December 27, 2018

Ever Heard of Eyeball Planets? Yep, They're Exactly as Creepy as They Sound (Source: Science Alert)
You've heard of hot Jupiters. You've heard of mini-Neptunes. You've heard of super-Earths. But have you heard of Eyeball Planets? Yep - planetary scientists think there might be a type of exoplanet out there that looks disturbingly like a giant eyeball. Just sitting there. Staring. But it's actually not as weird as it sounds - the appearance of these bodies has to do with tidal locking.

Tidal locking is when an orbiting body rotates at the same rate that it orbits. That means it always has one side facing the body it is orbiting, and the other side always facing away. The Moon, for instance, is tidally locked to Earth, that's why we never see its far side from here. Earth isn't tidally locked to the Sun - that's why we have a day/night cycle - but we know there are exoplanets that are tidally locked to their stars. Which means one side is in perpetual day, and the other in perpetual night. (12/24)

World's First Message Delivered from Outer Space to the EDM Community (Source: Your EDM)
Last year, World Club Dome teamed up with BigCityBeats to take ravers on a zero-gravity adventure with Armin van Buuren, Steve Aoki, and W&W. Next year, they’re literally challenging the metaphor “the sky’s the limit” as they take to space for the next frontier in dance music partnership.

Dance music history was just made this week, and a lot of people still don’t know it. The world’s first message from outer space to the electronic dance music community has been delivered by the International Space Station’s current Commander Alexander Gerst. The commander’s message was a response to world-famous star DJs Armin van Buuren, Dimitri Vegas & Like Mike, Steve Aoki and Timmy Trumpet who sent a greeting to the ISS, talking enthusiastically about the vision and collaboration between WCD and the European Space Agency (ESA) and their Zero Gravity mission. (12/22)

What Was It Like When The Milky Way Took Shape? (Source: Forbes)
The Milky Way galaxy may be just one of trillions in the observable Universe, but it's uniquely special as our cosmic home. Composed of a few hundred billion stars, about a trillion solar masses worth of dark matter, a supermassive central black hole, and a plethora of gas and dust, we're actually somewhat typical of modern galaxies. We're neither among the biggest or the smallest galaxies, nor are we in an ultra-massive cluster or found in isolation.

What does make us special, though, is how evolved we are. Some galaxies grow up quickly, exhausting their fuel and becoming "red and dead" when they lose the ability to form new stars. Some galaxies undergo major mergers, transforming from spirals into ellipticals when that occurs. And others experience enormous tidal disruptions, leading to sweeping, distended spiral arms. Not the Milky Way, though. We grew up exactly like you'd expect. Here's how we got there. (12/26)

Russia Says the Mysterious Hole in its Soyuz Rocket May Have Been Sabotage (Source: BGR)
We already knew that Russia was in the midst of an incredibly deep investigation into the origins of a strange hole that was found in a part of its Soyuz space vehicle earlier this year. The part of the ship that was damaged is no more — it was jettisoned during reentry and burned up — but samples taken from the damaged area are now being studied by Russian authorities as they try to explain how such a thing happened.

Sergei Prokopyev, one of the cosmonauts that rode back down to Earth last week aboard the Soyuz craft, told reporters at a new conference that the investigation is still ongoing. Samples gathered during a recent spacewalk should hopefully be the final piece to whatever puzzle officials are trying to piece together. Russia’s handling of the investigation has the full support of NASA, but it’s worth noting that the country’s messaging hasn’t exactly been consistent in the days, weeks, and months following the discovery of the hole.

Initially thought to be damage sustained by a tiny space rock, once the hole was determined to be manmade a whole lot of finger pointing ensued. Russia’s Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin seeded the idea that the hole was created while the spacecraft was docked to the ISS, hinting that it might have been the work of someone on board. (12/25)

China is Infiltrating US Space Industry with Investments (Source: The Hill)
Recent actions by China illuminate growing concerns regarding their influence in the technology industry and the national security implications for the U.S. Echoed by reports from the national security community regarding Chinese investments in U.S. emerging and critical technologies, concerns indicate the political landscape is shifting towards a more aggressive posture with respect to China. Increasingly, U.S. policymakers are dedicating attention and resources to this issue, creating a rift between regulators and industry that the space industry will not be immune from.

The most recent act of Chinese aggression, announced last week by the U.S. Department of Justice, charged hackers who allegedly stole data from over 45 technology companies and government agencies, including NASA. China’s interactions with the U.S. space industry include commercial investment in U.S. startups, civil and commercial competition, and hostile cyberattacks. On Dec. 6, Boeing announced that it would be canceling a satellite order with Global IP, a Los Angeles-based startup, following The Wall Street Journal investigation that shed light on a $200 million investment by a Chinese company into the startup. Boeing acted swiftly once the report was released, citing payment concerns as the primary reason for abandoning the project.

While Global IP is the most recent U.S.-based space company caught in between the two rival powers, it is not the only one. China’s Tencent Holdings has invested in Moon Express, a commercial lunar exploration company. Moon Express has worked closely with NASA, a relationship that recently paid off when NASA announced that it had been selected for the agency’s new Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS), a program that partners with commercial entities on delivering payloads to the Moon. Tencent Holdings has also invested in U.S.-based Planetary Resources and World View Enterprises. Similarly, in March 2018 Shenzhen-based Kuang-Chi initiated a “commercial partnership” with U.S.-based Nanoracks on a helium fueled spacecraft. (12/26)