February 7, 2023

NASA Standing Review Board OKs Design of Interstellar Mapping Mission (Source: ExecutiveGov)
NASA’s Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe mission has passed a critical design review by the agency’s Standing Review Board. IMAP, which will be launched in 2025 to explore the heliosphere, has some challenges to address but was deemed “good to go” by the SRB chair, the agency announced Tuesday.

The project is comprised of 10 instruments being designed and built in different parts of the globe. Three instrument suites will employ energetic neutral atoms to create a comprehensive map of the solar system’s boundaries. Other IMAP elements will use the Sun’s solar wind to continuously gather and share data on space weather conditions. (2/3)

What is the Environmental Impact of a Supercharged Space Industry? (Source: Space Review)
The space industry has long downplayed the environmental impact of launches, given their historically small number. Jeff Foust reports that, as launch activity soars, concerns grow about how emissions from both launches and spacecraft reentries might affect the upper atmosphere. Click here. (2/6)
 
National Reconnaissance Program Crisis Photography Concepts: PINTO (Source: Space Review)
In the second part of an examination of efforts more than a half-century ago to develop rapid-response reconnaissance systems, Joseph T. Page II discusses one concept that repurposed flight-proven hardware to rapidly collect and return images. Click here. (2/6)
 
Comparing the NASA Advisory Council and NASA’s External Advisory Bodies (Source: Space Review)
NASA has multiple places it can turn to for advice, from its own advisory council to external committees run by the National Academies. Joseph Alexander explores the differences between those internal and external advisers. Click here. (2/6)

SpaceX Launches Hispasat at Cape Canaveral Spaceport, Recovers Booster (Source: Space News)
SpaceX successfully launched a Hispasat GEO communications satellite Monday night. The Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 8:32 p.m. Eastern after a one-day slip because of weather. The satellite separated from the rocket about 36 minutes later to begin its journey to geostationary orbit over the next few months using onboard electric propulsion. Amazonas Nexus, built by Thales Alenia Space, is due to replace and expand the capacity of Hispasat's Amazonas 2 satellite at 61 degrees west, covering the Americas, Greenland, and North Atlantic transportation routes. Also onboard is a high-bandwidth protected communications transponder for the Space Force called Pathfinder 2. (2/7)

EchoStar Plans 28-Satellite IoT Constellation (Source: Space News)
EchoStar is planning a smallsat constellation to provide internet of things (IoT) services. The satellite operator ordered 28 smallsats from Astro Digital last week for the constellation, which will provide IoT services in S-band. The satellites would use a low-power telecoms protocol called LoRa (long range) designed for low-cost, battery-powered devices. EchoStar has been testing this in Europe using a GEO satellite, and the new constellation, operated under the company's Australia-based EchoStar Global subsidiary, would effectively expand its S-band coverage to compete with rival IoT networks internationally. One analyst estimates EchoStar will spend between $100 million and $200 million over several years for the entire constellation. (2/7)

Intiutive Machines Switches Lunar Landing to South Pole Crater (Source: Space News)
Intuitive Machines said Monday it's changed the landing site for its first lunar lander mission. The company said its IM-1 mission, originally set to land in Oceanus Procellarum, will land in a crater near the lunar south pole instead. Intuitive Machines said NASA requested the landing site change to better support the Artemis lunar exploration campaign, which is focused on the south polar region. The mission is scheduled to attempt that landing in late June. (2/7)

OneWeb Replaces Russian Supplier for Satellite Thrusters (Source: Space News)
Busek is supplying electric thrusters for OneWeb satellites that had previously used Russian thrusters. Busek announced Monday the successful on-orbit commissioning of its BHT-350 Hall-effect thrusters on 80 OneWeb satellites launched in December and January on Falcon 9 rockets. Airbus OneWeb Satellites had purchased thrusters from Russia-based electric propulsion company EDB Fakel and Busek, but when sanctions cut off the supply of thrusters from Fakel, Busek increased production. (2/7)

Energia Council Endorses Plans to Extend Russian ISS Operations to 2028 (Source: TASS)
Russian officials have endorsed continued participation on the International Space Station, at least on technical grounds. A council of chief designers at RSC Energia announced Monday that they recommended extending operations of the Russian segment of the station to 2028, forwarding that recommendation to Roscosmos. The head of Roscosmos, Yuri Borisov, said last fall that he would base any decision on continuing ISS operations beyond 2024 on the technical state of the station. (2/7)

Russian Progress Capsule Undocks From ISS (Source: TASS)
A Progress cargo spacecraft undocked from the station early Tuesday. The Progress MS-20 spacecraft undocked from the station and soon performed a deorbit maneuver to burn up over the South Pacific. The spacecraft's departure frees up a docking port for the next Progress cargo spacecraft, scheduled to launch early Thursday. (2/7)

