Category Archives: Space Travel

ITS not rocket science, as the saying goes, as to where those in the highly respected profession get their inspiration from as Alan Bond revealed upon receiving an honorary degree at the University of Warwick.

One of the UKs leading rocket scientists, he was motivated to take up rocket engineering when he read an episode of the comic strip Dan Dare called Operation Saturn, published in the Eagle comic in 1953.

He soon joined up with amateur rocket enthusiasts, including a group in Leamington, and he built and launched hundreds of rockets as a teenager.

Parts of the rocket engines he helped develop were manufactured in the Rolls Royce workshops in Parkside in Coventry, and tested at the companys facilities at Ansty.

Now he is leading the way in developing space travel.

Mr Bond received an honorary degree of Doctor of Science last Tuesday (July 18), and explained the numerous key Coventry and Warwickshire influences on his career and life.

During his time in the region, Alans son was born in the then Walsgrave Hospital (now part of University Hospitals Coventry and Warwickshire NHS Trust).

The young Alans interest in rockets brought him to the attention of leading UK rocket engineer Val Cleaver who hired him to work on the engines powering the UKs Blue Streak missile and Black Arrow launch vehicle. Parts of these engines were manufactured and tested by Rolls Royce in the region.

The university website adds: He first worked on liquid rocket engines, principally the RZ2 (liquid oxygen / kerosene) and the RZ20 (liquid oxygen / liquid hydrogen) at Rolls Royce, and he was also involved with flight trials of the UKs Blue Streak satellite launch rocket at Woomera in Australia.

He also worked for around two decades on the UK Atomic Energy Authoritys Culham Laboratory on nuclear fusion, on the JET and RFX nuclear research projects.

He also explored how to use fusion to enable interplanetary space travel.

And he was the leading author of the report on the Project Daedalus interstellar, a fusion powered starship proposal, which was published by the British Interplanetary Society.

In the 1980s, he was one of the creators of the HOTOL spaceplane project, and he brought a key jet engine design that he had invented to the HOTOL project.

In 1989, Alan Bond was one of the founders of Reaction Engines Ltd. REL is developing a single-stage orbital spaceplane called Skylon, and other advanced vehicles including a hypersonic airliner concept as part of the European LAPCAT programme.

The projects have involved the practical development of hydrogen fuelled, pre-cooled air breathing rocket engines, most notably, an engine called SABRE (Synergic Air Breathing Rocket Engine).

The aim being to create a vehicle which can take off like a normal aircraft and fly into space.

Read more from the original source:

Rocketman from Leamington leads the way in space travel - Leamington Observer

Dr. Mae Jemison has built her career by taking big risks in pursuit of helping others and bettering our world -- while constantly searching for brand new ones for us to explore.

In 1992, she became the first African-American woman to travel to space as a crew member on board the Space Shuttle Endeavor. Before her tenure as a NASA astronaut, Jemison practiced medicine across the world, and served as a medical officer in the Peace Corps, overseeing care in Sierra Leone and Liberia when she was just 26-years-old.

The physician and engineer is also an educator. She taught environmental studies at Dartmouth University and is currently the lead ambassador for Bayers science literacy program Making Science Make Sense.

Jemison is also the leader of an organization called 100 Year Starship. Founded in 2011, its mission is to make it possible for humans to travel beyond our solar system within the next 100 years.

Related: After a Decade in Business, This Founder Became CEO. Here is How She Tackles New Challenges With Conviction.

The Alabama native says she believes that innovation cannot happen without collaboration between people who have different perspectives, disciplines and backgrounds. Shes especially passionate about getting women engaged in STEM fields and careers.

One of the big issues is, how do women take their place at the table and [move] things forward? We have a tremendous amount of resources and power. We have to be willing to use it and not shy away from it, Jemison told Entrepreneur. Sometimes we sit back and allow others to sort of set the stage. We have to be willing to support each other. When somebody steps forward don't just just leave them standing there.

Entrepreneur spoke with Jemison about why you should turn to your younger self for advice during tough moments and how to find the fortitude to stand up for what you believe in.

What was a critical decision you made in your career that you knew was really important, but you werent sure of what the outcome would be?

In my fourth year [of medical school], we were supposed to be choosing residencies and internship programs to apply to. I decided that I wanted to do a rotating internship with nothing after it, because I realized if I actually planned everything out I would never go overseas to another developing country or pick a position like that, [which I wanted to do]. It would be just too hard to get off the track. So I left myself completely open without anything set out. I was called down to the dean's office and she said, "Why are you doing this? You know you're throwing away your career?"

