November 16, 2017

Air Force Wants to Speed Pace of Minuteman III Replacement (Source: Defense One)
The Air Force is eager to accelerate the Ground-Based Strategic Deterrent as Boeing and Northrop Grumman develop the replacement to the Minuteman III. "How do we get this capability earlier," said Gen. David Goldfein, noting that "if you can actually get it faster, you can get it cheaper sometimes." (11/15)

Spending 45 Days Inside a Fake Spaceship for Science (Source: WIRED)
When Timothy Evans, Andrew Mark Settles, James Titus, and John Kennard touched down at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, they looked a little pale. The four men had just spent 45 days voyaging millions of miles through the galaxy to collect soil samples from a near-earth asteroid. Yet, they hadn't been to space. Instead, they'd simulated a fake mission inside the Human Exploration Research Analog, a 636-square-foot metal capsule that helps NASA understand how humans behave when cooped up in a spacecraft for so long.

HERA recruits "astronaut-like" volunteers—fit, driven mid-lifers with a STEM background—and subjects them to more than a dozen studies testing their response to everything from sleep deprivation to lighting prototypes. Wearables collect biometric data, and nine video cameras record their every move (outside the bathroom, of course).

“Ultimately, what the researchers will want to be able to do is not just characterize how people act and behave, but to develop parameters that can be used in selecting crew members for specific types of missions,” says Lisa Spence, manager of NASA’s Flight Analogs Project. “Maybe there’s a certain set of personality markers or traits that are more well suited to a type of mission than others.” (11/7)

This New Satellite Could Produce the Most Accurate Weather Predictions Yet (Source: LA Times)
Once JPSS-1 makes it into orbit, its suite of five state-of-the-art instruments will collect the most high-resolution observations yet of our planet’s atmosphere, land and oceans, NOAA officials said.

“These instruments are so precise that they can measure temperatures to better than one-tenth of a degree in the entire atmosphere, from the Earth’s surface up to the edge of space,” said Greg Mandt, director of the JPSS program for NOAA.

The data these sensors collect will be fed into weather prediction models in almost real time. Ultimately, it will inform the seven-day forecasts you see when you hit the weather app on your phone, or turn on the morning news to decide whether or not to grab an umbrella. (11/14)

NASA Is Considering Deep Sleep for Human Mars Mission (Source: Wall Street Journal)
A NASA-backed study is exploring an innovative way to bring humans to Mars: Putting the spaceship crew in a deep sleep while they travel to the Red Planet. WSJ's Monika Auger reports. Click here for the video. (10/13)

The State of Commercial Spaceports in 2017 (Source: Space Daily)
About two years ago the FAA gave Houston the "go-ahead" to build America's 10th commercial spaceport. Yes, the US already had nine spaceports designated for commercial operations. One must ask, "Why do we need 10 spaceports for so little commercial space activities?" This represents a great deal of investment and ongoing expense for an industry still in its infancy. Click here. (11/14)

First Targets Chosen for Webb Space Telescope (Source: Space Daily)
Gas giant Jupiter, organic molecules in star-forming clouds and baby galaxies in the distant Universe are among the first targets for which data will be immediately available from the James Webb Space Telescope once it begins casting its powerful gaze on the Universe in 2019.

Thirteen "early release" programmes were chosen from more than 100 proposals after a competitive peer-review selection process within the astronomical community. The programmes have been allocated nearly 500 hours of observing time and will exercise all four of Webb's state-of-the-art science instruments. The data will be made publicly available immediately, showcasing the full potential of the observatory and allowing astronomers to best plan follow-up observations. (11/14)

Harris Corp., AIA Host STEM Workforce Summit in Florida (Source: Orlando Sentinel)
The Aerospace Industries Association and Harris Corp. are bringing together academics, government and industry stakeholders to discuss the future of aerospace workforce. "Currently, our nation depends more than ever on an aerospace and defense industry that spurs innovation in space, civil aviation and defense to enhance our nation’s strength, security and economic prosperity," AIA President and CEO David Melcher writes. (11/15)

Florida's Role Pivotal to Supplying the Aerospace Workforce (Source: Orlando Sentinel)
With its rich space heritage, strong education and research infrastructure and vibrant, business-friendly environment, Florida hosts many of the nation’s leading aerospace and defense companies. These companies employ the 76,000-plus workers who account for 10 percent of Florida’s exports and 1 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product.

