April 30, 2019

ISS Power Glitch Could Delay SpaceX Resupply Mission (Source: SpaceFlight Now)
A power glitch on the International Space Station may postpone Wednesday's launch of a Dragon cargo mission. NASA reported Monday there was a problem with a system on the station that distributes electrical power to two of eight channels on the station. While the issue didn't pose an immediate problem for the crew and can be corrected by swapping out the faulty hardware, NASA is considering delaying the Dragon cargo mission scheduled to launch at 3:59 a.m. Eastern Wednesday to give engineers more time to troubleshoot the problem. If the launch is postponed, the next launch opportunity will be Friday morning. (4/30)

China Launches Two Satellites on Long March 4B (Source: Xinhua)
China launched a pair of satellites Monday. A Long March 4B rocket lifted off from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center at 6:52 p.m. Eastern and placed two Tianhui II-01 satellites into orbit. The two satellites, whose launch was not announced in advance, will be used for scientific experiments and Earth observation, according to state media. Images from local residents showed that debris from the launch fell on a highway in the region, blocking traffic for a time. (4/30)

Space Force Could Boost Business (Source: Space News)
The proposed Space Force could provide benefits to the space industry, in particular startups. At a conference Monday, panelists argued that the Space Force could serve as a much-needed nexus between the military and industry, connecting launch and satellite startups to the armed services and intelligence community. A Space Force could also help better align contractors with the Pentagon's space needs. Lt. Gen. David Thompson, vice commander of Air Force Space Command, said he expected the military to make use of planned commercial broadband constellations, but that it was too soon to say which systems and for what applications. (4/30)

Lightfoot Joins Lockheed Martin (Source: Lockheed Martin)
A former NASA acting administrator is joining Lockheed Martin.  The company announced Monday that Robert Lightfoot will start work next week as vice president for strategy and business development in its space unit. Lightfoot retired from NASA a year ago as associate administrator, the highest-ranking civil service post. He spent more than a year as acting administrator at the beginning of the Trump administration because of delays in nominating and then confirming Jim Bridenstine as administrator. Lightfoot had been serving as president of LSINC Corporation in Alabama prior to joining Lockheed. (4/30)

SpeQtral Raises Money for Space-Based Quantum Communications (Source: Business Wire)
A startup developing space-based quantum communications has raised an initial round of funding. SpeQtral, formerly known as S15 Space Systems, said Space Capital led its $1.9 million seed round, with participation from several other investors. The Singapore-based company, spun out from the Centre for Quantum Technologies at the National University of Singapore, is working on quantum communications technologies that will be secure from eavesdropping. The funding will support work on a cubesat quantum communication demonstration mission. (4/30)

Blue Origin Expands in Washington State (Source: GeekWire)
Blue Origin is adding to its footprint in its hometown. The company is building a facility across the street from its current factory and headquarters in the Seattle suburb of Kent, Washington, that will include 236,000 square feet of warehouse space and 100,000 square feet of offices. The company didn't disclose when it expects the new facility to be complete. The company is also building a factory in Alabama for producing BE-4 engines and recently proposed to expand a just-completed factory in Florida for its New Glenn rocket. (4/30)

The Race to Develop the Moon (Source: New Yorker)
In January, the China National Space Administration landed a spacecraft on the far side of the moon, the side we can’t see from Earth. Chang’e-4 was named for a goddess in Chinese mythology, who lives on the moon for reasons connected to her husband’s problematic immortality drink. The story has many versions. In one, Chang’e has been banished to the moon for elixir theft and turned into an ugly toad. In another, she has saved humanity from a tyrannical emperor by stealing the drink. In many versions, she is a luminous beauty and has as a companion a pure-white rabbit.

Chang’e-4 is the first vehicle to alight on the far side of the moon. From that side, the moon blocks radio communication with Earth, which makes landing difficult, and the surface there is craggy and rough, with a mountain taller than anything on Earth. Older geologies are exposed, from which billions of years of history can be deduced. Chang’e-4 landed in a nearly four-mile-deep hole that was formed when an ancient meteor crashed into the moon—one of the largest known impact craters in our solar system.