ULA Closing Atlas Component Facility in Harlingen Texas (Source: Rio Grande Guardian)
United Launch Alliance is closing a Texas facility that builds Atlas rocket components. Officials in Harlingen, Texas, said Monday that ULA expects to end work late this year at a factory located at the city's airport that had been building parts for the Atlas, which is scheduled to be retired in the middle of the decade. ULA is consolidating work on its new Vulcan rocket at its main factory in Decatur, Alabama. About 100 employees at the Texas site will be offered transfers to other ULA facilities. Local officials said they expected ULA to close the plant and don't anticipate problems finding a new tenant for the facility. (2/7)

UN Making Progress on Space Norms (Source: Breaking Defense)
A United Nations meeting last week saw some progress on norms of behavior in space. The third session of the Open-Ended Working Group on Reducing Space Threats included several countries supporting the concept of a ban on destructive direct-ascent anti-satellite tests proposed last year by the United States. There was also support for improved space situational awareness capabilities and information sharing. However, observers noted that China and Russia were less supportive of those efforts, and Russia went as far as to argue about procedures rather than engage in substantive discussions at times. (2/7)

Three to be Inducted in Astronaut Hall of Fame at KSC (Source: CollectSpace)
Two former astronauts, one now a U.S. senator, will be inducted into the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame. The Astronaut Scholarship Foundation announced Monday it will induct Roy Bridges and Mark Kelly into the hall during a ceremony in May. Bridges, who joined the astronaut corps in 1980, was the pilot of one shuttle mission in 1985 and later served as director of the Kennedy Space Center and Langley Research Center. Kelly joined the astronaut corps in 1996 and flew on four shuttle missions from 2001 and 2011, including the next-to-last shuttle mission, STS-134. He is currently a senator representing Arizona. (2/7)

Space Cannon Could Fire Payloads to Orbit in 10 Minutes at Mach 20 (Source: Interesting Engineering)
Startup Green Launch is developing an artillery-like cannon called the hydrogen impulse launcher to fire payloads into orbit. The company's technology draws from the work of an experimental 1960s U.S. Army program called HARP. Green Launch co-founder Eric Robinson told IE the method will have the "least environmental impact per kilogram" of any orbital launch system. As the small satellite and payload launch market continues to grow at a rapid speed, concerns also grow over the environmental impact of the increasing number of yearly rocket launches. (2/2)

Groundbreaking Discovery of Hidden Molten Rock Layer Under Earth's Tectonic Plates (Source: SciTech Daily)
Scientists have discovered a new layer of partly molten rock under the Earth’s crust that might help settle a long-standing debate about how tectonic plates move. Researchers had previously identified patches of melt at a similar depth. But a new study led by The University of Texas at Austin revealed for the first time the layer’s global extent and its part in plate tectonics.

The molten layer is located about 100 miles from the surface and is part of the asthenosphere, which sits under the Earth’s tectonic plates in the upper mantle. The asthenosphere is important for plate tectonics because it forms a relatively soft boundary that lets tectonic plates move through the mantle. The reasons why it is soft, however, are not well understood. Scientists previously thought that molten rocks might be a factor. But this study shows that melt, in fact, does not appear to notably influence the flow of mantle rocks. (2/6)

Astronomers May Be on the Cusp of a “Potentially Revolutionary” Breakthrough (Source: Inverse)
By probing the period of roughly 370,000 to 1 billion years after the Big Bang with advanced radio telescopes, astronomers will gain valuable insights into how the first galaxies formed and evolved. This is the purpose of the Hydrogen Epoch of Reionization Array (HERA), a radio telescope dedicated to observing the large-scale structure of the cosmos during and before the Epoch of Reionization located in the Karoo desert in South Africa. In a recent paper, the HERA Collaboration reports how it doubled the array’s sensitivity and how their observations will lead to the first 3D map of Cosmic Dawn.

The HERA team continues to improve the telescope’s calibration and data analysis in the hopes of seeing the predicted ionization bubbles in the early Universe. Filtering out the local radio noise to see the radiation of the early Universe remains a challenge since the radio emissions from this era are about one-millionth the intensity of radio noise in the vicinity of Earth. When all of HERA’s radio dishes are online and fully calibrated, the team hopes to construct a 3D map of the ionized and neutral hydrogen bubbles from ca. 200 million to 1 billion years after the Big Bang. (2/4)

Israel's SpaceIL and the German Aerospace Center Collaborate on Second Beresheet Lunar Mission (Source: Jerusalem Post)
SpaceIL, NASA and the German Aerospace Center (DLR)  have signed an agreement for the ‘Beresheet 2’ space mission. This will be the second lunar mission by SpaceIL. The agreement allows the joint use of a Crater Navigation algorithm, which identifies craters in images of the lunar surface and matches them to an onboard database. This provides information that acts like a GPS and will help to navigate the landing for the spacecrafts, and the overall goal of the mission. (2/7)

Protestors Meet with Space Force General in ‘Good First Step’ to Addressing Hawaii Fuel Spill (Source: Hawaii News Now)
A protest by Native Hawaiian activists on Haleakala turned into a meeting Sunday with a U.S. Space Force general. On Sunday morning, around 40 activists met with the head of U.S Space Force operations in Hawaii about the spill of 700 gallons of diesel fuel at a Haleakala military complex. The meeting came after Maui Mayor Richard Bissen told the military to work with local stewardship groups in the clean-up efforts.

