Techdirt. Stories about "nasa"

Techdirt. Stories about "nasa" Easily digestible tech news... http://www.techdirt.com/ en-us Techdirt. Stories about "nasa"http://www.techdirt.com/images/td-88x31.gifhttp://www.techdirt.com/ Mon, 13 May 2013 17:00:00 PDT DailyDirt: Life On Other Planets Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101020/11575411511/dailydirt-life-other-planets.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101020/11575411511/dailydirt-life-other-planets.shtml abundant in the universe, but there's not that much hard evidence (yet!). Here are just a few astronomical discoveries that might encourage researchers to look for signs of life a bit more carefully.

Exoplanets have been discovered circling some extremely old, metal-poor stars, creating interesting curiosities that might expand the theories of how planets form. These exoplanets might not harbor any kind of life... or we may want to get a bit more creative about how we envision life on other worlds. [url]
A free-floating planet named CFBDSIR2149 is not orbiting a star, and it's only one of about two dozen or so known examples of a starless planet. This rogue planet is relatively young compared to the Earth, and some spectroscopic measurements suggest this planet's temperature is about 430° Celsius -- a bit too warm for our tastes (but maybe not for aliens?). [url]
Within our own solar system, NASA's Cassini spacecraft has detected spurts of water from Saturn's moon Enceladus. This evidence leads to some speculation of a habitable zone on some icy moons where microbes might be able to survive. [url]

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]]> http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20101020/11575411511 Tue, 7 May 2013 17:00:00 PDT DailyDirt: Living On Earth (Or Elsewhere) Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090603/1212035112/dailydirt-living-earth-elsewhere.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20090603/1212035112/dailydirt-living-earth-elsewhere.shtml synthetic life based on existing lifeforms). Here are just a few fascinating links on the topic of life.

Moore's law probably doesn't apply to biology, but if it did, it suggests that life as we know it began before the Earth existed. Genetic complexity as a function of time has been extrapolated backwards, but it's obviously more of an interesting thought experiment than a meaningful biological theory. [url]
NASA's Curiosity rover has analyzed some martian rock samples to answer the question: "could life have ever been supported on Mars?" The answer seems to be yes, but that still doesn't mean Mars had (or has) any life. [url]
Do we need to look for alien life that's already amongst us? A shadow biosphere on earth could be an explanation for some mysteries like "desert varnish"... or Occam's razor might start cutting in here. [url]

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20090603/1212035112 Thu, 21 Mar 2013 17:00:00 PDT DailyDirt: Life On Other Worlds Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101215/03531112286/dailydirt-life-outside-earth.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101215/03531112286/dailydirt-life-outside-earth.shtml several theories for how life might have come about, but it's difficult to design experiments to narrow down these options. In the meantime, researchers continue to look for clues and evidence for life that didn't originate on our planet. Here are just a few examples that could one day lead us in the right direction.

Meteorite fragments found in Sri Lanka *might* contain extra-terrestrial fossils -- if you kinda squint and tilt your head, the algae-like fossils support a panspermia theory for the origin of life. This isn't the first time a peer-reviewed journal has published a story like this, and it won't be the last. The real question is when will these papers actually be convincing to skeptics.... [url]
In 1996, a rock named ALH84001 made a lot more headlines when scientists claimed that it might contain evidence of life from Mars in the form of microfossils. Since then, the ALH84001 debate seems to have settled on the view that those small fossils weren't necessarily created by ET life, and the media hoopla re-affirmed that "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence." [url]
Maybe we'll see evidence of life outside our solar system by looking for evidence of asteroid mining operations around other stars -- if we see unusual amounts of dusty debris, it could mean intelligence life has been exploring for interplanetary resources. It might be hard to determine the difference between natural and unnatural debris, though. [url]
NASA's Curiosity rover has discovered that Mars once had an environment suitable for life. This is an important find, and it raises questions of why Mars doesn't seem to have ubiquitous life now. [url]

Somewhat unexpected foods have been eaten in space -- such as sushi, smuggled communion wafers, and a secretly-stashed corned beef sandwich. Emeril Lagasse and Rachel Ray have also prepared a few recipes for space meals. [url]

About 9 months prior to a mission, NASA astronauts start picking out what they'll eat while they're up in space. Tang wasn't designed for any space program, but its powdered formula is a convenient way to store flavored beverages for spaceflights. NASA-approved beverages include coffee, tea, apple cider, orange juice and lemonade. [url]

NASA has published several fact sheets on what astronauts eat in space. Random factoid: SkyLab was apparently the only spacecraft that offered both a freezer and fridge for food storage. [url]

Speculation on China's rocket technology suggests the country's Long March 9 rocket will be more than capable for sending astronauts to the moon, Mars, and perhaps other distant destinations within our solar system. The Long March 9 is expected to be in service around 2020-2025. [url]

Google's Lunar X Prize is closed to new participants, but there are about 25 teams still competing for rewards totaling $30 million -- for these privately funded teams to send robots to the moon. The deadline for these teams is the end of 2015. Hopefully at least one team will succeed in its mission, and we'll have mini moon bases sending back all kinds of data before the end of the decade. [url]

