Lego model of ISS created while onboard the real thing
Lego bricks are beloved all the world over — now they have made it into orbit as part of a joint NASA-Lego educational project. The model of the International Space Station (ISS) was created while in orbit as a way of engaging children as to what it is like living and working in zero gravity.
I’d wager that it doesn’t come back from orbit in one piece.
via DVICE.
US backs E.U. space conduct code
The long-term sustainability of our space environment is at serious risk from space debris and irresponsible actors. Ensuring the stability, safety, and security of our space systems is of vital interest to the United States and the global community.
Unless the international community addresses these challenges, the environment around our planet will become increasingly hazardous to human spaceflight and satellite systems, which would create damaging consequences for all of us.
In response to these challenges, the United States has decided to join with the European Union and other nations to develop an International Code of Conduct for Outer Space Activities. A Code of Conduct will help maintain the long-term sustainability, safety, stability, and security of space by establishing guidelines for the responsible use of space.
via DVICE
NASA Announces Technology Demonstration Missions
The Solar Sail demonstration will:
Demonstrate the deployment of a 38m x 38m solar sail in space (quadrupling the area of the largest sail deployed and tested on the ground of 20m x 20m by L’Garde at NASA’s Plumbrook facility in Ohio).
Demonstrate attitude control plus passive stability and trim using beam-tip vanes.
Execute a navigation sequence with mission-capable accuracy.
The Future is Now! Next up: Space Elevator.
via NASA
New ISS cameras to stream live HD video of your house from space
A company called UrtheCast is going to bolt a pair of high definition video cameras with big zoom lenses onto the International Space Station. These cameras will send down live video of Earth 24/7, with a resolution comparable to Google Earth. In other words, you’ll be able to see yourself waving. From space.
I’m not sure I really dig what they used for their “live video” tagging feature, but I do like their they’re going with this.
SPACE.
via DVICE.
Check out the moon’s surface in 3D
Sure, you’ve seen photos of the moon’s surface. But have you seen them in amazing 3D? OK, maybe, but how about without having to cross your eyes? I didn’t think so. But now, if you’ve got a pair of red/green 3D glasses kicking around, you can do so right now.
ha! I just bought some red/blue glasses, going to try this out when I get home from work tonight. it’ll be awesome.
via DVICE.
What to expect when a solar storm hits Earth tomorrow
Weak power grid fluctuations that you probably won’t notice
Minor impacts on satellite operations
High frequency radio transmissions going over the pole may get lost
Slightly increased radiation exposure for high-flying aircraft at high latitudes
Birds and other migratory animals may get confused about where they should be going
Auroras visible in northern Michigan and Maine
Well that’s not worrisome at all. I’ll be in my bunker just in case though!
via DVICE.
Habitable exoplanet confirmed?
French scientists have confirmed with computer models that Gliese 581d, a planet orbiting a red dwarf star about 20 light years from here, has a stable atmosphere, comfortable temperatures, and a surface covered in liquid water. It’s the first planet orbiting another star that could definitely support life, and it’s basically next door.
I’m already packing my bags!
via DVICE.
NASA wants to fly your face in space
Fly Your Face in Space
NASA Updates Target Launch Date for STS-133 and STS-134. Click here for new dates.
NASA wants to put a picture of you on one of the two remaining space shuttle missions and launch it into orbit. To launch your face into space and become a part of history, just follow these steps:
First…Select the Participate button at the bottom of this page and upload your image/name, which will be flown aboard the space shuttle. Don’t have a picture to upload? No problem, just skip the image upload and we will fly your name only on your selected mission!
Next…Print and save the confirmation page with your flight information.
Later…Return to this site after launch to print your Flight Certificate – a commemorative certificate signed by the Mission Commander. You can also check on mission status, view mission photographs, link to various NASA educational resources and follow the commander and crew on Twitter or Facebook.
European cargo rocket to supply Space Station
PARIS, Feb. 11, 2011 (Reuters) — An unmanned Ariane rocket is scheduled to launch a cargo vessel into orbit on Tuesday in Europe’s second mission to carry supplies to the International Space Station (ISS), space officials said on Friday.
