In Space Infrastructure, Living in Space, Space Systems

Videos: “Space to Ground” & other space habitat reports – Aug.29.2023

This week’s selection of videos about space stations and living in space including NASA’s latest Space to Ground report for the International Space Station:

** Hurricane Idalia seen from the International Space Station – VideoFromSpace

The International Space Station flew over Hurricane Idalia on Aug. 29, 2023.

** Crew-7 | Approach and Docking – SpaceX

On Sunday, August 27 at 9:16 a.m. ET, SpaceX’s Dragon autonomously docked with the International Space Station. Almost 30 hours earlier at 3:27 a.m. ET, Falcon 9 launched the spacecraft and Crew-7 to orbit from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

During their time on the orbiting laboratory, the crew will conduct science and technology demonstrations to prepare for human exploration beyond low-Earth orbit and to benefit humanity on Earth.

** NASA’s SpaceX Crew-7 Flight Day 2 Highlights – NASA Video

NASA’s SpaceX Dragon Endurance spacecraft carrying NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Andreas Mogensen, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Satoshi Furukawa, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Konstantin Borisov autonomously docked to the space-facing port of the Harmony module of the International Space Station at 9:16 a.m. EDT on Aug. 27 following a launch the day before on the SpaceX Dragon Endurance spacecraft aboard a Falcon 9 rocket from Launch Complex 39A at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Following docking, the quartet opened the hatch and floated onboard the orbital outpost before providing welcoming remarks as their mission aboard the space station began. The four crew members will conduct a long-duration science mission living and working aboard the microgravity laboratory to advance scientific knowledge and demonstrate new technologies for future human and robotic exploration missions. Such research benefits people on Earth and lays the groundwork for future human exploration through the agency’s Artemis missions, which will send astronauts to the Moon to prepare for future expeditions to Mars.

** NASA’s SpaceX Crew-7 Mission Overview – NASA Johnson

NASA’s SpaceX Crew-7 mission will carry NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Andreas Mogensen, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Satoshi Furukawa, and Konstantin Borisov of Roscosmos to the International Space Station. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft will launch from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on the company’s seventh crew rotation mission for NASA. Learn more about the crew and mission: https://www.nasa.gov/feature/what-you…

** The Science of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-6 Mission – NASA

After launching to the International Space Station on March 2, 2023, NASA’s SpaceX Crew-6 mission is wrapping up its time in orbit, with a return to Earth in early September 2023.

NASA astronauts Stephen Bowen and Woody Hoburg, UAE (United Arab Emirates) astronaut Sultan Alneyadi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev spent their months on the orbiting lab conducting scientific investigations and technology demonstrations, including running a student robotic challenge, studying plant genetic adaptations to space, and monitoring human health in microgravity to prepare for exploration beyond low Earth orbit and to benefit life on Earth.

The astronauts also released Saskatchewan’s first satellite, which tests a new radiation detection and protection system derived from melanin.

Learn more: https://go.nasa.gov/3OOOR3l

** Expedition 69 NASA’s SpaceX Crew-6 Talks with Media Before Station Departure – Aug. 23, 2023 – NASA Video

Aboard the International Space Station NASA astronauts Steve Bowen and Woody Hoburg, UAE (United Arab Emirates) astronaut Sultan Alneyadi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev gave remarks about their mission during a news conference August 23. The Crew-6 astronauts have been aboard the space station since March and will return to Earth via a parachute assisted splashdown in September. The four crew members have been living and working aboard the microgravity laboratory to advance scientific knowledge and demonstrate new technologies for future human and robotic exploration missions. Such research benefits people on Earth and lays the groundwork for future human exploration through the agency’s Artemis missions, which will send astronauts to the Moon to prepare for future expeditions to Mars.

** Expedition 69 Progress 85 Cargo Ship Docks to Space Station – Aug. 24, 2023 – NASA Video

The uncrewed Roscosmos ISS Progress 85 cargo spacecraft docked to the aft port of the Zvezda Service Module August 24 after launching to the International Space Station from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan August 22 on a Soyuz booster rocket. Progress is filled with almost three tons of supplies and cargo and will remain docked to the space station until early next year.

