Tag: Portal

Scientists solve methane data conflict on Mars

9:10 am

Using the methane detector on the rover Curiosity scientists now think they have solved the mystery why Curiosity has detected methane in the atmosphere near the surface while Europe’s Trace Gas Orbiter fails to detect any methane at all.

[Planetary scientist John E. Moores from York University in Toronto], as well as other Curiosity team members studying wind patterns in Gale Crater, hypothesized that the discrepancy between methane measurements comes down to the time of day they’re taken. Because it needs a lot of power, TLS [Curiosity’s methane detector] operates mostly at night when no other Curiosity instruments are working. The Martian atmosphere is calm at night, Moores noted, so the methane seeping from the ground builds up near the surface where Curiosity can detect it.

The Trace Gas Orbiter, on the other hand, requires sunlight to pinpoint methane about 3 miles, or 5 kilometers, above the surface. “Any atmosphere near a planet’s surface goes through a cycle during the day,” Moores said. Heat from the Sun churns the atmosphere as warm air rises and cool air sinks. Thus, the methane that is confined near the surface at night is mixed into the broader atmosphere during the day, which dilutes it to undetectable levels. “So I realized no instrument, especially an orbiting one, would see anything,” Moores said.

Immediately, the Curiosity team decided to test Moores’ prediction by collecting the first high-precision daytime measurements. TLS measured methane consecutively over the course of one Martian day, bracketing one nighttime measurement with two daytime ones. With each experiment, SAM sucked in Martian air for two hours, continuously removing the carbon dioxide, which makes up 95% of the planet’s atmosphere. This left a concentrated sample of methane that TLS could easily measure by passing an infrared laser beam through it many times, one that’s tuned to use a precise wavelength of light that is absorbed by methane.

“John predicted that methane should effectively go down to zero during the day, and our two daytime measurements confirmed that,” said Paul Mahaffy, the principal investigator of SAM, who’s based at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. TLS’ nighttime measurement fit neatly within the average the team had already established. “So that’s one way of putting to bed this big discrepancy,” Mahaffy said.

While this explains the data conflict, it does not yet explain where the methane is coming from. It is suspected it is coming from underground, but why and from what is still unclear. Nor do scientists yet understand why it doesn’t accumulate enough in the atmosphere for Trace Gas Orbiter to detect it. Something is causing the methane to break up sooner than expected.

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Russia: Progress freighter and SpaceX rocket/satellite to have near miss

9:00 am

According to a Russia news outlet, their just launched Progress freighter will have a near miss today prior to its docking with ISS with two SpaceX objects, a Falcon 9 upper stage and a decommissioned Starlink satellite.

The Progress spacecraft, which carries about 3,600 lbs. (1,633 kilograms) of cargo including food, fuel and other supplies to the orbital outpost, launched from Roscomos’ Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 7:27 p.m. EDT (2327 GMT) on Tuesday (June 29). Progress 78 will approach the two objects about three and a half hours before its docking at the International Space Station, which is scheduled for 9:02 p.m. EDT on July 1 (0102 July 2 GMT).

The close approach, which triggered a potential collision alert, was detected by the Roscosmos TsNIIMash Main Information and Analytical Center of the Automated System for Warning of Hazardous Situations in Near-Earth Space (ASPOS OKP), Roscosmos said in the statement issued on the space agency’s website Wednesday (June 30) at 7:47 a.m. EDT (1147 GMT).

Based on preliminary calculations, the Starlink 1691 satellite will be just 0.9 miles (1.5 kilometers) away from Progress 78 on Thursday (July 1) at 5:32 p.m. EDT (2132 GMT). Three minutes later, a fragment of a Falcon 9 rocket booster left in orbit in 2020 is expected to approach the spaceship within 0.3 miles (500 meters).

Based on that timetable, the near miss has already occurred. No word yet on whether there were any issues.

What is interesting is that Russia should have known this prior to launch. It is routine procedure to consider known orbital objects in scheduling liftoffs. Either they knew and decided to purposely fly this close for political reasons (it allows them to slam SpaceX while also touting the dangers of space junk) or had not done their due diligence before launch.

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Hubble update: Engineers narrow possible failed hardware to one of two units

5:09 pm

Engineers working to pinpoint the cause of the computer hardware issue that has placed the Hubble Space Telescope in safe mode since June 13th have now narrowed the possible failed hardware to one of two units.

The source of the computer problem lies in the Science Instrument Command and Data Handling (SI C&DH) unit, where the payload computer resides. A few hardware pieces on the SI C&DH could be the culprit(s).

