April 14, 2023

Vast New Stores of Water Reported on the Moon (Source: IEEE Spectrum)
Two new studies—one Chinese, the other American—suggest that lunar soil may have a good deal more water in it than modern space scientists previously believed. It’s still very, very dry; NASA’s Artemis program is looking for ice in shadowed craters near the moon’s south pole, and mission managers should not change those plans. Still, the new evidence is tantalizing, and scientists say it deserves further exploration.

In 2020, the China National Space Administration launched a robotic mission, called Chang’e-5, to the Ocean of Storms. It was China’s first mission to return soil samples from the lunar surface. The CNSA said the ship gathered just over 1.7 kilograms of lunar regolith, which it found to be speckled with thousands of glass beads, mostly microscopic. “The interesting thing is that the water entrapped in impact glass beads is of solar-wind origin,” wrote Hu Sen, one of the study authors. Scientists doing related work say to tread very, very carefully.

“The measurements are well done but it’s not a game changer,” says Rhonda Stroud at Arizona State University. She was not involved in the Chang’e-5 study, but has done extensive research on the likelihood of water in the lunar regolith. She points out that geologists sometimes use the word “water” loosely to describe both molecules with hydroxyl groups and actual H2O because their chemical signatures may often be very similar. “There are lots of ways hydrogen can be stored in the glass beads,” she says. She concludes, “It’s premature to say there’s an easily extractable source of water.” (4/13)

FAA Approval Paves Way for SpaceX Starship/Super Heavy Launch (Source: SpaceX)
The FAA on Friday issued a commercial Vehicle Operator License to SpaceX for launches of the Starship/Super Heavy in Texas. Based on a re-evaluation of environmental impact analyses, the FAA concluded that a vehicle operator license for Starship/Super Heavy operations conforms to the requirements of a 2022 Programmatic Environmental Assessment, and a supplemental or new environmental document is not necessary for enabling the launch operations. The the Vehicle Operator License is here, and the re-evaluation document is here. (4/14)

FAA Takes Steps to Optimize, Provide Equitable Access to In-Demand Airspace Near Launch Sites (Source: FAA)
Due to the increasing pace of space activity, the FAA is taking steps to optimize and equitably manage the airspace in the vicinity of launch sites. The agency will rely on a set of objective factors to better balance the needs of launch licensees, as well as airlines, general aviation and the military to minimize disruptions. The FAA will consider the following factors in determining whether a commercial space operation may proceed as requested or whether an alternative time is necessary. Click here. (4/13)

South Korea Plans Next KSLV Launch in May (Source: Space News)
The next launch of South Korea's KSLV-2 rocket is scheduled for next month. The South Korean science ministry said the KSLV-2 launch of eight satellites is scheduled for May 24 from the Naro Space Center. The primary payload is NEXTSat 2, a 180-kilogram technology demonstration satellite developed by the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. The rocket will also deploy seven smallsats. The launch will come 11 months after the first successful KSLV-2 flight. (4/14)

Argo Space Corp. Raises $2 Million for Lunar Water Harvesting (Source: Tech Crunch)
A startup founded by three brothers who are all former SpaceX employees seeks to offer lunar water as propellant. Argo Space Corporation, founded by Robert, Ryan and Kirby Carlisle, said Thursday it has raised $2 million in seed funding to start developing of technologies to harvest lunar ice and use it as propellant in a plasma thruster to propel a transfer vehicle called Argonaut to move spacecraft to GEO and other orbits. Argo Space plans to launch a demonstration mission in late 2024 to test its propulsion technology. (4/14)

Ingenuity Drone Makes 50th Mars Flight (Source: NASA)
The Ingenuity Mars helicopter has completed its 50th flight. The small helicopter made that flight Thursday, traveling 322 meters in nearly two and a half minutes. The helicopter also set an altitude record of 18 meters on the flight. The helicopter, which made its first flight almost exactly two years ago, was included on the Perseverance Mars rover as a technology demonstration with no more than five flights originally planned.  The helicopter is now serving as a scout for the rover. (4/14)

Astronomers Enhance Black Hole Image (Source: Science News)
Astronomers have improved the first image of a black hole. In a new paper, astronomers described how they used machine learning techniques to sharpen the image of the supermassive black hole at the heart of galaxy M87 taken by the Event Horizon Telescope and released four years ago. The sharper image shows a ring of gas around the black hole half as thick as originally detected. (4/14)

