TYB
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NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day
May 25, 2025
Beneath Jupiter
Jupiter is stranger than we knew. NASA's Juno spacecraft has now completed over 70 swoops past Jupiter as it moves around its highly elliptical orbit. Pictured from 2017, Jupiter is seen from below where, surprisingly, the horizontal bands that cover most of the planet disappear into swirls and complex patterns. A line of white oval clouds is visible nearer to the equator. Impressive results from Juno show that Jupiter's weather phenomena can extend deep below its cloud tops, that Jupiter's center has a core that is unexpectedly large and soft, and that Jupiter's magnetic field varies greatly with location. Although Juno is scheduled to keep orbiting Jupiter further into 2025, at some time the robotic spacecraft will be maneuvered to plunge into the giant planet.
https://apod.nasa.gov/apod/astropix.html
SpaceX Dragon Splashes Down off the Coast of California
May 25, 2025
At 1:44 a.m. EDT, the unpiloted SpaceX Dragon spacecraft splashed down off the coast of California, marking the return of the company’s 32nd commercial resupply services mission to the International Space Station for NASA.
The spacecraft carried back to Earth about 6,700 pounds of supplies and scientific experiments designed to take advantage of the space station’s microgravity environment after undocking at 12:05 p.m., May 23, from the zenith port of the space station’s Harmony module.
Some of the scientific hardware and samples Dragon will return to Earth include MISSE-20 (Multipurpose International Space Station Experiment), which exposed various materials to space, including radiation shielding and detection materials, solar sails and reflective coatings, ceramic composites for reentry spacecraft studies, and resins for potential use in heat shields.
Samples were retrieved on the exterior of the station and can improve knowledge of how these materials respond to ultraviolet radiation, atomic oxygen, charged particles, thermal cycling, and other factors.
Additionally, Astrobee-REACCH (Responsive Engaging Arms for Captive Care and Handling) is returning to Earth after successfully demonstrating grasping and relocating capabilities on the space station.
The REACCH demonstration used Astrobee robots to capture space objects of different geometries or surface materials using tentacle-like arms and adhesive pads.
Testing a way to safely capture and relocate debris and other objects in orbit could help address end-of-life satellite servicing, orbit change maneuvers, and orbital debris removal.
These capabilities maximize satellite lifespan and protect satellites and spacecraft in low Earth orbit that provide services to people on Earth.
Books from the Story Time from Space project also will return.
Crew members aboard the space station read five science, technology, engineering, and mathematics-related children’s books in orbit and videotaped themselves completing science experiments.
Video and data collected during the readings and demonstrations were downlinked to Earth and were posted in a video library with accompanying educational materials.
Hardware and data from a one-year technology demonstration called OPTICA (Onboard Programmable Technology for Image Compression and Analysis) also will return to Earth.
The OPTICA technology was designed to advance transmission of real-time, ultra-high-resolution hyperspectral imagery from space to Earth, and it provided valuable insights for data compression and processing that could reduce the bandwidth required for communication, lowering the cost of acquiring data from space-based imaging systems without reducing the volume of data.
This technology also could improve services, such as disaster response, that rely on Earth observations.
The spacecraft arrived at the orbiting laboratory on April 22 after launching on April 21 on a Falcon 9 rocket from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
For more than 24 years, people have lived and worked continuously aboard the International Space Station, advancing scientific knowledge, and conducting critical research for the benefit of humanity and our home planet.
Space station research supports the future of human spaceflight as NASA looks toward deep space missions to the Moon under the Artemis campaign and in preparation for future human missions to Mars, as well as expanding commercial opportunities in low Earth orbit and beyond.
https://www.nasa.gov/blogs/spacestation/2025/05/25/spacex-dragon-splashes-down-off-the-coast-of-california/
https://www.spacex.com/launches/mission/?missionId=crs-32-return
Legendary NASA Flight Director Gene Kranz awarded the AAS Lifetime Achievement Award
Saturday, May 24, 2025 at 3:35:29p PDT
Here is another diary to help cleanse your timeline in these trying times.
