Category Archives: Space Exploration

Chinas Change 4 mission has sent back fascinating insights and images in the year since its historic landing on the lunar farside.

China's Change 4 lunar lander and Yutu 2 rover have powered down at the end of the missions 13th lunar day, completing a year of pioneering exploration of the farside of the Moon.

The lander and Yutu 2 (Jade Rabbit 2) rover powered down at 06:11 and 12:30 Universal Time (UT), respectively, on January 2nd. According to the end of mission day update from the China Lunar Exploration Program (Chinese blog), the spacecraft and all science payloads remain healthy.

The Change 4 lander took this high-resolution image of Yutu 2. CNSA / CLEP

Yutu 2 drove 12.63 meters (41 feet) during lunar day 13, bringing its total drive distance to 357.69 meters (1171.26 feet) since its deployment on Von Krmn Crater on January 3, 2019. The Soviet Lunokhod rover of the 1970s still holds the record for long-distance driving on the Moon, but in November, Yutu 2 set a record for sheer longevity.Going strong a year later, the 140-kilogram rover has far exceeded its design lifetime of three lunar days (three Earth months). Its long life is in part a product of lessons learned from the Yutu rover on the Change 3 mission in 2013, which lost mobility in its second lunar day due to a short circuit.

Tracking Yutu 2 activities reveals that the solar-powered rover awakens about 24 hours after sunrise over its location, and powers down roughly 24 hours ahead of sunset. The rover also enters a dormant phase for roughly six Earth days around local noon to protect itself from high direct solar radiation and temperatures. (While the Lunokhod rovers likewise halted during lunar noon, they did so because the lack of shadows made driving hazardous.)

This map shows the route Yutu 2 traveled by the end of day 12. The map was produced by space exploration historian and cartographer Phil Stooke.

Change 4 has been exploring the Von Krmn Crater in the South Pole-Aitken Basin, where it landed on the farside of the Moon. Over the past year, it has returned images from the surface and carried out in situ measurements.

Chinas Lunar Exploration Program (CLEP) recently made the first high-resolution images from the lander and rover available online. These include shots of the spacecraft, projection and cylindrical panoramas, and videos of the mesmerizing landing.

Yutu 2 took this high-resolution image of the Change 4 lander during lunar day 1. CNSA / CLEP

In the December 15th Earth and Planetary Science Letters, Yue Zongyu (Chinese Academy of Sciences) and colleagues analyzed rock fragments from the nearby Finsen Crater. Like earlier results of lunar soil, or regolith, published in the May 15th Nature, the new data suggest that some materials on the surface of Von Krmn Crater were long ago excavated from the lunar mantle. Discerning the composition of regolith in the South Pole-Aitken Basin, a primary goal of the mission, could help scientists understand the formation of this huge impact feature.

As Yutu 2 drives, its Lunar Penetrating Radar also explores what lies beneath its path. Lai Jialong (State Key Laboratory of Lunar and Planetary Sciences) and colleagues are finding that the Moons regolith is thicker than similar measurements of the nearside. The researchers report these results in the November 28th Geophysical Research Letters. They speculate that the thicker regolith at Change 4 could come from more impacts, since the site is on the leading side of the Moon with respect to its orbit around Earth.

Yutu 2s spectrometer also revealed a unique material in a small crater within Von Krmn. The Our Space Chinese science blog provoked widespread interest in August, when it described the substance as , which could be translated as gel-like. However, scientists now think the material is likely impact glass, which forms when rock mashes up during an impact.

Yutu 2 discovered material within a small impact crater that initially sparked widespread curiosity. CNSA/CLEP/NASA/GSFC/Dan Moriarty

Scientists are still awaiting results from Chang'e 4's Low Frequency Radio Spectrometer, which deployed its three 5-meter antennas in late November. This instrument will take advantage of the radio quiet on the lunar farside. And now, scientists are also looking forward to results from the Netherlands-China Low-Frequency Explorer, another radio astronomy instrument that has just been deployed on the the Queqiao (Magpie Bridge) relay satellite.

