OrbitalHub

Planetary Resources dixit:

“Asteroid mining is the key to our future expansion into space.

Planetary Resources is conducting the first commercial exploration of resources on near Earth asteroids.

The first resource that we’re interested in is water. Water, when you break it down into the elements Hydrogen and Oxygen, is rocket fuel – currently the best way to get around the Solar System.

In much the same way that the economic activity on Earth is enabled by fossil fuels, in space, we will have a water-based economy. The Earth’s gravity well is so deep that the cost of bringing propellant from Earth to fuel that economy in space will be prohibitive.”

Read more about how asteroid mining is the key to our future expansion into space.

Video credit: Planetary Resources

ESA dixit:

“It’s the perfect meeting of old and new. Astronomers have combined recent data from ESA’s Gaia mission with a simple analysis technique from the 18th century to discover a massive star cluster that had previously escaped detection. Subsequent investigations are helping to reveal the star-forming history of our Galaxy, the Milky Way. “

Video credit: ESA

NASA dixit:

“The first flight of an advanced supersonic parachute system for Mars 2020—NASA’s next Mars rover. This video is narrated by Ian Clark, the test’s technical lead from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. The test took place on October 4, 2017, at NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility, Virginia. At the moment of full inflation, the parachute is going 1.8 times the speed of sound or nearly 1,300 miles an hour, and generating nearly 35,000 pounds of drag force—drag that would be necessary to help slow a payload down as it was entering the Martian atmosphere. This is the first of several tests in support of NASA’s Mars 2020 mission.”

Video credit: NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory

NASA Goddard dixit:

“A team from NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, is developing a new, third-generation facility science instrument for the Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy, SOFIA.

The High Resolution Mid-InfrarEd Spectrometer (HIRMES), is a spectrometer optimized to detect neutral atomic oxygen, water, as well as normal and deuterated (or “heavy”) hydrogen molecules at infrared wavelengths between 25 and 122 microns (a micron is one-millionth of a meter). These wavelengths are key to determining how water vapor, ice, and oxygen combine at different times during planet formation, and will enable new observations of how these elements combine with dust to form the mass that may one day become a planet.

HIRMES will provide scientists with a unique opportunity to study this aspect of planetary formation, as SOFIA is currently the only NASA observatory capable of accessing these mid-infrared wavelengths. Infrared wavelengths between 28 and 112 microns do not reach ground-based telescopes because water vapor and carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere block this energy. SOFIA is able to access this part of the electromagnetic spectrum by flying between 39,000 feet and 45,000 feet, above more than 99 percent of this water vapor.”

Francis Reddy (Syneren Technologies): Science Writer

Rob Andreoli (AIMM): Videographer

John Caldwell (AIMM): Videographer

Scott Wiessinger (USRA): Animator

Music credit: “Sparkle Shimmer” and “The Orion Arm”, both from Killer Tracks.

Video credit: NASA Goddard/Scott Wiessinger

NASA Goddard dixit:

“A team of scientists led by Laura Hayes –a solar physicist who splits her time between NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center and Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland – investigated a connection between solar flares and Earth’s atmosphere. They discovered pulses in the electrified layer of the atmosphere – called the ionosphere – mirrored X-ray oscillations during a July 24, 2016 flare.”

Genna Duberstein (USRA): Lead Producer

Kathalina Tran (Wyle Information Systems): Lead Science Writer

Jack Ireland (ADNET Systems): Scientist

Laura Hayes (Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland): Lead Scientist

Music: “Good Chat” by Richard Anthony D Pike

Video credit: NASA Goddard

NASA dixit:

“Early on the morning of Saturday, November 18, NASA successfully launched for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) the first in a series of four advanced polar-orbiting satellites, equipped with next-generation technology and designed to improve the accuracy of U.S. weather forecasts out to seven days. The Joint Polar Satellite System-1 (JPSS-1) lifted off on a United Launch Alliance Delta II rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base on California’s central coast. JPSS-1 data will improve weather forecasting and help agencies involved with post-storm recovery by visualizing storm damage and the geographic extent of power outages.”

Video credit: ULA / NASA