** Timelapse showing Canadarm2 operations with Nanoracks Bishop Airlock –  ISS Above

“On Monday, August 28, 2023, Robotics ground controllers plan to perform the Gambit Sortie to demate NRAL, install Gambit on an exterior NRAL site, and then remate NRAL to Node 3. The objective of Gambit is to evaluate and catalog performance of the NRAL external sites. Gambit will be moved to all six external NRAL sites throughout the course of the investigation, and various sensors measure temperature, vibrations, and radiation to characterize each site. Results could support design and development of future science investigations that use these sites.” – NASA Station Report.

** ISSRDC Day2 Lightning Talk – Vast: Building the First Crewed, Independent Space Station  – ISS National Lab

** Shenzhou-16 Crew Reap Good Harvest in Space Planting Experiment – CCTV Video News Agency

The space vegetable planting experiment conducted by the Shenzhou-16 crew who have been in orbit for almost three months has yielded a good harvest.

** Live Video from the International Space Station (Official NASA Stream) – NASA

Watch live video from the International Space Station, including inside views when the crew aboard the space station is on duty. Views of Earth are also streamed from an external camera located outside of the space station. During periods of signal loss due to handover between communications satellites, a blue screen is displayed.

The space station orbits Earth about 250 miles (425 kilometers) above the surface. An international partnership of five space agencies from 15 countries operates the station, and it has been continuously occupied since November 2000. It’s a microgravity laboratory where science, research, and human innovation make way for new technologies and research breakthroughs not possible on Earth. More: https://go.nasa.gov/3CkVtC8

Did you know you can spot the station without a telescope? It looks like a fast-moving star, but you have to know when to look up. Sign up for text messages or email alerts to let you know when (and where) to spot the station and wave to the crew: https://spotthestation.nasa.gov

====

ISS after undocking of STS-132

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Rockets, Space industry, Space Systems

Videos: A SpaceX overview + Starship reports

Here is a sampling of videos about SpaceX and the Starship project.

** Public presentations about SpaceX are usually provided by Elon Musk or Gwynne Shotwell. However, here is an excellent overview of the company given by Kiko Dontchev, Vice President of Launch, at the Summit At Sea event last May.

Curious how SpaceX went from 13 launches in 2019 to pacing for 100 in 2023? As VP of Launch at SpaceX, Kiko Dontchev goes into work every day with the simple goal of making space travel as accessible as air travel, and he is well on his way. In this talk, Kiko will dive into SpaceX’s exponential growth approach, Elon’s problem-solving algorithm, and becoming the most prolific launcher of all time.

** Several new media sources have risen in the past couple of years that report extensively on SpaceX Starship related activities. A sampling of these include:

Here, for example, are three reports on recent Starship developments:

** The design, development, and commercial potential of Starship are presented in the SpaceX Starship report, for which I was the primary author. Initially published by NewSpace Global in March 2023, we updated it in May to include coverage of the first flight test.

==================

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for news and analysis of key developments in NewSpace

The latest issue:
Starships’ Second Flight, Blue HLS, Return Sustainably
Vol. 18, No. 2, July 16, 2023

Space Frontier Foundation Award for NewSpace Journalism

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Astronomy, Education, Space Science

ESO: Dark spot on Neptune observed by telescope on Earth for first time

A new report from the European Southern Observatory (ESO):

