OrbitalHub

NASA dicit:

Dragon 2 is a class of reusable spacecraft developed and manufactured by U.S. aerospace manufacturer SpaceX, intended as the successor to the Dragon cargo spacecraft. The spacecraft launches atop a Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket and returns via ocean splashdown. When compared to Dragon, Crew Dragon has larger windows, new flight computers and avionics, redesigned solar arrays, and a modified outer mold line.

The spacecraft has two planned variants – Crew Dragon, a human-rated capsule capable of carrying up to seven astronauts, and Cargo Dragon, an updated replacement for the original Dragon. Crew Dragon is equipped with an integrated launch escape system in a set of four side-mounted thruster pods with two SuperDraco engines each. Crew Dragon has been contracted to supply the International Space Station (ISS) with crew under the Commercial Crew Program, with the initial award occurring in October 2014 alongside Boeing CST-100 Starliner. Crew Dragon’s first non-piloted test flight to the ISS launched in March 2019.

SpaceX conducted an in-flight abort test from Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39A in Florida on 19 January 2020 at 15:30 UTC. The Crew Dragon test capsule was launched in an atmospheric flight to conduct a separation and abort scenario in the troposphere at transonic velocities, at max Q, where the vehicle experiences maximum aerodynamic pressure. The test objective was to demonstrate the ability to safely move away from the ascending rocket under the most challenging atmospheric conditions of the flight trajectory, imposing the worst structural stress of a real flight on the rocket and spacecraft. The abort test was performed using a regular Falcon 9 Block 5 rocket.

Video credit: NASA/SpaceX

NASA dicit:

NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) has discovered its first Earth-size planet in its star’s habitable zone, the range of distances where conditions may be just right to allow the presence of liquid water on the surface. Scientists confirmed the find, called TOI 700 d, using NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope and have modeled the planet’s potential environments to help inform future observations.

TOI 700 is a small, cool M dwarf star located just over 100 light-years away in the southern constellation Dorado. It’s roughly 40 of the Sun’s mass and size and about half its surface temperature. The star appears in 11 of the 13 sectors TESS observed during the mission’s first year, and scientists caught multiple transits by its three planets.

The innermost planet, called TOI 700 b, is almost exactly Earth-size, is probably rocky and completes an orbit every 10 days. The middle planet, TOI 700 c, is 2.6 times larger than Earth — between the sizes of Earth and Neptune — orbits every 16 days and is likely a gas-dominated world. TOI 700 d, the outermost known planet in the system and the only one in the habitable zone, measures 20 larger than Earth, orbits every 37 days and receives from its star 86% of the energy that the Sun provides to Earth. All of the planets are thought to be tidally locked to their star, which means they rotate once per orbit so that one side is constantly bathed in daylight.

Video Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger (USRA): Lead Producer/Chris Smith (USRA): Lead Animator/Jeanette Kazmierczak (University of Maryland College Park): Lead Science Writer/Gabrielle Engelmann-Suissa (USRA): Scientist/Barb Mattson (University of Maryland College Park): Narrator/Geronimo Villanueva (Catholic University of America): Visualizer

NASA dicit:

The animation shows RGB color images from NASA’s Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) instrument on NASA’s Aqua satellite for December 31, 2019 through January 5, 2020. A plume of brown smoke extends from the southeastern coast of Australia, over the Tasman Sea and beyond into the Pacific Ocean.

The overlaid vertical cross sections show CALIPSO lidar observations for these same days. The bright colors indicate the presence of small particles (aerosols) and the white color indicates clouds. Visible in each of the cross sections near 40 degrees south is a thick layer of smoke from the fires at altitudes above 9 miles (14.5 km). The dark shading below these layers is due to the absence of lidar signals below the opaque smoke layers. These layers contain very small particles and have optical properties similar to smoke.

The sequence of CALIPSO and MODIS tracks in the animation indicates the continued transport of the smoke layer to the east. As of Jan. 5, 2020, smoke was detected more than 4,000 miles from the source.

Video Credit: NASA Langley/Roman Kowch

NASA dicit:

This visualization shows how ultraviolet light from the first stars and galaxies gradually transformed the universe. Hydrogen atoms, also called neutral hydrogen, readily scatters UV light, preventing it from traveling very far from its sources. Gradually, intense UV light from stars and galaxies split apart the hydrogen atoms, creating expanding bubbles of ionized gas. As these bubbles grew and overlapped, the cosmic fog lifted. Astronomers call this process reionization. Here, regions already ionized are blue and translucent, areas undergoing ionization are red and white, and regions of neutral gas are dark and opaque.

Video Credit: NASA/M. Alvarez, R. Kaehler, and T. Abel (2009)

Wikipedia dicit:

The lunar phase or phase of the Moon is the shape of the directly sunlit portion of the Moon as viewed from Earth. The lunar phases gradually change over the period of a synodic month (about 29.53 days), as the orbital positions of the Moon around Earth and of Earth around the Sun shift.

The Moon’s rotation is tidally locked by Earth’s gravity; therefore, most of the same lunar side always faces Earth. This near side is variously sunlit, depending on the position of the Moon in its orbit. Thus, the sunlit portion of this face can vary from 0% (at new moon) to 100% (at full moon). The lunar terminator is the boundary between the illuminated and darkened hemispheres.

Each of the four “intermediate” lunar phases is around 7.4 days, but this varies slightly due to the elliptical shape of the Moon’s orbit. Aside from some craters near the lunar poles, such as Shoemaker, all parts of the Moon see around 14.77 days of daylight, followed by 14.77 days of “night”.

The side of the Moon facing away from Earth is sometimes called the “dark side of the Moon”, although that is a misnomer.

Video Credit: NASA

Wikipedia dicit:

The Crew Demo-2 was planned for launch in July 2019 as part of the Commercial Crew Development contract with a crew of two on a 14-day test mission to the International Space Station (ISS). It is expected to be the first American spacecraft to fly crew into orbit since STS-135 in July 2011, though depending on the success of their respective test programs this honor could go to the crewed flight test of the Boeing Starliner.

On April 20, 2019, the Crew Dragon capsule from the Demo-1 mission was destroyed during static fire testing of its SuperDraco thrusters, ahead of its planned use for an inflight abort test. SpaceX traced the cause of the static fire anomaly to a valve that leaked propellant into high pressure helium lines. As of October 23, 2019, a new static fire test is expected to take place in early November, to be followed by a drop test campaign to qualify the upgraded parachute system. If all tests are successful, the Demo-2 mission could take place during the first quarter of 2020. NASA is considering extending the duration of the mission, enabling it to perform a standard crew rotation.

Video Credit: SpaceX