It's Crater-palooza on Dwarf Planet Ceres (New Photo)

A new view of Ceres, captured by NASA’s Dawn probe on May 23, 2015, shows fine details of the dwarf planet’s surface coming into focus. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA View full size image

A new photo from NASA's Dawn spacecraft shows the battered surface of the dwarf planet Ceres in unprecedented detail.
Dawn captured the image on May 23, when the probe was just 3,200 miles (5,100 kilometers) from Ceres. The photo's resolution is about 1,600 feet (480 meters) per pixel, scientists said.
"The view shows numerous secondary craters, formed by the re-impact of debris strewn from larger impact sites. Smaller surface details like this are becoming visible with increasing clarity as Dawn spirals lower in its campaign to map Ceres," NASA officials wrote in an image description today (May 28).

"The region shown here is located between 13 degrees and 51 degrees north latitude and 182 degrees and 228 degrees east longitude," they added. "The image has been projected onto a globe of Ceres, which accounts for the small notch of black at upper right."

NASA's Dawn spacecraft captured this image of the dwarf planet Ceres' heavily cratered surface on May 23, 2015, from a distance of 3,200 miles (5,100 kilometers).
Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA

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The $473 million Dawn mission launched in September 2007 to study Vesta and Ceres, the two largest objects in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Vesta and Ceres are planetary building blocks left over from the solar system's early days, so Dawn's observations should help researchers better understand how rocky worlds like Earth and Mars formed and grew, NASA officials have said.
Dawn orbited the 330-mile-wide (530 km) Vesta from July 2011 through September 2012 and reached Ceres, which is 590 miles (950 km) across, this March. In the process, Dawn became the first spacecraft to orbit two objects beyond the Earth-moon system, as well as the first to circle a dwarf planet.
Dawn is studying Ceres from a series of progressively closer-in orbits. The craft's first science orbit lay about 8,400 miles (13,500 km) from the dwarf planet's surface; Dawn is currently spiraling down to a 2,700-mile-high (4,400 km) orbit, which it should reach on June 3.
By the time Dawn wraps up its mission in June 2016, it will be eyeing Ceres' intriguing surface from just 230 miles (375 km) away.

May 27, 2015

 

NASA’s Europa Mission Begins with Selection of Science Instruments

Bizarre features on Europa’s icy surface suggest a warm interior. This view of the surface of Jupiter's moon Europa was obtained by NASA's Galileo mission, and shows a color image set within a larger mosaic of low-resolution monochrome images. Galileo was able to survey only a small fraction of Europa's surface in color at high resolution; a future mission would include a high-resolution imaging capability to capture a much larger part of the moon's surface.

Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech

NASA has selected nine science instruments for a mission to Jupiter’s moon Europa, to investigate whether the mysterious icy moon could harbor conditions suitable for life.
NASA’s Galileo mission yielded strong evidence that Europa, about the size of Earth’s moon, has an ocean beneath a frozen crust of unknown thickness. If proven to exist, this global ocean could have more than twice as much water as Earth. With abundant salt water, a rocky sea floor, and the energy and chemistry provided by tidal heating, Europa could be the best place in the solar system to look for present day life beyond our home planet.

This artist's rendering shows a concept for a future NASA mission to Europa in which a spacecraft would make multiple close flybys of the icy Jovian moon, thought to contain a global subsurface ocean.

Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech

“Europa has tantalized us with its enigmatic icy surface and evidence of a vast ocean, following the amazing data from 11 flybys of the Galileo spacecraft over a decade ago and recent Hubble observations suggesting plumes of water shooting out from the moon," said John Grunsfeld, associate administrator for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. “We’re excited about the potential of this new mission and these instruments to unravel the mysteries of Europa in our quest to find evidence of life beyond Earth.”
NASA’s fiscal year 2016 budget request includes $30 million to formulate a mission to Europa. The mission would send a solar-powered spacecraft into a long, looping orbit around the gas giant Jupiter to perform repeated close flybys of Europa over a three-year period. In total, the mission would perform 45 flybys at altitudes ranging from 16 miles to 1,700 miles (25 kilometers to 2,700 kilometers).
The payload of selected science instruments includes cameras and spectrometers to produce high-resolution images of Europa’s surface and determine its composition. An ice penetrating radar will determine the thickness of the moon’s icy shell and search for subsurface lakes similar to those beneath Antarctica. The mission also will carry a magnetometer to measure strength and direction of the moon’s magnetic field, which will allow scientists to determine the depth and salinity of its ocean.
A thermal instrument will scour Europa’s frozen surface in search of recent eruptions of warmer water, while additional instruments will search for evidence of water and tiny particles in the moon’s thin atmosphere. NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope observed water vapor above the south polar region of Europa in 2012, providing the first strong evidence of water plumes. If the plumes’ existence is confirmed – and they’re linked to a subsurface ocean – it will help scientists investigate the chemical makeup of Europa's potentially habitable environment while minimizing the need to drill through layers of ice.
Last year, NASA invited researchers to submit proposals for instruments to study Europa. Thirty-three were reviewed and, of those, nine were selected for a mission that will launch in the 2020s.
“This is a giant step in our search for oases that could support life in our own celestial backyard,” said Curt Niebur, Europa program scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington. “We’re confident that this versatile set of science instruments will produce exciting discoveries on a much-anticipated mission.”
The NASA selectees are:
Plasma Instrument for Magnetic Sounding (PIMS) -- principal investigator Dr. Joseph Westlake of Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), Laurel, Maryland. This instrument works in conjunction with a magnetometer and is key to determining Europa's ice shell thickness, ocean depth, and salinity by correcting the magnetic induction signal for plasma currents around Europa.
Interior Characterization of Europa using Magnetometry (ICEMAG) -- principal investigator Dr. Carol Raymond of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), Pasadena, California. This magnetometer will measure the magnetic field near Europa and – in conjunction with the PIMS instrument – infer the location, thickness and salinity of Europa’s subsurface ocean using multi-frequency electromagnetic sounding.
Mapping Imaging Spectrometer for Europa (MISE) -- principal investigator Dr. Diana Blaney of JPL. This instrument will probe the composition of Europa, identifying and mapping the distributions of organics, salts, acid hydrates, water ice phases, and other materials to determine the habitability of Europa’s ocean.
Europa Imaging System (EIS) -- principal investigator Dr. Elizabeth Turtle of APL. The wide and narrow angle cameras on this instrument will map most of Europa at 50 meter (164 foot) resolution, and will provide images of areas of Europa’s surface at up to 100 times higher resolution.
Radar for Europa Assessment and Sounding: Ocean to Near-surface (REASON) -- principal investigator Dr. Donald Blankenship of the University of Texas, Austin. This dual-frequency ice penetrating radar instrument is designed to characterize and sound Europa's icy crust from the near-surface to the ocean, revealing the hidden structure of Europa’s ice shell and potential water within.
Europa Thermal Emission Imaging System (E-THEMIS) -- principal investigator Dr. Philip Christensen of Arizona State University, Tempe. This “heat detector” will provide high spatial resolution, multi-spectral thermal imaging of Europa to help detect active sites, such as potential vents erupting plumes of water into space.
MAss SPectrometer for Planetary EXploration/Europa (MASPEX) -- principal investigator Dr. Jack (Hunter) Waite of the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), San Antonio. This instrument will determine the composition of the surface and subsurface ocean by measuring Europa’s extremely tenuous atmosphere and any surface material ejected into space.
Ultraviolet Spectrograph/Europa (UVS) -- principal investigator Dr. Kurt Retherford of SwRI. This instrument will adopt the same technique used by the Hubble Space Telescope to detect the likely presence of water plumes erupting from Europa’s surface. UVS will be able to detect small plumes and will provide valuable data about the composition and dynamics of the moon’s rarefied atmosphere.
SUrface Dust Mass Analyzer (SUDA) -- principal investigator Dr. Sascha Kempf of the University of Colorado, Boulder. This instrument will measure the composition of small, solid particles ejected from Europa, providing the opportunity to directly sample the surface and potential plumes on low-altitude flybys.
Separate from the selectees listed above, the SPace Environmental and Composition Investigation near the Europan Surface (SPECIES) instrument has been chosen for further technology development. Led by principal investigator Dr. Mehdi Benna at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, this combined neutral mass spectrometer and gas chromatograph will be developed for other mission opportunities.  
NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington conducts a wide variety of research and scientific exploration programs for Earth studies, space weather, the solar system and the universe.