Gene Kranz, the legendary NASA Flight Director,who is now 91, was bestowed with the 2024 American Astronautical Society Lifetime Achievement Award for his outstanding contributions to the field of astronautics.
The award ceremony was held on May 15, at Space Center Houston. The award is given every 10 years. astronautical.org/…
Kranz, who is well-known to most folks here, served as NASA's 2nd Chief Flight Director, directing missions of the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs, including Apollo 11 and Apollo 13.
Kranz is best known for directing the Mission Control team to save the crew of Apollo 13.
Here are a few pics from the award ceremony -
Legacy
Gene Kranz was present in mission control for over 100 missions. He served as Chief Flight Director during the Mercury, Gemini, and Apollo programs, including Apollo 11 and Apollo 13.
Here is a pic of Kranz from 60 years ago in April 30, 1965 at his console in the Mission Operations Control Room in Houston during testing for the Gemini-Titan 4 mission.
Kranz retired in 1994. Gene Kranz celebrated his 91st birthday on Aug 17, 2024.
Apollo 13 and “Failure Is Not an Option”
This scene from the 1995 film "Apollo 13" is one of the most memorable scenes of all time, with Gene Kranz, played by Ed Harris, uttering the famous phrase "Failure Is Not an Option."
Kranz never used that phrase in real life; it was coined by Bill Broyles, one of the screenwriters of the film.
Kranz did embrace the phrase and used it as the title of his 2009 memoir - "Failure Is Not an Option: Mission Control From Mercury to Apollo 13 and Beyond."
The Kranz Dictum
Gene Kranz did coin the famous phrase "Tough and Competent" following the Apollo 1 pre-launch accident that killed 3 astronauts — Virgil "Gus" Grissom, Edward White II, and Roger B. Chaffee.
The address below is known as "The Kranz Dictum" and applies to all walks of life. Spaceflight will never tolerate carelessness, incapacity, and neglect. Somewhere, somehow, we screwed up.
It could have been in design, build, or test. Whatever it was, we should have caught it.
We were too gung-ho about the schedule and we locked out all of the problems we saw each day in our work.
Every element of the program was in trouble and so were we. The simulators were not working, Mission Control was behind in virtually every area, and the flight and test procedures changed daily.
Nothing we did had any shelf life. Not one of us stood up and said, 'Dammit, stop!'
I don't know what Thompson's committee will find as the cause, but I know what I find. We are the cause! We were not ready! We did not do our job.
We were rolling the dice, hoping that things would come together by launch day, when in our hearts we knew it would take a miracle. We were pushing the schedule and betting that the Cape would slip before we did.
From this day forward, Flight Control will be known by two words: 'Tough' and 'Competent.'
Tough means we are forever accountable for what we do or what we fail to do. We will never again compromise our responsibilities. Every time we walk into Mission Control we will know what we stand for.
Competent means we will never take anything for granted. We will never be found short in our knowledge and in our skills. Mission Control will be perfect.
When you leave this meeting today you will go to your office and the first thing you will do there is to write 'Tough and Competent' on your blackboards. It will never be erased.
Each day when you enter the room these words will remind you of the price paid by Grissom, White, and Chaffee. These words are the price of admission to the ranks of Mission Control.
Leadership
Gene Kranz's new book published in 2023, at the age of 89, focuses on the leadership lessons he learned over the years at NASA. It's called "Tough and Competent: Leadership and Team Chemistry."
Congratulations to Gene Kranz, who probably does not care much for awards, given his legendary status in the Space community.
And kudos to the men and women of NASA whose toughness and competence is unmatched by any other group.
And jeers to the trump regime that wants to drastically cut NASA’s science and astrophysics budget, replace much of its leadership by sycophants, and funnel our tax dollars to defense (offense really), homeland security (aka terrorizing immigrants and Democrats) and to line their own pockets.
https://www.dailykos.com/story/2025/5/24/2323889/-Legendary-NASA-Flight-Director-Gene-Kranz-awarded-the-AAS-Lifetime-Achievement-Award
https://astronautical.org/awards/lifetime/lifetime-photos/
Mysterious Cosmic Radiation is “a Very Serious Problem” for Astronauts—New Research Could Finally Reveal Its Origins
May 24, 2025
New research from the Norwegian University of Science and Technology may finally answer the question of the power source behind mysterious cosmic rays that have long perplexed astronomers.
