May 2, 2018

Trump Again Teases ‘Space Force’ as the Sixth Military Branch (Source: Military Times)
President Donald Trump on Tuesday again hinted at the possibility of a new military service dedicated to space, saying discussions are already underway with defense officials. During a ceremony honoring the Army football team, Trump praised the players as representatives of “the five proud branches” of the military: the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Coast Guard. And then Trump added, “We’re actually thinking of a sixth.”

“That would be the space force,” the commander in chief said. “Does that make sense? We’re getting very big in space, both militarily and for other reasons. And we are seriously thinking of a space force.” In March, at a similar military event at Miramar Air Station in California, Trump said his new national security strategy “recognizes that space is a war-fighting domain just like the land, air and sea,” adding that “we may even have a space force” one day. (5/1)

China's New FAST Radio Telescope -World's Largest- Makes Breakthrough Discovery (Source: Daily Galaxy)
“This discovery demonstrated the great potential of FAST in pulsar searching, highlighting the vitality of the large aperture radio telescope in the new era,” said Kejia Lee, scientist at the Kavli Institute of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Peking University.

China’s Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical radio Telescope(FAST), discovered a radio millisecond pulsar (MSP) coincident with the unassociated gamma-ray source 3FGL J0318.1+0252 in the Fermi Large Area Telescope (LAT) point-source list. FAST, operated by the National Astronomical Observatory of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, has discovered more than 20 new pulsars so far. This first MSP discovery was made by FAST on Feb. 27 and later confirmed by the Fermi-LAT team in reprocessing of Fermi data on April 18th.
 
The pulsar timing array (PTA) attempts to detect low-frequency gravitational waves from merging supermassive black holes using the long-term timing of a set of stable millisecond pulsars. Pulsar search is the basis of gravitational wave detection through PTAs. The newly discovered pulsar, now named PSR J0318+0253, was confirmed through timing of gamma-ray pulsations. This discovery is the first result from the FAST-Fermi LAT collaboration. (4/29)

ESA Official: Lunar Orbital Platform Gateway is First Step Towards Mars (Source: Space Daily)
The Lunar Orbital Platform Gateway, which will be used for deep space exploration and research, is due to start operating by 2025, and NASA is preparing its first manufacture contracts. Philippe Schoonejans, head of robotics and future projects and coordinator for ESA's Meteron project, said the mission is "aggressive, but doable."

It's very big, because it's the first step towards also going to Mars. I think all of the agencies have in any case the goal that eventually they want to go to Mars, with people also. But we have so much to learn before we could actually go there. We need to know what it's like to be in deep space and to deal with the cosmic radiation of deep space, or to deal with the fact that you have to live and work there without having the benefit like we have on the International Space Station, which is actually quite close to Earth, where you can have rockets going up and down all the time to send supplies. (5/2_

NASA Just Proved it is Serious About Returning to the Moon (Source: The Hill)
Recently NASA canceled work on a proposed lunar rover called the Resource Prospector, less a mission than an idea for a mission. The RP would have sent a rover to one of the lunar poles to prospect for resources, including water ice, with a drill and an onboard laboratory. Work on the concept had been ongoing for four years, even though it was never an approved mission on NASA’s manifest.

The decision to cancel the RP elicited a flurry of media reports that, in effect, NASA was canceling a lunar mission just as President Trump had ordered the space agency to return to the moon. The truth is a little more complicated. NASA’s Lunar Exploration Analysis Group sent a letter to NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine in protest. The letter was a well-reasoned argument for reinstating the Resource Prospector, suggesting that it would fulfill many of the science goals for the return to the moon program.
 
Bridenstine did not take long to respond on his Twitter feed. “We’re committed to lunar exploration @NASA. Resource Prospector instruments will go forward in an expanded lunar surface campaign. More landers. More science. More exploration. More prospectors. More commercial partners. Ad astra!” NASA then expanded on the tweet. “NASA is developing an exploration strategy to meet the agency’s expanded lunar exploration goals. Consistent with this strategy, NASA is planning a series of progressive robotic missions to the lunar surface," according to a statement. (5/1)

NASA’s Mini Fission Reactor Could Help Humans Survive on Mars, and It Just Cleared Early Tests (Source: Gizmodo)
NASA announced today that it has completed tests of its Kilopower portable nuclear fission reactor, a device designed to one day power bases on Mars or the moon. The tests met or exceeded expectations on all metrics, which means the device can now go on to more serious flight testing. The Kilopower device is still a prototype, but will be important for space expeditions where astronauts can’t bring enough supplies on their ship and must still generate power far from Earth. (5/2)