Hunting LightSail in Orbit

by David Dickinson on May 20, 2015

An artist’s conception of LightSail in low Earth orbit. Image credit: The Planetary Society

The hunt is on in the satellite tracking community, as the U.S. Air Force’s super-secret X-37B space plane rocketed into orbit today atop an Atlas V rocket out of Cape Canaveral.  This marks the start of OTV-4, the X-37B’s fourth trip into low Earth orbit. And though NORAD won’t be publishing the orbital elements for the mission, it is sure to provide an interesting hunt for backyard satellite sleuths on the ground.
Previous OTV missions were placed in a 40 to 43.5 degree inclination orbit, and the current NOTAMs cite a 61 degree azimuth angle for today’s launch out of the Cape which suggests a slightly shallower 39 degree orbit. Such variability speaks to the versatile nature of the second stage Centaur motor.

A capture of the X-37B in orbit. Image credit and copyright: Luke (Catching up)

There’s also been word afoot that future X-37B missions may return to Earth at the Kennedy Space Center, just like the Space Shuttle. To date, the X-37B has only landed at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.
But there’s also another high interest payload being released along with a flock of CubeSats aboard AFPSC-5: The Planetary Society’s Lightsail-1.

The UltraSat P-POD CubeSat dispenser. Image credit: United Launch Alliance

About the size of a loaf of bread and the result of a successful Kickstarter campaign, LightSail is set to demonstrate key technologies in low Earth orbit before the Planetary Society’s main solar sail demonstrator takes to space in 2016.
The idea of using solar wind pressure for space travel is an enticing one. A big plus is the fact that unlike chemical propulsion, a solar sail does not need to contend with hauling the mass of its own fuel. The idea of using a solar sail plus a focused laser to propel an interstellar spacecraft has long been a staple of science fiction. But light-sailing technology has had a troubled history—the Planetary Society lost its Cosmos-1 mission launched from a Russian submarine in 2001. JAXA has fared better with its Venus-bound IKAROS, also equipped with a solar sail. To date, the IKAROS solar sail is the largest that has been deployed, at 20-metres on the diagonal.
Another use for space sail technology is the commanded reentry of spacecraft at the end of their mission life, as demonstrated by NanoSail-D2 in 2011.
Prospects of seeing LightSail may well be similar to what we had hunting for NanoSail-D2. Unfolded, LightSail will be 32 square meters in size, or about 5.6 meters on a side. NanoSail-D2 measured 3.1 meters on a side, and the reflective panels on the Iridium satellites which produce brilliant Iridium flares exceeding Venus in brightness measure about the size of a large rectangular door at 1 x 3 meters. Even the Hubble Space Telescope can flare on occasion as seen from the ground if one of its massive solar arrays catches the Sun just right.

Hubble can flare too! Image credit: David Dickinson

The 39 degree orbital inclination angle will also limit visible passes to from about 45 degrees north to 45 degrees south latitude.
Hunting down X-37B and LightSail will push ground observing skills to the max. Like NanoSail-D2, LightSail probably won’t be visible to the naked eye until it flares. What we like to do is note when a faint satellite is set to pass by a bright star, then sit back with our trusty 15x 45 image-stabilized binoculars and watch. We caught sight of the ‘tool bag’ lost during an ISS EVA in 2009 in this fashion. There it was, drifting past Spica as a +7^th magnitude ‘star’. The key to this method is an accurate prediction—Heavens-Above now overlays orbital satellite passes on all-sky charts—and an accurate time source. We prefer to have WWV radio running in the background, as it’ll call out the time signal so we don’t have to take our eyes off the sky.

