TYB
NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day
June 1, 2024
Stereo Helene
Get out your red/blue glasses and float next to Helene, small, icy moon of Saturn. Appropriately named, Helene is a Trojan moon, so called because it orbits at a Lagrange point. A Lagrange point is a gravitationally stable position near two massive bodies, in this case Saturn and larger moon Dione. In fact, irregularly shaped ( about 36 by 32 by 30 kilometers) Helene orbits at Dione's leading Lagrange point while brotherly ice moon Polydeuces follows at Dione's trailing Lagrange point. The sharp stereo anaglyph was constructed from two Cassini images captured during a close flyby in 2011. It shows part of the Saturn-facing hemisphere of Helene mottled with craters and gully-like features.
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html?
NASA’s Boeing Starliner Crew Flight Test Launch– June 1, 2024
Watch live as two NASA astronauts launch from Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft as one of the final steps on the road to certification. Launch of the ULA (United Launch Alliance) Atlas V rocket and Starliner spacecraft is targeted for 12:25 p.m. EDT Saturday, June 1 (1625 UTC) from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
The launch attempt on May 6 was scrubbed due to a faulty oxygen relief valve observation on the United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket Centaur second stage.
The two NASA astronauts aboard, flight commander Butch Wilmore and pilot Suni Williams, will test the end-to-end capabilities of the Starliner system, including launch, docking, and return to Earth. After a one-week stay docked to the International Space Station, the Starliner and crew will land under parachutes in the western United States.
Launch coverage on NASA+ (https://plus.nasa.gov) will end shortly after Starliner orbital insertion. NASA Television (https://nasa.gov/nasatv) will provide continuous coverage leading up to docking and through hatch opening and welcome remarks.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aEi5boWupRk
NASA’s Hubble Temporarily Pauses Science
MAY 31, 2024
NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope entered safe mode May 24 due to an ongoing gyroscope (gyro) issue, suspending science operations. Hubble’s instruments are stable, and the telescope is in good health.
The telescope automatically entered safe mode when one of its three gyroscopes gave faulty telemetry readings. Hubble’s gyros measure the telescope’s slew rates and are part of the system that determines and controls precisely the direction the telescope is pointed. NASA will provide more information early the first week of June.
NASA anticipates Hubble will continue making discoveries throughout this decade and possibly into the next, working with other observatories, such as the agency’s James Webb Space Telescope for the benefit of humanity.
Launched in 1990, Hubble has been observing the universe for more than three decades and recently celebrated its 34th anniversary. Read more about some of Hubble’s greatest scientific discoveries.
https://science.nasa.gov/missions/hubble/nasas-hubble-temporarily-pauses-science/
Hubble Views the Lights of a Galactic Bar
MAY 31, 2024
This new image from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope shows the broad and sweeping spiral galaxy NGC 4731. It lies in the constellation Virgo and is located 43 million light-years from Earth. This highly detailed image uses data collected from six different filters. The abundance of color illustrates the galaxy's billowing clouds of gas, dark dust bands, bright pink star-forming regions and, most obviously, the long, glowing bar with trailing arms.
Barred spiral galaxies outnumber both regular spirals and elliptical galaxies put together, numbering around 60% of all galaxies. The visible bar structure is a result of orbits of stars and gas in the galaxy lining up, forming a dense region that individual stars move in and out of over time. This is the same process that maintains a galaxy's spiral arms, but it is somewhat more mysterious for bars: spiral galaxies seem to form bars in their centers as they mature, which helps explain the large number of bars we see today, but they can also lose them if the accumulated mass along the bar grows unstable. The orbital patterns and the gravitational interactions within a galaxy that sustain the bar also transport matter and energy into it, fueling star formation. Indeed, the observing program studying NGC 4731 seeks to investigate this flow of matter in galaxies.
Beyond the bar, the spiral arms of NGC 4731 stretch out far past the confines of this close-in Hubble view. Astronomers think the galaxy’s elongated arms are the result of gravitational interactions with other, nearby galaxies in the Virgo cluster.
https://science.nasa.gov/missions/hubble/hubble-views-the-lights-of-a-galactic-bar/
NASA Awards Advance Technologies for Future Habitable Worlds Mission
MAY 31, 2024
NASA announced Friday it selected three industry proposals to help develop technologies for future large space telescopes and plan for the agency’s Habitable Worlds Observatory mission concept, which could be the first space telescope designed to search for life outside our solar system.
