COVID-19 Impact on Smallsat Market Mitigated by Funding Availability, Government Support
Thursday, 08 April 2021 12:49The latest update of "Prospects for the Small Satellite Market" was released this week by Euroconsult, forecasting further growth in the global supply and demand of government, commercial and academic satellites weighing up to 500 kg. The market intelligence report, now in its 7th edition, builds upon Euroconsult's previous iteration that accurately predicted more than 1,000 satellites would be
Pentagon building autonomous daytime telescopes for tracking enemy satellites
Thursday, 08 April 2021 12:49While the Pentagon has cried foul over Russian space-based devices it claims are weapons, the US has tested its own identical devices for years. Their claims have served as the alarmist foundations for justifying the creation of the US Space Force and the militarization of space. The US Air Force has invested in half a dozen advanced daytime ground-based telescopes it intends to use for tr
Air Force's hypersonic missile booster fails to launch from B-52 in first test
Thursday, 08 April 2021 12:49The Air Force's first booster vehicle in a hypersonic weapons test this week failed to launch, the service said on Tuesday. A U.S. Air Force B-52H Stratofortress took off over the Point Mugu Sea Range in California on Monday with the intention of firing the first booster test vehicle for the AGM-183A Air-launched Rapid Response Weapon program. But the booster was not able to comp
The fiery chief of Russia's troubled space programme
Thursday, 08 April 2021 12:49Dmitry Rogozin, the head of Russia's troubled space agency Roscosmos, is hardly your typical bureaucrat. Brash and brazen, the former diplomat has made his name with provocative tweets and boisterous claims. But he is equally well-known for leading the once-prized Soviet space programme during years of corruption scandals and technological stagnation. In 2014, Rogozin, then a deputy
NASA certifies new launch control system for Artemis I
Thursday, 08 April 2021 12:49When NASA's Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and Orion spacecraft lift off from the agency's Kennedy Space Center in Florida on the Artemis I mission, the amount of data generated by the rocket, spacecraft, and ground support equipment will be about 100 megabytes per second. The volume and speed of this information demands an equally complex and robust computer system to process and deliver that
DLR is creating the rocket fuels of the future
Thursday, 08 April 2021 12:49Sustainability and environmental compatibility are becoming increasingly important considerations in the space sector. In order to achieve these objectives, scientists at the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum fur Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) in Lampoldshausen are developing fuels for next-generation space applications. The focus is on application-related properties such as improved environ
Asteroid crater on Earth provides clues about Martian craters
Thursday, 08 April 2021 12:49The almost 15-million-year-old Nordlinger Ries is an asteroid impact crater filled with lake sediments. Its structure is comparable to the craters currently being explored on Mars. In addition to various other deposits on the rim of the basin, the crater fill is mainly formed by stratified clay deposits. Unexpectedly, a research team led by the University of Gottingen has now discovered a
NASA selects innovative, early-stage tech concepts for continued study
Thursday, 08 April 2021 12:49NASA encourages researchers to develop and study unexpected approaches for traveling through, understanding, and exploring space. To further these goals, the agency has selected seven studies for additional funding - totaling $5 million - from the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program. The researchers previously received at least one NIAC award related to their proposals. "Creat
More than 5,000 tons of extraterrestrial dust fall to Earth each year
Thursday, 08 April 2021 12:49Every year, our planet encounters dust from comets and asteroids. These interplanetary dust particles pass through our atmosphere and give rise to shooting stars. Some of them reach the ground in the form of micrometeorites. An international program conducted for nearly 20 years by scientists from the CNRS, the Universite Paris-Saclay and the National museum of natural history with the support o
Contained confinement
Thursday, 08 April 2021 12:01ESA-sponsored medical doctor Nick Smith snapped this photo of the storage containers at Concordia research station in Antarctica shortly before sunset, 8 April 2021. The dark blue line at the horizon is the shadow of the Earth.
The containers store food, recycling and the scientific samples of blood, saliva, and stool that Nick routinely takes. The units on the right are part of the summer camp, during which researchers sleep in tents.
Science for the benefit of space exploration does not only happen off planet. While some studies require the weightless isolation of the International Space Station, Antarctica also provides the
Soyuz launches new crew to International Space Station
Thursday, 08 April 2021 11:45WASHINGTON — A Soyuz spacecraft carrying two Russian cosmonauts and one American astronaut arrived at the International Space Station April 9, a few hours after its launch from Kazakhstan.
A Soyuz-2.1a rocket lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome at 3:42 a.m.
Different neutron energies enhance asteroid deflection
Thursday, 08 April 2021 11:14Liftoff! Pioneers of space
Thursday, 08 April 2021 08:27Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first man in space 60 years ago next week.
He was one of several stars of the Cold War space race between the Soviet Union and the United States who would became heroes to millions.
But the technology that sent them into orbit had less glorious origins in the dying days of Nazi Germany.
The Germans
Many of the key rocket scientists behind both the American and Soviet space programmes were Germans, who had worked on Adolf Hitler's "secret weapons", the V-1 and V-2 rockets.
Some 1,600 German rocket experts were secretly taken to the US in the dying days of World War II, while the Russians rounded up about 2,000 in one night at gunpoint and sent them to work in the Soviet Union.
Wernher von Braun
The inventor of Hitler's V-2 rocket—the world's first guided ballistic missile—was the architect of the US Apollo programme that would put a man on the Moon.
Brought across the Atlantic with his brother Magnus, he came up with the Saturn V rocket that powered the American lunar missions.
Three-man Soyuz flight honouring Gagarin blasts off for ISS
Thursday, 08 April 2021 08:21A three-man crew blasted off to the International Space Station Friday in a capsule honouring the 60th anniversary of Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becoming the first person in space.
Roscosmos cosmonauts Oleg Novitsky and Pyotr Dubrov and NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei lifted off from Russia's Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at the expected time of 0742 GMT, footage broadcast by NASA TV showed, with docking expected at 1107 GMT.
A NASA commentator citing Russian Mission Control reports confirmed that the Soyuz capsule had entered orbit, with all stages of the flight proceeding as expected.
"Hey, Expedition 64 –- set the dinner table... Can't wait to join you on @Space_Station in a few hours!" Vande Hei tweeted to the crew on board the ISS before blast-off.
The launch came just ahead of Monday's anniversary of Gagarin's historic flight on April 12, 1961.
Three-man crew docks at ISS after flight honouring Gagarin (Update)
Thursday, 08 April 2021 08:21A three-man crew blasted off to the International Space Station Friday in a capsule honouring the 60th anniversary of Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becoming the first person in space.
Roscosmos cosmonauts Oleg Novitsky and Pyotr Dubrov and NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei lifted off from Russia's Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at the expected time of 0742 GMT, footage broadcast by NASA TV showed, with docking expected at 1107 GMT.
A NASA commentator citing Russian Mission Control reports confirmed that the Soyuz capsule had entered orbit, with all stages of the flight proceeding as expected.
"Hey, Expedition 64 –- set the dinner table... Can't wait to join you on @Space_Station in a few hours!" Vande Hei tweeted to the crew on board the ISS before blast-off.
The launch came just ahead of Monday's anniversary of Gagarin's historic flight on April 12, 1961.