The orbital trace of OTV-3. Image credit: Orbitron

Veteran satellite watcher Ted Molczan recently discussed the prospects for spotting LightSail once it’s deployed.  “By then, the orbit will be visible from the northern hemisphere during the middle of the night. The southern hemisphere may have marginal evening passes. Note that the high area to mass ratio with the sail deployed, combined with the low perigee height, is expected to result in decay as soon as a couple days after deployment.”
Read a further discussion concerning OTV-4 and associated payloads by Mr. Molczan on the See-Sat message board here.
The Planetary Society’s Jason Davis confirmed for Universe Today that LightSail will deploy 28 days after launch. But we may only have a slim two day observation window for LightSail between deployment and reentry.
A deployment of LightSail 28 days after launch would put it in the June 16^th timeframe.
“That’s the nominal mission time, yes,” Davis told Universe Today. “Our orbital models predict 2-10 days. For our 2016 flight, the mission will last at least four months.”
The Planetary Society plans to have a live ‘mission control center’ to track LightSail after P-POD deployment, complete with a Google Map showing pass predictions.
Satellite spotting can be a fun and addictive pastime, where part of the fun is sleuthing out what you’re seeing. Hey, some relics of space history such as the early Vanguards, Telstars, and Canada’s first satellite Alouette-1 are still up there! Nabbing these photographically are as simple as plopping your DSLR on a tripod, setting the focus and doing a time exposure as the satellite passes by.

The X-37B undergoing encapsulation in preparation for launch. Image credit: USAF

Here’s to smooth solar sailing and clear skies as we embark on our quest to track down the X-37B and LightSail-1 in orbit.

Newly Discovered Ultra-Diffuse Galaxies as Large as the Milky Way but with Only 1% of the Stars

Posted Yesterday

Comparing data from the Dragonfly Telephoto Array (which uses 14 centimetre state-of-the-art telephoto camera lens) and the celebrated 10m Keck I private telescope at the W. M. Observatory on Mauna Kea in Hawaii – both directed at the Coma Galactic Cluster, located over 300 light-years away from the Earth – astronomers have discovered 47 so-called ultra-diffuse (or “wispy”) galaxies that are almost as wide as the Milky Way (about 60.000 light-years across), yet harbour only 1% of the stars.

Astronomers have found a new type of galaxies, more similar to wisps of clouds than to a sea of stars that are near the size of our own native Milky Way, but contain only around 1% of the stars. Image credit: ESA/Hubble & NASA via spacetelescope.org, CC BY 3.0.

“If the Milky Way is a sea of stars, then these newly discovered galaxies are like wisps of clouds,” said Yale University astronomer and study lead author Pieter van Dokkum. “We are beginning to form some ideas about how they were born and it’s remarkable they have survived at all. They are found in a dense, violent region of space filled with dark matter and galaxies whizzing around, so we think they must be cloaked in their own invisible dark matter “shields” that are protecting them from this intergalactic assault.”
The discovery was made by separating the light from one of the objects (an ultra-diffuse galaxy called DragonFly44) – seen in the digital images produced by the DTA – into colors, which helped diagnose its composition, age and distance. Ultra-diffuse galaxies have the same number of stars as dwarf elliptical galaxies, but are spread out over a much larger region. The findings of the study were recently published in the Astrophysical Journal Letters.
“If there are any aliens living on a planet in an ultra-diffuse galaxy, they would have no band of light across the sky, like our own Milky Way, to tell them they were living in a galaxy. The night sky would be much emptier of stars,” noted team member Aaron Romanowsky of the San Jose State University.
Given what we know about galactic formation, these new galaxies, seen in the constellation Coma Berenices (situated near Leo), simply shouldn’t exist, prompting astronomers to revise some of their hypotheses.
“The big challenge now is to figure out where these mysterious objects came from. Are they “failed galaxies” that started off well and then ran out of gas? Were they once normal galaxies that got knocked around so much inside the Coma Cluster that they puffed up? Or are they bits of galaxies that were pulled off and then got lost in space?” speculated University of Toronto astronomer Roberto Abraham.
To answer these questions and better understand the new type of galaxies, the researchers will now have to pin down exactly how much dark matter they contain – a measurement that no doubt will prove to be even more complicated than the ones involved in the present work.

Solar Power: Is Space The Final Frontier?

Posted Today

As researchers frantically search for new sources of clean power to meet the rising power demand on earth, the sci-fi idea of space-based solar power is finally taking shape to become a reality. It was science fiction writer Isaac Asimov who, in his science fiction story Reason in 1941, had first talked about a space station transmitting energy collected from the Sun to various planets using microwave beams. The concept makes such a strong case for solving the energy crisis on earth that countries like USA, China and Japan are pushing ahead with their plans to tap space solar power.

