December 13, 2023

"Spacepower" Conference Brings Together Military, Industry in Orlando (Source: Space News)
The US Space Force recently held its inaugural "Spacepower" conference, focusing on professional development and bringing together members from the Space Force, allied nations, and private industry. Chief of Space Operations Gen. Chance Saltzman emphasized the importance of understanding space systems' support for joint military forces and the role of space in great power competition. (12/12)

Why There Should Not Be a Norm for “Minimum Safe Distance” Between Satellites (Source: WOTR)
There are many reasons to fear close approaches — also known as conjunctions — in space, even if they are accidental. From a safety perspective, accidental satellite collisions could produce thousands of pieces of long-lived debris, as happened when an Iridium satellite and a defunct Russian satellite collided in 2009. Satellites that get too close to each other could also, intentionally or unintentionally, cause radio frequency interference that jams communications. If the approach is intentional, a threatening satellite could grab on to, physically destroy, electromagnetically interfere with, or collect intelligence for a future strike on a victim satellite.

Due to both safety and security concerns, international strategists and diplomats have raised two proposals related to the concept of “How close is too close?” in space. One safety-focused proposal is the concept of “minimum safe distance,” which would constitute a spherical safety zone in the three-dimensional space environment. On the security side, the concept appears as spherical “keep-out zones,” which would prohibit satellites from operating within a certain distance of another satellite without consent. For example, one set of authors proposed 700 kilometer (430 mile) radius keep-out zones for military communications and missile warning satellites in geostationary orbit. (12/12)

Humans Could Use Black Holes as Batteries (Source: Live Science)
The gravitational pull from black holes is  so strong that nothing can escape its grasp. So could we ever harness the gargantuan power of black holes as a source of energy? In a new study, scientists propose two ways to use black holes as energy sources someday. They predicted processes for extracting energy from black holes by using their rotational and gravitational properties. (12/12)

Minor Planet Chiron Doesn't Have Rings After All – It's Something Weirder (Source: IFL Science)
What astronomers in 2011 took for rings around the minor planet Chiron is actually something much stranger, new research reveals. The true nature of the material orbiting the icy world remains unknown, but it appears to be an ever-shifting disk of dust and gas. “The locations and amounts of material that were detected around Chiron are different enough from previous observations to suggest that there is not a stable ring system but rather surrounding material that is currently evolving,” said study author Dr Amanda Sickafoose. (12/8)

All Points Payload Processsing Venture in Florida to Include Logistics Center (Source: Huntsville Business Journal)
All Points Logistics, a technical services provider to the aerospace industry with a strong presence in Huntsville, has completed an early milestone in establishing new commercial infrastructure-as-a-service operations at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The All Points’ Space Prep team, in conjunction with NASA, has completed all necessary physical environmental studies, including boundary and topological surveys, on a 60-acre parcel that will host the Space Prep Kennedy Space Center Complex, located near NASA’s Vehicle Assembly Building.

Space Prep, an All Points line of business, is focused on establishing multi-user spaceport infrastructure at major launch sites worldwide. The Kennedy Complex is the first Space Prep project and will be anchored by a 270,000 square foot Spaceport Logistics Center, offering extensive storage space, clean processing areas for small spacecraft, control rooms, and customized customer areas. (12/12)

FCC Issues Final Denial of $885M Starlink Subsidy (Source: TechCrunch)
The FCC has made a final denial of Starlink’s application for $885 million in public funds to expand its orbital communications infrastructure to cover parts of rural America, saying the company “failed to demonstrate that it could deliver the promised service.”

As previously reported, the money in question was part of the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund, a multibillion-dollar program to subsidize the rollout of internet service in places where private companies have previously decided it’s too expensive or distant to do so. The $885 million was first set aside for Starlink in 2020, corresponding to the company’s bid on how much connectivity it could provide, at what cost and to which regions. (12/12)

Starlink is Booming, with Traffic Almost Tripling This Year (Source: Business Insider)
Starlink use has soared this year, according to new data — even as SpaceX's satellite network has been at the center of several major Elon Musk controversies. Global internet traffic from Starlink nearly tripled in 2023 according to data from IT security firm Cloudflare, as the internet service, which provides high-speed web access through a network of low-orbit satellites, expanded to a host of new countries. In the US, Starlink traffic was up by two and a half times this year. (12/12)