The mission would directly image Earth-like planets around stars like our Sun and study their atmospheres for the chemical signatures of life, as well as enable other investigations about our solar system and universe.
NASA is currently in the early planning stages for this mission concept, with community-wide working groups exploring its fundamental science goals and how best to pursue them.
The agency is also in the process of establishing a Habitable Worlds Observatory Technology Maturation project office at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland.
“The Habitable Worlds Observatory will be a historically ambitious mission, so we are taking a deliberate, strategic approach to its development and laying the groundwork now.
We will need to bring together diverse expertise from government, academia, and industry, while building on technologies and lessons learned from our previous large space telescopes,” said Mark Clampin, director of the Astrophysics Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
“With these awards, we’re excited to engage industry to help close technology gaps to make this groundbreaking mission a reality.” In January 2024, NASA solicited industry proposals to help advance key technologies that will eventually be necessary for the Habitable Worlds Observatory.
For example, the mission will require a coronagraph – an instrument that blocks the light of a star so we can better see nearby objects – thousands of times more capable than any prior space coronagraph, and a stable optical system moving no more than the width of an atom during its observations.
To help further the readiness of these technologies, NASA has now selected the following proposals for two-year, fixed-price contracts with a combined value of $17.5 million, targeted to begin by late summer 2024:
“Ultra-stable Telescope Research and Analysis – Critical Technologies (ULTRA-CT)”
This project will focus on high-fidelity modeling and subsystem demonstrations to support future development of “ultra-stable” optical systems beyond current state-of-the-art technologies.
Principal investigator: Laura Coyle, Ball Aerospace (now BAE Systems)
“Technology Maturation for Astrophysics Space Telescopes (TechMAST)”
This project seeks to advance the integrated modeling infrastructure required to navigate design interdependencies and compare potential mission design options.
Principal investigator: Alain Carrier, Lockheed Martin
“STABLE: Systems Technologies for Architecture Baseline”
This project will focus on maturing technologies that support telescope features, such as a deployable baffle and a structure to support the optical train, while mitigating the impact of system or environmental disturbances.
Principal investigator: Tiffany Glassman, Northrop Grumman
This work will continue industry involvement started in 2017 under NASA’s “System-Level Segmented Telescope Design” solicitations, which concluded in December 2023. The new selected proposals will help inform NASA’s approach to planning for the Habitable Worlds Observatory, as the agency builds on technologies from its James Webb Space Telescope and future Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope and identifies where future investments are needed.
https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasa-awards-advance-technologies-for-future-habitable-worlds-mission/
Harris Calls on Air Force Academy Graduates to Extend U.S. Air, Space Power
May 30, 2024
The United States' air and space supremacy is critical to maintaining global peace and security as the nation faces evolving national security challenges, Vice President Kamala Harris said today.
In her address to this year's U.S. Air Force Academy graduating class, the vice president called on the cadets to continue the legacy of innovation that has served as the foundation for the nation's dominance in the skies.
"As it has been for generations, America's national security and global stability depend on our strength in the sky and space," Harris said.
"And our officers, our nation is counting on you to preserve and extend that strength, including, I will add, through innovation."
This call to action, Harris said, comes as the United States depends on the air and space prowess it has maintained for generations to deter competitors and defend allies against aggression.
"It was America's forces in the air that bombed train tracks and fuel depots to prevent Nazi reinforcements from reaching the front lines and helped defeat tyranny and fascism in Europe 80 years ago," she said.
"Over the beaches of Normandy, America won control of the sky and we have kept it ever since." Still today, U.S. allies around the world "are in awe and our adversaries in fear of America's dominance in the air," Harris said.
She said that dominance is on display on NATO's eastern flank. U.S. weapons shipments help Ukraine defend its territory as U.S. air patrols deter Russia from expanding its war further into Europe.
U.S. air superiority was also key to defending Israel against a barrage of drones and missiles launched last month by Iran.
"It was our Air and Space Forces that mounted an unprecedented defense along with our allies and partners," Harris said.
"More than 300 drones, cruise missiles and ballistic missiles were fired at Israel. And thanks to our airmen and guardians, 99% of those threats did not hit their targets."
Harris assured the graduating class that, armed with their experience gained as Air Force Academy cadets, they are up to the challenge of maintaining the United States' edge in the air and in space.
"Wherever you go from here, you are ready," she said. "You already have the skills. You have the knowledge and the strength of character to meet any challenge.
