Category Archives: Space Science

Asteroids & Comets, Space Science, Space Systems

NASA’s NEOWISE spacecraft finding previously unknown near-earth objects

NASA’s NEOWISE space observatory has had a busy two years:

Asteroid-Hunting Spacecraft Delivers a Second Year of Data 

NASA’s Near-Earth Object Wide-field Survey Explorer (NEOWISE) mission has released its second year of survey data. The spacecraft has now characterized a total of 439 NEOs since the mission was re-started in December 2013. Of these, 72 were new discoveries.

Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) are comets and asteroids that have been nudged by the gravitational attraction of the giant planets in our solar system into orbits that allow them to enter Earth’s neighborhood. Eight of the objects discovered in the past year have been classified as potentially hazardous asteroids (PHAs), based on their size and how closely their orbits approach Earth.

With the release to the public of its second year of data, NASA’s NEOWISE spacecraft completed another milestone in its mission to discover, track and characterize the asteroids and comets that approach closest to Earth.

Since beginning its survey in December 2013, NEOWISE has measured more than 19,000 asteroids and comets at infrared wavelengths. More than 5.1 million infrared images of the sky were collected in the last year. A new movie, based on the data collected, depicts asteroids and comets observed so far by NEOWISE.

“By studying the distribution of lighter- and darker-colored material, NEOWISE data give us a better understanding of the origins of the NEOs, originating from either different parts of the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter or the icier comet populations,” said James Bauer, the mission’s deputy principal investigator at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

Originally called the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE), the spacecraft was launched in December 2009. It was placed in hibernation in 2011 after its primary mission was completed. In September 2013, it was reactivated, renamed NEOWISE and assigned a new mission: to assist NASA’s efforts to identify the population of potentially hazardous near-Earth objects. NEOWISE also is characterizing previously known asteroids and comets to provide information about their sizes and compositions.

“NEOWISE discovers large, dark, near-Earth objects, complementing our network of ground-based telescopes operating at visible-light wavelengths. On average, these objects are many hundreds of meters across,” said Amy Mainzer of JPL, NEOWISE principal investigator. NEOWISE has discovered 250 new objects since its restart, including 72 near-Earth objects and four new comets.

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, manages the NEOWISE mission for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Space Dynamics Laboratory in Logan, Utah, built the science instrument. Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp. of Boulder, Colorado, built the spacecraft. Science operations and data processing take place at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Caltech manages JPL for NASA.

For more information about NEOWISE, visit: www.nasa.gov/neowise

More information about asteroids and near-Earth objects is at: www.jpl.nasa.gov/asteroidwatch

Rockets, Space Science, Spaceflight & Parabolic Flight

Video: Blue Origin flies its New Shepard rocket to space and back

Blue Origin, the space company owned by Jeff Bezos of Amazon.com fame, flew their New Shepard reusable suborbital rocket vehicle for the third time last Saturday. The rocket takes off with the rocket booster and crew capsule connected together but just above 100 km in altitude the two separate. The crew capsule falls back to earth for a parachute landing while the booster does a vertical tail-first powered return using its liquid hydrogen, liquid oxygen engine.

In this test flight they decided to wait till the booster was at low altitude before turning on the engine. As you will see in the video, it comes down really fast and then brakes smoothly for a soft landing:

In a year or two, the New Shepard vehicles will fly people above the threshold to space but for the time being scientific and technology research payloads will be frequent customers. Here are videos describing the two experiments that flew on the above flight:

A University of Central Florida experiment designed to mimic impacts between objects in microgravity is flying aboard the next flight of Blue Origin’s reusable New Shepard space vehicle. Principal Investigator: Dr. Joshua Colwell

A Southwest Research Institute experiment designed to better understand the rocky soil on small, near-Earth asteroids is flying aboard the next flight of Blue Origin’s reusable New Shepard space vehicle. Principal Investigator: Dr. Dan Durda

Astronomy, Space Science

Audio: Update on space science news + The hunt for dark matter & dark energy

Dr. David Grinspoon of the Planetary Science Institute gives an interesting update on a number of recent space science developments including the sighting of a comet or asteroid hitting Jupiter, icebergs on Pluto, seas on Charon, salt mounds on Ceres, and gravity maps of Mars: John Batchelor Show –  David Grinspoon, PSI.

And here is a talk with Evalyn Gates, author of Einstein’s Telescope: The Hunt for Dark Matter and Dark Energy in the Universe, about these mysteries of the universe: The John Batchelor Show – Evalyn Gates –

Living in Space, Multiple media, Space Science

Video: Tim Peake shows the aurora

UK/ESA astronaut Tim Peake posted this impressive extended view of an aurora as seen from the International Space Station:

See also the recent Video: ‘On the shoulders of giants’ – Tim Peake’s Principia mission on the ISS.

Europa, Titan, & other deep space sites, Gas giants Saturn, Jupiter, et al, Space Science

Video: Artist Michael Carroll – “On the shores of Titan’s Farthest Sea”

In this SETI Institute seminar,  author/artist Michael Carroll explores

the bizarre methane-filled seas and soaring dunes of Saturn’s largest moon, Titan. Recent advances in our understanding of this planet-sized moon provide enough information for authors to paint a realistic picture of this truly alien world.