The team is currently scrutinizing the Command Unit/Science Data Formatter (CU/SDF), which sends and formats commands and data. They are also looking at a power regulator within the Power Control Unit, which is designed to ensure a steady voltage supply to the payload computer’s hardware. If one of these systems is determined to be the likely cause, the team must complete a more complicated operations procedure to switch to the backup units. This procedure would be more complex and riskier than those the team executed last week, which involved switching to the backup payload computer hardware and memory modules. To switch to the backup CU/SDF or power regulator, several other hardware boxes on the spacecraft must also be switched due to the way they are connected to the SI C&DH unit.

Over the next week or so, the team will review and update all of the operations procedures, commands and other related items necessary to perform the switch to backup hardware. They will then test their execution against a high-fidelity simulator.

The team performed a similar switch in 2008, which allowed Hubble to continue normal science operations after a CU/SDF module failed.

That such a switch was done successfully in the past is a very hopeful sign. However, it sounds as though they are not 100% sure they have pinpointed the actual issue, which means that this switch still might not fix the problem.

We can only wait and hope. And even if the fix works, Hubble will no longer have working backup units for these pieces of hardware. Should any of the backup that are now being activated fail, the telescope will fail, and this time it won’t be fixable with the equipment on board.

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SpaceX successfully launches 88 smallsats, marking a renaissance in rocketry in 2021

1:07 pm

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First stage landing at Cape Canaveral today

Capitalism in space: SpaceX today successfully used its Falcon 9 rocket to place 88 smallsats into orbit, the third rocket launch today.

While Transporter-2 won’t beat the unprecedented number of satellites launched on on Transporter-1 [the first such smallsat launch by SpaceX earlier this year], SpaceX says it will still “launch 88 spacecraft to orbit” and – more importantly – carry more customer mass. In other words, Transporter-2 will carry roughly 50% fewer satellites, each of which will weigh substantially more on average.

Ordering directly through SpaceX, [the price] begins at $1 million for up to 200 kg (~440 lb). … A majority of small satellites weigh significantly less than 200 kilograms but if a customer manages to use all of their allotment, the total cost of a SpaceX rideshare launch could be as low as $5000 per kilogram – incredibly cheap relative to almost any other option. For a [comparable] launch … on a Rocket Lab Electron or Astra Rocket 3.0 rocket using every last gram of available performance, the same customer would end up paying a minimum of $25,000 to $37,500 per kilogram to orbit.

The launch also included a handful of Starlink satellites, adding to SpaceX’s constellation. I have embedded SpaceX’s live stream below the fold. As I write this the satellites have not yet been deployed from the second stage, but that should happen shortly.

The first stage landed successfully, the eighth time this booster has done so. The fairings were also reused, completing their third flight. All told, this was SpaceX’s 20th launch in 2021, 18 of which used reused boosters.

The leaders in the 2021 launch race:
» Read more

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Astronomers detect a white dwarf that is both the smallest and most massive ever found

10:04 am

Using an array of telescopes on the ground and in space, astronomers have discovered a white dwarf star that is both the smallest ever found while also being the most massive.

White dwarfs are the collapsed remnants of stars that were once about eight times the mass of our Sun or lighter. Our Sun, for example, after it first puffs up into a red giant in about 5 billion years, will ultimately slough off its outer layers and shrink down into a compact white dwarf. About 97 percent of all stars become white dwarfs.

While our Sun is alone in space without a stellar partner, many stars orbit around each other in pairs. The stars grow old together, and if they are both less than eight solar-masses, they will both evolve into white dwarfs.

The new discovery provides an example of what can happen after this phase. The pair of white dwarfs, which spiral around each other, lose energy in the form of gravitational waves and ultimately merge. If the dead stars are massive enough, they explode in what is called a type Ia supernova. But if they are below a certain mass threshold, they combine together into a new white dwarf that is heavier than either progenitor star. This process of merging boosts the magnetic field of that star and speeds up its rotation compared to that of the progenitors.

Astronomers say that the newfound tiny white dwarf, named ZTF J1901+1458, took the latter route of evolution; its progenitors merged and produced a white dwarf 1.35 times the mass of our Sun. The white dwarf has an extreme magnetic field almost 1 billion times stronger than our Sun’s and whips around on its axis at a frenzied pace of one revolution every seven minutes (the zippiest white dwarf known, called EPIC 228939929, rotates every 5.3 minutes).

Based on their present understanding of stellar evolution, single white dwarfs do not form from stars with more than 1.3 solar masses. Stars with greater masses instead become neutron stars, or black holes. To get a white dwarf of 1.35 masses thus requires a merger of two white dwarfs, but it also means that the resulting dwarf could be unstable and could collapse into a neutron star at some point. The data also suggests that this merger process might be how a large number of neutron stars actually form.

