May 22, 2018

Jacksonville Resets Schedule for Spaceport Operations (Source: News4Jax)
Jacksonville could be one step closer to launching rockets. Jacksonville Aviation Authority CEO Steve Grossman told News4Jax on Monday that rocket launches could be coming to Cecil Airport by the end of this year or early next year.  "We have a commercial space operator who wants to use Cecil Spaceport for all their operations," Grossman said. "We have issued them an operating permit, we believe the first one in the country, for a horizontal launch spaceport. The company's called Generation Orbit."

The company is headquartered in Atlanta, but will conduct its operations out of Jacksonville. They won't be vertical rocket launches, such as the ones in Cape Canaveral. Grossman explained how the horizontal launches work. "It's basically a business jet that they have mounted an 8- to 12-foot rocket underneath," he said. "They take off, fly out at 50,000 feet, drop rocket and ignite it and it'll take several nanosatellites -- they're the size of softballs -- up into low earth orbit."

The company has already completed test runs in Jacksonville. If this launch takes place, Grossman said, Jacksonville could be the first official horizontal spaceport in the country. (5/22)

Parsons Acquires Polaris Alpha, Seeks Bigger Footprint in Defense, Space, Intelligence (Source: Space News)
Parsons, a government contractor with more than $3 billion in annual revenues, announced it has acquired Polaris Alpha, a defense and intelligence technology firm with a growing business in space, artificial intelligence, command and control and cybersecurity.

With more than 14,000 employees, Parsons is known for engineering, construction and infrastructure. Polaris Alpha has a workforce of 1,300, nearly 90 percent with security clearances. The acquisition fits into Parsons’ strategy to expand its high-tech government services business, particularly in space, intelligence and cybersecurity.

The combination makes Parsons a more competitive player in the space and defense markets, Smith said. She noted the company’s deep roots as a Pentagon and Missile Defense Agency contractor, and Polaris Alpha’s expertise in cutting-edge intelligence and information technologies. (5/21)

Why the Pentagon Thinks Small Satellites Can Solve Big Problems (Source: Popular Science)
The U.S. military's old way of thinking about satellites goes something like this: Pack as much technology as humanly possible onto every spacecraft because they are so expensive. Strap that big satellite onto a rocket. Once the satellite reaches orbit, the dangerous part is over.

“It was assumed when you put a satellite up there, it was not going to be contested,” says Gen. Ellen Pawlikowski, commander of Air Force Materiel Command. “That is no longer the situation.” As China and Russia develop weapons that can threaten satellites, defending space has suddenly become hugely important to the United States, which has led to an overhaul in America's strategic thinking. Suddenly, small satellites are all the rage in military circles. (5/22)

Telescope Partnership to Improve Access, Attract Funding (Source: Science)
Two other large telescope projects are joining forces to win a share of NSF funding. The Giant Magellan Telescope and the Thirty Meter Telescope have been competing for funding for years, and neither has raised all the money needed to complete their observatories. The two projects have now agreed to a partnership that will include the ability for astronomers not associated with organizations or countries involved with the observatories to complete for observing time. That partnership, the observatories hope, will be compelling enough to the NSF to convince it to pay up to 25 percent of the costs of each telescope. (5/22)

Retrograde Asteroid an Outsider (Source: Scientific American)
The discovery of an asteroid orbiting backwards around the sun has led some astronomers to conclude it is an interloper from another solar system. Asteroid 2015 BZ509 orbits near Jupiter in a retrograde direction, opposite that of the planets and other asteroids. A study by astronomers published Monday concluded that the only way to explain its existence is that it came from another solar system. Other researchers are not convinced, arguing that the astronomers haven't modeled how the asteroid could be captured, or considered other models, such as the influence of a hypothetical planet in the outer solar system. (5/22)

NASA's EM Drive Might Have No Thrust Afterall (Source: Ars Technica)
A controversial propulsion system could have a mundane explanation. The "EM drive" has been studied for several years, including by one NASA group, appearing to generate thrust without using any fuel. Research by a German team found that their EM drive created thrust even when not powered up. They believe that the thrust is actually just an effect of the Earth's magnetic field not properly accounted for in previous experiments. (5/22)

How SpaceX Beat Boeing to Become a $28 Billion Aerospace Juggernaut (Source: CNBC)
SpaceX has upended the rocket industry, making founder Elon Musk the world's most disruptive space pioneer. The visionary entrepreneur is bent on building giant low-cost reusable rockets and spaceships that can be used to colonize humans on Mars. In the process, he is helping to catalyze a private space exploration industry in the United States while outmaneuvering mammoth aerospace companies like Boeing.