We must do a better job of training noncollege-bound students for good aerospace and defense manufacturing jobs with expanded career and technical education training and community-college partnership programs. The Senate can help advance progress on work-force issues by sending the Strengthening Career and Technical Education for the 21st Century Act, which passed the House unanimously in June, to the president’s desk as soon as possible. Both Sens. Bill Nelson and Marco Rubio recently sent a letter urging the relevant committee to do just this. (11/15)

Florida Space Coast's Growing $260B Satellite Industry (Source: Orlando Business Journal)
The fast-growing satellite industry is offering Central Florida businesses the best opportunity to cash in on the action. The industry has a big impact on the world, connecting countries to the internet, improving broadcast services, enhancing military needs, monitoring weather and so much more. Plus, the industry had a 2016 global revenue of $260.5 billion — a big jump from 2012's $209.2 billion.

And Central Florida — specifically Brevard County — is playing a big role in the future of the satellite industry in two big ways: OneWeb LLC in March expects to debut its $85 million, 100,000 square-foot manufacturing plant in Space Florida's Exploration Park. Space Florida is the state's economic development agency for the aerospace industry. The Space Coast is the busiest place for commercial and government rocket launches that carry satellites to space. Click here. (11/10)

On The Alien Question: Where Are They? (Source: NPR)
If ETs came to Earth at some point, they didn't leave a single clue. The countless UFO sightings, some from dumbfounded military and commercial pilots, do not work as scientific evidence. We can't, in a question of such key relevance, relax scientific criteria. Oral narratives and photos are not credible evidence. Also not credible are "studies" relating the knowledge and artistic creations of ancient civilizations to visitations from aliens. The gods were not alien astronauts.

Various anthropological studies — such as those by Anthony Aveni, about the end of time and the Mayan calendar, and others — show that ancient civilizations were perfectly capable of building spectacular monuments, even when needing to transport massive boulders for many miles. If anything, these wonderful buildings are proof of our own creativity and ingenuity, and not that of some alien mind.

Apart from a lack of conclusive evidence of alien visitiation, there is also the technological difficulty of undertaking interstellar space trips. As an illustration, using our fastest rocket ship to travel to the nearest star system at Alpha Centauri, at 4.5 light-years away, would take about 100,000 years or so. Even at one-tenth of the speed of light, a one-way trip would take some 45 years. Interstellar travel is an enormous barrier to dreams of cosmic exploration. Click here. (11/14)

New California Telescope Aims to Catch Quickly Moving Celestial Events (Source: Science)
Astronomers in California have taken a telescope built before most of them were born and converted it into a new instrument dedicated to one of the newest and fastest-moving branches of astronomy: spotting objects in the sky that change from one day to the next. The new Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF), which today opened its eye to the sky, was created by retooling the 1.2-meter Samuel Oschin Telescope at the Palomar Observatory near San Diego, California.

The ZTF has been fitted with a new camera made up of 16 charge-coupled device (CCD) detectors. That will enable it to snap single images covering an area more than 200 times the size of the full moon. With such a wide field of view—the biggest of any telescope more than 0.5 meters wide—the ZTF can survey the whole northern sky visible from Palomar every night. (11/14)

Roscosmos: US Sanctions Do Not Apply to Russia’s Lunar Projects with NASA and ESA (Source: Tass)
The United States’ latest sanctions do not influence Roscosmos’s joint projects with the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and the European Space Agency, the chief of the Roscosmos corporation Igor Komarov told the Rossiya-24 television news channel.

"The possibility of sanctions (against space projects - TASS) has not been raised at any talks or discussions, because this is a unique experience. It’s joint work that will become hardly accomplishable should at least one country, let alone one of the leading space powers drop out. Currently, we are in the process of discussing joint lunar projects with NASA and the ESA. We have no doubts that these programs must be implemented together," he said. (11/14)