Really Rocket Science

Along with millions on earth, the ISS astronauts will be watching today’s opening match, too.

I like the soccer/football/futbol demo in zero gravity.

What if Saturn was only a million kilometers away? The gravity would kill us all.

If you’re curious, click on the video by Yeti Dynamics.

Saturn’s rings were created using Voyager data and Cassini Data, and tables from the IAU, and NASA Interestingly enough, the Voyager data and Cassini data did NOT completely match each other. More interestingly, the differences between the two data sets were not consistent along the ring, specifically the small Gaps along the rings are inconsistent between Voyager and Cassini. There are 3 conclusions I can reach from this,
1. the data is simply not perfectly accurate,
2. I interpreted the data incorrectly,
3. the Rings have actually changed a bit between voyager and cassini.

To create the rings, I interpolated between the two data sets, so the rings are a mix between Voyager and Cassini data, there are multiple textures used, for scattering, translucency, transparency, and color, I think I probably have some of the highest resolution textures in use anywhere on the web(over 19k pixels across).

In Part 1, (the 2d blue print video) the Planets are all correctly scaled to each other, except the SUN.. The Orbits are also all correctly scaled to each other (except the Moon’s). However, the planet size, and the planet orbits are not scaled to each other. The orbital speeds are also all correct relative to one another,

In part 2, The illumination between the moon and Saturn is reasonably accurate, in case you didn’t understand. This is Saturn as Far away as the closest approach mars would get

In Part 3, the meteors ramp up and down in response to going through the very distended outer rings E, and G

The Meteors are Greenish, I’ve actually seen a Number of large daylight meteors, all of them had flashes of green and blue, The velocity and direction they are in the video is accurate to the motion of Saturn in this video

Disclaimer:
This will.. never never ever happen, ever (probably).

Hat tip: Bad Astronomer

Now’s a really good time to view Saturn.

Of course, the best way to get Saturn up on your wall, permanent-like, is to get a Big Bang Print.

Thank you, NASA!

This supercomputer simulation shows one of the most violent events in the universe: a pair of neutron stars colliding, merging and forming a black hole. A neutron star is the compressed core left behind when a star born with between eight and 30 times the sun’s mass explodes as a supernova. Neutron stars pack about 1.5 times the mass of the sun — equivalent to about half a million Earths — into a ball just 12 miles (20 km) across.

As the simulation begins, we view an unequally matched pair of neutron stars weighing 1.4 and 1.7 solar masses. They are separated by only about 11 miles, slightly less distance than their own diameters. Redder colors show regions of progressively lower density.

As the stars spiral toward each other, intense tides begin to deform them, possibly cracking their crusts. Neutron stars possess incredible density, but their surfaces are comparatively thin, with densities about a million times greater than gold. Their interiors crush matter to a much greater degree densities rise by 100 million times in their centers. To begin to imagine such mind-boggling densities, consider that a cubic centimeter of neutron star matter outweighs Mount Everest.

By 7 milliseconds, tidal forces overwhelm and shatter the lesser star. Its superdense contents erupt into the system and curl a spiral arm of incredibly hot material. At 13 milliseconds, the more massive star has accumulated too much mass to support it against gravity and collapses, and a new black hole is born. The black hole’s event horizon — its point of no return — is shown by the gray sphere. While most of the matter from both neutron stars will fall into the black hole, some of the less dense, faster moving matter manages to orbit around it, quickly forming a large and rapidly rotating torus. This torus extends for about 124 miles (200 km) and contains the equivalent of 1/5th the mass of our sun.

Scientists think neutron star mergers like this produce short gamma-ray bursts (GRBs). Short GRBs last less than two seconds yet unleash as much energy as all the stars in our galaxy produce over one year.

The rapidly fading afterglow of these explosions presents a challenge to astronomers. A key element in understanding GRBs is getting instruments on large ground-based telescopes to capture afterglows as soon as possible after the burst. The rapid notification and accurate positions provided by NASA’s Swift mission creates a vibrant synergy with ground-based observatories that has led to dramatically improved understanding of GRBs, especially for short bursts.

By 7 milliseconds, tidal forces overwhelm and shatter the lesser star. Its superdense contents erupt into the system and curl a spiral arm of incredibly hot material. At 13 milliseconds, the more massive star has accumulated too much mass to support it against gravity and collapses, and a new black hole is born. The black hole’s event horizon — its point of no return — is shown by the gray sphere. While most of the matter from both neutron stars will fall into the black hole, some of the less dense, faster moving matter manages to orbit around it, quickly forming a large and rapidly rotating torus. This torus extends for about 124 miles (200 km) and contains the equivalent of 1/5th the mass of our sun.

Get ready, watchers of the skies!

Periodic Comet 209P/LINEAR is predicted to put on a show for us.

