Copernical Team
Pentagon building autonomous daytime telescopes for tracking enemy satellites
While the Pentagon has cried foul over Russian space-based devices it claims are weapons, the US has tested its own identical devices for years. Their claims have served as the alarmist foundations for justifying the creation of the US Space Force and the militarization of space.
The US Air Force has invested in half a dozen advanced daytime ground-based telescopes it intends to use for tr COVID-19 Impact on Smallsat Market Mitigated by Funding Availability, Government Support
The latest update of "Prospects for the Small Satellite Market" was released this week by Euroconsult, forecasting further growth in the global supply and demand of government, commercial and academic satellites weighing up to 500 kg. The market intelligence report, now in its 7th edition, builds upon Euroconsult's previous iteration that accurately predicted more than 1,000 satellites would be NASA seeks to create a better battery with SABERS
Dealing with battery issues on our phones, tablets, or laptops can be frustrating. Although batteries are everywhere in everyday life, many still suffer breakdowns and failures. The minor inconvenience of needing to charge them more often could even turn into costly repairs or buying a new device altogether. Batteries in larger electronics, like hoverboards or cars, can even catch fire.
No Soyuz crew blasts off; marking 60 years of spaceflight
A three-man crew will blast off to the International Space Station on Friday in a capsule honouring the 60th anniversary of Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becoming the first person in space.
Reminders of Gagarin's achievement were everywhere at the Russia-operated Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan as Roscosmos cosmonauts Oleg Novitsky and Pyotr Dubrov and NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei prepare Earth from Space: Bucharest, Romania
The Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission takes us over Bucharest – the capital and largest city of Romania.
New research shows that Mars did not dry up all at once
The Perseverance rover has just landed on Mars. Meanwhile, its precursor Curiosity continues to explore the base of Mount Sharp (officially Aeolis Mons), a mountain several kilometers high at the center of the Gale crater. Using the telescope on the ChemCam instrument to make detailed observations of the steep terrain of Mount Sharp at a distance, a French-US team headed by William Rapin, CNRS researcher at the Institut de Recherche en Astrophysique et Planétologie (CNRS/Université Toulouse III/CNES), has discovered that the Martian climate recorded there alternated between dry and wetter periods, before drying up completely about 3 billion years ago.
Say cheese on Mars: Perseverance's selfie with Ingenuity
NASA's Perseverance Mars rover took a selfie with the Ingenuity helicopter, seen here about 13 feet (4 meters) away in this image from April 6, 2021, the 46th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. Perseverance captured the image using a camera called WATSON (Wide Angle Topographic Sensor for Operations and eNgineering), part of the SHERLOC (Scanning Habitable Environments with Raman and Luminescence for Organics and Chemicals) instrument, located at the end of the rover's robotic arm.
NASA's Odyssey orbiter marks 20 historic years of mapping Mars
NASA's 2001 Mars Odyssey spacecraft launched 20 years ago on April 7, making it the oldest spacecraft still working at the Red Planet. The orbiter, which takes its name from Arthur C. Clarke's classic sci-fi novel "2001: A Space Odyssey" (Clarke blessed its use before launch), was sent to map the composition of the Martian surface, providing a window to the past so scientists could piece together how the planet evolved.
Mars didn't dry up in one go
The Perseverance rover has just landed on Mars. Meanwhile, its precursor Curiosity continues to explore the base of Mount Sharp (officially Aeolis Mons), a mountain several kilometers high at the center of the Gale crater. Using the telescope on the ChemCam instrument to make detailed observations of the steep terrain of Mount Sharp at a distance, a French-US team headed by William Rapin, CNRS researcher at the Institut de Recherche en Astrophysique et Planétologie (CNRS/Université Toulouse III/CNES), has discovered that the Martian climate recorded there alternated between dry and wetter periods, before drying up completely about 3 billion years ago.
Lunar brightness temperature for calibration of microwave humidity sounders
Calibration and validation (CAL/VAL) is a key technology for quantitative application of space-borne remote sensing data. However, the complex space environment can cause many uncertainties and degrade calibration accuracy. In-flight calibration is always needed. The thermal emission of the Moon is stable over hundreds of years because there is no atmosphere and no significant physical or chemical change on its surface. The deep space view of the Microwave Humidity Sounder onboard NOAA-18 has viewed the Moon many times every year. Under solar illumination, the lunar surface shows stable and periodical variation in microwave brightness temperature (TB). The Moon is a potential calibration source for thermal calibration
The related work was published in Science China Earth Sciences as "Calibration of the space-borne microwave humidity sounder based on real-time thermal emission from lunar surface." Based on the heat conductive equation, the temperature profiles of lunar regolith at different regions and local time are simulated numerically with the real-time solar radiance and angle of incidence.