Photo Courtesy of NASA. via Wikimedia, Public Domain

California Institute of Technology (Caltech) has launched Space Solar Power Initiative (SSPI) with the goal of generating electricity from sunlight in space as cheaply as fossil-fuels. Funded by aerospace company Northrop Grumman Corporation, the initiative will focus on innovations for enabling a space-based solar array system, consisting of ultralight, high-efficiency photovoltaics, a phased-array system to produce and distribute power dynamically, and ultralight deployable space structures.
The space solar power station being planned by China, if realised, would be the largest-ever space project. The power station would be a super spacecraft, on a geosynchronous orbit 36,000 km above the ground, equipped with huge solar panels. The electricity generated would be converted into microwaves or lasers, and transmitted to a collector on Earth—reports Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Wang Xiji, an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences and an International Academy of Astronautics member, believes Asimov’s fiction has a scientific basis. “An economically viable space power station would be really huge, with the total area of the solar panels reaching 5 to 6 sq km. Maybe people on Earth could see at night, like a star,” says Wang.
Japan too has similar plans. The spacecraft being developed by researchers at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency and Japan Space Systems will have a square screen of solar panels measuring more than 1.2 miles along each side and use microwaves to beam energy down to Earth—reports Telegraph.
Inching a step closer to realization of space solar power transmission to earth, Japan Space Systems recently successfully tested wireless transmission of electricity. In the experiment, a total of 1.8 kilowatts of electricity was converted into microwaves, transmitted to a two-square-meter antenna panel 55 meters away and converted back into electricity.
Given that the cost of generating solar power here on earth is going down fast and, in many countries, now equals that of fossil fuels, one may wonder “why go to space then for harnessing the solar power.”  To answer this question, it’s important to look at the many advantages of space-based solar power vis a vis ground-based solar.
According to the National Space Society, an American international non-profit organization specializing in space advocacy, “Unlike terrestrial solar and wind power plants, space solar power is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, in huge quantities. It works regardless of cloud cover, daylight, or wind speed. Space solar power can provide large quantities of energy to each and every person on Earth with very little environmental impact. The solar energy available in space is literally billions of times greater than we use today. The lifetime of the sun is an estimated 4-5 billion years, making space solar power a truly long-term energy solution. As Earth receives only one part in 2.3 billion of the Sun’s output, space solar power is by far the largest potential energy source available, dwarfing all others combined.”
Saving of valuable real space on earth and freedom from cable clutter in households are two other major factors that work in favour of space solar power.
However, there are challenges to overcome before space solar power becomes feasible—high development and deployment cost tops the list. There is need to develop super-light, super-efficient solar cells and structures, as also low-cost, environmentally-friendly launch vehicles. Considering that solar power satellites must be large to collect massive quantities of energy, large-scale in-orbit construction makes sense.
Summing up in the words of the National Space Society: “Space solar power can completely solve our energy problems long term. The sooner we start and the harder we work, the shorter “long term” will be.” With successful testing of wireless power transmission and increasing funding for space solar projects, a beginning has already been made towards fruition of space solar power!

Ceres’ White Spots Multiply in Latest Dawn Photos

Posted Yesterday

We don’t know exactly what those mysterious white spots on Ceres are yet, but we’re getting closer to an explanation. Literally. The latest images from the Dawn spacecraft taken a mere 8,400 miles from the dwarf planet Ceres reveal that the pair of  spots are comprised of even more spots. 

Where there were two, now there are 10! Ceres photographed on May 3 and 4 by NASA’s Dawn spacecraft show multiple white spots inside the 57-mile-wide crater located in the asteroid’s northern hemisphere. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA / montage by Tom Ruen

“Dawn scientists can now conclude that the intense brightness of these spots is due to the reflection of sunlight by highly reflective material on the surface, possibly ice,” said Christopher Russell, principal investigator for the Dawn mission from the University of California, Los Angeles.
Dawn recently concluded its first science orbit, making a 15-day full circle around Ceres while gathering data with its suite of science instruments. This past Saturday, May 9, its ion engine fired once again to lower the spacecraft to its second science orbit which it will enter on June 6. On that date, the probe will hover just 2,700 miles (4,400 km) above the dwarf planet and begin a comprehensive mapping of the surface. Scientists also hope the bird’s eye view will reveal clues of ongoing geological activity.

