Category Archives: Space Exploration

The space trade is skyrocketing higher.

The Procure Space ETF (UFO), the first-ever global ETF to give investors access to the growing space industry, has soared nearly 20% in November amid some positive tailwinds including SpaceX's historic Crew-1 launch with NASA, the first of its kind conducted by a private company.

Though some of the upside is likely tied to hopes around Joe Biden's presidency and how it could progress the space race, the impact could be more nuanced than some may think, Andrew Chanin, co-founder and CEO of ProcureAM, told CNBC's "ETF Edge" this week.

"We're actually really encouraged, although the previous administration has really done a lot to push the space industry forward, both from a commercial and military and defense standpoint," Chanin said Monday.

"Space ... isn't something that is bipartisan. It's nonpartisan," he said. "So, we believe that space is something that's here to stay and should and will be potentially a priority for any administration in the future."

President-elect Biden is expected to toe the Democratic Party line on space policy, likely prolonging the new age of human spaceflight and steering NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration towards studying the impacts of climate change.

For UFO which requires 80% of its holdings to be "pure plays" on space, or derive 50% of their revenues from space-related businesses a "new set of eyes" may be beneficial, Chanin said.

UFO's top five holdings are Orbcomm at roughly 6.5%, Virgin Galactic at over 6%, SES at nearly 6%, Maxar Technologies at about 5% and Trimble at almost 5%. Communications, aerospace and defense, and wireless communications plays account for more than 70% of the 31-stock portfolio.

"Communications is one of the largest revenue-generating areas for the space industry today. So, think satellites, think ground stations and the various equipment that relies upon satellite signals," Chanin said.

"This interview likely wouldn't be happening today without satellites helping in that process," he said. "So, as technologies like 5G, cloud computing, internet of things and so on start to rely more and more on using satellites to transfer data from point A to point B, it's something that we think could become a very large player of space."

It's worth considering adding a thematic ETF such as UFO to more traditional portfolios, Dave Nadig, chief investment officer and director of research at ETF Trends and ETF Database, said in the same "ETF Edge" interview.

"I love products like this. I think they give you a real opportunity to make a little satellite play pardon the pun in your portfolio on something that you may believe in," Nadig said.

"I do think this is well-positioned for a Biden administration, not so much because I expect all of a sudden there to be a trillion-dollar space budget, but because I think one of the things that drives these companies is actually international cooperation," he added. "A lot of the companies that are driving international space development happen to be U.S. companies. I suspect in a Biden administration we're going to see not just a focus on [research and development] and traditional NASA-style space exploration. I think we're going to see a focus on international cooperation around infrastructure."

Moreover, through UFO, investors can get "accidental exposure" to both strengthening themes such as aerospace and technology stock they may not have otherwise bought, Nadig said.

"I think it's worth taking a look at not just for the theme itself, but for those individual companies," he said. "Many of these smaller satellite companies you have no exposure to unless you're in the Russell 3000. ... Some of these are small- and mid-cap names that just are not household, in-every-portfolio kinds of names. So, thematic funds like this are a great way to sort of re-weight yourself towards innovation."

UFO climbed a fraction of a percent on Friday. It is down about 5% year to date.

Disclaimer

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The UFO ETF is up 20% this month. How a Biden administration could impact the space trade - CNBC

CHAPEL HILL For space exploration to be successful, we need to understand and address underlying causes of health issues observed in astronauts who have spent extended periods of time away from Earth. These problems include loss of bone and muscle mass, immune dysfunction, and heart and liver problems. Using data collected from a number of different resources, a multidisciplinary team led by NASA scientists reports the discovery of a common but surprising thread that drives this damage: mitochondrial dysfunction.

The researchers, whopublished their workin the journalCell, used a systems approach to look at widespread alterations affecting biological function.

We started by asking whether there is some kind of universal mechanism happening in the body in space that could explain what weve observed, said senior author Afshin Beheshti, a principal investigator and bioinformatician at KBR in the Space Biosciences Division of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), visiting researcher at the Broad Institute, and co-president at the COVID-19 International Research Team (COV-IRT).What we found over and over was that something is happening with the mitochondria regulation that throws everything out of whack.

Mitochondria are cell organelles that generate most of the chemical energy cells need for the biochemical reactions we all depend on for life. This chemical energy is stored in a small molecule called adenosine triphosphate (ATP), the molecular engines that rev biological processes such as muscle contraction and nerve impulse propagation.

To implicate mitochondrial dysfunction, the investigators analyzed data obtained from NASAs GeneLab platform, a comprehensive database that includes data from animal studies, the NASA Twin Study, and samples collected from 59 astronauts over decades of space travel. Many of the scientists who participated in this study are involved with GeneLabs Analysis Working Groups, which draw from institutions worldwide. The platform contains a range of biological data related to changes in tissues and cells that occur due to the combined effects of space radiation and microgravity, including proteomic, metabolomic, transcriptomic, and epigenomic data.

The researchers used an unbiased approach to look for correlations that could explain the widespread changes observed. We compared all these different tissues from mice that were flown in space on two different missions, and we saw that mitochondrial dysfunction kept popping up, Beheshti said. We looked at problems in the liver, and saw they were caused by pathways related to the mitochondria. Then we looked at problems in the eyes and saw the same pathways. This is when we became interested in taking a deeper look.

Jonathon Schisler. (Photo by Alyssa LaFaro)

Jonathan Schisler, PhD, assistant professor of pharmacology and pathology & laboratory medicine at the UNC School of Medicine, is a co-senior author of the paper.

