On its first try, China's Zhurong rover hit a Mars milestone
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 23:15
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China's Zhurong rover landed safely on Mars on May 15, making China only the third country to successfully land a rover on the red planet.
More impressively still, China is the first Mars-going nation to carry out an orbiting, landing and rovering operation as its first mission.
Planetary scientist Roberto Orosei told Nature China is "doing in a single go what NASA took decades to Heavy metal vapors unexpectedly found in comets throughout our Solar System
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 23:15 Write a comment
A new study by a Belgian team using data from the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope (ESO's VLT) has shown that iron and nickel exist in the atmospheres of comets throughout our Solar System, even those far from the Sun. A separate study by a Polish team, who also used ESO data, reported that nickel vapour is also present in the icy interstellar comet 2I/Borisov. This is the fi Chinese Mars rover beams back first photos
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 23:15 Write a comment
Solar panels against an alien landscape, ramps and rods pointing at the Martian horizon - China's first probe on the Red Planet has beamed back its first "selfies" after its history-making landing last week.
The Zhurong rover was carried into the Martian atmosphere in a lander on Saturday, in the first ever successful probe landing by any country on its first Mars mission.
Zhurong, name A revolutionary method to drastically reduce stray light on space telescopes
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 23:15 Write a comment
A team of researchers at the Centre Spatial de Liege (CSL) of the University of Liege has just developed a method to identify the contributors and origins of stray light on space telescopes. This is a major advance in the field of space engineering that will help in the acquisition of even finer space images and the development of increasingly efficient space instruments. This study has just bee More than 175 billion cosmic rays later
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 23:15 Write a comment
The International Space Station's largest scientific instrument celebrates a decade in orbit. Wednesday 19 May 2021 marks 10 years since the cosmic-ray-hunting Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS-02) was installed on the exterior of the Space Station.
AMS-02 is a sub-atomic particle detector that looks for dark matter, antimatter and measures cosmic rays. It took 16 countries and nearly 20 ye IAF moves forward with in-person conference in Dubai
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 22:22 Write a comment
WASHINGTON — The International Astronautical Federation (IAF) is moving ahead with plans to hold an in-person conference, one of the largest in the space industry, this October in Dubai.
At a May 18 press conference, officials with the IAF and the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Center confirmed they will hold the 72nd International Astronautical Congress (IAC) Oct.
NASA seeking more than $10 billion in infrastructure bill
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 20:43 Write a comment
WASHINGTON — NASA Administrator Bill Nelson told House appropriators May 19 that the agency is requesting more than $11 billion in an upcoming infrastructure bill that would go for the agency’s Human Landing System program and upgrading center facilities.
Horizon Technologies gets funding for maritime surveillance satellites
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 20:39 Write a comment
TAMPA, Fla. — A British company that equips spy planes and drones to track satellite telephones has raised capital to launch a handful of tiny surveillance spacecraft to listen for signals from ships operating clandestinely.
China postpones launch of rocket carrying space station supplies
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 20:20 Write a comment
China has postponed the planned launch Thursday of a rocket carrying supplies for its new space station due to technical reasons, state media said.
The China Manned Space Agency gave no details on what the reasons were, and said only that a new launch time would be "determined later," the Xinhua News Agency reported.
The blast-off was to have taken place just days after China landed 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.
China delays supply mission to newly launched space station
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 20:20 Write a comment
China has postponed the planned launch Thursday of a rocket carrying supplies for its new space station due to technical reasons, state media said.
The China Manned Space Agency gave no details on what the reasons were, and said only that a new launch time would be "determined later," the Xinhua News Agency reported.
The blast-off was to have taken place just days after China landed 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.
ESA Astronaut Careers Fair Q&A
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 15:45 Write a comment
Video:
00:29:18
This video is a summary compilation of the questions and answers sessions held during the ESA Astronaut Careers Fair on 22 April 2021. The ESA speakers are Florence Loustalot, Talent Acquisition Specialist; Antonella Costa, HR Business Partner; Dagmar Boos, Head of HR Competence and Policy Centre; and Guillaume Weerts, Space Medicine Team Leader. See the astronaut vacancy notice and other opportunities to work at ESA at https://jobs.esa.int
Further information on the astronaut selection may be found in the Astronaut Applicant Handbook and in the astronaut selection FAQs. If your question is not answered in these documents,
Op-ed | India at the Inflection Point: A New Era in the Space Ecosystem
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 14:52 Write a comment
The Indian space ecosystem is transforming. Public sector space programs are orienting toward exploration, commercial space endeavors are proliferating, national space policy is shifting, and the students who will carry India to new achievements in space are increasingly looking to opportunities in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM).
Back to the space cradle: ESA astronaut's ongoing experiments in the ISS
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 13:40
Cool test of Proba-V companion during preparation for 'thermal balance' testing
Wednesday, 19 May 2021 13:36 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.