In Today’s Deep Space Extra… China and India continue to move forward with space exploration plans.
Human Space Exploration
NASA’s new Mars rover concept vehicle, inspired by science — and Hollywood
CBS News (6/3): Hollywood’s Shanon and Marc Parker, brothers and movie prop veterans, are showing off their concept for a tough Mars rover at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. NASA has also debuted its next red planet rover, the unmanned Mars 2020 rover, which is to collect samples of the planet’s soil for eventual return to Earth. NASA’s twin Viking landers were the first unmanned spacecraft to reach the Martian surface in the mid-1970s. Since then, a half dozen other NASA spacecraft have managed to reach the Martian terrain.
Space Science
Announcing a new paper on NASA’s Mars exploration program
The Planetary Society (6/6): U.S. efforts to pursue the exploration of Mars, both robotic and human, will require commitments to new reconnaissance and communications assets in orbit around the red planet as well as capabilities to collect and return to Earth samples of Martian rock and soil, according to an analysis by the nonprofit Planetary Society.
Hubble ‘traps’ a vermin galaxy
Science Magazine (6/2): The Hubble Space Telescope images a “transit,” a distant galaxy moving behind a much closer star in the Milky Way Galaxy. The first glance at the colorful passage came in 2004, with a follow-up in 2011.
Self-replicating 3-D printers could build moon bases, fight global warming
Space.com (6/6): Canadian engineers are developing a 3-D printer that could recreate itself from lunar materials. Additive manufacturing, the formal name for 3-D printing, could transform space exploration as the technology matures.
Scientists discover strange KELT-9b planet ‘hotter than most stars’
USA Today (6/6): Kelt-9b appears to be a planet too hot to handle, according to ground based observations of the alien world. The Jupiter-sized planet reveals temperatures slightly lower than the sun. Kelt-9 is tidally locked. Like the Earth’s moon, only one side of Kelt-9b faces its star, which is even hotter.
ISS and Low Earth Orbit
Additional astronaut on the Space Station means dozens of new team members on the ground
NASA (6/2): NASA’s recent announcement of an additional crew member to the International Space Station, which will effectively double the amount of science data acquired from the orbiting laboratory, means a lot of changes. Many of them are on the ground at the Payload Operations Integration Center at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.
International Developments
India shows off space prowess with launch of mega-rocket
Space Daily (6/5): Monday India successfully launched its most powerful home-produced rocket, another milestone for its indigenous space program which one day hopes to put a human into orbit. The 43-metre (140-foot) rocket hurtled into a clear sky at 5:28 pm from the southern island of Sriharikota, one of two sites used by the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) to launch satellites.
Luxembourg’s space initiatives presented to global experts
Luxembourg Wort (6/6): Corporate strategies, investment opportunities and financing of space exploration were discussed as part of a conference on Luxembourg’s spatial initiatives in New York this week. The Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of the Economy, Étienne Schneider, led the conference — ‘The Promise of Space Resources: a Luxembourg Public-Private Initiative’ — on Monday.
China emphasizes peaceful space exploration
Xinhuanet of China (6/7): China plans an expanding program of peaceful space exploration, including human missions to the moon, Wu Yansheng, president of the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, tells the Global Space Exploration Conference meeting this week in Beijing.
New Chinese astronaut selection and space station missions revealed
GB Times of Finland (6/6): China has announced plans to select 10 to 12 more men and women to its national astronaut corps.
China to conduct at least four manned spaceflight missions in five years
Xinhuanet of China (6/6): China plans four or more human space flight missions in the near future to assemble a new space station, China’s first astronaut Yang Liwei said Tuesday. He spoke before the Global Space Exploration Conference which got under way in Beijing earlier this week.
News Analysis: U.S. – China space freeze may thaw with new commercial pathway
Xinhuanet of China (6/6): The latest NASA contracted cargo mission to the International Space Station included an experiment from the Beijing Institute of Technology, which will assess the effects of space radiation on gene mutation. NASA has been restricted by Congress from cooperating with China. The commercial front, however, may open new cooperative opportunities.
Other News
Air Force moving forward after Blue Origin ‘setback’
Investors.com (6/6): The Air Force said Monday it is working to “figure out how to progress forward” after a setback in the development of a U.S.-made rocket engine. Blue Origin, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’ space company, tweeted May 14 that it lost a “set of powerpack test hardware on one of its BE-4” engine tests.