Queqiao launched ahead of Change 4 to a halo orbit around the Earth-Moon L2 Lagrangian point in order to facilitate communications between the mission and Earth. Now, after 18 months in space, three 5-meter-long antennas have been deployed from the orbiter. Only one antenna has achieved full extension; the other two have extended to only about 2.5 meters.

However, this limitation may have unintended benefits: The two shorter antennas will be better suited to collect signals from the cosmic dawn, when the first stars began to shine, while the fully extended antenna will listen for the longer-wavelength signals that come from the cosmic dark ages that preceded star formation. NCLE operates across a frequency range between 1 and 80 MHz; observations below 30 MHz are difficult to make from the ground due to interference within Earth's upper atmosphere.

Sunrise over the Statio Tianhe landing site in Von Krmn Crater will take place late January 17th. Both lander and rover are expected to begin activities for a 14th lunar day by late January 19th UT. With the abundant scientific data already returned, more science results are expected to follow throughout 2020.

Yutu 2 left tracks in the lunar regolith during lunar day 13. CNSA / CLEP

This image shows lunar regolith and the distant rim of Von Krmn Crater on lunar day 12. CNSA / CLEP

Yutu 2 took this partial panorama during lunar day 12. (Click for higher-resolution image.) CNSA / CLEP

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Chang'e 4 Celebrates a Year on the Farside of the Moon - Sky & Telescope

To put it simply, a space suit is a garment worn by a space traveler for the purpose of safely supporting life in the harsh environment of space while allowing the wearer to perform many desired functions. Anytime a space traveler is outside of the spacecraft, this suit is absolutely essential for survival. Often these suits are worn inside spacecraft for precautionary measures.

Different suits may be found on different missions due to differing operations and environments. For example, there have been a variety of space suits that have been used for short suborbital flights and lunar missions. Most recently, NASA released a new suit design for use in planned lunar colonies.

Modern space suits are quite complex. In addition to the basic pressure garment there are a number of equipment systems including environmental controls that keep the wearer comfortable and special joint mechanisms to minimize forces needed to bend limbs.

In order to freely move outside the spacecraft, some suits can support maneuvering units that incorporate propulsion devices. Of course, a self-contained oxygen supply is usually part of the environmental control system.

There are three categories of space suit for differing uses. One type is used for intravehicular activity (IVA), one for extravehicular activity (EVA) and one for intra/extravehicular activity (IEVA).

IVA suits are worn inside a pressurized spacecraft. So, they have less mass and offer more comfort. IEVA suits can be used inside and outside of the spacecraft. EVA suits are used outside of the spacecraft and for planetary exploration.

In summary a space suit must perform several functions to ensure safety for the occupant while outside of the spacecraft:

+ Maintain stable internal pressure while providing breathable oxygen+ Eliminate carbon dioxide+ Permit mobility+ Regulate temperature+ Include a communications system+ Collect and contain solid and liquid bodily waste

In reality, some of these suits have many of the same systems as spacecraft.

Related LinksLaunchspaceSpace Tourism, Space Transport and Space Exploration News

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Have Space Suit Will Travel - Space Daily

Jeff Bezos

On Wednesday evening, Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos posted a video on his official Twitter account to tout about the success of his self-funded space exploration company, Blue Origin.

Dressed in a camo parka, cowboy hat and aviators, Bezos looked less like the richest man in the world (now worth $109 billion) and more like a Texas ranger.The video shows him walking towards a reusable Blue Origin rocket called New Shepard, presumably at the companys launch site in West Texas. [T]his vehicle has now flown to space & back six times making this a new milestone, Bezos tweeted.