I applied for a position as a Peace Corps medical officer. I took care of Peace Corps volunteers and State Department personnel in Sierra Leone and Liberia for two and a half years. I was one of the youngest doctors they ever had in that position. I actually thought that those two and a half years were basically going to be throwaway years. Then I'd come back and I'd get into biomedical engineering. But what it did was it gave me a lot of operational experience. I was on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. I had to make life-and-death decisions.

My first two weeks in Sierra Leone, I had to call a military medical evacuation that cost over $80,000 to take care of a volunteer who was very ill. I had to be very forceful with a number of folks and [understand] that this was my ability and my authority to do this. That's one of those things that sticks with you. Sometimes if I start to falter, I can look back at my 26-year-old self. My mantra was, my job is first and foremost for my patients, to the volunteers and to people's health, and I will do my job. And I won't be intimidated from doing my job.

When I got back, I applied for the astronaut program and it turns out that [operational experience] was important to [them]. When they looked at me, they saw someone who had been working on their own in very difficult circumstances and in extreme environments and extreme medicine. It also set me on the path of really understanding and fully appreciating the idea of trans-disciplinary work, that you need to have different people at the table coming up with solutions.

Related: This Entrepreneur Who Sold Her Company for $1 Billion Wants You to Throw Out the Unwritten Rules That Hold You Back

What do you do when youre faced with a big decision or when you know youre going to be taking a big risk?

The first thing I do is I actually make a pros and cons list. I look at the things I really like to do and things I don't like to do. And then what things I'm good at and what things I'm not so good at. And those are different lists, right? I might like to do some things that I'm not necessarily good at. And there may be some things you're good at that you're not particularly interested in doing. Which usually means that you don't do as good a job at those things in the long run.

I think about what my younger self would have advised me to do. You get wisdom when you get older but sometimes you also get a little bit of trepidation. You may not take those those risks that are actually really good for you to take. And the other thing I rely on is I've always been a quick study. I think I rely on my innate ability and the confidence I have in myself. If no one has ever done it before, I can give it a try.

Related: ThirdLove Founder Heidi Zak on How to Develop Authentic Connections

What was a time when you knew you had to stand up for what you believed in despite any pushback you might have gotten? How did you approach it?

I was an environmental studies professor at Dartmouth and I worked on a ton of issues around sustainable development. It's taken a while for the issue of the environment and sustainable development to flow into [the mainstream]. Fifteen or 20 years ago, it wasn't necessarily the thing to talk about, especially in corporations and board meeting or banks. But I [told myself], well, what difference does it make? Do your job. Your job is to bring a different point of view -- your point of view and the experiences that you have. Even though you know people are going to get irritated or they don't want to hear it, you have to do the right thing.

I think one of the things that we do is to give away our power by not talking about things, by not bringing them up. Women very frequently are taught not to not to make waves. People sometimes see you as more combative than they would see a male who brings up the same thing. It's not even that you're combative or aggressive, you're bringing up a different point of view. They get kind of irritated when you have your own views, especially if they depart from the baseline of what they are looking at. And that's where you have to have the fortitude. That's sometimes difficult, because you may know that you're not going to get brownie points for doing that. You have to figure out what's important to you at that time and how strong your position is.

Related: The Forgotten Hollywood Icon Whose Genius Made Wi-Fi Possible

In your career, what as a mistake youve made and how did you address it and move forward from it?

Hiring people and not letting them go soon enough. And then you end up with all this baggage that you have to clean up when you finally realize it's time to let go. The mistake is not necessarily in hiring them. The mistake is when you recognized that something was wrong and you kept telling yourself it's going to get better, maybe it's something I'm doing that I need to correct and change. If it keeps going on and on and you don't act on it, you end up wasting a lot of time, money and energy. And that's particularly true in a small company when you have very few people. One of the parts of growing up and learning that maybe you can't [change things]. Maybe it's not you. There may not be anybody who's at fault. It's just not a good fit.

What are you working on now that has you excited about the future?

I'm very excited about continuing my work with science literacy. We need to fill this gap of the upcoming job shortage. That's the reason why we need to get women involved and underrepresented minorities. But for me it's not just the number of people -- it's really about the different perspectives that are brought to bear so that we get more robust solutions.

I'm also excited about the work I'm doing with 100 Year Starship. In 2011, it was seed funded through a competitive grant from DARPA. [Our mission is to] make sure we have the capabilities for human interstellar travel, to the outer solar system and to another star within a hundred years. [When we applied for the grant] I was channeling my younger self. And I brought in what I've learned about the importance of different perspectives. I thought that if anyone could do this, I should know how to do this, in terms of putting together the organization.

