Category Archives: Transhuman News

I don't know why I'm always so excited when cool stuff flies through the sky at night and we get to see it. From the SpaceX rockets to the Starlink Satellites the night sky is getting a lot more active. Add that to the occasional sighting of the International Space Station and you can pretty much see something exciting every night. even the natural sights are still worth staying up late to see, like the Blood Moon Super Eclipse this morning. This week is an exciting one for night sky viewing as we'll get to see the ISSevery nightas it flies over Twin Falls.

How many times you can see the International Space Station will depend on where you are and how late you want to stay up. From Twin Falls we should be able to see it five times through Memorial Day weekend (at least once each night). Any sightings are contingent on weather conditions.

The ISS passes by us frequently, but if it isn't at the right angle we won't see it. Spot The Station is a website that helps you plan the best times for catching a glimpse of it. Under good conditions and if the station reaches at least a height of 40 degrees, you'll be able to see it if you know where to look.

Seeing the International Space Station is only a matter of knowing when and where to look. There are five times it will fly over us this week and through the weekend where you will get a good look at it. You may also be able to see it on other occasions at lower degrees in the sky, but these are your most likely times to see it each night:

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You'll Be Able to See the Space Station Again This Week in Idaho - kezj.com

JAXA astronaut Akihiko Hoshide framed the May 26 supermoon above part of the ISS.

Life is a little different on the International Space Station. The residents see 16 sunrises and 16 sunsets every day, and there are no pesky clouds to get in the way of their moon views. Astronaut Akihiko Hoshide captured scenic views of the May 26 supermoon and lunar eclipse from orbit.

Hoshide is with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and is part of the SpaceX Crew-2 mission that arrived at the ISS in April.

From the lab to your inbox. Get the latest science stories from CNET every week.

Hoshide's trio of photos includes two looks at the supermoon, one of which shows part of the ISS in the foreground. There's a fuzzier shot of the eclipse in process, showing a sliver of the moon glowing against the darkness of space.

This is what the May 26 "blood moon" eclipse looked like from the ISS.

NASA shared Hoshide's shots on Wednesday morning, saying, "The crew aboard the space station observed today's supermoon and lunar eclipse!" Thanks to the moon's location in its elliptical orbit around Earth, it appeared a little brighter and a little bigger than usual.

The eclipse may be over now, but the "super flower blood moon" (so named for being a May supermoon that turned red during the eclipse) will live on in images.

Hoshide will likely be on Earth when the next total lunar eclipse comes around in May 2022. Crew-2 is scheduled to return home later this year.

FollowCNET's 2021 Space Calendarto stay up to date with all the latest space news this year. You can even add it to your own Google Calendar.

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ISS astronaut snaps supermoon and lunar eclipse from orbit - CNET

June 3 will mark the 22nd SpaceX cargo resupply mission of scientific research and technology demonstrations.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla It's that time again. The International Space Station is in need of a delivery, and SpaceX is ready to lend a hand with its 22nd cargo resupply mission.

A collection of scientific research and technology demonstrations will fly to the orbiting laboratory on SpaceX's upgraded Dragon spacecraft on June 3.

The commercial space company is targeting a 1:29 p.m. liftoff from Kennedy Space Center's historic Launch Complex 39A.

Among the dozens of experiments heading into space to support the Expedition 65 and 66 crews are tardigrades or "water bears" that NASA says can tolerate more extreme environments than most life forms.

Research involving the organisms will advance astronauts' understanding of stress factors impacting them while in space and allow researchers to develop countermeasures.

Spaceflight can be a really challenging environment for organisms, including humans, who have evolved to the conditions on Earth, said principal investigator Thomas Boothby. One of the things we are really keen to do is understand how tardigrades are surviving and reproducing in these environments and whether we can learn anything about the tricks that they are using and adapt them to safeguard astronauts.

Joining the microscopic will be the equally small symbiotic squid, which will interact with microbes to help develop protective measures to preserve astronaut health while on long-duration missions in space.

Researchers will also be looking to give cotton a boost by examining stressors that can toughen the material-producing plants.