Mysterious Neptune dark spot detected from Earth for the first time

This image shows Neptune observed with the MUSE instrument at ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT). At each pixel within Neptune, MUSE splits the incoming light into its constituent colours or wavelengths. This is similar to obtaining images at thousands of different wavelengths all at once, which provides a wealth of valuable information to astronomers. The image to the right combines all colours captured by MUSE into a “natural” view of Neptune, where a dark spot can be seen to the upper-right. Then we see images at specific wavelengths: 551 nanometres (blue), 831 nm (green), and 848 nm (red); note that the colours are only indicative, for display purposes. The dark spot is most prominent at shorter (bluer) wavelengths. Right next to this dark spot MUSE also captured a small bright one, seen here only in the middle image at 831 nm and located deep in the atmosphere. This type of deep bright cloud had never been identified before on the planet. The images also show several other shallower bright spots towards the bottom-left edge of Neptune, seen at long wavelengths. Imaging Neptune’s dark spot from the ground was only possible thanks to the VLT’s Adaptive Optics Facility, which corrects the blur caused by atmospheric turbulence and allows MUSE to obtain crystal clear images. To better highlight the subtle dark and bright features on the planet, the astronomers carefully processed the MUSE data, obtaining what you see here.

Using ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), astronomers have observed a large dark spot in Neptune’s atmosphere, with an unexpected smaller bright spot adjacent to it. This is the first time a dark spot on the planet has ever been observed with a telescope on Earth. These occasional features in the blue background of Neptune’s atmosphere are a mystery to astronomers, and the new results provide further clues as to their nature and origin.

Large spots are common features in the atmospheres of giant planets, the most famous being Jupiter’s Great Red Spot. On Neptune, a dark spot was first discovered by NASA’s Voyager 2 in 1989, before disappearing a few years later.

“Since the first discovery of a dark spot, I’ve always wondered what these short-lived and elusive dark features are,”

says Patrick Irwin, Professor at the University of Oxford in the UK and lead investigator of the study published today in Nature Astronomy.

Irwin and his team used data from ESO’s VLT to rule out the possibility that dark spots are caused by a ‘clearing’ in the clouds. The new observations indicate instead that dark spots are likely the result of air particles darkening in a layer below the main visible haze layer, as ices and hazes mix in Neptune’s atmosphere.

Coming to this conclusion was no easy feat because dark spots are not permanent features of Neptune’s atmosphere and astronomers had never before been able to study them in sufficient detail. The opportunity came after the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope discovered several dark spots in Neptune’s atmosphere, including one in the planet’s northern hemisphere first noticed in 2018. Irwin and his team immediately got to work studying it from the ground — with an instrument that is ideally suited to these challenging observations.

Using the VLT’s Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE), the researchers were able to split reflected sunlight from Neptune and its spot into its component colours, or wavelengths, and obtain a 3D spectrum [1]. This meant they could study the spot in more detail than was possible before.

“I’m absolutely thrilled to have been able to not only make the first detection of a dark spot from the ground, but also record for the very first time a reflection spectrum of such a feature,”

says Irwin.

This image shows Neptune observed with the MUSE instrument at ESO’s Very Large Telescope. At each pixel within Neptune, MUSE splits the incoming light into its constituent colours or wavelengths. This is similar to obtaining images at thousands of different wavelengths all at once, which provides a wealth of valuable information to astronomers. This image combines all colours captured by MUSE into a “natural” view of Neptune, where a dark spot can be seen to the upper-right.

Since different wavelengths probe different depths in Neptune’s atmosphere, having a spectrum enabled astronomers to better determine the height at which the dark spot sits in the planet’s atmosphere. The spectrum also provided information on the chemical composition of the different layers of the atmosphere, which gave the team clues as to why the spot appeared dark.

The observations also offered up a surprise result.

“In the process we discovered a rare deep bright cloud type that had never been identified before, even from space,”

says study co-author Michael Wong, a researcher at the University of California, Berkeley, USA. This rare cloud type appeared as a bright spot right beside the larger main dark spot, the VLT data showing that the new ‘deep bright cloud’ was at the same level in the atmosphere as the main dark spot. This means it is a completely new type of feature compared to the small ‘companion’ clouds of high-altitude methane ice that have been previously observed.

With the help of ESO’s VLT, it is now possible for astronomers to study features like these spots from Earth. “This is an astounding increase in humanity’s ability to observe the cosmos.

At first, we could only detect these spots by sending a spacecraft there, like Voyager. Then we gained the ability to make them out remotely with Hubble. Finally, technology has advanced to enable this from the ground,”

concludes Wong, before adding, jokingly:

“This could put me out of work as a Hubble observer!”

