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Webinar: Understanding and Protecting Earth
Mar 25, 2024
With Earth Day coming up on April 22, the Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) mission team is hosting a free webinar to describe how and why NASA missions—and the data from these missions—can help us better understand and protect our home planet's climate and ecosystems. The webinar also will highlight the ways various stakeholders are making these data available and accessible to decision-makers as well as how you can get involved in efforts to improve life on Earth.
This webinar is part of the ongoing GPM 10-in-10 Webinar Series celebrating the 10-year anniversary of the launch of the joint NASA/JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) GPM Core Observatory on February 27, 2014. These webinars are aimed at anyone interested in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics and how these disciplines can be used to better understand and protect our home planet. Each webinar features guests exploring a different theme and how it relates to the GPM mission.
The GPM mission is an international network of satellites that provide next-generation global observations of rain and snow. The GPM concept centers on the deployment of a Core Observatory satellite carrying an advanced radar/radiometer system to measure precipitation from space and serve as a reference standard to unify precipitation measurements from a constellation of research and operational satellites.
Through improved measurements of precipitation globally, the GPM mission is helping to advance our understanding of Earth's water and energy cycles, improve forecasting of extreme events that cause natural hazards and disasters, and extend current capabilities in using accurate and timely information of precipitation to directly benefit society.
https://www.earthdata.nasa.gov/learn/webinars-and-tutorials/webinar-understanding-and-protecting-earth
Best geological map for a European rover on Mars
26/03/2024
A team of European scientists have published the most detailed geological map of Oxia Planum – the landing site for ESA’s Rosalind Franklin rover on Mars. This thorough look at the geography and geological history of the area will help the rover scout the once water-rich terrain, in the search for signs of past and present life.
The map gives scientists a head start before Rosalind Franklin lands there in 2030. Four years in the making, this map identifies 15 units with characteristic geological features that can help decide how the rover explores the area, interprets its surroundings, and tries to collect evidence of primitive life.
Oxia Planum is located near the martian equator and contains sedimentary deposits that are nearly four billion years old. On a geological scale, this will be the oldest landing site visited by a rover on Mars. The region is rich in clay minerals formed in the presence of water. These rocks are ideal for preserving evidence of the earliest life forms. This makes it an excellent location to look for clues as to whether life once existed on the Red Planet.
Mapping science community
During COVID lockdowns, the Rosalind Franklin science team began an online training programme for around 80 volunteers to map the chosen landing site.
The work was divided into 134 one-square-kilometre areas, so that the team could fully cover the estimated landing area. Scientists used a web-based system that allowed everyone to work on the map in parallel. The software was provided by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and set up at ESA.
Data came from the Colour and Stereo Surface Imaging System (CaSSIS) onboard the ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter and several instruments on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO), including the HiRISE camera, which returns images from Mars orbit at 25 cm per pixel.
The mapping leads then pieced together the information on all the areas to form a coherent map that shows the geology of the landing site in unprecedented detail. The map includes the main types of bedrock, and structures with distinct shapes like ridges and craters. It even features the material that rests on top, for example blown by the wind, or thrown long distances when meteorites impacted the surface.
The result is the highest resolution map of Oxia Planum yet, created at a scale of 1:25 000, by which every centimetre equals 250 metres on the martian surface. An average drive of 25 to 50 metres a day for Rosalind Franklin would be one to two milimetres on the map.
The map has been published in the Journal of Maps, along with a scientific paper that includes observations and interpretations of each geological unit and will soon be followed by a second publication exploring what these geological units mean for scientists ideas about what the environment of ancient Mars was like.
Why a map for Mars
The exercise familiarised scientists from different teams with the geology and geography of the landing site years before the rover starts operating on Mars. The Rosalind Franklin science team now has a better idea of potential science targets, the type of terrain the rover will be facing and some hazards on its path.
“This map is exciting because it is a guide that shows us where to find the answers. It serves as a visual hypothesis of what we currently know about the different rocks in the landing site. The instruments on Rosalind Franklin will allow us to test our knowledge on the spot when the time comes,” explains Peter Fawdon, one of the lead authors from the Open University.
ESA’s Rosalind Franklin rover is equipped to search for evidence of past and present life on Mars thanks to its drill and scientific instruments. It will allow science teams on Earth to plan the strategy for Rosalind Franklin’s daily expeditions on Mars as they identify the best place to drill below the harsh radiation environment and daily swings in surface temperature.
