In Today’s Deep Space Extra…Key U.S. Senate appropriator seeks NASA budget increase.
Human Deep Space Exploration
Mikulski vows to increase NASA funding in Senate bill
Space News (4/18): In remarks before the Maryland Space Business Roundtable on Monday, U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski vowed to seek more than the White House Request of $19.025 billion for NASA for 2017. Mikulski, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee, plans to retire at the end of this year. “Whatever we have on the books, make sure it is adequately funded and adequately ready to go,” she said in a description of her guidelines for the upcoming appropriations bill.
Welding Wonder Completes Hardware for First Flight of NASA’s SLS Rocket
ECN Magazine (3/17): The first stage of NASA’s Space Launch System hardware for the Exploration Mission-1 flight test planned for late 2018 has completed component welding at the Michoud Assembly Center in New Orleans. The uncrewed flight test will launch an Orion capsule with the SLS for the first time. Orion will embark on a three week journey around the moon and back to Earth for an ocean splashdown and recovery.
Space Science
Chinese space lab back on Earth after groundbreaking embryo experiment
Spaceflightnow.com (4/18): The uncrewed Chinese SJ-10 space capsule with microgravity science experiments parachuted to Earth on Monday, after 13 days in orbit.
Chinese scientists find mammal embryos can develop in space
CCTV (4/18): Chinese scientists say they successfully cultured early stage mouse embryos aboard their SJ-10 research satellite mission launched April 6. That marks a first for mammalian embryo development in space.
Alien ‘Wow!’ Signal Could Soon be Explained
Discovery.com (4/18): A former DOD analyst suggests a pair of comets, discovered in 2006 and 2008, may be the source of the “Wow” signal detected on Aug. 15, 1977 that prompted a famous notation from astronomer Jerry Ehman on a recording of the observation by an Ohio State Universe radio telescope. The 72 second radio signal burst from the direction of the constellation Sagittarius has long produced speculation that its source was an alien intelligence.
Door now open to launch educational hitchhikers on Atlas 5 rockets for free
Spaceflightnow.com (4/18): United Launch Alliance is accepting applications from university sponsored CubeSats with a STEM theme for launch using excess capacity on the company’s rockets. “Our goal is to eventually add university CubeSat slots to nearly every Atlas and Vulcan Centaur launch with a potential for 100 rides per year,” said ULA president and CEO Tory Bruno.
A starshot into the dark
The Space Review (4/18): In New York City last week, Russian millionaire Yuri Milner joined forces with British cosmologist Stephen Hawking to announce Breakthrough Starshot, a high tech quest to propel a fleet of small robotic spacecraft to the neighboring galaxy Alpha Centauri. Space Review editor Jeff Foust sizes up the prospects for success.
Q&A: STEM Career Advice From NASA’s Chief Scientist
U.S. News & World Report (4/18): NASA Chief Scientist Ellen Stofan discussed careers in the engineering disciplines and academic grades during remarks before the USA Science and Engineering Festival in Washington. “I struggled,” Ellen Stofan told an audience on Sunday. “You don’t have to be an A-plus math student. If you’re a B/C student in math, people think you can’t be an engineer; that’s just not true.” Stofan’s portfolio at NASA includes efforts to place human explorers on Mars.
Low Earth Orbit
What happens when a Michelin-starred chef, Heston Blumenthal, decides to make astronaut food
Boston Globe (4/19): British astronaut Tim Peake, currently serving aboard the six person International Space Station, is experimenting with award winning cuisine furnished by Chef Heston Blumenthal, whose creations include snail porridge.
Commercial to Orbit
Expanding the space station market
The Space Review (4/18): Bigelow Aerospace has pondered the company’s next steps with the Bigelow Expandable Activities Module. A prototype of the compressed module was delivered to the International Space Station earlier this month and installed last Saturday. The habitable BEAM prototype is scheduled to be expanded in late May for a two year evaluation. Might NASA and Bigelow find an arrangement that would permit a larger advanced version of the module to be attached to the space station on a commercial basis?
Space companies feud over what to do with rockets in ICBM stockpile
Washington Post (4/18): The Pentagon has some interest in disposing of about 1,000 Cold War era Minuteman and Peacekeeper rockets that some commercial launch services companies, like Orbital ATK, believe could be re-purposed for commercial satellite launch purposes. Other companies believe the plan would undercut the efforts of investors who’ve started companies with innovative plans to place satellites in orbit at lower costs.