Copernical Team
China prepares to launch rocket carrying space station supplies
Write a comment
China is preparing to launch a rocket carrying supplies for its new space station just days after landing a rover on Mars, as it hustles ahead with its extraterrestrial ambitions.
Beijing has pumped billions into its space programme in a bid to make up ground on pioneers Russia and the United States, with ambitious projects in Earth orbit and the landing of uncrewed craft on the Moon and Mars.
But it was heavily reprimanded by the United States and many experts for a potentially dangerous breach of space etiquette for letting a massive rocket segment free-fall to Earth earlier this month after launching the core module of China's space station.
In the upcoming mission, the Tianzhou-2 cargo craft will blast off on a 14-tonne Long March 7 rocket, and is expected to carry essentials such as food and space suits to the core module.
Cool test of Proba-V companion during preparation for 'thermal balance' testing
Write a comment
A test version of ESA's Proba-V Companion CubeSat seen during preparation for 'thermal balance' testing in the Agency's Mechanical Systems Laboratory at its ESTEC technical centre in the Netherlands.
Space is a place where it is possible to be hot and cold at the same time, if one part of your satellite is in sunlight and another face in shade. A satellite's interior needs to maintain a steady temperature to go on operating properly.
Accordingly this 'structural and thermal model' of the Proba-V Companion CubeSat was placed inside the Large Vacuum Facility of ESA's Mechanical Systems Laboratory—employed to test large satellite systems or complete small satellites—for a week-long exposure to temperature extremes in space-quality vacuum.
Developed by prime contractor Aerospacelab in Belgium for ESA, this mission is a 12-unit 'CubeSat' – a small, low-cost satellite built up from standardized 10-cm boxes. It will fly a cut-down version of the vegetation-monitoring instrument aboard the Earth-observing Proba-V to perform experimental combined observations with its predecessor.
Launched in 2013, Proba-V was an innovative 'gap filler' mission between the Vegetation instruments monitoring global plant growth aboard the full-size Spot-4 and -5 satellites and compatible imagery coming from Copernicus Sentinel-3, the first of which flew in 2016.
Back to the space cradle: ESA astronaut's ongoing experiments in the ISS
ESA to unveil its plans for lunar satellites
Write a comment
ESA is backing a bold proposal to create a commercially viable constellation of satellites around the Moon.
Deep water on Neptune and Uranus may be magnesium-rich
Write a comment
While scientists have amassed considerable knowledge of the rocky planets in our solar system, like Earth and Mars, much less is known about the icy water-rich planets, Neptune and Uranus.
In a new study recently published in Nature Astronomy, a team of scientists re-created the temperature and pressure of the interiors of Neptune and Uranus in the lab, and in so doing have gained a greate Missile detection satellite launches from Florida
Write a comment
United Launch Alliance sent a new missile-warning satellite into orbit for the U.S. Space Force from Florida on Tuesday afternoon.
The Atlas V rocket lifted off at 1:37 p.m. EDT into a mostly blue sky from Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. After just a minute into flight, the vehicle traveled at 2,000 mph.
The satellite, known as SBIRS GEO 5, is the fifth in a ser Up-Close View of NASA's X-59 Engine Inlet
Write a comment
NASA's X-59 requires the use of creative and strategic supersonic technologies to control and soften the jarring sound that hits the ground as the aircraft flies faster than the speed of sound above. One of these creative technologies is the placement of the X-59 engine inlet.
This visual is a closeup looking downstream inside of the X-59's engine inlet where, later in the assembly process Stunning simulation of stars being born is most realistic ever
Write a comment
A team including Northwestern University astrophysicists has developed the most realistic, highest-resolution 3D simulation of star formation to date. The result is a visually stunning, mathematically-driven marvel that allows viewers to float around a colorful gas cloud in 3D space while watching twinkling stars emerge.
Called STARFORGE (Star Formation in Gaseous Environments), the comput LHAASO discovers a dozen PeVatrons and photons exceeding 1 PeV and launches ultra-high-energy gamma
Write a comment
China's Large High Altitude Air Shower Observatory (LHAASO) - one of the country's key national science and technology infrastructure facilities - has found a dozen ultra-high-energy (UHE) cosmic accelerators within the Milky Way. It has also detected photons with energies exceeding 1 peta-electron-volt (quadrillion electron-volts or PeV), including one at 1.4 PeV. The latter is the highest ener China's core space station module Tianhe completes in-orbit tests
Write a comment
China's core space station module Tianhe has recently completed its platform function tests and entered the orbit to rendezvous and dock with the Tianzhou-2 cargo spacecraft, according to the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA) on Tuesday.
The core module, which was sent into orbit on April 29, has recently completed platform function tests for rendezvous and docking, astronaut stay and the m