The researchers found that using five robots allowed them to complete the task, even if one of the robots failed. The project will help the students create automated navigation so satellites can dock up without bumping into each other in space, sending the objects tumbling. Once a satellite is launched, it's impossible to repair or refuel it in low-Earth orbit. This leads to a number of useless satellites drifting through LEO.
As humans keep putting satellites into space, the risk of these human-made objects colliding into each other grows with every launch. The preexisting debris and naturally occurring micrometeoroids surrounding Earth are already a concern. But when these objects collide with each other, they create even more debris. The potential runaway debris problem, dubbed the Kessler effect or Kessler syndrome, has become a growing concern as more and more satellites are sent into space.
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Orbiting robots could soon start repairing satellites in space | Astronomy.com
Ou Ma testing out the technology that would allow satellites to repair and refuel each other in space.
Once a satellite is launched, it’s impossible to repair or refuel it in low-Earth orbit. This leads to a number of useless satellites drifting through LEO. A human mission to repair every broken satellite would be too costly to be effective. But with more and more satellites being launched, fixing a few of them would be an effective way to reduce the number orbiting Earth.
Beer in orbit: Why space is the next frontier for alcohol | Fox News
NASA reconstructed the view from astronaut Buzz Aldrin's window on the Lunar Module Eagle and displayed it side-by-side with the original 16mm film.
The idea of alcohol in space may seem outlandish, but a number of companies and organizations are ready to tap into some new opportunities.
On Dec. 5, SpaceX launched a 3-ton shipment to the International Space Station containing a miniature of a brewery's malt house. The barley grains were sent into space for a beer-malting experiment by Anheuser-Busch. It's the latest in a series of Budweiser experiments to explore how barley germination is affected by weightlessness.
In a first, astronomers find traces of a planet orbiting a white dwarf – Astronomy Now
In the first observation of its kind, astronomers using the Very Large Telescope in Chile have found evidence of a Neptune-size planet orbiting a white dwarf, the collapsed remnant of a Sun-like star that has run out of nuclear fuel. The planet orbits so close to the dwarf that its atmosphere has been stripped away by intense ultraviolet radiation, forming a disc around the star.
"It was one of those chance discoveries," said Boris Gänsicke, a researcher at the University of Warwick who led the study. The team was tipped off by finding traces of elements not seen in the spectra of some 7,000 other white dwarf stars observed by the Sloan Digital Sky Survey.
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Astroscale pursuing military customers for in-orbit services, debris removal - SpaceNews.com
LOS ANGELES — Astroscale, a Japanese company that recently stood up an American subsidiary , sees the U.S. military as a potential customer for the company's debris removal and other in-orbit services.
Astroscale is preparing to demonstrate satellite de-orbiting technology in low Earth orbit next year and is talking to potential commercial and government customers, Ron Lopez, president and managing director of Denver-based Astroscale U.S. Inc., told SpaceNews.
NASA's Sun-Orbiting Probe Reveals New Secrets of Our Host Star | Smart News |
The $1.5 billion probe has flown closer to the sun than any spacecraft in history, passing through the sun’s upper atmosphere, or corona, for the first time. The probe is loaded up with several suites of instruments that collect data about solar wind, plasma flows, the sun’s magnetic field and more, reports Alexandra Witze at Nature News & Comment .
Scientists at University of California, Berkeley led by plasma physicist Stuart Bale control the probe’s devices, fittingly dubbed FIELDS, that study the sun’s magnetic and electric fields. A second toolkit called SWEAP—or Solar Wind Electrons Alphas and Protons, operated by the University of Michigan and the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory—measures the particles of solar winds. The probe’s imaging instrument WISPR is led by the Naval Research Lab.
NASA Space Station On-Orbit Status 5 December 2019 - SpaceX Resupply Mission Launched - SpaceRef
The SpaceX Dragon resupply ship is on its way to the International Space Station packed with science and supplies for the Expedition 61 crew.
Russia's Progress 74 cargo craft will soon follow the U.S. spaceship with a launch set for Friday morning.
Dragon blasted off from Florida on Thursday at 12:29 p.m. EST carrying nearly three tons of cargo. Included in the space shipment are new science experiments such as the Confined Combustion study, Japan's Hyperspectral Imager Suite (HISUI) and the AzTechSat-1 cubesat developed by Mexican students.
China sends six satellites into orbit with single rocket - Xinhua | English.news.cn
An earth observation satellite, Gaofen-12, is launched aboard a Long March-4C rocket from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in Taiyuan, capital of north China's Shanxi Province, Nov. 28, 2019. (Xinhua/Zheng Taotao)
Six satellites were launched into space at once by a Kuaizhou-1A (KZ-1A) rocket from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in north China's Shanxi Province Saturday.
TAIYUAN, Dec. 7 (Xinhua) -- China sent six satellites into space from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in northern Shanxi Province at 4:52 p.m. Saturday (Beijing Time).
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