Antarctica as Proving Ground for Space Exploration Technologies

Stone Aerospace advance team for the Autonomous Rover/airborne-radar Transects of the Environment beneath the McMurdo Ice Shelf (ARTEMIS) is schedule to reach Antarctica August 22 to set up a test lab. The main team will arrive with ARTEMIS at the end of September, just ahead of the southern hemisphere Spring season. It is designed to evaluate technologies and techniques for independent exploration of vast underground water systems. ARTEMIS will be consolidated into a project called Sub-glacial Polar Ice Navigation, Descent, and Lake Exploration (SPINDLE), along with other elements including a cryobot transport system to tunnel through thick surface ice and a number of small, disposable “marsupial robots”, designed to collect samples from hazardous areas and bring them back to the main AUV. Bill Stone, of Stone Aerospace, indicates that SPINDLE development and field-testing in Antarctic subglacial lakes is done in preparation for exploration at locations of highest interest in the search for life across the Solar System, such as Europa, Enceladus and Ganymede. The International Council for Science division known as the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) just held the 3rd workshop of the Astronomy and Astrophysics from Antarctica research program in Volcano National Park, Hawai’i, USA. The extreme environments, physical isolation and regime for international science cooperation characteristic of Antarctica make it a very interesting analog and inspiration for future large-scale and long-term space science, exploration and development endeavors. (Image Credit: Kevin Hand (JPL/Caltech), Jack Cook (Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution), Howard Perlman (USGS) via NASA; NASA/JPL; NASA’s Planetary Photojournal, PIA01669)

MONDAY

Aug 17 — ISS, LEO: Expedition 44 six-member crew reviewing procedures for Kounotori HTV-5 arrival, analyzing samples & photographs taken from outside ISS during recent Russia EVA; Veggie experiment yielding edible / healthy plants – more advanced system being developed for various vegetables & flowers (to test pollination in space).

Aug 17 — X-37B Space Plane, 312 x 325 km Earth Orbit: Fourth undisclosed mission (OTV-4, Orbital Test Vehicle-4) of U.S. Air Force continues to conduct experiments & test technologies; launched May 20.

Aug 17 — Chang’e-5T1, Circular 200-km Altitude Moon Orbit: Performing various maneuvers / exercises to verify guidance techniques for future Chang’e-5 sample return mission, imagining surface at low altitude.

Aug 17 — New Horizons, Kuiper Belt Trajectory: Traveling at 52,240 kph, continuing to collect data on Pluto system / send information to Earth; will take about 500 days to downlink 50 gigabytes of data from flyby already in storage.

Aug 17 — Cassini, Saturn Orbit: Dione flyby scheduled at 474-km altitude, Tethys at 42,000 km, Enceladus at 53,000 km, Methone at 90,000 km, Titan at 960,000 km.

Aug 17 — New Worlds Institute, Austin TX: NewSpace company with Rick Tumlinson as Chairman, holding conference for Oct 16-17, advocating for space exploration, human spaceflight and education, working to connect all sectors of people interested in Space.

Aug 17 — Innovative Solutions In Space (ISIS), Delft, The Netherlands: Partnering with space-mining Deep Space Industries to integrate its hardware & avionics with DSI technologies for high-quality, low-cost, 1-20 kg turnkey nanosatellites.

Aug 17 — Starburst Accelerator, Paris, France: Helping aerospace start-ups receive funding, office space, mentorship; planning to open new location in El Segundo CA; more than 40+ space start-ups received average of $893K.

Aug 17 — United Nations, CANEUS (Canada-Europe-USA-Asia), Worldwide / Montreal, Canada: Global satellite to be named UN Kalam GlobalSat to celebrate Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, former President / rocket man of India; satellite is UN-driven initiative for sharing technology & ideas to prepare / control risk of natural disasters.

Aug 17 — Silicon Valley Space Center, Mountain View CA: Lecture: Quantum Key Distribution by CubeSat; presented by Robert Bedington, Research Fellow at Center for Quantum Technologies & post-doc at National University of Singapore.

ISEC 2015 and IAA Space Elevator Study Group Convene in Seattle

The 2015 International Space Elevator Consortium (ISEC) at the Museum of Flight in Seattle, Washington August 21-23 features keynote speaker PhD. student Mark Haase of University of Cincinnati and David Horn conducting the welcoming statement and wrap-up remarks. The conference this year, with the twin themes Carbon Nanotube Tensile Strength Progress and Marine Node Design Characteristics, offers mini-workshops, “Elevator Speech” competition, Family Science Fest, youth robotics competition and science sessions. The revolutionary Space Elevator (SE) concept will be an undertaking of epic proportions, testing the limits of engineering ingenuity. SE construction would connect long cables tethered from a base site near the equator to a tower at 35,786-km altitude (geostationary orbit). While developing materials and resources to construct the cables have been challenging, laboratory produced carbon nanotubes are identified as a possibility. The SE will be designed for electromagnetic vehicles to travel up high-speed tracks to various platform levels. Preceding the conference, an IAA study group meeting is scheduled for Aug 20 as a follow-up to the “Assessment of the Technological Feasibility and Challenges of the Space Elevator Concept” with members: Chair, Akira Tsuchida, Co-Chair(s) David Raitt and Peter Swan, and Secretary Sakurako Takahashi. (Image Credit: NASA, ESA, ISEC)

Aug 17 — The Space Show, Online / Tiburon CA: Dr. David Livingston talks with Professor Madhu Thangavelu from Department Of Astronautical Engineering within the Viterbi School of Engineering at University of Southern California.

Aug 17-19 — University of Australia, AAO, Australia Academy of Science, Sydney, Australia: Conference: Quantum Astronomy and Stellar Imaging.

Aug 17-21 — Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, Tokyo, Japan: 8th Meeting on Cosmic Dust.

Aug 17-28 — ICTP South American Institute for Fundamental Research (ICTP-SAIFR), Fermilab, American Physical Society, Sao Paulo, Brazil: International Neutrino Summer School 2015.

Aug 17-21 — Millimeter Astronomy Group – National Research Council, North American ALMA Science Center, University of BC, Penticton, British Columbia, Canada: 2015 Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) Summer School.

Aug 17 — Moon: At apogee (distance 405,386 km), 17:00.

Continued from…

Aug 9 – Sep 13 — Aspen Center for Physics, Aspen CO: Workshop: New Directions to Shed Light on Dark Matter.

Aug 15-22 — LSST, National Optical Astronomy Observatory, NSF, AURA Observatory in Chile, University of Chile, La Serena, Chile: La Serena School for Data Science: Applied Tools for Astronomy.

Aug 16-19 — University of Hawai’i at Mānoa, Honolulu HI: Conference: Chaos Among The Stars (CATS).

Aug 16-22 — Qui Nhon Science and Education Foundation, Rencontres du Vietnam, Quy Nhon, Vietnam: 11th Rencontres du Vietnam: Cosmology 50 Years after CMB Discovery.