The dwarf is also the smallest ever found, with a diameter of 2,670 miles, because the larger masses squeezes it into a tighter space.

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Dust covering solar panels threatens to end InSight mission

9:52 am

The InSight science team has revealed that the amount of dust that presently covers the solar panels on the Mars lander has now reduced their available power by about 80%, and if a dust devil doesn’t soon blow the dust off they will have to shut the spacecraft down sometime in the next ten months.

“The dust accumulation on the solar arrays has been considerable. We have about 80% obscuration of the arrays,” said Bruce Banerdt, principal investigator for the InSight mission at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California, according to SpaceNews.

Banerdt showed the impact of the declining power levels during a June 21 meeting of NASA’s Mars Exploration Program Analysis Group. When InSight landed near the Martian equator in November 2018, he said, the robot was generating roughly 5,000 watt-hours of power. Today that level is less than 700 watt-hours.

None of this is a surprise. Both the Opportunity and Spirit rovers faced the same problems. Both however were able to recover because periodically a dust devil would fly over the rover and clear the dust from the solar panels.

InSight however has not so far been lucky. While it has seen many nearby dust devils with its camera, none has come close enough to sweep the solar panels clean.

As the power has declined they have shut off various systems in order to keep the lander’s prime instrument, its seismometer, operating continuously. Engineers have also been using the scoop on the lander’s robot arm to try to dislodge some of the dust, with only a very very limited success. If the panels are not cleared soon, however, engineers will eventually be forced to shut everything down.

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Gravitational wave detectors see two different black holes as they swallowed a neutron star

9:41 am

Astronomers using three different gravitational wave detectors have seen the gravity ripples caused when two different black holes swallowed a nearby neutron star.

The two gravitational-wave events, dubbed GW200105 and GW200115, rippled through detectors only 10 days apart, on January 5, 2020, and January 15, 2020, respectively.

Each merger involved a fairly small black hole (less than 10 Suns in heft) paired with an object between 1½ and 2 solar masses — right in the expected range for neutron stars. Observers caught no glow from the collisions, but given that both crashes happened roughly 900 million light-years away, spotting a flash was improbable, even if one happened — and it likely didn’t: The black holes are large enough that they would have gobbled the neutron stars whole instead of ripping them into bite-size pieces.

Note the time between the detection, in early 2020, and its announcement now, in mid-2021. The data is very complex and filled with a lot of noise, requiring many months of analysis to determine if a detection was made. For example, in a third case one detector was thought to have seen another such merger but scientists remain unsure. It might simply be noise in the system. I point this out to emphasize that thought they are much more confident in these new detections, there remains some uncertainty.

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SpaceX launch scrubbed because airplane strayed into what Musk calls “an unreasonably gigantic” launch zone.

9:33 am

Capitalism in space: Yesterday a SpaceX Falcon 9 launch was scrubbed mere seconds before launch because an airplane had been detected inside the government’s keep-out zone.

The scrub was called by the range officer at T-11 seconds. SpaceX will attempt the launch again today.

Musk immediately blasted the size of that keep-out zone, which was established decades ago at the very beginnings of the space race and has not been adjusted as launch technology has improved.

“Unfortunately, launch is called off for today, as an aircraft entered the ‘keep out zone,’ which is unreasonably gigantic,” Musk tweeted Tuesday afternoon. “There is simply no way that humanity can become a spacefaring civilization without major regulatory reform. The current regulatory system is broken.”

Musk has successfully forced the range to accept new technology that simplifies launches, makes it possible for them to occur faster with less time in-between, and requires fewer range officials monitoring the launch. He is now pushing them to rethink the size of the range, which is likely much larger than now necessary, as Musk claims, because not only are rockets more reliable, their programming is more precise.

The article at the link also notes as an aside at the end another Musk tweet, that SpaceX’s Starlink network now has 70,000 customers and hopes to have 500,000 within a year. More on that story here.

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Russians launch Progress freighter; Virgin Orbit launches seven commercial satellites

9:04 am

This morning two launches occurred. First the Russians successfully launched a Progress freighter to ISS, using their Soyuz-2 rocket.

Second, Virgin Orbit successfully completed its second orbital launch with its air-launched LauncherOne rocket, which was its first operational commercial launch, placing seven smallsats into orbit for three customers. This was also its second launch in 2021.

