July 3, 2021

European Plan for Gigantic New Gravitational Wave Detector Passes Milestone (Source: Science)
It’s far from a done deal, but plans by European physicists to build a huge new gravitational wave observatory with a radical design received a boost this week. The European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI), which advises European governments on research priorities, added the €1.9 billion observatory, called the Einstein Telescope, to a road map of large science projects ripe for progress. Developers hope the move will give them the political validation needed to transform the Einstein Telescope idea into a project.

With its novel subterranean, triangular design, Europe’s Einstein Telescope would be a gravitational wave observatory unlike any other. U.S. gravitational wave physicists welcomed the announcement, too, as they think it may bolster their plans to build a pair of detectors even bigger than the Einstein Telescope in a project called Cosmic Explorer. “In the U.S. (7/2)

Branson Plans To Beat Jeff Bezos To Sub-Orbital Trip (Source: Deadline)
In the race to be the first billionaire in space, Richard Branson is now the odds-on favorite. The brash Britisher, the founder of Virgin Galactic, said today he will fly into space aboard his company’s VSS Unity rocketplane on July 11, beating Jeff Bezos into sub-orbital space by nine days. Branson’s Virgin Galactic and Bezos’ Blue Origin are battling to to become the leaders in space tourism, with both hoping to offer short rides just above the discernible atmosphere for a few minutes of weightlessness. (7/1)

Virgin Orbit Suddenly Has a Viable Rocket, So What Comes Next? (Source: Ars Technica)
"A lot of potential customers have been watching what we’ve been up to, but they really want you to fly before they believe you’re going to be there for them," said Virgin Orbit's chief executive, Dan Hart, in an interview with Ars. "After January, we were inundated with queries. My business development team was not getting any sleep at all. Now, I’m looking at my emails and texts piling up, so I kind of anticipate that we’re going to get more of that. We’re in a different world [from] where we were six months ago."

Branson has acknowledged that he and others have invested about $1 billion in Virgin Orbit to date. From its founding in 2002 to its first launch attempt in May 2006, SpaceX spent about $100 million developing the Falcon 1 rocket, which had a comparable lift capacity to LauncherOne. Likewise, Rocket Lab CEO Peter Beck said his company spent nearly $100 million getting its Electron rocket into space. Astra has spent about the same amount on its Rocket 3.0 vehicle, which reached space late in 2020. These two rockets are smaller and slightly less capable than LauncherOne. (7/1)

Virgin Orbit Eyes Foreign Spaceport Markets, More Aircraft (Source: Ars Technica)
The rocket can be "launched" from a runway anywhere in the world with mobile ground support equipment. Virgin Orbit is already planning launches from Guam and Cornwall, England, and has had discussions about locations in Japan, Brazil, and elsewhere. Some of these countries do not have their own national launch capability, which Virgin Orbit could fulfill. The company is working on potentially making a more powerful upper stage to increase LauncherOne's performance and in-space capabilities.

Toward that end, Hart said the company is planning to modify additional 747 airplanes to deploy around the world. "The answer is an emphatic yes, we do anticipate additional aircraft, and perhaps some additional sets of portable ground equipment that we can package into those aircraft and fly wherever we want to take off," he said. "Some of that will start to get going as early as next year." The company presently has more than a dozen launches on contract. The remaining flight for 2021 is sold, and the manifest for 2022 is nearly fully booked, with only a few remaining rideshare opportunities. Some launches are already sold for 2023 as well. (7/1)

Breaking Barriers: Vanessa Wyche Becomes First African-American Woman Director of Johnson Space Center (Source: KHOU)
Thirty-one years with NASA brought Vanessa Wyche to this moment. She is now the first African-American woman to be named Director of Johnson Space Center. She now leads more than 10,000 employees at the agency. Breaking barriers has always been a part of Wyche's life. She grew up in the Deep South and was the first person in her family to go through all integrated schools. "I was a little girl growing up in South Carolina. I never thought I'd work at NASA," she said. (7/1)

Bezos Rights a Long-Ago Wrong (Source: TIME)
Most people have never heard of Wally Funk—and that's more or less the way the long-ago NASA wanted it. Funk was part of a class of 13 women—known as the Mercury 13—who, in the early 1960s, went through the same training and testing as the original seven Mercury astronauts as a sort of proof of principle study of whether women were fit for space travel. The study found that they were, of course, though none of them got the chance to launch. (7/2)

Mixed Results From Mars Methane Measurements Solved (Source: TIME)
Methane makes a mess on Earth. Released by all manner of biological processes, it is a powerful greenhouse gas. But on Mars, finding methane is always huge news. While some geological processes can produce the gas, its presence on the Red Planet at least hints at Martian biology. But the hunt for methane on Mars has yielded uneven results. The Curiosity rover regularly detects it near the surface, but high overhead, ESA's ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter has always disagreed, routinely failing to find the methane Curiosity insists is there.

