As new probes reach Mars, here's what we know so far from trips to the red planet
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 14:27
Three new spacecraft are due to arrive at Mars this month, ending their seven-month journey through space.
The first, the United Arab Emirates' Hope Probe, should have made it to the red planet this week. It will stay in orbit and study its atmosphere for one complete Martian year (687 Earth days).
China's Taiwen-1 mission also enters orbit this month and will begin scouting the potential landing site for its Mars rover, due to be deployed in May.
If successful, China will become the second country to land a rover on Mars.
These two missions will join six orbiting spacecraft actively studying the red planet from above:
NASA's Mars Odyssey, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) and MAVEN OrbiterEurope's Mars ExpressIndia's Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM)the European and Russian partnership ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter.
The oldest active probe—Mars Odyssey—has been orbiting the planet for 20 years.
The third spacecraft to reach Mars this month is NASA's Perseverance rover, scheduled to land on February 18.
Image: Proba-V's plus one
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 13:17
This satellite mockup, seen during antenna testing, shows the shape of ESA's new Proba-V Companion CubeSat, which is due for launch at the end of this year.
The 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.
A pair of antennas for the CubeSat, mounted in this 'structural and thermal model' underwent testing at ESA's Compact Antenna Test Range at the ESTEC technical center in the Netherlands.
"The white patch is a directional high-data rate antenna, needed to downlink large amounts of imagery to users," explains Xavier Collaud of Aerospacelab in Belgium, developing the mission for ESA. "Then the brown patch is an omnidirectional antenna, that—combined with a similar antenna on the other side—allows the reception and transmission of lower-data rate signals in any direction, enabling the control of the mission.
"These antennnas are commercial off the shelf equipment, allowing the building up of small satellites in an affordable, modular manner.
China’s Tianwen-1 enters orbit around Mars
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:59
HELSINKI — China’s first interplanetary mission, Tianwen-1, successfully entered Mars orbit Feb.
ESA's Solar Orbiter ducks behind the sun
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:37
Name: Solar Orbiter, or "Solo' as the mission control team fondly call it, is one of the European Space Agency's pluckiest missions and is now cruising toward the sun.
Age: One year old! We launched on 10 February 2020. Granted, it was first powered up on Earth at some point during construction, but launch is 'when it came alive."
What's it doing out there? It's imaging our star, observing the solar wind and unraveling mysteries of the solar cycle. It's already returned some of the best images of ol'Sol ever, revealing omnipresent miniature solar flares, dubbed 'campfires," near the surface.
Anything else? Well, it uses prehistoric cave pigment as a coating to withstand temperatures up to 520°C. The sun's pretty darn hot, you know.
So, what's happening now? The spacecraft's orbit is taking it behind the sun, and starting a few days ago the apparent angle, as seen from Earth, between Solar Orbiter and the sun started falling below 5 degrees.
NASA weighs options for additional Soyuz Mission to ISS
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:30
A rotating crew of NASA and international astronauts have called the International Space Station home for more than 20 years. To ensure a consistent U.S. presence on the space station through the years, NASA has implemented safeguards to ensure crew transportation is always available.
NASA now is considering obtaining a supplemental seat on the upcoming spring Soyuz crew rotation mission f NASA awards contract to launch initial elements for lunar outpost
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:30
NASA has selected Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) of Hawthorne, California, to provide launch services for the agency's Power and Propulsion Element (PPE) and Habitation and Logistics Outpost (HALO), the foundational elements of the Gateway. As the first long-term orbiting outpost around the Moon, the Gateway is critical to supporting sustainable astronauts missions under the agency's Ar Ozmens' SNC Dream Chaser spaceplane closer to commercial runway landing
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:30
Sierra Nevada Corporation (SNC), the global aerospace and national security company owned by Eren and Fatih Ozmen, is a step closer to landing the world's first commercial spaceplane on U.S. soil. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) Office of Commercial Space Transportation (AST) awarded the re-entry site license to Cape Canaveral Spaceport Shuttle Landing Facility (SLF) in Florida at requ Astronauts of India's first human spaceflight will be treated to Indian cuisine
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:30
"Gaganyaan" - India's first human spaceflight programme - is due to take off in December 2021. Four of its astronauts are currently undergoing rigorous 11-month training in Russia.
From lip-smacking upma and poha for breakfast to biryani for lunch, and korma with chapatis for dinner, Indian scientists have prepared a special menu of popular Indian dishes to tickle the tastebuds of Indian a Water ice resources identified in Martian northern hemisphere
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:30
Areas featuring subsurface frozen water ice that could benefit future human explorers have been identified in the northern mid-latitudes of Mars, a new paper led by Planetary Science Institute Senior Scientist Gareth A. Morgan says. Through the integration of orbital datasets from several NASA spacecraft - Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, Mars Odyssey, and Mars Global Surveyor - in concert with new RUAG Space provides Solar Subsystem for planet hunter PLATO
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:30
The "planet-hunting" mission PLATO (PLAnetary Transits and Oscillations of stars) of the European Space Agency (ESA) is a space-based observatory to find and study extrasolar planetary systems with emphasis on the properties of terrestrial planets in the habitable zone around solar-like stars.
It is scheduled to launch in 2026. Mid-January RUAG Space, a leading supplier to the space indust Rare blast's remains discovered in Milky Way's center
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:30
Astronomers may have found our galaxy's first example of an unusual kind of stellar explosion. This discovery, made with NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, adds to the understanding of how some stars shatter and seed the universe with elements critical for life on Earth.
This intriguing object, located near the center of the Milky Way, is a supernova remnant called Sagittarius A East, or Sg Study of supergiant star Betelgeuse unveils the cause of its pulsations
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:30
Betelgeuse is normally one of the brightest, most recognizable stars of the winter sky, marking the left shoulder of the constellation Orion. But lately, it has been behaving strangely: an unprecedentedly large drop in its brightness has been observed in early 2020 (Figure 1), which has prompted speculation that Betelgeuse may be about to explode.
To find out more, an international team of NATO picks France's Toulouse for new military space 'Center of Excellence'
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:30
While the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) has disavowed an interest in militarizing space, several members of the alliance, including the US, UK, and France, have oriented themselves toward conflict in the space domain in recent years.
The North Atlantic alliance has selected the French city of Toulouse to host its new higher education center for military space affairs.
NAT DARPA pursues plan for robust manufacturing in space
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:30
As commercial space companies increase the cadence of successful rocket launches, access to space is becoming more routine for both government and commercial interests. But even with regular launches, modern rockets impose mass and volume limits on the payloads they deliver to orbit. This size constraint hinders developing and deploying large-scale, dynamic space systems that can adapt to change China tests its missile interception equipment
Tuesday, 09 February 2021 12:30
China conducted a land-based, midcourse missile interception test on Thursday-the fifth land-based, anti-ballistic missile test the country has publicly announced.
The Defense Ministry said in a brief statement late on Thursday that the test had achieved its goals, and the operation was defensive in nature, not targeting any other country.
Before the latest operation, China had succe