November 27, 2023

Astra Secures $2.7 Million Financing (Source: Space News)
Astra secured $2.7 million in additional financing last week. In an SEC fling late Friday, the company said it lined up the "subsequent financing" from two existing investors as well as company co-founders Chris Kemp and Adam London. The filing provided no updates on efforts to arrange a larger, long-term deal to keep the cash-strapped company operating, including a proposal by Kemp and London earlier this month to take the company private. (11/27)

Space Companies Seek State Legislative Support in Florida (Source: Orlando Sentinel)
During a House committee meeting, David Goldman, SpaceX vice president of satellite policy, made recommendations such as a need for improved launch infrastructure, an expanded pool of workers including machinists and welders and a need to address potential conflicting local-government rules that could add time to space operations. One regulation-related issue could involve helping space tourism grow in Florida.

Florida has seen a return of human flights by SpaceX to the ISS. But most of the wealthy people paying for passenger seats on orbital flights by SpaceX and suborbital runs by Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic have gone up in Texas or landed in New Mexico. Megan Mitchell said Blue Origin intends to offer space tourism in Florida.

During the 2023 legislative session, Florida lawmakers passed a measure to extend liability protections to private aerospace companies if crew members are injured or killed in spaceflights. The new law stemmed from the growth in private launches. Florida previously had provided such liability protections for injuries or deaths of spaceflight participants who were not considered crew members. (11/20)

Data from Kepler Reveals Reason Behind Shrinking Exoplanets (Source: NSF)
Located throughout the universe, there are billions — possibly even trillions — of exoplanets orbiting around stars of varying shapes, sizes, colors, and more. Like the stars they orbit, exoplanets also come in many different shapes, sizes, and colors, with scientists classifying exoplanets into one of four groups: gas giants, super-Earths, sub-Neptunes, and terrestrial.

Interestingly, among the 5,000+ exoplanets that have been discovered and cataloged by NASA, ESA, and other agencies, there is a strange absence of exoplanets whose sizes are between 1.5 and two times the size of Earth (between super-Earths and sub-Neptunes). In a new study using data from NASA’s now-retired Kepler Space Telescope, scientists may have found evidence for why this size gap exists — the cores of the exoplanets are pushing away their atmospheres from the inside out.

“Scientists have now confirmed the detection of over 5,000 exoplanets, but there are fewer planets than expected, with a diameter between 1.5 and two times that of Earth. Exoplanet scientists have enough data now to say that this gap is not a fluke. There’s something going on that impedes planets from reaching and/or staying at this size,” said the science lead for the NASA Exoplanet Archive and lead author Jessie Christiansen of Caltech. (11/26)

North Korea’s Kim Inspects Spy Satellite Photos of 'Target Regions' (Source: NBC)
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un inspected photos taken by the country’s new spy satellite of “major target regions,” including the South Korean capital of Seoul and cities that host U.S. military bases, state media said. Nuclear-armed North Korea launched the satellite on Tuesday, but South Korean defence officials and analysts said its capabilities have not been independently verified. (11/25)

Some of The Galaxy's Brightest Stars Might Not Be Quite What They Seem (Source: Science Alert)
A study of some of the brightest, hottest stars in the Milky Way suggests theorized binary systems comprizing of a rapidly-spinning star feeding off a companion might actually be trinary systems, with a drained husk of one star lurking in the larger star's glow and a second companion lurking nearby. The new discovery suggests that such triple-star systems could be far more common than we thought. (11/21)

Dark Matter Could Help Solve the Final Parsec Problem of Black Holes (Source: Universe Today)
When galaxies collide, their supermassive black holes enter into a gravitational dance, gradually orbiting each other ever closer until eventually…merging. We know they merge because we see the gravitational beasts that result, and we have detected the gravitational waves they emit as they inspiral. But the details of their final consummation remain a mystery. Now a new paper suggests part of that mystery can be solved with a bit of dark matter.

Just as the famous three-body problem has no general analytical solution for Newtonian gravity, the two-body problem has no general solution in general relativity. So, we have to resort to computer simulations to model how black holes orbit each other and eventually merge. For binary black holes that are relatively widely separated, our simulations work really well, but when black holes are close to each other things get complicated. Einstein’s equations are very nonlinear, and modeling the dynamics of strongly interacting black holes is difficult.