In this uncropped single frame, not only are multiple white spots visible but also long, roughly parallel cracks or troughs in Ceres’ surface. Are they impact-related or caused by some other stress? Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA/MPS/DLR/IDA

There’s no doubt a lot’s been happening on Ceres. One look at all those cracks hint at either impact-related stresses some kind of crustal expansion. Geological processes may still make this little world rock and roll.
Fortunately, we won’t have to wait till next month for more photos. NASA plans to pause the probe twice on the way down to shoot and send fresh images.

Inside the US Air Force's Next X-37B Space Plane Mystery Mission

by Leonard David, Space.com's Space Insider Columnist   |   May 08, 2015 06:26pm ET

 

The U.S. Air Force's fourth X-37B space plane mission, the Orbital Test Vehicle 4 flight, will launch on a secret mission on May 20, 2015. An unmanned Atlas V rocket will launch the space plane from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Credit: United Launch Alliance View full size image

The U.S. Air Force is set to launch the fourth flight of its X-37B space plane on May 20, and new details are unfolding about the upcoming mystery mission.
For this latest flight of the X-37B space plane, also known as the Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV), the Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office has teamed up with several partners, including NASA, to test experimental space technologies.
"With the demonstrated success of the first three missions, we're able to shift our focus from initial checkouts of the vehicle to testing of experimental payloads," Randy Walden, director of the Air Force Rapid Capabilities Office overseeing the flight, said in a statement. [The Air Force's X-37B Space Plane Explained (Infographic)]

The forthcoming mission will test an experimental propulsion system jointly developed by the Air Force Research Laboratory and Space and Missile Systems Center. In addition, the X-37B craft will carry a NASA advanced materials investigation.
"We're very pleased with the experiments lined-up for our fourth OTV Mission OTV-4," Walden said. "We'll continue to evaluate improvements to the space vehicle's performance, but we're honored to host these collaborative experiments that will help advance the state-of-the-art for space technology."
According to a recent statement by launch provider United Launch Alliance (ULA), an Atlas V 501 rocket will loft the next X-37B flight as part of the "AFSPC-5" mission. AFSPC stands for Air Force Space Command.
"This mission will be launched in support of the national defense, ULA representatives wrote of the mission.

Previous X-37B being readied for launch atop Atlas booster.
Credit: Boeing

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Building on success

The reusable X-37B space plane looks like a miniature version of NASA's now mothballed space shuttle fleet. This military space plane is 29 feet (8.8 meters) long and 9.5 feet (2.9 m) tall, and has a wingspan of nearly 15 feet (4.6 m). The space plane's payload bay is the size of a pickup truck bed.
The X-37B program completed its most recent mission on Oct. 17, landing after 674 days  in orbit. That flight extended the total time in space for the X-37B space plane fleet to 1,367 days spread over three missions flown by two different vehicles.
The first OTV mission launched April 22, 2010 and concluded on Dec. 3 of that year, spending 224 days in orbit. The second OTV mission followed on March 5, 2011, and landed  on June 16, 2012, after 468 days on orbit.
Each of the three X-37B missions to date ended with an autopilot landing at the Vandenberg Air Force Base in California – but that may change.

Recovery crew members process the X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle at Vandenberg Air Force Base last year after mission complete.
Credit: Boeing

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Built by Boeing

The X-37B is built by Boeing Network & Space Systems, the same unit that designs and delivers satellites used for communications, navigation, intelligence, and weather monitoring. To date, only two X-37B vehicles have been confirmed as being built. [Evolution of the Space Plane (Infographic)]
While details of the X-37B project (such as its contract value, and the number of Boeing employees assigned to the program) are classified, work on this program is performed in California at Boeing's Huntington Beach, Seal Beach, and El Segundo sites.
Recently, the Space Foundation selected the U.S. Air Force-Boeing X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle Team to receive one of its top honors, the 2015 Space Achievement Award. The award was presented on April 13 during the opening ceremony of the 31st Space Symposium at The Broadmoor in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
The prestigious award was given "for significantly advancing the state of the art for reusable spacecraft and on-orbit operations, with the design, development, test and orbital operation of the X-37B space flight vehicle over three missions totaling 1,367 days in space," said Elliot Pulham, Space Foundation Chief Executive Officer.