The Oldest Stars in Our Galaxy Make Elements That Aren't Yet on the Periodic Table (Source: Cosmos)
Move over uranium, the Milky Way’s oldest stars have bigger and better elements to make. A group of researchers from across the United States, Canada and Sweden have discovered ancient neutron stars might have created elements with atomic mass greater than 260. With an atomic mass of 238, uranium is the heaviest naturally occurring element known on Earth, though others like plutonium have been found in trace amounts due to reactions in uranium deposits. (12/8)

Astronomers Calculate Which Exoplanets Are Most Likely to Have Water (Source: Universe Today)
Astronomers know of about 60 rocky exoplanets orbiting in the habitable zones of their stars. When they try to determine how habitable these planets might be, detecting water in their atmospheres plays a huge role. But what if there was another way of measuring the water content in these worlds? Researchers are developing a way of modelling these worlds to determine how much water they have.

Habitability likely requires surface water, as far as we can tell. But detecting surface water is next to impossible. The next best thing is to use the tools we have—like the James Webb Space Telescope—to detect and characterize exoplanet atmospheres. But despite the JWST’s power, it can’t examine every exoplanet atmosphere. Some are beyond its reach. But one team of researchers is using what we do know about exoplanets, tidal heating, and radiogenic heating to try to determine which exoplanets might have oceans, either on the surface or under the surface. (12/12)

Looking at the Stars Through a Puddle of Mercury (Source: Popular Science)
It’s pretty easy to imagine carving glass to make parts for a piece of technology. We see them everyday–in eyeglasses, in microscopes in high school chemistry classes, and even in most telescopes. But astronomers have done something a bit different. They’ve made a telescope with a far weirder component: liquid mercury.

The International Liquid Mirror Telescope (ILMT), situated atop a mountain in the Himalayas, has a spinning vat of liquid mercury as its mirror. This international project—a collaboration between India, Belgium, Poland, Uzbekistan, and Canada—recently successfully observed its first supernova, illustrating that these fluid marvels can be used for modern astronomy. (12/11)

New Dark Matter Theory Explains Two Puzzles in Astrophysics (Source: Phys.org)
A theory called "self-interacting dark matter," or SIDM, proposes that dark matter particles self-interact through a dark force, strongly colliding with one another close to the center of a galaxy. SIDM simultaneously can explain two astrophysics puzzles in opposite extremes. "The first is a high-density dark matter halo in a massive elliptical galaxy," Yu said. "The halo was detected through observations of strong gravitational lensing, and its density is so high that it is extremely unlikely in the prevailing cold dark matter theory. The second is that dark matter halos of ultra-diffuse galaxies have extremely low densities and they are difficult to explain by the cold dark matter theory." (12/7)

DOD Awards $161 Million to Universities to Purchase Equipment Supporting Defense-Relevant R&D (Source: DoD)
The Department of Defense today announced awards totaling $161 million to 281 university researchers under the Defense University Research Instrumentation Program. The grants will support the purchase of major equipment to augment current and develop new research capabilities relevant to the Department at 120 institutions across 39 states in fiscal year 2024. 

Editor's Note: Sixteen grants are for Florida university equipment, including UF (7), UCF (3), USF (2), FAMU, Florida Tech, UWF, and FIU. Two of the grants are for space-related items, including hypersonics and space propulsion at UCF, and small satellite space weather monitoring sensors. (12/12)

NG-20 Cygnus Spacecraft Service Module on its Way to Florida (Source: SpaceFlight Insider)
The NG-20 Cygnus service module has left Virginia for Florida to be processed for launch to the International Space Station early next year. The service module for Northrop Grumman’s next Cygnus resupply spacecraft is en route to Florida for launch atop SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket. (12/13)

France 2030 boosts HyPrSpace and Partners with 35M Euro for Micro-Launcher Development (Source: Space Daily)
HyPrSpace, in collaboration with Telespazio France and CT Ingenierie, has recently secured a significant funding boost of euro 35 million for the Agile Space Access Development Project #1 (PADA1). This project, part of the France 2030 initiative, focuses on the development of innovative space access solutions, marking a significant step in the nation's space industry. The PADA1 consortium, led by HyPrSpace, aims to finalize the detailed design of the OB-1 rocket. This effort includes the first flight of Baguette One, a suborbital demonstration rocket. Baguette One is set to showcase HyPrSpace's novel hybrid propulsion technology. (12/13)