The Soyuz spacecraft has been a workhorse for decades, but Russia has recently announced plans for its next generation spaceship design that could be used for manned missions to the moon (or possibly Mars). Test flights are scheduled to begin in 2017, and this Prospective Piloted Transport System (PPTS) could also service the International Space Station (creating another backup solution to supply the ISS). [url]

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]]> http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20101110/19025111806 Wed, 28 Nov 2012 17:00:00 PST DailyDirt: Cool Telescopes Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101021/10511511527/dailydirt-cool-telescopes.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20101021/10511511527/dailydirt-cool-telescopes.shtml

The US National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) donated a couple of huge space telescopes to NASA. Instead of spying on earthlings, these telescopes could be outfitted with equipment to look for ETs in distant star systems. [url]

A starshade fitted to a helium blimp could help astronomers pick out exoplanets more easily. The starshade blocks light from a parent star so that its orbiting planets can be detected directly. [url]

NuSTAR is an orbiting space telescope that's looking for sources of high-energy X-rays that potentially come from black holes or radioactive material in supernova remnants. This telescope is still calibrating, but it should start collecting some cool data soon. [url]

While the Earth and other rocky objects in our solar systems aren't perfectly round, our Sun is remarkably spherical... almost too spherical. The Sun isn't perfectly spherical, but it's actually one of the roundest objects humans have ever measured, and it's a bit puzzling why it should be so round. [url]

NASA's Cassini spacecraft has discovered that Saturn's moon Titan could hold bodies of liquid water under its crust. This could mean there's yet another place in our solar system with water that could possibly sustain life. [url]

A geochronometer is an instrument that could help determine how old various things in our solar system are. Portable geochronometers could be sent to other planets (like Mars) to improve our estimates of how long it takes for certain planetary features to develop. [url]

NASA is about to announce ambitious plans for manned space outposts on the moon and at a Lagrangian point. There are only a handful of Earth-moon Lagrangian points, so if NASA gets to the better ones first, the US will occupy some of the best space real estate. [url]

China is planning to land a probe on the moon sometime in 2013. China ultimately wants to have a manned mission to the moon, but it hasn't set a timeframe for that goal. [url]

If you want to keep score, the Soviets have landed spacecraft on two other planets (Venus and Mars), while the US has only landed equipment on Mars. But if we're counting quality, not quantity, then the US has gathered far more information on Mars than any other space program. [url]

NASA's Morpheus lander is designed to touch down on other planets, moons and even asteroids. Morpheus runs on methane and oxygen so that it could potentially re-fuel on extra-terrestrial bodies, and it could handle a variety of payloads such as robots, laboratories and even astronauts. [url]

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20100908/16190410942 Tue, 18 Sep 2012 17:00:00 PDT DailyDirt: Interstellar Travel -- 'To Boldly Go Where No One Has Gone Before' Joyce Hung http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120303/01062217972/dailydirt-interstellar-travel-to-boldly-go-where-no-one-has-gone-before.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20120303/01062217972/dailydirt-interstellar-travel-to-boldly-go-where-no-one-has-gone-before.shtml Star Trek... While we won't be traveling beyond our solar system anytime soon, there are already plenty of efforts underway to develop the technologies needed to make interstellar travel a reality. Here are a few examples.

DARPA is funding the "100 Year Starship Initiative" which aims to make long-distance space travel possible within the next century. The initiative will focus on identifying and driving advancements in the technologies needed for interstellar flight, as well as using them to improve the quality of life on Earth. [url]
According to an estimate of how much energy would be needed to make interstellar travel possible, it will be at least another 200 years before humans will have enough to trek to the stars. For example, a mission to send 500 people on a one-way trip into space would require 10¹⁸ Joules of energy for rocket propulsion. In comparison, a shuttle launch requires 10¹³ Joules of energy. [url]
NASA's Glenn Research Center has compiled a list of some ideas for interstellar travel that are based on scientific knowledge that exists today. To make interstellar travel practical, we'll need to be able to control gravitational/inertial forces, travel faster than light, find ways to harness the energy in the vacuum of space, etc. [url]
Icarus Interstellar Inc. is working on the concept of using powerful lasers to generate antimatter from the vacuum of space. The large amount of energy produced through matter-antimatter annihilation could then be used for interstellar propulsion. [url]

Neil Armstrong's first words as he stepped on the moon were slightly misheard by everyone on Earth, and audio analysis of the recordings suggests that Armstrong didn't just mis-speak. "That's one small step for *A* man, one giant leap for mankind." [url]
In 2006, NASA realized that it had lost its original Apollo 11 moon landing videos, but fortunately, archived footage of the moonwalk was found in Australia in 2010. The tapes were restored and digitized -- and hopefully we won't lose them again when nobody remembers what MP4 is. [url]
President Nixon was prepared for an Apollo 11 disaster with a speech that he thankfully never read to the American public. The "moon disaster" speech is a creepy reminder that space exploration is an inherently risky venture... [url] [page2]

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20100922/04320611115 Wed, 8 Aug 2012 17:00:00 PDT DailyDirt: Mars Missions Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100804/14231710499/dailydirt-mars-missions.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100804/14231710499/dailydirt-mars-missions.shtml useful radiation measurements on its journey that will give scientists a better idea of what kind of radiation levels a future manned mission would face on a similar trip to Mars. Here are just a few other interesting Mars-related missions to peruse while Curiosity performs its self-diagnostics before roaming around the surface of Mars.