Now, as JPL has an explanation, and it's a simple one: The difference has to do with the time of day the samples are taken. Curiosity's methane detector is a power-hungry instrument, so it does its work at night, when its other instruments are powered down. The ESA's orbiter uses sunlight to help spot methane in the air, so it conducts its scans during the day. But just as on Earth, sunlight causes the Martian air to warm and rise, meaning that whatever methane is near the surface at night would be dispersed and diluted to undetectable levels during daytime. The implication of the study: the methane is real. The question: Is biology causing it? The answer: Who knows? (7/2)

China Plans First Crewed Mission to Mars in 2033 (Source: Reuters)
China aims to send its first crewed mission to Mars in 2033, with regular follow-up flights to follow, under a long-term plan to build a permanently inhabited base on the Red Planet and extract its resources. The ambitious plan, which will intensify a race with the United States to plant humans on Mars, was disclosed in detail for the first time after China landed a robotic rover on Mars in mid-May in its inaugural mission to the planet.

Crewed launches to Mars are planned for 2033, 2035, 2037, 2041 and beyond, said the head of China's main rocket maker, Wang Xiaojun. Before the crewed missions begin, China will send robots to Mars to study possible sites for the base and to build systems to extract resources there. For human inhabitation on Mars, crews would have to be able to use the planet's resources, such as extracting any water beneath its surface, generating oxygen on-site and producing electricity. China must also develop technology to fly astronauts back to Earth.

An uncrewed round-trip mission to acquire soil samples from the planet is expected by the end of 2030. NASA has been developing technology to get a crew to Mars and back sometime in the 2030s. China's Mars plan envisages fleets of spacecraft shuttling between Earth and Mars and major development of its resources, Wang said. To shorten the travel time, spacecraft would have to tap energy released from nuclear reactions, in addition to traditional chemical propellants, Wang said. China would have to accomplish round trips with a total flight time of "a few hundred days", he said. (7/2)

Japan’s Space Journey: From the Land of the Rising Sun to the Moon (Source: Space News)
To appreciate how Japan’s space ecosystem functions today, consider where it started. Research and development of space technologies began in the 1950s, and when the Ohsumi research satellite launched in 1970, Japan was just the fourth country to put a domestic payload in orbit via an indigenous launch system. This period, from the 1950s until the 1990s, can be characterized as the R&D phase in Japan’s space history, according to Dr. Masami Onoda.

The space ecosystem in Japan emerged into a strategic national effort that includes a focus on industry and security, which Dr. Onoda said “brought a lot of life to the ecosystem since the 2000s.” Today, it appears that Japan is entering a third phase in its space journey. In June 2020, it released a revision to its “Basic Plan on Space Policy,” which focuses on four core areas: ensuring space security; contributing to disaster management, national resilience and resolving global issues; creating new knowledge through space science and exploration; and realizing economic growth and innovation.

These goals command a larger space budget: 449.8 billion yen ($4.17 billion) in FY2021, nearly 25% more than a year prior. The budget funds continued development of the new H3 launch system, satellite programs, and a planned expansion of a military Space Operations Squadron. Perhaps most exciting is the funding for JAXA’s participation in NASA’s Artemis program and Japan’s contributions to the lunar Gateway construction. “JAXA has approximately $500 million for exploration, including contributions to Artemis." (7/2)

NASA Seeking Proposals for Next Phase of Artemis Lunar Lander Services Despite Industry Protests (Source: Space News)
NASA is seeking proposals to begin the next phase of Artemis lunar lander services, moving quickly despite unresolved protests about its selection of SpaceX to develop a lunar lander.

NASA issued a request for proposals July 1 for what it calls “Sustainable Human Landing System Studies and Risk Reduction.” The solicitation, Appendix N of NASA’s Next Space Technologies for Exploration Partnerships (NextSTEP) program, will fund initial studies of landers to support the agency’s later phases of the Artemis program after the initial Artemis 3 landing.

The studies will enable companies to mature their designs for crewed lunar landers and provide feedback to NASA on proposed standards and specifications, such as a series of trade studies on aspects of the lander architecture. The studies would also support specific risk reduction activities proposed by companies for their landers. (7/2)

James Webb Space Telescope Passes Key Launch Clearance Review (Source: Parabolic Arc)
The international James Webb Space Telescope has passed the final mission analysis review for its launch on an Ariane 5 rocket from Europe’s Spaceport in French Guiana. This major milestone, carried out with Arianespace, the Webb launch service provider, confirms that Ariane 5, the Webb spacecraft and the flight plan are set for launch. It also specifically provides the final confirmation that all aspects of the launch vehicle and spacecraft are fully compatible. (7/2)

Unique Exoplanet Photobombs Cheops Study of Nearby Star System (Source: Parabolic Arc)
While exploring two exoplanets in a bright nearby star system, ESA’s exoplanet-hunting Cheops satellite has unexpectedly spotted the system’s third known planet crossing the face of the star. This transit reveals exciting details about a rare planet “with no known equivalent”, say the researchers. The discovery is one of the first results from ESA’s Cheops (CHaracterising ExOPlanet Satellite), and the first time an exoplanet with a period of over 100 days has been spotted transiting a star that is bright enough to be visible to the naked eye.

