Slashdot Mirror
Domain: space.com
Stories and comments across the archive that link to space.com.
Stories · 1,058
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Space Shuttle One Step Closer To July Launch
Mictian writes "The risk to the space shuttle from launch debris, mainly ice falling off the external tank, has been reduced and is now low enough to be considered 'an acceptable risk,' NASA's shuttle engineers and managers concluded in the debris verification meeting held Saturday at Kennedy Space Center. The board recommended a green light for a July launch, which Shuttle Program Manager Bill Parsons accepted. The independent Return to Flight Task Group will hold its final meeting on June 27th to determine if the remaining 3 (out of 15) hurdles to launch are cleared, as mentioned in previous Slashdot coverage." -
Terraforming - Human Destiny or Hubris?
jangobongo writes "Space.com has a thought-provoking article written by Dave Brody for Ad Astra Magazine about the practical and ethical aspects of terraforming other planets. Mars is currently the focus of most terraforming debates, but the author's conclusion is: 'What works is what takes the least work: [terraform] asteroid/comet resources in near Earth orbits... Humanity would get lots and lots of cheap, free-floating, scalable, designer settlements in interesting, useful orbits.' These would then become stepping stones to other planets in our solar system and beyond." -
BLAST High Altitude Telescope Launched
Xandu writes "BLAST, the Balloon-borne Large Aperture Sub-millimeter Telescope, was launched on the 11th at 11:09 UTC from Esrange in northern Sweden, and is currently floating over Greenland. BLAST is a 2700kg telescope with a 2 meter primary mirror that hangs from a 1.1 million m^3 balloon floating at an altitude of 38km that will study the star formation history of the universe. It will float west at nearly constant latitude for about 5 days before the flight is terminated over northwest Canada or northern Alaska. Real time position and flight track is available from the NSBF. Two of the graduate students working on the project have photo blogs of the entire (8 week) prep period, including several launch photos. The press has more traditional coverage as well. And if that isn't geeky enough to make it on Slashdot, the flight computers run Slack." -
Space Shuttles almost Ready to Re-Launch
stagmeister writes "CNN and Space.com are reporting that the Return to Flight Task Group, the overseeing committee that determines when the Space Shuttles can go back into space, has reported that the only items blocking the Shuttles are issues 'related to tank debris, orbiter hardening and tile repair.' They plan to re-meet in later this month to finalize their decision. However, 'NASA has made clear it intends to resume shuttle flights with the repair capabilities it has in hand without knowing for sure whether they would work in an emergency.' Would you want your children flying a space shuttle that hasn't been properly beta-tested?" -
Math to Crack Deep Impact Blurry Vision Problem
starexplorer writes "NASA announced that they believe they have a solution for the Deep Impact mission's blurry vision problem: math. Although the craft will still snap blurry pictures of the Tempel-1 comet, mathmetical manipulation will help scientists clear up the images once they make their way back to Earth. A special report and viewing guide are also available at SPACE.com." -
Math to Crack Deep Impact Blurry Vision Problem
starexplorer writes "NASA announced that they believe they have a solution for the Deep Impact mission's blurry vision problem: math. Although the craft will still snap blurry pictures of the Tempel-1 comet, mathmetical manipulation will help scientists clear up the images once they make their way back to Earth. A special report and viewing guide are also available at SPACE.com." -
Math to Crack Deep Impact Blurry Vision Problem
starexplorer writes "NASA announced that they believe they have a solution for the Deep Impact mission's blurry vision problem: math. Although the craft will still snap blurry pictures of the Tempel-1 comet, mathmetical manipulation will help scientists clear up the images once they make their way back to Earth. A special report and viewing guide are also available at SPACE.com." -
ISS Oxygen Generator Fails for Good
billyj4 writes "A balky Russian oxygen generator broke down on the International Space Station, but its two-man crew has a reserve air supply that would last about five months, NASA officials said Friday. The station's primary generator, which has been operating in an on-again, off-again fashion for months, stopped working last week and the station's crew has not been able to fix it. Mission managers say the unit has failed for good. Consequently, Russian cosmonaut Sergei Krikalev and U.S. astronaut John Phillips will be relying on reserves until replacement parts arrive at the station in late August." -
