History, Space TV

Proposed TV series will dramatize the Cold War space race

Nicholas Meyer, a noted screenwriter and director who was involved in several Star Trek films, is developing a TV series about the US/Soviet Union space race in the 1950s-60s:

The project will use material from the book Red Moon Rising: Sputnik and the Hidden Rivalries that Ignited the Space Age by Matthew Brzezinski .

“In ‘Red Moon Rising,’ Matthew Brzezinski takes us inside the Kremlin, the White House, secret military facilities, and the halls of Congress to bring to life the Russians and Americans who feared and distrusted their compatriots as much as their superpower rivals,” publisher Times Books wrote. “‘Red Moon Rising’ recounts the true story of the birth of the space age in dramatic detail, bringing it to life as never before.'”

The New York Times, in its Sunday Book Review, saw the potential for Brzezinski’s work to be adapted.

“[‘Red Moon Rising’] tells the story of American and Soviet decisions with remarkable dramatic — even cinematic — flair,” Mark Atwood Lawrence, who teaches history at the University of Texas at Austin, wrote in the paper’s review.

Exoplanets

Demonstrating the diversity of distant star systems

Check out this cool animation demonstrating the orbits of the confirmed exoplanets discovered by the Kepler space observatory: Kepler’s Tally of Planets – Interactive Feature – NYTimes.com

Education, In Space Infrastructure, Space Systems

FISO: SPHERES robots for research on the ISS

The latest presentation to the Future In-Space Operations (FISO) study group is now posted in the FISO Working Group Presentations Archive. Both slides (pdf) and audio (mp3) are available for the talk, SPHERES Distributed Satellite Algorithm Research Aboard the ISS, Alvar Saenz-Otero, MIT – June 26, 2013.

The presentation gives the details behind the robotic SPHERES (Synchronized Position Hold Engage and Reorient Experimental Satellites)  used on the ISS for research and student competitions.

See also the website SPHERES  and Zero Robotics websites at MIT.

 

Activism, Asteroids & Comets, Space participation

Video: Planetary Society Hangout with Chris Lewicki of Planetary Resources

The latest Hangout of the Planetary Society welcomes Chris Lewicki of Planetary Resources, Inc. who talks about their Arkyd space telesope project and asteroid mining : Planetary Society Hangout: Arkyd Telescopes, Planetary Resources, Chris Lewicki, Bill Nye – The Planetary Society

DIY space, Space participation

New space Kickstarter: Pocket Spacecraft on a Mission to the Moon

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Here’s another space Kickstater getting started: Send your own Pocket Spacecraft on a Mission to the Moon! by Pocket Spacecraft — Kickstarter

Here’s a press release:

Sending Your Own Spacecraft to the Moon Just Became a Reality

Thursday June 27th, 2013: A new project to give thousands of people the opportunity to design, build and launch personalised spacecraft and send them to the moon has begun.

Now anyone can become a citizen space explorer and take part in a mission to send their own Pocket Spacecraft to the moon. At a cost of just GBP 99 (~EUR119/JPY15499/USD159), explorers who back the project will be able to personalise their own spacecraft by adding a picture or message direct from their favourite social media or game profile or create their own unique design. They can do this from their smartphone or web browser and will be able to monitor progress throughout their mission with their own Pocket Mission Control app. Users will be able to track the progress of their spacecraft as it is designed, built in the lab and travels through space. More technical explorers will be able to write software and even customise the on-board hardware enabling them to conduct their own unique experiments whether mapping the solar wind or playing laser tag – in space!

Pocket Spacecraft are disks with flexible electronics, smaller than a CD and as thin as a piece of paper, that will be loaded into an Interplanetary CubeSat mothership to hitch a ride into space on a commercial rocket. The mothership will then set off to the moon and when it arrives many months later, the fleet of Pocket Spacecraft will be photographed as they are released to land on the moon to complete their mission.

Anyone can take part in the mission via the crowd-funding site Kickstarter (search for ‘Pocket Spacecraft‘ or visit PocketSpacecraft.com ). Since launch in 2009, Kickstarter has raised more than $500 million for various projects from over 3 million individuals. Pocket Spacecraft only needs support from 2000 or more people to allow the mission to go ahead.

The global team of scientists, engineers and designers behind Pocket Spacecraft have already created two dozen open space projects for the mission since 2009, supported by more than a hundred volunteers from twenty countries (and counting) led by co-ordinators in Europe (Bristol, UK) and America (Pasadena, CA, USA).

Michael Johnson, founder of Pocket Spacecraft, co-created the first space mission funded on KickStarter (KickSat – due to be launched by NASA later this year), and influential workshops such as the Interplanetary CubeSat Workshop at MIT, and the Keck Institute for Space Studies Small Satellites: A Revolution in Space Science workshop at Caltech.

“By backing this mission people will revolutionise space exploration and space science” enthuses Michael. “By democratising interplanetary space exploration we will create a generation of young explorers who can use the same affordable methods to explore Mars, Venus and beyond. We’re building tools so that one day every child will be able to send their own spacecraft on a robotic field trip in space”.

The campaign will run for 60 days and end on August 26, 2013. Detailed information regarding the campaign is available on the KickStarter website:

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1677943140/send-your-own-pocket-spacecraft-on-a-mission-to-th

Everyone can participate in space