Category Archives: Simulators

Asteroids & Comets, Astronomy, Simulators

Simulating Rosetta and Philae with ‘SpaceTraveller’

BINARY SPACE, which provides the Satellite Tracking Tool and with whom I work to make the Virtual SpaceTV 3D animated news reports, is developing a new program called the SpaceTraveller,”a solar system simulator and space mission visualizer program”. This video uses SpaceTraveller to depict the maneuvers of the Rosetta spacecraft at the comet Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko. It also shows the lander Philae and its deployment to the comet (currently scheduled for November 12, 2014).

For further info on SpaceTraveller, contact  info@binary-space.com.

Simulators, Software, Space Settlement

‘High Frontier’ space colony sim – Kickstarter to fund final artwork

An announcement about the High Frontier space settlement simuator:

New Video Game Blends Science, Fun

FORT COLLINS, Colo. – Oct. 27, 2014 – A small family business launched a KickStarter campaign today for a space settlement simulation game.  The game, called “High Frontier“,  allows the player to design their own free-floating orbital colony.  Players will then be able to go “inside” their colony, and manage the city in detail.

The game is being developed by Strout and Sons, a small company based in Fort Collins, Colorado (USA).  Joe Strout, the lead developer, has previously coauthored two scientific papers on real space settlement designs.  That experience is now being applied to the new video game, which features a custom physics engine to accurately simulate how large rotating bodies behave in space.  Other parts of the simulation cover energy balance and population dynamics.

“High Frontier is already the most accurate, detailed space colony simulator ever made,” Strout said in a statement Monday.  Work on the game has led to several relevant scientific insights, including the realization that inverted endcaps (like the bottom of a soda can) improve the stability of cylindrical space colonies, and recognition of the advantages of building early space colonies in low-Earth orbit.

“The idea of orbital space colonies has been around since the 1970s,” Strout explains, “but hasn’t received much attention in recent years. With High Frontier, we hope to change that.”

High Frontier has been following the incremental release model popularized by such games as Minecraft and Kerbal Space Program.  The team has released ten versions so far, completing the “design” and “build” phases of the game.  The third phase of the game, managing the colony, is still in progress; so far only an external view is available.  To support the internal city-management view, the company has launched a KickStarter campaign (www.kickstarter.com/projects/1045364912/high-frontier).  The team hopes to raise $10,000, which will be used primarily to fund custom artwork for the city simulation.

“We hope this game will help people realize the vast potential of the solar system,” Strout says.  “High Frontier is designed to both entertain and inspire.”

The KickStarter campaign continues until November 26.

Education, Living in Space, Simulators

Update on UND 30-day planetary base simulation

I recently mentioned the 3o day simulation of life in a space habitat underway by three grad students at the Univ. of North Dakota Department of Space Studies. Here are a couple of updates via the NDX Space Suit Projects blog:

On Day 8 there was an EVA:

Living in Space, Simulators, Space Systems

Univ. North Dakota group begins 30 day planetary base simulation

Pablo de Leon‘s group at the Univ. of North Dakota Department of Space Studies is carrying out another extended simulated space base project:

Updates on the sim are available at the NDX Space Suit Projects blog:

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DIY space, Simulators, Space Settlement

More about that “bleak” Mars One simulation

I pointed earlier to an MIT student project that simulated a base on Mars similar to that proposed by the Mars One organization.  (See the Mars simulation paper (pdf)).  Mars One chief Bas Lansdorp responds in the comments to this post: MIT Analysis Paints Bleak Outcome for Mars One Concept – SpacePolicyOnline.com .

Stewart Money also considers the “bleak” description as overly pessimistic: The Mars One Plan: Bleak? or Needs to be Tweeked? – Innerspace.net

There is no doubt that Mars One is risky concept, and if it is to ever gain real traction, it will have to endure a lot more scrutiny than presented in the MIT study.  It should probably begin with a clear statement that Mars One is meant as an evolving concept, in which the final product may differ considerable from what has initially been put forward on a time frame which like all space projects, is subject to change.  At the same time, its many critics might want to at least consider how much of the risk to any future Mars mission, whether one way of with a return ticket, could be reduced through advancing the Technological Readiness Level (TRL) of some of the core technologies the MIT team identifies.

Finally, they might want to ask why the U.S. is committed to a very different, but perhaps even more financially implausible plan.