As a result, the simulations we do have don’t show the black holes merging. Instead, they inspiral until they are about a parsec apart, then stabilize. This is known as the final parsec problem. One idea to solve the problem is to introduce dark matter into the mix. After all, cold dark matter is nearly everywhere according to the standard cosmological model, so it likely plays a role in the mergers of supermassive black holes. But so far it seems cold dark matter isn’t the answer. Simulations using it have the same final parsec problem as general relativity alone. (11/25)

Next Generation Space Telescopes Could Use Deformable Mirrors to Image Earth-Sized Worlds (Source: Universe Today)
NASA is pursuing the development of adaptive optics through its Deformable Mirror Technology project, which is carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at Caltech and sponsored by NASA’s Astrophysics Division Strategic Astrophysics Technology (SAT) and the NASA Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) programs. (11/26)

Huawei Eyes Connectivity Similar To SpaceX’s Starlink After Maiden Satellite Test (Source: WCCFTech)
Chinese personal computing and technology firm Huawei has become one of the few companies of its kind in the world to test out a low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite internet network similar to SpaceX's Starlink satellite internet service. Starlink is the world's largest LEO constellation, and it owes its size to SpaceX's workhorse Falcon 9 rocket, which has made rocket launches a regular occurrence of daily life in the 21st century. Details of Huawei's test were shared on the Chinese social media platform Weibo, with slides from a presentation showing that the LEO satellite test delivered download speeds of as much as 660 Mbps. (11/26)

Medical Emergencies Will Happen in Deep Space. Here's How Canada is Getting Ready (Source: Space.com)
Finalists in a Canadian Space Agency and Impact Canada tech challenge aim to pivot medical knowledge from working with remote communities — like Indigenous groups in Canada's far north — to help astronauts in deep space. The five finalists for the Canadian government's Deep Space Healthcare Challenge made presentations in Montreal on Tuesday (Nov. 21) explaining why their technology may one day be worthy of a space mission. At stake for the future winner is a rich half-million-dollar purse in Canadian dollars (roughly $365,000 USD). (11/26)

SpaceX’s Starship Could Be a Few Tests Away From its Ultimate Goal (Source: The Hill)
The recent second test flight of the SpaceX Starship/Super Heavy rocket was a perfect example of Elon Musk’s philosophy of technology development. Test the launch vehicle. Blow it up. Note what went wrong. Fix what went wrong. Repeat until you get something that flies as reliably as an airliner. The approach results in a lot of spectacular explosions and angst for government regulators. But, in the end, we get a spaceship that will take humankind to the moon, Mars and beyond. (11/26)

North Korea Has a Satellite Spying on Hawaii and Guam. A Security Expert Explains Why We Should Care (Source: Hawaii News Now)
Military experts believe North Korea’s new spy satellite shows the Korean peninsula remains a major threat, especially to our islands. Last week, North Korea released photos of leader Kim Jung Un looking at photos of Pearl Harbor, Hickam Air Force Base and military bases on Guam it claims were taken by the satellite.

Retired U.S. Air Force Lt. Gen. Dan “Fig” Leaf said the arms race continues with missile tests and support from Russia, despite United Nations sanctions and a U.S. strategy of deterrence through its alliance with South Korea. He also talked about an upcoming North Korean Human Rights Hawaii Conference on Dec. 4. Attendees will discuss deplorable conditions inside North Korea, with current policies unable to help innocent North Koreans. Leaf said the satellite builds internal prestige for Kim Jong Un against external enemies and allows continued advancement in missile capability. (11/26)

Space Race 2.0: Why Europe is Joining the New Dash to the Moon (Source: The Guardian)
By the unanimous agreement of the 22 European countries that fund and govern ESA, which include the UK, the space agency would open a competition for industry to propose a cargo spacecraft to fly to and from the International Space Station (ISS) by 2028. But the gamechanger came in what Aschbacher said next: “We will also conceive it in a way that it is not a dead end, meaning that it’s open and can evolve in the future to become a crew vehicle if member states decide to do so.”

This would be the first time that Europe has developed a crew transportation vehicle, and while it would initially be used to transport humans to and from the ISS, Aschbacher also told the gathered press that a further evolution of the design – again, pending Esa member states’ agreement – could serve other destinations beyond low Earth orbit. And there is the potential for history to be made, because if political will holds strong, Europe has begun the journey that could result in it developing the capability to land its own astronauts on the surface of the moon. (11/26)

Chinese Spacecraft That Smashed Into Moon Was Carrying Something Mysterious (Source: Futurism)
In early 2022, a piece of Chinese space junk hit the Moon and left a mysterious double pockmark on its surface — and, as it turns out, there's more to this story than meets the eye. Researchers from the University of Arizona say there's little doubt that the object that hit the moon in March 2022 was debris from a Chinese Long March 3C rocket booster, and that the strange double crater it left suggests that it carried an undisclosed payload along with it.

Specifically, the researchers' observations of the Chinese rocket suggested that there was something heavy attached to it that made it tumble in space before its crash landing — which isn't how these kinds of objects would normally act in these situations. Whatever was attached to the obliterated rocket, it seems to have been big enough to counterbalance its two 1,200-pound engines and make it tumble like a kid in gymnastics class. But after looking at the booster's known payloads, the AU team determined an object of a suitable mass was mysteriously missing from the list. (11/23)

New Mexico's Spaceport Dream Still Has Wings (Source: Santa Fe New Mexican)
I suspect someone will build a statue to Bill Richardson someday, a bow to the late governor's personality, power and persistence. But if you're really interested in accurate historical perspective and long-lasting influence, place the sculpture not in an obvious location — Santa Fe nor Albuquerque — but in the dust of Southern New Mexico, where Spaceport America is housed. The "vision thing" that Richardson trumpeted — and others could not deny — lives down there.