This particular study is a great example of what team science can accomplish, said Schisler, who is also a member of the UNC McAllister Heart Institute. My lab focuses on the integration of complex genomic-biologic data to elucidate the relationship between complex biological functions and disease. So our expertise was a great fit for this collaboration with NASA.

Mitochondrial suppression, as well as overcompensation that can sometimes occur because of that suppression, can lead to many systemic organ responses. They can also explain many of the common changes seen in the immune system.

Using their discoveries from mice as a starting point, the researchers then looked at whether the same mechanisms could be involved with humans in space. Examining data from the NASA Twin study, in which identical twins Scott and Mark Kelly were followed over time, the former on the International Space Station and the latter on the ground, they saw many changes in mitochondrial activity. Some of these changes could explain alterations in the distribution of immune cells that occurred in Scott during his year in space. They also used physiological data and blood and urine samples that had been collected from dozens of other astronauts to confirm that mitochondria in different cell types had been suppressed.

I was completely surprised to see that mitochondria are so important, because they werent on our radar, Beheshti said. We were focusing on all the downstream components but hadnt made this connection. He added that mitochondrial dysfunction can also help explain another common problem with extended space traveldisrupted circadian rhythms. Since the team first reported their findings within NASA, other NASA scientists have begun making connections between mitochondrial changes and common space-related cardiovascular problems as well.

Schisler added, We can now ask more specific questions regarding the relationship between mitochondrial function and space flight. One challenging aspect of mitochondrial biology is the chicken and egg discussion. Are the changes in mitochondrial function resulting from other parts of the cell not working correctly, or do the elements of space directly impact the mitochondria? Its exciting that our study opens the door for the design of mitochondrial-specific countermeasures that could negate the impact of microgravity and radiation on our bodys cells to generate energy.

In conjunction with this paper, and again with a large consortium research group, Schisler co-authored acompanion article inCell Reportsthat describes how molecular-based countermeasures can protect tissues against the damage caused by space flight.

Future research will build upon both of these studies, allowing us to defend our astronauts from spaceflights pathophysiological impact on the human body so we can reach our goals of getting to Mars, Schisler said.

The hope is that now that mitochondrial issues have been identified as a cause of so many health risks related to space travel, countermeasures could be developed to address them. There are already many approved drugs for various mitochondrial disorders, which would make it easier to move them toward this application, Beheshti noted. The low-hanging fruit now would be to test some of these drugs with animal and cell models in space.

Read more about Schislerscollaboration with NASA.

This work was supported by the GeneLab Project at NASA Ames Research Center, through NASAs Space Biology Program in the Division of Space Life and Physical Sciences Research and Applications (SLPSRA); the National Aeronautics and Space Administration; the National Institutes of Health; the South Carolina Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research; the American Heart Association; and the Human Health Countermeasures Element of the NASA Human Research Program.

(C) UNC-CH

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Why does space travel create health issues? UNC, NASA scientists may have the answer - WRAL Tech Wire

Artists concept of Change 5 entering lunar orbit. Its Chinas 1st moon-sample-return mission and the 1st for the world at large since 1976. Image via China Lunar Exploration Project.

After a journey lasting 112 hours, the Change 5 spacecraft is now reported by space engineers in China to have entered orbit around the moon. The robotic mission is the first lunar sample-return mission since the 1970s. It launched last week (November 23, 2020) from the Wenchang Space Launch Center in Chinas Hainan province, rising into the sky atop a Long March 5 rocket. The China Lunar Exploration Program said earlier today:

At 20:58 on November 28, the Change-5 probe flew to the moon for about 112 hours and successfully ignited a 3000 N engine at a distance of 400 kilometers [248 miles] from the lunar surface. About 17 minutes later, the engine shut down normally. According to the monitoring and judgment of real-time telemetry data, the Change-5 probe braked normally in recent months and entered the orbit around the moon smoothly.

If all goes according to plan, the new and ambitious Change 5 will haul pristine moon samples back to Earth in mid-December,something that hasnt been done since the Soviet Unions Luna 24 mission in 1976.

EarthSkys lunar calendar shows the moon phase for every day in 2021. Order yours before theyre gone! Makes a great gift.

The mission, named after the ancient Chinese goddess of the moon, will seek to collect lunar material to help scientists understand more about the moons origins and formation. Image via China Global Television Network.

Although Chinese officials have been characteristically vague about Change 5s details, we know the short mission will be action-packed. The 18,100 pound (8,200 kg) spacecraft is expected to send two of its four modules a lander and an ascent vehicle to the lunar surface within the next day or two. The mission will land in the Mons Rumker area of the huge volcanic plain Oceanus Procellarum (translated from Latin to English as Ocean of Storms). Portions of this region on the moon have been explored by a number of other surface missions, including NASAs Apollo 12 in 1969.

The stationary lander will study its environment with cameras, ground-penetrating radar, and a spectrometer, but its main job is to snag about 4.4 pounds (2 kg) of lunar material, some of which will be dug from up to 6.5 feet (2 meters) underground. This work will be done over the course of two weeks, or one lunar day. That isa firm deadline, given that the Change 5 lander is solar-powered and wont be able to operate once night falls at its location.

Mons Rumker harbors rocks that formed just 1.2 billion years ago. In contrast, the moon rocks brought home by the Apollo astronauts between 1969 and 1972 are considerably older. The Planetary Society, a nonprofit space advocacy program, explained:

The samples should be the youngest ever returned to Earth: just 1.2 billion years old, when multicellular life may have already evolved on our planet. Change-5 will help scientists understand what was happening late in the moons history, as well as how Earth and the solar system evolved.