"We are hoping to reveal features of root system formation that can be targeted by breeders and scientists to improve characteristics such as drought resistance or nutrient uptake, both key factors in the environmental impacts of modern agriculture, principal investigator Simon Gilroy said. "Improved understanding of cotton root systems and associated gene expression could enable development of more robust cotton plants and reduce water and pesticide use."

NASA noted a portable ultrasound device, Pilote, tissue chip and new solar panels to help increase the energy available for activities at the ISS will also join the cargo headed to the orbiting laboratory.

You can catch the mission live by tuning into 10 Tampa Bay where we will be streaming on Facebookand YouTube.

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Squid, cotton and 'water bears' among cargo headed to the International Space Station - WTSP.com

Lunar Eclipse 2021: The Super Blood Moon from the International Space Station

Super Blood Moon and Lunar Eclipse today: The much awaited time has arrived. The Super Blood Moon is already visible from many parts of the world. A Lunar Eclipse will also take place. In India, most of us won't be able to witness the celestial spactacle. The total Lunar Eclipse will be at its best in parts of the United States, Australia, the Pacificand New Zealand. Netizens and sky watchers are already clicking amazing videos and photos, and posting on Twitter.Compared to other Full Moons, today's Super Blood Moonor the Flower Moon will be nearest to the Earth in its orbit, making it appear as the closet and largest Full Moon of the year.Unlike a solar eclipse, you won't need special eye glasses to view the Lunar Eclipse.

The total Lunar Eclipse will occur for over several hours, when the moon will pass through Earth's shadow.

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Lunar Eclipse 2021: The Full Moon From The International Space Station - NDTV

Picture an aircraft hangar filled with vines. Rows upon rows of tiny plants, ranging from a few centimetres high with fledgling green leaves up to one metre tall, all housed in a semi-tropical atmosphere designed to turbo-charge growth.

The floors are white, the wall and roof made of clouded glass creating warm and humid conditions.

This is the hydroponic greenhouse at Mercier Group, one of four that together contain hundreds of thousands of young plants, part of the 30 million vines that are grown at this Loire vine nursery each year.

Im here to meet with Olivier Zekri, head of research and development for Mercier and the man responsible for overseeing the centres newest and most media-friendly arrivals 340 Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon plants that have made their way here via 10 months spent on the International Space Station (ISS).

The vines are part of a wider research project from French startup Space Cargo Unlimited that you might have read about or at least, the part where they were sent to the ISS alongside 12 bottles of Petrus 2000, and that one of the bottles (alongside its terrestrial sibling and an extremely fancy presentation case) is soon to be auctioned by Christies private sales department with a price estate of US$1 million.

I was lucky enough to taste another of those bottles a few months ago, and it has to be said that sending Petrus into space, and then auctioning off a bottle for US$1million to fund further space projects, is pretty smart way to get people talking about you.

The vines havent generated as many headlines, but they are the part of the project with the most long-term potential, particularly when considered within Merciers wider breeding programmes aimed at developing vines with genetic resistance to disease or climate change.

Five years ago Mercier provided vines for a Chinese project to send plants into Space, says Zekri. But we didnt follow them on their return and have not been told how they reacted. So it is great this time around to get the chance to track any changes that have been brought about by the ISS environment.

This time, the vines were sent as small pieces of bud wood, kept at 4 degrees Celsius in 80% humidity within specially-designed containers, then rehydrated and planted on their return to earth in January 2021.

For now half of them are in Zekris laboratory along with over 1,000 young plants that are part of other experiments, but will be moved into the hydroponic greenhouses this June.

The other half are at the Institute of Wine and Vine Science (ISVV) in Bordeaux, being tracked by Professor Stephanie Cluzot and post-doctoral researcher Aleksandra Burdziej.

I first saw them both at Mercier, and the ISVV back in March, and went back this week to catch up with Professor Cluzot and Aleksandra. Frankly, its hard not to get excited about their growth rate. Around 70% of them (at a conservative estimate, according to Cluzot) have survived and are doing well and the biggest are now at least two metres in height, just three months after planting.

It is still far too early to make any comments, as all of our experiments and results have to be peer-reviewed before release, says Cluzot, but we have begun the first round of exposing the vines to pathogens to see how they react.

