The thread for space cadets!

[hobbsyoyo]

That's pretty cool PlutonianEmpire. Though I don't think it will change the fact that any astronauts will still have to bury their habs due to radiation because of the length of time they will be stuck there and in transit unless new rocket tech becomes available.

 

[PlutonianEmpire]

Looks like the CoRoT mission is pretty much over.

http://www.nature.com/news/exoplanet-hunter-nears-its-end-1.11845

A pioneering European space telescope that discovered the first rocky extrasolar planet is on its last legs, Nature has learned.

According to the French space agency CNES, the Convection, Rotation and Planetary Transits (CoRoT) satellite suffered a computer failure on 2 November. While the spacecraft is still functioning, it can no longer retrieve data from its 30-centimetre telescope, which spots exoplanets by looking for transits — a dimming in brightness as the planet crosses its host star.

“To be frank, I think the problem is serious,” says Fabienne Casoli, the director of space science and exploration at CNES headquarters in Paris.

Launched in 2006, CoRoT set about monitoring thousands of stars. The mission survived its first computer failure in 2009 by relying completely on a second, redundant unit. Casoli says the team has tried several times to reboot the second computer to no avail. The engineering team hasn’t given up on a rescue, and, sometime in December, it will try and reboot the first computer using an alternate power chain. “For the time being, we don’t give up,” she says. “But it is one of the last things we can do.”

 

[dutchfire]

Have you tried turning it off and on again?

 

[PlutonianEmpire]

Have you tried turning it off and on again?

May be possible, but IIRC, some systems may be designed so that if one part, or even a whole spacecraft or space probe, is shut down, deliberately or otherwise, it can't be turned back on again, even if nothing was wrong. I could be wrong though.

 

[Crezth]

May be possible, but IIRC, some systems may be designed so that if one part, or even a whole spacecraft or space probe, is shut down, deliberately or otherwise, it can't be turned back on again, even if nothing was wrong. I could be wrong though.

Nah, that's not what happened here (I'm also failing to grasp what kind of system you're talking about here) It is probably any type of physical failure in the computers; radiation damage, electrical damage, stress-caused fracturing. Vetting a system for space is bad enough, but even so you can run into problems.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

IIRC, most space probes aren't even built with an 'off' switch. Systems can be shut down but you can't turn the whole thing off ever. Could be wrong though.

 

[PlutonianEmpire]

(I'm also failing to grasp what kind of system you're talking about here)

When I typed that, I was thinking of when they shut down the oxygen valves on the Apollo 13 command module when their crisis started, but I didn't know if that was fact or just one of Hollywood's artistic licenses uses in the film, prompting me to admit I may have been wrong.

 

[Winner]

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk: 'Europe's rocket has no chance'

"The Californian SpaceX chief executive Elon Musk has warned Europe it must replace its Ariane 5 rocket if it wants to keep up with his company."

-> I agree with him, he's absolutely right. So let's build Skylon and drive him out of business

---

IIRC, most space probes aren't even built with an 'off' switch. Systems can be shut down but you can't turn the whole thing off ever. Could be wrong though.

Probes usually have a "deep hibernation" mode. Don't know about space telescopes.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk: 'Europe's rocket has no chance'

"The Californian SpaceX chief executive Elon Musk has warned Europe it must replace its Ariane 5 rocket if it wants to keep up with his company."

-> I agree with him, he's absolutely right. So let's build Skylon and drive him out of business

---
Probes usually have a "deep hibernation" mode. Don't know about space telescopes.

I had no idea ESA was subsidizing Ariane as heavily as it is. Does that mean they aren't making a profit on launches and are basically dumping the market? (Dumping means unloading goods at less than a break-even price to drive competitors out of the market) Interesting stuff, thanks for the article winner.

Here's an article I swear was written just for you.
It's about a service and refueling satellite.

NEW YORK — A young spaceflight company is building what it hopes will be the ultimate space handyman, a combination repair droid and orbital gas station to serve ailing satellites around Earth.

The company, called ViviSat, is planning to launch a fleet of specially built spacecraft that will be able to attach to other vehicles in Earth orbit that need a pick-me-up.

"We call them Mission Extension Vehicles," ViviSat chief operating officer Bryan McGuirk said Nov. 15 at the 2012 Satellite and Content Delivery Conference and Expo here. "Our job will be to dock with commercial satellites to extend their lives."

 

[Winner]

I am compiling a list of resource which may play a role in future interplanetary economy. If you have something to add/correct/comment on, please do.

Space Resources:

Energy (diffuse):

• Solar – through photovoltaic collectors. The closer to the Sun, the better (within reason).
• Gravity (Oberth effect exploitation) – near the bottom of deep gravity wells: Jupiter, Saturn, giants with moons.

