NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day

Nov 22, 2023

IC 342: Hidden Galaxy in Camelopardalis

Similar in size to large, bright spiral galaxies in our neighborhood, IC 342 is a mere 10 million light-years distant in the long-necked, northern constellation Camelopardalis. A sprawling island universe, IC 342 would otherwise be a prominent galaxy in our night sky, but it is hidden from clear view and only glimpsed through the veil of stars, gas and dust clouds along the plane of our own Milky Way galaxy. Even though IC 342's light is dimmed and reddened by intervening cosmic clouds, this sharp telescopic image traces the galaxy's own obscuring dust, young star clusters, and glowing star forming regions along spiral arms that wind far from the galaxy's core. IC 342 has undergone a recent burst of star formation activity and is close enough to have gravitationally influenced the evolution of the local group of galaxies and the Milky Way.

https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html?

SpaceX Starlink Mission

On Wednesday, November 22 at 2:47 a.m. ET, Falcon 9 launched 23 Starlink satellites to low-Earth orbit from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.

This was the 15th flight for the first stage booster supporting this mission, which previously launched CRS-22, Crew-3, Turksat 5B, Crew-4, CRS-25, Eutelsat HOTBIRD 13G, mPOWER-a, PSN SATRIA, and now seven Starlink missions.

https://www.spacex.com/launches/mission/?missionId=sl-6-29

£47 million investment to supercharge space infrastructure across the UK

22 November 2023

The Space Clusters Infrastructure Fund (SCIF) has awarded more than £47 million for 12 projects which will be doubled by match funding from the sector, representing over £98 million of new private/public investment in space research and development infrastructure. Further projects will be announced in the coming weeks.

Not only will the funding support the growth of UK space businesses and create new jobs, but it will enhance the UK’s offering of space capabilities and services to international investors and major space players. SCIF funding builds upon investment the UK Space Agency has made to develop the UK space ecosystem; building and connecting clusters of space capabilities across the country which create the environments for businesses to start-up and flourish. These clusters will help SCIF projects connect to local talent and supply chains and ensure the benefits of this investment are shared across the UK.

Minister of State at the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, Andrew Griffith, said:

Making Britain a space superpower means backing brilliant ideas up and down the land and harnessing the full potential of talent in our growing sector – from Dundee to Newcastle, Cornwall to Snowdonia.

By investing with the private sector in research and facilities across the UK, we are ensuring they become home to global industries that support the growth of our £17.5 billion space sector, create hundreds of new jobs and build dynamic businesses across the UK.

Dr Paul Bate, Chief Executive of the UK Space Agency, said:

Our space sector has been concentrated in London and the South East, but in recent years we’ve seen the emergence of vibrant clusters across the whole of the country. These projects demonstrate the potential of our thriving space sector across the length and breadth of the UK to develop innovative space infrastructure that helps us to deliver increasingly ambitious missions and capabilities, and champions the power of space to improve lives.

The Space Clusters Infrastructure Fund highlights the government’s commitment to space and will help deliver the goal set out in the National Space Strategy to build one of the most innovative and attractive space economies in the world, developing new skills and creating jobs.

Northumbria University will use £10 million of SCIF funding to develop the North East Space Skills and Technology (NESST) centre in the heart of Newcastle, providing jobs and investment to the area and delivering services that will allow companies to make their space products mission-ready, accelerating their entry into commercial markets. The increased capabilities will help position the UK as a global leader in optical satellite communications, space weather and space-based energy.

Almost £8 million will go to Cardiff-based Space Forge for a National Microgravity Research Centre, for advanced material research and production. Alongside the development of centre tooling and open access facilities for customers, the centre will create a central space hub for the growing Welsh space sector.

Magdrive will use just under £2 million to build a state-of-the-art Electric Propulsion facility in the UK. The DEEP Lab (Disruptive EP) will meet the growing demands of small-satellite Electric Propulsion (EP) serving as a cornerstone for EP development, enabling rapid development and testing of EP solutions, integration of EP technologies into a wide range of space missions, and the development of innovative manufacturing approaches to meet the assembly, testing and cost reduction needs of modern satellite constellation missions.

The government has previously invested in space infrastructure such as the National Satellite Test Facility (NSTF) and National Space Propulsion Test Facility on a case-by-case basis. The NSTF, due to open later this year in Harwell, features the UK’s largest vacuum test chamber, where satellites the size of a double decker bus will be exposed to extremes of hot and cold for months at a time, and a vibration facility that replicates the conditions of a rocket launch. The National Space Propulsion Test Facility in Westcott allows UK organisations to test state-of-the-art engines which move small satellites in space, at a more affordable rate than having to go abroad.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/47-million-investment-to-supercharge-space-infrastructure-across-the-uk

Three Innovative Projects Funded in Annual ‘Fight Tonight’ Competition

Nov. 21, 2023

A proposal to create a standardized interface between the U.S. and allied partners to share data from the U.S. Space Force’s Unified Data Library was named the winner of Space Systems Command’s (SSC) 2nd annual Fight Tonight innovation competition.

