Frozentophat
TNPer
Published Weekly by FrozenTopHat
China is moving boldly ahead with its own space-exploration efforts, and with little ambiguity about its mission. The country recently announced it would conduct about 30 launches this year. The target, if met, would be a record for China. The country conducted 21 successful orbital-launch missions in 2016, and 19 the year before that. The output puts China in a close second behind the United States, which saw 22 successful launches, and ahead of Russia, which conducted 16.
And there's plenty more to come, according to a recent report from the China National Space Administration (CNSA), a quinquennial document that lays out the country's space goals for the next five years. The report, released late last month, said CNSA will launch in 2017 its first-ever cargo spacecraft, headed for the space laboratory launched last year. In 2018, CNSA aims to land a rover to the far side of the moon, a first for humankind. And in 2020, it plans to land a rover on Mars, a feat that has been attempted by Russia and other European nations, but only successfully accomplished by the United States. Saturn and Crescent Moon Pair off Before Dawn Tuesday --> Read the full article here
Check out the southeast sky about an hour before sunrise on Tuesday morning (Jan. 24). There you will find a lovely crescent moon and hovering to its lower right will be a bright "star" shining sedately with a yellowish-white hue. But that's not a star, it's a planet: the famed "ringed wonder" Saturn.
Probably the most popular planet, especially for beginners in astronomy, to seek out with telescopes, Saturn currently is rising around 4:30 a.m. local time ... or about an hour before the break of dawn. The rings are not evident with unaided eyes; you will need a telescope magnifying at least 30-power to bring them into view. Even with such a minimum amount of magnification, the view is striking and in larger instruments even more so. With a 6-inch telescope at 150-power, Saturn is a beautiful sight; with a 10-inch telescope at 250-power the view is breathtaking. Dwarf Planet Ceres Camouflaged by Asteroid Dust --> Read the full article here
The dwarf planet Ceres is cloaked in a layer of asteroid dust that disguises its true surface composition, a new study suggests. Data gathered by ground-based telescopes and NASA's Dawn spacecraft, which has been orbiting Ceres for nearly two years, indicate that the dwarf planet's surface harbors lots of water-bearing minerals, such as carbonates and clays.
But that's not exactly what astronomers saw when they studied Ceres using NASA's Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA), a modified Boeing 747 jet that carries a 100-inch-wide (2.5 meters) telescope. "We find that the outer few microns of the surface is partially coated with dry particles," study co-author Franck Marchis, a senior planetary astronomer at the SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Institute in Mountain View, California, said in a statement. "But they don't come from Ceres itself. They're debris from asteroid impacts that probably occurred tens of millions of years ago." Moon Beer? Brewing Experiment Short-Listed for Indian Lunar Lander --> Read the full article here
There could soon be a whole new definition of the term "moonshine." A team of University of California San Diego (UCSD) engineering students is in a ferment, all hopped up to see if beer can be brewed on the moon. Their experiment is designed to test the viability of yeast on the moon. The potential brewmasters hail from UCSD's Jacobs School of Engineering, and call themselves "Team Original Gravity." They are 1 of 25 teams selected from a pool of several thousand entries to compete for a spot aboard a moon lander/rover that's scheduled to launch on Dec. 28, 2017.
Proposed Space Mission Would Use the Moon to Help Search for Exploding Stars --> Read the full article here
Earth's moon could help scientists locate exploding stars in the Milky Way galaxy and beyond, according to the creators of a proposed space science mission. The Lunar Occultation Explorer (LOX) would orbit the moon and scan the sky for high-energy light called gamma-rays; in particular, the instruments would look for light that is produced by a particular type of exploding star that's called a Type Ia supernova.
LOX would take advantage of the relatively quiet lunar environment, where the significant sources of background noise that would plague such an instrument orbiting the Earth would be absent or well understood. In addition, LOX would effectively use the moon as a reference object to better determine the location of the supernovas it discovers. If the mission flies, it would be the first dedicated astrophysics mission to the moon, according to the scientists who are making the proposal. Clingy Alien Planets May Fling Their Moons Out of Orbit --> Read the full article here
Alien planets that orbit especially close to their stars have a bigger chance of losing their moons, which may reduce the chances that habitable alien moons will survive for very long around those planets, a new study finds. In the past 20 years or so, astronomers have confirmed the existence of more than 3,400 worlds outside Earth's solar system. These discoveries have revealed that many exoplanets are very different from those seen in Earth's solar system; for instance, about 40 percent of exoplanets discovered to date orbit their stars at least 10 times closer than Earth orbits the sun. (In comparison, Mercury is at most about three times closer than Earth is to the sun.)
