Lifeboat Foundation

As part of the partnership between SpaceWatch. Global and Joint Air Power Competence Centre, we have been granted permission to publish selected articles and texts. We are pleased to present “Space Situational Awareness Together We Stand, Divided We Fall”, originally published in the Joint Air Power Competence Centre Journal 30.

by Major General Juan P. Sánchez de Lara, SP AF, Commander in Chief Canary Islands Air Command

Space as an Operational Domain.

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Communications in space demand the most sensitive receivers possible for maximum reach, while also requiring high bit-rate operations. A novel concept for laser-beam based communications, using an almost noiseless optical preamplifier in the receiver, was recently demonstrated by researchers at Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden.

In a new paper published in the scientific journal Nature: Light Science & Applications, a team of researchers describes a free-space optical transmission system relying on an optical amplifier that, in principle, does not add any excess noise — in contrast to all other preexisting optical amplifiers, referred to as phase-sensitive amplifiers (PSAs).

The researchers’ new concept demonstrates an unprecedented receiver sensitivity of just one photon-per-information bit at a data rate of 10 gigabits per second.

Did you know Perseverance has a twin on Earth, OPTIMISM, that helps engineers test hardware and software before commands get sent to the rover?

Join NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) for an Instagram live on Oct. 7 in the 9am PT hour (~noon ET, ~1600 UTC): http://instagram.com/nasajpl

Learn more about OPTIMISM: mars.nasa.gov/news/8749/nasa-readies-perseverance-mars-rovers-earthly-twin/

Continue reading “Twin of NASA’s Perseverance Mars Rover Now on the Move” »

NASA’s OSIRIS-REx Asteroid Sample Return Mission now knows much more about the material it will be collecting in just a few weeks.

Goddard’s Amy Simon found that carbon-bearing, organic material is widespread on the asteroid’s surface, including at the mission’s primary sample site, Nightingale, where OSIRIS-REx will make its first sample collection attempt on Oct.20.

These and other findings indicate that hydrated minerals and organic material will likely be present in the collected sample.

Photographer Steve Rice had fantasized about taking such pictures for years before a Cygnus cargo resupply mission created the perfect opportunity.

NASA will broadcast key events, including an Artemis program update, of the 71st International Astronautical Congress (IAC), which takes place virtually Monday, Oct. 12, through Wednesday, Oct. 14. Coverage will air on NASA Television and the agency’s website.

During the conference, NASA will discuss international cooperation for the agency’s lunar exploration plans throughout the Artemis program, which includes sending American astronauts to the surface of the Moon in 2024 and establishing a sustainable lunar presence by the end of the decade.

In addition to participation in events outlined below, NASA will have a virtual exhibit featuring information on Artemis, NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, and the International Space Station. Visitors also will have an opportunity to contribute to a digital mosaic of the space station on social media using #NASAVirtualExhibit.

I’m excited to welcome Catherine Johnson, a planetary geophysicist at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, a senior scientist at the Planetary Science Institute in Tucson, Arizona and an expert on the planet Mercury; the innermost planet in our solar system. Spacecraft have only visited Mercury twice, via flyby and orbit. But in 2025, a European mission is scheduled to orbit this puzzling planet with two separate spacecraft and should help further lift the scientific veil on this tiny world. Catherine and I will be talking all things Mercury! Stay tuned.

Einstein’s theory of special relativity gave us the speed limit of the Universe — that of light in a vacuum. But the absolute top speed of sound, through any medium, has been somewhat trickier to constrain.

It’s impossible to measure the speed of sound in every single material in existence, but scientists have now managed to pin down an upper limit based on fundamental constants, the universal parameters by which we understand the physics of the Universe.

That speed limit, according to the new calculations, is 36 kilometres per second (22 miles per second). That’s about twice the speed of sound travelling through diamond.