NASA Selected Scientific Florida a Top Innovative Company (Source: Scientific Florida)
Selected by NASA as top innovative company, Scientific Florida presented its Spacevisor technology to the aerospace industry at the Space Symposium in Colorado Springs. Spacevisor is a self-learning AI-powered augmented operations management platform, providing predictive analytics to identify and even solve problems before they occur. Click here. (5/1)

Asteroid Miners' Arkyd-6 Satellite Aces Big Test in Space (Source: Space.com)
Some of Planetary Resources' asteroid-mining tech just passed a major space test. The company's tiny Arkyd-6 satellite has completed all its mission goals in Earth orbit, just three months after lifting off atop an Indian rocket, Planetary Resources representatives said. "The spacecraft successfully demonstrated its distributed computing system, communications, attitude-control system, power generation and storage with deployable solar arrays and batteries, star tracker and reaction wheels, and the first commercial mid-wave infrared (MWIR) imager operated in space."  (4/25)

Earth's Magnetic Field is Not About to Reverse (Source: Space Daily)
A study of the most recent near-reversals of the Earth's magnetic field by an international team of researchers, including the University of Liverpool, has found it is unlikely that such an event will take place anytime soon. There has been speculation that the Earth's geomagnetic fields may be about to reverse , with substantial implications, due to a weakening of the magnetic field over at least the last two hundred years, combined with the expansion of an identified weak area in the Earth's magnetic field called the South Atlantic Anomaly, which stretches from Chile to Zimbabwe.

A team of international researchers model observations of the geomagnetic field of the two most recent geomagnetic excursion events, the Laschamp, approximately 41,000 years ago, and Mono Lake, around 34,000 years ago, where the field came close to reversing but recovered its original structure. The model reveals a field structures comparable to the current geomagnetic field at both approximately 49,000 and 46,000 years ago, with an intensity structure similar to, but much stronger than, today's South Atlantic Anomaly (SAA); their timing and severity is confirmed by records of cosmogenic nuclides. However, neither of these SAA-like fields developed into an excursion or reversal. (5/1)

SpaceX Sets Monday Launch Window for First Block 5 Rocket Launch (Source: Orlando Sentinel)
SpaceX has set a 2 hour and 25 minute window on Monday afternoon for the first launch of the next-generation Falcon 9 rocket, the Block 5. The Block 5 is designed for more reusability, a key factor in lowering the cost of a launch. The first Block 5 launch is set to carry a communications satellite, Bangabandhu 1, into orbit for the Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission. The launch window is set to open at 4 p.m. through 6:25 p.m. at the Cape Canaveral Spaceport. (5/2)

OneWeb Shifts First Launch to Year’s End (Source: Space News)
OneWeb is delaying the launch of its first satellites until late this year. The company previously planned to launch its first 10 satellites on a Soyuz rocket this month, but company founder Greg Wyler said those satellites are now scheduled for launch in the fourth quarter. The delay will allow for more testing of the satellites and the addition of improved components. Wyler said there may be a gap of up to two months between the first and second launches, after which he expects to perform launches of 34 to 36 satellites per Soyuz rocket every three weeks. (5/2)

Rescue Operations Take Shape for Commercial Crew Program Astronauts (Source: NASA)
Rescue and recovery involves meticulous planning and close coordination between NASA, the Department of Defense (DOD), and company recovery teams for Starliner and Crew Dragon. These are the spacecraft of commercial partners Boeing and SpaceX that will fly astronauts to and from the International Space Station from U.S. soil. In the event of a variety of contingency landings, an elite team is prepared to rescue the crew anywhere in the world.

In preparation for both launch and landing, U.S. Air Force “Guardian Angel” Pararescue forces will be pre-positioned in key locations, alert and ready to deploy at a moment’s notice. Should a spacecraft splash down within 200 nautical miles of the launch site, an HC-130 aircraft along with two HH-60 Pave Hawk helicopters will deploy from Patrick Air Force Base in Florida. Click here. (5/1)

Space is Essential to Nuclear Deterrence (Source: Space News)
Space is an essential part of the triad of nuclear deterrence, an Air Force general says. Lt. Gen. Jack Weinstein, Air Force deputy chief of staff for strategic deterrence and nuclear integration, said that while the Pentagon plans to spend a trillion dollars over the next decade on modernizing bombers, ballistic missiles and submarines, it also needs to support space capabilities, like satellites used for secure communications and for missile warning, also in need of modernization. The Air Force is planning to spend $58 billion over the next decade on updating nuclear command, control and communications systems, and a review of those plans was due to Secretary of Defense Mattis Tuesday. (5/2)

