Copernical Team
We could get large amounts of water from the moon by directing the sun at it
One of the most commonly discussed challenges when starting our species' space exploration journey is how to get the resources necessary for life off of the Earth. Typically this is thought of as two things—water and oxygen, but, luckily, oxygen can be supplied by splitting apart a water molecule, so the most critical resource we could find in space is water.
Commonly called a "volatile" in the language of space resources, water has been the focal point of many plans for in-situ resource utilization on the moon, Mars, and elsewhere. Some of those plans have been well thought out, others not. One particular showed some promise when it was selected as part of NASA's Institute for Advanced Concepts (NIAC) funding back in 2019, and here we'll take a closer look at it.
The concept, published in a report titled "Thermal Mining of Ices on Cold Solar System Bodies" but hereafter referred to as "thermal mining," is the brainchild of George Sowers, a space resource expert and Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the Colorado School of Mines (CSM).
The clays of Mawrth Vallis
ESA's Mars Express has revisited an old favourite: the distinctive and fascinating Mawrth Vallis, one of the most promising locations on Mars in our search for signs of life.
Webb sees carbon-rich dust grains in the first billion years of cosmic time
For the first time, the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope has observed the chemical signature of carbon-rich dust grains at redshift ~ 7 [1], which is roughly equivalent to one billion years after the birth of the Universe [2]. Similar observational signatures have been observed in the much more recent Universe, attributed to complex, carbon-based molecules known as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs). It is not thought likely, however, that PAHs would have developed within the first billion years of cosmic time.
Replay: Aeolus reentry media briefing
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After completing its mission in orbit, ESA’s wind mission Aeolus will soon reenter Earth's atmosphere. Currently orbiting 320 km above, Aeolus is being kept in orbit with its remaining fuel. This fuel is running out, and the satellite will soon succumb to Earth’s atmosphere and gravity.
Going above and beyond what the satellite was technically designed to do, ESA is attempting a first-of-its-kind assisted reentry to reduce the (already very small) risk of damage from any fragments that survive the journey and reach the ground.
ESA held an online media briefing on 19 July 2023 to explain more about this assisted
Urania: muse of gravitational-wave astronomy
The new supercomputer "Urania" has been put into operation by the Max Planck Institute for Gravitational Physics in Potsdam. With 6,048 compute-cores and 22 Terabyte of memory it is just as powerful as its predecessor, but requires only half the electricity to operate. Scientists in the Astrophysical and Cosmological Relativity department are now able to compute gravitational waveforms of coales Training robots how to learn, make decisions on the fly
Mars rovers have teams of human experts on Earth telling them what to do. But robots on lander missions to moons orbiting Saturn or Jupiter are too far away to receive timely commands from Earth. Researchers in the Departments of Aerospace Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign developed a novel learning-based method so robots on extraterrestrial bodies c Simulating Aeolus's return: mission control feels the heat
No two missions are the same but launches have many milestones and features in common with each other: a satellite or spacecraft is launched on a gravity-defying rocket into space, after it separates and, exact sequences differ but it is woken up, solar arrays are deployed, instruments are switched on and tested and its thrusters are fired to get it where it needs to be.
Five years ago, Ae How an "AI-tocracy" emerges
Many scholars, analysts, and other observers have suggested that resistance to innovation is an Achilles' heel of authoritarian regimes. Such governments can fail to keep up with technological changes that help their opponents; they may also, by stifling rights, inhibit innovative economic activity and weaken the long-term condition of the country.
But a new study co-led by an MIT professo PSI's David Grinspoon Appointed to New NASA Post
David Grinspoon, a Senior Scientist at Planetary Science Institute has been appointed by NASA to be the new Senior Scientist for Astrobiology Strategy. Astrobiology is the study of the origin, evolution and distribution of life in the universe. As Senior Scientist for Astrobiology Strategy at NASA Grinspoon will serve as the Agency's senior leader for astrobiology, spearheading efforts from NASA NASA's IXPE fires up astronomers with new blazar findings
The universe is full of powerful supermassive black holes that create powerful jets of high-energy particles, creating sources of extreme brightness in the vastness of space. When one of those jets points directly at Earth, scientists call the black hole system a blazar.
To understand why particles in the jet move with great speeds and energies, scientists look to NASA's IXPE (Imaging X-ra