ESA Launches JUICE to Jupiter on Ariane 5 (Source: BBC)
An Ariane 5 launched ESA's JUICE mission to Jupiter this morning. The Ariane 5 lifted off from Kourou, French Guiana at 8:14 a.m. Eastern after a one-day delay due to weather. The Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE) spacecraft separated from the upper stage nearly a half-hour later, and controllers are working through initial deployments and other commissioning of the spacecraft. JUICE will perform several gravity-assist flybys of Venus and Earth before arriving at Jupiter in 2031 to study the large icy moons of Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. (4/14)

HawkEye 360 and Maxar Get Extended NRO RF Contracts (Source: Space News)
HawkEye 360 and Maxar have won extensions of NRO awards to provide commercial radio-frequency (RF) data. HawkEye 360 and Maxar's Aurora Insight were awarded "stage two" two-year contract options under the NRO's  Strategic Commercial Enhancements Broad Agency Announcement program, after the NRO provided similar extensions to Kleos Space and Spire Global. RF signals monitoring from space is an emerging sector of the remote sensing industry that uses low Earth orbit satellites to track ships, vehicles, electronic jammers or any devices that emit radio frequency signals. (4/14)

Intelsat Orders Northrop Grumman In-Orbit Fuel Pod (Source: Space News)
Intelsat has ordered one of three fuel pods Northrop Grumman's in-orbit servicing subsidiary is launching in late 2024 to extend the life of one of its satellites. Intelsat said Thursday it ordered a Mission Extension Pod (MEP) from SpaceLogistics, which plans to install it in 2026 using a Mission Robotic Vehicle (MRV) servicer with a robotic arm. Intelsat has yet to decide which of its more than 50 GEO satellites will receive the MEP. The MRV will launch with three pods, one of which will be installed on the Optus D3 satellite in 2025. (4/14)

Japan's ispace Stock Takes Off as Lander Approaches Moon (Source: Space News)
Japanese company ispace is preparing for its first lunar landing as its stock is taking off. The company said Friday that its HAKUTO-R M1 lander was in its final orbit around the moon, a circular one at an altitude of 100 kilometers, ahead of a landing scheduled for April 25. the announcement came as the company's stock started trading this week on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. The shares, priced at 254 yen ($1.91), closed Friday at 1,501 yen, giving the company a valuation of more than $900 million. (4/14)

Draper Lunar Lander Mission Progresses (Source: Space News)
Draper has completed the first milestones for its first lunar lander mission. Draper announced Thursday it completed two reviews with NASA for its Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) award it received last summer. That mission, scheduled for launch in 2025, will be the first CLPS mission to attempt a landing on the lunar farside, carrying a set of NASA instruments. Draper is leading a team that includes ispace U.S., General Atomics and Systima. (4/14)

BRPH Enlists Orlando EDC Official to Lead Business Development (Source: SPACErePORT)
Architecture/engineering firm BRPH, a respected Space Coast-based developer of spaceport and space industry facilities, has hired Casey Barnes to support their aerospace business development. Casey will leave his post as vice president of the Orlando Economic Partnership. BRPH has designed and developed facilities at most US spaceports. The company was founded in 1964 to support America’s space program. Casey and BRPH will compete with RS&H, another aerospace-focused A&E firm with a major Space Coast presence, which recently hired Andrew Nelson to lead their aerospace business development. (4/14)

BRPH Proud to Sponsor the Higher Orbits’ Go for Launch! Program and Team Laika (Source: BRPH)
When the Dragon capsule aboard SpaceX’s CRS-27 launched from Kennedy Space Center, Florida, on March 14, it carried with it several science experiments, including one by a team of student scientists who won that honor in a competition sponsored by BRPH. The firm is proud to be a repeat presenting sponsor of Higher Orbits’ Go for Launch! BRPH Series, through which students explore STEM and space topics while working on a viable experiment design that could be successfully researched in space. The BRPH Series consisted of Go For Launch! events at Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, and in Arizona and Alabama in 2022. (3/16)

