January 27, 2020

Gravity: We Might Have Been Getting it Wrong This Whole Time (Source: Phys.org)
Symmetry has been one of the guiding principles in physicists' search for fundamental laws of nature. What does it mean that laws of nature have symmetry? It means that laws look the same before and after an operation, similar to a mirror reflection, the same but right is now left in the reflection. Physicists have been looking for laws that explain both the microscopic world of elementary particles and the macroscopic world of the universe and the Big Bang at its beginning, expecting that such fundamental laws should have symmetry in all circumstances. However, last year, two physicists found a theoretical proof that, at the most fundamental level, nature does not respect symmetry. Click here. (1/24)

Fallen Virgin Galactic Test Pilot Remembered at Space Mirror Memorial Ceremony (Source: Florida Today)
More than five years after his death in a space plane crash, Michael Alsbury's illuminated name now glows on the 43-by-50-foot black granite Space Mirror Memorial honoring fallen astronauts. "Michael Alsbury's life was not wasted. In fact, his accomplishments will continue to impact every human being on the face of this earth," Mick Ukleja, who chairs the Astronauts Memorial Foundation board of advisers, told a somber crowd Saturday at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex.

Alsbury died Oct. 31, 2014, while co-piloting Virgin Galactic's experimental SpaceShipTwo, which engineers hoped could take space tourists on suborbital trips. Alsbury was a test pilot for Scaled Composites, the company that designed and built the rocket-powered space plane. Thirteen seconds after SpaceShipTwo released from the belly of its WhiteKnightTwo mother ship, the plane broke apart and crashed in California's Mojave desert. Alsbury was 39. (1/25)

AstroClipper Spaceplane Planned by Exodus Space Corp. (Source: Space.com)
Startup Exodus Space Corp. plans to build a space plane to ferry cargo around Earth. Eventually, that cargo could include people, if the spacecraft is deemed safe enough. The spaceship — called AstroClipper — will take off from a runaway, make a flight into space and then land again, plane-style. A heft booster at the space plane's back end will help it get into orbit by giving AstroClipper the speed it requires to break out of Earth's atmosphere.

Exodus is new and still raising money, but its team includes deep experience across the space industry. Principals at the company have worked at SpaceX, Lockheed Martin and NASA, among others. The company's first step is a technology demonstrator in 2022 that would remain within Earth's atmosphere but eventually lead to suborbital and orbital spacecraft. The eventual dream, in the 2030s, would be carrying passengers if Exodus can get the necessary human-rating regulations achieved. (1/24)

Target Moscow: Soviet Suspicions About the Military Uses of the American Space Shuttle (Source: Space Review)
Russian historians recently uncovered a Soviet report from the 1970s that studied whether the Space Shuttle could be used as a bomber to attack Moscow. Bart Hendrickx and Dwayne Day study that report in more detail to better understand its logic, and its flaws. Click here. (1/27)
 
Assessing China’s Commercial Space Industry (Source: Space Review)
Outside the United States, the country with the most vibrant commercial space startup industry may be China, with dozens of firms established in just the last few years pursuing launch vehicles, satellites, and more. Jeff Foust examines a report that offered detailed insights on the size and growth potential of Chinese entrepreneurial space. Click here. (1/27)
 
Forty Years of Revolution, Ten Years of Spaceflight (Source: Space Review)
Iran is preparing to attempt another satellite launch in the coming days, amid tensions about its nuclear programs. Henk Smid discusses the history of both Iran’s ballistic missile and space launch vehicle programs to better understand if the latter helps the former. Click here. (1/27) 

House NASA Bill Rejects Artemis Goals (Source: Ars Technica)
On Friday evening, a US House of Representatives committee released H.R. 5666, an authorization act for NASA. Such bills do not directly provide funding—that comes from the appropriations committees in the House and Senate. Authorization bills provide a "sense" of Congress, however and indicate what legislators will be willing to fund in the coming years. The big-picture takeaway from the bipartisan legislation is that it rejects the Artemis Program as put forth by the Trump White House.

