OrbitalHub

 


 

ESA dixit:

“The Soyuz TMA-15M spacecraft approaches the International Space Station. The spacecraft lifted off at 20:59 GMT on 23 November (21:59 CET; 02:59 local time 24 November) and reached orbit nine minutes later.

Their spacecraft docked as planned at 02:49 GMT (03:49 CET), and the hatch to their new home in space was opened at 05:00 GMT (06:00 CET).

For more information about Samantha’s Futura mission online, visit http://www.esa.int/Futura“

Credit: ESA/Roscosmos

ESA dixit:

“This animation shows changes in Earth’s magnetic field from January to June 2014 as measured by ESA’s Swarm trio of satellites.

The magnetic field protects us from cosmic radiation and charged particles that bombard Earth, but it is in a permanent state of flux. Magnetic north wanders, and every few hundred thousand years the polarity flips so that a compass would point south instead of north.

Moreover, the strength of the magnetic field constantly changes — and it is currently showing signs of significant weakening.

The field is particularly weak over the South Atlantic Ocean — known as the South Atlantic Anomaly. This weak field has indirectly caused many temporary satellite ‘hiccups’ (called Single Event Upsets) as the satellites are exposed to strong radiation over this area.

More about Swarm: http://www.esa.int/swarm“

Credit: ESA/Dot2Dot

NASA Goddard dixit:

“This supercomputer simulation shows one of the most violent events in the universe: a pair of neutron stars colliding, merging and forming a black hole. A neutron star is the compressed core left behind when a star born with between eight and 30 times the sun’s mass explodes as a supernova. Neutron stars pack about 1.5 times the mass of the sun — equivalent to about half a million Earths — into a ball just 12 miles (20 km) across.

As the simulation begins, we view an unequally matched pair of neutron stars weighing 1.4 and 1.7 solar masses. They are separated by only about 11 miles, slightly less distance than their own diameters. Redder colors show regions of progressively lower density.

As the stars spiral toward each other, intense tides begin to deform them, possibly cracking their crusts. Neutron stars possess incredible density, but their surfaces are comparatively thin, with densities about a million times greater than gold. Their interiors crush matter to a much greater degree densities rise by 100 million times in their centers. To begin to imagine such mind-boggling densities, consider that a cubic centimeter of neutron star matter outweighs Mount Everest.

By 7 milliseconds, tidal forces overwhelm and shatter the lesser star. Its superdense contents erupt into the system and curl a spiral arm of incredibly hot material. At 13 milliseconds, the more massive star has accumulated too much mass to support it against gravity and collapses, and a new black hole is born. The black hole’s event horizon — its point of no return — is shown by the gray sphere. While most of the matter from both neutron stars will fall into the black hole, some of the less dense, faster moving matter manages to orbit around it, quickly forming a large and rapidly rotating torus. This torus extends for about 124 miles (200 km) and contains the equivalent of 1/5th the mass of our sun. The entire simulation covers only 20 milliseconds.

Scientists think neutron star mergers like this produce short gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). Short GRBs last less than two seconds yet unleash as much energy as all the stars in our galaxy produce over one year.

The rapidly fading afterglow of these explosions presents a challenge to astronomers. A key element in understanding GRBs is getting instruments on large ground-based telescopes to capture afterglows as soon as possible after the burst. The rapid notification and accurate positions provided by NASA’s Swift mission creates a vibrant synergy with ground-based observatories that has led to dramatically improved understanding of GRBs, especially for short bursts.

The scientific paper this simulation is a part of can be found here: http://arxiv.org/abs/1001.3074“

Credit: David Link/Luciano Rezzolla/Michael Koppitz

 

NASA dixit:

“NASA’s Orion spacecraft is built to take humans farther than they’ve ever gone before. Orion will serve as the exploration vehicle that will carry the crew to space, provide emergency abort capability, sustain the crew during the space travel, and provide safe re-entry from deep space return velocities.

On December 4, 2014, Orion will launch atop a Delta IV Heavy rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station’s Space Launch Complex Flight Test on the Orion Flight Test: a two-orbit, four-hour flight that will test many of the systems most critical to safety.