Mars Rover Opportunity Still Stuck In a Dune
Maddog Batty writes "The mars rover Opportunity, which has been stuck in a sand dune since the end of April, is still going nowhere after wheel spinning attempts were made to free the probe. It did manage to move a very short distance as can be seen in the difference between these two images. Before this attempt the NASA JPL team were playing in their own sandpit trying to replicate the conditions on Mars. (older coverage)" -
Low-Cost Space Shuttle Replacement Proposed
FleaPlus writes "The Washington Times and Space.com has an article on a plan for a low-cost shuttle replacement by t/Space, an organization whose team includes AirLaunch LLC and Burt Rutan's Scaled Composites. Instead of a one-size-fits-all craft, t/Space's plan is to build an air-launched four-person capsule termed the Crew Transfer Vehicle (CXV), specialized for carrying people to and from low-Earth orbit. Once in orbit the CXV would dock with a separately-launched Crew Exploration Vehicle (likely built by Lockheed Martin or Northrop Grumman), which could be optimized for traveling between Earth orbit and the Moon. The CXV would also be able to dock with a space station or serve as a crew lifeboat. The group, which has already received some NASA funding, calculates that it can have the system ready by 2008 for $400 million, with a per-launch cost of $20 million (compared to ~$500 million per shuttle launch). Development would be done under a competitive fixed-price (instead of cost-plus) contract." -
Black Hole Birth Detected this Morning
An anonymous reader writes "SPACE.com is reporting on the first optical afterglow ever detected from a short-duration (milliseconds) Gamma-Ray Burst. The GRB signals the birth of a black hole resulting from a merger between two neutron stars. Theory had predicted the whole thing, which was all spotted this morning by NASA's Swift satellite and ground-based observatories, thanks to an automated email system that notifies astronomers worldwide." -
NASA Preparing Manned Hubble Service Mission
danimrich writes "According to an article at Space.com, 'NASA's new Administrator Mike Griffin told reporters today [April 29] that he informed key members of Congress Thursday evening that he would direct engineers at Goddard Spaceflight center to start preparing for a space shuttle servicing mission to the Hubble Space Telescope on the assumption that one ultimately will go forward.'" -
Mars Rover Stuck in a Dune
Bamfarooni writes "The NASA Mars rover Opportunity has gotten stuck in a dune, buried up to the hubs of the wheels. While they haven't given up yet, it doesn't look good for the little guy who's now 359 days into the extended mission." From the article: "The Mars machinery had been cruising southward across the open parking lot-like landscape of Meridiani Planum, full of larger and larger ripples of soil. Opportunity has been en route to its next stopover, Erebus crater, nestled inside an even larger crater known as Terra Nova." -
NASA Postpones Shuttle Launch
Mictian writes "NASA has decided to postpone Discovery's upcoming Return to Flight (STS-114) by a week to May 22. This is done in order to give the agency more time to finish paperwork, analyses and reviews of safety changes made. The delay came as no surprise, since the original May 15 date was always considered preliminary. The current launch window extends from May 15 to June 3." -
Biological Activity on Mars
visination.com writes "Recent ground based observations of Mars have confirmed the presence of water and methane. The 300 year life time of methane on Mars is short, giving scientists reason to beleive that Mars may be biologically active." From the article: "Every one of these longitudes shows a very substantial enhancement in the equatorial zone...So this is a very intense source of methane on Mars in this region. It also requires a very rapid decay of methane...more rapid than photochemistry would allow..." -
Site for Moon Base Determined
Deinhard writes "Going hand-in-hand with the recent discussion on Moon Bases, Space.com is reporting that the perfect spot for a moon base has been found. According to the article, 'the best spot to settle on the Moon may be on the northern rim of Peary crater, close to the north pole.' What makes the location so important is that it is permanently lit, with a balmy -58 Fahrenheit (-50 C)." -
Hope for Hubble
yulek writes "It may not be over yet. space today reports that Bush's NASA administrator nominee, Michael Griffin, wants to revisit the Hubble decision. Space.com has some more details. The big question is: do we really want to save Hubble for the right reasons or is it more of a symbolic thing? Considering NASA's fiscal woes, is this a waste of funds? I have loved the Hubble images for the last decade, and the research that stemmed from them, but I think that the most incredible camera we've ever made may need more than just an upgrade. Perhaps it is obsolete." -