The title of our proposal that we put together was "An inclusive, audacious journey transforms life here on Earth and beyond." And the first word is inclusive. [Not just] ethnicity, gender and geography, but also the range of disciplines and getting people involved who were not just "space people" and subject matter experts, but the public as well. It's what we need to do to get things accomplished. We also have to connect it to how we transform our lives here on Earth.

Nina Zipkin is a staff writer at Entrepreneur.com. She frequently covers media, tech, startups, culture and workplace trends.

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The First African-American Woman to Travel to Space Shares How She Finds Solutions to the World's Biggest Problems - Entrepreneur

President Donald Trump still hasnt named a NASA administrator one of three top NASA posts that have yet to be filled despite having made a bold promise in April to send a human to Mars during his first term. | Mark Wilson/Getty Images

Even the space policy adviser for Trumps campaign says its not going to happen during his time in the White House.

By NEGASSI TESFAMICHAEL

07/28/2017 11:17 AM EDT

President Donald Trump made a bold promise in April: He would send a human to Mars during his first term or, at worst, during my second term.

Vice President Mike Pence doubled down earlier this month. Here from this bridge to space, our nation will return to the moon ad we will put American boots on the face of Mars, Pence said at the Kennedy Space Center.

Story Continued Below

But just about everyone else is saying fat chance.

Even Trumps space policy adviser for his campaign and transition says getting a man or woman on the face of Mars by 2024 is virtually impossible.

I dont think youll get there [to Mars], former Pennsylvania Rep. Bob Walker said in an interview about the possibilities under the Trump White House. I do think that we will probably have a flight to the moon, an Apollo 8-type flight where you go up and go around the moon in a fairly short period of time.

A NASA official who served under former President Barack Obama shared Walkers prediction. I think things could go very well for going to the moon, which I think is more likely to be a Trump agenda, said Lori Garver, Obamas deputy NASA administrator.

During his first six months in office, Trump has laid out an ambitious if non-specific space agenda.

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Beyond his promises on Mars, Trump has reinstated the National Space Council, a coordinating body that was first created under a different name during the Eisenhower administration, but has been dormant since 1993 after infighting doomed the entity. Hes also talked up the potential for the private sector to help advance space travel in the near future.

But there are plenty of other signs that cast doubt on Trumps dedication to ambitious leaps in space exploration.

Trump still hasnt named a NASA administrator one of three top NASA posts that have yet to be filled.

Rep. Jim Bridenstine (R-OK) is the most prominent contender, but has been for months. Current acting administrator Robert Lightfoot is also a possibility, according to Walker. A spokesperson for Bridenstines office did not respond to a request for comment.

The space council has also seen slow progress. Pence said at the Kennedy Space Center that he hoped to have the space councils first meeting before the end of the summer. But Marc Lotter, the vice presidents press secretary, said a date for that meeting has yet to be set.

The slow progress of the council and the NASA appointments worries some in the space community, who wonder how Trump is going to meet his space exploration goals.

I think there is a growing impatience with getting started with setting a direction of the space program that reflects Mr. Trumps views, said John Logsdon, founder and former director of George Washington Universitys Space Policy Institute.

Logsdon said the space policy community is encouraged by signals coming from the White House, but with little policy specifics announced, any optimism is cautious.

(Top) Vice President Mike Pence recognizes the 12 new NASA astronaut candidates on June 7, 2017 at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. (Bottom) Pence signs a hatch from a space station training module mockup at the same event. | Bill Ingalls/NASA via Getty Images

I think the community wants to give the council a chance, wants to give Mr. Trump a chance, Logsdon, who authored an extensive historical essay on council in January, said. Everything hes said so far, at least in terms of civilian space anyways, has been really positive. I think the community wants the words backed up by actions.

Trump also has yet to reckon with the harsh realities that would make it challenging to greatly accelerate NASAs Journey to Mars program that currently has astronauts reaching the vicinity of Mars in the 2030s.

In a call with NASA astronauts in April, Commander Peggy Whitson explained to the president that putting a human on Mars by 2024 is a longshot.

Unfortunately, spaceflight takes a lot of time and money, so getting there will require some international cooperation to get it to be a planet-wide approach, just because it is a very expensive endeavor, Whitson told Trump.

Logsdon called Trumps notion that the country could go to Mars ahead of schedule nonsense.

The White House press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Trumps space policy as described by Walker, Pence and several Republicans on the House Subcommittee on Space will center around increasing the role of the private sector, with the government entering more partnerships with companies like SpaceX and Boeing.

But using the private sector to accelerate NASAs schedule has its challenges. Walker said the U.S. will no longer have to depend on Russia rockets which cost NASA roughly $80 million a seat to get astronauts to the International Space Station, as Boeing and SpaceX test commercial crew vehicles.