Rosalind Franklin will be the first rover to drill two metres below the surface, acquiring samples from where there are higher chances of preservation for biosignatures than on the surface and analysing them with its onboard laboratory.
https://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Human_and_Robotic_Exploration/Best_geological_map_for_a_European_rover_on_Mars
https://www.state.gov/joint-statement-of-the-second-meeting-of-the-u-s-france-comprehensive-dialogue-on-space/
Joint Statement of the Second Meeting of the U.S.-France Comprehensive Dialogue on Space
MARCH 26, 2024
Pursuant to their shared goal of advancing bilateral space cooperation as declared by their leaders, the Government of the United States of America and the Government of France held their second meeting of the Comprehensive Dialogue on Space in Washington, D.C., on March 20-21, 2024.
This meeting was co-chaired by representatives from the Executive Office of the President’s National Space Council and National Security Council for the United States, and by representatives from the Secretariat-General for Defense and National Security (SGDSN) and the Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs for France. Principal U.S. participants were from the Executive Office of the President’s Office of the National Cyber Director; the Departments of State, Commerce, Homeland Security, and Transportation; the Department of Defense, including U.S. Space Force and U.S. Space Command; the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA); and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. The French delegation was made up of representatives from the Ministry of Economy, Finance, and Industrial and Digital Sovereignty; the Ministry of Armed Forces -including the French Space Command (CdE)- and the National Centre for Space Studies (CNES).
The convening of this second Comprehensive Dialogue on Space continues an initiative announced by U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and French President Emmanuel Macron in November 2021 to ensure a whole-of-government approach to bilateral space cooperation. This Dialogue underscores the importance of the U.S.-France alliance’s more than 60-year relationship in space and recognizes the growing nexus of civil, commercial, and national security space activities and the increasingly interconnected nature of all three sectors.
At the meeting, U.S. and French officials exchanged information on respective national space policies, including the U.S. Framework for Novel Space Activities and France’s forthcoming update of its national space law. Both sides reiterated their strong determination to expand already robust bilateral cooperation in a variety of areas, including addressing the climate crisis; advancing national security space cooperation and information sharing; and strengthening bilateral commercial space cooperation.
The participants held extensive discussions about challenges to our shared economic and national security interests. Both sides are determined to continue their close coordination in strengthening the global governance of space activities by promoting the widest possible accession to and compliance with the Outer Space Treaty, as well as the development and implementation of voluntary, non-legally binding international instruments to promote the sustainable, secure, and responsible use of outer space.
Both sides resolved to deepen the bilateral coordination of national security space capabilities, particularly given the growing scope of space-enabled and related threats. They also resolved to strengthen the coordination of national security space activities with allies and partners around the globe, including by leveraging innovative commercial space capabilities, to ensure access to critical space-based services. Both sides also confirmed their interest in working together to strengthen the security of space systems and protect critical space-related infrastructure against the full spectrum of hazards and threats.
The participants discussed ongoing bilateral cooperation in space exploration and science and opportunities to strengthen our partnership in these areas. Both sides are determined to continue collaboration on scientific missions to enhance understanding of our solar system and investigate the origins of our universe, including through NASA’s Artemis missions. The participants also expressed their intent to discuss further cooperation in exploration, particularly on Lunar surface activities.
Both sides reaffirmed their shared commitment to maintaining a robust dialogue with Artemis Accords signatories, deepening the implementation of the Accords in practice, and utilizing multilateral fora to advance the peaceful, responsible, and sustainable exploration and use of outer space.
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Both sides recognized the important role of Earth observation and space science, to include weather observation and global environment observation from space, in supporting climate change mitigation and adaptation. The participants also noted mutual interest in collaborating on a project to develop a common Coastal Zone Digital Twin to monitor climate change and flood mapping. Both sides reaffirmed their commitment to global climate leadership through the Space for Climate Observatory and open dissemination of Earth observation data and decided to continue to develop operational tools to make this data actionable for governments and local communities.
The participants celebrated the launch in December 2022 of the joint U.S.-French Surface Water and Ocean Topography (SWOT) mission, which now measures the height of nearly all water on Earth’s surface. SWOT is developing one of the most detailed, comprehensive views yet of the planet’s oceans and freshwater lakes and rivers. Combined with other information, unprecedented data from SWOT is helping researchers and scientists determine how flood conditions evolve during extreme events, such as those experienced this year in northern California.
Both sides expressed their intent to cooperate on Earth science missions in the fields of aerosol, cloud, convection, and precipitation (ACCP) research, Designated Observables from the U.S. 2017 Decadal Survey, that is expected to include time-differenced microwave radiometers from CNES to measure convective vertical motions.