In Earth's solar system, there are far more moons than planets, with Jupiter alone having at least 67 moons. Previous work has suggested that exomoons, or moons around exoplanets, could be as big or larger than Earth. If an exoplanet happens to lie in a star's habitable zone - the area in which worlds have surface temperatures warm enough to host liquid water - then an Earth-size exomoon around such a planet could potentially harbor life. The Universe Is Expanding Surprisingly Fast --> Read the full article here
The universe really is expanding faster than scientists had thought, new research suggests. Astronomers have pegged the universe's current expansion rate - a value known as the Hubble constant, after American astronomer Edwin Hubble - at about 44.7 miles (71.9 kilometers) per second per megaparsec. (One megaparsec is about 3.26 million light-years.)
This newly derived number is consistent with a calculation that was announced last year by a different research team, which was led by Nobel laureate Adam Riess. But it's considerably higher than the rate that was estimated by the European Space Agency's Planck satellite mission in 2015 - about 41.6 miles (66.9 km) per second per megaparsec. The Path Astronauts Will Walk When US Launches Humans Into Space Again --> Read the full article here
CAPE CANAVERAL: They'll take the elevator 175 feet above the shoreline, then march 15 steps across the platform and another 13 down the grated gangplank to the double doors that open to a small white room. There the astronauts will make their final preparations, adjust their space suits, check their equipment, before stepping into the spacecraft. This is the walk the astronauts will take as part of the NASA's effort to restore human spaceflight to U.S. soil by 2018, ending an ignominious hiatus that has endured since the space shuttle was retired in 2011.
Now, NASA is depending on two commercial companies-Boeing and SpaceX- to ferry its astronauts to the International Space Station, under contracts worth billions. Both companies have faced technical and design challenges that have forced them to push back the dates of their initial flights- delays that could prove costly. But there are growing signs that the companies are making progress, and this week Boeing opened up some of its new facilities here for the first time, and unveiled its new space suit, for a glimpse of what's to come. Russia to check space flight engines over faulty parts --> Read the full article here
Russia on Saturday said it had ordered a full check of engines used on its key Proton rocket after a cargo ship crashed last month due to engine disintegration and an inspection revealed factory violations.A plant making engines for both the Soyuz and Proton rockets had workers "switch technology and documentation," Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said, vowing to punish those responsible.
Earlier reports said engine parts used on the second and third stages of the widely-used Proton rocket had been swapped for cheaper variants."A necessary check of engines with possible technical defects will be made," Roscosmos space agency said, adding that the launch schedule will be "coordinated" with the verifications. Rogozin said launches using the Proton rocket would resume in three and a half months. 'Rogue' Science Agency Twitter Accounts Mock Trump-Ordered Restrictions --> Read the full article here
Two new Twitter accounts that call themselves "rogue" representatives for NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have popped up over the past few days. The accounts, which have no official ties to either agency, are a response to the Trump administration's order for at least four government agencies to stop all communications with the public, according to The New York Times. Other government science agencies have started such "rogue" accounts as well; you can see a full list of the "rogue" feeds here.
On the space side, a trio of Twitter feeds (@RogueNASA, @Resistance_NASA and @AltNASA) have cropped up, though, as SpaceNews' Jeff Foust reports, NASA has not been affected by any restrictions on research or communications like those reportedly affecting the Environmental Protection Agency and others. For example, NASA's main climate change website, climate.nasa.gov, remains online and shows the current global levels of carbon dioxide, as well as temperature-rise data and arctic and land ice changes.
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China's Long March rocket carrying the crewed spacecraft Shenzhou-11 at the launch center in Jiuquan, China, on October 10, 2016.
Artist's concept of the Team Indus rover on the moon.
An artist's rendition of the Lunar Occultation Explorer (LOX) spacecraft, a proposed mission for NASA's Medium-class Explorer (MIDEX) program.
Boeing's new blue spacesuit.
Saturn's icy moon Mimas highlights with shadows the vast size of Herschel Crater and its centerpiece Herschel peak. The image was captured by Cassini's narrow-angle camera on October 22, 2016 using several of its spectral filters.
This artist's rendering shows the atmosphere of Mars being stripped off by particle surges from the sun. A new study suggests high levels of radiation from a parent star could reduce the number of moons around planets that orbit close to their parent star.
This image of Ceres, as seen by NASA's Dawn spacecraft, shows how the dwarf planet would appear to human eyes.
Afterword
We're already at the end of January! What a surprise, the month seemed to go by quite quickly. I certainly plan to keep publishing my ANU, as I've gotten an overwhelmingly positive response from you people. As usual, please reply with any comments, questions, or critique. FTH out.
Edit: hit "Post Topic" instead of "Preview" once, so forgot pictures