This image of Mons Rumker on the moon was captured by Apollo 15 astronauts in 1971. It is about 43 miles (70 km) wide and rises nearly a mile (1.6 km) above the surrounding area. Image via Planetary Society.

China is often said to have been late to the space race. It didnt send its first satellite into orbit until 1970, by which time the U.S. had already landed astronauts on the moon. But China has caught up fast. Supported by billions of dollars in government investment, China has rapidly accelerated its space program over the past decade, firing space labs and satellites into orbit.

China launched the Change 1 and Change 2 orbiters in 2007 and 2010 respectively, and the Change 3 lander-rover duo that touched down on the moons near side in December 2013. Sadly, the Change 3 rover died after 31 months of work on the lunar surface when the rover became unresponsive to calls from the ground, although not before surpassing its intended lifetime and setting a new record for the longest operating rover on the lunar surface. The Change 3 rover, like all other rovers, was designed to move and explore the surface whereas its lander, which is still going strong, was built specifically to stay in place without roaming around.And in January 2019, Change 4 became the first mission ever to ace a soft landing on the moons mysterious far side. Change 4 is still currently in operation.

Change 5 is part of a recent surge in sample-return missions. On December 6, 2020, for example, pieces of the asteroid Ryugu collected by Japans Hayabusa2 mission are scheduled to touch down in Australia. More recently, NASAs OSIRIS-REx probe snagged a hefty sample of the asteroid Bennu; that material will come down to Earth in September 2023, if all goes according to plan.

Speaking to astronauts aboard the Shenzhou 10 spacecraft through a video call in 2013, Chinese president Xi Jinping said:

The space dream is part of the dream to make China stronger. The Chinese people will take bigger strides to explore further into space.

Last year, China also became the first country to send an unmanned rover to the far side of the moon. And in July this year, China launched its first unmanned mission to Mars: the Tianwen-1 probe, which will orbit the planet before landing a rover on the surface; its expected to reach the red planet next February. If Tianwen-1 is successful, Beijing has plans to eventually send a manned mission to Mars. Plans are also underway to launch a permanent space station by 2022, and send astronauts to the moon by the 2030s.

If successful, China would become only the second country, after the U.S., to put a citizen on the moon.

Bottom line: Chinas robotic Change 5 mission launched from the Wenchang Space Launch Center of Chinas Hainan province, rising into the sky atop a Long March 5 rocket at about 3:30 p.m. EST (20:30 UTC) on November 23, 2020. If all goes according to plan, the new and ambitious Change 5 will haul pristine moon samples back to Earth in mid-December, a feat not accomplished since the Soviet Unions Luna 24 mission in 1976.

Read more from The Guardian: China launches Change-5 mission to bring back rocks from moon

Read more from Scientific American: Chinas Change-5 Mission Launches to Collect Lunar Samples

Excerpt from:

Chinas Change 5 mission is orbiting the moon! - EarthSky

Astronaut Bruce McCandless II participates in a historical spacewalk.

Imagine an organism that has habituated to carrying 50 to 80 kgs of weight throughout its life and has evolved over millions of years doing just that. Suddenly, one day a member of the species flies off to a new world with no weight pushing him down. Sixty years later, members of this species now spend months in such weightless conditions. Ever wondered how their genes are affected as they adjust to this new normal?

Curiosity is a trait that has driven human species to ever greater heightsexploring every depth and height on this planet, and even travelling beyond this world and into outer space. But while humans remain more curious than ever to explore the celestial bodies around us, scientists have started to wonder how our bodies would respond to this change.

A chief barrier in humans path to long-term space exploration is our inability to survive for long in low gravity conditions. While it has been known that human beings suffer a physical decline in space, a new study has now found how living in low gravity can affect our cells at the genetic leveland it has done so using worms!

The research, conducted by the University of Exeter and the NASA GeneLab, took some Caenorhabditis elegans worms to the International Space Station and exposed them to low gravity conditions. Subsequently, a genetic analysis of these worms revealed "subtle changes" in about 1,000 genes. Stronger effects were observed in some of the genes, especially among neurons (the nervous system cells).

"We looked at levels of every gene in the worms' genome and identified a clear pattern of genetic change," said Dr Timothy Etheridge of the University of Exeter.

"These changes might help explain why the body reacts badly to space flight. It also gives us some therapy targets in terms of reducing these health effects, which are currently a major barrier to deep-space exploration."

Furthermore, this research also exposed the worms to high gravity conditions in centrifuges, and these tests provided the researchers with more data on gravity's genetic impacts while allowing them to look for possible treatments using high gravity in space.

"A crucial step towards overcoming any physiological condition is first understanding its underlying molecular mechanism," said Craig Willis of the University of Exeter, who is also the lead author of the study.

"We have identified genes with roles in neuronal function and cellular metabolism that are affected by gravitational changes. These worms display molecular signatures and physiological features that closely mirror those observed in humans, so our findings should provide foundations for a better understanding of spaceflight-induced health decline in mammals and, eventually, humans."

While the rapid development in technology has brought deep space exploration firmly within our species reach, it remains to be seen if we will be physically and mentally capable of such extended space flights that cover significant distances. But with more and more studies on space flight life sciences, our species might just end up surpassing this barrier as well.

The paper was published in the journal iScience, and it can be accessed here.

**

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Experiments on Worms in Space Show How Low Gravity Can Affect Humans on Genetic Level | The Weather Channel - Articles from The Weather Channel |...

TerraMetric Founder and CEO Clint Graumann and SpaceBD Co-Founder & CEO Masa Nagasaki

Teams can be created when two specialist space-sector firms from opposite sides of the globe sign a Teaming Agreement and officially kick off a collaborative relationship that focuses on business development for the space industry.