Space Elevator Update
TheMadReaper writes "The 2005 edition of the Space Exploration Conference in Albuquerque, NM came to a conclusion earlier this week. A large fraction of the conference was devoted to the Space Elevator. Surprisingly, there hasn't been much news coverage of this conference, perhaps because it doesn't have Space Elevator in its name. The most interesting fact I got from the conference is that money is really starting to exist in the space elevator world mainly thanks to the work of Dr. Bradley Edwards at ISR and at Carbon Designs, Inc. The strong nanotube talk was also more promising than last year." -
NASA Looking for Bandwidth Sponsorship
Neil Halelamien writes "A news release and MSNBC's Cosmic Log report that NASA has a web sponsorship opportunity for companies in return for providing bandwidth support for the two upcoming Space Shuttle missions of Discovery and Atlantis. The missions, scheduled for this summer, are expected to cause 20 to 30 million web site visits each and up to a half million streaming video feeds. The alternative is for NASA to cap the number of visitors. Sponsorship proposals are being accepted through April 13." -
Crack Found in Shuttle Tank
hpulley writes "The shuttle's new fuel tank, supposedly redesigned to be safer, has a crack in it. Pictures were sent to the manufacturer who decided that it is too small to be worrisome. Hmm, what caused the Columbia disaster, pieces of foam? Meanwhile, there will be a second shuttle on standby, just in case the first one has problems after being hit by foam, etc. If the first shuttle has a design flaw, what's to say the second one isn't afflicted by the same problem? Won't there be a good chance of them stranding the rescue crew in addition to the original crew? If an aircraft crashes and the redesign to fix it crashes, would you send another of the same type to rescue it? Of course not! The ISS is going to be a smelly, scary place with the regular complement and two shuttle crews onboard and no way home but a Russian Soyuz capsule that isn't slated to launch again until September and has seats for just three..." -
Japan's 20-Year Plan for Space
rwven writes "Japan has just released information on their new space plan which will take them through the year 2025. Included in their plan are robots and nanotechnology for moon surveys as well as an eventual hydrogen powered mach-5 capable plane, a mach-2 capable passenger airliner and a manned mission to the moon. They will consider missions to mars and other planets after 2025. Space.com is also carrying this story." -
Draft Guidelines for Space Tourists
IZ Reloaded writes "Draft guidelines for space tourists have already been written in the United States." From the article: "A paying customer will now be able to fly into space once he has been informed and accepts the risks of space travel. There are several factors to take into account, depending on whether a passenger is taking a speedy "pop top," up-and-down, suborbital voyage, versus climbing onboard space machinery to roar off into orbit for an extended stay." -
NASA Unveils Centennial Challenges
wonderfesten writes "NASA has finally got its Centennial Challenges program off the ground. Like the X Prize, the Challenges award cash prizes to private inventors who come up with solutions to problems. The first challenges are to design a light-weight, ultra-strength tether and a means of transmitting power wirelessly. But with a prize of just $50,000, will anyone give it a shot?" Details also available on MSNBC and Space.com. -
ESA and NASA Consider Joint Mission To Europa
ewg writes "In defiance of the monolith, the European Space Agency and NASA are in the early planning stages of an automated joint mission to Europa, Jupiter's watery moon. This follows the triumphant Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn's moon Titan. "All these worlds are yours, except Europa..."" -
Whirlwinds on Mars, From the Ground
Neil Halelamien writes "Back in 1999, satellite images were photographed of 5-mile-high whirlwinds streaking across the surface of Mars. A couple of months ago the Spirit rover got a close up view of whirlwind tracks, and this past week photographed a whirlwind in action (animation). It's thought that these dust devils may be responsible for the mystery power boost to the rovers' solar cells. Last year the rovers also spotted clouds and frost." -
Whirlwinds on Mars, From the Ground