NASA's Continuing Challenges with Cost and Schedule Performance (Source: Space News)
NASA's cost and schedule performance on major projects has "deterioriated" in the last year, according to the GAO. In a report Tuesday, the GAO said the average launch delay had grown to 12 months, the largest in the 10 years that the GAO has been tracking NASA programs. Costs have also grown by an average of 18.8 percent, but the GAO said a lack of updated cost information on Orion prevented it from developing a complete estimate. The GAO warned that NASA was at risk of increased overruns in the years to come as it starts new projects while existing ones take longer to complete. (5/2)

Swarm Faces Regulatory Action for Microsat Launch (Source: Quartz)
A company that launched several cubesats without FCC authorization may now be facing enforcement action. Swarm launched the four SpaceBee satellites on an Indian rocket in January, even though the FCC hadn't granted a communications license for the satellites out of concern they would be too small to track. The FCC has completed an inquiry into the incident and referred it to its enforcement bureau, the agency said. Swarm had won grants from several government agencies, including NASA, valued at more than $1 million, although NASA says they no longer have an agreement with the company.

“Based on continuing Swarm Technologies statements, NASA…believed that FCC approval of the Swarm Technologies operating license was imminent and forthcoming,” the space agency said on May 1. “It was only after the January 12 launch that it became apparent that no license had been granted."  The lack of communication between the officials who regulate these new satellites and those who pay for them shows the gaps in the US approach to regulating space as private companies gain new capabilities there. Lawmakers and the Trump administration say they are working to fix the problems. (5/2)

Mars InSight: NASA’s Journey Into the Red Planet’s Deepest Mysteries (Source: New York Times)
NASA’s Mars InSight spacecraft, scheduled to launch on Saturday, is headed to one of the most boring places on the red planet. Its landing spot will be Elysium Planitia, an idyllically named expanse that will likely be flat as far as the spacecraft’s eyes can see — no mountains in the distance, probably not even many large rocks nearby. “We picked something as close to a 100 kilometer-long parking lot as we could find anywhere,” said Bruce Banerdt, the mission’s principal investigator. He said that one of his colleagues described it as “Kansas without the corn.” Which is exactly what the scientists want.

InSight — the name is a compression of the mission’s full name, Interior Exploration Using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport — is in many ways a diversion from “follow the water,” the mantra that has kept NASA focused on the possibility that the sun’s fourth planet may have once been hospitable for life. This mission will instead probe the mysteries of Mars’s deep interior and help answer geophysical questions about the planet’s structure, composition and how it formed. Since there was not much interest in what InSight will find at the surface, a safe — that is, flat — landing spot was selected. (5/1)

Mars Mission Includes Cubesats (Source: Space.com)
Two cubesats will be tagging along with InSight to Mars. The Mars Cube One, or MarCO, cubesats, will fly with InSight to Mars and go past the plant, serving as communications relays during InSight's entry, descent and landing. The MarCO cubesats aren't needed for the misison, but will demonstrate technologies that can be used on future interplanetary cubesat missions. The two cubesats are named "Wall-E" and "Eva" after the robots who were the main characters in the movie Wall-E. (5/2)

NASA Developing Cubesat to Study Van Allen Belts (Source: NASA/GSFC)
NASA is developing another cubesat mission to study the Earth's Van Allen Belts. GTOSat, selected as part of NASA's Heliophysics Technology and Instrument Development for Science, will operate in geostationary transfer orbit to study high-energy particles in the belts. The six-unit cubesat, scheduled for launch in 2021, is based on a bus called Dellingr-X, an updated version of the Dellingr cubesat launched last year. (5/2)

Dragon Departure from ISS Delayed (Source: NASA)
NASA has postponed the departure of a Dragon cargo spacecraft from the International Space Station. The Dragon was scheduled to unberth from the ISS today and splashdown in the Pacific Ocean off the California coast, but NASA said Tuesday that the spacecraft's return will now take place Saturday. NASA didn't disclose the reason for the delay. Dragon is returning more than 1,800 kilograms of cargo, including research payloads, from the station. (5/2)

XS-1: DARPA's Experimental Spaceplane (Source: Space.com)
The XS-1 is a space plane under development by the U.S. military's high-tech agency, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The major goal of the project is to reuse the spacecraft frequently, with a proposed launch rate of 10 one-day missions in just 10 days. In May 2017, DARPA selected Boeing as the provider for phases 2 and 3. Test fights are scheduled for 2020.