Thats what occurred when Tokyo-based Space BD and Floridas TerraMetric realized they share a common vision of making space an accessible market to any industry or company and are committed to achieving results from launch to low Earth orbit, with a further focus on lunar and deep space exploration.

Technical skills, legislative knowledge, funding and time management are all critical factors in successfully accomplishing any space mission. However, guidance on how to effectively bring these factors together and thrive in the competitive global NewSpace market is equally important especially for those who are new to the space sector. Space BD and TerraMetric not only offer this guidance, but also work alongside key partners to achieve their goals, sharing every step on the path to success.

This Teaming Agreement reinforces the capabilities of both organizations, allowing them to push forward together. Space BDs experience and market connections in Asia-Pacific and their partnership with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), strengthens TerraMetrics reach into the Eastern hemisphere, while TerraMetrics expertise and network throughout North America as well as other regions, will provide Space BD with increased global coverage.

The mutual extension of capabilities for both companies will offer clients more choices from a wider range of options. Today, TerraMetric and Space BD already collaborate to provide in-orbit demonstration service using stable condition on the external platform of International Space Station through their respective existing partnerships. As on orbiting testimony to the achievements of international cooperation, the International Space Station is a fitting first step for this new international partnership.

TerraMetric is a global space business development firm with proven expertise up and down the integrated space exploration value chain, helping small- to medium-sized NewSpace businesses worldwide break into new markets and achieve their vision. TerraMetric works in concert with clients to provide market intelligence, secure large contracts, and connect with partners and customers.

We at TerraMetric are delighted to announce our teaming agreement with Space BD, commented TerraMetric CEO and Founder Clint Graumann. Space BD and TerraMetric have a common business culture driven by a shared passion for space. With Space BDs upstream focus and TerraMetrics detailed knowledge of downstream applications, together we can offer customers greater choice from a wide-reaching, comprehensive range of space business connections and expertise.

Space BD is the leading satellite launch and ISS utilization service provider based in Japan, and is expanding its services to support component import and export, test facilities installation, capacity building program, and strategic research project from business development perspective.

We are pleased to start our partnership with TerraMetric, said Space BD Co-Founder and CEO Masa Nagasaki. Since our initial discussion, we have been sharing common values and vision to expand space industry through providing optimum solution to everyone who wants to utilize space.We look forward to accelerating commercialization of Low Earth Orbit as well as development of deep space exploration including lunar missions with TerraMetric as U.S.-Japan strategic private partnership.

By combining their expertise and using space as enabler for various industries, TerraMetric and Space BD will work together to accelerate space business development and make space a sustainably growing industry.

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Space BD and TerraMetric Agree to Accelerate Commercial Space Growth - SatNews Publishers

It sounds like science fiction: giant solar power stations floating in space that beam down enormous amounts of energy to Earth. And for a long time, the conceptfirst developed by the Russian scientist Konstantin Tsiolkovsky in the 1920swas mainly an inspiration for writers.

A century later, however, scientists are making huge strides in turning the concept into reality. The European Space Agency has realized the potential of these efforts and is now looking to fund such projects, predicting that the first industrial resource we will get from space is beamed power.

Climate change is the greatest challenge of our time, so theres a lot at stake. From rising global temperatures to shifting weather patterns, the impacts of climate change are already being felt around the globe. Overcoming this challenge will require radical changes to how we generate and consume energy.

Renewable energy technologies have developed drastically in recent years, with improved efficiency and lower cost. But one major barrier to their uptake is the fact that they dont provide a constant supply of energy. Wind and solar farms only produce energy when the wind is blowing or the sun is shiningbut we need electricity around the clock, every day. Ultimately, we need a way to store energy on a large scale before we can make the switch to renewable sources.

A possible way around this would be to generate solar energy in space. There are many advantages to this. A space-based solar power station could orbit to face the sun 24 hours a day. Earths atmosphere also absorbs and reflects some of the suns light, so solar cells above the atmosphere will receive more sunlight and produce more energy.

But one of the key challenges to overcome is how to assemble, launch, and deploy such large structures. A single solar power station may have to be as much as 10 kilometers squared in areaequivalent to 1,400 football fields. Using lightweight materials will also be critical, as the biggest expense will be the cost of launching the station into space on a rocket.

Artists conceptions of a solar power satellite, dubbed the Integrated Symmetrical Concentrator SPS concept. Image Credit: NASA

One proposed solution is to develop a swarm of thousands of smaller satellites that will come together and configure to form a single, large solar generator. In 2017, researchers at the California Institute of Technology outlined designs for a modular power station, consisting of thousands of ultralight solar cell tiles. They also demonstrated a prototype tile weighing just 280 grams per square meter, similar to the weight of card.

Recently, developments in manufacturing, such as 3D printing, are also being looked at for this application. At the University of Liverpool, we are exploring new manufacturing techniques for printing ultralight solar cells on to solar sails. A solar sail is a foldable, lightweight, and highly reflective membrane capable of harnessing the effect of the suns radiation pressure to propel a spacecraft forward without fuel. We are exploring how to embed solar cells on solar sail structures to create large, fuel-free solar power stations.

These methods would enable us to construct the power stations in space. Indeed, it could one day be possible to manufacture and deploy units in space from the International Space Station or the future lunar gateway station that will orbit the moon. Such devices could in fact help provide power on the moon.

The possibilities dont end there. While we are currently reliant on materials from Earth to build power stations, scientists are also considering using resources from space for manufacturing, such as materials found on the moon.