While there were no humans onboard on its most recent mission, the rocket did carry thousands of postcards that children had written as part of the Space Mail campaign from Club For The Future, a nonprofit funded by Blue Origin. The organization is open to students, parents and teachers, with a mission to give children affordable, frequent and reliable access to space in order to foster a future generation of space explorers. The postcards will be sent back to the children after their voyage to spacewith a Blue Origin stamp newly affixed. Bezos is shown stamping a few of the postcards in the video. Alright, thats a success guys. Thats beautiful, Bezos says in the video.

Eventually, Blue Origin hopes to carry humans to space in the reusable rocket. This mission was another step towards verifying New Shepard for human spaceflight as we continue to mature the safety and reliability of the vehicle, the company said in a statement.

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The Richest Man On Earth Just Sent Thousands Of Postcards To Space And Back - Forbes

Astronomers are making the case for a new mission to search for Earth-like planets outside our solar system.

The mission, nicknamed HabEx for The Habitable Exoplanet Observatory, would use a telescope with a mirror larger than Hubbles, and would employ origami techniques to utilize an external starshade, which would block the light from the parent star and enable the search for and characterization of dim planets orbiting that star, according to a presentation todayat the annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union.

Our goal is to see if we can find a planet that is similar to Earth one that can support life, said Scott Gaudi, one of the projects co-chairs. While weve identified a number of planets outside our solar system, so far, none have conclusively been shown to have the elements necessary for habitability.

Gaudi, who is an astronomy professor at The Ohio State University, said the mission would be the next logical step in the search for planets similar to our Earth.

The project is one of four mission concepts proposed by NASA to be the next Great Observatory a large-scale mission that will play an important role in the space science the United States invests in over the next decade. The federalDecadal Survey intends to make its recommendation on which project if any should receive funding by 2021. If prioritized, the mission would likely not launch until the 2030s.

HabEx would have a mirror that is 4 meters wide as compared to Hubbles 2.4-meter mirror and would be used in conjunction with a starshade to search the skies for light from other planets. That light is typically drowned out by brighter light from nearby stars, including our sun, Gaudi said. But HabEx would deflect starlight using the starshade a 52-meter flower-shaped disk that would go into space folded origami-like into a tight spiral.

The starshade would unfold once the satellite reached its orbit and fly nearly 77,000 kilometers from the telescope, blocking light from stars but allowing light reflecting off other planets to reach the telescopes instruments.

The telescope would then search nearby stars that are similar to the sun for signs of planets that have water or carbon dioxide two signs that a planet might be habitable. The telescope would also have a camera a very powerful one that could take pictures of nearby planetary systems.

Those pictures would be the first family portraits of those systems, Gaudi said.

The telescope would have additional instrumentation as well, including a coronagraph, a piece of equipment that can also characterize planets outside our solar system and record images of them.

The mission is designed to collect data on exoplanets for about a decade. The telescope would also run other experiments to attempt to understand more about our own solar system.

One of the other three mission concepts under consideration by NASA would also search for habitable exoplanets, but on a larger scale and with a heftier price tag than HabEx. (HabEx is estimated to cost about $7 billion over 10 years.)

The HabEx mission was designed by astronomers, physicists and engineers from around the country, including the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California. If it is selected, the mission would likely require international collaboration among universities, governments and corporations to be successful, Gaudi said similar to other large-scale space missions in the past.

The four mission concepts are the finalists for the next Decadal Survey, aprogram that identifies flagship space missions and experiments by surveying scientists who study space and asking them to identify priorities for space exploration. The next flagship mission after the James Webb Space Telescope, the Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope, or WFIRST, is in the planning stages. Ohio State astronomers have played an important role in that mission as well.

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A mission to find the next Earth - The Ohio State University News

Space is more than a legally defined domain; it is an integral part of our understanding of the human experience. Space advances our understanding of our fundamental place in the universe and serves as a testing ground for science that has dramatically changed how we live. Now, space is also critical infrastructure for the daily survival of our human species. Our cell phone communications, GPS, banking systems, air travel, and more all depend on our space assets. If we lose them or they are attacked, Americans will become collateral damage.