Although often called “rays,” this cosmic radiation comprises highly accelerated small particles—primarily atomic nuclei—sent forth from parts of the universe that have long remained undetermined.
Their intensity has led scientists to suspect that they have some relationship to the universe’s most extreme environments, such as neutron stars, black holes, or supernovae, with some cosmic rays displaying extraordinarily high energy levels.
Black Hole Winds
“We suspect that this high-energy radiation is created by winds from supermassive black holes,” said co-author Foteini Oikonomou, an associate professor at the NTNU Department of Physics.
Our Sun is just one of at least 100 billion stars within the Milky Way galaxy. At the center of our galaxy lies the Sagittarius A* black hole, which is currently relatively quiet due to a lack of nearby material to consume.
However, many black holes across the universe are far more active, devouring matter equal to several Suns each year.
“A tiny portion of the material can be pushed away by the force of the black hole before it is pulled in,” said co-author Enrico Peretti from the Université Paris Cité.
“As a result, around half of these supermassive black holes create winds that move through the universe at up to half the speed of light.”
A Potential Source of Cosmic Rays
Scientists first discovered these intense winds about a decade ago and found that their force could have galaxy-scale effects—such as halting star formation by dispersing interstellar gas.
The NTNU researchers proposed that these winds might also produce smaller-scale phenomena, including cosmic rays. To test this, they developed an advanced computer model.
“It is possible that these powerful winds accelerate the particles that create the ultra-high-energy radiation,” said lead author Domenik Ehlert.
“The ultra-high-energy radiation consists of protons or atomic nuclei with energy up to 10²⁰ electron volts,” Oikonomou added. This represents an extraordinary amount of energy compressed into a tiny particle.
If applied to something the size of a tennis ball, the same amount of energy could propel it at 200 kilometers per hour—about a billion times more energy than particles produced in the Large Hadron Collider.
Cosmic Radiation: A Cause for Concern
Despite their incredible power, cosmic rays are harmless to life on Earth, as the atmosphere destroys them before they can reach the ground—or even the cruising altitude of commercial airplanes.
Still, there are important reasons to study them beyond pure scientific interest.
“For astronauts, cosmic radiation is a very serious problem,” Oikonomou emphasized.
“The main concern for astronauts is cosmic low-energy radiation produced by our own Sun, because it is much more common.
The rays we study are infrequent enough that it is extremely unlikely they would pass through an astronaut,” she explained.
Comparisons to Earlier Work
Previous theories proposed other sources for cosmic rays, including starburst galaxies, gamma-ray bursts, and plasma outflows from black holes.
“All the other hypotheses are very good guesses—they are all sources that contain a lot of energy. But no one has provided evidence that any of them are the source. That is why we decided to investigate the winds from the supermassive black holes,” said Ehlert.
“We find that the conditions related to these winds align particularly well with particle acceleration. But we are still unable to prove that it is specifically these winds that accelerate the particles behind the high-energy cosmic radiation,” said Oikonomou.
Despite how well the model fits, one aspect remains unresolved.
For cosmic rays in a specific energy range, the particles show a chemical composition that the current model cannot yet explain. Further studies will be necessary to uncover the complete origin story.
“We can also test the model using neutrino experiments,” Oikonomou added. “In the years to come, we hope to collaborate with neutrino astronomers to test our hypothesis.”
https://thedebrief.org/mysterious-cosmic-radiation-is-a-very-serious-problem-for-astronauts-new-research-could-finally-reveal-its-origins/
https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/539/3/2435/8087347?login=false
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kevinholdenplatt/2025/05/24/nasa-spacex-and-scientists-speed-up-human-race-to-invade-mars/
NASA, SpaceX And Scientists Speed Up Human Race To Invade Mars
May 24, 2025, 03:31pm EDT
As NASA pivots toward speeding astronauts to Mars, and SpaceX pilots the Starship super-capsules that will lead this new space odyssey, vanguard American scientists are testing the technologies that could transform the Red Planet into an astonishing New Eden.
