NASA wants to harvest water on moon and Mars, and students think they can help
Monday, 27 September 2021 13:45
Deep beneath Mars' red clay surface lie ancient oceans now frozen into ice sheets. Earth's moon has hidden water deposits, too—pockets embedded deep inside its rocks.
It's the kind of liquid treasure scientists at NASA hope to one day mine using specialized drilling tools on the moon or Mars.
As NASA looks for new technology to use in space, the agency is mining a different treasure to help develop those tools: the ingenuity of student engineers.
To that end, 10 student teams from universities around the country—including a team from Virginia Tech—gathered Friday at the Hampton Road Convention Center to share prototypes of remote-controlled drilling machines, during the "Moon to Mars Ice and Prospecting Challenge." The event was a three-day competition that began Thursday and ended Saturday.
The students' prototypes attempted to extract and harvest the most water from ice buried within simulated lunar and Martian landscapes—dirt, clay, sand—packed inside giant blue tubs. It's a technology NASA needs. Rather than sending tons of water into space with the astronauts, it's easier and saves millions to extract the water there.
"The most interesting thing about this is it has to be completely hands off.
RocketStar ready for second suborbital flight attempt
Monday, 27 September 2021 13:32
New York-based RocketStar plans to launch its aerospike-powered rocket for the first time this fall, carrying a prototype satellite for resource-mapping startup Lunasonde on a brief suborbital trip.
Video: NASA's Artemis astronaut Victor Glover
Monday, 27 September 2021 12:52
As we look forward to the Artemis program to the Moon and even one-day crewed missions to Mars, accessing resources like water will be crucial for humans to survive on other worlds. We sat down with Victor Glover, NASA Crew-1 astronaut, to talk about NASA's Artemis program, what it would be like to be on the Moon one day, and how technology from the Moon to Mars Ice & Prospecting Challenge could help astronauts extract ice and water resources from the lunar surface.
Portions of this interview appeared in NASA Science Live: NASA's Moon to Mars Ice & Prospecting Challenge, a one-hour live broadcast that showcased student teams and their unique technology and engineering demonstrations that could be capable of digging through a simulated Martian or lunar surface to access and extract water ice below.
Explore further
Planet co-founder Chris Boshuizen to fly with Blue Origin
Monday, 27 September 2021 12:23
Planet co-founder Chris Boshuizen will be one of four passengers on the next flight of the Blue Origin New Shepard suborbital vehicle.
Microgravity on demand with Earth return through ESA's Boost
Monday, 27 September 2021 11:56
Spaceflight offers lunar flyby rideshare mission
Monday, 27 September 2021 10:10
Launch services provider Spaceflight sees a lunar flyby mission opportunity next year as a pathfinder for future opportunities to support customers going to both geostationary orbit and the moon.
Microgravity on demand with Earth return through ESA’s Boost!
Monday, 27 September 2021 09:30
A new round-trip commercial space transportation service from 2022, backed by ESA, will enable companies to manufacture in space very pure and more capable materials, discover new pharmaceutical drugs and bring them back for use on Earth.
ESA Open Day 2021
Monday, 27 September 2021 07:00
Video:
00:01:09
What’s coming next in space? Find out at our virtual ESA Open Day on Sunday 3 October, from 1300 – 1600 CEST (1200 – 1500 BST). Your chance to talk to the people behind future space missions, get close-up views of space hardware and hear from astronaut Alexander Gerst. The Open Day is open to anyone; all you have to do is register to attend.
Space physician training course: call for applications
Monday, 27 September 2021 06:15
Are you a qualified physician? Would you like to gain insight into the field of space medicine? ESA is once again seeking medical doctors for its out-of-this-world training course and this is your chance to apply.
Going hyperspectral for CHIME
Monday, 27 September 2021 06:15
With Covid restrictions a little more relaxed, scientists from Europe and the USA were finally able to team up for a long-awaited field experiment to ensure that a new Copernicus satellite called CHIME will deliver the best possible data products as soon as it is operational in orbit. This new mission is being developed to support EU policies on the management of natural resources, ultimately helping to address the global issue of food security.
China to Korea at night timelapse
Saturday, 25 September 2021 15:00
Video:
00:01:52
Timelapse video made during ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet’s second mission to the International Space Station, “Alpha”. 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. The video is around 12 times faster than real speed.
Thomas shared this video on social media with the caption:
“A night #timelapse over South-East Asia. Green lights of squid fishing, bright city lights of Hong Kong and Shanghai followed by Seoul until the border of the Korean peninsula closes on a pitch black
Blue Origin, Rocket Lab, SpaceX, ULA win Space Force contracts for rocket technology projects
Saturday, 25 September 2021 08:31
Blue Origin, Rocket Lab, SpaceX and United Launch Alliance were selected to participate in Space Force development projects to advance rocket engine testing and launch vehicle upper stages.
Op-ed | Can we backhaul our way to space?
Saturday, 25 September 2021 03:04
If the market grows large enough, a dedicated lunar-to-LEO tanker industry could evolve – which might never happen if the infrastructure for supplying space facilities with lunar water had to be paid for up front and from scratch, before any water was delivered.
UN secretary-general criticizes “billionaires joyriding to space”
Friday, 24 September 2021 15:54
The secretary-general of the United Nations lumped space tourism alongside corruption and loss of freedoms as part of a “malady of mistrust” facing the world, another sign of the backlash in some quarters to private human spaceflight.
Orbit Fab to launch propellant tanker to fuel satellites in geostationary orbit
Friday, 24 September 2021 14:52
Orbit Fab, a startup offering a refueling service in space, will launch a propellant tanker to geostationary orbit on a SpaceX Falcon 9 lunar lander mission projected for late 2022 or early 2023.