Cubesat Offers Template for Future Astronomy Missions (Source: Space News)
The first NASA-funded small satellite for exoplanet science is continuing to gather data well beyond its expected lifetime. The Colorado Ultraviolet Transit Experiment, known as CUTE, a six-unit cubesat equipped with a telescope to funnel data to a spectrograph, traveled to sun-synchronous low-Earth orbit in September 2021 as a secondary payload on the NASA- U.S. Geological Survey Landsat 9 Earth-observation mission. (12/12)

Blinky Rejoins Pinky, Inky, and Clyde in NASA's Starling CubeSat Swarm Configuration (Source: Space Daily)
NASA's innovative Starling spacecraft, comprising four CubeSats named Blinky, Pinky, Inky, and Clyde, have successfully maneuvered into a swarm configuration, marking a significant milestone in the mission. The Starling team at NASA has devoted the past two months to resolving technical issues and commissioning these spacecraft, ensuring they are operationally ready for their groundbreaking swarm experiment operations. (12/13)

USAGM Enlists SES Space and Defense for Advanced Global Satellite Broadcasting (Source: Space Daily)
SES Space and Defense, a prominent player in the realm of satellite communications, has recently been awarded a pivotal contract to support the United States Agency for Global Media (USAGM). This five-year agreement, facilitated through the General Services Administration's (GSA) Complex Commercial SATCOM Solutions (CS3) contract vehicle, positions SES Space and Defense at the forefront of advancing global media broadcasting. (12/13)

Engineers Working to Resolve Issue With Voyager 1 Computer (Source: Space Daily)
Engineers are working to resolve an issue with one of Voyager 1's three onboard computers, called the flight data system (FDS). The spacecraft is receiving and executing commands sent from Earth; however, the FDS is not communicating properly with one of the probe's subsystems, called the telecommunications unit (TMU). As a result, no science or engineering data is being sent back to Earth. (12/13)

China's Landspace Makes History, Launches Satellites on Green Fuel (Source: Interesting Engineering)
Beijing-based Landspace Technology etched its name in history on December 8, 2023, with a successful launch that marked two major milestones for the Chinese space industry. Not only did their Zhuque-2 ("Vermillion Bird-2") rocket successfully send satellites into orbit for the first time, but the company also revealed ambitious plans for a new stainless steel rocket known as the Zhuque-3. (12/10)

NASA's Perseverance Rover Deciphers Ancient History of Martian Lake (Source: NASA)
Marking its 1,000th Martian day on the Red Planet, NASA’s Perseverance rover recently completed its exploration of the ancient river delta that holds evidence of a lake that filled Jezero Crater billions of years ago. The six-wheeled scientist has to date collected a total of 23 samples, revealing the geologic history of this region of Mars in the process.

One sample called “Lefroy Bay” contains a large quantity of fine-grained silica, a material known to preserve ancient fossils on Earth. Another, “Otis Peak,” holds a significant amount of phosphate, which is often associated with life as we know it. Both of these samples are also rich in carbonate, which can preserve a record of the environmental conditions from when the rock was formed. (12/12)

Space Force Looks to Commercial Weather Services (Source: Space News)
The Space Force will conduct a study to see if commercial services can fill some of its weather needs. The study, expected to last 6 to 12 months, will include a "reverse industry day" where companies can come in and pitch their offerings, in contrast to the traditional approach where the military dictates its requirements and waits for industry to respond. While weather data is undeniably crucial for military operations, a Space Force official said it faces stiff competition for resources within the Space Force budget. (12/13)

Australia's Quasar Seeks US Defense/Intel Business (Source: Space News)
An Australian startup is hoping to enter the American defense and intelligence market. Quasar Satellite Technologies tracks radio-frequency signals emitted by satellites and analyzes the radio chatter to draw insights, and its systems can track hundreds of satellites at a time. The company, formed in 2021 as a spinoff from an Australian science agency, is opening a U.S. office next year to offer its capabilities to U.S. government customers. (12/13)

