Space science news

Tag: image

  • How did you do that?


    Human spaceflight and operations image of the week: NASA astronaut Terry Virst demonstrates how he took ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti’s picture in space

  • All Along the Fractures

    All Along the Fractures

    The High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera aboard NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter often takes images of Martian sand dunes to study the mobile soils. These images provide information about erosion and movement of surface material, about wind and weather patterns, even about the soil grains and grain sizes.

  • All Along the Fractures

    The High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera aboard NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter often takes images of Martian sand dunes to study the mobile soils. These images provide information about erosion and movement of surface material, about wind and weather patterns, even about the soil grains and grain sizes.

  • Testing asteroid camera


    Technology image of the week: practical testing of the navigation camera planned to guide ESA’s proposed Asteroid Impact Mission around its double-asteroid target

  • NASA Completes Successful Heat Shield Testing for Future Mars Exploration Vehicles

    NASA Completes Successful Heat Shield Testing for Future Mars Exploration Vehicles

    As NASA missions to Mars progress with science and complex human exploration missions, spacecraft will require larger heat shields to protect against the extreme heat of entering a planet’s atmosphere and decelerating at a safe altitude in the thin Martian atmosphere.

  • NASA Completes Successful Heat Shield Testing for Future Mars Exploration Vehicles

    As NASA missions to Mars progress with science and complex human exploration missions, spacecraft will require larger heat shields to protect against the extreme heat of entering a planet’s atmosphere and decelerating at a safe altitude in the thin Martian atmosphere.

  • Aliens observed


    Space Invader art has arrived at ESA’s Earth observation centre in Italy

  • [JAXA President Monthly Press Conference] JAXA President Monthly Regular Press Conference September 2015

    JAXA President Monthly Regular Press Conference

    Date and time: From 11:00 – 11:45 a.m. on Sept. 10 (Thu.), 2015
    Venue: JAXA Tokyo Office Presentation Room (B1 floor)
    MC: Shigeki Kamigaichi, JAXA Public Affairs Department Director

    The recently launched “KOUNOTORI5” (HTV5) carried a small satellite of the Chiba Institute of Technology and one from Brazil. I would like to announce the date of their deployment from the “Kibo”. It was set for Sept. 17, 2015. Astronaut Yui is one of the members who are in charge of the deployment.

    A rough estimate for the JFY 2016 budget request was proposed by the Ministry of Education Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT). Regarding JAXA, there are four major pillars: a next-generation engineering test satellite, advanced radar satellite, new cargo supplier to the International Space Station (ISS) (temporarily called “HTV-X”), and small moon landing demonstrator.

    Astronaut Norishige Kanai was selected as the seventh Japanese astronaut to stay at the ISS for a prolonged period. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced the decision during a “VIP call” with Astronaut Yui at the ISS on Aug. 26. We expect that Astronaut Kanai will play an active role based on his special knowledge as a medical doctor to generate achievements in the area of space medicine and life science experiments. The Japanese government is also expecting productive results for its health and medicine study as part of its science and technology promotion policy. We informed the government that the Kibo project places emphasis on biomedicine and drug discovery research. I hope that our activities for the Kibo will fulfill objectives and expectations while stimulating interest in science among the young generations. Astronaut Kanai is scheduled to stay at the ISS in the winter of 2017.

    On this Tuesday (Sept. 8), MEXT Minister Hakubun Shimomura announced at a press conference after the Cabinet meeting that JAXA signed an agreement of cooperation with the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) on Sept. 8 for the deployment of small satellites from the Kibo. We will utilize our space technology to improve space development and the utilization capabilities of developing countries under cooperation with the U.N. For JAXA, promoting and providing an opportunity of small satellite deployment through the U.N. means international contributions for maximizing the achievements of the Kibo.

    We held a press conference and issued a press release on July 27 about the second phase test of the “Drop test for the Simplified Evaluation of Non-symmetrically Distributed sonic boom” Project (D-SEND#2). The test was held at the Esrange Space Center in Sweden on July 24, and it successfully performed supersonic flight and measured the sonic boom. For the verification of design technology for reducing the sonic boom, we are still conducting an analysis. We plan to provide data on our project to the Super Sonic Task Group of the International Civil Aviation Organization to be held in Montreal, Canada, at the end of October.