Instead, the House advocates for a "flags-and-footprints" strategy whereby astronauts make a few short visits to the Moon beginning in 2028 and then depart for a Mars orbit mission by 2033. Whatever one might think about NASA's Artemis Program to land humans on the Moon by 2024, it attempted to learn from decades of space policy failure. Artemis set a near-term target, 2024, for a human return to the Moon that provided some urgency for NASA to get moving. It also sought to develop a "sustainable" path with meaningful activities on the surface of the Moon, including polar landings, efforts to tap lunar resources (the House bill specifically prohibits this), and establishment of a base.

Pretty much everyone in the spaceflight community agrees that it would be amazing to see humans set foot on Mars. But it is hard to believe the House is serious about this activity unless it doubles the human exploration budget and actually requires that funding go to the big technical challenges, like landing large vehicles on Mars, surface habitats, power on Mars, and more. That is absent from this bill. Effectively, this probably would consign NASA to another decade of spending billions of dollars on "capabilities" such as the Space Launch System without actually sending astronauts anywhere beyond low-Earth orbit. (1/27)

Axiom Space Wins NASA Approval for Construction of Commercial Space Station Module (Source: Axiom)
The human dream of universal access to living and working in space has drawn one step closer. On Monday NASA selected Axiom Space as the winner of the NextSTEP-2 Appendix I solicitation, which sought to grant access to the International Space Station's Node 2 Forward port for a commercial space station that could ultimately serve as ISS' replacement. Co-founded by stalwart space entrepreneur Dr. Kam Ghaffarian and former NASA ISS Program Manager Michael Suffredini, Axiom plans to launch a node module, research & manufacturing facility, crew habitat, and large-windowed Earth observatory to form the "Axiom Segment" of the ISS.

This new commercial platform will significantly increase the usable and habitable volume of the ISS, provide for novel avenues of research in areas such as isolation studies and Earth observation, and allow a gradual transfer of the innovative work being done on-station to prevent interruptions when the ISS is ultimately retired. The company targets launch of the first module in the latter half of 2024. (1/27)

House Bill Favors Boeing for Artemis (Source: Ars Technica)
The House NASA authorization act, which will be considered in committee before going before the full House, rolls back a lot of Artemis. Its proposed Human Landing System, which will take astronauts from lunar orbit, offers the prime example of this. The bill states that: The United States should retain "full ownership" of the Human Landing System, and unfettered insight into its design and development. In other words, it must be let under a cost-plus contract.

The lunar plans should utilize "the Orion vehicle and an integrated lunar landing system carried on an Exploration Upper Stage-enhanced Space Launch System" for the human lunar landing missions. The Gateway (orbiting lunar station) shall not be required for the conduct of human lunar landing missions. The net effect of this is to shut down all potential competition and cost savings for the lunar lander. It is particularly telling that there is only one company—Boeing—that has proposed building an integrated lunar lander, has the contract for the Exploration Upper Stage, and is building core stages for the Space Launch System rocket.

Boeing has also tried to minimize use of the Gateway. With the House bill, legislators seem to be trying to take NASA's human exploration program and give it over to the Boeing Company, going back to an era of cost-plus contracting. The House Subcommittee on Space, Science, and Technology will hold a hearing Wednesday to mark up this legislation. Further discussions will take place on February 10, when the White House releases its 2021 budget request, which will contain a five-year funding plan for Artemis along with a request for Congress to fund it. (1/27)

Japan and US Close to Artemis Agreement (Source: Space News)
Japan hopes to finalize an agreement with NASA on cooperation on the Artemis lunar exploration program in the next few months. At an event Friday, an official with the Japanese space agency JAXA said the agency hopes to have a memorandum of understanding with NASA in place by April or May. JAXA is interested in cooperating in several areas, from providing components for an early NASA module for the lunar Gateway to ultimately providing a habitation module for the Gateway or a pressurized rover for use by astronauts on the lunar surface. (1/27)

Spacewalkers Complete ISS Repairs on AMS Instrument (Source: CBS)
Spacewalking astronauts wrapped up repairs to the International Space Station's Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) experiment Saturday. Andrew Morgan and Luca Parmitano spent six hours and 16 minutes outside the station completing repairs to the AMS cooling system they started on four earlier spacewalks in November and December. A coolant line initially showed signs of leaking, but astronauts confirmed that leak had stopped when a fitting was tightened. The two astronauts also replaced filters on two cameras mounted outside the station during the spacewalk. (1/27)