Air New Zealand Tests Starlink for Airliners (Source: Space News)
Air New Zealand is the latest airline to consider using SpaceX's Starlink on its aircraft. Starlink antennas will be installed on two Air New Zealand planes in late 2024 for an initial four-to-six-month period. Air New Zealand will look to deploy Starlink on other aircraft in its domestic fleet in 2025 if the trial run is successful. SpaceX is competing with OneWeb to serve the airline market, and while Starlink has a first-mover advantage over OneWeb, progress with airlines has been slow as the company navigates technical and regulatory hurdles in the market. (12/13)

Dragon Cargo Craft Postpones ISS Undocking (Source: NASA)
A Dragon cargo spacecraft will spend an extra day in space. NASA said Tuesday it was postponing the undocking of the CRS-29 Dragon from Thursday to Friday because of forecasts of unfavorable weather conditions at splashdown locations off the Florida coast. The undocking has been rescheduled for no earlier than 5:05 p.m. Eastern on Friday. (12/13)

House Space Mining Hearing Turns Partisan (Source: Space News)
A House hearing on space mining turned into a partisan debate. A subcommittee of the House Natural Resources Committee held a hearing Tuesday where witnesses discussed the potential of space mining as well as legal and other challenges. During the hearing, Democratic members questioned whether the committee had jurisdiction to discuss the topic, noting it has traditionally been in the purview of the House Science Committee. They also wondered if lunar or asteroid mining was viable in the near term. Republicans, by contrast, appeared to support space mining and warned of falling behind China. (12/13)

After Subsuming Aerojet Rocketdyne, Space Coast-Based L3Harris to Take a Break From Mergers and Acquisitions (Source: Reuters)
L3Harris says it is taking a break from mergers and acquisitions. The company, which completed its acquisition of propulsion company Aerojet Rocketdyne earlier this year, said it would pause any future deals for the "foreseeable future" to strengthen its bottom line. L3Harris sold a commercial aviation services unit recently for $800 million, using the proceeds to pay down debt. (12/13)

NASA Perseverance Rover Marks 1000 Martian Days (Source: BBC)
NASA's Perseverance rover has marked 1,000 Martian days on the red planet. NASA announced the "1,000-sol" milestone at the AGU Fall Meeting this week. A sol is a Martian day, about 40 minutes longer than an Earth day. Perseverance remains in good condition as travels across the remains of a river delta in Jezero Crater, collecting samples that will be brought back to Earth as part of the Mars Sample Return program. (12/13)

The SpaceX Military Starship Is Real! How's This Going To End? (Source: What About It?)
The Air Force wants to test a military Starship! Is Relativity Space becoming the next SpaceX? Has it only taken them a year to develop an entire engine? And buckle up for a crazy story regarding Osiris-REX! Click here. (12/12)

Don’t Trash the International Space Station (Source: Houston Chronicle)
NASA and its international partners intend to deorbit the International Space Station sometime around 2030. The ISS, the greatest engineering achievement in human history, would become a magnificent fireball streaking across the skies over the North Pacific. Much of it would burn up in the upper atmosphere, and the remains would splash into the sea.

We believe the deorbit plan is depressing, wasteful, environmentally undesirable, and most importantly, dishonoring of all those who built this magnificent structure, which is a testament to human ingenuity and international cooperation. The ISS arguably has been the first long-term home of human beings beyond Earth and the venue of many scientific and technological achievements. Important research has taken place on the space laboratory in biomedicine, space manufacturing, and space agriculture, among other fields of study. (12/8)

ASRC Federal Subsidiary Wins $489M Cape Launch Operations & Infrastructure Support III Contract (Source: ASRC)
ASRC Federal subsidiary NetCentric Technology, LLC was awarded a continuation of ASRC Federal’s work on the Cape Launch Operations and Infrastructure Support III (CLOIS III) contract by the U.S. Space Force. The awarded nine-year, $262 million ($489 million ceiling) Indefinite Delivery/Indefinite Quantity contract continues ASRC Federal’s support to Space Launch Delta 45. The ASRC Federal team will provide logistical and engineering assistance for facilities and systems at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station supporting civil and commercial space launch. (12/7)

Voyager Announces Two Starlab Demo Missions (Source: Voyager Space)
Voyager announces two new milestones for the Starlab space station. As part of our Space Act Agreement with NASA, our team is kicking off demonstration missions for an alternative urine processor (AUP) and a free-space optical (FSO) link. The Starlab program team has mandated that at least 90% of the wastewater generated on the space station will be purified and recycled to reduce the cost of transporting water from Earth. The Starlab team has initiated maturation and ground testing of a full-scale alternative urine processor to drive down cost and technical implementation risk and to leverage increased options in the marketplace for this essential technology. 

