Voyager 1 team accomplishes tricky thruster swap
Wednesday, 11 September 2024 06:39
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Engineers working on NASA's Voyager 1 probe have successfully mitigated an issue with the spacecraft's thrusters, which keep the distant explorer pointed at Earth so that it can receive commands, send engineering data, and provide the unique science data it is gathering.
After 47 years, a fuel tube inside the thrusters has become clogged with silicon dioxide, a byproduct that appears with age from a rubber diaphragm in the spacecraft's fuel tank. The clogging reduces how efficiently the thrusters can generate force. After weeks of careful planning, the team switched the spacecraft to a different set of thrusters.
The thrusters are fueled by liquid hydrazine, which is turned into gases and released in tens-of-milliseconds-long puffs to gently tilt the spacecraft's antenna toward Earth.
SpaceX Polaris Dawn crew set for historic private spacewalk
Wednesday, 11 September 2024 06:10 Write a comment
A private crew set out on an audacious orbital expedition Tuesday, journeying deeper into the cosmos than any humans in half a century as they prepare for the first ever spacewalk by non-professional astronauts.
The SpaceX Polaris Dawn mission, led by Shift4 Payments CEO Jared Isaacman, launched early morning from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida and attained its peak altitude of 870 miles (1,400 kilometers) later that day.
"Achievement unlocked—apogee 1,400.7 km," SpaceX said on X Tuesday night.
Congress, industry criticize FAA launch licensing regulations
Wednesday, 11 September 2024 02:19
OneWeb launches alternative navigation service amid GPS vulnerability concerns
Tuesday, 10 September 2024 21:26
National lab takes its radiation expertise to space
Tuesday, 10 September 2024 20:05 Write a comment
An experiment designed to answer questions about the radiation environment for manned space missions was launched from Kennedy Space Center today.
For the five-day mission, experiments from the Department of Energy's Pacific Northwest National Laboratory and several other institutions will circle the Earth 435 miles above—nearly twice as high as the International Space Station. Before settling in at that altitude, Polaris Dawn will reach 870 miles, the highest that any person has been since NASA's Apollo program several decades ago.
Who is on SpaceX's historic private spacewalk mission?
Tuesday, 10 September 2024 19:30 Write a comment
Four US civilians are set to attempt the first-ever private spacewalk on Thursday—a risky endeavor usually reserved for trained astronauts from government agencies.
The ambitious mission, dubbed Polaris Dawn, is being carried out on a SpaceX capsule that launched early Tuesday from Florida.
Who are the select few to pioneer this new chapter of space exploration?
Jared Isaacman, billionaire
The driving force behind the mission is Jared Isaacman, a billionaire who serves as mission commander.
The 41-year-old American from Pennsylvania is the CEO of the digital finance company Shift4 Payments, which he founded in his family's basement when he was only 16.
Isaacman is a seasoned pilot who is qualified to fly military aircraft and holds several world records.
He had previously gone into space in 2021 as part of another SpaceX mission he chartered, Inspiration4, which was the first orbital spacecraft to feature no professional astronauts.
SpaceX successfully launches all-civilian crew for historic private spacewalk
Tuesday, 10 September 2024 19:24 Write a comment
SpaceX successfully launched the Polaris Dawn mission early Tuesday morning, marking the beginning of a multiday orbital expedition featuring the first-ever spacewalk conducted by private citizens. The Falcon 9 rocket lifted off at 5:23 a.m. ET from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
"Liftoff of Polaris Dawn!" SpaceX announced on X, along with an image of the rocket ascending into the China expands global partnerships for Lunar Research Station
Tuesday, 10 September 2024 19:24 Write a comment
China's initiative to establish an international lunar research station has attracted new international partners, marking a significant step in global space collaboration.
At the opening of a two-day space conference in Tunxi, Anhui Province, on Thursday, the China National Space Administration (CNSA) signed a cooperation agreement with Senegal on the International Lunar Research Station ( Major leap for nuclear clock paves way for ultraprecise timekeeping
Tuesday, 10 September 2024 19:24 Write a comment
The world keeps time with the ticks of atomic clocks, but a new type of clock under development - a nuclear clock - could revolutionize how we measure time and probe fundamental physics.
An international research team led by scientists at JILA, a joint institute of the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the University of Colorado Boulder, has demonstrated key element NASA's carbon nanotube technology aids search for life on exoplanets
Tuesday, 10 September 2024 19:24 Write a comment
NASA's development of a carbon nanotube material is poised to significantly enhance the search for exoplanets, some of which may harbor life. Originally devised in 2007 by a team led by John Hagopian and Stephanie Getty at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, this carbon nanotube technology is now being refined for potential use on NASA's upcoming Habitable Worlds Observatory (HWO). HWO will be t UAlbany physicists highlight ongoing progress in dark matter search
Tuesday, 10 September 2024 19:24 Write a comment
Physicists at the University at Albany celebrated the latest advancements in the search for direct evidence of dark matter on Monday, as new findings from the LUX-ZEPLIN (LZ) project were presented at two scientific conferences. Dark matter is thought to be a massive, yet unseen, component of the universe's structure.
The LUX-ZEPLIN detector, known as the most sensitive dark matter detecto Gilat secures $12M in orders for SkyEdge VSAT Platforms
Tuesday, 10 September 2024 19:24 Write a comment
Gilat Satellite Networks Ltd. (NASDAQ, TASE: GILT), a global leader in satellite networking technologies and services, has announced that it secured over $12 million in orders from a prominent satellite operator. These orders are aimed at enhancing the operator's global satellite communication (SATCOM) network using Gilat's SkyEdge family of Very Small Aperture Terminal (VSAT) platforms. The del SATIM partners with Capella Space to enhance AI-driven object detection in SAR imagery
Tuesday, 10 September 2024 19:24 Write a comment
Capella Space Corp., a prominent provider of high-resolution synthetic aperture radar (SAR) imagery, has announced that SATIM, a leader in automatic object detection and classification software, is now a Capella Space Certified Analytics Partner. This partnership allows SATIM to utilize Capella's vast imagery archive to boost its advanced analytics capabilities, delivering enhanced actionable in NASA begins monitoring polar heat emissions in far-infrared spectrum
Tuesday, 10 September 2024 19:24 Write a comment
NASA's latest climate-focused mission has commenced its study of far-infrared radiation emitted by the Arctic and Antarctic regions. The data collected by the Polar Radiant Energy in the Far-Infrared Experiment (PREFIRE) will play a critical role in predicting the impact of climate change on Earth's ice, oceans, and weather, aiding global efforts to prepare for environmental shifts.
PREFIR Satellites unlock new insights into aerosol layer heights over oceans
Tuesday, 10 September 2024 19:24 Write a comment
A new study has shown that NASA's PACE satellite, equipped with the Ocean Color Instrument (OCI), can precisely measure the height of aerosol layers above ocean surfaces. This capability is essential for improving our understanding of how aerosols influence weather patterns and climate and is a major advancement in atmospheric correction techniques used in satellite-based ocean color monitoring.