Copernical Team
DARPA's Operational Fires Ground-Launched Hypersonics program enters new phase
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DARPA's Operational Fires (OpFires) program, which is developing a ground-launched intermediate-range hypersonic weapons system, is advancing to a new phase. Phase 3b will involve full-scale missile fabrication, assembly, and flight testing from a launch vehicle.
Lockheed Martin Missiles and Fire Control was awarded this new contract modification after leading a successful Phase 3a integra Cargo Dragon undocks from Station and heads for splashdown
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With NASA astronaut Victor Glover monitoring aboard the International Space Station, an upgraded SpaceX cargo Dragon spacecraft undocked from the International Docking Adapter on the station's space-facing port of the Harmony module at 9:05 a.m. EST.
It is the first undocking of a U.S. commercial cargo craft from the complex. Previous cargo Dragon spacecraft were attached and removed from New solar arrays to power International Space Station Research
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As the International Space Station orbits Earth, its four pairs of solar arrays soak up the sun's energy to provide electrical power for the numerous research and science investigations conducted every day, as well as the continued operations of the orbiting platform.
The space station is the springboard to NASA's Artemis missions to the Moon, a platform to test advanced technologies for h Prepping for a spacewalk to install Colka on ISS external hull
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Prepping for a spacewalk typically means diving underwater to rehearse and fine-tune operations.
In 2016, ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst performed such an underwater rehearsal for the Colka high speed radio, the brown box imaged above, that will be installed this month on the International Space Station.
NASA astronauts Mike Hopkins and Victor Glover will integrate the small fridge-si Exotrail aims for more in orbit space mobility
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Exotrail reports full success of first-ever cubesat mission equipped with Hall-effect electric propulsion technology. Through an In-Orbit Demonstration mission launched to Low Earth Orbit on 7th of November 2020 onboard a PSLV rocket, Exotrail nominally ignited its ExoMGTM Hall-effect electric propulsion system on the first attempt.
Small satellite constellations will now be able to quickl Cheers! French wine, vines headed home after year in space
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The International Space Station bid adieu Tuesday to 12 bottles of French Bordeaux wine and hundreds of snippets of grapevines that spent a year orbiting the world in the name of science.
Curiosity rover reaches its 3,000th day on Mars
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As the rover has continued to ascend Mount Sharp, it's found distinctive benchlike rock formations.
It's been 3,000 Martian days, or sols, since Curiosity touched down on Mars on Aug. 6, 2012, and the rover keeps making new discoveries during its gradual climb up Mount Sharp, the 3-mile-tall (5-kilometer-tall) mountain it has been exploring since 2014. Geologists were intrigued to see a series of rock "benches" in the most recent panorama from the mission.
Stitched together from 122 images taken on Nov. 18, 2020, the mission's 2,946th sol, the panorama was captured by the Mast Camera, or Mastcam, which serves as the rover's main "eyes.
New Horizons spacecraft answers the question: How dark is space?
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Reconstructing the solar system's original architecture
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As the solar system was developing, the giant planets (Jupiter and Saturn) formed very early, and as they grew, they migrated both closer to and further away from the sun to stay in gravitationally stable orbits.
The gravitational effect of these massive objects caused immense reshuffling of other planetary bodies that were forming at the time, meaning that the current locations of many planetary bodies in our solar system are not where they originally formed.
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) scientists set out to reconstruct these original formation locations by studying the isotopic compositions of different groups of meteorites that all derived from the asteroid belt (between Mars and Jupiter). The asteroid belt is the source of almost all of Earth's meteorites, but the material that makes up the asteroid belt formed from sweeping of materials all over the solar system.
SpaceX's next idea: Catch Super Heavy boosters with the launch tower
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SpaceX is getting closer and closer to realizing the design for its Starship and Super Heavy launch system. Once complete, it will be the world's first fully reusable launch system and will facilitate trips to low Earth orbit (LEO), the moon and Mars. Construction began on the system's booster element (Super Heavy) this past summer and, according to a recent tweet by Musk, will be "caught" by its launch tower.
The tweet came (as they often do) in response to a question from one of Musk's followers. In this case, it was a space designer who goes by the Twitter handle Erc X (@ErcXspace) who produced a video that illustrates what the Super Heavy might look like as it returns to its landing site. The video is captioned with a question: "Accurate Super Heavy Descent profile?"
Accurate Super Heavy Descent profile? pic.twitter.com/MxIJ0zLzKn
— Erc X (@ErcXspace) December 30, 2020
Musk responded by tweeting:
"We're going to try to catch the Super Heavy Booster with the launch tower arm, using the grid fins to take the load… Saves mass & cost of legs & enables immediate repositioning of booster on to launch mount—ready to refly in under an hour.