The AUP test article will be supplied by Paragon Space Development Corporation and the test campaign will be performed at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center. In addition, Voyager Space is developing an optical communications space terminal to be mounted on the Bishop Airlock, the first commercial module attached to the ISS. This technology will serve to establish a high-bandwidth optical communications link between a ground terminal and the flight terminal on the ISS in the absence of accurate attitude knowledge and quantify optical link performance over a range of atmospheric conditions. (12/7)

D.C. Circuit Skeptical of Suit Over SpaceX Satellite License (Source: Bloomberg))
The International Dark-Sky Association told judges on the D.C. Circuit that they should revoke SpaceX’s licenses to operate 7,500 Starlink satellites—even though around 1,500 of them have already been launched into space. The FCC could limit the number of satellites, require additional mitigation measures, and turn the unused orbiting satellites to minimize solar reflections, Charles Lee Mudd Jr. of Mudd Law, representing International Dark-Sky Association, said during oral arguments Monday.

The organization claimed that the Federal Communications Commission violated the National Environmental Policy Act when it approved SpaceX’s They claim the FCC skirted climate and light pollution analysis. (12/11)

Global Experts Obtain Maturity Index of Chang'e-5 Lunar Soil (Source: Xinhua)
Global experts have measured the maturity index of the lunar soil brought back by the Chang'e-5 mission by magnetic techniques for the first time after the return of samples, shedding light on the space weathering processes occurring on the Moon's surface. The lunar soil maturity is an index to characterize the space weathering degree of the soil. It is quantified by a variety of indices such as mean grain size, agglutinate abundance and solar wind gases abundances.

Studying the maturity index can reveal the interaction between micrometeorites, solar wind and lunar surface, and reflect the geological process of lunar soil formation. The value of Is/FeO (the intensity of the characteristic ferromagnetic resonance normalized to total iron content) is regarded as the only golden standard of lunar soil maturity, according to the research paper published in the journal Icarus. (12/12)

‘Head Scratcher’: First Look at Asteroid Dust Brought to Earth Offers Surprises (Source: Nature)
In the two and a half months since NASA’s first asteroid sample-return mission landed safely on Earth, technicians have carefully plucked more than 70 grams of asteroid dust and pebbles from the outside of the spacecraft’s canister. That’s more than ten times the amount ever brought back from an asteroid, and more than NASA declared necessary to call the mission a success. Some of the pebbles even seem to contain a combination of chemical elements that is puzzling researchers.

But these early discoveries are still a long way from where planetary scientists had hoped to be after the 24 September touchdown. Last month, researchers at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, discovered that two of the 35 screws that fasten the lid of the sample-return canister couldn’t be opened — blocking access to the remainder of the space rock. Curators used tweezers to pull out what they could, but NASA is now making new screwdrivers so it can get into the equipment it flew billions of kilometres across the Solar System to the asteroid Bennu and back. (12/12)

NASA’s Commercial Partners Continue Progress on New Space Stations (Source: NASA)
Three NASA-funded commercial space station partners are on track for the design and development of their orbital destinations and the transition of agency’s low Earth orbit needs from the International Space Station. “We are ending the year on a high note with multiple important milestones being completed by our partners,” said Angela Hart, manager of the Commercial Low Earth Orbit Development Program at NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston. Click here. (12/12)

Performing Evasive Maneuvers Increases Satellites' Collision Risk Down the Road (Source: Space.com)
Researchers have found that trying to avoid collisions in orbit increases the risk of future collisions in the aftermath of each avoidance maneuver. The reason? Current methods of space traffic management can't adequately deal with the growing numbers of satellites in space. Analysts with the Pennsylvania-based company COMSPOC (short for "Commercial Space Operations Center") found that, in the aftermath of every satellite collision avoidance maneuver, operators and space traffic observers have only a rough idea of where their objects are. (12/11)