If all goes as planned, SpaceX will complete a third launch today also, placing more than 80 smallsats in orbit with its Falcon 9 rocket. Until then, however, the leaders in the 2021 launch race are as follows:

19 SpaceX
18 China
10 Russia
3 Northrop Grumman

The U.S. now leads China 28-18 in the national rankings.

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Comet spewed out an unusual amount of alcohol during solar flyby

1:04 pm

A review of the data gathered when Comet 46P/Wirtanen made its close fly-by of the Sun in 2018 has found that the comet released an unusual amount of alcohol during that flyby.

The data also showed that the temperature of the comet’s coma did not cool as much as expected at larger distances from the comet.

“46P/Wirtanen has one of the highest alcohol-to-aldehyde ratios measured in any comet to date,” said Neil Dello Russo, a cometary scientist at Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory and co-author of the study. “This tells us information about how carbon, oxygen, and hydrogen molecules were distributed in the early solar system where Wirtanen formed.”

Keck Observatory data also revealed a strange characteristic. Normally, as comets orbit closer to the Sun, the frozen particles in their nucleus heat up, then boil off, or sublimate, going directly from solid ice to gas, skipping the liquid phase. This process, called outgassing, is what produces the coma – a giant cloak of gas and dust glowing around the comet’s nucleus. As the comet gets even closer to the Sun, solar radiation pushes some of the coma away from the comet, creating the tails.

With comet 46P/Wirtanen however, the team made a strange discovery: Another process beyond solar radiation is mysteriously heating up the comet.

“Interestingly, we found that the temperature measured for water gas in the coma did not decrease significantly with distance from the nucleus, which implies a heating mechanism,” said co-author Erika Gibb, professor and chair of the Department of Physics and Astronomy at University of Missouri–St. Louis.

They have theories about why they got these results, such as a chemical reaction with sunlight or the presence of large ice chunks breaking off the comet that reflect light and increase the ambient temperature of the coma. Nothing is confirmed however.

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First orbital Raptor engine delivered to Boca Chica

10:59 am

Capitalism in space: SpaceX has delivered to its Boca Chica launch site the first Raptor vacuum engine optimized for orbital operation.

The Starship prototype that will use this engine, as well as fly on the first orbital test flight, is #20.

While most of S20’s upgrades are a mystery, the ship’s thrust dome – spotted in work at Boca Chica earlier this month – has already confirmed that the prototype will be the first with the necessary hardware for Raptor Vacuum engine installation. That likely means that S20 will also be the first Starship to attempt to static fire six Raptor engines*, potentially producing more thrust than a Falcon 9 booster. On June 27th, one such vacuum-optimized Raptor (RVac) arrived in Boca Chica for the first time ever, making it clear that the comparatively brand new engine may already be ready to start integrated Starship testing.

*Update: SpaceX CEO Elon Musk says that the Raptor Vacuum delivered to Boca Chica on June 27th is, in fact, meant for Starship S20, seemingly confirming that the prototype will fly with a full six Raptor engines.

While this delivery as well as statements by both Musk and Gwynn Shotwell, SpaceX CEO, all point to an intended orbital test flight in July, the article at the link outlines the many tasks still undone that must be completed before that flight, all of which suggest that it will be August at the earliest before that flight can happen.

Nonetheless, SpaceX is barreling forward toward that first orbital flight, with clearly a goal to beat SLS’s first orbital flight, presently scheduled for November.

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Study: Venus’ atmosphere too dry for life

8:43 am

The uncertainty of science: A new study has found that the amount of water in Venus’ atmosphere is too low to support the possibility of life.

On Earth, Hallsworth said, microorganisms can survive and proliferate in droplets of water in the atmosphere when temperatures allow. However, the findings of the new study, based on data from several Venus probes, leave zero chance of anything living in the clouds of Venus, he said.

“Living systems including microorganisms are composed mainly of water and without being hydrated, they can’t be active and are unable to proliferate,” Hallsworth said.

Studies on microorganisms living in extreme conditions on Earth found that life can exist at temperatures as cold as minus 40 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 40 degrees Celsius). For water activity, which is measured on the scale from 0 to 1, the lowest survivable value is 0.585. The water activity level found in the molecules in the Venusian clouds was merely 0.004.

NASA Ames astrobiologist Chris McKay, one of the co-authors of the paper, said in the news conference that the findings of the study were conclusive and the new fleet of space missions currently being prepared for Venus will not change anything about the hope for life on Earth’s closest neighbor.

McKay can be as “conclusive” as he wants, but that really isn’t how science works. While this data is very strong evidence that there is no life on Venus, a result that should be expected given its harsh environment, it can’t preclude for certain the possibility. You can’t prove a negative in science.

