Astronomy and space exploration

[eloic]

Launch of NASA's TESS Exoplanet Hunter Delayed by Rocket Issue

NASA's TESS exoplanet satellite stands atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on April 16, 2018. Launch was planned for this day, but a rocket issue has pushed it to April 18 at the earliest.​

https://www.space.com/40322-spacex-nasa-tess-exoplanet-mission-launch-delay.html

:-S

 

[nutball]

Yeah bad news. A couple of my colleagues flew out from Europe to be at the launch. They have to fly back Tuesday evening I think so will probably miss it!

 

[Grall]

Oh man, that's a bummer!

Still, visiting faraway countries is always a great opportunity, so hardly a total loss!

 

[nutball]

Well yes. Two days in Florida, I don't have a great deal of sympathy for that bit! Plus they got the VIP treatment around Cape Canaveral. Just being there is something I'd love to do.

 

[Grall]

VIP treatment huh? Wow. What does that entail, you know? Is it NASA or SpaceX doing the treating?

Btw I wonder... Is there any good cajun food to be had in Florida? Love to try some famous dishes, honestly.

I'd also love to finally get to meet Florida Man someday... Oh, the stuff he gets up to, I bet he's got quite a few stories to tell!

 

[nutball]

MIT I think. They funded TESS privately to a princely sum.

On a slightly more discordant note the press conference on Monday night ran true to form. All about US missions and how they will deliver all the answers, no mention of that fact that no they actually won't. The European Space Agency missions CHEOPS, PLATO and ARIEL combined will do a better job than TESS and JWST. I was left to Jonathan Amos to stick the oar in for the Europeans.

The real answers will have to wait for the successor(s) to JWST, of which only concepts exist now, eg. LUVOIR, which if it launches before 2050 I will be surprised (and also probably dead, but that's an implementation detail).

 

[cheapchips]

ECLIPS on LOVIUR would be amazing. The first direct imaging of Earth sized exoplanets.

I'd hope that the James Webb is the last monolithic space telescope though. Changes in the launch market in the next decade ought to enable something modular. Guess large science projects can't be planned on that uncertainty though.

 

[nutball]

Well, maybe. If by modular you mean multiple spacecraft flying in formation, than that potentially just adds to the cost because you will probably have to worry about station-keeping, and quite likely to exquisite precision.

My hope is that the dramatic lowering of launch costs will get us away from the massive one-size-fits-all projects like JWST. You can do a lot with a $500 million mission, and you can do nearly 20 of them with the money that will have been spent on JWST by the time it is done. Some projects just require a massive light bucket, and aren't that bothered about image quality. An 8m monolithic mirror of OK quality is a hell of a lot cheaper than the deployable mirror of JWST. OK so direct imaging of exoplanets might not be in this class, but there are other compromises that can be made, especially if it is feasible to launch truly massive payloads for closer to $100M than $1B.

 

[eloic]

Finally:

 

[eloic]

WHAAAT?!?!

I just found out that a lander made its way to Titan more than 10 years ago, on 2015. :-O It was the Huygens lander.

We even have this enhanced image from there:

​

Amazing...

How come I didn't know this until now? Where was I??!?!

There are some proposed missions to further explore this moon. I'm not saying I won't like it, but ATM I would prefer the money goes to other missions, such a big Mars mission, a mission to icy moons which could host life (such as Europa or Enceladus) or better telescopes and a starshade.

 

[Grall]

Where was I??!?!

Maybe you were busy being fairly young?

I myself wasn't aware of the earliest space probes to the moon, Mars and Venus, or even the moon landings themselves; I was only like 6 months old when the Apollo program was cancelled by NASA...

 

[CSI PC]

Finally:

Yeah good news.
Do SpaceX now have the license to show film from space (always love those shots of film) or was it possible due to being transmitted by NASA?
Just curious as the licensing to broadcast such images is now being enforced against companies; I think this is managed by NOAA.
Brings back memory with watching launch from Nasa Causeway, incredible sense of power involved with the rockets (but maybe more so due to Space Shuttles involved); awesome spectacle no matter the age of the person.

 

[eloic]

Yeah good news.
...Just curious as the licensing to broadcast such images is now being enforced against companies...

I didn't know anything about that.

 

[nutball]

Wasn't that just NOAA being overly officious?

 

[CSI PC]

Wasn't that just NOAA being overly officious?

Its a weird situation for sure that needs rectifying beyond NOAA responsibility.
No idea if the license is per launch request or time period, why I was curious if this one was fully filmed due to NASA or license agreement for SpaceX; never heard of NASA ever having this issue but it could be a "prestige"/"class" perception thing from NOAA or truly administrative procedures.

Eloyc; article here of interest: https://www.space.com/40153-spacex-launch-video-noaa-restrictions.html
and: http://spacenews.com/commerce-depar...ace-traffic-management-to-growing-space-role/

 

[eloic]

SpaceX execs bullish on BFR as Mars rocket test facilities expand in Texas
Aerial observations of SpaceX’s McGregor, Texas testing facilities on April 17 revealed an unusually frenetic level of construction and expansion centered around Raptor – the rocket engine intended to power BFR and SpaceX to Mars – and a new test-stand, the purpose of which is currently unknown.

https://www.teslarati.com/spacex-shotwell-bfr-mars-rocket-texas/

 

[eloic]

Blue Origin Is Testing Reusable Rockets. Here’s Why You Rarely See Them.
On Sunday, April 29, space travel company Blue Origin launched a test of the New Shepard reusable rocket and the space capsule that the company hopes will one day transport tourists to the edge of space.

https://futurism.com/blue-origin-rockets-competition/

 

[eloic]

Hubble detects helium in the atmosphere of an exoplanet for the first time
Astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have detected helium in the atmosphere of the exoplanet WASP-107b. This is the first time this element has been detected in the atmosphere of a planet outside the Solar System. The discovery demonstrates the ability to use infrared spectra to study exoplanet extended atmospheres.

The exoplanet WASP-107b is a gas giant, orbiting a highly active K-type main sequence star. The star is about 200 light-years from Earth. Using spectroscopy, scientists were able to find helium in the escaping atmosphere of the planet -- the first detection of this element in the atmosphere of an exoplanet.​

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/05/180502131817.htm

It's very cool that we are launching new tech to space, but it seems we can still take advantage of current active tech to detect some chemicals in other planets' atmospheres.

 

[nutball]

You need to take these "astronomers detect X in atmosphere of exoplanet" stories with a big pinch of salt. It is incredibly hard to do, it's at the edge of what is possible with HST and other instruments, and depends a lot on how carefully you model and remove instrumental systematics. This isn't a comment directed at Jessica's work, just a general point.

It doesn't help that once it's been through the press office and the media any riders attached to the original scientific paper tend to get lost.

 

[eloic]

Yes, I guess that doesn't work like magic. I only hope we can better squeeze the current hardware out there.