Space Junk-The Waste in space

Don Kessler, the creator of the said-to-be-famous “Kessler Syndrome” theory? In the late 70s, Kessler, a now retired NASA scientist, penned a seminal paper called: “Collision Frequency of Artificial Satellites: The Creation of a Debris Belt”. In it he wrote: “As the number of artificial satellites in earth orbit increases, the probability of collisions between satellites also increases. Satellite collisions would produce orbiting fragments, each of which would increase the probability of further collisions, leading to the growth of a belt of debris around the earth. This process parallels certain theories concerning the growth of the asteroid belt. The debris flux in such an earth-orbiting belt could exceed the natural meteoroid flux, affecting future spacecraft designs.”

Kessler used a mathematical model to project the rate at which the asteroid belt he described in his paper would form, and came to the conclusion that, given the right conditions, the debris-filled belt could form as early as this century.

Now, in earth terms you’d hardly call something that passed by you with kilometres to spare a miss, but in space a couple of kilometres is what one calls a close shave. Then there’s the fact that a NASA satellite fell to earth last year, and a Russian probe dropped out of the sky this year.

Photo: The Father of Space Junk, Donald Kessler. (Photo courtesy of Space Junk 3D, LLC.) 

But the problem isn’t so much space debris falling to earth because about 70% of the planet is water and smaller pieces of space junk invariably burn up on entry into earth’s atmosphere. The bigger pieces that do land from time to time are a bit of an issue. The real nightmare that’s keeping NASA awake at night, however, is the growing amount of space debris, and the potential for it colliding with the space station or an intergalactic private craft taking tourists into outer space.

A US non-profit science policy outfit, the National Research Council called on NASA to develop a formal strategy for tracking space junk, and to look at removing debris.

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PSLV-C17 Successfully Launches GSAT-12 Satellite

ISRO's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle proves its mettle again. PSLV-C17, in its 19th flight, successfully launches India's communication satellite GSAT-12 from the Second Launch Pad of Satish Dhawan Space Centre- SHAR, Sriharikota, India. PSLV-C17 measuring 44.5 m height, with a lift off weight of 320 tonnes has four stages of solid and liquid propulsion systems alternately. In its XL Version, PSLV-XL uses six extended solid strap-on motors wherein each strap-on carries 12 tonnes of solid propellant. This is a second time such a configuration is being flown, earlier one being the PSLV-C11/Chandrayaan-I mission.

Salient feature of PSLV-C17/GSAT-12 Mission:

·         For the first time, use of indigenously designed and developed On-Board computer (OBC) with Vikram 1601 processor in both primary and redundant chains of the vehicle. The OBC performs the functions of Navigation, Guidance and Control processing for the vehicle.

·         Use of extended solid strap-on configuration

·         Satellite injection in elliptical transfer orbit sub-Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (GTO)

·         Five burn strategy (2 perigee burn and 3 apogee burn) for placing the GSAT-12 satellite from its sub-GTO to Geostationary Orbit

Aurora Borealis as seen from Space

A handy video from our friends at the BBC on a northern light spectacular witnessed in 2009.

SpaceX to Launch World's Most Powerful Rocket

Falcon Heavy will lift more than twice as much as any other launch vehicle

Elon Musk, CEO and chief rocket designer of Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) unveiled the dramatic final specifications and launch date for the Falcon Heavy, the world's largest rocket.

“Falcon Heavy will carry more payload to orbit or escape velocity than any vehicle in history, apart from the Saturn V moon rocket, which was decommissioned after the Apollo program. This opens a new world of capability for both government and commercial space missions,” Musk told a press conference at the National Press Club in Washington, DC.

“Falcon Heavy will arrive at our Vandenberg, California, launch complex by the end of next year, with liftoff to follow soon thereafter. First launch from our Cape Canaveral launch complex is planned for late 2013 or 2014.”

Musk added that with the ability to carry satellites or interplanetary spacecraft weighing over 53 metric tons or 117,000 pounds to orbit, Falcon Heavy will have more than twice the performance of the Delta IV Heavy, the next most powerful vehicle, which is operated by United Launch Alliance, a Boeing-Lockheed Martin joint venture.

53 metric tons is more than the maximum take-off weight of a fully-loaded Boeing 737-200 with 136 passengers. In other words, Falcon Heavy can deliver the equivalent of an entire commercial airplane full of passengers, crew, luggage and fuel all the way to orbit.

Falcon Heavy’s first stage will be made up of three nine-engine cores, which are used as the first stage of the SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle. It will be powered by SpaceX’s upgraded Merlin engines currently being tested at the SpaceX rocket development facility in McGregor, Texas. Falcon Heavy will generate 3.8 million pounds of thrust at liftoff. This is the equivalent to the thrust of fifteen Boeing 747s taking off at the same time.

Above all, Falcon Heavy has been designed for extreme reliability. Unique safety features of the Falcon 9 are preserved, such as the ability to complete its mission even if multiple engines fail. Like a commercial airliner, each engine is surrounded by a protective shell that contains a worst case situation like fire or a chamber rupture, preventing it from affecting other engines or the vehicle itself.