But NASA thought in 2011 that the commercial space industry would be able to launch astronauts to the station by 2015, according to a 2016 audit.

Even with the private sector involved, space policy experts say the government would have to spend more moneyand increase NASAs budgetto get to Mars sooner.

However, Trumps budget proposal for the 2018 fiscal year has NASA at $19.1 billion, which leaves the space agencys resources relatively unchanged from the last few years. Though the agency warmly praised the budget, there are no major changes that indicate the Journey to Mars program will be accelerated.

Theres nothing that were spending on right now that would preclude a policy that were going to the moon and then going to Mars, said Andrew Aldrin, director of the Buzz Aldrin Space Institute. I would argue that what were spending money on is less than optimal than what we would need to go to Mars.

Garver said the first year of a new administration is an information-gathering year, and that like the Obama administration, the Trump White Houses second budget request would reflect more substantive policy decisions.

And if the administration decides to rapidly accelerate the Journey to Mars program by nearly a decade, the U.S. might have to end its commitment to the International Space Station.

The American portion of the space station is funded through 2024, but the U.S. will soon have to decide whether to stay or redirect those resourcesroughly $3 billionelsewhere if it decides to go to Mars in the near future.

If we maintain the International Space Station we will not have the funding for deep space exploration, Rep. Brian Babin (R-Texas) said of choosing Mars over the space station. We need to make plans. I just dont think we can do both.

Babin, who chairs the House Subcommittee on Space, said members have varying views on staying with the International Space Station past 2024 but nearly everyone wants to go back to the moon and eventually to Mars.

Meanwhile, Garver says the U.S. is likely to stay a part of the International Space Station after Scott Pace was appointed as executive secretary to the space council.

Hes been a supporter of commercial space, but also a supporter of status quo large programs, and would likely keep those as well," Garver said.

In the same April conversation with NASA astronauts, Trump said well have to speed that up a little bit, to get to Mars under his administration. However, few outside of the former real estate mogul himself have seemed to agree it would happen.

Walker, along with White House adviser Peter Navarro, helped craft space policy during the campaign, which was summed up in an op-ed in October entitled Trumps space policy reaches for Mars and the stars. With Mars still scheduled for the 2030s, experts and one of those same advisers say the U.S. will still be reaching for Mars at the end of the Trump era.

I think theyre pronouncements that are aspirational and the president likes to make those kinds of statements, Garver said of going to Mars under Trump. It would be best for NASA if the goal came with a why, a purpose I dont think a lot more thought has gone into it.

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Continued here:

Will Trump get a man to Mars? - Politico

When a video game that unfolds in space has the likes of celebrity astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson behind it, the expectation is rightfully set that this is not a shoot-em-up or some kind of race against the clock to find a new planet to live on after earth has been destroyed.

Space Odyssey, the game that Tyson and a creative team are in the process of bringing to fruition and crowdfunding is a slower, more cerebral title. The imperative is not defeating an enemy; its, quite simply, to venture out, to go beyond, to come across whatever you find and figure out how to live well among the stars.

And, on the game maker side of the equation, to be as scientifically as accurate as possible along the way.

The idea here is youre part of a coalition in the future, Mark Murphy, part of the team behind the game, tells BGR. And the idea behind the coalition is to really go out and explore the exoplanets and see what we can do with them. Its about challenging yourself to see what kinds of things you can innovate on planet surfaces and finding what you can find by exploring.

The narrative is about you and a community going on a great adventure and exploration together. Its about the ideas of innovation, exploration and adventure. And how science underpins all of that.

The team is currently raising funds through Kickstarter to help with the games creation. The campaign, which runs through July 29th, had at the time of this writing raised more than $275,000.

Its coming first to PC, and then platforms like the Mac after that. No decision had been made at the time of this publication about which consoles the game will land on.

About the game itself: players will according to information from the Kickstarter campaign get immersed in biology, chemistry, geo-science and engineering as they build and explore planetary systems. As the newest Astro-Explorer in the Galactic Coalition, youve been tasked to explore the universe and build a new solar system for humanities galactic expansion. Your journey begins at Infinity Command in the not-so-distant future. You are one of the explorers and pioneers to join a new age of space travel.

The first stop on the players journey is an exploration of Proxima B, the closest known exoplanet to the solar system thats about 4.2 light years from earth. After creating their home planet, players will perform tasks like modding their civilizations spacesuits and spacecraft. Theyll also cultivate flora and fauna, as well as biomes and landscapes.

As far as how Tyson adds his input to the games creation Murphy said the team brings ideas to him and bounces a few things around. Tyson, who appears in the game as a hologram to guide players, likes to see choices before he weighs in, and then he gives his opinion and expands things from there.