The spaceport is one of those roll-the-dice gambles that only Richardson could come up with. It made little sense to most of us when it was proposed and muscled into reality; its critics say it makes no sense now. Their skepticism is fueled by the recent news Virgin Galactic, the company with which the facility is closely associated, recently announced layoffs and a pause in its flight schedule. Sure, that hurts. But here's the reality of the spaceport: It's here to stay. And the future of space is way bigger than Virgin Galactic.

The CEO of Spaceport America, Scott McLaughlin, has basically been saying that since he got the job, not merely in the days since Virgin Galactic made its announcement earlier this month. The bet, the investment, on the facility is in the long run — years and decades from now. I'm not a science guy, but almost every new technology, and then industry, has progressed in fits and starts since someone was crazy enough to invent the former and wise enough to monetize the latter. The automobile was a dream. So was the portable computer. For that matter, so was the airplane. (11/25)

Live in Space? Someday. Live for Space? 'Spacers' Already Do (Source: Houston Chronicle)
As an evolutionary biologist, I’m interested in what would happen to human beings if people were to ever leave Earth to live in settlements on Mars or elsewhere. Many spacers think we’re now on the verge of that enormous leap: As wealthy tourists routinely make day trips to the edge of space, nations and corporations are vying to create permanent bases on the moon and Mars.

Starbase, SpaceX’s facility in Boca Chica, is located along State Highway 4, a public road. That means that the general public can get far closer to a SpaceX launch than to a NASA one. Spacers keep a close eye on comings and goings, making minute observations of each new tweak on a rocket. No detail is too small to discuss on a platform like Everyday Astronaut.

Everyday Astronaut, a spacer favorite, has 1.5 million YouTube subscribers, and more than a million people had tuned in for its live coverage of the launch. Tim Dodd, the channel’s host, may be the purest embodiment of the spacer dream. He is in fact an everyday astronaut: Nerdy-dad vibe and all, he’s slated to serve as crew next year on a Japanese billionaire’s SpaceX flight around the Moon on Starship — assuming its development proceeds as planned. Click here. (11/27)

Mars Needs Insects (Source: New York Times)
At first it was just one flower, but Emmanuel Mendoza, an undergraduate student at Texas A&M University, had worked hard to help it bloom. When this five-petaled thing burst forth from his English pea plant collection in late October, and then more flowers and even pea pods followed, he could also see, a little better, the future it might foretell on another world millions of miles from Earth. Click here. (11/27) 

North Korea Vows More Satellite Launches, Beefs Up Military on Border (Source: Reuters)
North Korea warned on Monday it would continue to exercise its sovereign rights, including through satellite launches, while its troops were reported to be restoring some demolished guard posts on the border with South Korea. North Korea's foreign ministry said the launch of a reconnaissance satellite last week was prompted by the need to monitor the United States and its allies, state media KCNA reported. (11/27)

Iran's Space Agency Progresses in Bio-Space Development (Source: MEHR)
"With the thirteenth government's arrival and our country's space industry reorganization, along with a ten-year space program approval, Iran's Space Agency aims to address challenges for various space projects," Salariyeh stated in an interview with the Tasnim News Agency. Salariyeh emphasized that Iran made efforts in the late 2000s, conducting experimental launches in this domain, but the research trend had halted in recent years.

In emphasizing the paramount importance of bio-space within Iran's space industry, Salariyeh underscored the agency's dedicated focus on advancing space sciences and exploration in this sphere. He highlighted the development and imminent launch of a 'bio-capsule' by Iranian experts at a prominent research center, marking a pivotal stride in ensuring conducive living conditions and survivability in space capsules. (11/26)

Extremely Large Telescopes At Risk (Source: Science)
The extremely large telescopes (ELTs) under construction today, with mirrors that are 25 to 39 m in diameter and adaptive optics, will have 100 times the light-gathering power and 10 times the image quality of the Hubble Space Telescope. These giant telescopes will search for signatures of life on exoplanets, reveal new insights on the nature and origin of black holes, and investigate the deep mysteries of dark matter and dark energy. These technological marvels are also extremely expensive and complex to build and manage.

Both the GMT and TMT have substantial fundraising challenges, and each is hoping to bring the US National Science Foundation (NSF) on as a partner. It is simply not possible for NSF to join both projects at the level needed to make each successful. Instead, NSF should take the lead in planning, building, and operating a single telescope. International partners are a must, and an alliance with ESO might be desirable. NSF knows how to manage such agreements, and international partners will be more comfortable with a government-to-government arrangement. (11/23)