It all started as a protest by the group Kako’o Haleakala, which works to protect the area. They say around 9 a.m., Brig. Gen. Anthony Mastalir took them to the site of the spill and answered questions. The group says they asked Mastalir to have a cultural monitor at the site at all times during clean-up efforts and says he agreed to it. (2/6)

At UN Meeting, Space Cooperation Picks Up Momentum, but Moscow and Beijing Play Spoilers (Source: Breaking Defense)
A discussion this week by a United Nations working group on space security highlighted emerging international accord about the importance of norms and data sharing for space operations, but also became a forum for complaints by China, Russia and Iran targeting everything from US military space activities to the role of commercial firms in the war in Ukraine to the very existence of SpaceX’s Starlink constellation. The Jan. 30-Feb. 3 meeting in Geneva was the third session of the UN Open Ended Working Group (OEWG) on Reducing Space Threats, created to hopefully hash out recommendations for new norms of behavior for on-orbit activities.

A significant number of nations also rallied around concepts related to information exchange, such as the proposal put forward by jointly by the Philippines and Germany for the establishment of a “permanent” communications channel for countries to share pre-launch notifications, updated notifications in changes of planned launch, reentry notifications and warnings regarding space debris. And in a win for the US, many delegations also expressed support, at least in principle, for the concept of a ban on testing of destructive, direct-ascent anti-satellite (DA-ASAT) missiles.

At the same time, Russia and China remain reluctant, to say the least, to accept new norms of behavior on orbit. Not only did they reject the growing consensus about the need for new SSA sharing mechanisms, they also continued to push back against the application of globally accepted international humanitarian law to actions in space. In addition, both countries continue to spat with the US about military space activities, which each side hurling accusations that the other has moved to “weaponize” the space domain to the detriment of all. (2/3)

Ex-Astronaut Says 'Toxic' NASA Hasn't Learned from Fatal Mistakes — and May Lose Space Race to China (Source: New York Post)
Charles Camarda, 70, retired from NASA in 2019. Among his missions in a 45-year career was flying on the first space shuttle to launch after the Columbia disaster in 2003. He has been sounding the alarm for years about safety lapses at the space agency, where he also served as director of engineering at the Johnson Space Center and deputy director of the NASA Engineering and Safety Center.

Feb. 1 was the 20th anniversary of the Columbia accident when all seven aboard died as the space shuttle disintegrated upon entering the Earth’s atmosphere on its return from space. We solemnly remember and honor all of NASA’s fallen heroes. But to truly honor them, it is our obligation to learn from our mistakes and make the necessary changes to ensure they are never repeated. However, NASA has not learned the lessons of both the Challenger and Columbia accidents and is ill-prepared for the next space race with China; one which we may very likely lose. (2/4)

NASA Rover Encounters Spectacular Metal Meteorite on Mars (Source: Science Alert)
MSL Curiosity is going about its business exploring Mars. The high-tech rover is currently exploring the sulphate-bearing unit on Mt. Sharp, the central peak in Mars' Gale Crater. Serendipity placed a metal meteorite in its path. The meteorite is made mostly of nickel and iron, and it has a name: Cacao. (Chocolate comes from cacao.) Cacao isn't very large; it's only about 1 ft. across. Curiosity has come across several meteorites since landing in Gale Crater in August 2012.

Cacao stands out visually from its surroundings. While the Martian surface is red from oxides, the meteorite is dark grey and metallic-looking. It's also smooth and rounded, obvious signs that it passed through an atmosphere. Iron-nickel meteorites are the rarest type of meteorites, making up about six percent of witnessed falls. But because of their tell-tale visual appearance, they're over-represented in collections. That's because they're more likely to survive passage through an atmosphere and are more resistant to weathering, even on Mars. (2/6)

Rolls-Royce's New Micro-Reactor Design Could Send Humans to Mars (Source: Interesting Engineering)
The future of deep space exploration is near. Rolls-Royce revealed a conceptual micro-reactor for space that it says is "designed to use an inherently safe and extremely robust fuel form." The iconic engineering firm is designing the nuclear fission system as part of an agreement it penned with the UK Space Agency in 2021. Scientists and large organizations are increasingly looking at nuclear fission for space. Last month, for example, NASA and DARPA announced plans to build a functioning nuclear thermal rocket by 2027. (2/2)

Will the NASA-DARPA Nuclear Engine Test Cause Environmental Protests? (Source: The Hill)
The recent news that NASA and DARPA are teaming up to build a nuclear thermal propulsion rocket and test it in 2027 was welcomed by advocates of space exploration. The technology would cut the time for humans to voyage to Mars in half or even more. It would also be useful for deep space planetary voyages, such as the proposed flagship mission to Uranus. NASA has been working on nuclear propulsion for several years.