The Orion Flight Test will evaluate launch and high speed re-entry systems such as avionics, attitude control, parachutes and the heat shield. In the future, Orion will launch on NASA’s new heavy-lift rocket, the Space Launch System. More powerful than any rocket ever built, SLS will be capable of sending humans to deep space destinations such as an asteroid and eventually Mars. Exploration Mission-1 will be the first mission to integrate Orion and the Space Launch System.”

Credit: NASA

ESA dixit:

“This short movie tells the story of Rosetta’s journey through the Solar System and its exploration of Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko so far, through the voices of some of the many people involved in this exciting mission.

ESA’s Rosetta spacecraft was launched in March 2004 and has chased down the comet for 10 years, reaching it on 6 August 2014. It is the first space mission to orbit a comet and to attempt a soft landing. It will also be the first mission to journey with a comet as they swing around the Sun throughout 2015.

In the last 10 years Rosetta has made three flybys of Earth and one of Mars, and passed by and imaged asteroids Steins and Lutetia. In June 2011, Rosetta was placed into deep-space hibernation as it cruised nearly 800 million kilometres from the warmth of the Sun, close to the orbit of Jupiter. This was necessary because not enough energy could be generated by the solar panels to keep all the spacecraft systems operating. On 20 January 2014, Rosetta woke up from hibernation and continued its journey towards the comet.

Rosetta first viewed its target from a distance in 2011. After the wake-up, the first sight of the comet came in March 2014. Since then, Rosetta scientists have been following the comet’s activity, studying it with various instruments on board. As Rosetta drew closer and closer in July, the complex shape of this double-lobed object was revealed.

After Rosetta arrived at the comet in August, it started mapping the surface in greater detail, leading to the selection of a target for the lander, Philae, in September 2014. The site, now named Agilkia after an island on the Nile river, is located on the smaller lobe of the comet.

Rosetta is scheduled to release Philae on 12 November and, seven hours later, the lander is expected to reach the comet’s surface.

Acknowledgements: The images of the comet were taken with the OSIRIS camera (ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA) and with the navigation camera (ESA/Rosetta/NavCam) on Rosetta; the self-portraits were taken with the CIVA instrument on Philae (ESA/Rosetta/Philae/CIVA); the ground-based images of the comet were taken using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope in Chile. The images of asteroids Steins and Lutetia were also taken with the OSIRIS camera.”

Credit: ESA

ESA dixit:

“Could astronauts one day be printing rather than building a base on the Moon? In 2013 ESA, working with industrial partners, proved that 3D printing using lunar material was feasible in principle. Since then, work continues to investigate the technique. The shielding against radiation provided by a 3D-printed block of simulated lunar regolith was measured, providing important inputs for next-stage designs… Soon the Agency is due to investigate another lunar 3D printing method, harnessing concentrated sunlight to melt regolith rather than using a binding liquid.

But how might lunar 3D printing one day be used in practice? Foster+Partners, contributing architectural concepts for the original study, put together this outline of a hypothetical mission to 3D-print an entire a lunar base, illustrating the design factors that steered them in their work. The rim of Shackleton Crater at the lunar south pole was chosen for the base location. The Moon’s rotation is such that the Sun only grazes its poles at low angles. The result is a near-constant ‘peak of eternal light’ along the rim of Shackleton Crater, beside regions of permanent shadow. Building in the vicinity of such a site would offer plentiful solar power, and relief from the extremes of heat and cold found across the rest of the Moon.

In reality any lunar base remains firmly on the drawing board, but each small step forward in research makes future lunar colonisation a little more feasible. In November 2014 more than 350 experts came together for a two-day Additive Manufacturing for Space Applications workshop at ESA’s ESTEC technical centre in Noordwijk, the Netherlands. They discussed the potential of 3D printing – also known as Additive Manufacturing – to transform the way the space industry operates and begin preparing common standards for its use.”

Read more about 3D-printing using Lunar soil…

Credit: ESA/Foster+Partners