At the same time, this paper puts another nail in the coffin of that very weak result, since found even weaker, in September 2020 that suggested the presence of phosphine in the atmosphere that suggested the possibility of life.

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Paisley terrain on Mars

1:56 pm

paisley terrain on Mars
Click for full image.

Cool image time! The photo to the right, cropped and reduced to post here, is actually a somewhat old image from the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). It was taken more than a decade ago, on December 28, 2010, and featured as a captioned image one month later. I post it now because it was recently featured as MRO’s picture of the day, and thought it deserved a new look. As the caption from 2010, written by planetary scientist Alfred McEwen, noted,

Remember those paisley shirts during the summer of love in 1967? If so, this terrain may look somewhat familiar.

How did this terrain really form? One theory is that it’s a landslide deposit, perhaps associated with draining an ancient lake.

The overview map below might help make sense of this theory.
» Read more

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OneWeb signs deal with BT, Britain’s biggest telecommunications company

9:08 am

Capitalism in space: OneWeb has signed a deal with BT (formerly British Telecom) where BT will test the use of OneWeb’s satellites to provide internet to remote regions in Great Britain.

The tie-up with Oneweb will come as a major boost to BT as it ramps up its efforts to roll out full-fibre broadband across the country. The telecoms giant recently hiked its target to 25m premises by the end of 2026. However, BT has previously warned that regulatory hurdles and geographic challenges could slow down the project. The companies said they would explore how a partnership could boost capacity, mobile resilience, backhaul and coverage in remote locations.

This means that OneWeb and SpaceX’s Starlink are now in direct competition for customers in the rural areas of Great Britain. While a Starlink customer uses their own dish to communicate directly to the SpaceX satellite constellation, OneWeb is designed to have many nearby customers first link via a ground network to a much larger single dish, in this case something that BT would provide, which will then send the data to the satellite constellation.

I have no idea which design is better. For customers however the existence of two options is great, and will guarantee better service and lower prices.

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Scientists question existence of liquid water lake under Martian south pole

8:56 am

The uncertainty of science: A re-analysis of the ground-penetrating radar data that suggested there was a liquid water lake under the Martian south pole has found that it might not be liquid water at all, but either “clays, metal-bearing minerals, or saline ice.”

The abstract can be read here.

The radar data, obtained by the European orbiter Mars Express, definitely shows a layer of bright reflection suggesting a layer of something different below the icecap. The research team decided to find out if other things besides liquid water could cause the difference.

They were able to determine what level of electric conductivity the material below the ice would need to have to match the observed signal from MARSIS. Then, they identified materials that are both conductive and present on Mars including clays, metal-bearing minerals and saline ice. “Salty ice or conductive minerals at the base of the ice sheet are less flashy, but are more in line with the extremely cold temperatures at Mars’ poles,” Bierson said.

While not explicitly excluding a liquid brine, the results open new potential explanations for the observed strong radar reflections, some of which do not require liquid brine beneath the Martian south polar ice cap.

Nothing is proven, one way or another. This research has simply underlined the uncertainty of the liquid water claim. We simply do not know what caused the bright radar reflection. All we know for certainty is that it is there.

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China releases more images & videos from Zhurong

10:33 am

Zhurong panorama looking north, June 27, 2021
Click for full image.

Overview map
Click for full image.

China today released a new panorama as well as several videos taken by its Mars rover Zhurong.

The videos show the rover’s landing as well as two short videos taken from the remote camera it had dropped off shortly after deployment from its lander, the first showing the rover moving away and the second showing it turning in place.. China also released sound recorded during that deployment, as the rover rolled down the ramps. The sound was of course enhanced, but it does allow scientists to learn something about the atmosphere of Mars.

The image above is a cropped section from the panorama. The map to the right, taken on June 11th by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), has been annotated by me to show the area I think is seen by this section of that panorama, looking due north. (For a higher resolution version that clearly shows the rover’s tracks since leaving the lander, go here.)

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Hubble update: Still no solution

2:02 pm

An update today from the engineers trouble-shooting the problem on the Hubble Space Telescope that put it into safe mode on June 13 continue to show the problem is complex, and has not yet been traced to its source.

Additional tests performed on June 23 and 24 included turning on the backup computer for the first time in space. The tests showed that numerous combinations of [a number of] hardware pieces from both the primary and backup payload computer all experienced the same error – commands to write into or read from memory were not successful.