Like, when we were talking about ways to get to the exoplanet obviously not today, but looking into the future theres a lot of different ideas, Murphy said. Theres a slingshot method. You could theoretically create a laser-based system. But Neil said, Why dont we think of a way that we could employ wormholes that would just get us there faster? Or, you do something where your being, your essence, is transported into a droid or a robot or something like that your awareness is transported so basically the robots are exploring the world and youre linked in in a Matrix sort of way.

The teams goal was to create something visually interesting and compelling. But more than that, to also inspire people to think about what the future of mankind might look like.

Underneath it all, this is really meant to inspire, Murphy said. We want to inspire people to play it, inspire people to be engaged in being part of a community, to come up with ideas and think about what their future is. You know? And hopefully, we can do that together.

When we talk about things like gameplay, one of the things that was important to us was to create a situation where you engage in gameplay where its not like a massive MMO, but you feel like you can play in our galaxy in a large place. We dont want this to be a competition. We dont want to create a game thats about looting or piracy or, you know, crazy combat or anything like that.

Read more here:

Interview: Neil deGrasse Tyson is helping to create this space exploration video game - BGR

Origami rocket (photo by the author for Hyperallergic)

Through its Tournament Lab, NASA is making crowdsourcing a part of the future of space travel. Following competitions on an array of space problems, includingrobot arm architecture, a 3D printed Mars habitat, anddelivering astronaut email, NASA is now looking for proposals on how to fold a radiation shield like origami.

As Nicola Davis reported for the Guardian, the idea challenge is launching todaythrough Freelancer, an online outsourcing marketplace. On Freelancer, NASA states that the challenge is to develop a 3D folding concept for radiation shielding used to cover human habitation sections of spacecraft. These shields would protect spacecraft, and the astronauts within, fromgalactic cosmic rays (GCRs), and are essential for deep space travel. With storage space at a premium onboard these proposed vessels, such shields would need to be as compact as possible.

And thats where the origami comes in. Perhaps most familiar to people as a foldable, and sometimes frustrating, art, its skill in reducing a sheet of paper to a dense maze of mountains and valleys has wider applications.NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory previously explored how to usethe craft of paper-folding to store solar panels for space travel, and physicist, origami expert, and former NASA scientistRobert J. Langhas experimented with its use in things like automotive airbags.

Outsourcing ideas to the gig economy isnt as great as NASA hiring those minds,yet it is a creative way for the organization to innovate, even as funding cuts put into question whether deep space travel is a possibility. Meanwhile, NASA has more upcoming initiatives you can join, such as making observations as a citizen scientist during the August 21 solar eclipse, and suggesting patch designs for a mission to test the limits of 3D recyclability.

Continue reading here:

Help NASA Design a Radiation Shield That Folds Like Origami - Hyperallergic

Georgetown native Gray Rineharts first novel, Walking on the Sea of Clouds, a science fiction story about asteroid miners, just hit book store shelves.

Rinehart has some experience with space travel after spending 20 years in the Air Force working in space systems operations and support.

Growing up on Screven Street in Georgetown, Rinehart watched Star Trek reruns and read Omni and Analog magazines. After graduating from Winyah High School in 1982, Rinehart joined the Air Force.

His love of science fiction sparked his interest in working in space systems for the Air Force. While serving, however, Rinehart said he stopped reading science fiction, although he did enjoy watching sci-fi movies.

The 1985 Orson Scott Card novel Enders Game got Rinehart reading science fiction again. It also inspired him to starting writing science fiction.

Walking on the Sea of Clouds follows the exploits of two couples struggling to establish the first commercial lunar colony for asteroid miners, and the sacrifices they have to make. The couples take care of everything to keep the colony running and the colonists alive.

Survival requires a certain amount of sacrifice, Rinehart said. The question is what sacrifices are people willing to make in order to survive and succeed in this endeavor.

Rinehart said he liked the idea of writing about the early days of space colonies because he didnt find a lot of stories about the topic.

What I wanted to do is explore some of the stories about the people who would be involved in building the (colonies) from the ground up, he added.

Rinehart started writing the book around 2008 after retiring from the Air Force. It took about 18 months to complete.

There was immense relief in having actually gotten to the end of a novel-length manuscript, he said.

Rinehart said he had a general idea of the plot of the book and how it was going to end, but didnt outline a lot of the details in advance. He compared it to episodes of a television series, where he came up with the major events of the story and then put them all together.

Because of his military background, Rinehart said he was careful about what he wrote because hes aware of how things actually work.