The XS-1 (Experimental Spaceplane 1) is envisioned to heft payloads for less than $5 million a flight, each weighing between 3,000 and 5,000 lbs. (1,360 to 2,267 kilograms). The aircraft-like craft is also supposed to fly faster than Mach 10, or 10 times the speed of sound. "The long-term intent is for XS-1 technologies to be transitioned to support not only next-generation launch for government and commercial customers, but also global reach hypersonic and space access aircraft." (4/27)

Rocket Lab Preparing to Launch Miniature NASA Satellites (Source: BizEdge)
Rocket Lab and NASA have carried out the integration of the CubeSat payloads scheduled to launch on the Electron rocket in the first half of 2018 for NASA’s first ever Venture Class Launch Services (VCLS) mission. The flight will constitute the smallest class of dedicated launch services used by NASA and marks a significant milestone for Rocket Lab in providing access to space for a NASA-sponsored mission of small satellites.

The launch is manifested with research and development payloads from NASA and educational institutions that will conduct a wide variety of new, on-orbit science. Applications of the CubeSats booked on the mission include research such as measuring radiation in the Van Allen belts to understand their impact on spacecraft, through to monitoring space weather. (5/1)

How Would Humanity React If We Really Found Aliens? (Source: Space.com)
If aliens reach out to us, what would happen first? It's a question that has puzzled science-fiction fans and scientists alike for decades, and we already may have a hint of how people will react. On Oct. 30, 1938, a dramatized version of the 1898 H.G. Wells novel "The War of the Worlds" played on the CBS Radio system across the United States. The story details how Martians attacked Earth.

If researchers find a signal today, Forgan said, one of the things they will have to manage is a public used to getting constant news updates on Twitter and other forms of social media. It's something Forgan and his colleagues are already working on. The International Academy of Astronautics SETI Permanent Committee created a post-detection protocol in 1989 that was slightly updated in 2010; a new update is starting soon and should be finished in a few years, Forgan said.

For the most part, scientists assume alien contact would happen through a signal purposely sent toward Earth. The "acid test" is to make sure the signal is verified by multiple observatories, said SETI Institute senior astronomer Seth Shostak. "It would take a while to verify, and then the people who like to think about these matters say you would have a press conference and announce this to the world," he said, but he added that wouldn't work unless everyone in the project were sworn to secrecy. In this era of news leaks, he said that situation is very unlikely to hold. (4/30)

Bezos’ Focus on Space Spending Sparks Questions About Philanthropy (Source: GeekWire)
While Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates spends billions of dollars a year on global health, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is spending $1 billion on his Blue Origin space venture — and some folks have a problem with that. The issue is coming to the fore in the wake of Bezos’ comments last week that Blue Origin represents “the most important work that I’m doing,” and is funded with billions of dollars of his personal wealth.

Bezos sees his share of Amazon’s success as the equivalent of “lottery winnings” that currently translate to an estimated net worth of $130 billion, making him the world’s richest individual. “The only way that I can see to deploy this much financial resource is by converting my Amazon winnings into space travel,” Bezos said last week during an Axel Springer award ceremony in Berlin. “That is basically it. Blue Origin is expensive enough to be able to use that fortune. I am liquidating about $1 billion a year of Amazon stock to fund Blue Origin. And I plan to continue to do that for a long time.”

That sentiment is in line with Bezos’ long-held passion to pioneer the space frontier by making it possible for millions of people to live and work in space. He’s gotten used to acknowledging that the main reason for starting up Amazon was to get the money to fund space development. But as last week’s comments became widely distributed, they attracted pushback from folks who pointed out concerns closer to home, like low wages for Amazon workers. (5/1)

SpaceX and Boeing Space Capsules May Not Become Operational Until 2020 (Source: Ars Technica)
A new report provides some insight into the challenges that SpaceX and Boeing are facing when it comes to flying commercial crew missions, and it also suggests both companies may be nearly two years away from reaching operational status for NASA. The assessment of large projects at NASA, published on Tuesday by the US Government Accountability Office, found that certification of the private spacecraft for flying astronauts to the International Space Station may be delayed to December 2019 for SpaceX and February 2020 for Boeing.

"Both of the Commercial Crew Program's contractors have made progress developing their crew transportation systems, but delays persist as the contractors have had difficulty executing aggressive schedules," the report states. Both SpaceX, with its Dragon spacecraft, and Boeing, with its Starliner vehicle, are engaged in intense development, testing, and assembly programs in preparation for critical flight tests. To become certified for operational missions, each company must complete one uncrewed flight and one crewed mission.

NASA officially updated the schedule for these flights in January of this year. Under the new timeline, Boeing is slated to fly an uncrewed test flight of Starliner in August 2018 and a second flight with astronauts in November. SpaceX is scheduled to fly a demonstration flight of its Dragon in August, followed by a crewed mission in December. However, the certification dates referenced in the GAO report indicate that NASA's recently published schedules may be too optimistic. (5/1)