Since it is highly unlikely that all individual hardware elements have a problem, the team is now looking at other hardware as the possible culprit, including the Command Unit/Science Data Formatter (CU/SDF), another module on the SI C&DH [the module that holds the telescope’s computers]. The CU formats and sends commands and data to specific destinations, including the science instruments. The SDF formats the science data from the science instruments for transmission to the ground. The team is also looking at the power regulator to see if possibly the voltages being supplied to hardware are not what they should be. A power regulator ensures a steady constant voltage supply. If the voltage is out of limits, it could cause the problems observed.

They remain hopeful they can find the problem and fix it, though the longer it takes the more worrisome it becomes.

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Many of Mars’ geological mysteries, all in one photo

1:06 pm

Knobs, streaks, and lava channels on Mars
Click for full image.

Today’s cool image is fun because it contains a plethora of Martian mysteries, all packed into a very small space. The photo to the right was taken on April 29, 2021 by the high resolution camera on Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO). I have rotated, cropped, and reduced it to post here.

The uncaptioned picture was labeled “Small Channel Winding between Knobs in Tartarus Colles.” The knobs, which can be seen on either side of the thin channel within the canyon, are actually a major Martian puzzle. Tartarus Colles has a lot of them, and planetary geologists are not really sure how they formed. One 2009 paper [pdf] suggested that the cones were formed by the violent interaction of lava and ice. This earlier paper [pdf] hypothesized that both water and lava had to be flowing over the surface at the same time, producing the steam and the energy that popped the lava cones, kind of like the small convection bubbles seen when tomato sauce simmers.

The scientific literature however is not deep, and there appears to be much uncertainty about this conclusion.

The photo however contains other major Martian puzzles.
» Read more

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Astronomers discover “comet” bigger than the largest comets approaching inner solar system

9:25 am

Astronomers have discovered an object 80 to 100 miles in diameter, larger than the largest comets, approaching the inner solar system and coming from the theorized Oort Cloud of material thought to exist between a tenth and a third of a light year from the Sun.

The object is probably rich in ice like a comet and is currently around three billion kilometres from the Sun. It will reach its closest point, known as perihelion, in 2031. At that time, it will be positioned below the plane of the solar system, near the orbit of Saturn.

Part of the interest in C/2014 UN271 is that it may be something of a transition object. Astronomers believe that many of the long period comets, that occasionally appear with bright tails, actually come from the Oort Cloud. Stars wandering near the Sun can nudge these objects from their positions and over millennia they work their way inwards, with the gravity of the giant planets tweaking their paths on each visit until they reside where we see them today.

“The fact that [C/2014 UN271] has a perihelion so far away from the Sun might be telling us that it’s done this a couple of times but is still in that process of eventually becoming some of those long period comets we know and love,” explains Meg Schwamb a Kuiper Belt and Oort Cloud expert at Queen’s University Belfast.

Initially astronomers thought because of its size that it was not a comet, but new observations have detected the first signs of a coma, suggesting that it will provide us a very interesting and extended show when it reaches its closest point in 2031. Because that perihelion is around the orbit of Saturn, the object will not be traveling very fast, so its passage through the inner solar system will take several years. Its size also suggests it will have a lot of material that can sublimate off to produce a tail.

The object was discovered by two astronomers, Gary Bernstein and Pedro Bernardinelli. If it turns out to be a comet it will then be named Comet Bernardinelli-Bernstein, or Comet B-B for short.

UPDATE: It is official. The object is now officially a comet, and named Comet Bernardinelli-Bernstein.

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FAA approves commercial launch license for Virgin Galactic

9:09 am

Capitalism in space: FAA today approved Virgin Galactic’s commercial launch license, allowing it to fly commercial paying tourists on its suborbital spacecraft, VSS Unity.

When Virgin Galactic will begin doing so remains uncertain. There have been rumors that the company is thinking of quickly scheduling a flight carrying Richard Branson for July 4th, thus beating Jeff Bezos’s planned July 20th into space. However, the company has denied this, referring back to its announced schedule.

Virgin Galactic has previously set out a schedule for this year, as it continues to mold the kind of service it plans to offer its commercial customers. This would see four of the company’s employees climb aboard Unity (along with the two pilots) for the next flight, to get a sense of the experience that future ticketed passengers will enjoy.

The flight after that is likely to see Sir Richard himself go to the edge of space, as a statement of readiness for commercial service.

And it’s then on the subsequent outing that the company is expected to start earning revenue from carrying people – although this is a mission that has been block booked by the Italian Air Force, which is going to put several payload specialists aboard Unity to supervise a number of microgravity experiments.