Last year, Opportunity found some "slam dunk" evidence of water having existed on Mars. There may have been an ancient "wet" Martian surface that was hospitable to our own biology, and Curiosity may find additional geological evidence to support a watery history on Mars. [url]
NASA also recently tested an inflatable heat shield, capable of withstanding hypersonic speeds of up to Mach 10. The Inflatable Re-entry Vehicle Experiment 3 (IRVE-3) could help designers create spacecraft that can land on Mars without the use of fancy rocket cranes. [url]
India is planning its own mission to mars in 2013 at an estimated cost of $70-90 million. But India's Department of Science hasn't fully approved a Mars mission with full funding, so these plans could be delayed. [url]

The menu for astronauts headed to Mars could include items like (vegan) pizza and fresh vegetables/fruits. The gravity on Mars should allow astronauts to chop vegetables and do some food prep that's a bit harder in a zero-gravity environment. [url]

Buzz Aldrin took a communion wafer and a vial of wine to the moon in 1969. Aldrin quietly read a few bible passages and consumed these items in the hours before he was scheduled to go for a walk on the moon's surface. [url]

A trip to Mars requires the shelf life of its food supplies to last about five years, but NASA's current astronaut menu only lasts a couple years. Lockheed Martin researchers are looking into a bunch of different (non-meat and non-dairy) menu options for a 2030-ish planned mission to the red planet. [url]

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20100902/11373810878 Tue, 26 Jun 2012 17:00:00 PDT DailyDirt: Space Race Continues Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100803/10525410479/dailydirt-space-race-continues.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100803/10525410479/dailydirt-space-race-continues.shtml SpaceX shipped some supplies to the International Space Station, and it's on track to providing a rocket system for ferrying astronauts to the ISS as well. More and more commercial space ventures are competing with government space programs, and this new space race will hopefully continue and create even more inspiring space technologies over the next decade and beyond. Here are just a few other interesting developments along the way.

NASA and the FAA have reached a tentative agreement to provide better guidelines for regulating all kinds of space launches. Virgin Galactic has been granted a license, but it might be interesting to see if all those amateur weather balloons and sub-orbital rocket projects will run into any regulatory problems. [url]
Excalibur Almaz is a commercial space transportation company with roots in the former Soviet Union's military space program. For about $100 million, you can hitch a ride on one of these older (but very reliable!) Soviet-era spacecraft that have been extensively tested -- possibly all the way to the moon. [url]
Citizen scientists are putting together an ArduSat -- an open source satellite -- that could be included on a free launch via a NASA or ESA ride-along program. There ain't no such thing as a free launch? [url]
China has recently become the third nation to successfully dock a manned space capsule with another space vessel. Three people (including China's first female astronaut/taikonaut) on the Shenzhou 9 spacecraft joined up with the Tiangong 1 space module in orbit. [url]

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]]> urls-we-dig-up http://www.techdirt.com/comment_rss.php?sid=20100803/10525410479 Thu, 14 Jun 2012 17:00:00 PDT DailyDirt: Space Tourism Is Almost Here Michael Ho http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100712/11454010177/dailydirt-space-tourism-is-almost-here.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20100712/11454010177/dailydirt-space-tourism-is-almost-here.shtml mini-shuttle) to get people into space. On top of that, though, the private space industry is starting to kick in with more and more ambitious plans to offer rides into space -- or at least to the edge of space. Here are just a few more examples of these private efforts.

Travel agents are already booking seats on Virgin Galactic -- for $200,000 (including a $20,000 upfront deposit). Over 450 passengers have already bought tickets. [url]
Mars One is aiming for human settlement on our neighboring planet around 2023. It'll be a one-way trip, so plan accordingly. [url]
The Hermes spacecraft received some Kickstarter funding to build its next test rocket. It's still far from developing a rocket system ready for humans, but it's still cool to see more engineers trying to re-invent space travel. [url]
Alliant Techsystems (aka ATK), which manufactured the Space Shuttle's booster rockets, is developing a rocket system it calls Liberty. This Liberty rocket system is designed to hold 7 passengers and reach destinations like the International Space Station. [url]
To discover more links on space exploration, check out what's floating around in StumbleUpon universe. [url]

Wayne Hale, a retired Space Shuttle Flight Director, explains how Columbia was damaged by the loss of insulation foam -- by finding out that Discovery was almost damaged in the same way. It wasn't due to improper foam installation, but instead thermal cycling from filling and re-filling the cryogenic fuel. [url]

On its way to a museum, Enterprise sustains damage to its wingtip after hitting a bridge. The NASA prototype spacecraft never flew in space, and it suffered only cosmetic damage while being transported to its final destination at the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in Manhattan. [url]

Caenorhabditis elegans worms actually survived the Columbia disaster, and their descendants flew into space in 2011 on the Endeavour. Worms on a m*********ing spaceplane! [url]