Linda Billings, a consultant for NASA’s Astrobiology Program and Planetary Defense Coordination Office, is not very thrilled by the news. She tweeted, “The concern here is what could happen on the launch pad, also manufacturing the nuclear fuel: NASA, DARPA Will Test Nuclear Engine for Future Mars Missions.” Billings also writes about space policy, generally from a progressive perspective.

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists has a lengthy study of the use of nuclear power in space. One way NASA plans to mitigate the possibility of a nuclear accident during a launch is to only turn on the nuclear reactor after the spacecraft achieves a safe orbit. Also, NASA will only use fissionable materials that cannot be diverted to nefarious purposes, such as creating a nuclear bomb. Those and other safeguards may not be enough to assuage the fears of environmentalists. (2/5)

Astronomers Have Discovered A Mysterious Object, Which Is 570 Billion Times Brighter Than The Sun (Source: Physics and Astronomy)
Billions of light years away, there is a giant ball of hot gas that is brighter than hundreds of billions of suns. It is hard to imagine something so bright. So what is it? Astronomers are not really sure, but they have a couple theories. They think it may be a very rare type of supernova — called a magnetar — but one so powerful that it pushes the energy limits of physics, or in other words, the most powerful supernova ever seen as of today.

This object is so luminous that astronomers are having a really difficult time finding a way to describe it. “If it really is a magnetar, it's as if nature took everything we know about magnetars and turned it up to 11,” said Krzysztof Stanek. (2/5)

Astronomers Poised to Hunt New Kind of Gravitational Wave (Source: Space.com)
Astronomers are getting closer to finding sources of continuous gravitational waves, thanks to observations of Scorpius X-2, a neutron star accreting matter from a low-mass binary companion.

So far, astronomers have only detected gravitational waves in the form of brief bursts from the mergers of black holes and neutron stars. However, non-merging compact objects can in theory produce a nonstop torrent of gravitational waves, albeit weaker than those emitted by mergers. In particular, low-mass X-ray binary systems, in which a dense neutron star sweeps up matter torn from a close companion star, are likely suspects for emitting continuous gravitational waves.

Scorpius X-2 is a classic example. It's a binary system 9,000 light-years away, featuring a 1.4-solar-mass neutron star accreting material from a companion star with half the mass of our sun. As the stolen gas flows onto the surface of the neutron star, it grows hot and radiates brightly in X-rays. The accretion of the material results in the neutron star becoming asymmetrically deformed as the gas piles up, and this deformation results in a torque (a rotational force) being imparted on the neutron star's spin, speeding it up. (2/6)

Strange Unprecedented Vortex Spotted Around the Sun's North Pole (Source: Space.com)
A huge filament of solar plasma has broken off the sun's surface and is circling its north pole like a vortex of powerful winds, but scientists have no clue what caused it. "Material from a northern prominence just broke away from the main filament & is now circulating in a massive polar vortex around the north pole of our star," space weather forecaster Tamitha Skov said. "Implications for understanding the sun's atmospheric dynamics above 55° here cannot be overstated!"

Other solar physicists shared Skov's excitement about the unusual phenomenon. But what exactly is it and why is it important? Scott McIntosh, a solar physicist and deputy director at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, told Space.com that while he has never seen a vortex like this, something odd is happening at the sun's 55 degree latitudes with clockwork regularity once every solar cycle, the 11-year period characterized by an ebb and flow in the generation of sunspots and eruptions. (2/5)

Super-Rare Star System Is a Giant Cosmic Accident Waiting to Happen (Source: Science Alert)
For the first time, astronomers have positively identified a binary system that is destined to one day end up as a kilonova – the explosive result of a neutron star collision. And, ironically, the key ingredient to this eventual fate is a pair of failed, fizzled supernovae. This phenomenon is thought to be so rare that there are only an estimated 10 such binary systems in the entire Milky Way. A closer study of this system should help scientists understand how these insane events evolve.

Neutron star collisions are rare, but they play an important role in seeding the Universe with heavy elements such as gold, platinum, and uranium. These elements can't be created inside stellar cores; the energy required for the stellar nucleosynthesis of elements heavier than iron is greater than the energy this nucleosynthesis produces, resulting in a messy end for the star. Instead, these elements are formed in energetic events, such as kilonovae: we have evidence of this from GW170817, the history-making neutron star collision observed by telescopes around the world. (2/6)