Anticipating potential astronaut transport needs, Falcon Heavy is also designed to meet NASA human rating standards, unlike other satellite launch vehicles. For example, this means designing to higher structural safety margins of 40% above flight loads, rather than the 25% level of other rockets, and triple redundant avionics.

Falcon Heavy will be the first rocket in history to do propellant cross-feed from the side boosters to the center core, thus leaving the center core with most of its propellant after the side boosters separate. The net effect is that Falcon Heavy achieves performance comparable to a three stage rocket, even though only the upper stage is airlit, further improving both payload performance and reliability. Crossfeed is not required for missions below 100,000 lbs, and can be turned off if desired.

Despite being designed to higher structural margins than other rockets, the side booster stages will have a mass ratio (full of propellant vs empty) above 30, better than any vehicle of any kind in history.

Falcon Heavy, with more than twice the payload, but less than one third the cost of a Delta IV Heavy, will provide much needed relief to government and commercial budgets. In fact, Falcon Heavy at approximately $1,000 per pound to orbit, sets a new world record in affordable spaceflight.

This year, even as the Department of Defense budget was cut, the EELV launch program, which includes the Delta IV, still saw a thirty percent increase.

The 2012 budget for four Air Force launches is $1.74B, which is an average of $435M per launch. Falcon 9 is offered on the commercial market for $50-60M and Falcon Heavy is offered for $80-$125M. Unlike our competitors, this price includes all non-recurring development costs and on-orbit delivery of an agreed upon mission. For government missions, NASA has added mission assurance and additional services to the Falcon 9 for less than $20M.

Vehicle Overview          

Mass to Orbit (200 km, 28.5 deg):             53 metric tons (117,000 lb)

Length:                                                       69.2 m (227 ft)

Max Stage Width:                                      5.2 m (17 ft)

Total Width:                                               11.6 meters (38 ft)

Weight at Liftoff:                                        1,400 metric tons or 3.1 million lbs

Thrust on Liftoff:                                        1,700 metric tons or 3.8 million lbs

Cosmic census finds 50 billion planets in the Milky Way

Scientists finds the first cosmic census of planets in our galaxy and the numbers are astronomical at least 50 billion planets in the Milky Way. At least 500 million of those planets are in the not-too-hot, not-too-cold zone where life could exist. The numbers were extrapolated from the early results of NASA's planet-hunting Kepler telescope.

Kepler science chief William Borucki says scientists took the number of planets they found in the first year of searching a small part of the night sky and then made an estimate on how likely stars are to have planets. Kepler spots planets as they pass between Earth and the star it orbits.

So far Kepler has found 1,235 candidate planets, with 54 in the Goldilocks zone, where life could possibly exist. Kepler's main mission is not to examine individual worlds, but give astronomers a sense of how many planets, especially potentially habitable ones, there are likely to be in our galaxy. They would use the one-four-hundredth of the night sky that Kepler is looking at and extrapolate from there.

Borucki and colleagues figured one of two stars has planets and one of 200 stars has planets in the habitable zone, announcing these ratios Saturday at the American Association for the Advancement of Science annual conference in Washington. And that's a minimum because these stars can have more than one planet and Kepler has yet to get a long enough glimpse to see planets that are further out from the star, like Earth, according to Borucki.

Charles Hayden Planetarium

 In the growing hush of full darkness, more than 9,000 stars appear, with so many gradations of intensity that binoculars can reveal more detail than the naked eye. That is the sensation offered by the newly renovated Charles Hayden Planetarium, which opened on 13 February 11 at the Museum of Science here, after a $9 million yearlong reconstruction, its new equipment, software and 57-foot dome promising to take the next generation to the stars.

                                      The dome of the Hayden Planetarium with a digital projection. 

It is easy to lose one’s balance in the vastness of space, and over the last 15 years as planetariums around the country have revamped their systems and shows to take advantage of the latest in digital technology and the most refined fiber-optic projectors from Zeiss (the same company that outfitted the first modern planetarium in Germany in 1923), many times the moorings have come loose. The domes have been used to stage fantastical free-for-all shows of cinematic effects, including dinosaurs, cartoonish tubes of warped space and sub-woofer grumblings.

NASA and General Motors built Humanoid robot

NASA and General Motors built a humanoid robot to be an astronaut assistant onboard the International Space Station will make a special guest appearance on the Fox Network's Super Bowl XLVpre-game show on Feb. 6. The robot named Robonaut 2 or R2 will appear on Fox's pre-game show with sports analyst Howie Long during the network's festivities before kickoff. 

The R2 robot was designed and constructed to help NASA on the International Space Station. Somewhat resembling a person, the R2 has a human-like build, but most importantly, the machine has hands designed similar to those of us with a pulse: its fingers and thumbs can full articulate and react similar to human hands.

With the potential capabilities of the R2, NASA is bringing its example on the next trip to the international space station to perform mundane tasks such as wiping down handrails. In doing so, astronauts have more time to spend on more important jobs than keeping house. The R2 can use the same tools as a non-robotic person and can adapt its grip accordingly.  NASA’s R2 is sitting aboard the Discovery awaiting a February 24th launch.