Space news topic and space related news

[Tsanten Eywa 'eveng]

More and more about Interstellar travelling, and they say it's a problem

http://www.space.com/17703-interstellar-spaceflight-challenges-humanity.html

The biggest challenge in mounting a space mission to another star may not be technology, but people, experts say.

"It seems like it would be so hard, and the biggest obstacle is ourselves. Once we get out of our way, once we commit to this, then it's a done deal," said former "Star Trek: The Next Generation" actor LeVar Burton, who is serving on the advisory committee of the 100 Year Starship project.

The initiative hopes to spur the development of new propulsion technologies, life support systems, starship and habitat designs, as well as myriad other necessary innovations, to send a vehicle beyond our solar system — where no manmade object has yet traveled — and to another star. As the closest stars to the sun are still light-years away, such a feat will be daunting.

[`Eylan Ayfalulukanä]

I would have thought this conclusion would have been obvious.

Its kind of like a big science experiment that concludes that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west.

Given time, and enough world peace, we will eventually do something like this. Its man's nature, and may in the end, be the only thing that saves our species.

[Tsanten Eywa 'eveng]

Curiosity finds a very unusual rock on Mars
It looks like a pyramid

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity has driven up to a football-size rock that will be the first for the rover's arm to examine.

Curiosity is about 8 feet (2.5 meters) from the rock. It lies about halfway from the rover's landing site, Bradbury Landing, to a location called Glenelg. In coming days, the team plans to touch the rock with a spectrometer to determine its elemental composition and use an arm-mounted camera to take close-up photographs.

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/news/msl20120919.html

[Tsanten Eywa 'eveng]

BIG NEWS


President candidate Mitt Romney reveals Space Exploration plans:

http://www.space.com/17736-romney-ryan-nasa-space-exploration.html


Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney has unveiled his plans for the future of NASA and American space exploration, unleashing a blistering attack on President Barack Obama in the process.

In a policy paper released Saturday (Sept. 22), Romney and running mate Paul Ryan pledge to secure the nation's global leadership position in space, which, they say, has eroded significantly during the president's first term.

"Over the past four years, the Obama Administration, through poor policy and outright negligence, has badly weakened one of the hallmarks of American leadership and ingenuity — our nation's space program," the paper reads.

"Rebuilding NASA, restoring U.S. leadership, and creating new opportunities for space commerce will be hard work, but Mitt Romney will strive to rebuild an institution worthy of our aspirations and capable once again of leading the world toward new frontiers," the authors add.

"A strong and successful NASA does not require more funding, it needs clearer priorities," the paper reads. "Romney will ensure that NASA has practical and sustainable missions. There will be a balance of pragmatic and top-priority science with inspirational and groundbreaking exploration programs."

No further details about these prospective science and exploration missions are provided. Indeed, the eight-page document is sparing with details throughout, saying that specifics will be drawn up later, after consulation with representatives from NASA, the Air Force, academia and the business community.

[Clarke]

Still wouldn't be enough to get me to vote for him.

[moonbeam]

More news about the interstellar travel

http://www.space.com/17628-warp-drive-possible-interstellar-spaceflight.html

Warp drive might come into real

A warp drive to achieve faster-than-light travel — a concept popularized in television's Star Trek — may not be as unrealistic as once thought, scientists say.

A warp drive would manipulate space-time itself to move a starship, taking advantage of a loophole in the laws of physics that prevent anything from moving faster than light. A concept for a real-life warp drive was suggested in 1994 by Mexican physicist Miguel Alcubierre, however subsequent calculations found that such a device would require prohibitive amounts of energy.

Now physicists say that adjustments can be made to the proposed warp drive that would enable it to run on significantly less energy, potentially brining the idea back from the realm of science fiction into science.

"There is hope," Harold "Sonny" White of NASA's Johnson Space Center said here Friday (Sept. 14) at the 100 Year Starship Symposium, a meeting to discuss the challenges of interstellar spaceflight.

An Alcubierre warp drive would involve a football-shape spacecraft attached to a large ring encircling it. This ring, potentially made of exotic matter, would cause space-time to warp around the starship, creating a region of contracted space in front of it and expanded space behind.

Meanwhile, the starship itself would stay inside a bubble of flat space-time that wasn't being warped at all.

"Everything within space is restricted by the speed of light," explained Richard Obousy, president of Icarus Interstellar, a non-profit group of scientists and engineers devoted to pursuing interstellar spaceflight. "But the really cool thing is space-time, the fabric of space, is not limited by the speed of light."

With this concept, the spacecraft would be able to achieve an effective speed of about 10 times the speed of light, all without breaking the cosmic speed limit.

The only problem is, previous studies estimated the warp drive would require a minimum amount of energy about equal to the mass-energy of the planet Jupiter.

That's awesome. I would love to ride arould in a cosmic football.