Another major challenge will be getting the power transmitted back to Earth. The plan is to convert electricity from the solar cells into energy waves and use electromagnetic fields to transfer them down to an antenna on the Earths surface. The antenna would then convert the waves back into electricity. Researchers led by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency have already developed designs and demonstrated an orbiter system which should be able to do this.

There is still a lot of work to be done in this field, but the aim is that solar power stations in space will become a reality in the coming decades. Researchers in China have designed a system called Omega, which they aim to have operational by 2050. This system should be capable of supplying two gigawatts of power into Earths grid at peak performance, which is a huge amount. To produce that much power with solar panels on Earth, you would need more than six million of them.

Smaller solar power satellites, like those designed to power lunar rovers, could be operational even sooner.

Across the globe, the scientific community is committing time and effort to the development of solar power stations in space. Our hope is that they could one day be a vital tool in our fight against climate change.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Image Credit: NASA

Excerpt from:

Solar Power Stations in Space Could Be the Answer to Our Energy Needs - Singularity Hub

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This piece was originally published in Wired and appears here as part of our Climate Desk Partnership.

In early October, a dead Soviet satellite and the abandoned upper stage of a Chinese rocketnarrowly avoided a collision in low Earth orbit. If the objects had crashed, the impact would have blown them to bits and created thousands of new pieces of dangerous space debris. Only a few days prior, the European Space Agency had published itsannual space environment report, which highlighted abandoned rocket bodies as one of the biggest threats to spacecraft. The best way to mitigate this risk is for launch providers to deorbit their rockets after theyve delivered their payload. But if you ask Jeffrey Manber, thats a waste of a perfectly good giant metal tube.

Manber is the CEO of Nanoracks, a space logistics companybest known for hosting private payloads on the International Space Station, and for the past few years he has been working on a plan to turn the upper stages of spent rockets into miniature space stations. Its not a new idea, but Manber feels its time has come. NASA has looked at the idea of refurbishing fuel tanks several times, he says. But it was always abandoned, usually because the technology wasnt there. All of NASAs previous plans depended on astronauts doing a lot of the manufacturing and assembly work, which made the projects expensive, slow, and hazardous. Manbers vision is to create an extraterrestrial chop shop where astronauts are replaced by autonomous robots that cut, bend, and weld the bodies of spent rockets until theyre fit to be used as laboratories, fuel depots, or warehouses.

The Nanoracks program, known asOutpost, will modify rockets after theyre done with their mission to give them a second life. The first Outposts will be uncrewed stations made from the upper stages of new rockets, but Manber says its possible that future stations could host people or be built from rocket stages already in orbit. In the beginning, Nanoracks wont use the interior of the rocket and will mount experiment payloads, power supply modules, and small propulsion units to the outside of the fuselage. Once company engineers have that figured out, they can focus on developing the inside of the rocket as a pressurized laboratory.

Rockets headed to orbit are launched with at least two stages, each equipped with its own propellant tanks and engine. The large first stage boosts the rocket to the edge of space before decoupling and falling back to Earthor, in SpaceXs case,landing on autonomous drone shipsin the ocean. The smaller second stage brings the payload up to orbital speed before releasing it. At that point, the upper stage typically has just enough fuel left to fire its engine so that it plummets back to Earth. If the upper stage doesnt do a deorbit burn, it will keep circling the planet as an uncontrolled satellite.

The Nanoracks team is targeting these upper stages for development because they already have many of the qualities that are needed for a space station. A rockets fuel tanks are designed to hold pressure, and theyre made out of incredibly durable material to withstand the rigors of launch. Theyre also roomy. The upper stage of SpaceXs Falcon 9 is 12 feet in diameter and around 30 feet tall, which is enough space to make a New York apartment dweller jealous.

But these tanks need a little sprucing up before they can host experiments or astronauts. The first step is to vent any remaining fuel to prevent an explosion. Then, the robots take over. These automatons will attach necessary components like solar panels, surface-mounted connectors, or small propulsion units. Nate Bishop, the Outpost project manager at Nanoracks, says the company will do several small in-space demos before attempting to convert a full upper stage into a functioning space station. Right now, were not really modifying anything, says Bishop. Were focused on showing we can control the upper stage with attachments. But in the future, just imagine a bunch of little robots going up and down the stage to add more connectors and stuff like that.

Theres just one problemno one has ever demonstrated the core metalworking and fabrication techniques needed to convert a space station in orbit before. Next May, Nanoracks will change that during its first Outpost demonstration mission. The company has developed a small chamber that will be deployed with several other payloads as part of a SpaceX ride-share mission. Inside the chamber, a small robotic arm tipped with a rapidly spinning drill bit will cut three small pieces of metal made from the same materials used in rocket fuel tanks. If the experiment goes well, the tool should be able to make a precise cut without generating any debris. It will be the first time that metal was ever cut in the vacuum of space.

The fundamental challenge of converting rockets in orbit is understanding how materials react to the space environment. For example, the temperature of a material can differ by hundreds of degrees if one side is facing the sun and the other side is facing away. Without going to space to try it, it can be difficult to predict how that material will react to standard manufacturing techniques like cutting or welding. Other techniques, like making thin film materials for solar panels, require an ultra-pure environment to prevent imperfections. Although space is a vacuum, it still contains a substantial amount of dust and radiation that could interfere with conventional manufacturing processes exported from Earth.

Its remarkable how little we still know about manufacturing in space after 70 years, says Manber. Theres a lot we need to learn if you really go into reuse in space hardware. These sorts of things seem mundane, but we just have to do it step by step.

