There’s never been a radio silence quite like this one. After long months with no way of making contact with Voyager 2, NASA has finally reestablished communications with the record-setting interstellar spacecraft.
The breakdown in communications – lasting since March, almost eight months and a whole pandemic ago – wasn’t due to some rogue malfunction, nor any run-in with interstellar space weirdness (although there’s that too).
Military observers said the disruptive technologies – those that fundamentally change the status quo – might include such things as sixth-generation fighters, high-energy weapons like laser and rail guns, quantum radar and communications systems, new stealth materials, autonomous combat robots, orbital spacecraft, and biological technologies such as prosthetics and powered exoskeletons.
Speeding up the development of ‘strategic forward-looking disruptive technologies’ is a focus of the country’s latest five-year plan.
SpaceX Starship SN8 will perform a historical flight test this upcoming week.
SN8 has already performed both the static fire and cryogenic tests. The next test is the flight test. SpaceX has announced the window of November 9th to the 11th for SN8, Starship number eight, 15 kilometer flight aka 9 miles.
(cc: Space Photographer Austin Barnard)
With a variety of backgrounds and talents, these women have helped push the boundaries of spaceflight.
Cosmonaut Svetlana Savitskaya.
Spacefacts.de
Svetlana Savitskaya was just the second woman to reach space. She was also a record-breaking jet pilot. Savitskaya was born in Moscow in 1948, and likewise started skydiving as a teenager. Her father, a high-ranking officer in the Soviet military, was allegedly unaware of her skydiving exploits. However, he soon supported her passion for flying jets, and Savitskaya quickly found herself competing in aerobatic competitions.
The scientist claims that this design could enable propulsion while only relying on electricity.
But take it with a grain of salt. It seems the propulsion system is based on ideas that are still being validated.
The drive would provide enough thrust for a spacecraft to travel near the speed of light using only electricity, says physicist Jim Woodward.
Article from Universetoday. Interesting read.
When human beings start living in space for extended periods of time they will need to be as self-sufficient as possible. The same holds true for settlements built on the Moon, on Mars, and other bodies in the Solar System. To avoid being entirely dependent on resupply missions from Earth (which is costly and time-consuming) the inhabitants will need to harvest resources locally – aka. In-Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU).
This means they’ll have to procure their own sources of water, building materials, and grow their own food. While the ISS has allowed for all kinds of experiments involving hydroponics in space, little has been done to see how soil fares in microgravity (or lower gravity). To address this, Morgan Irons – Chief Science Officer of the Virginia-based startup Deep Space Ecology (DSE) – recently sent her #id=8305″] Soil Health in Space experiment to the ISS.
The experiment, Determination of Gravitational Effects on Soil Stability for Controlled Environment Agriculture, was sponsored through Morgan’s fellowship with the Norfolk Institute – which provided grant funding from numerous companies (including DSE). An agreement between Norfolk Institute and Rhodium Scientific, LLC (an official space-flight implementation partner of the ISS U.S. National Laboratory) provided access to the NASA launch opportunities and the ISS.
Since the last manned landing in 1972, no humans have been back to the Moon. Now, NASA plans to change all that with Artemis, which aims to land the next man and the first woman on the lunar surface by 2024.
The Artemis program will take place in stages, from testing the spacecraft that will carry astronauts to the Moon to building Gateway, a space station in lunar orbit to serve as a midway point for long-term missions. Future astronauts will explore regions of the Moon humans have never visited, including its south pole, where water ice hides in shadowed craters.
In this episode of Infinity & Beyond, host Abigail Bollenbach takes you through the next space race to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.
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“For services provided on Mars, or in transit to Mars via Starship or other colonisation spacecraft, the parties recognise Mars as a free planet and that no Earth-based government has authority or sovereignty over Martian activities,” the governing law section states.
“Accordingly, disputes will be settled through self-governing principles, established in good faith, at the time of Martian settlement.”
Space systems engineer Erwan Beauvois said SpaceX’s position was reminiscent of a declaration put forward by the Earthlight Foundation, a non-profit organisation committed to preparing for the expansion of humanity beyond Earth.