[Tsanten Eywa 'eveng]

Hi space fans

I have 2 news to give you all today


First news....


the Curiosity rover on Mars is experiencing warm weather on the Red Planet. Where the location Curiosity is, it has experienced the warmest weather up to 43°F, that will say 6°C, and there is still not spring, in the Gale Crater area

Curiosity is going to find if there is, or have been microbial life there in the Gale Crater region
http://www.space.com/17828-mars-weather-curiosity-rover-discovery.html


The other news is......


The satellite Venus Express, which is orbiting the planet Venus, have spotted a curious cold layer in the atmosphere of Venus.
There is enough cold temperature for carbon dioxide to freeze to ice or snow
The planet Venus is well known for its thick, carbon dioxide atmosphere and oven-hot surface, and as a result is often portrayed as Earth's inhospitable evil twin.
But in a new analysis based on five years of observations using ESA's Venus Express, scientists have uncovered a very chilly layer at temperatures of around    –175ºC in the atmosphere 125 km above the planet's surface.

http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMILCERI7H_index_0.html

[`Eylan Ayfalulukanä]

There is a similar cold layer in our atmosphere, as well.

[Tsanten Eywa 'eveng]

There is a similar cold layer in our atmosphere, as well.

Yeah, but Venus is a total different planet. It's so hot, that you will die in just seconds
it's over 400°C on the surface

This thread explains the most
http://www.space.com/17850-venus-atmosphere-cold-layer.html

[`Eylan Ayfalulukanä]

I wonder if this has anything to do with the insulating qualities of carbon dioxide. Or perhaps, the high surface heat coupled with the substantial pressure gradient across the atmosphere might be driving some sort of refrigeration cycle, with carbon dioxide as the refrigerant.

[Tsanten Eywa 'eveng]

The private space transport SpaceX is gonna launch the Dragon spacraft to the International Space Station from Cape Canaveral, Florida next week. It is gonna be an unmanned launch. It will deliver food and to the crew onboard on the ISS.

The liftoff will be a night launch, one of the most impressive kinds of rocket launches to view, and should be visible across Florida's Space Coast and beyond.

The Dragon's heat shield is furthermore designed to withstand Earth re-entry velocities from potential Lunar and Martian spaceflights

http://www.space.com/17865-spacex-private-rocket-launch-viewing-tips.html

[`Eylan Ayfalulukanä]

The Dragon spacecraft is also soon to be man-rated. But even an unmanned resupply craft that can safely return is a big step in the right direction. SpaceX (I think) is also working on a reusable first stage that soft-lands at the end of boost.

I am still waiting for Skylon. Whey we aren't developing something like this, I will never know.

[Tsanten Eywa 'eveng]

Comets found in an alien solar system, 63 light-years away, Beta Pictors solar system, a very young solar system, around 8-20 million years old.

Comets detected around other stars appear strikingly similar to the most primitive comets in the solar system, researchers say.

The discovery suggests that matter around distant stars mixed in ways similar to the solar system in its youth, scientists added.

http://www.space.com/17875-alien-comets-distant-star-kuiper-belt.html

[Tsanten Eywa 'eveng]

A new satellite to the U.S Air Force, has been launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida
It was launched yesterday, with a Delta 4 rocket

http://www.space.com/17913-air-force-gps-satellite-launch.html

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=62LrwX-2u5k

[Tsanten Eywa 'eveng]

SpaceX's Dragon capsule have launched to the International Space Station from
Cape Canaveral, Florida with a Falcon 9 rocket.


Congratulations

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRTYh71D9P0&feature=plcp

[`Eylan Ayfalulukanä]

Impressive!

The engine start has a distinctive 'bark' to it I have never heard on any other launch vehicle. I also saw a green flash in the engine area at the same time. I wonder if they are using triethylborane as an ignitor (and this might cause the 'bark' as well). That would cause a green flash like that.

[Taronyu Leleioae]

Impressive!
The engine start has a distinctive 'bark' to it I have never heard on any other launch vehicle. I also saw a green flash in the engine area at the same time. I wonder if they are using triethylborane as an ignitor (and this might cause the 'bark' as well). That would cause a green flash like that.

Agreed!  Very unique ignition response.  I was wondering about the green.

I've always been a huge fan of viewing/watching space vehicle launches...

[Tsanten Eywa 'eveng]

Watch it live

Felix Baumgartner is going to make a supersonic freefall, from 23 miles(36.6 km)

http://www.space.com/17956-red-bull-stratos-skydive-live-video.html


This is going to be exciting to watch

[Tìtstewan]

The jump was canceled because of the strong wind.
Maybe the next attempt will be succesful.

[`Eylan Ayfalulukanä]

If you go back and take a look at the Falcon 9 launch again, you will see a flash of flames from the engine are at about the 1:19 mark. It seems the first stage lost an engine at that time, according to the flight report posted by SpaceX. The engine 'lost pressure, and shut down properly a moment later'. They don't believe the engine exploded, because they continued to receive telemetry from it. But a shroud protecting the engine was apparently blown off by whatever went wrong.

The fact that the spacecraft adjusted itself to the thrust loss and otherwise flew a nominal flight is a tribute to the good engineering that went into the Falcon 9 design.