Left to right: Space Foundation Chief Executive Officer Elliot Pulham; Gen. John Hyten, Commander, Air Force Space Command, Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado; Craig Cooning, president of Network and Space Systems for The Boeing Company; and Lon Levin, Chairman, Space Foundation Board of Directors.
Credit: NSS/Tom Kimmell Photography

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Florida landing?

Early in 2014, it was announced that Boeing Space & Intelligence Systems has consolidated its space plane operations by using NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida as a landing site for the X-37B.
Boeing has expanded its presence in Florida by adding technology, engineering and support jobs at the space center. As part of that Boeing plan, investments were made to convert the former space shuttle facility, Orbiter Processing Facility (OPF-1), to a structure that would enable the U.S. Air Force "to efficiently land, recover, refurbish, and re-launch the X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle (OTV)," according to Boeing representatives.
At the time of the announcement in 2014, this construction was to be completed by the second quarter of 2015, Boeing representatives said.
In response to an Inside Outer Space query regarding the space plane winging its way back to Florida, "the future landing location will be determined by a variety of factors," said Air Force spokesperson, Captain Chris Hoyler.
"Work is still ongoing to stand-up Florida as a landing site for the X-37B, and Vandenberg AFB is still being maintained as a landing location," Hoyler advised.

Fly-a-little, test-a-little

The US Air Force X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle during encapsulation within the United Launch Alliance Atlas V 5-meter fairing Feb. 8, 2011, at Astrotech in Titusville, Fla.
Credit: Boeing

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In terms of technology, the Air Force is following a prudent fly-a-little, test-a-little plan, observes Joan Johnson-Freese, a professor of National Security Affairs at the U.S. Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island.
"With the program goals and mission goals classified, we're left to guess, but it appears that with each mission they find how far they can push the envelope in some areas, and where they can keep pushing — or new areas to explore — in others," Johnson-Freese told Inside Outer Space.
Johnson-Freese said that she found it interesting that a mission objective for the upcoming flight noted that it was "in the interest of national defense."
"I can imagine that will be interpreted in some countries as the U.S. again trying to push toward 'domination' of space, especially if read in conjunction with $5 billion in new money being allocated for counterspace programs," Johnson-Freese said, noting her views are her own.
"Hopefully the U.S. will actively pursue all tools of power, including diplomacy, in conjunction with technology toward protecting U.S. assets and the sustainability of the space environment," Johnson-Freese concluded

Space Image: Mimas Stares Back

Posted Yesterday

The great eye of Saturn’s moon Mimas, a 130-kilometer-wide (80-mile) impact crater called Herschel, stares out from the battered moon. Several individual ringlets within the F ring are resolved here, and the small moon Atlas is also seen faintly outside the main rings.

Image Credit: NASA/JPL/Space Science Institute

Mimas is 397 kilometers (247 miles across); the view shows principally the moon’s anti-Saturn hemisphere. Atlas is 32 kilometers (20 miles) across.
The image was taken in visible light with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on April 5, 2005, at a distance of approximately 2.1 million kilometers (1.3 million miles) from Mimas and at a Sun-Mimas-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 72 degrees. The image scale is 13 kilometers (8 miles) per pixel.
The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency.
Source: NASA

Farewell, MESSENGER! NASA Probe Crashes Into Mercury

The region of Mercury where NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft crashed on April 30, 2015. This image was taken by MESSENGER during the course of its work at Mercury and so does not show the resulting crater. Higher-elevation regions are colored red in this image, while lower areas are blue. Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington View full size image

A NASA spacecraft slammed into the surface of Mercury on Thursday (April 30), bringing a groundbreaking mission to a dramatic end.
The MESSENGER probe crashed at 3:26 p.m. EDT (1926 GMT) Thursday, gouging a new crater into Mercury's heavily pockmarked surface. This violent demise was inevitable for MESSENGER, which had been orbiting Mercury since March 2011 and had run out of fuel.
The 10-foot-wide (3 meters) spacecraft was traveling about 8,750 mph (14,080 km/h) at the time of impact, and it likely created a smoking hole in the ground about 52 feet (16 m) wide in Mercury's northern terrain, NASA officials said. No observers or instruments witnessed today's crash, which occurred on the opposite side of Mercury from Earth. [Last Mercury Photos from NASA's MESSENGER]