It certainly makes me a better writer than I would be otherwise, but not a better writer than anybody else, he said.

At the time he finished the book, Rinehart was working for Baen Books, evaluating unsolicited manuscripts that the company received. He would read the submissions and decide whether they company should consider publishing them. So he knew what the process of shopping a book around to publishers was like.

He submitted his book to Baen, but I knew in my heart it wasnt quite right for our publishing house, he said.

It took several years, and a lot of rejections, before he eventually sold the book to WordFire Press in Monument, Colorado.

It was very much a marathon not a sprint, Rinehart said. Like a steeplechase with things to dodge.

Rinehart plans on writing more books, although probably not sequels to Walking on the Sea of Clouds. Hes already started a fantasy novel and has some short stories that will be published within the next year or so.

He prefers writing short stories.

It allows me to get to the point where I type The End faster, he said.

Rinehart said it has become more difficult for authors to keep up with the science fiction as the science has advanced.

He said science fiction in the 1950s and 1960s had a hopefulness about the future, where people would overcome difficulties and make things better.

In Rineharts opinion, science fiction then took a turn toward the dystopic with worlds that are fraught with difficulties. He said hed like see more hopeful, forward-looking science fiction.

After retiring from the Air Force, Rinehart settled in Cary, North Carolina. But he plans to return to his hometown for the solar eclipse on Aug. 21.

He said he is still in touch with his Winyah classmates, although he missed a recent 35-year anniversary gathering.

We still are in pretty close touch with one another, Rinehart said.

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Winyah grad tackles space in first novel - South Strand news

For the final song on their delightfully buoyant and mordant 1996 album This is a Long Drive for Someone with Nothing to Think About, Pacific Northwest indie rock band Modest Mouse penned an even more cynical response to David Bowie's already nihilistic ode to interstellar flight, "Space Oddity" The song imagines the life of a lonely female passenger on a flight to some distant lunar satellite, lost in post-gravitational anomie ("She's the only rocketeer in the whole damn place/They gave her a mirror so she could talk to her face.") Dreading the endless blankness of her voyage as much as the senseless achievement of reaching its destination, the unnamed woman wishes she could just read a dime-store novel and return home. It is titled, poignantly, "Space Travel is Boring."

We recently visited the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, NASA's literal launch pad for the Apollo missions and the Space Shuttle. Since there are currently no rockets going up, Space Florida's Shuttle Landing Facility did us the favor and allowed us to use the 3.5-mile-long runway built for the Shuttle literally, the longest stretch of underutilized, perfectly straight, perfectly paved roadway in the world for a series of automotive maneuvers. Our vehicle of choice was the $293,300 2018 Bentley Continental Supersports. This was decidedly not boring.

The Supersports is an enhanced version of an already extremely potent vehicle. Featuring an upgraded crankshaft, torque converter, and turbochargers for more power and improved power delivery, the Supersports' 6.0-liter W12 engine produces an even 700 horsepower, and 750 lb-ft of torque. That makes this the most powerful and fastest Bentley ever made. Sixty miles per hour is dispatched in 3.4 seconds on the way to a maximum velocity of 209 mph. The largest carbon ceramic brakes of any production car come as standard equipment, as do carbon fiber hood vents, front splitter and rear air diffuser, side trim, and a planed long-board of a rear wing. Handsome 21-inch lightweight forged wheels are also part of the package, though, really, weight savings is almost irrelevant in this vehicle. The Supersports weighs over 2.5 tons, or about as much as one of the tread belt shoes on the diesel/electric crawler used to tug the 70-million-pound Space Shuttle and its boosters out onto Canaveral's runway.

We were tugged out onto the runway as well, though in a slightly different fashion. Like a solid booster rocket, which can be lit, but not extinguished, the Supersports features a preternatural and uncanny capacity for thrust. We had the chance to experience this in a series of maneuvers on the concrete strip, including a high-speed slalom and accident avoidance course. These were also designed to show off the Super's trick, brake-based torque vectoring system, borrowed from the GT3R racer, an intervention that is as eerie and seamless as the ones on reality TV are not. But the centerpiece of our adventure was a top-speed run. For this, we started at one end of the empty roadbed, and simply kept the throttle pinned until we ran out of, well, space.

The Supersports never lets up. Our co-pilot, a professional Bentley race driver, called out our speeds in twenty and then ten mile-per-hour increments once we passed 100. By the time he said the safe word, about two miles in, indicating our need to ease off the gas, we had crested 190. The car had just shifted gears and would have kept tugging. The pros, who overran the boundary, made it to 198.