Sweden's Ovson to Launch Satellite on Falcon 9 (Source: Space News)
Swedish operator Ovzon said Friday it will launch a satellite later this year on a Falcon 9 after manufacturing delays caused it to lose a slot on an Ariane 5. Ovzon said it is now planning to launch the Ovzon 3 satellite on a Falcon 9 in the third quarter of the year. The company had planned to launch the satellite on one of the final Ariane 5 launches but production delays by manufacturer Maxar meant the satellite would not be ready in time. At around 1,500 kilograms, Ovzon 3 is smaller than traditional GEO communications satellites and could have joined an Ariane 5 with one or even two existing passengers. Ovzon said the change will increase the overall cost of the project by about $25 million. (2/6)

Lockheed Martin and Viasat Executives to Support National Security Committee (Source: Space News)
The White House named executives from Lockheed Martin and Viasat to a national security advisory panel. Among the newly selected members of the National Security Telecommunications Advisory Committee (NSTAC) announced Friday are Johnathon Caldwell, vice president of military space at Lockheed Martin, and Mark Dankberg, chairman and CEO of satellite operator Viasat. The NSTAC, chaired by Microsoft vice president Scott Charney, has a total of 30 presidentially appointed industry executives who advise the White House on the security, reliability and preparedness of the nation's critical communications and information infrastructure. (2/6)

Voyager Space Raises $80 Million for Space Station (Source: Tech Crunch)
Voyager Space has raised $80.2 million to advance its commercial space station plans. A filing with the SEC last month revealed the fundraising, but the company did not confirm its plans in response to media inquiries, including whether that amount reflected the final size of the round. Several funds, including NewSpace Capital, Midway Venture Partners, Industrious Ventures and Seraphim Space, reportedly participated in the round. Voyager Space is leading development of a commercial space station called Starlab, and received a $160 million award from NASA in late 2021 to support development of its design. (2/6)

Russia Launches Weather Satellite (Source: TASS)
The first Russian launch of the year placed a weather satellite into orbit Sunday. A Proton M rocket lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome at 4:12 a.m. Eastern and deployed the Elektro-L No. 4 weather satellite into its planned orbit several hours later after a series of burns by the rocket's upper stage. Elektro-L No. 4 is the latest in a series of geostationary weather satellites. (2/6)

World View Sees Remote Sensing as Target Market (Source: Space News)
Stratospheric ballooning company World View is emphasizing the remote sensing market, and not tourism, as it prepares to go public. In an investor presentation filed with the SEC Friday, the company argued its balloons can fill a gap between satellites and aerial platforms, providing persistent high-resolution imagery. World View reported $3 million in revenue in 2022 from four ballon flights, but projects that to grow to $89 million in 2025 with 65 flights. While World View has emphasized tourism as a market, flying people into the stratosphere for several hours, the company made little mention of that market in its presentation. World View last month announced it would go public through a SPAC merger that could raise up to $90 million. (2/6)

OSTP Deputy Departing (Source: Science)
The deputy director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy is leaving government to return to academia. Alondra Nelson will step down this week to return to her position at the Institute for Advanced Study, concluding a two-year leave from the institute to serve in the Biden administration. Nelson, deputy director for science and society, became acting OSTP director a year ago when Eric Lander resigned after accusations of bullying behavior. She became the first Black person, and first woman of color, to lead OSTP. She returned to her deputy director post late last year when the Senate confirmed Arati Prabhakar as the new OSTP director. (2/6)

Why Starlink and China’s Internet Satellite Groups Need to Talk to Each Other (Source: South China Morning Post)
Internet satellite networks owned by different countries must coordinate their operations or risk hurting each other’s services, a study by China’s space agency has warned. A China National Space Administration (CNSA) team led by researcher Liu Huiliang produced computer modelling that showed a medium-sized constellation of about 450 satellites could effectively reduce the communication bandwidth of a satellite network of more than 1,500.

In one computer-simulated scenario, operators of the smaller network changed the satellites’ flight path to achieve full communication speed, causing a performance dip in the larger network. This is because the larger network “does not know another system is making proactive moves and continues using the original strategy to communicate with ground stations”, according to the study published in the January edition of peer-reviewed journal Chinese Space Science and Technology.

The findings counter the generally held view that a larger network would have the upper hand in a fight for limited resources in space. Elon Musk, founder of US-based SpaceX, said last year there was room for tens of billions of satellites in lower-Earth orbit. But different satellite constellations often used similar radio frequencies which could interfere with each other when communicating with ground stations, Liu and his colleagues said. (2/5)

SpaceX Starlink Service Coming to Philippines (Source: Inquirer)
SpaceX will start offering Starlink services in the Philippines by next month. Data Lake Inc., a Philippine company working with SpaceX on providing Starlink in the country, said the service will be available by March, making the Philippines the first in Southeast Asia to have Starlink available. Data Lake blamed delays in deployment of Starlink satellites for missing an earlier deadline of late 2022 to start offering service in the country. (2/6)

CACI to Collaborate with U.S. Army on Space Technologies (Source: Space News)
U.S. defense contractor CACI International announced Feb. 6 it signed an agreement with the U.S. Army to collaborate on the development of space sensors and payloads for positioning, navigation and timing. The company, based in Reston, Virginia, signed a five-year cooperative research and development agreement (CRADA) with the U.S. Army Space and Missile Defense Technical Center, located in Huntsville, Alabama. (1/6)

NASA Tests New Ride For Science Studies From Wallops (Source: SpaceRef)
NASA will test a new capability for supporting science research in the mesosphere with the launch of two rockets from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility, Virginia on Feb. 9, 2023. The two Improved-Orion suborbital sounding rockets will launch about 30 minutes apart. The two rockets are part of an effort to advance the study of the mesosphere, a layer of Earth’s atmosphere between approximately 31 and 53 miles altitude. The mesosphere is a key region for studying meteor ablation and dust, noctilucent clouds, and upper atmospheric chemistry and winds.