The US government accepted space as a global commons during the Cold War, after a series of arms tests including the July 9, 1962 detonation of a 1.4 megaton hydrogen bomb by the United States that disabled six satellites .

But now our restraint is waning.

In December 2017, Scott Pace, executive secretary of the US National Space Council, said, It bears repeating: Outer space is not a global commons, not the common heritage of mankind, not res communis, nor is it a public good. Two years later, US Space Command was established as one of 11 Unified Commands under the Department of Defense. Its responsible for defending US action in space, delivering combat-relevant space capability, and joint warfighters to advance US interests in, through, and from the space domain. This is an aggressive militaristic approach that will be mimicked by other nations.

There is no precedent for assuming that weaponizing space will benefit humanity. In fact, we should assume the opposite, especially when reviewed in the context of its closest corollary: the Internet.

US Cyber Command, based within the National Security Agency, is the model for the US Space Force. Created in 2009 with the original mission to defend the nations cybersecurity, US Cyber Command has increasingly acted as an offensive force. The Internet is a war-fighting domain and becoming more so daily. On any given day, 30 nations are actively engaged in acts of war against one another. Cybercriminals and other bad actors use the Internet to maliciously target American citizens, companies, and institutions, steal data, and spread disinformation.

A war in a global commons is not traditional war: It is not finite, with strict boundaries and rules of engagement. Instead, wars in global commons spill outward and impact our entire world. For example, WannaCry ransomware, a top secret exploit developed by the NSA and released by hackers, brought China, Russia, Britain, and the United States to their knees by holding users files hostage until a ransom was paid. It spread to hospitals and other vital institutions. A cyber weapon knows no physical boundaries. Neither does a space-based one.

In wars that take place where there is no sovereign claim, weapons take new and ever-changing forms and have unintended consequences. Weapons in space could be used to defend against attacks on space-based critical infrastructure, but they could also lead to unprecedented damage. Space is large and unknown. Physical weapons like rockets would be hard to intercept. But physical weapons are only one scenario. Cyber weapons attacking vulnerable satellites are a real threat that will cross multiple commons.

Space is a blank canvas on which to paint a new existence, or it is a chance to repeat the failures of our past.

We need to figure out a way to create a resilient system in space where we put the common goodfirst. This includes a vision where our critical infrastructure is protected. But to do this, we need to have a broad discussion about space as a global commons. It must include understanding the role that space plays for humanity, the impacts of weaponizing space, how much of a role individual nation-states can play, identifying the policing force, how we envision space exploration, and more. If we do not develop a global vision for space, the militarization of space and inevitable conflicts will impact every one of us here on Earth.

Space is, indeed, our final frontier. It belongs to all of us. It should not be colonized or controlled by any nations military. We have the opportunity to get this one right and develop the future with a blockbuster Hollywood happy ending: a world where space is safe, secure, and stable for human exploration.

Kristina Libby is an adjunct professor at New York University and executive vice president of future science and research at Hypergiant. Follow her on @kristinalibby. Maggi Molina is a US Air Force veteran and a TechCongress alumni.

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Trumps US Space Command will bring Earths battlefields to the stars - The Boston Globe

What happens to the genes of organisms as they travel from the ground, through Earth's atmosphere and into space? Does their expression change? Are the changes subtle or dramatic? Do they happen quickly or gradually?

Answering such fundamental research questions is essential to our understanding of the impact of space travel on humans and other organisms. Two researchers from the University of Florida in Gainesville have been chipping away at the answers since the 1990s-using plants.

Soon, co-principal investigators Robert Ferl and Anna-Lisa Paul will launch their "space plants"-Arabidopsis thaliana to be exact-along with advanced cameras and sensors for imaging them on Blue Origin's New Shepard rocket. The flight test, facilitated by NASA's Flight Opportunities program, is the latest suborbital experiment to help the investigators further examine the cornerstone questions of two decades of biological research.