They are being tracked through every stage of their growth cycle, alongside control plants from the same original bud wood that remained on earth, to understand if the environmental factors of micro-gravity and elevated radiation have led to gene changes.

Initial DNA analysis was carried out in March, continuing throughout the growing season, with the initial exposure to mildew underway, and exposure to phylloxera planned later. In December, the second-generation canes that will be pruned from this years growth will be studied in turn.

If the vines, as we hope, prove to have developed strong resistance through their time on the ISS, says Zekri, the next step would be to isolate the components responsible for producing these new properties, then clone and graft the vines, planting them directly in the vineyard and eventually assess the wine they produce through vinifying the grapes.

In two or three years time, assuming all goes to plan, we will then scale up the programme and begin the process of registering them either as an entirely new variety or, more likely, separate clones of Merlot and of Cabernet Sauvignon. At that point, they will be ready for sale on the open market.

Although not, lets hope, for US$1 million apiece.

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Anson: Cabernet and Merlot 'space vines' take root on earth - Decanter - decanter.com

A source of poetic musings for some and an area of geostrategic competition for others, space is also starting to become a new niche market for the shrewdest of public and private entrepreneurs. For decades, the conquest of space was essentially just one more area of strategic competition between the great powers but now, the most intrepid economic players are beginning to see it as an opportunity to make handsome profits from everything that happens above an altitude of 100 kilometres the frontier that marks the start of outer space. Rapid technological progress and human need (but also the urge to push boundaries and the pull of exhibitionism and fame) have brought us to a point where space mining and space tourism have already moved beyond the realms of science fiction and into the realms of the possible, becoming real options in the here and now.

With regard to space mining, there is the recent news that NASAs Osiris-Rex probe has begun its journey home with material collected from the surface of asteroid Bennu (with the aim of studying the early solar system). It is not the first, as the Japanese probe Hayabusa reached the vicinity of asteroid Itokawa in September 2005 but, if it does make it back to Earth (in September 2023), it will be the most important mission in this field, demonstrating the technical possibility of landing on an asteroid, despite the lack of gravity, and bringing home resources.

These resources, that is, the mineral wealth resident in the belt of asteroids between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter are estimated, according to NASA, to be worth equivalent to about US$100 billion for every person on Earth today. Then there are the thousands of asteroids located between Mars and Earth, with some 12,000 passing relatively close to our planet every year (identified as NEA Near Earth Asteroids) and, of course, the Moon.

From a strictly economic perspective, the accumulated potential is dazzling, be it on the Moon (the first target in sight) or on carbonaceous (C-type), metallic (M-type) and siliceous (S-type) asteroids. It is first and foremost about accessing water, which is vital for missions to other planets, for human consumption and as a basic input for generating energy for any bases that might be set up out there, and as fuel for interplanetary spacecrafts. But the estimates regarding the existence of rare earths and commodities such as iron, nickel, platinum, gold, iridium, palladium, magnesium, rhodium, osmium and ruthenium are astounding.

Beyond the technical difficulties to be overcome before we can envisage any profitable exploitation of these vast resources, this hypothetical future raises a multitude of legal and ethical concerns.

To begin with, all we have at our disposal is an imperfect Outer Space Treaty (1967), which establishes that no nation can claim ownership of any celestial body but does not specify whether the same applies to the resources on them. The same issue has also been left unresolved in the Artemis Accords, signed on 13 October 2020 by eight countries (Australia, Canada, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom, and the United States) to regulate the exploitation of the Moon, although they do recognise property rights for those who operate on our natural satellite and establish safety zones around any future bases that may be established there.

Other issues to consider are whether, for example, the Moon is a legal person or not, and whether its future exploitation represents a new form of colonisation. In any case, no paradigm shift can take place until it is possible to produce the fuel needed on those bodies to make such long journeys with such valuable materials.

At a time when international tourism is still a long way from regaining the intensity of the pre-coronavirus pandemic era, there are those who are already planning to take advantage of the adventurous zeal of a few privileged individuals to make money. The first step was not in fact taken by a forward-looking private company, but by Russia, which, in April 2001, whilst in dire financial straits, decided to offer the third seat of its Soyuz spacecraft, bound for the International Space Station (ISS), to a US citizen, Dennis Tito, in exchange for US$20 million.

