Lockheed Martin awarded $3.7B to modernize key missile defense mission
Wednesday, 24 March 2021 11:00
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The Missile Defense Agency (MDA), in a competitive downselect phase, selected Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT) and partner Aerojet Rocketdyne (NYSE: AJRD) to deliver the nation's most advanced missile defense system, the Next Generation Interceptor (NGI).
The $3.7 billion contract for Next Generation Interceptor is the first step in the development and demonstration phase delivering on MDA's re AFRL directed energy industry days
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The Air Force Research Laboratory Directed Energy Directorate will host a Virtual Briefing for Industry to introduce the new Directed Energy Technology Experimentation Research (DETER), Advanced Research Announcement (ARA) April 13 - 14 from 10 a.m. to noon Mountain Standard Time each day.
"We are looking forward to hosting our first briefing for industry days," said Marcella Cantu, DETER Dubai reports launch of DMSat-1 Atmospheric Monitoring Microsatellite
Wednesday, 24 March 2021 11:00 Write a comment
Dubai Municipality announced the successful launch and deployment of DMSat-1, an atmospheric monitoring microsatellite built by Space Flight Laboratory (SFL). DMSat-1 launched Tuesday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan aboard a Soyuz rocket.
SFL developed DMSat-1 under contract to the Dubai-based Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC) in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The 15-kg Pentagon extends contract options for nuclear microreactor prototype
Wednesday, 24 March 2021 11:00 Write a comment
The Department of Defense awarded contract options this week to two companies to create a final prototype for a transportable advanced nuclear microreactor.
BWXT Advanced Technologies and X-energy, both of which won contracts last year to develop portable nuclear reactors, will continue that work under the new options, according to a Pentagon press release.
The teams are working US military must accelerate use of artificial intelligence, JAIC chief says
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The U.S. military must scale up its artificial intelligence use or be left behind by adversaries, Lt. Gen. Michael Groen told an industry conference this week.
Data must be standardized, cloud services must be adopted and AI must be integrated into military operations, Groen, chief of the Pentagon's Joint Artificial Intelligence Center, told the National Defense Industrial Association c Florida company licenses NASA tech that keeps electronics cool
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From shutting down unexpectedly to exploding, electronics can wreak havoc when they overheat. A Florida-based company called Protodromics LLC has licensed a NASA technology that takes advantage of a physical force called electrohydrodynamics (EHD) to pump water or other fluids and cool overheated electronics. Due to the technology's low power consumption, modular nature, and small size, it can b Warming drives 'fundamental' changes to ocean, scientists warn
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Climate change has wrought major changes to ocean stability faster than previously thought, according to a study published Wednesday, raising alarms over its role as a global thermostat and the marine life it supports.
The research published in the journal Nature looked at 50 years of data and followed the way in which surface water "decouples" from the deeper ocean.
Climate change has The same sea level for everyone
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Maps generally indicate elevation in meters above sea level. But sea level is not the same everywhere. A group of experts headed by the Technical University of Munich (TUM), has developed an International Height Reference System (IHRS) that will unify geodetic measurements worldwide.
How high is Mount Everest? 8848 meters? 8844 meters? Or 8850 meters? For years, China and Nepal could not a BlackSky strikes deal with Rocket Lab to launch eight more satellites in 2021
Wednesday, 24 March 2021 10:00 Write a comment
WASHINGTON — Earth imaging and geospatial data provider BlackSky announced March 25 it signed an agreement with Rocket Lab to launch eight satellites before the end of 2021.
BlackSky has worked with Rocket Lab since 2019.
SpaceX launch sends 23rd Starlink communications satellite cluster
Wednesday, 24 March 2021 09:24 Write a comment
SpaceX launched 60 more Starlink broadband communications satellites before dawn on Wednesday, from Florida.
Liftoff of the Falcon 9 rocket carrying the satellites occurred at Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. The weather was cooperative for the 23rd Starlink mission.
"Deployment of 60 Starlink satellites confirmed," Space tweeted.
"This was the sixth launc Russia launches more UK telecom satellites into space
Wednesday, 24 March 2021 08:21 Write a comment
A Soyuz rocket blasted off from the Vostochny cosmodrome in Russia's Far East on Thursday carrying 36 UK telecommunications and internet satellites, the Roscosmos space agency said.
OneWeb, a London-headquartered company, is working to complete the construction of a constellation of low earth orbit satellites providing enhanced broadband and other services to countries around the world.
The company is competing in the race to provide fast internet for the world's remote areas via satellites along with tech billionaire Elon Musk and fellow billionaire Jeff Bezos of Amazon.
Images released by Roscosmos showed the Soyuz rocket taking off against clear blue skies Thursday morning at 0247 GMT.
Roscosmos said in a statement that the launch and separation "took place normally".
"We can confirm our sixth separation is complete. Over half our satellites have now been released!" OneWeb wrote on Twitter.
The UK company plans for its global commercial internet service to be operational by next year, supported by some 650 satellites.
Space M&A boom appears right on time
Tuesday, 23 March 2021 20:56 Write a comment
SAN FRANCISCO — Long-term space investors aren’t surprised by the recent surge of space industry mergers and acquisitions. In fact, they say, it’s right on time.
ESA awards €10.45 million to two UK launch startups
Tuesday, 23 March 2021 20:41 Write a comment
VALLETTA, Malta — The European Space Agency awarded UK-based launch startups Orbex and Skyrora a combined €10.45 million ($12.35 million) to support development of competing microlaunchers.
The two support contracts announced March 24 were awarded under Boost!, an ESA program that aims to foster new commercial space transportation services.
Chandra X-ray data sonification: Stellar, galactic, and black hole
Tuesday, 23 March 2021 19:20 Write a comment
This latest installment from our data sonification series features three diverse cosmic scenes. In each, astronomical data collected by NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and other telescopes are converted into sounds. Data sonification maps the data from these space-based telescopes into a form that users can hear instead of only see, embodying the data in a new form without changing the original content.
Chandra Deep Field (below)
This is the deepest image ever taken in X-rays, representing over seven million seconds of Chandra observing time. For that reason, and because the observed field is in the southern hemisphere, astronomers call this region the "Chandra Deep Field South". At first glance, this image may appear to be a view of stars. Rather, almost all these different colored dots are black holes or galaxies. Most of the former are supermassive black holes that reside at the centers of galaxies. In this data sonification, the colors dictate the tones as the bar moves from the bottom of the image to the top.
