Category Archives: Transhuman News

Let #39;s Play Cargo Commander Part 10- Out with a bang
Hi guys! In this installment of cargo commander we ranked up twice in one go, got rushed by around 50 monsters, and finished the video by self destructing our space station. Thanks for watching :)From:xgamesandstuffxViews:0 0ratingsTime:09:04More inGaming

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Let's Play Cargo Commander Part 10- Out with a bang - Video

HUGE MARS ROVER DISCOVERY REVEALED - Curiosity Finds Sand In A Scoop of Sand
The big Mars rover discovery everyone has been waiting for is in. On the surface of the planet Mars that we flew to, Curiosity rover picked up a scoop of sand and found something every interesting in it. They found sand. It was a kind of sandy substance, that had the quality of sandy stuff. Nasa scientists also found molecules and chemicals in the sand. So far the only thing scientists have definitively found on Mars is sand. Next, they scientists will look for rocks and hope to discover some soon. Yo, yo, yo, rover move over and find some rocks, we built you in a clean room, by guys with funny socks We flew you to Mars on a long vacation so we could have something beside a space station youtu.beFrom:ezHealthyDietViews:0 1ratingsTime:01:08More inNews Politics

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HUGE MARS ROVER DISCOVERY REVEALED - Curiosity Finds Sand In A Scoop of Sand - Video

A story published in Space.com suggests that NASA's plans to build a deep space station at the Earth/moon Lagrange 2 point may be more hope than reality. The Obama administration seems actually cold to the idea.

Deep space station not approved by Obama administration

Space.com, quoting an unnamed administration official, contradicted recent media reports that a deep space station, designed to be a gateway for expeditions to the asteroids, Mars, and perhaps the lunar surface, had not been approved by the Obama administration. The unnamed official hinted that the stories in the media were part of a gambit by NASA to garner support for the project from the Congress. In any case, no funding for the deep space station has been requested for the current or the upcoming fiscal year.

Media speculation rampant on NASA deep space station

The Orlando Sentinel reported that NASA had proposed the deep space station as part of its exploration strategy in a September story. The idea was that the station would serve as a practice run for deep space missions to the asteroids and Mars as well as a base for the robotic exploration of the moon. The station would be located at the Earth/moon Lagrange Point 2, where the gravities of the Earth and moon tend to cancel one another out about 38,000 miles beyond the lunar far side. The facility would be deployed by the heavy lift Space Launch Vehicle and would be visited by crews of astronauts riding the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle. Eventually, the facility might become a refueling stop, perhaps with rocket fuel refined by lunar water, for spacecraft headed deeper into the Solar System.

Space policy confusion at the White House?

President Obama famously cancelled President George W. Bush's Constellation program and instead, in an April 2010 speech, pointed NASA's exploration efforts toward an Earth-approaching asteroid and, eventually, Mars. Congress, in the 2010 NASA Authorization Bill, not only added the moon back on the list of destinations, but mandated the development of the heavy lift Space Launch System and the Orion has two elements of that space exploration program. The idea of a deep space station at the Earth/moon L2 would seem to help address the conflicting priorities of the White House and the Congress, providing some flexibility and experience in the relative short term for NASA's space exploration program. If the White House is resisting the funding of the deep space station, the question arises whether it is actually serious about its own space exploration program.

Fiscal cliff may derail NASA space exploration.

If budget talks fail and the federal government goes over the fiscal cliff with the preprogrammed tax increases and budget cuts, NASA's dreams for space exploration would almost certainly suffer. Bill Nye, the CEO of the Planetary Society, warned about possible cuts to research and development, including NASA. Planetary Society member John Livingston, writing for the Patriot Ledger, agrees, suggesting that NASA space exploration is especially vulnerable to fiscal cliff brinksmanship. The confusion and uncertainty on the part of the White House concerning space policy may therefore be part of a wider problem.

Mark R. Whittington is the author of Children of Apollo and The Last Moonwalker. He has written on space subjects for a variety of periodicals, including The Houston Chronicle, The Washington Post, USA Today, the L.A. Times, and The Weekly Standard.

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NASA's Planned Deep Space Station Does Not Have Obama Approval

The two men preparing for the first-ever yearlong mission to the International Space Station are looking forward to the challenge, they said today (Dec. 5).

Friends and family are supportive of the mission, said astronaut Scott Kelly, though perhaps none more so than his 9-year-old daughter.

"When I told her on the phone that I was going to spend a year on the space station, she screamed out, 'Awesome!'" Kelly said today during a press conference at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Kelly and Russian Federal Space Agency cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko are due to launch on the yearlong mission in 2015.

The flight is designed to help scientists understand how the human body adapts to spaceflight longer than six months, the usual length of stints aboard the space station. [Most Extreme Human Spaceflight Records]

No one has ever spent a continuous year on the International Space Station (ISS), though four Russian cosmonauts have experienced nearly year-long or longer missions in low-Earth orbit. One, Valery Polyakov, stayed aboard the Russian space station Mir for 428 consecutive days in 1994 and 1995.

All of these cosmonauts flew in the early era of spaceflight, said ISS program scientist Julie Robinson. The last long-duration mission ended in 1999. Kelly Kornienko will become the first people since then to spend a year in orbit.

Testing the human body

NASA and other space agencies know a lot about how the body responds to six months in space, Robinson told reporters, but little about what happens next though that sort of knowledge is crucial as agencies contemplate sending humans back to the moon, to an asteroid, or to Mars.

NASA has several major concerns about the health effects of long-duration spaceflight. One of the most pressing is a recently discovered side effect: vision problems created by increased pressure in the skull in microgravity. Researchers aren't yet sure if some of those vision changes might be permanent, Robinson said.

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Astronauts Excited For First Yearlong Trip to International Space Station

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) NASA astronaut Scott Kelly is already bracing for an unprecedented one-year mission aboard the International Space Station. He figures it will be as grueling as climbing Mount Everest.

"It's fun when you're done with it, not while you're doing it," Kelly said Wednesday, barely a week after being named to the marathon flight along with Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko.

The mission, set to begin in 2015, is intended as a medical test bed for even longer Mars expeditions in the decades ahead.

Space station life can be routine, Kelly noted during a news conference.

"In the morning, you wake up, you're at work. When you go to sleep, you're also at work. So imagine being in your office for a whole year and you never get to leave," he said. "That is a challenge and it presents its own set of issues, but I think I'm up for it."

As for being off the planet for that long, Kelly said he already knows how he reacts to horrific news while in orbit.

During his five-month space station mission that spanned 2010 and 2011, his sister-in-law, former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, was shot in an assassination attempt in Tucson, Ariz. She is married to Kelly's identical twin, Mark, who retired as a NASA astronaut last year.

"Certainly, nothing good comes out of anything like this. But as a result, I do know how I respond to something along those lines," he said.

Kelly, 48, a Navy captain, has two daughters from a previous marriage, ages 9 and 18. The youngest, Charlotte, screamed "awesome" when she learned her father was selected for the one-year mission.

Brother Mark was all for it. So was Giffords. When Mark told his wife, she said, "a year in space, that's great," Scott Kelly said in a phone interview with The Associated Press.

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Astronaut braces for unprecedented year in space