The initial US reluctance towards allowing this type of activity did not manage to prevent the door being opened to similar flights, offering the same opportunity to seven other extremely wealthy individuals (the last in 2009). And it has not taken long for private companies to climb aboard. This type of space tourism to the ISS is set to resume in 2023. In the meantime, private suborbital flights have come a long way since Mojave Aerospace Ventures took its suborbital spacecraft, SpaceShipOne, to an altitude of 103 kilometres in 2004. Since then, there has been a flurry of projects aimed at solving the technical problems of such a journey and substantially lowering the costs.

In times of forced austerity, this is also what seems to have attracted state agencies to the idea of having private entrepreneurs, such as SpaceX, Blue Origin and Virgin Galactic, with whom to share the risks and costs of their own national projects. These businesses, in the meantime, are already competing with each other to gain an advantage in the private market. Everything seems to point to the fact that this public-private confluence is here to stay when it comes, for example, to taking astronauts or material to the ISS, the Moon or beyond. In May last year, NASA astronauts reached the ISS aboard the Crew Dragon spacecraft of SpaceX, the same company that is soon to take them to the Moon with its Starship spacecraft. These same spacecrafts will soon take private individuals to the ISS and the Moon.

This cooperation between states and private companies is being replicated to respond to the growing needs arising from the boundless technological advances in the fields of telecommunications, artificial intelligence and 6G, with increasingly sophisticated satellite services.

To get an idea of the commercial potential of providing high-speed, low-latency and low-cost internet in rural areas and developing countries, look at the task being undertaken by Elon Musk, for example, through his company Starlink (a subsidiary of SpaceX). By the end of this year, the company expects to have achieved complete coverage, having conducted a total of 28 satellite launches since 2018 (with an average of 60 satellites per launch), and hopes to have a constellation of around 42,000 satellites by the end of 2027, in orbit at an altitude of 550 kilometres. Other projects such as Britains OneWeb, Amazons Project Kuiper or Chinas Starnet are already looming in the background.

Despite the many obstacles to be overcome and doubts to be cleared up, none of them seem to be enough to dampen the eagerness of those who are already looking towards the stars with greedy eyes, with US entrepreneurs making the biggest strides in this direction. And although more questions than answers remain as to how to realise so many business dreams, the number of announcements about ever more bizarre projects continues to multiply, such as the Gateway Foundations project to build a hotel in Earths orbit, or the Orbital Assembly Corporations Voyager Station project, consisting of 24 modules assembled to form a kind of rotating wheel in which to accommodate those who overcome their fear of the risks inherent to this type of adventure and have sufficient financial resources to indulge themselves. Roll up, roll up, ladies and gentlemen!

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Asteroid mining, space tourism and the new space race - Equal Times

Theresa Cross

May 26th, 2021

The Inspiration4 crew. From left to right: Chris Sembroski, Hayley Arceneaux, Sian Proctor and Jared Isaacman. This flight is expected to be the first orbital space tourism mission since 2009 and the first 100% civilian crew to fly to low Earth orbit. Credit: SpaceX

Within a span of about six months, as many as a dozen new space tourists could fly into low Earth orbit on four flights beginning as early as this September.

2021 may mark a resurgence of the space tourism market, which took a hiatus in 2009, starting with SpaceX sending the first 100% civilian mission to low Earth orbit.

Launching inside Crew Dragon Resilience atop a Falcon 9 rocket in September from Launch Complex 39A at NASAs Kennedy Space Center in Florida, founder and CEO of Shift4 Payments Jared Isaacman will be the commander of the Inspiration4 mission. Hell be flying along with fellow crewmembers Hayley Arceneaux, Sian Proctor and Christopher Sembroski.

The crew will orbit around Earth every 90 minutes on a mission slated to last several days before reentering the atmosphere for a soft water landing off the coast of Florida.Elon Musk has said that flying on a Falcon 9 is akin to riding a really intense roller coaster.

