The Space Show this week – Mar.28.16

The guests and topics of discussion on The Space Show this week:

1. Monday, March 28, 2016: 2-3:30 PM PDT (5-6:30 PM EDT, 4-5:30 PM CDT): We welcome back DR. ROB MANNING of JPL to discuss Mars retro-propulsion landing.

2. Tuesday, March 29, 2016: 7-8:30 PM PDT (10-11:30 PM EDT, 9-10:30 PM CDT): We welcome back HENRY VANDERBILT to discuss and update us with the coming Space Access Society meeting in Phoenix.

3. Friday, April 1, 2016: 2016; 9:30-11AM PDT; (12:30-2 PM EDT; 11:30AM – 1 PM CDT. RICHARD EASTON co-hosts with DR. BLEDDYN BOWEN of the UK to discuss space policy and national security space, military history and space intelligence studies.

4. Sunday, 3 2016: 12-1:30 PM PDT (3-4:30 PM EDT, 2-3:30 PM CDT): JAY WITTNER returns with GARY BICKFORD regarding his company and our sponsor, Integrated Space Analytics.

See also:
* The Space Show on Vimeo – webinar videos
* The Space Show’s Blog – summaries of interviews.
* The Space Show Classroom Blog – tutorial programs

The Space Show is a project of the One Giant Leap Foundation.

Video: Exhibition “outer space” by artist Michael Najjar opens in NYC

I’ve posted a couple of times about photographer Michael Najjar’s space inspired works (see here and here). He has a new show opening in New York City this month:

Here are a couple of his photos plus a video that he made:

[]

[]

[]

[]

Here is the press release for the show:

Michael Najjar – outer space – March 31 – May 14, 2016

Benrubi Gallery is pleased to announce German photo and video artist Michael Najjar‘s solo exhibition, outer space – the artist’s first show with the gallery and the first major showing of this series in New York City. outer space explores the latest development in space travel and how it is shaping future life on earth and in near-earth orbit. Informed by Najjar’s training to become the first civilian artist to fly to space, the series of large-scale photographs capture an intense and immersive futuristic world, inspired by cutting-edge aeronautic technologies and the nascent space tourism industry. The potential of the photographic image is pushed to new frontiers as realistic elements fuse with fictitious realities to make visible what is invisible or beyond human perception.

Central to outer space is Najjar’s personal experience with space flight and the performative aspect of the exhibited images. As one of the pioneer astronauts of Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic, Najjar has been undergoing an intensive, multistage cosmonaut training in Star City, Russia, since 2012, and is scheduled to board SpaceShipTwo in the near future. The artist uses the actual experience of training (zero-g flight, centrifuge training, stratosphere flight, and underwater space walks, to name a few) to create complex and never-before carried out photos that examine vital connections between humans and technology. Reality and simulation are so intertwined that they become indistinguishable, allowing for novel ways of seeing. Video artworks based on Najjar’s extreme training will be shown as part of the exhibition.

The acceleration in aeronautic research and industry and the birth of commercial space travel has brought humanity on the verge of a new era. The images of outer space – the ultra-high resolution telescope “golden eye II,” the world’s largest centrifuge, the first private spaceport, mineral mining on the moon, or space debris orbiting around the earth at fast speed – all address these technological advancements, attempting to elucidate their important cultural implication through artistic transformation. “By leaving our home planet and flying to the moon or other planets, we change our understanding of who we are and where we come from,” Najjar says. “The point is to reflect on our world and what it means to us and the generations to come after us. It’s about the very origins of the self.”

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.

New Horizons: Frozen nitrogen lake spotted on the surface of Pluto

A New Horizons image shows an interesting feature:

Pluto: On Frozen Pond

NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft spied several features on Pluto that offer evidence of a time millions or billions of years ago when – thanks to much higher pressure in Pluto’s atmosphere and warmer conditions on the surface – liquids might have flowed across and pooled on the surface of the distant world.

Pond[1]
Image credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Southwest Research Institute
“In addition to this possible former lake, we also see evidence of channels that may also have carried liquids in Pluto’s past,” said Alan Stern, Southwest Research Institute, Boulder, Colorado—principal investigator of New Horizons and lead author of a scientific paper on the topic submitted to the journal Icarus.

This feature appears to be a frozen, former lake of liquid nitrogen, located in a mountain range just north of Pluto’s informally named Sputnik Planum. Captured by the New Horizons’ Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) as the spacecraft flew past Pluto on July 14, 2015, the image shows details as small as about 430 feet (130 meters). At its widest point the possible lake appears to be about 20 miles (30 kilometers) across.

===

See also a recent presentation of New Horizons results so far: New Horizons Team Presents Latest Pluto Science Results at Planetary Conference.