OrbitalHub

NASA dixit:

“This time-lapse video, obtained June 8, 2018, shows the precise choreography of NASA’s Neutron star Interior Composition Explorer (NICER) as it studies pulsars and other X-ray sources from its perch aboard the International Space Station. NICER observes and tracks numerous sources each day, ranging from the star closest to the Sun, Proxima Centauri, to X-ray sources in other galaxies. Movement in the movie, which represents a little more than one 90-minute orbit, is sped up by 100 times.

One factor in NICER’s gyrations is the motion of the space station’s solar arrays, each of which extends 112 feet (34 meters). Long before the panels can encroach on NICER’s field of view, the instrument pirouettes to aim its 56 X-ray telescopes at a new celestial target.

As the movie o pens, the station’s solar arrays are parked to prepare for the arrival and docking of the Soyuz MS-09 flight, which launched on June 6 carrying three members of the Expedition 56 crew. Then the panels reorient themselves and begin their normal tracking of the Sun.

Neutron stars, also called pulsars, are the crushed cores left behind when massive stars explode. They hold more mass than the Sun in a ball no bigger than a city. NICER aims to discover more about pulsars by obtaining precise measures of their size, which will determine their internal make-up. An embedded technology demonstration, called Station Explorer for X-ray Timing and Navigation Technology (SEXTANT), is paving the way for using pulsars as beacons for a future GPS-like system to aid spacecraft navigation in the solar system — and beyond.”

Video Credit: NASA Goddard

ULA dixit:

“Parker Solar Probe (previously Solar Probe, Solar Probe Plus, or Solar Probe+, abbreviated PSP) is a NASA robotic spacecraft en route to probe the outer corona of the Sun. It will approach to within 8.86 solar radii (6.2 million kilometers or 3.85 million miles) from the “surface” (photosphere) of the Sun and will travel, at closest approach, as fast as 700,000 km/h (430,000 mph). ”

Video Credit: ULA

NASA dixit:

“A project jointly funded by NASA and the National Science Foundation is heading west from Seattle, straight for the twilight zone. Using two research vessels, the Export Processes in the Ocean from Remote Sensing (EXPORTS) oceanographic campaign will study the fates and carbon cycle impacts of microscopic underwater organisms.

The large multidisciplinary team, including members from more than 20 different research institutions, is accompanied by advanced underwater robotics and other instruments on a month-long campaign to study the secret lives of tiny organisms called phytoplankton, and the animals that eat them. These organisms can have a large impact on Earth’s carbon cycle, storing carbon dioxide in a part of the ocean known as the twilight zone, between 650 and 3300 feet below the surface.”

Music: Brain Machine by George Arnas [PRS] and Anticipating Rain by Samuel Smith [PRS]

Video Credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Kathryn Mersmann

NASA dixit:

“The video is compiled from a series of images taken on July 25 by the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite. The angular extent of the widest field of view is six degrees. Visible in the images are the comet C/2018 N1, asteroids, variable stars, asteroids and reflected light from Mars. TESS is expected to find thousands of planets around other nearby stars.”

Video credit: Massachusetts Institute of Technology/NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

Scott Wiessinger (USRA): Lead Producer

Aaron E. Lepsch (ADNET Systems Inc.): Technical Support

Claire Saravia (NASA/GSFC): Lead Public Affairs Officer

Jeanette Kazmierczak (University of Maryland College Park): Lead Science Writer

Padi Boyd (NASA/GSFC): Scientist

Horizons mission time-lapse – Australia and New Zealand.

Credits Video: ESA

ESA dixit:

“Housed within the European Columbus Laboratory aboard the International Space Station, the Fluid Science Laboratory is a multi-user facility designed to investigate how fluids and granules behave in space. In July 2018, the Fluid Science Laboratory received an upgrade. The new video management unit, installed by ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst in this clip, enables even more precise recording so researchers on Earth can better analyse results.”

Credits Video: ESA