US leading race in artificial intelligence, China rising: survey
Wednesday, 27 January 2021 06:48
The United States is leading rivals in development and use of artificial intelligence while China is rising quickly and the European Union is lagging, a research report showed Monday.
The study by the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation assessed AI using 30 separate metrics including human talent, research activity, commercial development and investment in hardware and software. Unmanned aerial vehicles to scale new heights thanks to NASA
Wednesday, 27 January 2021 06:48
NASA is funding a major project on the future of autonomous air cargo transportation, and The University of Texas at Austin will be playing a lead role. The COVID-19 vaccine rollout - the largest global logistics effort since World War II - has underscored the importance of increasing efficiencies in the global supply chain infrastructure. Autonomous aerial vehicles have the potential to revolut Sirius XM says its newest satellite has malfunctioned
Wednesday, 27 January 2021 06:48
Sirius XM's newest satellite isn't working properly and may be the subject of a $225 million insurance claim, the company said Wednesday in a filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Elon Musk's SpaceX launched the SXM-7 communications satellite Dec. 13, and testing of its systems began Jan. 4. But "events occurred which have caused failures" on the craft, Sirius XM repo Lunar solar experiment build completed despite challenges
Wednesday, 27 January 2021 06:48
NASA is one step closer to understanding the solar power challenges and opportunities on the Moon's surface after completing the build and readiness review of the Photovoltaic Investigation on the Lunar Surface, or PILS, experiment. The agency overcame multiple engineering challenges to get the experiment ready for integration with a commercial lander for a ride to the Moon as part of NASA's Com Satellite data reveals bonds between emissions, pollution and economy
Wednesday, 27 January 2021 06:48
Burning fossil fuels has long powered world economies while contributing to air pollution and the buildup of greenhouse gases. A new analysis of nearly two decades of satellite data shows that economic development, fossil-fuel combustion and air quality are closely linked on the continental and national scales, but can be decoupled at the national level, according to Penn State scientists. Firefly Aerospace seeking to raise $350 million
Wednesday, 27 January 2021 00:45
WASHINGTON — Small launch vehicle developer Firefly Aerospace, nearing its first orbital launch attempt, is looking to raise $350 million to scale up production and work on a new, larger vehicle.
During an IPO Edge webinar Jan.
Lawmakers amp up pressure on Biden to investigate Space Command basing decision
Tuesday, 26 January 2021 21:52
WASHINGTON — Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.) on Jan. 27 added his voice to the chorus of lawmakers demanding that the Biden administration investigate the Air Force’s decision to move U.S. Space Command from Colorado to Alabama.
U.S. Space Force acquisitions to get fresh look, lawmaker wants hearings
Tuesday, 26 January 2021 20:50
WASHINGTON — Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.), a leading proponent of establishing the U.S. Space Force, said he wants the Biden administration to put pressure on the service to clean up its procurement act.
Cooper chairs the House Armed Services Committee’s strategic forces subcommittee that wrote language in 2017 to establish a Space Corps, which ultimately became the Space Force.
Purported phosphine on Venus more likely to be ordinary sulfur dioxide, new study shows
Tuesday, 26 January 2021 20:21
In September, a team led by astronomers in the United Kingdom announced that they had detected the chemical phosphine in the thick clouds of Venus. The team's reported detection, based on observations by two Earth-based radio telescopes, surprised many Venus experts. Earth's atmosphere contains small amounts of phosphine, which may be produced by life. Phosphine on Venus generated buzz that the planet, often succinctly touted as a "hellscape," could somehow harbor life within its acidic clouds.
Since that initial claim, other science teams have cast doubt on the reliability of the phosphine detection. Now, a team led by researchers at the University of Washington has used a robust model of the conditions within the atmosphere of Venus to revisit and comprehensively reinterpret the radio telescope observations underlying the initial phosphine claim.
SiriusXM and Maxar Technologies reveal problems with SXM-7
Tuesday, 26 January 2021 17:48
SAN FRANCISCO – SiriusXM and Maxar Technologies revealed problems with SXM-7, a SiriusXM communications satellite launched in December, in Jan. 27 filings with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
“During in-orbit testing of SXM-7, events occurred which have caused failures of certain SXM-7 payload units,” SiriusXM said in a Jan.
Unique solar system views from NASA sun-studying missions
Tuesday, 26 January 2021 15:28
Though they focus on the star at the center of our solar system, three of NASA's Sun-watching spacecraft have captured unique views of the planets throughout the last several months. Using instruments that look not at the Sun itself, but at the constant outflow of solar material from the Sun, the missions—ESA and NASA's Solar Orbiter, NASA's Parker Solar Probe, and NASA's Solar and Terrestrial Relations Observatory—have sent home images from their distinct vantage points across the inner solar system.
All three missions carry instruments to study the Sun and its influence on space, including cameras that look out the sides of the spacecraft to study the Sun's outer atmosphere, the solar wind, and the dust in the inner solar system. It's these instruments that, at various points in 2020, saw several planets pass through their fields of view.
Spacewalking astronauts improve station's European lab
Tuesday, 26 January 2021 15:15
Spacewalking astronauts installed a high-speed data link outside the International Space Station's European lab on Wednesday and tackled other improvements.
Video: EDRS: the space data highway
Tuesday, 26 January 2021 15:05The European Data Relay System, or EDRS, uses cutting-edge laser technology to greatly reduce the time it takes for information to be sent from low-Earth orbiting spacecraft—such as the Earth observing Sentinel satellites—to Earth.
The system makes Earth observation information available in almost real-time, which can help disaster management workers and the emergency services accelerate their responses to natural crises.
Known as the "space data highway," it currently consists of an extensive network of European ground stations and control centres, and two sister satellites: EDRS-A and EDRS-C. Both are in geostationary orbit at an altitude of around 36 000 km, far higher than low-Earth orbiting spacecraft, which typically have an altitude of below 1000 km.
Thanks to the orbital position of the system's satellites, low-Earth orbiting spacecraft lie within the field of view of EDRS for extended periods. At the same time, EDRS has a permanent connection to its own ground stations located on European soil.
Traditionally, when a low-Earth orbiting satellite sends information to Earth, it must wait until it has a direct line of sight to a ground station. This can lead to delays of up to 90 minutes.
Instead, the EDRS satellites relay data from spacecraft within their field of view, allowing people on Earth to receive Earth observation information in almost real-time.
A year in the life of GSTP
Tuesday, 26 January 2021 14:02
For more than a quarter of a century ESA’s optional General Support Technology Programme (GSTP) has been preparing promising technologies for space.
A CubeSat will test out water as a propulsion system
Tuesday, 26 January 2021 13:11
Novel propulsion systems for CubeSats have been on an innovative tear of late. UT has reported on propulsion systems that use everything from solid iodine to the Earth's own magnetic field as a way of moving a small spacecraft. Now, there is a potential solution using a much more mundane material for a propellant—water.
Water has plenty of advantages going for it as a propellant. Most obviously, it is not volatile or toxic, making it much easier to handle than conventional rocketfuel. One design flaw holding back the adoption of regular rocket fuel into widespread use in CubeSats is their explosive potential. CubeSats are usually housed next to larger, more expensive satellites in the payloads of rockets. If the rocket fuel loaded into a small CubeSat were to ignite unintentionally, it could completely destroy the much larger, more expensive telescope.