Embry‑Riddle Ph.D. Student Brings Top-Notch Experience to Space Research (Source: ERAU)
When Kyle Vernyi started his doctoral program at Embry‑Riddle Aeronautical University this past fall, he had already completed two exciting internships at NASA’s Glenn Research Center (GRC), where he worked closely with one of his undergraduate professors. “The projects and labs at NASA GRC span the whole engineering gambit,” said Vernyi. “Getting to tour those places and meet the engineers, mathematicians, pilots and technicians was fantastic.” For his Ph.D., Vernyi chose Embry‑Riddle, he said, because of its emphasis on aerospace. (12/11)

NASA Sensor Produces First Global Maps of Surface Minerals in Arid Regions (Source: NASA)
NASA’s EMIT mission has created the first comprehensive maps of the world’s mineral dust-source regions, providing precise locations of 10 key minerals based on how they reflect and absorb light. When winds loft these substances into the air, they either cool or warm the atmosphere and Earth’s surface, depending on their composition. Understanding their abundance around the globe will help researchers predict future climate impacts. (12/11)

12-billion-Year-Old Body of Water Discovered Floating in Space (Source: Indy 100)
Two teams of astronomers led by scientists at Caltech, have discovered the largest reservoir of water ever detected in the universe. And it's 30 billion trillion miles away. Yep, you read that correctly. The largest reservoir has been found in the cosmos, more specifically in a quasar, which is one of the brightest and most violent objects in the cosmos. The mass of water vapour is at least 140 trillion times more than all of the water in the world's oceans combined. (12/12)

Cow-Dung-Powered Space Rocket Engine Successfully Tested in Japan (Source: Interesting Engineering)
A successful prototype rocket engine test powered by liquid biomethane (LBM) derived from cattle manure has been carried out by the Japanese space start-up Interstellar Technologies Inc (IST). The company conducted a series of "Static Fire Test" for the ZERO launch vehicle rocket at the Hokkaido Spaceport's Launch Complex-0 in Taiki, Hokkaido. (12/12)

Something Unearthly Could Switch Train Signals From Red to Green (Source: Gizmodo)
Some train track circuits are at the mercy of distant storms on the Sun’s surface, researchers found, which could cause train signals to jump from red to green and vice versa as a result of extreme space weather. “Our research shows that space weather poses a serious, if relatively rare, risk to the rail signaling system, which could cause delays or even have more critical, safety implications,” said study lead author Cameron Patterson. (12/11)

Potential Signs of Life on Mars Might be Easier to Find Than First Thought (Source: Phys.org)
It is hoped that if it ever existed, Martian life left some traces behind in the form of physical or chemical markers known as biosignatures. But identifying these signs could prove tricky. High levels of radiation, temperature extremes and Mars' weather might have damaged or obscured the markers making them hard to detect.

To account for this, researchers wanted to know what tell-tale signs are left behind as biosignatures break down. The team were particularly interested in the effect gypsum might have on these signs. On Earth, this mineral is found in dry lakes, and it has been suggested that on Mars the mineral might have preserved the organic molecules of any life that could have lived in any liquid water. But there are problems with this.

"While gypsum might be good at preserving organics, it might also make them harder to find," Connor explains. "Working in infrared, the issue is that a lot of the core characteristics of gypsum have absorption features which obscure organic peaks in the spectrum. It's a bit of a catch-22." In collaboration with the students, the team decided to simulate what the signs of ancient life might look like on the red planet by making use of the Natural History Museum's collections. (12/12)

Europe’s Largest Rocket Travels on a Wind-Powered Cargo Ship (Source: CNN)
With its four sails towering 121 feet (37 meters) over its main deck, Canopée is a cargo ship with an unusual design, and a very unusual cargo. The sails have a combined surface area of almost 16,000 square feet (1,486 square meters), and can give the 3,150-ton ship a substantial boost when the wind conditions are favorable. Although Canopée’s primary power source is still a pair of diesel engines, it’s a glimpse into the future of shipping. The sails, called “Oceanwings” because they resemble aircraft wings when fully deployed, could cut fuel consumption in half. (12/12)