"About half of the genes in our bodies encode the exact same proteins in plants," explained Paul. "And that's very exciting because it means that as we look at how plants behave in the absence of gravity, we can translate many of those basic biological processes to humans."

And it turns out that plants behave quite differently in space compared to on the ground. In particular, plant growth is distinctly unique, with roots branching in skewed or random patterns rather than extending down from the shoots like they typically do on Earth.

Ferl and Paul began studying how plants respond to microgravity on the molecular level with space shuttle experiments in the late '90s, the findings from which they later applied to longer term observations with nine experiments on the International Space Station.

"What we learned from those early experiments was certain notions of how plants adapt to space. And then we compared that with how they behave on the ground," said Ferl. "That's monumental, but it doesn't tell us what happens in the transition. Essentially nowhere in the history of space biology have scientists had the opportunity to fully examine the transition from 1 g to 0 g and back."

Enter parabolic flights, many of which were facilitated by NASA, where Ferl and Paul were able to start examining that transition during 30-second periods of microgravity.

"Those flights gave us the first hints that plant adaptation happens very rapidly," said Paul. "We could get small glimpses into the transition using fluorescent imaging to study different types of molecule signaling and look at what genes are turned off, what genes are turned on and when that happens."

Ferl and Paul have now adapted their fluorescent imaging hardware to suborbital vehicles, where they continue studying the transition phase-the new frontier of their work. Of particular interest is calcium signaling, which is known to flip the switch on or off for specific genes in response to external stimuli, such as wind blowing across the leaves, the hungry bite of a caterpillar, or something more dramatic-like a change in gravity.

"Our very first spaceflight experiment indicated that being in space changes some aspects of calcium signaling," explained Ferl. "And calcium signaling in particular is very similar between plants and animals, so we want to better understand that role in response to transitions in gravity."

Suborbital flights are now enabling imaging of molecular changes during gravity transitions in real time-and with longer durations of microgravity than possible on parabolic flights. A suborbital flight on Virgin Galactic's SpaceShipTwo in December 2018 and a launch on New Shepard in January 2019 have hinted at some surprising findings.

"Our early suborbital data about how genes are responding is telling us that the calcium signaling during the transitions in gravity is working in ways we did not anticipate," noted Paul. "And that, of course, is very exciting because it means there is much to learn."

While Paul and Ferl can't say just yet what this means for their findings, data from the upcoming flight, which is scheduled to launch from Blue Origin's West Texas launch site no earlier than Dec. 10, 2019, will help confirm earlier suborbital findings, potentially leading to a new breakthrough in their research with significant implications for human space exploration.

"Understanding the biological processes of plants in space can give us insight into those processes in humans, but the plants are important in and of themselves," said Paul.

Ferl added that while they and other scientists have grown successful plant harvests in sustained microgravity in space station experiments, their ongoing work is helping to understand the underlying metabolic changes that allow those plants to adapt to spaceflight.

"Understanding what it takes to help plants thrive in space-as a food and oxygen source and for other needs-is crucial to any exploration initiative where the goal is a long-term habitat," said Paul.

More Tech Aboard New Shepard: A Method for Managing Trash in SpaceSeven other Flight Opportunities-supported payloads will also be tested on New Shepard, including the Orbital Syngas Commodity Augmentation Reactor-OSCAR for short. OSCAR, just like the Grouch, loves trash. The system uses two chemical processes, oxidation and steam reforming, to turn things like food packaging, old clothing and even human waste into water and a mixture of gases that include hydrogen, carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide and methane. OSCAR is one of several logistics reduction technologies NASA is investigating that could be useful for long-duration space exploration.

A multi-disciplinary team made up of early career researchers at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida is working on the project to help manage trash and waste in space and transform it into useful resources. The project is an Early Career Initiative funded by NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate.

