced mission risk and lower mission costs."
Workshop attendance included almost 200 scientists, engineers and
graduate students from academia, NASA centers, federal laboratories,
industry, and international partner organizations. More than 1,600
people participated online as the workshop proceedings were streamed
live on the Internet.
"The LPI workshop provided a broad set of ideas for Mars exploration,
including synergies between science, human exploration and technology
development," Gerstenmaier said. "The number of workshop participants
demonstrates the broad interest in Mars exploration."
The workshop provided a forum for broad community input on near-term
mission concepts. Ideas for longer-term activities will be used to
inform program architecture planning beyond the early 2020s. Workshop
results represent individual perspectives from members of the
scientific and technical community.
"The scientific and technical community has given us quite a range of
ideas to consider in reformulating the Mars Exploration Program,"
said Doug McCuistion, director of NASA's Mars Exploration Program at
the agency's headquarters. "Many concepts presented are highly
relevant to the challenges the MPPG must address."
NASA will land its most advanced rover, Curiosity, on the surface of
Mars in August. This mobile science laboratory will assess whether
the past or present environment on Mars could support life. In 2013,
NASA will launch the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution orbiter,
the first mission devoted to understanding the Martian upper
atmosphere.
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