Notes

[1] MUSE is a 3D spectrograph that allows astronomers to observe the entirety of an astronomical object, like Neptune, in one go. At each pixel, the instrument measures the intensity of light as a function of its colour or wavelength. The resulting data form a 3D set in which each pixel of the image has a full spectrum of light. In total, MUSE measures over 3500 colours. The instrument is designed to take advantage of adaptive optics, which corrects for the turbulence in the Earth’s atmosphere, resulting in sharper images than otherwise possible. Without this combination of features, studying a Neptune dark spot from the ground would not have been possible.

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An Infinity of Worlds:
Cosmic Inflation and the Beginning of the Universe

In Space Infrastructure, Living in Space, Space Systems

Videos: “Space to Ground” & other space habitat reports – Aug.21.2023

This week’s selection of videos about space stations and living in space including NASA’s latest Space to Ground report for the International Space Station:

** NASA’s SpaceX Crew-7 Mission to the Space Station (Official Trailer) – NASA

An international crew is preparing to launch to the International Space Station aboard NASA’s SpaceX Crew-7 mission.

NASA astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli, ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Andreas Mogensen, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Satoshi Furukawa, and cosmonaut Konstantin Borisov of Roscosmos will perform research technology demonstrations, science experiments, and maintenance activities aboard the microgravity laboratory.

Crew-7 is targeted to launch no earlier than 3:49 a.m. EDT on Friday, Aug. 25 from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy. As part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program, Crew-7 marks the eighth human spaceflight mission supported by a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft and the seventh crew rotation mission to the space station since 2020 for NASA.

You can watch the launch live on NASA TV, NASA.gov, the NASA app, and on social media (@NASA).

Learn more about the Crew-7 mission here: https://blogs.nasa.gov/crew-7/

** Gateway: A New Era of Utilization in Deep Space – ISS National Lab

** ISSRDC Day1 Fireside Chat – Getting to the Heart of the Matter in LEO – ISS National Lab

** Full Bishop Airlock Animation – Nanoracks

** Progress MS-22 undocking and departure – SciNews

The Progress MS-22 spacecraft autonomously undocked from the aft port of the Zvezda service module, on the International Space Station, on 20 August 2023, at 23:50 UTC. Progress MS-22 (ISS Progress 83 mission) delivered about three tons of food, fuel, and supplies for the Expedition 68 crew aboard the International Space Station.
Credit: NASA/Roscosmos

** Experiment Cabinet on China’s Space Station Versatile for Sci-Tech Verification – CCTV Video News Agency

Standing at two meters tall and one meter wide and with a design life of 15 years, the Space Basic Experiment Cabinet mounted on one of the lab modules of China’s Tiangong Space Station has served as a versatile space technology verification platform, facilitating fruitful scientific research achievements in a microgravity environment, since its launch into orbit last year.

** China Completes In-Orbit Observation of Conductive Ring Wear Debris – CCTV Video News Agency

China has completed its first in-orbit observation of the generation process and clustering phenomenon of conductive ring wear debris on the country’s space station Tiangong.

** Live Video from the International Space Station (Official NASA Stream) – NASA

Watch live video from the International Space Station, including inside views when the crew aboard the space station is on duty. Views of Earth are also streamed from an external camera located outside of the space station. During periods of signal loss due to handover between communications satellites, a blue screen is displayed.

The space station orbits Earth about 250 miles (425 kilometers) above the surface. An international partnership of five space agencies from 15 countries operates the station, and it has been continuously occupied since November 2000. It’s a microgravity laboratory where science, research, and human innovation make way for new technologies and research breakthroughs not possible on Earth. More: https://go.nasa.gov/3CkVtC8

Did you know you can spot the station without a telescope? It looks like a fast-moving star, but you have to know when to look up. Sign up for text messages or email alerts to let you know when (and where) to spot the station and wave to the crew: https://spotthestation.nasa.gov

====

ISS after undocking of STS-132

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Astronomy, Education, Space Science

ESO: New type star may help explain magnetars

A new report from the European Southern Observatory (ESO):

New type of star gives clues to mysterious origin of magnetars

Magnetars are the strongest magnets in the Universe. These super-dense dead stars with ultra-strong magnetic fields can be found all over our galaxy but astronomers don’t know exactly how they form. Now, using multiple telescopes around the world, including European Southern Observatory (ESO) facilities, researchers have uncovered a living star that is likely to become a magnetar. This finding marks the discovery of a new type of astronomical object — massive magnetic helium stars — and sheds light on the origin of magnetars.

