Copernical Team
MIT's MOXIE experiment reliably produces oxygen on Mars
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On the red and dusty surface of Mars, nearly 100 million miles from Earth, an instrument the size of a lunchbox is proving it can reliably do the work of a small tree.
The MIT-led Mars Oxygen In-Situ Resource Utilization Experiment, or MOXIE, has been successfully making oxygen from the Red Planet's carbon-dioxide-rich atmosphere since April 2021, about two months after it touched down on A vast and mysterious valley system in the southern Martian highlands
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These images, acquired using with DLR High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC), reveal a chaotic region on our neighbouring planet. It is located near Holden Crater in the southern Martian highlands and is part of a vast valley system through which considerable masses of water once flowed in a northerly direction.
The HRSC has been mapping the Red Planet on board ESA's Mars Express spacecraft MAVEN and EMM make first observations of patchy proton aurora at Mars
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NASA's MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution) mission and the United Arab Emirates' Emirates Mars Mission (EMM) have released joint observations of dynamic proton aurora events at Mars. Remote auroral observations by EMM paired with in-situ plasma observations made by MAVEN open new avenues for understanding the Martian atmosphere. This collaboration was made possible by recent data-shar Accenture invests in hyperspectral satellite company Pixxel to monitor Earth's health
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Accenture (NYSE: ACN) has made a strategic investment, through Accenture Ventures, in Pixxel, a leader in cutting-edge earth imaging technology. Based in Bangalore with a presence in Los Angeles, Pixxel is building the world's highest resolution hyperspectral imaging satellite constellation in order to offer industry AI-powered insights that discover, solve, and predict climate issues at a fract Outpost raises $7M seed round to develop reusable satellites for Earth return service
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Outpost Technologies Corporation ("Outpost"), the sustainable space company, announced the closing of a $7.1M Series Seed round. During a bearish fundraising environment, this round was oversubscribed, demonstrating Outpost's visionary approach to disrupting the satellite market.
The company has developed, and flight tested a novel re-entry method that e Where to land on the Moon?
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It was 1972 when the last humans landed on the Moon. The Apollo programme was discontinued thereafter. But interest in the Moon has been rekindled. With China having landed a robot - and raised its flag - on the far side of the Moon in 2020, NASA is planning for its Artemis programme to land in the lunar south pole region, probably between 2025 and 2028. Astronauts will then concentrate their ex Perseverance Rover team's first results
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Two papers recently released in the scholarly journal Science by Farley et al. and Liu et al., which describe recent major results from NASA's Mars 2020 mission provide new insight into the history of water on Mars.
The first samples analyzed by NASA's Perseverance Rover, in the former crater lake named Jezero, are an intriguing mix of igneous minerals (e.g., from lava) and salt patches in SpaceX wins another $1.4 billion from NASA to fly missions to ISS
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NASA has awarded five new missions to private exploration company SpaceX in a deal worth $1.4 billion that will transport astronauts and cargo to the International Space Station over the next eight years.
The contracts were awarded as part of NASA's Commercial Crew Transportation Capability contract (CCtCap), an initiative that opens the door for business with the private sector, the sp Game on at Gamescom
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More than 265 000 visitors headed to Cologne in Germany for Gamescom last week – the world’s largest computer and video games fair. As well as the latest games releases, they got a chance to discover that ESA and the gaming world have a lot in common.
System study of proposed inflatable moon base
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A vision of a future moon settlement is assembled from semi-buried inflatable habitats. Sited beside the lunar poles in regions of near-perpetual solar illumination, mirrors positioned above each habitat would reflect sunlight into greenhouses within the doughnut-shaped habitats.
Inflatable structures specialist Pneumocell in Austria performed a system study of an inflatable lunar habitat, based on prefabricated ultralight structures.
Once inflated, these habitats would be buried under 4–5 m of lunar regolith for radiation and micrometeorite protection. Above each habitat a truss holding a mirror membrane would be erected, designed to rotate to follow the sun through the sky. Sunlight from the mirror would be directed down through an artificial crater, from which another cone-shaped mirror reflects it into the surrounding greenhouse.
The study was supported through the Discovery element of ESA's Basic Activities. It came about after Pneumocell submitted their idea to the Agency's Open Space Innovation Platform, OSIP, seeking out promising ideas for space research from all possible sources.
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