"You are warriors," she added. "You have dedicated yourself to the service of our nation. America's security relies on you. I know you will make our country proud."
https://www.defense.gov/News/News-Stories/Article/Article/3791846/harris-calls-on-air-force-academy-graduates-to-extend-us-air-space-power/
Stunning image reveals the intricate structure of supersonic plasma
31 May 2024
The most detailed simulation of the chaotic supersonic plasma that floats across our universe has revealed an intricate map of swirling magnetic fields.
Clouds of charged particles, or plasmas, are ubiquitous in our universe and can exist at small scales, as with the solar wind, or cover vast distances, such as over entire galaxies.
These clouds experience turbulence, similar to the air in Earth’s atmosphere, which dictates key characteristics of our universe, such as how magnetic fields vary over space or how quickly stars form.
However, the turbulence’s inherently chaotic nature, as well as the mix of very different plasma speeds, makes it impossible to predict the plasma’s behaviour in a mathematically exact way.
Now, James Beattie at the Australian National University in Canberra and his colleagues have run the largest chaotic plasma simulation of its kind, using the SuperMUC-NG supercomputer at the Leibniz Supercomputing Centre in Germany.
The researchers set up a plasma fixed over a 10,000-cube grid, which they artificially stirred to see how the turbulence rippled through it, similar to stirring a cup of coffee.
The simulation would take 10,000 years to run on a standard single-core computer, says Beattie.
Now, James Beattie at the Australian National University in Canberra and his colleagues have run the largest chaotic plasma simulation of its kind, using the SuperMUC-NG supercomputer at the Leibniz Supercomputing Centre in Germany.
The researchers set up a plasma fixed over a 10,000-cube grid, which they artificially stirred to see how the turbulence rippled through it, similar to stirring a cup of coffee.
The simulation would take 10,000 years to run on a standard single-core computer, says Beattie.
A plasma’s intricate structure can be seen above in one extraordinary slice from the simulation grid. The top half of the image shows its charge density, with regions of red representing high density and blue for low density.
The bottom half of the image shows gas density, with yellow-orange colours representing high density and green showing low density.
The white lines indicate the contours of the resulting magnetic field lines. As well as teaching the researchers about how plasma typically move through our universe, the simulation also contained an unexpected result, says Beattie.
The team learned that the movement of magnetic fields from enormous plasmas doesn’t trickle down to the very smallest scales, unlike the swirls in a cup of coffee, which should move from large-scale vortices right down to the atoms themselves.
“The mixing properties on the large scales and the small scales seem to be very different,” says Beattie. “In fact, it becomes much less turbulent on the small scales than you’d expect it to.”
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2433764-stunning-image-reveals-the-intricate-structure-of-supersonic-plasma/
Sensor issue scrubs Rocket Lab launch of shoebox-sized NASA climate satellite
May 31, 2024
Rocket Lab's first attempt at launching the second of two cubesats for NASA's PREFIRE climate change mission ended in a scrub on Friday (May 31).
An Electron rocket topped with the tiny satellite had been poised to lift off from Rocket Lab's New Zealand site at 10:46 p.m. EDT (0246 GMT or 2:46 p.m. local time on June 1), until an "out-of-family sensor reading" near the end of the launch window resulted in a scrub.
Rocket Lab will announce a new targeted launch time and date when ready. There are several opportunities in the coming days.
PREFIRE is short for "Polar Radiant Energy in the Far-Infrared Experiment." As that name suggests, the mission will study heat loss from Earth's polar regions, gathering data that should help scientists better understand our warming world.
"A lot of the heat radiated from the Arctic and Antarctica is emitted as far-infrared radiation, but there is currently no detailed measurement of this type of energy," Rocket Lab wrote in a mission description.
"The water vapor content of the atmosphere, along with the presence, structure and composition of clouds, influences the amount of far-infrared radiation that escapes into space from Earth's poles," the company added. "Data collected from PREFIRE will give researchers information on where and when far-infrared energy radiates from the Arctic and Antarctic environments into space."
PREFIRE will collect this data using two shoebox-sized cubesats. Rocket Lab launched the first of the satellites on May 25, sending it to a 326-mile-high (525-kilometer-high) circular orbit above Earth.
This second PREFIRE craft will head to a slightly different orbit with the same altitude. If all goes according to plan, the duo's paths will cross every few hours near the planet's poles.
Rocket Lab calls this second mission, which will be its 49th orbital launch to date, "PREFIRE and Ice." The company named the May 25 liftoff "Ready, Aim, PREFIRE."