Despite having been observed for over 100 years, the enigmatic nature of the star HD 45166 could not be easily explained by conventional models, and little was known about it beyond the fact that it is one of a pair of stars [1], is rich in helium and is a few times more massive than our Sun.

“This star became a bit of an obsession of mine,”

says Tomer Shenar, the lead author of a study on this object published today in Science and an astronomer at the University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands.

“Tomer and I refer to HD 45166 as the ‘zombie star’,”

says co-author and ESO astronomer Julia Bodensteiner, based in Germany.

“This is not only because this star is so unique, but also because I jokingly said that it turns Tomer into a zombie.“

Having studied similar helium-rich stars before, Shenar thought magnetic fields could crack the case. Indeed, magnetic fields are known to influence the behaviour of stars and could explain why traditional models failed to describe HD 45166, which is located about 3000 light-years away in the constellation Monoceros.

“I remember having a Eureka moment while reading the literature: ‘What if the star is magnetic?’,”

says Shenar, who is currently based at the Centre for Astrobiology in Madrid, Spain.

Shenar and his team set out to study the star using multiple facilities around the globe. The main observations were conducted in February 2022 using an instrument on the Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope that can detect and measure magnetic fields. The team also relied on key archive data taken with the Fiber-fed Extended Range Optical Spectrograph (FEROS) at ESO’s La Silla Observatory in Chile.

Once the observations were in, Shenar asked co-author Gregg Wade, an expert on magnetic fields in stars at the Royal Military College of Canada, to examine the data. Wade’s response confirmed Shenar’s hunch:

“Well my friend, whatever this thing is — it is definitely magnetic.”

Shenar’s team had found that the star has an incredibly strong magnetic field, of 43 000 gauss, making HD 45166 the most magnetic massive star found to date [2].

“The entire surface of the helium star is as magnetic as the strongest human-made magnets,”

explains co-author Pablo Marchant, an astronomer at KU Leuven’s Institute of Astronomy in Belgium.

This observation marks the discovery of the very first massive magnetic helium star.

“It is exciting to uncover a new type of astronomical object,” says Shenar, ”especially when it’s been hiding in plain sight all along.”

Moreover, it provides clues to the origin of magnetars, compact dead stars laced with magnetic fields at least a billion times stronger than the one in HD 45166. The team’s calculations suggest that this star will end its life as a magnetar. As it collapses under its own gravity, its magnetic field will strengthen, and the star will eventually become a very compact core with a magnetic field of around 100 trillion gauss [3] — the most powerful type of magnet in the Universe.

Shenar and his team also found that HD 45166 has a mass smaller than previously reported, around twice the mass of the Sun, and that its stellar pair orbits at a far larger distance than believed before. Furthermore, their research indicates that HD 45166 formed through the merger of two smaller helium-rich stars.

“Our findings completely reshape our understanding of HD 45166,”

concludes Bodensteiner.

Notes

[1] While HD 45166 is a binary system, in this text HD 45166 refers to the helium-rich star, not to both stars.

[2] The magnetic field of 43 000 gauss is the strongest magnetic field ever detected in a star that exceeds the Chandrasekhar mass limit, which is the critical limit above which stars may collapse into neutron stars (magnetars are a type of neutron star).

[3] In this text, a billion refers to one followed by nine zeros and a trillion refers to one followed by 12 zeros.

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Envisioning Exoplanets:
Searching for Life in the Galaxy

Everyone can participate in space