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  • [Space Transportation Systems] H-IIA UPGRADE – Moving to a new stage

    H-IIA UPGRADE

    Enhanced launch performance to cope with geostationary satellite launch –
    Adopting it to the H-IIA Launch Vehicle No. 29, our upgraded flagship launch vehicle

    The “geostationary orbit” is about 36,000 km above the Earth’s equator. The orbit is used by meteorological and communication satellites.
    For entering into the geostationary orbit, a satellite is injected into the “geostationary transfer orbit (GTO)” by a launch vehicle. To date, a satellite has to fly to the geostationary orbit by its own thrust (in other words, by using its onboard engine consuming its loaded propellant) after being inserted into the GTO. Long-Coast (Improving the launch vehicle engine for longer space flight) and multiple-time ignitions enables us to inject a satellite into a closer point to the geostationary orbit.
    By placing a satellite into the orbit closer to the geostationary orbit, less propellant is necessary for the satellite to move to the final destination, thus the volume (weight) for that unnecessary propellant can be used for a larger observation sensor or extra propellant for longer satellite life.

    Renovated flight performance and launch vehicle engine to take a satellite farther

    1. Painting the liquid hydrogen tank in white to reduce propellant evaporation due to sun light
      During space flight, the launch vehicle is constantly heated by the sun and the liquid hydrogen (which is about minus 250 degrees Celsius) in the tank evaporates. By coting the tank surface with special white paint, the tank surface reflects the sun light to reduce propellant evaporation to contribute to Long-Coast.
    2. Decreasing the volume of liquid oxygen for cooling to a third by renovating the engine cooling function
      To ignite the engine, the turbo pump has to be cooled using liquid oxygen. We have developed a new cooling system called the “trickle pre-cooling” to significantly reduce the consumption of liquid oxygen during Long-Coast so that more liquid oxygen can be used for engine operation.
    3. BBQ rolling the launch vehicle to prevent avionics from being heated by the sun
      When one specific side of the launch vehicle is constantly hit by sunlight, the temperature of only that side goes up. By slowly rolling the launch vehicle like a (barbecue (BBQ) roll) while maintaining its attitude vertically against sunlight, we can keep the temperature of all parts of the launch vehicle constant.
    4. Reducing the consumption of propellant for attitude control by effectively utilizing evaporating propellant
      During the Long-Coast, propellant has to be held at the bottom part of the tank to avoid propellant evaporation as much as possible. For that, the propellant for attitude control (Hydrazine) used to be emitted backwards. In the case of Long-Coast, the volume of Hydrazine will not be enough; therefore, in the new system, evaporating propellant will be effectively used.
    5. Equipped with a large volume power source and high performance antenna for long flight
      We developed a large-size lithium ion battery to secure power for avionics during the Long-Coast. A high performance antenna is also installed on the launch vehicle for assuring communication with the launch vehicle even from 36,000 km away to acquire flight status data from the vehicle, such as the engine operation status, even when it reaches near the geostationary orbit.

    Adding the function to control second stage engine thrust (engine power)

    The speed of the launch vehicle near the geostationary orbit (apogee) is slow, thus, if the second stage engine is ignited to full power (100% thrust), it is too powerful to precisely inject a payload into the target orbit. Therefore, we added a function called the “throttling function” to control the second stage engine thrust to 60% so that more flexible orbit insertion becomes possible.

    1. Ignite the second stage engine (second time) at the perigee to increase speed.
    2. Long space flight (“long coast”) for about four hours without separating the second stage and a payload.
    3. Ignite the second stage engine for the third time at the apogee to increase speed, and separate the payload to inject it into the upgraded geostationary transfer orbit (upgraded GTO).
    4. The payload increases its speed at the apogee and enters into the geostationary orbit.

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  • ESTEC's Open Day


    Snapshots from the Sunday 4 October 2015 Open Day at ESA’s technical heart, the most popular one yet

  • Oct. 5, 1984, Launch of History-Making STS-41G Mission

    Oct. 5, 1984, Launch of History-Making STS-41G Mission

    The Space Shuttle Challenger launches from Florida at dawn. On this mission, Kathryn Sullivan became the first U.S. woman to perform a spacewalk and Marc Garneau became the first Canadian in space. The crew of seven was the largest to fly on a spacecraft at that time, and STS-41G was the first flight to include two female astronauts.

  • Oct. 5, 1984, Launch of History-Making STS-41G Mission

    The Space Shuttle Challenger launches from Florida at dawn. On this mission, Kathryn Sullivan became the first U.S. woman to perform a spacewalk and Marc Garneau became the first Canadian in space. The crew of seven was the largest to fly on a spacecraft at that time, and STS-41G was the first flight to include two female astronauts.

  • A Lunar Pox


    Space Science Image of the Week: ESA’s SMART-1 captures Moon’s pockmarked pole with stunning clarity