The upcoming launches will use one of the smaller rockets in NASA’s fleet to carry newly-designed compact payloads into the mesosphere. One payload has a four-inch diameter and is 71 inches long while the other has a nine-inch diameter and is 83 inches long. Both rockets are projected to carry their payloads to about 71 miles altitude, where they will test aerodynamic stability and performance of both the launch vehicle and payload designs. (2/4)

NASA Official Admits There's a Bit of an Issue on the Space Station (Source: Futurism)
A NASA official suggested during a recent conference that because commercial spacecraft like those of SpaceX have made it possible to take four American astronauts to the ISS rather than three, the extra cargo needed to sustain that fourth person takes up quite a bit of space that would otherwise be used to transport research equipment. "As we get into this discussion of what is full utilization, I will tell you that I believe that we are already there," said Kirt Costello.

Essentially, Costello said that there's now something of a space crunch aboard the station. "To get at equipment for research, for some of our investigations, the crew has to wade through this stowage and find the right bags," the scientist said. "We’re currently seeing enhanced amounts of crew time being added to crew activities just to retrieve stowage." For now, NASA is reportedly relying on the introduction of other commercial crafts to ease some of these cargo storage issues — at least three new ones, per Costello's comments. (2/2)

U.S.-Led Moon Exploration Project Cannot Succeed Wthout Japan (Source: Kyodo News)
The Artemis project, an international effort led by the United States aimed at advancing lunar exploration and eventually returning humans to the Moon by 2025, cannot succeed without Japan's help, NASA's attache in Asia said Friday. "To succeed, we need not only JAXA, but also the cooperation of private companies," said Garvey McIntosh, referring to the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency. "You don't need to be a big company. As long as you have good ideas and passion, you can (contribute)." (2/3)

Northrop Grumman Has Crashed (Source: Seeking Alpha)
The Northrop Grumman Corporation, which is one of my largest defense holdings, has crashed. The stock is down roughly 20% year-to-date, which is one of the worst performances of the past two decades. While losing 20% on a large investment does hurt, I'm far from concerned. On the contrary, I used weakness to buy NOC exposure for some portfolios that I manage/advise, as I like the risk/reward this sell-off provides us with.

What we're dealing with here are risks that growth in defense spending in the years ahead might be subdued. While I have 24% defense exposure, I'm not saying this out of greed but because defense companies depended on a boost in funding due to supply chain issues and high input inflation. Smaller companies in the supply chain were at risk of going out of business. (2/3)

How Stoke Space's Unique Rocket Works (Source: Everyday Astronaut)
What if I told you, there’s a company you likely haven’t heard of who's developing a fully and rapidly reusable rocket… and this isn’t a power point rocket, they’re already building it, and have been testing it at a pace that’s frankly ridiculous. And they’re using the aerospike effect in a genius way to make for a fully reusable upper stage. Join me as I show you around Stoke Space’s headquarters and test facility and reveal their never before seen rocket.

I’ll explain in great detail how it works from their actively regeneratively cooled heat shield, to its unique offset geometry for precision reentry and landing, but also how its unique engine is integrated into the heat shield. Click here. (2/4) 

SpaceX Starship's First Launch is for Real (Source: Mashable)
Elon Musk lost his claim as having the most powerful space-worthy rocket when NASA blasted its own mega rocket to the moon in November. But the SpaceX founder could win back the title with his company's next big project. Starship, SpaceX's skyscraping rocket and spacecraft, will launch on its first mission soon. During the test flight, the colossal booster will separate about three minutes after liftoff and land in the Gulf of Mexico, according to federal filings. The ship will fly in space around Earth at an altitude of over 150 miles, then splash down off the Hawaiian coast.

This will be a crucial demonstration of hardware NASA is depending on to get humans back on the moon in the next few years. And, if successful, it'll mean Musk is one small step closer to realizing his personal dream of building a city on Mars. The 400-foot-tall stainless steel tower looms over NASA's rocket, the Space Launch System. It would take about five billboards stacked on top of the latter to measure up to Musk's space vehicle. SpaceX estimates its rocket also has about twice as much thrust. (2/4)

Can SpaceX Launch Starship Three Times Per Day? (Source: Astralytical)
SpaceX announced the desired launch cadence for its yet-to-be-operational Starship launch system a few times during the past few months: three launches…per day. However, history hosts a few companies that have demonstrated that it is much easier to announce the "XX" capability of a non-existent rocket than build one. Another consideration is that SpaceX founder Elon Musk is known for embellishing his SpaceX pronouncements just a teensy bit. With that understanding, is SpaceX's goal realistic? After all, a year's worth of three Starship launches per day results in 1,095 launches, a 512% increase from 2022's global launch total.