The participants recognized the important contributions of the private sector in expanding our economic activity in outer space and welcomed efforts to strengthen industry cooperation. Both sides acknowledged their shared desire to create a safe and transparent environment for commercial activities in outer space, including evolving and emerging space activities, by clarifying government and private sector roles and responsibilities and supporting a timely and responsive regulatory environment. To create a free and fair market competition internationally, both sides noted the need to update and harmonize space policies, regulations, and other measures that govern commercial activities worldwide.
The participants also discussed multilateral cooperation, including our work in the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (UNCOPUOS) and separate but complementary UN space security fora. Participants recognized that each forum has a vital and complementary role to play in ensuring that activity in outer space is safe, secure, and sustainable, so that space systems can continue to deliver benefits into the future.
Both the United States and France reaffirmed their commitment to working through UNCOPUOS to promote the safe and sustainable use of outer space for peaceful purposes. For both sides, implementing the UNCOPUOS Space Debris Mitigation Guidelines and the UNCOPUOS Guidelines for the Long-Term Sustainability of Outer Space Activities are priorities. The United States and France look forward to continued engagement on the topic of long-term sustainability in the UNCOPUOS Long-Term Sustainability working group. Both the United States and France welcomed the progress towards the establishment of a new UNCOPUOS agenda item focused on Dark and Quiet Skies and expressed their commitment to astronomical sciences and the important benefits provided by commercial satellite services.
Both sides also underlined the importance of continued close coordination, bilaterally and with like-minded partners, to constructively support the work in UN space security fora, with a particular focus on the second OEWG on reducing space threats through norms, rules, and principles of responsible behaviors when it starts its work in 2025 to build upon the meaningful discussions during the first OEWG in 2022 and 2023. They stressed that the development and implementation of voluntary norms of responsible behavior and transparency and confidence-building measures, represent concrete first steps to promote mutual confidence among States while reducing the mistrust, misunderstanding, and miscalculation which may lead to unintended escalation. In this regard, both sides welcomed the adoption of United Nations General Assembly resolution 77/41 and called upon all States to commit not to conduct destructive direct-ascent anti-satellite missile tests. Both sides welcomed States making and observing this national commitment in order to ensure that this proposal becomes an internationally-recognized norm of responsible behavior.
Both governments recognized the importance of the Comprehensive Dialogue on Space and reaffirmed that this Dialogue would support cooperative relations between the two countries across ministries, departments, and agencies.
Both sides concurred on holding the third meeting of the Dialogue in Paris.
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Long March 6A launches second Yunhai-3 satellite
March 27, 2024
China added to its fleet of secretive meteorological satellites with the launch of Yunhai-3 (02) late Tuesday.
A Long March 6A rocket lifted off from Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, north China, at 6:51 p.m. Eastern (2251 UTC), March 26 . The China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp. (CASC) later confirmed launch success, revealing the previously unstated payload to be Yunhai-3 (02).
The launch plans were initially revealed by airspace closure notices. Few details regarding the satellite have been made available.
China’s space authorities and state media describe the satellite briefly as for atmospheric and marine environment surveys, space environment monitoring, disaster prevention and reduction and scientific experiments.
The Yunhai series are, however, assessed to be military meteorological satellites by some Western analysts. These are believed to include Global Navigation Satellite System Radio Occultation (GNSS-RO) satellites to collect atmospheric data. China also operates civilian Fengyun meteorological satellites.
The first Yunhai-3 satellite, launched in November 2022 on an earlier Long March 6A, is cataloged by the U.S. Space Force’s 18th Space Defense Squadron (SDS) in a near-polar, near circular 849-kilometer-altitude orbit.
That first Yunhai-3 launch saw the breakup of the Long March 6A’s upper stage. Nine of 37 pieces of debris tracked by 18 SDS from the event remain in orbit.
New Long March rockets
Tuesday’s mission was the fifth launch of the Long March 6A, lifting off from a specifically constructed launch pad at Taiyuan spaceport. The 50-meter-long, 530-metric-ton rocket features two kerosene-liquid oxygen stages and four solid propellant side boosters. It is the first Chinese rocket to use a combination of liquid and solid stages and boosters.
The Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology (SAST), the rocket’s manufacturer and subordinate to China’s main space contractor, CASC, plans to launch the first Long March 6C rocket later this year. This will use the Long March 6A core stage without the solid boosters.
The 3.35-meter-diameter Long March 6A series bears little resemblance to the 2.25-meter-diameter standard Long March 6.
CASC stated that Tuesday’s launch is the start of high-frequency launch of the Long March 6 series this year.
https://spacenews.com/long-march-6a-launches-second-yunhai-3-satellite/
Cosmic gold rush! Astronomers find 49 new galaxies in just 3 hours
Mar 27, 2024
Astronomers have been surprised by a "gold rush" of new galaxies, racking up 49 discoveries in just 3 hours.