Rocket Lab is working to make the first stage of the 59-foot-tall (18-meter-tall) Electron reusable; the company has recovered boosters from the sea on multiple previous launches, but no such activity occurred on "Ready, Aim, PREFIRE," and Rocket Lab has not mentioned a recovery component for "PREFIRE and Ice."
https://www.space.com/rocket-lab-prefire-and-ice-climate-change-mission-launch
Double trouble: Sun unleashes 2 powerful X-class solar flares in 12 hours
June 1, 2024
The hyperactive sunspot region responsible for May's incredible auroras has done it again, firing off not one but two X-class solar flares in less than 12 hours.
The first X-class solar flare peaked at 6:03 p.m. EDT (2203GMT) on Friday (May 31), and the second did so at 4:48 a.m. EDT (0848 GMT) today (June 1).
Solar flares are powerful bursts of electromagnetic radiation that blast from the surface of the sun.
They're categorized by strength into lettered groups, with X-class being the most powerful. Within each class, numbers from 1-10 (and beyond for X-class flares) describe a flare's relative strength.
Friday's and today's big flares clocked in at X1.18 and X1.43, respectively, according to spaceweatherlive.com.
The decaying sunspot region AR3664's magnetically complex core provides the perfect conditions to create powerful explosions. This is because, at the heart of AR3664, two oppositely signed magnetic poles are cramped together.
This is visible in the image below from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory Magnetogram, in which white represents north magnetic polarity and black represents south magnetic polarity.
When oppositely directed magnetic field lines in the sun's plasma break and rejoin, a process known as magnetic reconnection, the magnetic field energy is converted into plasma kinetic and thermal energy, which can result in powerful eruptions from the solar surface — in this case, the two recent X-class solar flares.
Radio blackouts were observed across the sunlit portion of Earth during the time of both solar flare eruptions, the first over the Western U.S. and the Pacific and the second over Europe, Africa and Asia.
Shortwave radio blackouts, like these, are common occurrences after powerful solar flare eruptions due to strong pulses of X-rays and extreme ultraviolet radiation emission.
The radiation travels toward Earth at the speed of light and ionizes (gives an electrical charge to) the top of Earth's atmosphere when it reaches us.
This ionization causes a higher-density environment for high-frequency shortwave radio signals to navigate through in order to support communication over long distances. Radio waves that interact with electrons in the ionized layers lose energy due to more frequent collisions, and this can lead to radio signals becoming degraded or completely absorbed.
https://www.space.com/sun-unleashes-2-x-class-solar-flares-in-less-than-12-hours
1st annual space piracy conference will examine threats of orbital crime and smuggling
May 31, 2024
Eye-patches on! Practice your best "grrr." Plop down pieces of eight, doubloons and cue "Captain" Jack Sparrow!
Get ready for the First Annual Space Piracy Conference, set for early next year. Held by the Center for the Study of Space Crime, Policy, and Governance (CSCPG), the conference is a "two-day, invite only symposium that brings together experts prepared to review crime, piracy, and smuggling in space," according to its website.
"Be among the first to discuss mitigating space crime and piracy, from the perspectives of investment, space law, space policy, intelligence, and the military," notes the group.
Risks of piracy
The CSCPG asks: What are the risks of piracy in space and solutions to this potentially devastating economic and legal problem?
"Now is the time to start thinking and talking about mitigating the threat of piracy in space," said Marc Feldman, Executive Director of the CSCPG.
"As we like to say, and please forgive me, Leon Trotsky, but you may not be interested in space piracy, but space pirates are interested in you…"
Feldman, who has worked in the space venture sector for years, is co-author, with Hugh Taylor, of the soon-to-be published book "Space Piracy: Preparing for a Criminal Crisis in Orbit."
Threat to space commerce, national security
"While crime and piracy in space are at this point largely theoretical problems, our view is that now is the time to start thinking about the issue and discussing potential solutions," Taylor, publications director of the center, tells Space.com.
"Space piracy is a threat to space commerce and national security."
"Any serious analysis and planning process for the future of space commerce, as well as space aspects of national security, needs to consider the threat of piracy," explains Gordon Roesler, a space system developer and retired US Navy Captain who serves as an advisor to the conference.
For more information on this event scheduled for next February, as well as the Center for the Study of Space Crime, Policy, and Governance (CSCPG), go to the center's website.
https://www.space.com/1st-space-piracy-conference-crime-smuggling
https://cscpg.org/