Regardless of when Branson’s first flight will be, that first commercial flight will come about fourteen years after the date Branson first predicted for such a flight. In 2004 he predicted he would fly by 2007 after hundreds of test flights, followed then by more hundreds of commercial flights each year. None of that ever happened, nor does it look like the flight numbers will ever approach his prediction.

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Curiosity’s mountainous view

11:48 am

Curiosity's view uphill on June 23, 2021
Click for full resolution panorama. Note: Navarro Mt is about 450 feet high.

The travels of Curiosity at the base of Mount Sharp continue. In the past week, since my last update on June 16th, the rover has moved west past the entrance to Gediz Vallis to now sit at the base of Raphael Navarro Mountain, as shown by the panorama above. To get a sense of how far the rover has traveled in the past week, compare this panorama with the one posted then. It is also clear now that they are slowly returning to their planned route, and will not push up into Gediz Vallis as I speculated in that post.

The panorama is created from three photos taken by Curiosity’s navigation camera, found here, here, and here.

The map below the fold gives the context.
» Read more

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Chinese official outlines that country’s Mars exploration plan

10:02 am

The new colonial movement: According to an official from China’s prime rocket manufacturer, China is now beginning to plan for the manned exploration of Mars.

Wang Xiaojun, head of the state-owned China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology (CALT), outlined the plans in his speech themed “The Space Transportation System of Human Mars Exploration” at the Global Space Exploration Conference (GLEX 2021) via a virtual link, the academy told the Global Times on Wednesday.

After reviewing the successful mission of the Tianwen-1 probe mission, the country’s first interplanetary exploration that achieved a successful orbiting, landing and roving the Red Planet all in one go, Wang introduced the three-step plan for future Mars expedition.

At the primary stage, or the technology preparation phase, androids will be launched whose mission include a Mars sample return mission and the exploration of a Mars base site. Next will be a manned Mars mission, and the building of a Mars base will be carried out. The third stage will be attempting shuttling large scale Earth-Mars cargo fleet and large scale development of the Red Planet.

The timetable for such mission launches will be 2033, 2035, 2037, 2041 and 2043, among others, the academy said.

While this is very far in the future, you can’t make it happen if you don’t get started early. China’s government is clearly looking at getting started, and appears to be following the same timetable approach it did for its space station. They began planning it about a decade ago, and are now launching and assembling it.

China’s decision to aim for Mars proves that the competition to get there is heating up considerably, and is likely their response to Elon Musk’s determined effort to make it possible.

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Balloon company begins selling tickets for high-altitude flights

9:53 am

Capitalism in space: The Florida-based balloon company Space Perspectives has announced that it is now selling tickets for high-altitude flights on its Neptune balloon vehicle, beginning in ’24.

From the company’s press release:

Introducing a new era in luxury travel experiences: Space Perspective reimagines the thrill of space exploration with the world’s most radically gentle voyage to space. Space Explorers and travel adventurers looking to upgrade their bucket list can now savor 360-degree views of planet Earth from 20 mi/30 km above in a luxurious six hour trip, inside Spaceship Neptune, propelled by a state-of-the-art spaceballoon the size of a football stadium. Up to eight guests can have the sensational experience from the comfort of plush, reclining seats in a beautifully appointed capsule, complete with a bar and a bathroom, for $125,000 each.

To secure your seat you need to send them a $1,000 deposit. The entire flight will take about six hours, with about two at the highest elevation.

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2,000 nearby stars found that see the Earth cross in front of the Sun

9:47 am

Astronomers have identified 2,134 nearby stars that at some point in the past, present, or future are properly positioned along the solar system’s ecliptic so that the Earth can be seen transiting in front of the Sun.

From their paper’s abstract:

[W]e report that 1,715 stars within 100 parsecs from the Sun are in the right position to have spotted life on a transiting Earth since early human civilization (about 5,000 years ago), with an additional 319 stars entering this special vantage point in the next 5,000 years. Among these stars are seven known exoplanet hosts, including Ross-128, which saw Earth transit the Sun in the past, and Teegarden’s Star and Trappist-1, which will start to see it in 29 and 1,642 years, respectively. We found that human-made radio waves have already swept over 75 of the closest stars on our list. [emphasis mine]

I like the detail highlighted. Of the stars that could definitely identify the Earth by transits, 75 are also now close enough to have also heard our radio broadcasts. Should any of those stars also have a sufficiently advanced alien civilization, they could know of our existence. These same stars in turn make for very good targets of study for us to see if there is alien life there.

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ULA to temporarily stop using new engine nozzle because of vibration issue

9:31 am

Capitalism in space: Because of an unexpected vibration issue seen during its first launches, ULA engineers have decided to temporarily stop using a new engine nozzle developed for the upper stage of both its Atlas 5 and new Vulcan rocket.