Neil Halelamien writes "Back in 1999, satellite images were photographed of 5-mile-high whirlwinds streaking across the surface of Mars. A couple of months ago the Spirit rover got a close up view of whirlwind tracks, and this past week photographed a whirlwind in action (animation). It's thought that these dust devils may be responsible for the mystery power boost to the rovers' solar cells. Last year the rovers also spotted clouds and frost." -
Senator Calls on NASA to Service Hubble
Avantare writes "Senator Calls on NASA to Service Hubble In a sternly worded letter to acting NASA Administrator Frederick D. Gregory, Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-Md.) said she expects the U.S. space agency to heed the will of the Congress and keep preparations for a Hubble Space Telescope servicing mission on track. Congress, in passing an omnibus spending bill late last year, directed NASA to set aside $291 million of its 2005 budget to spend planning and preparing for a servicing mission to Hubble by 2008. When NASA informed Congress just weeks later that it intended to spend only $175 million of that amount on the Hubble repair effort, some saw the move as an indication that the agency was preparing to abandon plans to service Hubble robotically and rely instead on a space shuttle crew to fix the telescope." -
Space Weather Forecasters Can Count on Jupiter
Abhishek writes "Space.com reports that forecasters who predict the Solar weather can rely on Jupiter now to help them see the part of the sun that is not visible due to Earth's rotation and revolution and sun's rotation along its own axis. Scientists observing the X-Ray emanating from the Jovian atmosphere theorised that those coming from the equator were related to solar activity but it is definitely not a perfect mirror; only one in every few thousand X-Ray photons get reflected. But even that is very useful in predicting the solar weather. 'We found that Jupiter's day-to-day disk X-rays were synchronized with the Sun's emissions,' said Anil Bhardwaj at NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, who led a new study using data from the European Space Agency's XMM-Newton telescope. Their work was detailed in Geophysical Research Letters." -
Astronauts Face Bleak Odds For Spaceflight
Abhishek writes "According to a Space.com report, Astronauts at NASA fear that they won't be able to fly until 2015 and that, for some, would be too late. The space shuttles that NASA have are almost at the end of their lifetimes and any shuttle can take years to be built. Though almost everybody is involved in some way or another in looking after a shuttle, only a lucky few actually gets the chance for a ride." -
Solar "Tadpoles" Finally Explained
Abhishek writes " Solar "tadpoles" - dark shadows that seem to wiggle down toward the surface of the sun during flares - may have been explained by University of Warwick astrophysicists. Dr Valery Nakariakov and Dr Erwin Verwichte analysed observations obtained with NASA's "Transition Region And Coronal Explorer" (TRACE) space mission. They theorize that the wiggles of the tadpoles' tails are earth-sized waves similar to the waves in a flag blown by the wind. They think that the waves are produced by a phenomenon known as "negative energy waves"; waves pull energy from the medium they propagate through. The "tadpoles" are optical illusions, rather than real physical structures; the apparently descending tadpole head marks the falling start point of the matter's upward acceleration." -
SMART-1 to Image Apollo Landing Sites
An anonymous reader writes "Space.com is reporting that the European Space Agency's SMART-1 probe is imaging the Apollo landing sites on the moon. The resolution may be good enough to see mineral evidence of the blasts created by landing craft. Photos expected too. The article says it "might put to rest conspiratorial thoughts that U.S. astronauts didn't go the distance and scuff up the lunar landscape." I wouldn't bet my Buzz Aldrin doll that hoax buffs will cease and desist." -
Debris is Shuttle's Biggest Threat
Masq666 writes "Tiny rocks, paint flecks and other fragments of junk whizzing around the Earth pose the greatest threat to the shuttles and the astronauts on board, according to the preliminary results of a new NASA risk study. Even coin sized fragments can cause great damage to a shuttle, and the damage can be lethal, if it hits the windows or the heat shield." -
Star Smaller Than Some Planets Found
Abhishek writes "Astronomers have found the tiniest full-fledged star known, an object just 16 percent bigger than Jupiter. It is smaller than some known planets that orbit other stars. The star is a companion to a Sun-like star toward the center of our Milky Way Galaxy. It was found and measured by observing changes in the light output of the system when the smaller star passes in front of the larger star from our vantagepoint. This would give a better idea of brown dwarfs or failed stars. The star has been named OGLE-TR-122b. This discovery also marks the possibility of stars that look strikingly like planets." -