SpaceX is slightly behind the monthly launch average required to reach 100 launches in 2023. Even if it maintains a seven-launch per-month average, the resulting 2023 launch total, 84, would still be impressive. Still, three launches per day is a downgrade from Elon Musk's initial Starship launch prediction. In 2019, he shared that a Super Heavy booster (Starship's first stage) could launch as often as 20 times per day, while Starship (the upper stage) would launch as often as four times every day.

However, if the first successful Starship launch, orbit, re-entry, and landing occurred today, it is unlikely SpaceX could launch half of the 1,095 launches for the remaining year. The company's inability to meet its goal is not because of challenges SpaceX faces with Starship's technology, such as heat tiles. It is not because customers will not be ready to use Starship's 100–150-ton payload capability. Instead, external support will not be ready. Whenever SpaceX conducts a launch, it relies on range support. DoD's ranges started 2022 with an Inspector General report warning that neither range's older technology can reliably cope with launch increases. It noted that both rely on aging equipment, some no longer manufactured. (1/6)

How Tim Ellis Went From Wannabe Screenwriter to Elon Musk’s Biggest Space Competitor (Source: Fast Company)
Seven years ago, Relativity Space CEO Tim Ellis gave himself a coin-flip’s chance of success with a newfangled way to design and build 3D-printed rockets to expedite humanity’s push to Mars. “It’s technology that, when I started, I honestly thought there was a 50-50 chance that it wasn’t going to work and we’d end up with a puddle of metal,” Ellis tells me when we meet in mid-January. “But there was a real need for somebody to at least try.” Click here. (2/5)

Relativity Space's Monster factory 3D-Printing Reusable Rockets (Source: CNBC)
t was a few days into the new year yet Relativity Space’s factory was anything but quiet, a din of activity with massive 3D printers humming and the clanging of construction ringing out. Now about eight years on from its founding, Relativity continues to grow as it pursues a novel way of manufacturing rockets out of mostly 3D-printed structures and parts.

Relativity believes that its approach will make building orbital-class rockets much faster than traditional methods, requiring thousands less parts and enabling changes to be made via software — aiming to create rockets from raw materials in as little as 60 days. The company has raised over $1.3 billion in capital to date and continues to expand its footprint, including the addition of more than 150 acres at NASA’s rocket engine testing center in Mississippi. Click here. (2/4)

Update on Orbex and UK's Sutherland Spaceport (Source: Space Hub Sutherland)
In October Orbex announced the successful completion of their Series C funding round, raising £40.4 million. The funding round was led by the Scottish National Investment Bank and saw a number of new investors joining the round along with renewed commitments from many existing investors. At the beginning of November Orbex shared the exciting news that they have acquired a 50-year lease from Highlands and Islands Enterprise, which will see them leading the construction and operation of the first vertical spaceport on the UK mainland.

Following their participation in Orbex's Series C funding round, Jacobs will collaborate with Orbex to provide spaceport construction and operations support, operations consultancy, and engineering services, drawing on its experience of managing and operating complex, highly regulated sites such as Cape Canaveral in the United States. (2/5)

The Real Value Proposition of Suborbital Space Tourism & Travel (Source: NSR)
Blue Origin’s launch failure in September has raised concerns about the continuity of suborbital space tourism. Will this inhibit the pace of space tourism and will regular flights take off in 2023? Furthermore, will Virgin Galactic finally make its comeback this year, after so many delays and financial hiccups? The market remains supply constrained, and regardless of these delays and launch failure investigations, ticket sales for suborbital flights have been going very well: Virgin Galactic sold over 700 tickets, increasing prices to $450,000 and Blue Origin’s sales reached $100M.

Meanwhile, PD Aerospace, i-Space, Beijing Lingkong Tianxing Technology Corporation and CASC are also developing spaceplanes or rockets to offer space tourism flights or point-to-point travel. In the context of high uncertainty about whether Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic will fly crewed missions this year, the investments into the development of vehicles from competing firms increases the likelihood of suborbital space tourism flights to take off in the near future.