You may have watched the near-operatic progress of Chang’e-4’s graceful landing. Or the uncannily cute robotic amblings of the lander’s companion, the Yutu-2 rover, named for the moon goddess’s white rabbit. You may have read that, aboard the lander, seeds germinated (cotton, rapeseed, and potato; the Chinese are also trying to grow a flowering plant known as mouse-ear cress), and that the rover survived the fourteen-day lunar night, when temperatures drop to negative two hundred and seventy degrees Fahrenheit. Chang’e-4 is a step in China’s long-term plan to build a base on the moon, a goal toward which the country has rapidly been advancing since it first orbited the moon, in 2007. Click here. (4/29) 

Scientists Want to Probe Atmospheres of Uranus and Neptune (Source: Space.com)
It's been decades since a spacecraft visited either Uranus or Neptune — which means scientists are busy dreaming up instruments that could be flown out on the next probe to these ice giants. The pair of planets haven't had a robotic visitor since the Voyager 2 flybys in 1986 and 1989. And in the decades that have passed since NASA designed and built that spacecraft, technology has become both much more powerful and much smaller, and the agency has plenty more missions under its belt. (4/29)

SpaceX Wants to Unleash Starhopper But Longer Raptor Test Fires Come First (Source: Teslarati)
According to SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, the next round of Starhopper activity will focus on removing the spacecraft prototype’s tethers and performing far more substantial hop tests. Longer tests demand that SpaceX begins expanding the known performance envelope of its full-scale Raptor engine. Towards that end, longer-duration tests would need to be done at the company’s McGregor, TX development facilities to reduce risk, tests that Musk confirmed are already well underway.

A recent Raptor static fire reportedly lasted no less than 40 seconds, more than enough time for a single-engine Starhopper to significantly expand both the maximum altitude and velocity of future hop tests. In support of the upcoming Starhopper test campaign, significant construction work is also ongoing at SpaceX’s Boca Chica test and development facilities. Click here. (4/29)

Scientists Plan to 3D Print Muscular Tissue on the Space Station (Source: Futurism)
The International Space Station is rapidly becoming a hotbed of biomedical research. One example: a 3D printer that scientists have been using to manufacture biological tissue while in orbit. Now the printer is scheduled for upgrades that will allow it to manufacture more complex types of tissue, including muscles and blood vessels, according to 3D Printing Industry — pushing the cutting edge of medical research that could make deep space exploration possible.

In September 2019, the Russian biotech lab 3D Bioprinting Solutions will ship the raw biomaterials necessary to print out muscle tissues up to the ISS. It’s easier to print out organs in space than on Earth, where they’re more likely to collapse under their own weight. In this case, 3D Printing Industry reports that the muscles, blood vessels, and other complex tissues that the Russian scientists plan to print will stay in space, where they will be examined over time to help reveal the long-term effects of space travel on the human body. (4/29)

NASA KSC Restricts Employees From Taking Photos (Sources: Ars Technica)
NASA appears to be clamping down on the public sharing of images and videos taken by its employees at Kennedy Space Center, a location known for its wealth of opportunities to photograph spacecraft under construction, as well as rocket tests and launches. On Monday, a software engineer and amateur photographer at Kennedy Space Center named K. Scott Piel expressed his frustration with the new policy on Twitter, saying: "From this point forward, employees are no longer permitted to photograph or share images from *any* operations at KSC without authorization. Regardless of source. Photographing, or sharing images, from operations is grounds for termination. *Only* authorized media may do so."

NASA issued a clarification statement: "To clarify, NASA does not have a policy that restricts employees from taking and posting general photos of the space center. However, all employees ae required to follow federal and contractual restrictions, which prevent the sharing of imagery that is export controlled and/or proprietary. (4/29)

Leaked Video of Failed SpaceX Test Prompts Clampdown on Sharing Images (Source: Orlando Sentinel)
NASA is trying to clamp down on employees taking photos inside the gates of Kennedy Space Center — and warning them they can be fired if they do so — after a video leaked showing SpaceX’s astronaut capsule exploding during a test. Workers employed under the Test and Operations Support Contract, which NASA awarded to aerospace company Jacobs for ground systems capabilities, flight hardware processing and launch operations, were notified Monday of the new rules in light of the SpaceX video. The internal memo confirms the video is authentic and the capsule did explode — a fact that neither NASA nor SpaceX have yet confirmed publicly.

“As most of you are aware, SpaceX conducted a test fire of their crew capsule abort engines at [Cape Canaveral Air Force Station], and they experienced an anomaly,” the email read. “Subsequently, video of the failed test — which was not released by SpaceX or NASA — appeared on the internet.”