SpaceX is developing a special window to take the place of the docking port for Inspiration4. Credit: SpaceX

Meanwhile, Blue Origin is expected to fly its first astronaut crew to suborbital space on New Shepard as early as July 20, 2021. The company has offered one seat to the winner of an online auction, slated to culminate June 12. The winning bid amount is expected to go toward Blue Origins foundation, Club for the Future, meant to inspire a career in STEM science, technology, engineering and math in future generations.

Another suborbital spaceflight company, Virgin Galactic, has recently announced its space tourism program has been pushed to 2022. Problems began with a disappointing launch in December of 2020, when a rocket motor for SpaceShipTwo did not ignite. The hope was, had the flight performed as expected, technicians would shift their focus on improvements for private commercial spaceflight.

Finally, on May 22, 2021, from Spaceport America in New Mexico, Virgin Galactic successfully performed the first human spaceflight from that location putting the company on a path towards furthering its quest for human space flight and tourism.

SpaceShipTwo VSS Unity coasts toward apogee after its first spaceflight from New Mexicos Spaceport America. Credit: Virgin Galactic

Back on the orbital side of space tourism, Axiom Space and NASA recently announced plans to launch the first private astronaut mission to the International Space Station as early as January 2022 from Kennedy Space Center.

The private astronauts for the Ax-1 mission, slated to fly in a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, are Michael Lpez-Alegra, Larry Connor, Mark Pathy and Eytan Stibbe. Mission commander for this mission will be Lpez-Alegra, a former NASA astronaut, and current vice president of Axiom with Peggy Whitson and John Shoffner as alternates.

Several more private Axiom Space missions are planned over the next several years.

On the other side of the world, Russia also hopes to attract more private customers for flights to the ISS.

Two of the three seats in a the next Soyuz capsule, Soyuz MS-19, are slated to be occupied by a Russian director and actor for an upcoming Russian film. The director for the film, called Challenge, is Klim Shipenko. Hell be flying with actor Yulia Peresild.

Soyuz MS-18 launches from Kazakhstan on a two-orbit trek to the International Space Station in April 2021. The spaceflight participants flying to the ISS in Soyuz MS-19 in October are expected to return in Soyuz MS-18. Credit: NASA

The launch is scheduled for early October 2021 and will also bring Russian cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov to the ISS for a six-month stay. After about a week, the Shipenko and Peresild are expected to return to Earth in Soyuz MS-18 with Russian cosmonaut Oleg Novitsky.

Also recently announced was the first Soyuz mission to not deliver ISS crewmembers to the outpost, Soyuz MS-20.

While Soyuz MS-20 will still visit the orbiting laboratory for about 10 days as early as December, it will include two spaceflight participants, Yusaku Maezawa (who is also expected to fly around the Moon later this decade in a SpaceX Starship spacecraft) and his production assistant, Yozo Hirano. Russian cosmonaut Alexander Misurkin is slated to command the flight.

In total, as many as 12 private spaceflight participants are hoping to fly into low Earth orbit in the span of about six months starting this September.

For comparison, in 2001 the first space tourist, Dennis Tito, launched to the ISS for a week in a Soyuz spacecraft via a company called Space Adventures, which partnered with Roscosmos. Between then and 2009, only six others had completed the same trip with one, Charles Simonyi, flying in 2007 and 2009.

Dennis Tito, left, the first orbital space tourist, floats inside the International Space Station in 2001. Credit: NASA

Tagged: Ax-1 Axiom Space Blue Origin Human Spaceflight inspiration4 Lead Stories NASA Roscosmos Space Adventures Space Tourism SpaceX Virgin Galactic

Theresa Cross grew up on the Space Coast. Its only natural that she would develop a passion for anything Space and its exploration. During these formative years, she also discovered that she possessed a talent and love for defining the unique quirks and intricacies that exist in mankind, nature, and machines.Hailing from a family of photographersincluding her father and her son, Theresa herself started documenting her world through pictures at a very early age. As an adult, she now exhibits an innate photographic ability to combine what appeals to her heart and her love of technology to deliver a diversified approach to her work and artistic presentations.Theresa has a background in water chemistry, fluid dynamics, and industrial utility.

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Orbital space tourism poised to take off later this year - SpaceFlight Insider