Backdropped by the blackness of space, the International Space Station is seen in this image taken by a crew member aboard the Space Shuttle Atlantis during rendezvous and docking activities in this photo released by NASA and taken November 18, 2009. REUTERS/NASA Handout
The modified Ariane launcher will lift off at 7.08 p.m. (2208 GMT) from Europe’s spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, on the northeast coast of South America, carrying a 20 tonne cargo module, the heaviest payload ever launched on an Ariane rocket.
The vessel, dubbed “Johannes Kepler” in honor of the 17th century German astronomer and mathematician, is the second Automatic Transfer Vehicle (ATV) Europe has contributed to the ISS program. The first docked with the ISS in early 2008.
The ATV is designed to deliver fuel, food, clothing and oxygen to the ISS crew as well as spare parts and is due to dock with the ISS on February 23.
Billed by the European Space Agency (ESA) as a major challenge for Europe’s space program, the ATV docks with the ISS without human intervention.
“The precision of the ATV is tremendous compared to the mass of the vehicle,” Nico Dettmann, ESA’s ATV Programme Manager said in a television interview. “We have redesigned the (cargo) racks and every rack is 50 kg (110 lb) lighter,” he said.
The ATV has three times the cargo capacity of Russia’s Progress vehicle and was developed by the ESA as part of a barter arrangement with the U.S. space agency NASA.
Instead of paying cash for its share of the station’s operating costs and also to secure additional astronaut access, ESA is providing the ATV and other components.
“A full ATV mission costs around 350 million Euros ($475 million), the ATV spacecraft itself accounting for around 200 million Euros ($270 million),” Pal Hvistendahl, ESA spokesman told Reuters.
“The program that led to the development, manufacturing, qualification and launch of ATV-1 (launched in 2008) cost 1.3 billion Euros ($1.75 billion),” he said.
Four more ATVs are planned for the space station, and NASA may buy more with the ESA as its space shuttle fleet is due to be retired after its next planned launch on February 24.
The space station, which is about 85 percent complete, is a $100 billion project by 15 nations.
NASA: The Frontier Is Everywhere
NASA is the most fascinating, adventurous, epic institution ever devised by human beings, and their media sucks. Seriously. None of their brilliant scientists appear to know how to connect with the social media crowd, which is now more important than ever. In fact, NASA is an institution whose funding directly depends on how the public views them.
Homemade Spacecraft
Homemade Spacecraft from Luke Geissbuhler on Vimeo.
Video from a camera attached to a weather balloon that rose into the
upper stratosphere and recorded the blackness of space.
Zarmina’s World
Explanation: A mere 20 light-years away in the constellation Libra, red dwarf star Gliese 581 has received much scrutiny by astronomers in recent years. Earthbound telescopes had detected the signatures of multiple planets orbiting the cool sun, two at least close to the system’s habitable zone — the region where an Earth-like planet can have liquid water on its surface. Now a team headed by Steven Vogt (UCO Lick), and Paul Butler (DTM Carnagie Inst.) has announced the detection of another planet, this one squarely in the system’s habitable zone. Based on 11 years of data, their work offers a very compelling case for the first potentially habitable planet found around a very nearby star. Shown in this artist’s illustration of the inner part of the exoplanetary system, the planet is designated Gliese 581g, but Vogt’s more personal name is Zarmina’s World, after his wife. The best fit to the data indicates the planet has a circular 37 day orbit, an orbital radius of only 0.15 AU, and a mass 3.1 times the Earth’s. Modeling includes estimates of a planet radius of 1.5, and gravity at the planet’s surface of 1.1 to 1.7 in Earth units. Finding a habitable planet so close by suggests there are many others in our Milky Way galaxy
Apparently a Goldilock’s planet. It’s seriously cool though.
Primordial Magnetic Field May Permeate the Universe
When it comes to unlocking the secrets of the universe, sometimes the devil is in the static. In the 1960s, scientists trying to find a source of radio interference discovered the microwave background radiation—extremely faint embers left over from the heat of the big bang that pervade the entire night sky. Now two physicists attempting to overcome some unexpected fuzziness in images of distant, supermassive black holes say they have found yet another potential big bang vestige: an extremely weak magnetic field that stretches across the universe. If scientists confirm the finding, it could help reveal the origins of magnetism in the cosmos.