Blue Origin to Resume New Shepard Suborbital Launches (Source: Space News)
Blue Origin has announced plans to launch its New Shepard suborbital vehicle on its first flight since a mishap more than 15 months ago. Blue Origin announced on social media Dec. 12 that it will launch its New Shepard vehicle no earlier than Dec. 18 from its West Texas test site. The vehicle will carry 33 experiments as well as 38,000 postcards from Club for the Future, the educational nonprofit affiliated with the company. The flight will be uncrewed. (12/12)

True Anomaly Raises $100 Million to Expand Investments in Space Security Technologies (Source: Space News)
True Anomaly, a startup based in Denver, announced Dec. 12 it has raised $100 million in a Series B funding round. True Anomaly is producing small satellites designed for surveillance and reconnaissance of objects in space, aimed at the military and intelligence markets. The company in August unveiled a 35,000 square-foot facility in Centennial, Colorado. It has doubled its staff from 50 to more than 100 employees. (12/12)

California ICBM Test Demonstrates 'Midcourse' Intercept (Source: Boeing)
The U.S. Missile Defense Agency and a Boeing-led industry team successfully intercepted an intermediate-range ballistic missile in space during the latest test of the Ground-based Midcourse Defense, or GMD, system. The test validated GMD’s Capability Increment 6B configuration, which gives the Missile Defense Operators more time, space and flexibility to intercept ballistic missile threats to the U.S. homeland.

During the test, a GMD interceptor released a kinetic-force Exoatmospheric Kill Vehicle, or EKV, during the rocket booster’s second stage of its normally three-stage sequence of flight. The threat-representative target was air-launched from the Broad Ocean Area and the interceptor was deployed from Vandenberg Space Force Base, California. (12/12)

Houston Company to Launch Hair From Three U.S. Presidents, Including Washington, Into Deep Space (Source: Houston Chronicle)
Americans have long revered George Washington’s hair. His locks have been studied by scientists, touted at World’s Fairs and included as prizes in packs of baseball cards. The niece of Washington’s secretary once wrote a poem using his hair clippings as letters. But in the coming weeks, a sample of the first president’s hair will journey toward an entirely new frontier when a rocket throttles it into deep space.

Houston-based Celestis has packed clippings from Washington, Dwight D. Eisenhower and John F. Kennedy onto United Launch Alliance's Vulcan rocket as part of a time capsule that will travel beyond the moon and, according to Celestis, preserve history for humans or aliens to rediscover. The company specializes in sending cremated remains and DNA into space. (12/12)

If Saturn’s Moon Has Signs of Life, Impact with a 15,000 km/h Spacecraft Won’t Stop It (Source: Cosmos)
When searching for signs of life in far flung planets or moons, sometimes the details are important. For example, if a space craft was sent to collect samples from the icy plumes of a distance moon, would the high speed fly-through disrupt properties of the substance it is trying to collect? Or more directly, could an amino acid even survive an impact with a spacecraft? A new study from researchers from the University of California San Diego says yes. (12/12)

How Tiny Red Stars Can Test Ideas About the Origin of Life (Source: Science News)
A survey of small, cool stars is helping to narrow in on the conditions that might set the stage for life beyond our solar system. A look at about 200 ultracool dwarf stars shows that they lack sufficient ultraviolet light intensity to have the potential to jump-start life, researchers report. That may initially seem to be bad news for finding signs of alien life on distant planets. But the diminutive stars could instead serve as test beds to determine what other conditions can create the chemical foundations of life. (12/11)

Japan's Space Startup Boom is Stoking Investor Demand, Says PD AeroSpace CEO (Source: Reuters)
A pick up in Japanese government spending on space has been a boon for domestic startups and stoked investor demand in the nascent sector, the head of suborbital aircraft company PD AeroSpace said. The company, which is aiming to start commercial spaceflight services in 2030, is considering an initial public offering by 2027 or possibly earlier, seeking some 17 billion yen ($117 million) in funding, chief executive Shuji Ogawa said in an interview.

By doing so, his company would follow in the footsteps of radar satellite firm iQPS (5595.T) and lunar transport company ispace (9348.T), which both debuted in the Tokyo market and secured million-dollar government subsidies this year. "Risk money and state budgets are finally coming to Japanese space ventures," said Ogawa, a former aircraft engineer who founded PD AeroSpace in 2007, even though government rejected his company's application for the latest rocket development grant. (12/12)