Named Nu2 Lupi, this bright, Sun-like star is located just under 50 light-years away from Earth in the constellation of Lupus (the Wolf). In 2019, the High Accuracy Radial velocity Planet Searcher (HARPS) at the ESO 3.6-metre telescope in Chile discovered three exoplanets (named ‘b’, ‘c’ and ‘d’, with the star deemed to be object ‘A’) in the system, with masses between those of Earth and Neptune and orbits lasting 11.6, 27.6 and 107.6 days. The innermost two of these planets – b and c – were subsequently found to transit Nu2 Lupi by NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), making it one of only three naked-eye stars known to host multiple transiting planets. (7/2)

U.S. Space Force Anticipates Release Of Force Design By Year’s End (Source: Aviation Week)
The U.S. Space Force will unveil its first-ever Force Design this year that will allow the service to compete optimally against China and Russia. The idea is to design a force that can counter Chinese and Russian threats while also allowing the Space Force to support its sister services. (7/1)

Yes, You Still Need to Have a Beauty Routine in Outer Space (Source: InStyle)
I was able to quench some of my galactic thirst by chatting with Joan Higginbotham, a former NASA astronaut and literal Black girl magic personified. Although her space days are now behind her, Higginbotham is going back to her NASA roots to help bring a new partnership with Tide to life, which aims help astronauts find a sustainable way to wash their clothes while on long space missions. The end goal is to be able to recycle the water, so it can be then used to drink — and if they can get it right, this is a process that could potentially be mimicked on earth.

"You don't get to wash clothes," the former astronaut shares with InStyle. "So for me, as someone who's just a little obsessed with cleanliness and hygiene, only being able to take three pairs of pants for a 12-day mission really sucked. We had to exercise 30 minutes a day, and on the Space Station, they exercise for about two hours. So on about the fourth day, those pants were starting to get a little gamey."

"The one thing I did notice with my skin was that because we regulate the humidity — it's roughly 70% — it was dry. In Houston, it is very muggy and wet and my skin loved that. Hair, not so much, but my skin loved it. However, when we got up to space and started regulating the humidity, I noticed that my skin and my face — which is usually like an oil slick — became a little drier, so I would put on moisturizer a lot more. And my body just became like the Sahara desert, so I was using a lot of Vaseline and all that." (7/1)

Aliens Might Already Be Watching Us (Source: Scientific American)
“Instead of constantly saying, ‘What can we detect from other worlds?’ and ‘Where are the other worlds that we can detect?’ think about it the other way,” says Jackie Faherty, an astronomer at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City and a co-author of the new study. “What worlds can find us? How many of them and for how long?”

Lisa Kaltenegger, an astronomer at Cornell University, approached Faherty with the idea to create a map showing which nearby stars could see Earth in the past and future. “I wanted to do a billion years!” Kaltenegger says of the proposed time line. “And I was like, ‘No, there’s a finite clock backtrack you can do,’” Faherty explains. (7/1)

Transgender Astronomers Speak Out About Outdated Name Change Policies (Source: Space.com)
An open letter to a scientific journal has sparked a conversation around diversity, inclusion and safety in the astronomy community. When scientists publish their work in a journal, they do so under their name. However, people change their names later for a number of reasons, and there remain policies in place at some journals that prohibit authors from changing or correcting the names they have listed on previous publications.

This might result in confusion or career difficulties for some, but for transgender scientists, it could cause very serious safety issues. The letter followed an incident in which the journal explicitly denied a name change request from a transgender astronomer, citing the publication's policy, and this open letter addressed that denial and the scientists' concerns with such policies. Since the open letter was published, A&A has decided to change the policy. (7/1)

RUAG Space Provides GNSS-Equipped Computer for Space Debris Removal (Source: GPS World)
RUAG Space has provided its GNSS-equipped computer to command Astroscale UK‘s ELSA-M Servicer, a spacecraft designed to remove space debris. Space debris is a growing concern for the space industry. End-of-life services by Astroscale (ELSA) — a spacecraft decommissioning service for satellite operators — will progress to a commercialization phase this year with the ELSA-M. The M stands for multi-client servicer. The Astroscale ELSA-M spacecraft is designed to de-orbit multiple retired satellites in low Earth orbit, which will then burn up on atmospheric re-entry. (6/30)