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Category: space travel – Page 522

NASA to develop humanoid robot to help in deep space missions

So, here is a question that many AI experts are and have been asking themselves for a while; “as humans create robots and have other humans; what will the world look like when Humanoid Robots and other types of robots create their own?”

NASA is in the process of developing a humanoid robot that could help astronauts in risky and extremely hazardous expeditions in the future.

The six-feet tall, 131.5 kg heavy humanoid robot called R5 will work as a ready-to-assist machine in every dangerous task of the utmost importance during long-lasting journeys beyond the Earth, Astrowatch.net reported on Sunday. The robot was previously known as Valkyrie.

“NASA is counting on robots to set up and care for deep space exploration facilities and equipment pre-deployed ahead of astronauts. Robots are also excellent precursors for conducting science missions ahead of human exploration,” Sasha Congiu Ellis of NASA’s Langley Research Centre in Hampton, Virginia, said.

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These 4 Cosmic Phenomena Travel Faster Than The Speed Of Light

Dreaming of wormholes: Kaku said “The only feasible way to break the light barriers is through general relativity and warping of space-time”. We call this warping as wormholes, theoretically, these allow something to break the cosmic speed limit by travelling huge distance in a short time. These wormholes have some exotic matter, holding them open. This exotic matter has been made in laboratories but in a small quantity. In 1988, Kip Thorne proposed a theory of Stable Wormholes to find out the possibility of a wormhole in the presence of that exotic matter (like the one in Interstellar Movie). Thorne says “After 30 years, the answer is still unknown and we are still away from the final answer.”

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5 Down-To-Earth Takeaways From ‘The Martian’

Glad to see The Martian get some Academy Award action; as much as I liked the novel, I found the film to be as good or better, which is rare. And I also found it to be personally inspiring in a way that few science fiction films are. But the point I’m trying to make here is that; we aren’t that far from Hermes-type spacecraft for interplanetary transfer. It’s not out of the realm of possibilities. I wonder if any of you feel the same way.

With six Academy Award nominations, the celebrated film adaptation of Andy Weir’s novel “The Martian” has been the perfect tonic for rousing interest in human missions to Mars.

But as good as the book truly is, the film transcends its source material about a stranded Mars astronaut with some practical takeaways that are as inspiring as any out there. They include:

Duct tape goes a long way –

Throwing money at a problem, particularly in aerospace, can often lead to little of real use.

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Blue Origin beats SpaceX to re-launching a reusable rocket

Blue Origin just launched and landed its suborbital rocket New Shepard — the same vehicle the company flew and then landed in November. The booster reached a maximum altitude of 333,582 feet, or 63 miles, above the Earth’s surface, before landing gently back at Blue Origin’s test facility in Texas. That makes it the first commercial vertical rocket to launch into space a second time.

It also means Blue Origin has seemingly beaten rival SpaceX yet again in the race to reuse rockets. SpaceX successfully landed one of its Falcon 9 rockets post-launch back in December for the first time, just a month after Blue Origin did. However, CEO Elon Musk said that particular rocket will never be launched again, as the company considers it too special to reuse. SpaceX tried to land another rocket last week, but the vehicle ultimately fell over and exploded, making it impossible to fly again.

SpaceX and Blue Origin may be working toward the same goal, but the companies do have two very different vehicles. Blue Origin’s New Shepard is designed to take future passengers into suborbital space, where they will experience four minutes of weightlessness before falling back to Earth. SpaceX’s Falcon 9 is made to launch payloads and cargo into orbit and beyond; the rocket goes much faster and to a much higher altitude before returning to the ground.

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Objet d’Art: A Space Oddity — By Rachel Small | Interview Magazine

“Though humble in appearance, this object is the product of great ambitions. Dubbed a “Lunar Rake,” it was designed and manufactured in the late 1960s in partnership with NASA. A facsimile of the implement that astronauts would theoretically use to scrape up dust on the moon, this model was used only during training.”

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Jan Woerner: ESA chief wants to establish a Moon Village

European Space Agency building a space colony by 2030.

The European Space Agency unveiled plans on Friday to build a “lunar village” by 2030 as a stepping stone to Mars.

ESA chief Jan Woerner said the lunar “village” would be a series of structures made by robots and 3D printers that use moon dust as building material.

“I looked into the requirements I see for a project after ISS. As of today, I see the moon village as the ideal successor of the International Space Station for [space] exploration,” Woerner said at a news briefing in Paris on Friday.

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