NASA estimates that a crew of four astronauts will generate approximately 5,500 pounds of waste during a one-year mission. Future long-duration missions, such as sending humans to Mars, will require new methods for trash handling and disposal. If OSCAR can turn trash into gases that a crew can use, it would greatly reduce the space needed for waste storage, while also making it biologically safe.

"Trash management should be a primary consideration for long-duration deep space human spaceflight," said Anne Meier, OSCAR's principal investigator at Kennedy. "OSCAR will be the first time we look at some of the engineering operations and science involved in the design for such a system to work in microgravity."

OSCAR's launch on New Shepard will enable researchers to add to data from previous lab and drop tests, evaluate the performance of the reactor, and inform future designs. The instrument will use trash simulants for this suborbital test flight.

Flight OpportunitiesThe Flight Opportunities program is funded by NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate and managed at NASA's Armstrong Flight Research Center in Edwards, California. NASA's Ames Research Center in California's Silicon Valley manages the solicitation and evaluation of technologies to be tested and demonstrated on commercial flight vehicles.

Related LinksSpace Technology Mission DirectorateSpace Medicine Technology and Systems

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Inner to outer space: studying biological changes with plants on rockets - Space Daily

WASHINGTON A House committee is finalizing its version of a NASA authorization bill that will cover many of the same topics as a Senate bill, but do so in different ways.

In a speech Dec. 11 at a space law conference here, Rep. Kendra Horn (D-Okla.), chair of the House Science Committees space subcommittee, said her committee was making progress on a new NASA authorization bill that would address issues such as ensuring continued progress on major agency programs, like its effort to return humans to the moon.

Were getting close on a bill, she said. Stay tuned. We should have more on that soon.

The last NASA authorization bill passed by Congress was the NASA Transition Authorization Act of 2017, signed into law in March 2017. It was intended to provide continuity for agency programs as the Trump administration took office.

The Senate Commerce Committee approved a new NASA authorization bill, introduced by bipartisan committee leadership, Nov. 13. That bill extends operations of the ISS through 2030 and calls for a stepping-stone approach to human exploration, although one that doesnt explicitly endorse the administrations goal of returning humans to the moon by 2024.

Horn said she expected the House bill to address some of the same issues, but not necessarily the same way. I think the broad topics, and many of the things the Senate has been concerned with, were concerned with, she said. We may be tackling some of them in slightly different ways, but we are eager to work with the Senate once we get ours done.

A top priority for the bill, she said, will be to address the challenges and opportunities of NASAs human spaceflight programs. An issue she emphasized in her speech and subsequent question-and-answer session was avoiding the stops and starts in agency programs during changes in presidential administrations and Congresses.

Our intention with this is that we do a better job to put some guardrails in place that will help to hopefully reduce some of those fits and starts, and decisions and changes, that take place between different priorities in administrations and Congresses, she said.

Horn said she is seeking to develop a strong bipartisan bill that can come out of the House, including working closely with the subcommittees ranking member, Rep. Brian Babin (R-Texas). Its incredibly important to me, and I think its incredibly important to this country, that we do this right, she said.

Work on a new NASA authorization bill has taken priority over commercial space legislation. The Senate Commerce Committee approved a new version of the Space Frontier Act in April, after the full Senate passed a similar bill last December. That earlier Senate bill, though, died in the House when it failed to garner the two-thirds majority needed for passage there under suspension of the rules.

Cruz criticized the lack of House action on the new Space Frontier Act, or similar legislation, in October. Many of the individuals who are gathered in this room today are the ones who are feeling the greatest impact moving forward due to the Houses failure not only to enact the Space Frontier Act, but also its current disinterest in taking any meaningful steps to address this issue, he said in an Oct. 31 speech at a forum organized by the Air Line Pilots Association and the Commercial Spaceflight Federation on airspace issues for commercial launches.

Horn said action on commercial space legislation would come after completion of the NASA authorization bill. Were definitely looking at some of those important questions and how we address those, she said.