At this speed, the most profound sensation is one of absolute, skull-sucking terror. Inputs must be as miniscule as Lloyd Christmas' IQ, crosswinds feel like a croquet drive from Thor's hammer, and the actual physical horizon approaches with apocalyptic surety. Make the slightest mistake, and you will go careening ass-over-tits-over-eyeballs-out-of-sockets-over-brains-and-blood-splattering-everywhere into the mangrove swamp runoff channels that line the runway, where plentiful alligators will feast on the remains of your charred and broken corpse until your orthodontic surgeon will not be able to identify an incisor. But the second-most profound sensation is serenity. It is possible to have a civilized conversation at these speeds. That is, if you're capable of overcoming the vile retching noises you're making as you try to ward off the panicked instinct to dry-swallow your tongue. (The Supersports' interior, with its Neapolitan ice-cream inspired triple-hued leather, plus Alcantara inserts, does little to diminish the gag reflex.)

Of course, activities like these are a performance, a simulacrum. They represent a fantasy of the kind of experiences that an owner of a car like this could potentially have if, for example, they bought NASA at the Government de-accessioning yard sale we're likely to soon witness. But they're also a means for discovery of how people react under intense pressure, how engineering is capable of overcoming superhuman challenges, and what may or may not happen once we transcend the fervent boundaries of the known. Kind of like venturing into space.

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2018 Bentley Continental Supersports | More exciting than space travel - Autoblog (blog)

On Jan. 16, 2016, Expedition 46 Commander Scott Kelly shared photographs of a blooming zinnia flower in the Veggie plant growth system aboard the International Space Station. NASA has more recently teamed up with Tupperware Brands Corp. to improve its system for growing plants. less On Jan. 16, 2016, Expedition 46 Commander Scott Kelly shared photographs of a blooming zinnia flower in the Veggie plant growth system aboard the International Space Station. NASA has more recently teamed up ... more Photo: handout web Astronauts on the International Space Station sampled their harvest of a crop of "Outredgeous" red romaine lettuce from the Veggie plant growth system that tests hardware for growing vegetables and other plants in space. NASA has more recently teamed up with Tupperware Brands Corp. to improve its system for growing plants. less Astronauts on the International Space Station sampled their harvest of a crop of "Outredgeous" red romaine lettuce from the Veggie plant growth system that tests hardware for growing vegetables and other plants ... more Photo: NASA

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Life aboard theInternational Space Station

The International Space Station was launched in November 1998, and the first crew arrived on Nov. 2, 2000. People have lived on the space station ever since.

Here are some great photos inside and outside the largest artificial body in Earth's orbit...

Life aboard theInternational Space Station

The International Space Station was launched in November 1998, and the first crew arrived on Nov. 2, 2000. People have lived on the space station ever since.

Here

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Tupperware, NASA team to grow plants in space

Tupperware Brands Corp. is helping NASA improve its system for growing plants aboard the International Space Station.

Astronauts have been growing a variety of flowers and leafy vegetables in the space station's Vegetable Production System since 2014. But to reduce the frequency with which astronauts must water plants, Howard Levine and his colleagues at the NASA Kennedy Space Center began exploring new designs for the component that holds the roots of the plants, according to a news release.

On HoustonChronicle.com:Pence champions a new era of space travel on NASA visit

They created a semi-hydroponic design, and Tupperware is helping to further develop and manufacture it. Tupperware has teamed with Techshot, a commercial space company, to create the device.

Up to six of the new units can be installed in the Vegetable Production System at one time. Like the so-called "plant pillows" they will replace, the devices would be used once and then discarded after the plants are grown and harvested.

Initial units are expected to launch to the space station in the third and fourth quarters of 2018 aboard two flights of the commercial unmanned SpaceX Cargo Dragon spacecraft.

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Tupperware, NASA team to grow plants in space - Chron.com

A San Francisco State University student analyzed muscle biopsies from a previous study initiated at California State University, Long Beach and discovered unexpected results regarding female musculature. Marsh found that female astronaut musculature can manage a prolonged spaceflight better than male astronauts because their muscles might not be as affected during spaceflight.

Kaylie Marsh is a graduate student studying kinesiology at San Francisco State University, and her research may encourage the demand for women in space. If were doing these spaceflights to Mars that last six months, maybe we should be targeting females and encouraging them more to go into space because it might not affect their musculature as much as men, Marsh said in a statement.

The journey to Mars is a six-month journey. With major advancements in technology, NASA is getting closer and closer to being able to send astronauts to Mars. While journeying to Mars may be a great accomplishment for the U.S., the health and safety of astronauts during this journey are critical concerns.