Boeing Satellite Problem Recurrence 'Not Likely' (Source: Space News)
Boeing says a battery problem on the Spaceway-1 satellite is unlikely to occur on other satellites of the same model. DirecTV announced last week that the battery on that satellite, a Boeing 702 HP, was in danger of exploding, forcing the company to rush to decommission the satellite. Boeing said the anomaly suffered by the battery took place after "a collection of events that have a very low likelihood of occurring on other satellites." Boeing said it will provide a "minor update to operating procedures" for other users of that satellite model to avoid similar problems. (1/27)

Iran Plans Satellite Launches Soon (Source: IRNA)
The Iranian government says it has a series of satellites ready for launch in the near future. The government's minister of information and communications technology said Sunday two Zafar small communications satellites are ready for launch in the "coming days," although he did not give a more precise launch date. Several other satellites are in production to provide limited voice and messaging services. (1/27)

UAE Extends Deadline for Astronaut Applications (Source: Arabian Business)
The United Arab Emirates is extending the deadline for astronaut applications. The Mohammed bin Rashid Space Centre said that strong demand led it to extend a deadline for submitting applications to join the country's astronaut corps through March 31. The country currently has two astronauts, one of whom, Hazzaa Al Mansoori, flew to the ISS for a brief mission last fall. (1/27)

Jacksonville’s Cecil Spaceport is Counting Down to ‘Liftoff’ (Source: Jacksonville.com)
The former Navy jet base is ahead of the game with continued progress into commercial space development and expects to begin launching into orbit within the year. The plans for Cecil Spaceport have long been in the making, but there’s been little visible progress of space operations at the former U.S. naval air station on Jacksonville’s Westside. But 2020 promises to be a threshold year, according to officials overseeing the development. “2020 is a big year,” said Todd Lindner, director of Cecil Spaceport since March 2017 for the Jacksonville Aviation Authority. Lindner, who is also a pilot, has been connected to Spaceport plans since 2006 and understands some of the skepticism.

But 2019 saw the addition of aerospace contractor Aevum Inc. for space vehicle development. The company, based in Huntsville, Ala., was awarded a $4.9 million contract from the Air Force Space and Missile Systems center to launch small satellites to low earth orbit from Cecil Spaceport, which is a “horizontal” launch point. That’s the kind of launches similar to airplanes that take off from runways as opposed to “vertical” launch vehicles that take off from launch pads at Cape Canaveral.

Aevum’s project will eventually launch Department of Defense Space Test Program missions. Aevum joins Generation Orbit, a contractor that’s already been working on projects at the Cecil Spaceport since 2014. Engine testing for spacecraft has already taken place at Cecil, with this year expected to see more and possibly some launches. In January, the U.S. Air Force Research laboratory completed an engine firing test at the facility. The testing of the X-60A engine was on-ground, meaning it did not take flight. But the firing of the single-stage rocket engine is hypersonic and is designed to reach Mach 5 speeds. It was tested under the oversight of Generation Orbit, JAA officials said. (1/27)

European Scientists are Taking a Mock moon Mission in Hawaii Right Now (Source: Space.com)
A crew of researchers prepared to leave "Mars" this past Saturday (Jan. 18) as another crew arrived, ready to explore the "moon." The members of the Sensoria I crew ended their two-week analog "Mars" mission Saturday in the HI-SEAS (Hawaii Space Exploration Analog & Simulation) habitat, which is located on a remote slope of Mauna Loa on the Big Island of Hawaii. But before they left to return to "Earth," a new crew of researchers arrived, ready to begin a lunar analog mission.

This new, lunar crew is embarking on the third EuroMoonMars mission — a series of missions running in collaboration with the European Space Agency, the International MoonBase Alliance and HI-SEAS, Michaela Musilova, the director of HI-SEAS, who is also serving as the commander of this mission, told Space.com. (1/27)