One challenge, she said, is jurisdictional issues among House committees. While the Senate Commerce Committees jurisdiction includes both aviation and space, the House Transportation Committee handles aviation issues while the House Science Committee handles space. In recent years the House Transportation Committee has taken an increased interest in commercial space transportation, including how it interacts with the national airspace system.

In panels later in the day at the conference, held under the Chatham House Rule, other speakers noted that commercial space issues in general in Congress have taken a back seat this year to the new emphasis on human space exploration. The Artemis program has taken up all the attention when it comes to policymaking, said one.

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House preparing to introduce new NASA authorization bill - SpaceNews

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An out-of-this-world artifactfound in Montgomery'stime capsule from 1969 was a letter from aerospace engineer Wernher von Braun from a few weeks after Apollo 11 landed on the moon.

Bernhard Tessmann and Wernher von Braun at the Saturn V rocket test stand at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, in this file photo from the late 1960s.(Photo: Alabama Department of Archives and History)

The capsule was sealed during Montgomery's 150th anniversary with instructions not to open it until the city's 200th anniversary.The city commemorated Montgomerys bicentennial with the opening of the capsule.

More: Here's the full list of what was in the 1969 Montgomery time capsule

Von Braun, was a rocket scientist who spearheaded Nazi Germany's rocket development program during World War II. After the war, he emigrated to the United States and became the driving force and architect of America's program to land astronauts on the moon. Along with the letter, von Braun sent Saturn V and Apollo 8 medallions to be placed in the capsule.

"After the turn of the century, when this time capsule will be opened, space exploration will advance to a degree unforeseen in these opening years of space flight," von Braun wrote in a letter addressed to Jim Pruett, a well-known Montgomery local on the board for the time capsule at the time. "It is our fondest hope that space advancements follow the trend that we attempted to establish in the 1960s and are directed toward the benefit of mankind and toward the uplifting of all Earth's people."

A letter addressed to Jimmy Pruett from Wernher von Braun is seen as items are pulled from the time capsule.(Photo: Mickey Welsh / Advertiser)

Messages, a Coke, pantyhose from the past: Montgomery opens 50-year-old time capsule

Contents placedin the capsule in 1969are were archived by theAlabama Department of Archives and History.

A small exhibit of some of the materials found in the capsule will be on view beginning Thursday in the ADAHs main lobby. Several items have been digitized and can be viewed here.

The ADAH will begin releasing letters to their intended recipients in the coming weeks.

Sara MacNeilcan be reached at smacneil@montgome.gannett.com. Follow her onTwitter.

Jimmy Pruett holds a letter addressed to him from Wernher von Braun as items are pulled from the time capsule, that was sealed during Montgomery's 150th anniversary in 1969.(Photo: Mickey Welsh / Advertiser)

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Letter from space architect Wernher von Braun found in time capsule from 1969 - Montgomery Advertiser

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. (WTHR) - An associate professor at Purdue is behind one of TIME Magazine's Best Inventions of 2019.

David Spencer was one of six people who have been developing the LightSail 2 over the last decade. It is the first spacecraft to sail through Earth's orbit propelled by the power of the sun.

"We're getting beautiful images from the spacecraft, as well," said Spencer.

Spencer said The Planetary Society's crowdfunded space mission has "captured people's imagination."

"Solar energy from the sun is limitless. We deployed a solar sail the size of a boxing ring from a spacecraft the size of a loaf of bread. For the first time, we're controlling the orientation of that solar sail relative to the sun and changing the orbit based on the solar sail and that hasn't been done before," said Spencer with smile.

LightSail 2 can advance our space exploration.

"Solar sails are one of the few technologies that allow you travel from one solar system to another in a reasonable amount of time. It'll still take generations, but it's a fast way to get there," said Spencer.

But it can also help protect our military and our infrastructure, by being the first alarm bells for inevitable solar storms in the future.

Solar storms "are definitely going to happen again and we need to be ready for them," said Spencer.