Preliminary results by Esko Lyytinen and Peter Jenniskens, later confirmed by other researchers, predict 209P/LINEAR may cause the next big meteor shower which would come from the constellation Camelopardalis on the night of 23/24 May 2014. There may be 100 to 400 meteors per hour. All the trails from the comet from 1803 through 1924 may intersect Earths orbit during May 2014. The peak activity is expected to occur around 24 May 2014 7h UT when dust trails produced from past returns of the comet may pass 0.0002 AU (30,000 km; 19,000 mi) from Earth.

This April 30, 2014 image was taken using the NASA Marshal Space Flight Center 20″ telescope located in New Mexico. A 3-minute exposure, it shows 14th magnitude Comet 209P/LINEAR shining faintly among the stars of Ursa Major. At the time of this image, 209P was just over 40 million km from Earth, heading for a relatively close approach (8.3 million km) with us on May 29, 2014.

Image credit: NASA/MSFC/Bill Cooke

KickSat follow-up:

Regular updates as well as more background information are available on the project’s Kickstarter page. As an open source project, all of our code and design files are freely available. The primary source for technical information on the KickSat project is the project wiki. Academic publications are listed on our research group’s website.

While pondering the possibility of geosynchronous spacecraft running into an out-of-control or very inclined one (around the 150-deg. West area), I was reminded there’s a reason we call it “space.” There’s a lot of it out there.

The gorgeous image from our friends at the Cassini Solstice Mission is one that’ll make you think about space.

Here’s their description…

Uranus is a pale blue in this natural color image because its visible atmosphere contains methane gas and few aerosols or clouds. Methane on Uranus – and its sapphire-colored sibling, Neptune – absorbs red wavelengths of incoming sunlight, but allows blue wavelengths to escape back into space, resulting in the predominantly bluish color seen here. Cassini imaging scientists combined red, green and blue spectral filter images to create a final image that represents what human eyes might see from the vantage point of the spacecraft.

Uranus has been brightened by a factor of 4.5 to make it more easily visible. The outer portion of Saturn’s A ring, seen at bottom right, has been brightened by a factor of two. The bright ring cutting across the image center is Saturn’s narrow F ring.

Uranus was approximately 28.6 astronomical units from Cassini and Saturn when this view was obtained. An astronomical unit is the average distance from Earth to the sun, equal to 93,000,000 miles (150,000,000 kilometers).

This view was acquired by the Cassini narrow-angle camera at a distance of approximately 614,300 miles (988,600 kilometers) from Saturn on April 11, 2014. Image scale at Uranus is approximately 16,000 miles (25,700 kilometers) per pixel. Image scale at Saturn’s rings is approximately 4 miles (6 kilometers) per pixel. In the image, the disk of Uranus is just barely resolved. The solar phase angle at Uranus, seen from Cassini, is 11.9 degrees.

The images our space program produce are free. Getting big print made suitable for framing is available here. They do custom orders, so if you don’t see what you want — go out and find it, then have it done that way you like it.

The Large Hadron Collider beauty (LHCb) collaboration today announced results that confirm the existence of exotic hadrons – a type of matter that cannot be classified within the traditional quark model.

Hadrons are subatomic particles that can take part in the strong interaction – the force that binds protons inside the nuclei of atoms. Physicists have theorized since the 1960s, and ample experimental evidence since has confirmed, that hadrons are made up of quarks and antiquarks that determine their properties. A subset of hadrons, called mesons, is formed from quark-antiquark pairs, while the rest – baryons – are made up of three quarks.

But since it was first proposed physicists have found several particles that do not fit into this model of hadron structure. Now the LHCb collaboration has published an unambiguous observation of an exotic particle – the Z(4430) – that does not fit the quark model.

This is like finding a four-leaf clover, but really geeky.

Very cool, yet incomprehensible. A 360º view of the Milky Way galaxy, composed of more than 2 million images. Not very pretty, is it? Well, you can win them all — but the sheer magnitude of this piece of work is pretty wild.

That’s astronomy for you: deeper than your deepest imagination. Never ceases to amaze most of us: there are more galaxies out there than there are stars in the Milky Way.

W T F ?!?

OK, now get this. You can put some of this “WTF?!?” up on your wall. Go check out BigBangPrints.com and order some for yourself, or your spouse, boss, kids, etc. Go ahead: make their day!

In the satellite business, there’s a always a sense of excitement.

The competitive arena around choice orbitals slots. The suspense surrounding a launch campaign. Pushing the limits of new technology to get more out of what you already have.

Outside the industry, the general business public doesn’t fully understand it. For those of us inside the satellite business, being aware of the immense financial interests at stake on each of those complex systems, we can get worked up over the smallest success or failure, only without the drama.

It depends on what part of the business you’re working on.

We work in spacecraft propulsion systems: electric propulsion, to be specific. So you can imagine how we reacted two years ago, when we released news of our partnership with OHB Sweden, just as Boeing announced contracts to build two pair of all-electric spacecraft, one each for Satelitales Mexicano (Satmex) and Asia Broadcast Satellite (ABS).

