A CADRE of mini-rovers navigates the lunar terrain of SLOPE
Thursday, 04 November 2021 21:19
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NASA's Cooperative Autonomous Distributed Robotic Exploration (CADRE) project is developing small robots programmed to work autonomously as a team to explore the lunar surface.
A team of shoebox-size rover scouts was recently put to the test at a NASA Glenn Research Center lab. The facility, called the Simulated Lunar Operations lab (or SLOPE) is designed to mimic lunar and planetary surface operations. The mini-rovers traversed simulated lunar soil—called regolith—to better understand the types of challenges that lunar rovers of this size will face on the Moon's surface. The results of the tests will be used to characterize small rover performance and improve the rovers' mobility design.
Debris removal a key goal in Space Force’s ‘Orbital Prime’ project
Thursday, 04 November 2021 20:02 Write a comment
SpaceWERX plans to select at least one team to conduct an on-orbit demonstration of active debris removal within the next two years
US judge rules against Blue Origin in lunar lander suit
Thursday, 04 November 2021 18:59 Write a comment
A US federal judge on Thursday ruled against Blue Origin brought by Jeff Bezos' company in a bid to overturn a NASA contract awarded to rival SpaceX, founded by Elon Musk, to build the next craft for Moon landings.
The ruling put an end to a months-long legal battle that had prevented the US space agency from working with SpaceX on the lunar lander called Starship, which will allow Americans to return to the Moon as part of the Artemis program.
"NASA will resume work with SpaceX under the Option A contract as soon as possible," the agency said in a statement after the ruling.
In April, NASA announced it had awarded the contract to Musk's company—a deal worth $2.9 billion.
But Blue Origin filed a complaint about the decision to the Government Accountability Office (GAO), saying the bidding process had been unfair and that NASA should have offered more than one contract.
SpaceX crew launch bumped to next week; astronaut on mend
Thursday, 04 November 2021 18:58 Write a comment
![SpaceX crew launch bumped to next week; astronaut on mend](https://scx1.b-cdn.net/csz/news/800a/2021/spacex-crew-launch-bum.jpg "The official portraits of astronauts, from left, Raja Chari, Kayla Barron, Matthias Maurer, of Germany, and Tom Marshburn, are displayed as a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with the crew dragon capsule attached sits on Launch Pad 39-A at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla., Friday, Oct. 29, 2021. On Thursday, Nov. 4, 2021, officials announced SpaceX's next astronaut flight is off until at least next week as more bad weather looms, and as flight surgeons continue to monitor the "minor medical issue" affecting one of the four astronauts. Credit: AP Photo/Chris O'Meara, File")
From space, astronaut sounds the alarm about climate crisis
Thursday, 04 November 2021 16:12 Write a comment
Smart focus on Mars
Thursday, 04 November 2021 15:32 Write a comment
From panoramas to close-ups, from 3D maps to a wheel selfie, the Earth-bound twin of ESA’s Rosalind Franklin rover is testing the wide range of photo settings that will deliver the greatest science possible during the ExoMars mission on the Red Planet.
Mind the stars
Thursday, 04 November 2021 14:48 Write a comment
Image:
Space can be a cruel mistress, but she is a beautiful one.
As we await the launch of ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer and the return of Thomas Pesquet, let us marvel at the fact that humans live and work in space, an environment so inhospitable to us.
As Thomas nears the end of his six-month mission Alpha on the Space Station, he took this image, noting that living on the International Space Station “really feels like flying on a spaceship into the cosmos… or wait… that’s what we do.”
While astronauts are often pointing their cameras down to Earth, Thomas looked
Federal court rules against Blue Origin in HLS lawsuit
Thursday, 04 November 2021 14:42 Write a comment
The Court of Federal Claims has ruled against Blue Origin in its suit about the agency’s selection of SpaceX for a single Human Landing System award.
Astrophysics decadal survey recommends a program of flagship space telescopes
Thursday, 04 November 2021 14:01 Write a comment
A long-awaited report on the future of astrophysics research recommended NASA pursue a series of flagship observatories, starting with a large space telescope estimated to cost $11 billion but which would not fly until the early 2040s.
Melt
Thursday, 04 November 2021 13:00 Write a comment
Video:
00:31:09
Glaciers across the globe have lost over nine trillion tonnes of ice in half a century. How will glaciers look over the coming decades? “It all depends on what humans are doing now in terms of greenhouse gas emissions:” this is the message one scientist delivered during an ESA-led expedition to the Gorner Glacier in Switzerland – one of the biggest ice masses in the Alps.
As world leaders gather for the 26th UN Climate Change Conference of Parties, watch the exclusive premiere of the documentary that follows ESA astronaut Luca Parmitano, along with a team of glaciologists
Quantum technologies' journey to space seen in patent survey
Thursday, 04 November 2021 12:50 Write a comment
Tipped to change the world, quantum technologies – employing special properties of matter that manifest at the very tiniest of scales – are heading to space too. To highlight the space applications of this emerging sector, ESA has supported the European Patent Office and the European Space Policy Institute in a survey of the past two decades of related patent filings.
China is planning a complex Mars sample return mission
Thursday, 04 November 2021 11:55 Write a comment
China is working on a complex mission to collect Mars rock samples and deliver them to Earth by building on the successes of recent moon and Mars missions.
Video: Best of Alpha mission timelapse
Thursday, 04 November 2021 11:26 Write a comment
A collection of the best timelapse videos made during ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet's second mission to the International Space Station, "Alpha" in 2021. The camera is setup to take pictures at intervals of two a second, and the pictures are then edited into this video that plays at 25 pictures a second. Most videos around 12 times faster than real speed.
Thomas shared this video on social media with the caption:
"Probably the last the timelapse from space, and fittingly here is a special edition "best of" montage: aurora, lightning, spacewalks, day views and spacecraft reentry in less than five minutes. Get comfy, cast it to your largest screen in the house and enjoy!"
Over 200 experiments are planned during Thomas' time in space, with 40 European ones and 12 new experiments led by the French space agency CNES.
Explore further
Space Station call with French President Emmanuel Macron
Thursday, 04 November 2021 09:00 Write a comment
Video:
00:20:53
ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet had a call with the French President Emmanuel Macron on 4 November 2021 from the International Space Station. The call came at the end of Thomas’s second mission to space called Alpha.
Over 200 experiments are planned during Thomas’ time in space, with 40 European ones and 12 new experiments led by the French space agency CNES.
Latest updates on the Alpha mission can be found via @esaspaceflight on Twitter, with more details on ESA’s exploration blog via thomaspesquet.esa.int.
Background information on the Alpha mission is available at www.esa.int/MissionAlpha with a brochure at www.esa.int/AlphaBrochure.
Explore ESA’s interactive Climate Change Kit
Thursday, 04 November 2021 08:10 Write a comment
Arguably, humankind has never been more aware of the jeopardy we and the planet face because of climate change. As world leaders at COP26 work to accelerate action towards reducing greenhouse gas emissions to keep the goal of 1.5°C temperature rise within reach, we bring you a new easy-to-use guide on what ESA is doing to understand and monitor climate change from space – data that are essential for policy-makers.