OrbitalHub

NASA dicit:

Bee-lieve it or not NASA could send a swarm of robot bees to the Red Planet. Researchers are taking inspiration from the insect world to develop Marsbee, a bold new idea that could enhance the exploration of Mars.

This is a research study within the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program. NIAC is a visionary and far-reaching aerospace program, one that has the potential to create breakthrough technologies for possible future space missions. However, such early stage technology developments may never become actual NASA missions.

Video credit: NASA

NASA dicit:

Dragonfly is a NASA mission to explore the chemistry and habitability of Saturn’s largest moon, Titan. The fourth mission in the New Frontiers line, Dragonfly will send an autonomously-operated rotorcraft to visit dozens of sites on Titan, investigating the moon’s surface and shallow subsurface for organic molecules and possible biosignatures. To carry out its mission, Dragonfly is equipped with a neutron spectrometer, a drill system, and a mass spectrometer, allowing scientists to make a detailed survey of Titan’s chemical makeup. Dragonfly is scheduled to launch in 2026 and arrive at Titan in 2034.

Video credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Johns Hopkins APL/Dan Gallagher (USRA): Producer, Narrator, Writer/Jonathan North (USRA): Lead Animator/Melissa Trainer (NASA/GSFC): Lead Writer, Scientist/ Michael Lentz (USRA): Animator/Ann Parsons (NASA/GSFC): Scientist/Elizabeth Turtle (Johns Hopkins University/APL): Scientist/Aaron E. Lepsch (ADNET): Technical Support

NASA dicit:

OSIRIS-REx is a NASA mission to explore near-Earth asteroid Bennu and return a sample to Earth. Prior to arriving at Bennu, mission planners had expected the asteroid’s surface to consist largely of fine-grained material, like a sandy beach. When OSIRIS-REx arrived in December 2018, however, it was greeted by a rocky world covered with boulders.

This unexpected roughness means that there are few places on Bennu where OSIRIS-REx can safely touch down and collect a sample. After a year of studying the asteroid, the mission announced a primary sample collection site, which they designated “Nightingale,” along with a backup site called “Osprey.” In August 2020, OSIRIS-REx will descend to Nightingale and attempt to collect up to four-and-a-half pounds of loose material, for return to Earth in 2023.

Video credit: NASA Goddard

NASA dicit:

Scientists have used all available New Horizons images of Arrokoth, taken from many angles, to determine its 3D shape, as shown in this animation. The shape provides additional insight into Arrokoth’s origins. The flattened shapes of each of Arrokoth’s lobes, as well as the remarkably close alignment of their poles and equators, point to an orderly, gentle merger of two objects formed from the same collapsing cloud of particles. Arrokoth has the physical features of a body that came together slowly, with ‘locally-sourced’ materials from a small part of the solar nebula. An object like Arrokoth wouldn’t have formed, or look the way it does, in a more chaotic accretion environment.

Video credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute/James Tuttle Keane

Wikipedia dicit:

NASA’s MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution) spacecraft has discovered “layers” and “rifts” in the electrically charged part of the upper atmosphere (the ionosphere) of Mars. The phenomenon is very common at Earth and causes unpredictable disruptions to radio communications. However, we do not fully understand them because they form at altitudes that are very difficult to explore at Earth. The unexpected discovery by MAVEN shows that Mars is a unique laboratory to explore and better understand this highly disruptive phenomenon.

Video credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/James Tralie (ADNET): Lead Producer, Lead Editor, Narrator/Bailee DesRocher (USRA): Lead Animator/Michael Lentz (USRA): Art Director/Jonathan North (USRA): Animator/Krystofer Kim (USRA): Animator/Jacquelyn DeMink (USRA): Animator/Bruce Jakosky (LASP): Scientist/Glyn Collinson (Catholic University of America): Scientist/Aaron E. Lepsch (ADNET): Technical Support

NASA dicit:

A new spacecraft is journeying to the Sun to snap the first pictures of the Sun’s north and south poles. Solar Orbiter, a collaboration between ESA and NASA will have its first opportunity to launch from Cape Canaveral on February 7, 2020. Launching on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket, the spacecraft will use Venus’ and Earth’s gravity to swing itself out of the ecliptic plane — the swath of space, roughly aligned with the Sun’s equator, where all planets orbit. From there, Solar Orbiter’s bird’s eye view will give it the first-ever look at the Sun’s poles.

Video credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Holly Gilbert (NASA/GSFC): Scientist/Teresa Nieves-Chinchilla (Catholic University of America): Scientist/Chris St. Cyr (NASA/GSFC): Scientist/Joy Ng (USRA): Producer/Tom Bridgman (GST): Data Visualizer/Adriana Manrique Gutierrez (USRA): Animator/Chris Smith (USRA): Animator/Joy Ng (USRA): Animator/Lisa Poje (USRA): Animator/Krystofer Kim (USRA): Animator/Brian Monroe (USRA): Animator/Miles S. Hatfield (Telophase): Writer