ULA’s CEO Tory Bruno said June 23 that the company is studying the data from the flight and has not yet decided what corrective action, if any, it might take. In the meantime, the new version of the RL10 [engine] with the carbon nozzle extension will not be used in upcoming Atlas 5 missions, Bruno said during a talk at the Secure World Foundation’s Summit for Space Sustainability.

Concerns about vibrations in the engine led ULA to delay the launch of the Space Force STP-3 mission that had been scheduled for June 23 and was planned to fly with the enhanced RL10. The company has not announced a new launch date for STP-3. ULA first plans to launch Boeing’s Starliner Orbital Flight Test 2 mission to the International Space Station scheduled for July 30. “It’ll be several missions, probably next year” before ULA decides whether to fly the RL10 configuration with the nozzle extension, said Bruno. The company wants to be “fully satisfied that we understand it.”

Below the fold is the live stream from that May launch, cued to show that vibration. It is their intention to go back to the older nozzle configuration for the next few launches.
» Read more

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Study proposes new radiation standards in space

9:14 am

Health limits of radiation for space missions

A new report issued today from the National Academies of Science is recommending that NASA adopt a new health standard for limiting the exposure of astronauts to radiation during long space missions. The new standard, based on a maximum accumulative dosage of 600, is indicated by the figure to the right, taken from the report [pdf] and annotated to show both the new recommendation as well as the standards used by other space-faring nations.

The key result of this change is expressed in the report in this one sentence:
» Read more

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Ingenuity completes 8th flight, moving south with Perseverance

10:19 am

Perservance's location, June 17, 2021
Click for interactive map.

On June 21, 2021 the Mars helicopter Ingenuity successfully completed its eighth flight, leapfrogging south past the rover Perseverance.

During the flight, Ingenuity remained aloft for 77.4 seconds, flew 525 feet (160 meters), and landed about 440 feet (133.5 m) away from its companion, the Perseverance rover, according to a tweet from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, which operates the helicopter.

The map to the right, annotated by me from the interactive map provided by the Perseverance team, shows the helicopter’s approximate new position, labeled #8 in green. The other green numbers show its previous landing spots after earlier flights.

The white line shows Perseverance’s travels through June 17th. The yellow dashed line shows their planned route over the next few months. Perseverance was just slightly north of Ingenuity on that date. It has likely traveled further south since then.

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A detailed look at Russia’s suffering and shrinking space program

9:46 am

Link here. The article starts off outlining Russia’s deepening inability to produce the computer chips it needs for its space effort, acerbated by sanctions imposed against that country because of its invasion of the Ukraine. It then goes on to describe the program’s overall financial problems, including its shrinking commercial market share resulting in a significant drop in income.

The article’s conclusion is stark:

If Moscow is unable to reach a new space deal with Washington, it will need to reconsider its space policy. But Russia has little wiggle room to increase federal spending on space activities to boost the industry. For instance, the government’s space program for 2016–2025 received $11.1 billion in 2016–2020 and will obtain another $10.2 billion in 2021–2025. The federal program for launch sites (2017–2025) secured $1.4 billion in 2017–2020 and will take in a further $2.83 billion in 2021–2025 (Economy.gov.ru, 2016–2021). The 2012–2020 GLONASS program received almost $5.1 billion, and $6.45 billion more is planned for the GLONASS program in 2021–2030 (RBC, December 21, 2020). Thus, without an international cooperation deal, and as long as Western sanctions are maintained, prospects for Russia’s space industry look bleak.

Russia has recently been working to establish a partnership with China and its effort to build a space station and a lunar base. That partnership however is not likely to provide Russia with any cash, which means the deal is an empty one. While China will continue to proceed to the Moon, I doubt Russia will follow with much.

It has also been trying to rework its American partnership, with Rogozin acting alternatively as a good guy/bad guy in public declarations. Since Russia opposes the Artemis Accords, and the Biden administration is continuing the Trump administration’s demand that all partners in the Artemis program agree to these accords, those negotiations are not likely to get Russia much. Moreover, NASA policy today is to feed money to American private companies so that they can grow, not feed money to Russia so that it can prosper.

Until Russia starts allowing free competition and private enterprise, outside the control of Roscosmos and the government, do not expect much of this Russian bad news to change. While China might strictly supervise the goals of its private space companies, it still encourages them to compete and innovate, and even fail. Russia not only strictly supervises, it also forbids any new startups from forming, as they might do harm to already established players. The result is no new innovation, and no new products of any real value.

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