A Harvard-based torchbearer in the quest to remake Mars in the Earth’s image, Robin Wordsworth, says new-generation rockets that are slashing launch costs and tech breakthroughs across the sphere of geo-engineering are setting the stage to create human-tended biospheres across Mars.
One of the leading wunderkinds in the campaign to terraform Mars, or render it inhabitable for the arks of Earth life envisioned to be lofted over the next decades, Wordsworth tells me in an interview that his team is now designing sanctuaries that could shelter the first humans to touch down on the Martian dunes.
“We’re currently working on new habitat designs that specifically address the challenge of helping humans live on Mars in the future,” says Wordsworth, a professor of planetary sciences at Harvard who has written a torrent of groundbreaking papers on Mars and on potentially habitable planets circling other stars.
Yet the overarching goal, he says, is to restore Mars to its first phase of evolution - billions of years ago - when the orb was warmer, likely covered in networks of waterways, and surrounded by a thicker atmosphere that could have protected early forms of life.
Part of Mars’ carbon dioxide atmosphere, along with rich reservoirs of water, are now frozen and sequestered around its southern and northern poles.
But these building blocks toward recreating Mars when it resembled the Earth - as life started appearing across the blue globe - can be released via cutting-edge engineering advances that space technologists have already begun testing, Wordsworth says.
The Harvard space-tech designer says he aims to push forward and refine a proposal first floated by Robert Zubrin in his masterwork book, “The Case for Mars: The Plan to Settle the Red Planet and Why We Must,” on reshaping the entire Martian orb to host a new branch of human civilization.
Dr. Zubin’s idea for massive solar sail mirrors positioned above the Martian poles - channeling reflected light from the sun to melt the polar caps - could be realized, Wordsworth says, if inventors can take the last steps toward reducing the mass of the orbital reflectors.
Zubrin says in his incredible primer on re-engineering Mars, which has influenced future mission plans by NASA and SpaceX, that: “A space-based mirror with a radius of 125 kilometers could reflect enough sunlight” to melt each of the caps, and spark “a runaway greenhouse effect in the polar region.”
This evaporating CO2 and water vapor would trigger an expanding Martian atmosphere that could in turn help melt the frozen H2O trapped in the Martian dunes.
As the planet’s ancient water cycle is regenerated, Wordsworth predicts, renewed snowstorms could clear the air of dust devils that currently haunt the ruddy globe.
Vast shields, constructed of lightweight silica aerogel, deployed across the warming plains around the equator could shelter the first Edenic gardens, sprinkled with bio-engineered bacteria to remediate the poisonous perchlorate that now plagues the surface sands.
As photosynthetic life spreads across these enclaves, Wordsworth predicts, the oxygen it generates will ultimately produce an optimum atmosphere for humans - perhaps over the course of two centuries.
Before then, even as the entire planet begins turning blue and green, the first generations of human explorers could live across an archipelago of interconnected geodesic domes, pressurized and filled with oxygen to replicate Earth.
While Robert Zubrin sketched out blueprints to construct a web of domes using super-strength Kevlar, Wordsworth made the remarkable discovery that hemispheres built of silica aerogel would heat up the interior by 50 degrees Kelvin, above the melting point of frozen H2O along the Martian equator.
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The aerogel shield would, like the Earth’s ozone, block hazardous ultraviolet radiation, creating a perfect oasis for humans and birds, wildlife and verdant gardens to flourish.
Combining these two proposed prototypes into a twin-shell dome could create a fortified, life-enabling citadel, Wordsworth predicts.
“A dome with Kevlar for strength and silica aerogel to create a strong solid-state greenhouse effect,” he says, could shelter the first wave of interplanetary nomads to reach Mars.
During this opening stage of humanity’s expansion, he says, “Robots could have a major role to play in the construction of sustainable habitats.”