Sun Storms Deplete Ozone, Too
An anonymous reader writes "Turns out the sun itself zaps the ozone that protects us from the sun. LiveScience is reporting that the record-setting string of solar storms around Halloween in 2003 (including an X28 flare) set off a cascade of events that depleted the ozone layer over the Arctic in early 2004. In a nutshell, more nitrogen was created, and an unusually strong vortex of high-speed winds aloft brought the nitrogen down, where it contributed to cutting ozone by 60 percent over the polar region. In January, the a European scientist warned residents of the far north to basically stay out of the sun. While chlorofluorocarbons are still blamed for ozone depletion, scientists said this study shows they don't properly account for the sun's impact." -
Brightest Galactic Flash Ever Detected Hits Earth
phenon writes "On December 27th scientists detected the largest cosmic blast to strike the Earth, actually altering the earths ionosphere briefly. MSNBC reports (along with Space.com), that this event happened from a magnetar 50,000 light years away from us, and if it had happened from a distance of 10 light years away, we would be talking about mass extinction here on earth. The cosmic ray blast was measured at 10,000 trillion trillion trillion watts of power!" -
The Indirect Case For Life On Mars
Deinhard writes "Space.com is reporting that '[a] pair of NASA scientists told a group of space officials at a private meeting here Sunday that they have found strong evidence that life may exist today on Mars, hidden away in caves and sustained by pockets of water.' It is all based on methane signatures and not direct observation. Now plans for using the Genesis Device on Mars are out ... unless this is just a particle of preanimate matter caught in the matrix." -
Personal Spaceflight Leaders Form New Federation
Neil Halelamien writes "A number of entrepreneurs in the nascent commercial space industry are establishing the Personal Spaceflight Federation, an industry group which will work with federal regulators to come up with standards to promote crew and passenger safety. The founders include both suborbital and orbital spaceflight entrepreneurs, such as Armadillo Aerospace's John Carmack, Scaled Composites's Burt Rutan, SpaceX's Elon Musk, and t/Space's Gary Hudson. Commentary available on MSNBC, Space.com, and Space Race News. In related news, NASA is looking at commercial options for resupply of the International Space Station." -
Huygens Wind Experiment Salvaged
SeaDour writes "Earlier, it was reported that the data from a critical wind speed experiment onboard the Huygens probe to Titan was completely lost due to someone forgetting to turn on one of Cassini's communications channels. However, it now appears that ground-based radio telescopes from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory were able to record the transmission's many subtle doppler shifts and reconstruct that lost wind data. The winds altered the probe's horizontal rate of descent, thereby producing a change in the frequency of the signal received on Earth. Additionally, the resolution of the radio telescopes was good enough to track Huygen's position to within one kilometer, allowing for the creation of a three-dimensional model of Huygen's descent." -
Space Tourism First Hand
starexplorer writes "You've probably heard that Zero-G Corporation is offering weightless trips to the public. But now, Space.com is reporting an insider's assessment of the experience. Space Tourism seems to be taking off with the public, and with advertisers, as evidenced by Volvo's new 'win a trip to space' contest that kicked off during the Super Bowl." -
Strange Mini Solar System Found
starexplorer writes "In 1990, Penn State's Alex Wolszczan found the first exoplanets. But he never got much credit from mainstream researchers, because his planets (3 of them, roughly Earth-sized) orbit pulsars and hold no chance for harboring life. Now he's found a 4th object on the outskirts of the system, SPACE.com is reporting. Call it a planet, call it an asteroid, Wolszczan says, but call the setup a dark, eerie twin of the inner half of our solar system. Also in the same story, news of a brown dwarf just 15 times the mass of Jupiter that has a planet-making disk of stuff around it. Together, more problems for astronomers, who still don't have a basic definition for the word planet or a firm idea of what separates planets from stars." -
Strange Mini Solar System Found