This is the last photo captured and sent to Earth by NASA’s MESSENGER Mercury probe. The spacecraft took the image on April 30, 2015, shortly before crashing into Mercury’s surface in a death dive that ended four years of operations at the solar system’s innermost planet.
Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington

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MESSENGER was the first spacecraft ever to orbit the solar system's innermost planet, and its observations over the last four years helped lift the veil on mysterious Mercury, mission team members said.
"Although Mercury is one of Earth's nearest planetary neighbors, astonishingly little was known when we set out," MESSENGER principal investigator Sean Solomon, director of Columbia University's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, said in a statement.
"MESSENGER has at last brought Mercury up to the level of understanding of its sister planets in the inner solar system," Solomon added. "Of course, the more we learn, the more new questions we can ask, and there are ample reasons to return to Mercury with new missions."
Confirmation of MESSENGER's death came at 3:40 p.m. EDT (1940 GMT), when NASA's Deep Space Network station in Goldstone, California, was unable to detect a signal from the spacecraft, NASA officials said.
"On behalf of MESSENGER, thank you all for your support. We will continue to update you on our great discoveries. We will miss it," mission team members tweeted Thursday, via the @MESSENGER2011 account.
Bringing Mercury into focus;

 

Bringing Mercury into focusNASA's MESSENGER spacecraft is the first ever to orbit the planet Mercury. See how the MESSENGER mission to Mercury works in this Space.com infographic.
Credit: Karl Tate/SPACE.com

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The $450 million



 MESSENGER spacecraft, whose name is short for MErcury Surface, Space
ENvironment, GEochemistry and Ranging, launched on Aug. 3, 2004.
The probe took a long and looping trip through the inner solar system, relying on flybys of Earth, Venus and Mercury to slow down enough to be captured by Mercury's gravity. (Mercury lies very close to the sun, whose powerful gravitational pull would accelerate to great speeds spacecraft taking a direct route to the planet.)
MESSENGER finally arrived at Mercury on March 17, 2011, becoming the first probe ever to orbit the heat-blasted world, and just the second spacecraft ever to study it up close. (NASA's Mariner 10 probe performed three Mercury flybys in 1974 and 1975.)
MESSENGER's original mission at Mercury was supposed to last just one year, but NASA extended operations twice so the probe could continue its observations, which team members say have revolutionized our understanding of the planet.
For example, MESSENGER mapped the planet in unprecedented detail, discovered that Mercury hosts a strangely offset magnetic field and confirmed that permanently shadowed craters near Mercury's poles harbor deposits of water ice.
"The water now stored in ice deposits in the permanently shadowed floors of impact craters at Mercury's poles most likely was delivered to the innermost planet by the impacts of comets and volatile-rich asteroids," Solomon said. "By this interpretation, Mercury's polar regions serve as a witness plate to the delivery to the inner solar system of water and organic compounds from the outer solar system, a process that much earlier may have led to prebiotic chemical synthesis and the origin of life on Earth."
During the course of its four years at Mercury, MESSENGER captured more than 250,000 images and used its seven scientific instruments to gather extensive data sets that will keep scientists busy for years to come, NASA officials said.
The mission also leaves a technological legacy that could help future spacecraft work in harsh environments, officials added. For instance, MESSENGER's ceramic-cloth sunshade effectively protected the probe's instruments against powerful solar radiation.
"The front side of the sunshade routinely experience[d] temperatures in excess of 300 degrees Celsius (570 degrees Fahrenheit), whereas the majority of components in its shadow routinely operate[d] near room temperature (20 degrees Celsius or 68 degrees Fahrenheit)," MESSENGER project manager Helene Winters, of the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, said in the same statement.

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Next probe up

MESSENGER blazed a trail that another spacecraft will be following soon: The joint European-Japanese BepiColombo mission is scheduled to launch in 2017 and arrive in orbit around Mercury in 2024.
BepiColombo consists of two different orbiters. One of them will study Mercury's surface and internal composition, and the other will focus on the planet's magnetosphere.
During the course of its work, BepiColombo may identify and investigate MESSENGER's grave, in an attempt to better understand how space weathering affects Mercury's surface, Solomon said.
The BepiColombo team "will be looking for signs of [MESSENGER's] crater, and if they can make measurements of it, they will know precisely how long that region has been exposed to space," Solomon said during a news briefing earlier this month. "That will be an important study that comes a decade from now."