Mission extension programs like Outpost are new to the space industry. Ever since Sputnik, the stuff that was put into orbit was either intentionally deorbited or abandoned and left to fall back to Earth. There simply wasnt the technology to move a satellite once it ran out of fuel or to commandeer an abandoned rocket hull. And that meant there werent any regulations on how to do it safelyor any consensus on whether it was legal to do it at all.

But things are starting to change. Last year, a Northrop Grumman satellite successfullylatched onto another satellitethat had depleted its fuel supplies and moved it to a new orbit. This maneuver will extend the satellites lifetime by at least five years, and it officially ushered in the era of space mission extensions. During atalkat the International Astronautical Congress this year, Joseph Anderson, vice president of the Northrop Grumman subsidiary Space Logistics, described how the company had to work with several different US agencies to modify licensing requirements so that it could launch the historic mission. It simply didnt fit the licensing structure that the US government had established, Anderson said. Ultimately, we landed on a solution in which the FCC acts as our primary oversight agency. (Thats the Federal Communications Commission, which also regulates things like radio, television and broadband systems.)

If Nanoracks wants to turn rockets into space stations, it will also have to forge new licensing policies to make it happen. Northrop Grummans mission may have laid the foundation for extending the lifespan of new rockets heading to orbit, but what is less clear is whether a company can refurbish rockets that have been abandoned in orbit without the permission of the country or company that launched them.

This is an issue that James Dunstan, the principal attorney at the space law firm Mobius Legal Group, has been grappling with for years. On Earth, international maritime law allows sailors to salvage wreckage they find at sea, but Dunstan says that under the Outer Space Treaty, an international agreement signed in 1967, spent rockets remain the property of whoever launched them. Under this law, if a company or country were to take over an abandoned rocket stage without permission, they would be trespassing on the property of the launching state. But Dunstan describes this interpretation of the law as a fallacy, because, he says, neither the launching states nor launching companies really care about the spent stages. Theyd love for them to go away.

For now, though, Dunstan says the legal risk would be significant for any company that commandeered a rocket stage without asking. Hes spent more than a decade advocating that find and salvage maritime laws should be applied to orbital debris like rocket bodies, but he says regulators at agencies like the FCC and Federal Aviation Administration have been slow to act. It really is going to take a test case to move the needle on the issue of salvage, Dunstan says. And Nanoracks may very well be the company to do it.

Manber sees recycling rockets as the next logical step to increase orbital commerce and expand humanitys reach in the solar system. Launching stuff into space is expensive, but developing the techniques to take advantage of resources that are already there could drastically lower the cost of living and working beyond Earth. When I look 15 or 20 years ahead, there will be scout missions looking for good things to salvage, Manber says. Youre going to have prospectors looking for parts and using them for in-space assembly. Its going to be one of the big markets of the future.

Manbers vision has been a long time coming. Over the past 50 years, engineers at NASA have explored several different methods for converting old rockets into habitats. The agencys first space station, Skylab, was originally meant to be built out of the upper stage of a Saturn V, the massive launcher that carried Apollo astronauts to the moon. This concept, known as a wet workstation, was fairly developed before the engineers on the project decided it would be easier to just launch a bespoke space station instead. But the dream of recycling rockets didnt die.

Bill Stoneis an extreme caver who has been tosome of the deepest places on Earth, and he is the CEO of Stone Aerospace, a company he founded tobuild robots for exploring the oceans on the icy moons of Jupiter and Saturn. Before that, he spent a decade at the National Institute of Standards and Technology working to turn a space shuttles external tank into an orbital habitat. At the time, NASA was just beginning to explore engineering designs for Freedom, a space station concept that would eventually morph into the International Space Station. The leadership at NIST tasked Stone and his colleagues with assessing all the details of NASAs plans to look for ways they could be improved.

One of the things that kept popping up was the fact that the space shuttle was not 100 percent reusable, says Stone. Although NASA could land the shuttle orbiter and occasionally recover the solid boosters from the ocean, the biggest element on the rocketthe external tankwas lost on every launch. For Stone and his team, this was a massive waste of resources. By the time the external tank was jettisoned from the shuttle, it had reached 98 percent of the velocity needed to achieve orbit. It wouldnt take much of an extra boost to keep it in space where it could later be converted into an industrial laboratory.

The shuttle external tank was actually two separate tanksa small one for liquid oxygen and a much larger one for liquid hydrogenthat are connected by an intertank ring to create one massive structure. The NIST teams plan was to use the intertank section as a temporary pressurized habitat for crew as they prepared one of the larger tanks for occupation. This would have required several modifications to the tank, such as a hatch to allow astronauts inside and a small motor attached to the bottom of the external tank so it could orient itself in orbit. But the payoff would have been a tremendous amount of space to use as a warehouse or research lab. The smaller liquid oxygen tank would have provided 25 percent more habitable volume than is currently available on the ISS. If the entire external tank was used, it would have had six times more volume than the space station.

There was 65,000 pounds of aluminum and other aerospace-grade components capable of being pressurized for human habitation that was thrown away on every mission, says Stone. Even looking at the best rates that SpaceX will give you for a boost to low Earth orbit today, thats pushing hundreds of billions of assets that were tossed away.

