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Today’s CSExtra offers the latest reporting and commentary on space related activities from across the globe. After Apollo? A new historical account, examines former President Richard Nixon’s lingering influence on the U.S. human space program. NASA’s Curiosity rover finds evidence for an important biological nutrient in a rock analysis. Australia harbors evidence of large sub surface craters left by long ago asteroid impacts. Who arranged the solar system? Maybe Jupiter. Surveyor 1’s 1966 lunar landing assured NASA’s Apollo astronauts of solid ground. An editorial finds Russia’s decision to extend International Space Station operations a plus for the U.S. commercial sector and scientists. NASA astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian colleague Mikhail Kornienko are prepped to help answer the question: Are humans ready for a month’s to year’s long journey to Mars? Kelly packs carefully for his one year space station mission, which is to lift off late Friday. Is spaceflight ready for the open container? U.S. commercial space companies mix and match to compete for future space station cargo deliveries. United Launch Alliance assembles the launch vehicles for initial Boeing commercial crew launches in 2017. ULA suggests Eagle, Freedom or GalaxyOne as names for the company’s new rocket.
Human Deep Space Exploration
The Space Review (3/23): Space historian and policy expert John Logsdon looks to Richard Nixon rather than John Kennedy as perhaps the most influential president when it comes to the nation’s long term direction in human space exploration. Nixon’s guidance following the early Apollo mission successes placed the U.S. on its current course, writes Logsdon in After Apollo? Richard Nixon and the American Space Program, a new book reviewed by TSR editor Jeff Foust. “After Apollo? is a rigorously researched book on Nixon’s space policy legacy, which lays out a strong argument that the real roots of NASA’s human spaceflight program today and the problems and uncertainties it faces date back to the end of Apollo, and not its beginning,” writes Foust.
Unmanned Deep Space Exploration
NASA’s Curiosity rover finds fresh signs of ingredients for life on Mars
Los Angeles Times (3/23): NASA’s Mars Curiosity Rover has detected nitrates in a red planet rock sample. On Earth, these nitrogen compounds serve as nutrients for living organisms. Published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the findings lend more evidence that now cold and dry, Mars once hosted an environment favorable for biological activity.
Ancient doomsday asteroid impact found in Australia
Discovery.com (3/23): Scientists have described subsurface evidence for two massive asteroid impacts in Australia, strikes that probably occurred more than 300 million years ago, each with enough devastating force to qualify as extinction events. The two asteroids likely measured more than 6 miles across, rivaling the Chicxulub impactor of 66 million years ago that is credited with wiping out the dinosaurs and other terrestrial life.
Jupiter may have dilled solar system’s baby super-Earths
Discovery.com (3/23): Giant Jupiter may have played a strong hand in arranging the planets in the inner solar system, according to the “Grand Tack” theory, as explained by University of California, Santa Cruz astronomer Gregory Laughlin and published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Grand Tack may explain why the solar system seems so different from other planetary systems recently discovered.
Air and Space Magazine (3/23): The U.S. Surveyor 1 mission relayed the first high fidelity images of the moon’s surface back to Earth, after the camera equipped robotic probe landed in June 1966. The imagery provided visual assurance that NASA’s Apollo astronauts would touch down on a solid surface three years later, writes William Mellberg, son of Frank Mellberg, who was responsible at Bell & Howell for the camera lens.
Low Earth Orbit
Plan to extend participation overshadows possible 2024 exit
Space News (3/23): In an editorial, the trade publication commends Russia’s decision to extend participation in the six person International Space Station through 2024. Early last year, the White House called on the program’s four major partners, Russia, Europe, Japan and Canada, to join the U.S. in an extension beyond 2020. So far, only Russia has committed, which is good news for those in the U.S. commercial space sector eager to take advantage of the orbiting research laboratory, according to the editorial.
One astronaut will help answer NASA’s biggest question
Houston Chronicle (3/23): Late Friday, NASA astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko are scheduled to lift off on a yearlong mission in space. The venture will combine the two men’s volunteer spirit with the capabilities of the International Space Station to address an important question about the future of human space exploration: Can the human body withstand the physical and mental stresses of long journeys to deep space? “We’re trying to get to Mars,” said Kelly. “I won’t go, but the next generation has a chance.”
What to pack for year in space? A ‘superhero utility belt’
Associated Press via New York Times (3/23): Late Friday, NASA astronaut Scott Kelly will blast off with Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko for a yearlong stay aboard the International Space Station, a venture intended to help the space agencies prepare for the future human exploration of Mars by revealing possible physical and psychological obstacles. Kelly’s last stay on the space station in 2011 pointed out the need for a utility belt. Kornienko is taking plenty of vitamins.
Finally! A cocktail glass fit for space martinis
Discovery.com (3/23): So far, investor interest in Cosmic Lifestyle Corps’ open air container that would allow astronauts to trade in their enclosed drink bags and straws has been luke warm.
Commercial to Low Earth Orbit
For commercial cargo, ideas old and new
The Space Review (3/23): In June, NASA is expected to award at least two contracts to support the re-supply needs of the International Space Station after 2017. The competition is attracting proposals from Orbital ATK and SpaceX as well as Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Sierra Nevada. All but Orbital ATK are drawing on experience and expertise from efforts to develop commercial crew vessels as well. The new market and the competition were initiated nearly a decade ago by previous NASA Administrator Mike Griffin with the introduction of the Commercial Orbital Transportation Services program.
Rockets for Commercial Crew launches begin to come together
Spaceflight Insider (3/23): The assembly of two United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rockets that will launch the first Boeing CST-100’s is underway at a Decatur, Ala., factory. The CST-100 is a capsule designed for the commercial transportation of astronauts to and from the International Space Station. One of the rockets will launch a test capsule without crew, one with. Plans are to transport the first crew to the station by late 2017.
ULA wants you to help pick name of new rocket
Spaceflightnow.com (3/24): United Launch Alliance has selected three candidate names for a new launch vehicle in the works to replace the Atlas 5 and Delta 4. The candidates are Eagle, Freedom and GalaxyOne. The proposed names came from the company’s workforce and space enthusiasts. Now, it’s up to the public to vote on a finalist. First flight is planned for 2019.
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