starexplorer writes "In 1990, Penn State's Alex Wolszczan found the first exoplanets. But he never got much credit from mainstream researchers, because his planets (3 of them, roughly Earth-sized) orbit pulsars and hold no chance for harboring life. Now he's found a 4th object on the outskirts of the system, SPACE.com is reporting. Call it a planet, call it an asteroid, Wolszczan says, but call the setup a dark, eerie twin of the inner half of our solar system. Also in the same story, news of a brown dwarf just 15 times the mass of Jupiter that has a planet-making disk of stuff around it. Together, more problems for astronomers, who still don't have a basic definition for the word planet or a firm idea of what separates planets from stars." -
Strange Mini Solar System Found
starexplorer writes "In 1990, Penn State's Alex Wolszczan found the first exoplanets. But he never got much credit from mainstream researchers, because his planets (3 of them, roughly Earth-sized) orbit pulsars and hold no chance for harboring life. Now he's found a 4th object on the outskirts of the system, SPACE.com is reporting. Call it a planet, call it an asteroid, Wolszczan says, but call the setup a dark, eerie twin of the inner half of our solar system. Also in the same story, news of a brown dwarf just 15 times the mass of Jupiter that has a planet-making disk of stuff around it. Together, more problems for astronomers, who still don't have a basic definition for the word planet or a firm idea of what separates planets from stars." -
Asteroid To Be Naked-Eye Visible In 2029
An anonymous reader writes "SPACE.com is reporting that asteroid 2004 MN4 will fly so close to Earth in 2029 that it'll be visible to the naked eye. Other than barely-visible Vesta, this is a first. And 2004 MN4 will be about magnitude 3.3 -- like a dim but easily visible star. A moving star in this case. You might remember 2004 MN4 is the one that sparked worry, in December, that it would hit Earth. No worries, NASA says, just a once-in-a-millennium sky show." -
Asteroid To Be Naked-Eye Visible In 2029
An anonymous reader writes "SPACE.com is reporting that asteroid 2004 MN4 will fly so close to Earth in 2029 that it'll be visible to the naked eye. Other than barely-visible Vesta, this is a first. And 2004 MN4 will be about magnitude 3.3 -- like a dim but easily visible star. A moving star in this case. You might remember 2004 MN4 is the one that sparked worry, in December, that it would hit Earth. No worries, NASA says, just a once-in-a-millennium sky show." -
A Star of Space and Film
Rollie Hawk writes "Three years ago, light from V838 Monocerotis (a star about 20,000 light years from us) reached the Earth that showed the star exploding. The more politically correct term for what happened is "stellar outburst." In the time since, images from a pulse of light released during the outburst have been arriving here on Earth. In October of 2004, Hubble captured a beautiful image of the scene with the pulse lighting up interstellar gasses that encapsulated the area around this red giant (a star 600,000 times brighter than our Sun). The release of this photo just days ago seems rather timely, as it appears that some of Hubble's funding may be cut in the near future. There is also talk of eliminating the program entirely." -
The Evolution of Space Suit Design
William_Lee writes "According to space.com, it looks like we may finally be on the verge of seeing a long overdue, radical redesign of space suits that will result in much lighter, more maneuverable, custom fitted suits. Now if we can actually get around to sending someone to Mars..." -
No Money For Hubble Service Mission
starexplorer writes "SPACE.com is reporting that the White House has eliminated funding for servicing the Hubble Space Telescope from its 2006 budget request. After many options 1, 2 were explored, is this the death knell for Hubble?" -
No Money For Hubble Service Mission
starexplorer writes "SPACE.com is reporting that the White House has eliminated funding for servicing the Hubble Space Telescope from its 2006 budget request. After many options 1, 2 were explored, is this the death knell for Hubble?" -
No Money For Hubble Service Mission
starexplorer writes "SPACE.com is reporting that the White House has eliminated funding for servicing the Hubble Space Telescope from its 2006 budget request. After many options 1, 2 were explored, is this the death knell for Hubble?" -
Paypal Founder's Merlin Rocket Engine Fires Up
Baldrson writes "Wired News reports that after 2 years of development, Space Exploration Technology Corp ('SpaceEx') successfully test-fired their new LOX/Kerosene Merlin rocket engine for the 160 seconds required for orbit. SpaceEx was founded by Elon Musk from the proceeds of the 2002 sale of his prior start-up, Paypal, to Ebay. According to Musk, 5 Merlins bundled with the first stage of SpaceEx's powerful Falcon V booster will launch 5 people to orbit by 2010, thereby winning America's Space Prize which was endowed by Robert Bigelow."
