I mentioned the other day the deployment of three small cubesat spacecraft (10 cm x 10 cm x 10cm) from the International Space Station. They were ejected with a special device attached to the Japanese Kibo module. Below is a great photo of the deployment: Cubesats Released From Space Station – NASA
The Mars Curiosity Rover has an electrical problem. So far the “soft short” doesn’t appear to be too serious but it dise reduce the level of robustness and tolerance for future problems. Operations with the rover are currently suspended while NASA JPL engineers attempt to diagnose the problem and determine if there is anything that can be done about it.
Here’s another video of presentations at the recent NASA workshop on proposals for asteroid missions:
NASA TV coverage of the Grand Challenge panel session of the NASA-hosted public workshop at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston to examine 96 of the ideas submitted to the recent Request For Information on ways to accomplish the agency’s asteroid initiative.
Here is the initial session of a recent workshop on proposals submitted for NASA’s asteroid initiative:
NASA TV coverage of the plenary session of the NASA-hosted public workshop at the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston to examine 96 of the ideas submitted to the recent Request For Information on ways to accomplish the agency’s asteroid initiative
Two more firings of the engine will need to be done to put the vehicle on course for Mars. When it reaches Mars on September 24, 2014, it will have to fire the engine again to go into orbit.
Click for high resolution version.