Marshs research was initially aimed at efforts to prevent muscle atrophy in low gravity by developing exercise countermeasures. Because there is very little gravity in space, astronauts face a significant loss of muscle and bone mass during prolonged spaceflights, Marsh told The University Network (TUN). In fact, astronauts can lose about 10 to 15 percent of their muscle mass during six months on board the International Space Station with current exercise countermeasures.

Even with exercise, a significant amount of muscle mass is still being lost during space travel. The current challenge researchers face is finding new ways to use in-flight exercises to maintain enough muscle to make the trip to Mars. The International Space Station is equipped with various fitness equipment, including a treadmill, stationary bicycle, and a weightlifting simulator to reduce deterioration in muscular and cardiovascular functions, but these exercises have not eliminated muscle loss.

In her research, Marsh used biopsies from a previous study at California State University, Long Beach by a colleague of Professor Jimmy Bagley, assistant professor of kinesiology at SF State. Bagleys colleague performed the experiment on eight healthy men and eight healthy women. The participants used crutches to get around and wore a shoe with a one-and-a-half inch sole on one foot and left the other leg dangling for ten days. One group performed regular exercises each day with a dangled leg, and the other group dangled their leg without a countermeasure. Muscle biopsies were taken before and after the 10-day period, and Marshs analysis revealed that female muscles might be affected less than male muscles.

I was seeing all these differences with women responding differently than men, Marsh said in a statement. At least in my study, some of the womens muscle fibers were bigger in general than the mens fibers, suggesting that gender made little difference at the cellular level in our participants. And you would think the opposite, because men are typically stronger than women.

Marshs study was motivated by her interest in molecular changes in muscles. I was interested generally in molecular changes in muscles, she told TUN. That could be from any kind of intervention if someone is a strength athlete, if theyre inactive or if theyre aging. And for spaceflight, the mechanism that happens when atrophy takes place is probably one of the most perfect mechanisms to study.

While the loss of muscle mass is a major concern for spaceflight, there are also concerns of bone loss and radiation exposure during spaceflight, which NASA is researching.

To date, 537 astronauts have traveled to space, but only 60 of them have been women. Marshs discovery of the difference in molecular changes in muscles between men and women serves as a foundation for future developments in muscle exercises for female astronauts, and hopefully pave the way for more space missions for female astronauts.

Vanessa Sewell is studying Economics and Communications at Boston College. She is from Bronx, NY. Vanessa has worked on topics related to lifestyle, fashion, culture, and education during her time at Boston College. During her free time, she can be found playing piano and guitar or jamming to Spotify.

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San Francisco State University Graduate Student Studies Female Musculature for Space Travel - The University Network (blog)

Susan B. Barnes, Special for USA TODAY Published 7:45 a.m. ET July 21, 2017

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The Mars Rover concept vehicle was commissioned by Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex as an educational tool and to inspire the public about the future of space exploration and interplanetary travel.(Photo: Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex)

Imagine traveling over the landscape of the Red Planet in a Mars Rover, the fine sands slipping through its 50-inch wheels as it traverses over dunes, rocks, craters and hills at a slow-but-steady 2 to 4 MPH.

In an effort to bring Mars closer to home, Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex teamed up with Parker Brothers Concepts, along with NASA-engineer science and specs, to develop the four-passenger Mars Rover concept vehicle, currently on tour along the Eastern Seaboard.

The nearly 11-foot-tall, 5,500-pound, all-aluminum Mars rover concept vehicle is as realistic as possible to show space enthusiasts the technology thats being developed to send to Mars, including carbon fiber, solar panels and a 700-volt battery that is used to power the Rover. This is a look but dont touch opportunity after all, this Mars Rover was created to be as realistic as possible, but for educational purposes only; it wont be making the trip to Mars when the time comes.

At Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, we create immersive space experiences for our guests, said Therrin Protze, chief operating officer, Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex. The Mars rover will give guests a front row seat to NASAs Journey to Mars and bring the future of space exploration to life for the generation that will first step foot on Mars, as they see and learn what it will take to travel the landscape of the Red Planet.

The Mars rover concept vehicles first stop on the tour was at The Battery Atlanta at Sun Trust Park in Atlanta, Georgia, and it will spend the next month traveling, starting withthe National Air & Space Museum in Washington, D.C. (July 21-22), Liberty Science Center in Jersey City, New Jersey (July 29-30), Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in New York, New York (August 3-6) and finishing at the North Point Mall in Alpharetta, Georgia (August 12) before returning to Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex.

Back at Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex in Cape Canaveral, Florida, the Summer of Mars continues with games that enable visitors to learn about plant life and habitats on Mars; a virtual reality trip to the Red Planet via Lockheed Martins Mars Experience Bus, using real NASA footage of Mars to explore 200 miles of the service; and more.

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