The researchers who made the discovery found an important clue in images of the supermassive black holes that occupy the centers of most if not all galaxies. With the mass of up to a billion suns, these monsters can create havoc in their neighborhoods by gobbling up any stars, clouds of dust and gas, and even other black holes unfortunate enough to drift too close to their immense gravitational wells. As they consume matter, supermassive black holes expel gigantic amounts of energy in the form of huge jets of particles that extend well beyond their galactic confines and travel at nearly the speed of light.
In the new study, physicists Shin’ichiro Ando of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena and Alexander Kusenko of the University of California, Los Angeles, examined images of supermassive black holes collected by the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope looking for something that had been suspected for a long time but never observed: the possibility of a primordial, intergalactic magnetic field.
If it exists, such a magnetic field could scatter high-energy photons emitted from the jets of a supermassive black hole and blur images collected by detectors aboard the Fermi spacecraft just as a mist can blur an image on a photograph on Earth. The effect is so minuscule, however, that it can’t be seen with current technology on a single image of jets from a supermassive black hole. So Ando and Kusenko took Fermi data from 170 different black holes and combined them into a single, composite image. Then they compared the composite with the product of a mathematical model, showing what the image should have looked like if all of the high-energy photons from the supermassive black holes had hit Fermi’s detectors at the expected energy levels. But the real and simulated images didn’t match.
Further analysis yielded the result the two researchers were seeking: Somewhere in the vastness of space, the millions or billions of light-years between the black hole jets and Fermi’s instruments, something was indeed scattering the photons—and very, very subtly. Calculations by the researchers, published online 17 September in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, suggest that a magnetic field equivalent to about one-quadrillionth the strength of Earth’s magnetism had interacted with the photons.
…
A tad long winded, but still very interesting.
Earth Time Lapse from Space
Time lapse footage taken by Oregon State University alum Don Pettit during his time on the International Space Station. This one shows Earth from day to night.
Epic!
Three Rotations in Three Temperatures
Solar images in three different wavelengths in extreme ultraviolet light are combined together to show solar activity over almost three months (June 2 — Aug. 26, 2010). Each wavelength is shown in a different color. The wavelengths are at 211 (red – 2 million degrees), 193 (green – 1.3 million degrees), and 171 Angstroms (blue – 600,000 degrees). The cadence is basically a frame every 45 minutes. The brightest areas are active regions, which have stronger magnetic field than the surrounding area.
A Milky Way Shadow at Loch Ard Gorge
Explanation: Have you ever seen the Milky Way’s glow create shadows? To do so, conditions need to be just right. First and foremost, the sky must be relatively clear of clouds so that the long band of the Milky Way’s central disk can be seen. The surroundings must be very near to completely dark, with no bright artificial lights visible anywhere. Next, the Moon cannot be anywhere above the horizon, or its glow will dominate the landscape. Last, the shadows can best be caught on long camera exposures. In the above image taken in Port Campbell National Park, Victoria, Australia, seven 15-second images of the ground and de-rotated sky were digitally added to bring up the needed light and detail. In the foreground lies Loch Ard Gorge, named after a ship that tragically ran aground in 1878. The two rocks pictured are the remnants of a collapsed arch and are named Tom and Eva after the only two people who survived that Loch Ard ship wreck. A close inspection of the water just before the rocks will show reflections and shadows in light thrown by our Milky Way galaxy. Low clouds are visible moving through the serene scene in this movie.
Lots of cool links, check them out.
APOD
Australian laser system to track space junk
An Australian company Tuesday said it had developed a laser tracking system that will stop chunks of space debris colliding with spacecraft and satellites in the Earth’s orbit.
Sounds like this is the start of a global effort to thwart the Kessler Syndrome from happening.
via Spacemart.
Trip to Mars could leave crew dangerously weak
If a human ever sets foot on Mars, will it be a giant step or an exhausted shuffle? Long-term space flight so weakens fitness that an astronaut heading to the Red Planet may lose up to half the power in key muscles in the course of the mission, scientists have found.The loss — equivalent to a crew member aged between 30 and 50 returning home with the muscles of an 80-year-old — would add a major danger to a trip already laden with peril, they said.
Sounds like they need to keep up the gravity on their trip.
via Mars daily.
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