Space Stories: Fast-Spinning Martians, Artemis 3 Mission Issues, and an Ancient Star Cluster

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Image of Mars taken by the United Arab Emirates’ “Amal,” or “Hope,” probe. (Mohammed bin Rashid Space Center/UAE Space Agency, via AP)

Here are some recent stories of interest.

—Space.com : “Mars is Spinning Faster and its Days are Getting Shorter. Scientists Aren’t Sure Why“

The length of Mars’ day is shortening by three-quarters of a millisecond each year as the planet’s rotation spins up, according to new results from NASA’s InSight lander…Planetary scientists are not entirely sure why this is happening, but it is likely related to the redistribution of Mars’ mass, which can have an effect on the planet’s rotation like an ice skater pulling in their arms to spin faster. This redistribution might be caused by the accumulation of ice on Mars’ polar caps, experts believe, or by the surface itself slowly rebounding from residing under the weight of immense glaciers that existed at equatorial latitudes during the world’s most recent ice ages, which ended about 400,000 years ago.

—SpaceNews.com : “NASA Weighs Changes to Artemis 3 if Key Elements are Delayed“

NASA has left the door open for changing the scope of Artemis 3, currently set to be the first crewed lunar landing of the program, if key elements suffer major delays. Speaking at an Aug. 8 briefing at the Kennedy Space Center, Jim Free, NASA associate administrator for exploration systems development, said the Artemis 3 mission still has a formal launch date of December 2025 but that he was monitoring potential delays in hardware needed for the mission. “We may end up flying a different mission if that’s the case,” he said. “If we have these big slips out, we’ve looked at if can we do other missions.” Artemis 3 could also change based on the outcome of Artemis 2, he added.

—ScienceNews.com : “A Star Cluster in the Milky Way Appears to be as Old as the Universe“

One of the oldest known objects in the universe is wandering around the Milky Way. Star cluster M92, a densely packed ball of stars roughly 27,000 light-years from Earth, is about 13.8 billion years old, researchers report in a paper submitted June 3 to arXiv.org. The newly refined age estimate makes this clump of stars nearly the same age as the universe. Refining the ages of clusters like M92 can help put limits on the age of the universe itself. It can also help solve cosmic conundrums about how the universe evolved.

DRACO: A New Approach for Traveling to Mars

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Artist’s rendering of the DRACO spacecraft. (DARPA)

When you hear the word DRACO, you may think of the Harry Potter series or even severe Athenians, but NASA wants you to think of speedy travel to Mars. DRACO, or Demonstration for Rocket to Agile Cislunar Operations, is NASA’s plan to develop a nuclear thermal rocket engine with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). Defense contractor Lockheed Martin was recently tapped to lead this effort.

Such an engine would shorten the journey to Mars, thereby exposing astronauts to less risk from solar energetic particles and galactic cosmic rays as well as lessening the amount of supplies needed for the trip. The rocket engine could also be used initially for shorter trips to the Moon.

Dr. Stefanie Tompkins, director, DARPA, stated earlier:

The space domain is critical to modern commerce, scientific discovery, and national security. The ability to accomplish leap-ahead advances in space technology through the DRACO nuclear thermal rocket program will be essential for more efficiently and quickly transporting material to the Moon and eventually, people to Mars.

You can read more about this new rocket approach and the parties involved at this NASA link.

Travel to Moon and Mars Not Most Important Missions for the Public

Posted on by onespaceman2000

While both Buzz Aldrin and I believe that lunar and Martian colonies are important, it would appear the public has other ideas about NASA’s priorities. The graphic above shows in a recent Pew Research Center study indicates the more Americans are interested in monitoring the Earth’s climate as well as watching for asteroids.

Even finding exoplanets that could support life seems to be more important than occupying local moons and planets. I am not sure how that would help us now if we want to spread the risk of living on one planet, as some propose. We are nowhere near sending a probe to exoplanets, let alone getting humans there.

The study has quite a bit to ponder, including:

  • 58% of U.S. adults believe it is essential to include the use of human astronauts in the U.S. space program, while 41% say astronauts are not essential;
  • Some 44% of Americans have a great deal of confidence private companies will make a profit in their space-related ventures;
  • As the public considers the possibilities ahead for ordinary citizens to orbit the Earth in a spacecraft, more Americans say they would not want to orbit the Earth than say they would (58% to 42%); and
  • About seven-in-ten Americans (72%) say it is essential for the U.S. to continue to be a world leader in space exploration, and eight-in-ten (80%) say the space station has been a good investment for the country.

I am not sure the survey shows a lot of consistency in the answers, but this can be a difficult topic at the outset. NASA should just be worried if Americans saw no reason for a space program, which does not seem to be the case. As noted above, the majority of Americans want a strong space program. Let’s see if that helps with the ongoing congressional budget discussions.

Pic of the Week/A Day in Astronomy: Moon Landing

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): Astronaut Edwin E. (Buzz) Aldrin Jr., Lunar Module (LM) pilot, climbs down the LM ladder, preparing for his first steps on the Moon. (NASA)

On this day in 1969, the Apollo 11 crew stepped on the Moon for the first time, showing that mankind could actually travel to another world. The image above shows Astronaut Buzz Aldrin preparing the step on the Moon as the second human to ever walk on the lunar surface.

Buzz Aldrin has plenty of quotes related to his Moon mission and life in general, but I like his quotes about our next trip to Mars, like this one:

When we set out to land people on the surface of Mars, I think we should as a nation, as a world, commit ourselves to supporting a growing settlement and colonization there. To visit a few times and then withdraw would be an unforgivable waste of resources.

NASA’s Artemis mission is retracing Buzz Adrin’s steps, which is a good sign given that we visited only a few times and then withdrew for decades. Let’s hope Artemis gets us settlements on both the Moon and Mars.

Space Stories: More Moon Missions, a Two-Faced Star, and Missing Dark Matter

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): An artist’s rendering of NASA’s VIPER Moon rover. (NASA/Daniel Rutter)

Here are some recent stories of interest.

—Ars Technica : “NASA Starts Building Ice-hunting Moon Rover“

The search for ice at the Moon’s poles has loomed large in the field of lunar science since an instrument on an Indian satellite discovered water molecules inside shadowed crater floors more than a decade ago. NASA is now assembling a golf cart-size rover to drive into the dark polar craters to search for ice deposits that could be used by future astronauts to make their own rocket propellant and breathable air. “A large group of people have been working on this idea for 10-plus years,” said Anthony Colaprete, project scientist for NASA’s Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover (VIPER) mission.

—Caltech: “Two-Faced Star Exposed“

In a first for white dwarfs, the burnt-out cores of dead stars, astronomers have discovered that at least one member of this cosmic family is two faced. One side of the white dwarf is composed of hydrogen, while the other is made up of helium. “The surface of the white dwarf completely changes from one side to the other,” says Ilaria Caiazzo, a postdoctoral scholar at Caltech who leads a new study on the findings in the journal Nature. “When I show the observations to people, they are blown away.”

—Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias: “The Puzzle of the Galaxy with No Dark Matter“

A team of scientists, led by the researcher at the IAC and the University of La Laguna (ULL) Sebastién Comerón, has found that the galaxy NGC 1277 does not contain dark matter. This is the first time that a massive galaxy (it has a mass several times that of the Milky Way) has not shown evidence for this invisible component of the universe. “This result does not fit in with the currently accepted cosmological models, which include dark matter,” explains Comerón.