The video surfaced shortly after the April 20 accident, which SpaceX described as an “anomaly” during static fire testing of the SuperDraco engines that push the capsule away from a rocket in the case of an emergency. The capsule, called Crew Dragon, is under development for NASA under its Commercial Crew Program that endeavors to return astronauts to space from U.S. soil for the first time since the space shuttle was retired in 2011. (4/30)

The Hubble Space Telescope Has Just Found Solid Evidence of Interstellar Buckyballs (Source: Science Alert)
In the bewildering quagmire that is the gas between the stars, the Hubble Space Telescope has identified evidence of ionised buckminsterfullerene, the carbon molecule known colloquially as "buckyballs." Containing 60 carbon atoms arranged in a soccer ball shape, buckminsterfullerene (C60) occurs naturally here on Earth - in soot. But in 2010, it was also detected in a nebula; in 2012, it was found in gas orbiting a star. Now we have the strongest evidence yet that it's also floating in the interstellar medium - the sparse, tenuous gas between the stars. (4/29)

What's the Next Internet-Like Investing Opportunity? Some on Wall Street Say it's Spaceflight (Source: CNN)
New spaceflight technologies could reshape the global economy on a level not seen since the internet. That's what some in the industry and on Wall Street are saying, at least. And a growing number of analysts say it's time for mainstream investors to get in on the action. We're entering a new era in which the private sector is offering cheap and reliable access to space. That could pave the way for wild new businesses like in-orbit hotels or asteroid mining. New satellite and rocket technologies could also shake up a broad range of industries, from air travel to broadband service and data storage.

"Costs are coming down and technology is improving," said Laura Kane, a long-term investing analyst at UBS. We're "getting beyond the realm of science fiction fans and thinking about where returns can be had." The space economy is following the roadmap of the internet revolution: Just like in the early dot-com days, flashy Silicon Valley types and a wellspring of venture capital money are pushing the envelope. The most high profile names are billionaire-backed startups, like Elon Musk's SpaceX and Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin. Click here. (4/29)

Firefly Has Successfully Tested the Upper Stage of its Alpha Rocket (Source: Ars Technica)
Last Thursday, on a green expanse at the edge of the Texas Hill Country, Firefly Aerospace prepared to test the second stage of its Alpha rocket. After years of development, engineers bolted the rocket stage to a vertical test stand and began to feed kerosene and liquid oxygen into the engine. Then, for 300 seconds, the rocket's Lightning-1 engine fired, blowing white and yellow flame out of its exhaust nozzle. The five-minute test demonstrated the performance of the engine and upper stage over an entire cycle of flight in space, during which the upper stage would boost a satellite and insert into orbit. (4/29)

The Moon May Have Formed When Earth's Magma Was Blasted into Space (Source: NBC News)
The moon may have formed after a giant Mars-size rock hit a magma-covered newborn Earth, a new study finds. Earth came together about 4.5 billion years ago, and previous research suggested the moon arose a short time later. For the past three decades, the prevailing explanation for the moon's origin was that the moon resulted from the collision of two protoplanets, or embryonic worlds. One of those was the newborn Earth, and the other was a Mars-size rock called Theia, named after the mother of the moon in Greek myth. The moon then coalesced from the debris.

This "Giant Impact Hypothesis" seemed to explain many details about Earth and the moon, such as the large size of the moon compared with Earth and the rotation rates of the two bodies. However, in the past 15 or so years, evidence has emerged to challenge it and suggest a multitude of alternatives. One recent lunar formation model suggested the moon might have formed from an impact so violent, it vaporized a large portion of the early Earth, with the moon emerging from the resulting doughnut-shaped mass called a synestia. Another suggested the collision involved a fast-spinning proto-Earth. (4/29)

Trump Space Force Aimed at Reviving Reagan-Era Star Wars Insanity (Source: Sputnik)
The Trump administration has committed considerable resources to expanding the scope of the US' modernisation of its nuclear forces, proposing a new 'Space Force' branch for the armed forces and withdrawing from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF), a key arms agreement signed at the twilight of the Cold War to secure peace in Europe. US efforts to create a global missile defence system are aimed at reaching "strategic superiority" and neutralising the strategic deterrents of possible US adversaries like Russia and China, said Russian Lt. Gen. Viktor Poznikhir. (4/26)

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