The gas-rich galaxies were uncovered by a team using the MeerKAT radio telescope located in South Africa. They have been dubbed the "forty-niners," a callback to the nickname given to the thousands of gold miners who flocked to California during the state's Gold Rush, which peaked in 1849. The nickname is now carried by the San Francisco 49ers American football team.
The team of astronomers certainly wasn't playing around when it stumbled across the nearly 50 new galaxies. They were attempting to study star-forming gas in a single radio galaxy. Instead, they found 49 new galaxies in observations lasting about 180 minutes, thus demonstrating the power of MeerKat when it comes to revealing star-forming gas.
Research leader Marcin Glowacki, from the Curtin University node of the International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) in Western Australia, views the 49 new galaxies as "gold nuggets" for astronomers. Their discovery is arguably no less fortuitous than the discovery of the first gold chunks at Sutter's Mill in Coloma, California, which kick-started the California Gold Rush in 1848.
"I did not expect to find almost 50 new galaxies in such a short time," Glowacki said in a statement. "By implementing different techniques for finding galaxies, which are used for other MeerKAT surveys, we were able to detect all of these galaxies and reveal their gas content."
Many of the 49 newfound galaxies are located in close proximity to each other and form galaxy groups.
Of these collections that come in an array of different shapes and sizes, three in particular have captured the imagination of Glowacki and colleagues. Of four galaxies seen in the same image, three are connected by the gas content that runs throughout them.
"These three are particularly interesting, as by studying the galaxies at other wavelengths of light, we discovered the central galaxy is forming many stars," Glowacki said. "It is likely stealing the gas from its companion galaxies to fuel its star formation, which may lead the other two to become inactive."
"We hope to continue our studies and share even more discoveries of new gas-rich galaxies with the wider community soon," said Glowacki.
Glowacki recently teamed up with ICRAR summer student Jasmine White, who also analyzed short observations made by MeerKAT to discover even more gas-rich galaxies.
"This discovery highlights the raw power of the MeerKAT telescope as an imaging instrument," research co-author and University of the Western Cape researcher Ed Elson said. "The methods we developed and implemented to study the forty-niners will be useful for MeerKAT large science surveys and smaller observing campaigns such as ours."
The team's research was published online Tuesday (March 26) in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society.
https://www.space.com/meerkat-discovers-49-galaxies-3-hours
Militarisation, weaponisation of space inevitable reality: IAF chief
Mar 27, 2024, 08:30:00 PM IST
IAF Chief Air Chief Marshal V R Chaudhari on Wednesday said as nations increasingly rely on space-based assets for building strategic advantage, "militarisation and weaponisation" of space have become the "inevitable reality". He said this in his address at a seminar on "Aerospace Power in Future Conflicts" at Subroto Park here.
"Through the annals of human history, the skies have often been regarded as realms of wonder and exploration, where dreams take flight and boundaries dissolve into the vast blue expanse," he said.
Yet, beneath this calmness lies a domain "fraught with competition where contest for aerial superiority" has shaped the destiny of many nations and decided the outcome of many wars, the chief of the Indian Air Force (IAF) said.
"As we navigate these uncharted skies, air power being a key component of national power, would undoubtedly play a pivotal role and also serve as a symbol of national strength, a tool for peace and cooperation," he said.
Air Chief Marshal Chaudhari said over the last few decades, understanding of the military operational environment has "significantly transformed" from primarily a force, time and space-driven battlefield to an arrangement of systems capable of simultaneous and independent operations across multiple domains.
"We all need to acknowledge that the wars of the future will be fought differently," he said.
In his address on Wednesday, Air Chief Marshal Chaudhari added that space has also emerged as a "critical domain for conduct of military operations", wherein seamless communication, navigation and surveillance capabilities would enhance survivability of modern military forces.
"As nations increasingly rely on space-based assets for building strategic advantage, militarisation and weaponisation of space has become an inevitable reality," he said.
Air and space control along with denial capabilities "will prove to be decisive" for furtherance of all operations. For that to happen, "we would need to gain and maintain not only information superiority but also decision superiority", he said.
"Emerging technologies like CMOS (complementary metal oxide semiconductor) sensors, smart decision support matrices, manned-unmanned teaming and robust and redundant C2 networks are critical capabilities that need to be developed," the IAF chief added.
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/defence/militarisation-weaponisation-of-space-inevitable-reality-iaf-chief/articleshow/108826869.cms