Energy (concentrated):

• Fissile materials (uranium, thorium) – geologically differentiated terrestrial planets (Earth, Mars, Venus, Mercury?), perhaps metallic asteroids. Ores with greater U / Th concentrations may have formed on Mars due to the presence of liquid water early in its geologic history. Same could be true for Venus.
• Deuterium (D-T fusion, other purposes) – seawater (Earth, potentially Europa and other icy moons whose subsurface oceans can be accessed); atmospheres of gas giants, realistically Saturn, Uranus, Neptune.
• Helium-3 (for aneutronic fusion) – extremely small concentrations in regolith of airless worlds (Luna, Mercury?). Stable supply could be got from atmospheres of gas giants, realistically Saturn, Uranus, Neptune (Jupiter’s gravity well is simply too deep).
• Antimatter (propulsion, various other applications) – could be produced in gigantic ‘farms’ orbiting close to the Sun, utilizing large solar arrays to power particle accelerators, thus essentially converting solar energy into antimatter. Potential exists for mining anti-particles trapped in magnetic fields of Jupiter and Saturn, but in low quantities (micrograms).

Construction/industrial materials

• Metals – basically everywhere in the inner Solar System. Much better concentrations in metallic asteroids and in some places on geologically differentiated worlds. Limiting factors: availability of energy and chemical elements/compounds needed to extract them.
• Hydrocarbons (for plastics and other uses) – asteroids (dead cometary cores), comets, vast quantities easily obtainable on Titan. Probably mixed with ices of the out planet’s moons and the Kuiper Belt objects.
• Silicates (glass) – everywhere.
• Sulphur compounds – atmosphere of Venus (H2SO4 clouds), surface of Io, sulfide-rich rocks on terrestrial planets and certain types of asteroids.

Volatiles

• Water-H2O (for propellant, hydrogen/oxygen) – ices at lunar poles, NEOs, some main belt asteroids, possibly in liquid aquifers on Mars. Omnipresent in the outer solsys.
• Nitrogen-N2 (air mixtures, various other uses) – locked in nitrates and ammonium salts on Mars, can easily be distilled from Earth, Venus, and Titan atmospheres. Nitrogen ices present on Triton and the Kupier Belt objects.
• Ammonia-NH3 (propellant, various other uses) – atmospheres of gas giants, frozen as ice in cometary cores, some outer solsys moons and the Kuiper Belt objects.

Speculative

• Exotic minerals – could potentially occur as a result of unique geologic processes on other planetary bodies.
• (Metastable) Metallic hydrogen (propulsion) – good luck getting it from the gas giants, but it could perhaps be produced artificially. The process would of course be energy-intensive, but if used as fuel, it would make the job of getting out of gravity wells much easier. As a propellant for in-space propulsion, it would rival NTRs in efficiency. Potentially very hazardous to store in large quantities.
• Primordial black holes – if they exist, we could try looking for them in the Oort cloud where we should be able to detect their radiation emissions (Hawking radiation and x-ray bursts as they sometimes collide with comets). They could potentially be captured and utilized as a power source.
• Magnetic monopoles and other topological defects, strange matter, exotic matter, . . . unobtainium – don’t hold your breath ;-)

 

[Crezth]

Primordial black holes in the Oort cloud? O_o Now I wish I had stuck with that astrophysics minor...

 

[bugwar]

New hope for Europeans to support the Russians in their space program.
source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-20407902

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Here's hoping the Proton boosters don't blow up.

 

[Winner]

New hope for Europeans to support the Russians in their space program.
source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-20407902

It's the other way round.

One key contribution would be the landing system that places the rover on the surface of the Red Planet. With the exception of some key components, this would be built by Russian industry.

Here's hoping the Proton boosters don't blow up.

The planned agreement calls for Russia to provide the Proton rockets to send the two ExoMars missions on their way.

I'd sooner cut off my left hand than launch my flagship multi-billion Mars probe on a Russian rocket of any type, especially not Proton

 

[bugwar]

I'd sooner cut off my left hand than launch my flagship multi-billion Mars probe on a Russian rocket of any type, especially not Proton

Good thing you are not an American astronaut, you would be stuck on the ground.

 

[Winner]

Read this article if you want to know why some American space advocates are so bloody annoying.

 

[Crezth]

Read this article if you want to know why some American space advocates are so bloody annoying.

If you're saying that the person who wrote that article is bloody annoying, I wholeheartedly agree.

 

[Winner]

Just see how many clichés this guy is throwing around, it's incredible. Do Americans really require this much patriotic hogwash in an essay?

 

[PlutonianEmpire]

http://news.yahoo.com/nuclear-one-two-punch-could-knock-dangerous-asteroid-160319627.html

Destroying a dangerous asteroid with a nuclear bomb is a well-worn trope of science fiction, but it could become reality soon enough.

Scientists are developing a mission concept that would blow apart an Earth-threatening asteroid with a nuclear explosion, just like Bruce Willis and his oilmen-turned-astronaut crew did in the 1998 film "Armageddon."

But unlike in the movie, the spacecraft under development — known as the Hypervelocity Asteroid Intercept Vehicle, or HAIV — would be unmanned. It would hit the space rock twice in quick succession, with the non-nuclear first blow blasting out a crater for the nuclear bomb to explode inside, thus magnifying its asteroid-shattering power.

Sounds fun, but I'm skeptical. Thoughts?

 

[bugwar]

http://news.yahoo.com/nuclear-one-two-punch-could-knock-dangerous-asteroid-160319627.html



Sounds fun, but I'm skeptical. Thoughts?

Love to see what the validation program looks like.
How do you test to see if it works?