ORNL Activates 5th Supercomputer to Aid NOAA's Climate Science Simulation Projects (Source: GovCon Daily)
Oak Ridge National Laboratory has launched the fifth Gaea supercomputer for use in climate science research. The C5 system was commissioned in partnership with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and will be operated by ORNL's National Climate-Computing Research Center. (4/14)

Pentagon Should Expand Defense Innovation Unit's Role, Experts Say (Source: C4ISRnet)
Former defense officials and industry executives are calling on the Pentagon to expand the influence of its commercial innovation hub to make it easier for the military to buy off-the-shelf technology. The recommendation comes from the Atlantic Council’s Commission on Defense Innovation Adoption — a panel of defense experts convened to consider how the U.S. Department of Defense can better integrate new technology into its arsenal.

The Defense Innovation Unit, a Silicon Valley-based organization created in 2015 to champion commercial technology integration within the Defense Department, has had success transitioning capabilities from non-traditional defense companies for use by the military services. However, its former leader, Mike Brown, pointed to a lack of support from senior Pentagon leaders. (4/12)

Boeing Unveils WGS-11 Design with New Military Payload (Source: Space News)
A new version of the U.S. military’s Wideband Global Satcom (WGS) satellite unveiled by Boeing on April 13 has a new payload that the company designed under a U.S. Space Force contract. Boeing in 2019 received a $605 million contract to build the WGS-11, the 11th satellite in the WGS geostationary constellation that provides communications services to the U.S. military and allies. Separately Boeing in 2020 won a $191 million contract to develop a Protect Tactical Satcom payload that the Space Force is considering including in future military communications satellites. (4/13)

Lockheed Martin Makes a Big Bet on Commercial Space and the Moon (Source: Ars Technica)
Crescent Space Services, a subsidiary of Lockheed Martin, will initially offer a communications and navigation network around the Moon, called Parsec. The new company will be led by Joe Landon, who has a commercial space background and previously led Advanced Development Programs for Lockheed. This network will initially have two satellites, launching as a rideshare in 2025, in orbit around the Moon to provide a continuous connection between Earth and areas on the Moon, including the South Pole.

Lockheed will seek to sell its communications services to the dozens of commercial companies planning to send spacecraft to the Moon this decade. But it also is clearly targeting a recent announcement by NASA seeking "Near Space Network Services." Eventually, NASA said it would like to rely on commercial communications for its Artemis missions to the lunar surface. Crescent plans to soon announce a commercial partner on Earth with a ground-based network of satellite dishes to receive signals from the Parsec satellites. (4/11)

Slingshot's Space-Tracking Network to Extend Coverage of Low Earth Orbit (Source: Space News)
Slingshot Aerospace, a space tracking and data analytics company, announced April 12 it is expanding its network of ground-based optical telescopes to increase coverage of low Earth orbit. The company currently operates about 150 optical sensors at more than 20 sites around the world. By the end of 2023, Slingshot expects to deploy about 80 more telescopes. These autonomous sensors will be added to existing sites and at two new Southern Hemisphere sites Slingshot plans to build. (4/12)

Planet's Vision for Monitoring Global Ecological Variables (Source: Quartz)
In nearly a year and a half since going public, Planet has been one of the more successful space companies. But it has yet to turn a profit, as it focuses on building out a novel space data business its executives describe as a kind of a Bloomberg terminal for planet Earth. At the company’s annual Explore conference, CEO Will Marshall extolled a set of products called Planetary Variables, which aim to convert the firm’s earth-observation data into usable metrics for users who don’t already employ a small army of geospatial analysts.

The current lineup includes automated identification of buildings and roads, as well as measures of soil water content, biomass, and land surface temperatures. But what really excites Marshall is forest carbon. “Carbon accounting faces difficult tradeoffs: Drones and [aerial radar imaging] are accurate but not scalable. Satellite data is scalable, but is too coarse,” Marshall says. But his company, thanks in part to the recent acquisition of the firm Salo Sciences, will soon provide the “first accurate, consistent, scalable and high resolution forest carbon measurement, producing at a global scale and updating frequently.” (4/13)

