There's an iconic scene in the original Star Wars movie where Luke Skywalker looks out over the desert landscape of Tatooine at the amazing spectacle of a double sunset.
Now, a new study out of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) suggests that such exotic exoplanet worlds orbiting multiple stars may exist in misaligned orbits, far out of the primary orbital plane.
The find has implications for planetary formation in complex multiple star systems. The study used ALMA (the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array) in Chile to look at 19 protoplanetary disks around binary stars with longer period orbits, versus a dozen binary stars known to host exoplanets with periods less than 40 days found in the Kepler space telescope observations.
Not to change the topic here:
Virgin Orbit's 'dress rehearsal' | Local News | avpress.com
Cosmic Girl, the modified 747 airliner used as Virgin Orbit's laugh platform, is seen practicing the pull up maneuver used when it drops the LauncherOne rocket to propel a payload into space during a test flight Sunday from the Mojave Air and Space Port.
MOJAVE — Virgin Orbit had a final dress rehearsal Sunday, before the maiden launch demonstration of its LauncherOne space launch system, a captive carry flight with essentially everything but the actual rocket launch.
Meet Oumuamua: The Rogue Planet That Doesn't Orbit a Star | The National Interest
Small satellite launcher Virgin Orbit conducts dress rehearsal ahead of its first test flight -
On Sunday, small satellite launcher Virgin Orbit did an intricate dress rehearsal of how it plans to launch rockets into space — without actually sending any rockets anywhere. The successful demonstration potentially paves the way for the company's first test launch sometime this year.
Instead of launching its vehicles vertically from the ground — like most other rocket companies — Virgin Orbit plans to launch them from midair. The company has developed a small rocket called LauncherOne, which is designed to take off from under the wing of the company's giant 747 airplane nicknamed Cosmic Girl. The plane is meant to fly to an altitude of 35,000 feet, and from there, LauncherOne will fall from the wing and ignite its main engine. It'll then climb the rest of the way to space.
In case you are keeping track:
Marubeni links up with Italian aerospace startup D-Orbit -
TOKYO -- Japan's Marubeni Corp . announced on Tuesday that it will form a partnership with Italian aerospace startup D-Orbit aimed at the satellite launch business.
The trading house is already an investor in Japanese startup Interstellar Technologies but the partnership with D-Orbit will focus on studying the development of an agile satellite release system to attract European demand for small satellite launches.
Marubeni formed a capital partnership with Interstellar, run by entrepreneur Takafumi Horie, in November. Interstellar develops and manufactures a small-sized space rocket, MOMO, as well as Zero, which can launch small satellites into orbit.
How SpaceX, Blue Origin, Virgin Orbit and ULA are helping in the fight against coronavirus
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Known for the ingenuity and problem-solving skills, the engineers responsible for making rockets and spacecraft are now putting their brainpower and high-tech manufacturing methods to help combat COVID-19.
To help with the shortage of face shields for healthcare professionals, Blue Origin is using 25 of its 3D printers that normally make rocket parts to crank out hundreds of visors used for protective face shields.
The employees volunteering to work on the project spend their days developing Blue's powerful rocket engine known as BE4 and their free time making the shields at their headquarters in Kent, Washington.
After careful quarantine, the next ISS crew arrives in orbit – TechCrunch
To be clear, ISS crews are always quarantined prior to launch to make sure they don’t bring the flu up from a chance encounter, but given the coronavirus situation, this was a special occasion.
Expedition 63 will relieve the current crew after about a week of overlap, during which no doubt the ISS begins to feel fairly crowded.
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Chris Cassidy and his Soyuz crewmates were not tested for coronavirus. They have been under strict quarantine procedures ahead of their launch and no members of their support team in Baikonur have shown any symptoms or fevers.
NASA Space Station On-Orbit Status 10 April 2020 - Ice Experiment Update - SpaceRef
Today - STP-H5 (Space Test Program) ICE (Innovative Coatings Experiment) photos: The crew took several still camera photos of the ICE strip from the Cupola and JEM Window locations.
These photos are used to document the current state of the ICE experiment once per quarter. The harsh radiation and extreme temperatures of space can corrode the paint and coatings that protect spacecraft exteriors, potentially damaging a spacecraft's hull. Optical coatings are also important for robotic and human navigators, who would rely on specialized markings to capture or repair spacecraft.
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