In the past, solar storms haven't caused a substantial upset.

"The biggest ones were before we were totally dependent on our electrical power grid," said Spencer.

But in our modern world?

"It could be really damaging to our infrastructure, it could take down our power grid. It would take down our ability to do navigation not only for individual navigation but military applications as well as communication systems," said Spencer.

But the advance warning provided through solar sails can make a difference.

"Eight, 10, 12 hours of warning can allow us to put our systems in a safe state and allow us to recover from that event more readily, " said Spencer.

The LightSail 2 is also visible from Earth, but you have to be close enough to the equator.

"It's a streak of light in the sky, or it's probably flickering, because it's gathering the sun's rays," said Spencer.

Its ability to protect our infrastructure, advance space travel and sail through Earth's orbit by the power of sun are all reasons why Time Magazine named it one of the best inventions of 2019.

Spencer also said that next year NASA Is going to launch a mission that will use solar sail technology to observe an asteroid and that the LightSail team has been sharing their lessons learned from this mission with NASA.

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Purdue professor behind one of Time Magazine's Best Inventions of 2019 - WTHR

The U.S. government has shifted its priorities toward supporting private space companies, minimizing its own risks and saving billions on a bet that a single administration can accomplish anything in a short amount of time.

This move beyond the old national space race with the former Soviet Union has benefited high-profile private companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin, but funding gaps and obstacles persist for smaller, earlier-stage companies looking to develop cutting-edge space technology and solve a range of space travel, sustainable food and climate challenges.

NASA, or any single agency, is limited in the support they can offer early stage companies, said Dorit Donoviet, a director of Translational Research Institute for Space Health, a research consortium that has a partnership with NASAs Human Research Program.

We just dont have the funding to take it all the way to market and so we absolutely need to be partnered up with other investors who are willing to look over our shoulders, she said at a webinar held by Boundless Impact Investing this week.

Out of the $2.6 billion NASA budget allocated for 2020, only $222 million is directed to exploration technology and science.

Programs like SBIR, Small Business Innovative Research and Business Technology Transfer are run out of NASAs Ames Research Center in Californias Silicon Valley.

Earlier this year, NASA allocated more than $45 million to fund 363 proposals from small businesses or research organizations. Other government agencies like NIH and Department of Energy, also use these programs to allocate funds to early-stage companies.

What that does is that it allows us to get technology to a certain level of maturity to prove them out, but there is still a big funding gap between proving (that) technology and commercializing it and bringing it to market, said Christine Escobar, vice president and chief business officer of Space Lab Technologies, at the webinar.

We just dont have the funding to take it all the way to market and so we absolutely need to be partnered up with other investors who are willing to look over our shoulders.

Founded in 2016, Space Lab Technologies is working on space agriculture technology, crop production systems, and various solutions to support living and working in space.

Escobar notes there are opportunities for private investors.

Whats neat about the SBIR program, is that once you get past phases one and two, phase three is meant to commercialize that technology the government would actually match funds from investors, she said, encouraging investors to keep track of the phase two companies.

Phase one of the SBIR program allocated up to $125,000 in funding, while phase two companies receive $750,000, according to the program website.

The governments so-called extension funds, or follow-on funding for phase two companies, present a good opportunity for private investors, Escobar notes.

During this time, if a company has outside investment for further R&D, the SBIR program will match those investment funds up to a cap, she said. In NASAs case, the agency can match external investments up to $375,000.

Escobar said a separate funding challenge occurs when startups, in their quest for commercialization, have to repackage space technology for operation on Earth.

Another funding gap is when you transform a new technology you developed for space (for Earth) there are some development costs, because that technology is a bit more robust and complex than it needs to be, she said. You need to do a little repackaging to make it more cost-effective thats where investors could help as well.

Originally posted here:

U.S. Government Looks to Back Cutting-Edge Space Tech as Funding Gaps Remain - Karma