Taiwan Seeks Satellite Solutions After Undersea Cables Cut (Source: Space Daily)
Taiwanese hostel worker Wang Chuang-jen's business took a hammering when undersea telecoms lines serving tiny Matsu archipelago were cut in February. Customers struggled to book or pay online due to slow connectivity. "We all heavily depend on the internet." The cut-off not only caused headaches for businesspeople such as Wang, it also highlighted Taiwan's digital vulnerability at a time of heightened menace from China. The two cables were severed about 50 kilometers from Matsu in the Taiwan Strait within days of each other. (4/13)

Is the US in a Space Race Against China? (Source: Space Daily)
This idea of a space race between China and the U.S. sounds convincing given the broader narrative of China's rise, but how accurate is it? As a professor who studies space and international relations, my research aims to quantify the power and capabilities of different nations in space. When I look at various capacities, the data paints a much more complex picture than a tight space race between the U.S. and China.

At least for now, the reality looks more like what I call a complex hegemony - one state, the U.S., is still dominating in key space capabilities, and this lead is further amplified by a strong network of partners. Calling the current situation a race implies that the U.S. and China have roughly equal capabilities in space. But in several key areas, the U.S. is far ahead not only of China, but of all other spacefaring nations combined. (4/13)

Humans Need Earth-Like Ecosystem for Deep-Space Living (Source: Space Daily)
Can humans endure long-term living in deep space? The answer is a lukewarm maybe, according to a new theory describing the complexity of maintaining gravity and oxygen, obtaining water, developing agriculture and handling waste far from Earth. Dubbed the Pancosmorio theory - a word coined to mean "all world limit" - it was described in a paper published in Frontiers in Astronomy and Space Sciences.

Morgan Irons said that it would be unwise to spend billions of dollars to set up a space settlement only to see it fail, because even with all other systems in place, you need gravity. Humans and all Earth life have evolved within the context of 1G of gravity. "Our bodies, our natural ecosystems, all the energy movement and the way we utilize energy is all fundamentally based upon 1G of gravity being present," she said. "There is just no other place in space where there is 1G of gravity; that just doesn't exist anywhere else in our solar system. That's one of the first problems we must solve." Click here. (4/13)

Tendeg Selected by Lockheed Martin as Strategic Supplier of Deployable Antennas (Source: Space Daily)
Aerospace deployable antenna provider Tendeg LLC has been selected by Lockheed Martin as a strategic supplier for several of the company's critical global security space missions. tendeg is an innovative manufacturer of spacecraft antennas and deployable structures with full-range aerospace engineering services, including design, analysis, prototyping and flight unit build. The company's antennas are scalable to support missions requiring apertures that deploy from .5 meters to further than 16 meters. (4/12)

Raytheon and SpiderOak Collaborate to Secure Satcoms in Crowded LEO (Source: Space Daily)
Raytheon and SpiderOak announced a strategic partnership to develop and field a new generation of zero-trust security systems for satellite communications in proliferated low-Earth orbit, or pLEO. SpiderOak's OrbitSecure solution will be combined with Raytheon BBN's Distributed, Disrupted, Disconnected and Denied (D4) secure cloud solution to ensure resilience of mesh networks in contested environments. (4/12)

Satixfy Tests New Antenna with OneWeb and Air Force Research Lab (Source: Space Daily)
SatixFy has completed a contracted demonstration with OneWeb and the Air Force Research Lab to demonstrate SatixFy's new antenna for use by DoD, under its initiative Defense Experimentation Using Commercial Space Internet (DEUCSI). This program was executed in partnership with the U.S. Army. The DEUCSI initiative has been designed to explore new ways to leverage commercial space internet capabilities, to provide resilient, high-speed, and low-latency satellite communications. (4/10)

FCC Senior Counsel Julie Kearney Appointed Chief of Space Bureau (Source: Executive Gov)
The Federal Communications Commission has appointed Julie Kearney, senior counsel for space law and policy since February, as chief of the Space Bureau, the FCC’s newly launched organization tasked with overseeing satellite policy and licensing matters. (4/12)

NOAA Sets Sights on Satellite, Ground Tech Partnerships (Source: Executive Gov)
NOAA is looking to conduct research into emerging satellite and ground technologies through broad agency announcements. Forthcoming BAAs will focus on potential projects to design a microwave sensor, demonstrate ground processes and address passive sensor data corrupting emissions, NOAA said Friday. The agency wants to explore modern tools that could support the modernization of numerical weather prediction models and satellite support infrastructure. (4/12)