Negative feedback to suborbital space tourism, in combination with mission failures have further led to flight cancellations and debate about its value proposition:  what audience should suborbital space companies target and for what purpose: space tourism, science or highspeed space travel? Amidst the heavy criticism, people have been buying space tourism tickets for years and are still patiently waiting to get their astronaut wings and living the microgravity experience. NSR’s Space Tourism and Travel Report forecasts suborbital space travel to generate cumulative revenues of $1.1 B by 2032 with  90% of space travelers on suborbital rides. (1/10)

Long-Delayed ExoMars Mission Still Dreams of 2028 Launch (Source: Space Daily)
War, budget cuts, a pandemic and a crash: For all its trials, Europe's ExoMars mission might be more deserving of the name Perseverance than NASA's Martian rover. But the European Space Agency still hopes the mission can launch in 2028 on its long-delayed quest to search for extraterrestrial life on the Red Planet.

This time last year, the ESA's Rosalind Franklin rover was all ready for a September launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, planning to catch a ride on a Russian rocket and descend to the Martian surface on a Russian lander. Then Moscow invaded Ukraine in March, and sanctions imposed by the ESA's 22 member states led to Russia pulling out and the mission being suspended. It was just the latest blow for the hundreds of scientists who have been working on the project for more than two decades. (2/3)

Poland's SatRev Signs on for Future Virgin Orbit Flights (Source: Space Daily)
Virgin Orbit and Poland-based satellite manufacturer SatRev announced a follow-on launch services agreement (LSA) for additional launches of SatRev's satellites in 2023 and beyond. This new agreement provides SatRev with the flexibility to launch 500 kg over multiple launches to a variety of different orbital planes from the Mojave Air and Space Port in California, USA and/or from other international launch sites as they come online with mission requirements.

Four satellites built by SatRev have already been delivered to Low Earth Orbit by Virgin Orbit's LauncherOne system onboard missions Tubular Bells and Above the Clouds. The parties anticipate launching a new batch of SatRev's satellites as soon as 2023. (2/3)

Design a Spacesuit for ESA (Source: Space Daily)
In the coming decades, ESA is planning not only to go to the Moon and Mars, but possibly beyond. When we land on the surface of other planets, it is important for astronauts to have spacesuits that can help them withstand the harsh conditions thrust upon them by alien environments.

These harsh conditions include extreme temperatures, radiation, high-speed debris and dust. Places such as our Moon have nights that last as long as 14 days, dropping temperatures to -170C. The Moon has no magnetic field so cosmic radiation passes through the thin lunar atmosphere uncontested, exposing astronauts to dangerous levels of radiation. This applies to Mars as well, where days and nights are cold, and radiation can kill without proper protection.

ESA is holding a spacesuit design competition to allow those interested in Europe's future in space to have their say on what it might look like, visually. The spacesuit must include essential design elements of course, such as a backpack with life support systems, a visor to see through in varying lighting conditions, and it must be a realistic, so bulky, pressurised suit. Designers do not have to worry about technical specifications as this is a visual design competition. Other elements to include are a flag with the astronaut's nationality, a minimum of seven different layers of materials and an interface for the life support system. (2/3)

AFRL Partners with NASA in Cubesat Navigation, Communication Mission (Source: Space Daily)
The Air Force Research Laboratory's, or AFRL, newest sensor experiment deployed from the International Space Station Dec. 29, 2022, hosted on NASA's six-unit cube satellite named petitSat, or Plasma Enhancements in the Ionosphere-Thermosphere Satellite. The CubeSat's mission is to study a layer in Earth's upper atmosphere known as the ionosphere to provide insight into space weather disturbances and their impact on navigation and communication systems.

AFRL's sensor, developed at the enterprise's Space Vehicles Directorate, is named Gridded Retarding Ion Drift Sensor, or GRIDS, and is one of two main sensors flying on the mission. The GRIDS sensor is a low size, weight and power sensor built in-house over the past two years that will measure various ions in the ionosphere. (2/3)

NASA Is Helping Apptronic Build a Humanoid Robot (Source: CNET)
Apptronik is getting ready to reveal the general-purpose robot called Apollo it's building with NASA. Click here. (2/5)

Professor Believes Door to Warp Drive May Lie With Ethylene Glycol (Source: Futurism)
While the idea has historically been relegated largely to the realms of science fiction, a growing number of engineers are hard at work trying to turn it into a reality. Take Chance Glenn, an engineering professor and provost of the University of Houston-Victoria, who tells The Debrief that he's ready to bring early-stage research on a new concept to a lab. Needless to say, an actual warp drive as seen in "Star Trek" is still many years out — if it ever materializes, that is. But with a bit of luck and creativity, researchers like Glenn are starting to suspect we could inch closer to ways to play with the rules of space and time.

Glenn is ready to throw funding and his time behind a brand new idea — not to create a "warp bubble," the protective cocoon that would shield a spacecraft as it flies at superluminal speeds, but to see how time and space could be bent. "My planned experiment (involves) pumping a radio frequency chamber with a laser beam running through it," he told The Debrief, "and if somehow, even slightly, space/time is distorted in some way, it could be detected." To do just that, Glenn is planning to fill the chamber with ethylene glycol — better known as the antifreeze that helps run your automobile — a surprisingly simple off-the-shelf material for an otherwise complex experiment. (2/3)