This came soon after the U.S. Air Force and Aerospace Corp. saved the Advanced EHF spacecraft using electric propulsion. So we thought our timing was rather fortunate.

We’ve always admired Boeing for being typically at the forefront of new technologies in commercial space systems. And it’s been rather interesting to see how other manufacturers are responding. The ELECTRA project, a partnership with SES S.A. and European Space Agency, is one of the most noteworthy recent examples in developing a complete, all-electric propulsion platform.

Naturally, we’re very excited. We’ve seen the future and electric propulsion technologies will soon be at the core of in-space propulsion. This transformation will likely usher in a new era for satellite-based services by significantly expanding payloads aboard virtually any spacecraft.

We’re a small company and we’ve spent more than a decade developing electric propulsion systems and we think that soon the scene will be set for it to take center stage. Our breakthrough technology, the Electrodeless Ionization Magnetized Ponderomotive Acceleration Thruster (E-IMPAcT) is being brought to market on a solid foundation of more than 30 registered patents. Various testing in the U.S. and Europe have been very promising and we are approaching a new technological horizon. The interest we’ve received over the last couple of years has exceeded our expectations. Propulsion has a major impact on the entire economics of the satellite market and new solutions are rare.

Indeed, in many respects, the interest in electric propulsion for orbit-raising is logical and expected. Boeing’s 702SP bus is a real commercial endorsement of the critical advantages conferred by all electric propulsion and a prime example of future game-changing economics: more payload at less overall cost.

The Boeing spacecraft for Satmex and ABS, scheduled to launch in early 2015, are expected to weigh 1,800 kg and carry the same payload as some of the behemoths we’ve seen go up lately, thereby getting two spacecraft to launch on a Falcon 9 (or Ariane 5, just in case). Think about what this does for the design-build-launch side of the satellite business. Add the revenues associated with bigger payloads and the economic advantages are enormous.

There’s always risk in the space business. However, Boeing’s approach is only the beginning of this revolution. They spent a few years developing this propulsion system for the 702SP bus. However, one must consider the heritage this is built on top of — many years of experience with XIPS (xenon-ion propulsion system). Proven on-orbit technology is one of the most significant qualities customers looks for. This flown technology is being used in a new way, applied to medium-sized spacecraft after proving itself for station-keeping many times over.

On the orbit-raising aspect, flight-proven electric propulsion systems do take a long time to get the spacecraft to its useful service orbit. ESA’s Artemis took 18 months from the launch to its intended orbital location. That’s right: 18 months. The U.S. Air Force’s AEHF spacecraft needed 14 months to be salvaged by its electric propulsion system after its main chemical propulsion system failed.

That’s why we see opportunity for change in our industry, providing the technology for faster, higher-thrust, all-electric orbit-raising capability. We feel fortunate to have worked in electric propulsion for more than a decade and to now be at a point where we expect to meet the emerging and proven needs of the marketplace. We are but one company out of many in the space business who are continually looking for a better way to do things. These are the leaders with whom we identify – and the quiet, inherent enthusiasm we feel in our space business partners have for their work.

Seek out new technology. Embrace it and share your vision of what’s possible. The enthusiasm, competence and dedication I see every day is encouraging.

The new era in electric propulsion, of which Elwing hopes to be a part of, brings to mind a passage in Sir Arthur C. Clarke’s essay “Space and the Spirit of Man” (1965)…

“…we cannot predict the new forces, powers, and discoveries that will be disclosed to us when we reach the other planets or can set up new laboratories in space. They are as much beyond our vision today as fire or electricity would be beyond the imagination of a fish.”

Yet it now seems quite clear to many the future of in-space propulsion will indeed be electric propulsion technologies. Not that chemical propulsion is going away — there will still be many missions using it, but electric will swiftly become the mainstay, just as the rise of airplanes have not made all sea-faring vessels disappear. This evolution will certainly deeply reshuffle the global shares of the various space companies. It seems likely that the majority of satellite manufacturers will choose to no longer produce their own propulsion systems and rely instead on specialized industrial partners. Most importantly, this change in the root of the technology underlying all satellite services will probably change the entire industry, enabling new services and/or new players to emerge (think lower cost of bandwidth for sure, but also asteroid mining or satellite servicing which could not be viable without advanced propulsion).

The future will be electric, and it will be a much more diverse one. For the time being, no flight-proven electric technology to date is able to cover all the needs of all missions. Even as new technologies become available, the needs of satellite and space probe missions are diverse and call for diversified solutions. The future belongs to electric propulsion and it will greatly improve the space-based services we receive here on earth.

Gregory Emsellem
Chief Executive Officer
The Elwing Company
+1.310.308.3295
+33.601.82.15.27