The winning idea, and two other finalists who will all receive funding for their projects, were announced Nov. 17 at the Space Force Ball at the Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, Calif.

“SSC’s Fight Tonight program was designed to identify innovative thinking from our most valuable and brightest assets – our people,” explained Lt. Gen. Michael Guetlein. “The submissions were amazing and the collaboration between our acquisition and operations professionals to vet each idea’s operational feasibility to get after the fight, is why the program is so successful.”

Sage Andorka, deputy branch chief and chief engineer, Cross Mission Data, who represented the winning team at the event said it was exciting when their team was announced as the winner of the 2023 competition.

“The chosen finalists were all great projects, so we certainly felt that we had strong competition,” Andorka said. “This win will ensure delivery of a much needed data-sharing capability for our coalition partners. We can’t win alone.”

SSC’s “Fight Tonight” competition seeks to find solutions aligned to the critical Space Force mission of ensuring a secure space domain for all.

All military and civilian SSC personnel were eligible to participate. Proposals needed to be based on actionable ideas that could be implemented in a one-year timeframe and directly in line with the Field Command’s strategic intent to exploit the resources it has, tap the commercial marketplace to buy what is already available and build when a commercial or allied solution is not a viable option.

A total of 28 projects were submitted in August, and five of those were selected as finalists. Each proposal required the submitter(s) to align with an operations sponsor from Space Operations Command to validate that the proposed idea was operationally relevant. Up to $8 million in funding was available for the winners. Ideas that were not selected were forwarded to SSC’s relevant Program Executive Offices for consideration to implement if funding can be secured from other sources.

On Nov. 6, the five finalist teams presented their ideas to a special panel made up of Guetlein; Maj. Gen. Douglas A. Schiess, Combined Force Space Component commander; and Maj. Gen. Stephen G. Purdy Jr., military deputy, Office of the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force.

“Under great power competition, it really becomes prudent upon us to make sure that we can credibly not only protect, defend and deter aggression, but if called upon, defeat it at a time and location of our choosing,” Guetlein told the finalists. “In order to do that, we can no longer rely on our old processes and ways of doing business, which could take months, if not years, to field a credible capability into operations.”

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The Winner: Allied Exchange Environment (AXE)

There is no known capability for near real-time, bi-directional, machine-to-machine data sharing with international allies, said Lt. Col. Dan Kimmich, Materiel Leader, Cross Mission Data

at SSC. What is needed is a common data platform, a “babel fish”, Kimmich said, referring to the fictional instant translation creature in “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.”

AXE will create a standardized interface between the U.S. and any foreign allied partner for highly valuable, two-way operational data distribution. Leveraging the Unified Data Library's (UDL) capabilities and cybersecurity best practices to reduce and/or eliminate current data sharing bottlenecks, AXE would enable near real-time data sharing from the Secret UDL currently unavailable to partners, Kimmich said.

Kimmich’s team plans to proceed with the development, installation, and software sustainment of the systems in support of Japan and Australia in FY24, Kimmich said. The project is currently being tested using data from the Australian Space Surveillance Telescope, and the AXE environment can be seen on the DISA (Defense Information Systems Agency) network.

“(The USSF) wants to be ‘Allied by Design,’ and quite simply, the United States doesn’t have all of the space-based or ground-based sensors to watch everything,” Kimmich said. “If we can get to a point where we are able to share space information – current known location, detection of a maneuver, or change in brightness of an object – in both directions to and from our allies, that may give us just enough advance notice so we can take the appropriate action.”

“The systems in place today enable email exchange or chat capabilities, but we don’t have systems to enable machine-to-machine connections to flow data in real time,” Kimmich added.

“If a radar in Japan collects data on a space object, how does it share that with United States? It doesn’t, unless an operator in Japan types a message, and that’s prone to error and not timely.”

Kimmich said the finalists’ presentation was an incredible opportunity to explain their concepts directly to three generals representing the strategic, operational and tactical sectors, instead of going through a more lengthy traditional process. He also praised SSC’s Atlas X team, which worked with all the finalists to help them hone their presentations, calling it a “great experience for me and my team.”

Two additional projects were chosen as runners-up and also given funding: Aalyria Spacetime and DEEP-RF.

cont. in link

https://www.ssc.spaceforce.mil/Newsroom/Article-Display/Article/3596526/three-innovative-projects-funded-in-annual-fight-tonight-competition