As NISTs plans came together in the 1980s, a consortium of 57 universities took a majority stake in a private venture called theExternal Tank Corporationthat would convert spent shuttle tanks for NASA. As Randolph Ware, the companys president, toldThe Los Angeles Timesin 1987, the program wasnt meant to compete with the agencys plans for space station Freedom. We are not a substitute for the space station, we are a warehouse on the edge of an industrial park, Ware said. As the External Tanks Corporations led efforts to commercialize the project, Stone and his colleagues at NIST ran digital and physical simulations of their recycled space station. By the late 80s, they had even built a mock-up of a shuttle tank in the pool at NASAs Marshall Space Flight Center so astronauts could practice getting in and out of it. The plan was to use two astronauts during the first demo missionand Stone was going to be one of them.

NIST wasnt the only organization that had designs on the space shuttles external tank. Astudyled by an engineer at Martin Marietta Aerospace, one half of what would become Lockheed Martin, floated the idea of using the tank as the basis for a larger space station, and a separate Air Forceproposalsuggested using the tanks as scrap metal for building structures in orbit. Around the same time, a joint research project between Boeing and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agencysuggestedconverting the external tank into a large-diameter telescope. Even Hilton Hotels had plans for building orbital hotels calledSpace Islandsout of shuttle boosters, although it seems the project never made it beyond a conceptual stage. (Hilton representatives did not respond to WIREDs request for comment.)

The dream of turning spent shuttle boosters into a space station collapsed in 1993 when the Clinton administration gave a stamp of approval to the International Space Station. Stone and his team at NIST had recently submitted a proposal to turn shuttle boosters into space stations, which had worked its way up through the highest levels at NASA and into the White House. But as the Clinton administration prepared to move ahead with the ISS, Stone recalls, the director of NIST called him into his office to deliver the bad news: NASA had spiked the program. The space station had become a national jobs program, and the project was viewed as a threat to the space station, says Stone. It was a tragic mistake that NASA didnt store those external tanks, because they would have established the orbital depots that you need to implement an Earth-moon economy.

For the next two decades, the idea of living and working in old rockets faded from memory as NASA engineers concentrated their efforts on the ISS. It wasnt until 2013 that the idea made a modest comeback when Brand Griffin, a NASA contractor from Jacobs Engineering, led astudyfor the agency on how to turn a fuel tank from its next generationSpace Launch System rocketinto a habitat for deep space exploration. He called his reclaimed space stationSkylab II.

Like its namesake, Skylab II would be launched in a single piece in the upper stage of NASAs SLS, the rocket that the agency will use to send humans back to the moon. The crew compartment would be made from an unused hydrogen fuel tank that would be launched as a payload in the upper stage of the rocket. This is similar to the design of Skylab, which was built from the third stage of a Saturn rocket that had been modified on the ground, rather than converted from a spent upper stage in orbit. All the components needed to turn the tank into a viable habitatsolar panels, antennas, robotic armswould be integrated before it was launched. Much like the Nanoracks Outpost idea, there would be no need for astronauts to assemble the station. The converted hydrogen tank would have enough space to host up to four astronauts and their provisions for a multiyear journey around the moon or Mars. Once Skylab II was in orbit, the crew would be delivered on a subsequent launch via theOrion crew vehicle, which could dock with the habitat and provide propulsion for the mission.

Griffin says the Skylab II study was motivated by the need to lower the cost of deep space exploration. Building the ISS was expensive, and it took dozens of launches to get all the components into orbit. A similar modular station around the moon or Mars would be more expensive still. But Skylab had demonstrated it was possible to launch a capable space station in one shot. We wanted to bring that economy to a cislunar habitat, says Griffin. After the study, Griffin and his team built a full-scale mock-up of a Skylab II station at NASAs Marshall Space Flight Center.

But despite some enthusiasm for the project from NASA officials, the idea was shelved and the agency proceeded withGateway, its new plan for a lunar space station. Unlike Skylab II, the Gateway is modular and more closely resembles a scaled-down version of the ISS. There are lots of reasons why people dont accept change, says Griffin. Sometimes people get an idea of where the solution is going to go and have invested too much already. It needed more pressure, but it wasnt like people were against it.

Manber and Bishop are well aware of the long history of failed attempts at turning space junk into space stations. But they believe that they can succeed where others have failed. Today, robots are able to carry out some of the tasks that, during the shuttle era,would have required a team of astronauts. Aburgeoning space economyis driving demand for more orbital R&D platforms. AndNASAs lunar ambitions will require the agency to rethink the deep-space supply chain. Nanoracks still has to demo many fundamental technologies before the company can recycle a rocket, but for the first time in decades it seems plausible that future astronauts will be living in a secondhand space station.

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Spent Rockets Are Dangerous Space Trash, but They Could Be the Future of Living and Working in Orbit - Mother Jones

Japan joined a U.S.-led international agreement Wednesday that outlines the exploration and utilization of resources in space, the government said.

The Artemis Accords proposed by NASA seeks to establish a set of principles for space exploration including lunar resource extraction. China and Russia are not members of the framework.

The agreement also covers issues regarding space debris and stipulates that its members will not interfere with their counterparts endeavors on the moon.

I hope it will become a guide to implementing future international regulations, said science and technology minister Shinji Inoue in a video message for an online signing ceremony.

The treaty paves the way for its founding members Australia, Canada, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, United Arab Emirates, the U.K. and the United States to participate in NASAs Artemis program, which aims to return humans to Earths nearest neighbor by 2024.

Artemis will be the broadest and most diverse international human space exploration program in history, and the Artemis Accords are the vehicle that will establish this singular global coalition, said NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine.

With todays signing, we are uniting with our partners to explore the moon and are establishing vital principles that will create a safe, peaceful, and prosperous future in space for all of humanity to enjoy.

While NASA is leading the Artemis program, it has emphasized the need for international partnerships in building up a sustainable presence on the moon, something the agency views as key ahead of an eventual human mission to Mars.

