OrbitalHub

NASA dicit:

Scientists have reached a new frontier in our understanding of pulsars, the dense, whirling remains of exploded stars, thanks to observations from NASA’s Neutron star Interior Composition Explorer (NICER). Data from this X-ray telescope aboard the International Space Station has produced the first precise and dependable measurements of both a pulsar’s size and its mass.

The pulsar in question, J0030+0451 (J0030 for short), is a solitary pulsar that lies 1,100 light-years away in the constellation Pisces. While measuring the pulsar’s heft and proportions, NICER revealed that the shapes and locations of million-degree hot spots on the pulsar’s surface are much stranger than generally thought.

Using NICER observations, two groups of scientists mapped J0030’s hot spots using independent methods and converged on nearly identical results for its mass and size. One team, led by researchers at the University of Amsterdam, determined the pulsar is around 1.3 times the Sun’s mass, 15.8 miles (25.4 kilometers) across and has two hot spots — one small and circular, the other long and crescent-shaped. A second team found J0030 is about 1.4 times the Sun’s mass, about 16.2 miles (26 kilometers) wide and has two or three oval-shaped hot spots. All spots in all models are in the pulsar’s southern hemisphere — unlike textbook images where the spots lie on opposite sides other at each magnetic poles.

Video credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessinger (USRA): Producer/Jeanette Kazmierczak (University of Maryland College Park): Science Writer/Francis Reddy (University of Maryland College Park): Science Writer/Michael Lentz (USRA): Animator/Barb Mattson (University of Maryland College Park): Narrator/Zaven Arzoumanian (NASA/GSFC): Scientist

NASA dicit:

Cameras outside the International Space Station captured dramatic views of Hurricane Zeta at 12:50 p.m. Eastern time Wednesday October 28, 2020 as the storm churned 200 miles south-southwest of New Orleans packing winds of 90 miles an hour.

Zeta is expected to make landfall near New Orleans later in the day Wednesday October 28 as a Category 2 hurricane before accelerating to the northeast.

Video credit: NASA

Wikipedia dicit:

The International Space Station (ISS) is a modular space station (habitable artificial satellite) in low Earth orbit. It is a multinational collaborative project between five participating space agencies: NASA (United States), Roscosmos (Russia), JAXA (Japan), ESA (Europe), and CSA (Canada). The ownership and use of the space station is established by intergovernmental treaties and agreements. The ISS program evolved from the Space Station Freedom, an American proposal in the 1980s to construct a permanently crewed Earth-orbiting station.

The ISS serves as a microgravity and space environment research laboratory in which scientific experiments are conducted in astrobiology, astronomy, meteorology, physics, and other fields. The station is suited for testing the spacecraft systems and equipment required for possible future long-duration missions to the Moon and Mars. It is the largest artificial object in space and the largest satellite in low Earth orbit, regularly visible to the naked eye from Earth’s surface. It maintains an orbit with an average altitude of 400 kilometres (250 mi) by means of reboost manoeuvres using the engines of the Zvezda Service Module or visiting spacecraft. The ISS circles the Earth in roughly 93 minutes, completing 15.5 orbits per day.

The station is divided into two sections: the Russian Orbital Segment (ROS), operated by Russia; and the United States Orbital Segment (USOS), which is shared by many nations. Roscosmos has endorsed the continued operation of ISS through 2024, but had previously proposed using elements of the Russian segment to construct a new Russian space station called OPSEK. As of December 2018, the station is expected to operate until 2030.

Video credit: NASA

NASA dicit:

Wherever there are humans, there are microbes, too. Bacteria and fungi live all around us, in our homes, offices, industrial areas, the outdoors – even in space. People literally could not live without these tiny organisms, many of which are beneficial.

The trick is limiting the number of potentially harmful ones, particularly in a contained environment such as a spacecraft. So from the launch of the very first module of the International Space Station, NASA has monitored its microbial community.

Because the station is an enclosed system, the only way that microbes get there is hitching a ride on the contents of resupply spacecraft from Earth and on arriving astronauts. The NASA Johnson Space Center Microbiology Laboratory puts a lot of effort into knowing which microbes ride along.

Video Credit: NASA Johnson

Updated tasks on U.S. EVA 53.

Video Credit: NASA

NASA dicit:

“The SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft undocks from the International Space Station on March 8, 2019 after nearly 5 days aboard the orbiting laboratory during the company’s Demo-1 mission for NASA’s Commercial Crew Program and descends to re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere. Just over 5 hours later, the uncrewed spacecraft splashes down in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Florida and is recovered by SpaceX teams.”

Video Credit: NASA