Swarms of ground-based and aerial robots are already being tested out by leading-edge architects and roboticists to co-construct avant-garde towers back on Earth.
Fabio Gramazio, a professor at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich who heads perhaps the planet’s most advanced studio for robotics-enabled building, told me in an earlier interview that his squadrons of next-generation aero-robots, which have already constructed an experimental cloud-scraper in France, might one day help assemble the first crystalline domes on Mars.
Professor Wordsworth, meanwhile, says silica derived from Martian rocks could be transformed into aerogel to craft habitats and biospheres across these off-world bases.
His colleagues at Harvard’s School of Engineering and Applied Sciences have already received a NASA Space Technology Research Institutes grant to robotically construct autonomous “smart habitats” for potential deployment on Mars.
In a surprise revelation, NASA spokesperson Bethany Stevens recently told Politico the American aerospace agency is now “evaluating every opportunity, including launch windows in 2026 and 2028, to test technologies that will land humans on Mars.”
NASA’s new timetable for these potential launches, when the Hohmann transfer window for optimal Earth-Mars flights opens in late 2026 and again in 2028, echoes Elon Musk’s declaration, issued last summer on his digital platform X, that he aims to loft a flotilla of five Starships carrying a robotic exploration team to Mars in 2026, and the first human mission two years later.
Underscoring this accelerated timeline, the White House just released a proposed budget for NASA that for the first time includes $1 billion in funding for precursor missions leading to human flights to Mars.
While the last two flight tests of SpaceX’s colossal Starship ended in pyrotechnic explosions of the capsule over the Atlantic Ocean, Kip Hodges, one of the top space scholars in the U.S. and the founding director of the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University, told me the Mars-bound Starship is a technological wonder that portends a revolution in spaceflight that could reverberate across the twin planets.
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On the eve of the American Memorial Day holiday, SpaceX’s leadership revealed that the next flight demo of the Starship could be launched right after the extended weekend.
Pete Worden, an acclaimed American astrophysicist who headed the NASA Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley during its golden age of experimentation, says NASA’s new focus on Mars “is a very positive sign.”
“I would expect that just as the 2020s are the lunar decade, culminating in what I believe will be the beginning of human settlement of the Moon, the 2030s will be the beginning of permanent human settlement of Mars,” Worden tells me in an interview.
Worden predicted, in an overview he co-authored with Robin Wordsworth on the “Future of Life in Space,” that the skyrocketing production of new reusable rockets by SpaceX and Blue Origin augurs a new phase of human spaceflight that could begin to crisscross the solar system.
As NASA expands its target celestial destinations, Worden says, “The ideas Robin [Wordsworth] and others are advocating will play a crucial part of that expansion.”
During the countdown to initial exploratory expeditions to Mars, he adds, “Robin Wordsworth’s concepts begin with really small scale habitats.”
“These could be on the surface or, alternatively, inside natural caves/lava tubes (a concept also relevant for the moon).”
“These will be followed by larger habitats, ultimately something like the Biosphere 2 in Arizona (geodesic dome approach) that will include human habitation.” “The Starships,” Worden adds, “and other systems like them make all of this possible.”
In a White Paper on projected Starship treks to Mars that he co-wrote with two of SpaceX’s top engineers, Professor Kip Hodges stated that the first group of uncrewed ships will deliver “mobile robotic assets that could be used to conduct planetary science research either autonomously or through high-latency teleoperation.”
With 1100 cubic meters of pressurized space, each Starship capsule could hold a brigade of advanced robots, along with “equipment for increased power production, water extraction, LOX/methane [rocket fuel] production, pre-prepared landing pads, radiation shielding, dust control equipment [and] exterior shelters for humans."
Although each Starship is designed to transport about 100 spacefarers, the “first crewed Starships will likely each have about 10-20 total people onboard,” Professor Hodges and the SpaceX tech wizards predict.
“Current SpaceX architecture plans call for multiple Starship flights to be launched to Mars at every launch opportunity (~2 years),” they add.
“An ultimate objective of SpaceX is to develop self-sustaining cities on Mars.”
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