SpaceX is the No. 1 company on the 2018 CNBC Disruptor 50 list, announced Tuesday. SpaceX has vaulted to become one of the most valuable private companies in the world, with a valuation estimated at $28 billion. As its long-term prospects soar, it is steadily raising funds from global investors to fuel its lofty ambitions. The company's achievements have many awestruck: In February it launched the world's most powerful rocket since NASA's Saturn V. It stood more than 21 stories high. Click here. (5/22)

Drug Could Prevent Memory Loss in Deep Space Astronauts (Source: Engadget)
Cosmic radiation is one of the greatest threats to astronauts embarking on deep space missions, not the least of which is the effect on the brain: it could hinder your memory and destroy vital synapses. Thankfully, you might only need to take some pills. UCSF researchers have discovered that a drug from Plexxikon potentially prevents memory problems from cosmic radiation. Tests on mice show that the medicine forces the brain to replace irradiated immune system cells (microglia) with healthy examples, preventing inflammation that could damage memory functions. (5/22)

Iridium Set to Provide Emergency Maritime Comms (Source: Space News)
Iridium has won approval from a maritime organization to provide emergency communications services. Iridium said Monday that the International Maritime Organization certified the company to provide Global Maritime Distress Safety System services, which only Inmarsat provides today by satellite. Iridium spent five years winning that approval, facing opposition from Inmarsat. (5/22)

Jurczyk Named NASA Associate Administrator (Source: NASA)
NASA named Steve Jurczyk as the agency's associate administrator Monday. Jurczyk, a former associate administrator for space technology and Langley Research Center director, had been serving in that role in an acting capacity since March. Associate administrator is the highest-ranking civil service position at NASA. The agency also announced that Krista Paquin, the deputy associate administrator, will retire at the end of May. Melanie W. Saunders, acting deputy center director at the Johnson Space Center, will take over for Paquin on an acting basis in June. (5/22)

Air Force Needs Time to Study Falcon-9 Upgrades (Source: Bloomberg)
The Air Force wants more time to study the upgraded version of SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket. In a statement, the Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center said the launch of the first GPS 3 satellite has been delayed to no earlier than October so that SpaceX can complete qualification testing, followed by final engineering reviews of the Block 5 variant of the Falcon 9. While the report states the launch slipped from this month, that mission had been scheduled for launch this fall for some time. (5/22)

Nova Scotia Spaceport Delayed (Source: Canadian Press)
Construction of a spaceport in Nova Scotia has been delayed until at least later this year. Maritime Launch Services had previously planned to start work on the launch site for Cyclone-4 rockets near the town of Canso this month, but the company says it needs more time to win approvals and complete an environmental assessment. The company still expects to begin launches from the site in 2021. (5/22)

Jeff Bezos Says it’s ‘Day One’ for Space Industry (Source: GeekWire)
“Day One” has been a mantra at Amazon since Bezos used the phrase in an annual letter to shareholders in 1997. In last year’s letter, Bezos went so far as to say there should never be a “Day Two” at Amazon. “Day 2 is stasis. Followed by irrelevance. Followed by excruciating, painful decline. Followed by death,” he wrote. “And that is why it is always Day 1.”

It makes sense that Bezos applies his “Day One” philosophy to his space venture as well, but in his public pronouncements, he usually emphasizes Blue Origin’s slow but steady pace. “Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast,” he has said. Blue Origin’s motto is “Gradatim Ferociter,” which is Latin for “Step by Step, Ferociously.” Its mascot is a tortoise, for heaven’s sake. Click here. (5/21)

How NASA Will Unlock the Secrets of Quantum Mechanics Aboard the ISS (Source: Gizmodo)
An Antares rocket launched from Virginia before sunrise this morning and is on its way to the International Space Station. Its 7,400 pounds of cargo include an experiment that will chill atoms to just about absolute zero—colder than the vacuum of space itself. The Cold Atom Laboratory (CAL) is set to create Bose-Einstein condensates on board the ISS. But what’s a Bose-Einstein condensate? And why make it in space?

“Essentially, it’s going to allow us to do different kinds of things than we’d be able to do on Earth,” said Gretchen Campbell. Bose-Einstein condensates are collections of certain atoms (like rubidium, for example) held motionless by lasers, which cools them to temperatures just above absolute zero. These systems magnify the mind-boggling effects of quantum mechanics to nearly macroscopic scales, making them easier to study. Scientists have used Bose-Einstein condensates to create entirely new states of matter, quantum entangle thousands of atoms, and even model the Big Bang. (5/21)