The agency hopes, for example, to excavate ice from the moons south pole for drinking water. It also hopes the molecules can be split apart to make rocket fuel for the onward journey.

It also plans to establish an orbital space station called Gateway.

A different international framework, the Outer Space Treaty, has been ratified by over 100 countries but does not set rules on resource extraction, while the United Nations so-called Moon Agreement bars individuals and businesses from claiming possession of celestial bodies but has not been ratified by leading space exploration countries such as the United States, Russia, China and Japan.

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Japan joins U.S.-led pact for space exploration and moon mining - The Japan Times

Commercializing the International Space Station (ISS) could allow for testing components for future moon and Mars missions, and the orbiting platform could also be a pit stop on the way to the moon, according to a panel at the virtual International Astronautical Congress.

The IAC usually runs in-person at a different city every year, but its 2020 conference in Dubai was delayed by a year in favor of virtual sessions a necessary change due to the novel coronavirus pandemic. Participants in the ISS commercialization discussion Tuesday (Oct. 13) represented private space companies on three continents who have forged close relationships with NASA, the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).

"The vastness of the microgravity environment provides a huge opportunity for us to do research, to manufacture items in orbit, and to allow our species to make a step off our home planet and live in other parts of the universe," said Axiom Space CEO Michael Suffredini, who was NASA's ISS program manager from 2005 to 2015.

Related: ISS at 20: Commercialization and its looming end of life

In January, NASA picked the Houston-based company Axiom Space to build at least one habitable private module that will attach to the ISS no earlier than the end of 2021. Suffredini said this module would be the first of several planned space rooms to eventually bridge the commercial users of the ISS to moving their operations to Axiom.

Axiom itself plans to have an independent commercial space station in low Earth orbit after the ISS's planned retirement in 2024. The ISS, however, could be extended to 2028 or beyond with the approval of the international partners.

"The [current] users of the ISS have a place to evolve to," Suffredini said of the Axiom module, adding it will be "critical for success" for other companies looking to make a business out of activities in low Earth orbit.

It is unclear what will happen to the ISS after the international consortium plans to retire the facility, which celebrates 20 years of continuous, long-duration human occupation this October. The vision right now is to deorbit the station, but some entities have talked about breaking off parts of it for smaller, commercially run space stations.

The ISS could also morph into a new role, which would be serving the Earth-to-moon missions that NASA hopes to start running in the near future, said Andreas Hammer, who leads the space exploration unit at Airbus Defence and Space in Bremen, Germany. (Airbus built the European Space Agency's Columbus ISS module, among other space activities.)

The Trump administration would like to see astronauts touch down again on the moon's surface in 2024 during the Artemis 3 mission, with the first orbital mission (Artemis 2) taking place in 2023 or 2024. NASA is seeking international support for these missions and Hammer said his company hopes these moon missions will indeed be part of a long-duration program, instead of just the short visits the Apollo program had in the 1960s and 1970s.

"The aim must be for humans, mankind, to stay longer there to build a kind of lunar ecosystem in the years to come, as a necessary bridgehead for the next step ... going in the direction of Mars," Hammer said.

Related: Trump administration urges more commercial activities in space

Having space to work on the ISS provides another advantage to companies, in that they can test out hardware and have it returned rather than launching it on a satellite and relying on only remote data. For example, Hammer added, companies can evaluate the effects of space radiation on equipment at the ISS by examining the hardware directly after it is brought back to Earth.

He urged using the facilities of the ISS to test systems ahead of jumping ahead to deeper-space destinations, to make sure items such as life support could stand up to months or years in space. Further, he advocated for shipping items from the ISS to the moon to lower costs of exploration. "I do believe that the moon is not possible without LEO [low Earth orbit]," he added.

Space agencies will need to deepen their relationships with commercial partners if the "new space" economy is to get going in earnest, but that is already starting to happen. NASA is already opening up the ISS to more commercial modules and soon, private astronauts. JAXA tasked the Japanese startup Space BD with satellite deployment, running an external platform and doing rideshare services, mostly basing its operations in space at the JAXA Kibo module.

"JAXA could have gone with a large company for these opportunities, but instead selected [us]," Space BD co-founder and CEO Masatoshi Nagasaki said. "We believe ... their priority was not just hiring a company, but rather a company's [strategic] direction. It facilitates JAXA's movement to opening space industrial demand with business-oriented design."

The participants did not address U.S. budgets or politics at all in the panel, but the activities of the next few months will be key to the future of the ISS. NASA is currently undergoing review for the Trump administration's 2021 fiscal budget request, which was put in before the pandemic altered the economy of the United States for the foreseeable future. The United States is also undergoing presidential elections, with officials expecting the ballot-box outcome in the next few weeks after mail-in ballots are counted along with in-person ballots and ballots cast from space.

Follow Elizabeth Howell on Twitter @howellspace. Follow us on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.

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How commercializing the International Space Station can help astronauts get to the moon and Mars - Space.com

Description: The accessibility of space allows for a number of scientific and technological innovations and exploration of planets and other universes. However, it also raises issues related to the ethical study of space that would allow for these innovations to occur. Such questions include: who owns space, how space ownership should be legally regulated, whether space should be privatized or commercialized, what technologies would aid in the study of space, and what international space collaboration might look like. This session provides early career researchers (ECRs) with an opportunity to describe their space policy work published in Journal of Science Policy & Governance (JSPG), interact with science policy professionals and lead fruitful discussions on space exploration, protection, technology, and collaboration.

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Ethical study of space exploration and utilisation - SpaceNews