1. NASA

Category Archives: NASA

NASA officially backs mission to explore Europa

Posted on by

Another celestial body has been added to NASA's bucket list with the space agency officially asking the US Congress for US$30 million for the first mission aimed at exploring Jupiters moon Europa. Part of the FY 2015 NASA Planetary Science budget, it would fund further development of an unmanned probe to study places in the Solar System other than Earth and Mars where life may exist.

Though NASA has made studies of missions to Europa before, these have been conceptual, while the new budget request now asks for double last year's appropriations to fund the build up to an actual mission. Though smaller than the Moon, many scientists believe that Europa has a subsurface ocean beneath its ice crust. Europa's ocean may be twice the volume than of all the seas of Earth, and some scientists believe it to be the most likely place in the Solar System where life may exist if only on the microbial level.

NASA is interested in learning more about this potential ocean, the composition of the brown areas on the moon's surface, and the geological forces forming the ice crust. In NASA's budget request, the mission was called one of the "two highest priority flagships" along with the Mars Astrobiology Explorer-Cacher.

Possible flyby paths of the Europa Clipper (Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

If the Europa mission gets the green light from Congress, NASA says that it will be similar to the conceptual Europa Clipper, which the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California has been working on. This would not be an orbital mission, but one with the probe orbiting Jupiter with occasional visits to Ganymede and Callisto to use their gravity to shift the spacecraft's orbit to send it back to Europa. NASA says that such flybys can achieve 80 percent of the science that an orbiter could for half the cost.

Exact details for the mission have yet to be nailed down, but at this time NASA says that the probe would be solar powered using current technology, and hardened against radiation with the electronics sealed in a shielded vault located between the propellant tanks. Instruments would include radar to penetrate the ice, infrared spectrometer, topographic camera, and an ion and neutral mass spectrometer.

Possible mission objectives of the Europa Clipper (Image: NASA/JPL-Caltech)

If the mission follows the Europa Clipper study, the new probe could fly sometime in the early 2020s with a travel time to Jupiter of six and a half years as it builds up speed using flybys of Venus and Earth. Arriving in orbit around Jupiter with a two-hour main engine burn, It would then execute 45 flybys of Europa over a three-month period, passing at an altitude of 16 to 1,675 miles (25 to 2,700 km). At the end of the nominal and any extended missions, the probe would be targeted at the Jovian moon Ganymede for a controlled impact to avoid biological contamination of Europa in the event of an accidental crash.

If the mission is funded, NASA's next step will be to determine the mission requirements, architecture, planetary protection requirements, identification of risks and their mitigation, cost and schedule estimates, and payload accommodations. In addition, planning would focus on current studies of the plumes discovered jetting from the region of Europa's south pole to determine how these might affect the mission's objectives.

Source: NASA (PDF)

Follow this link:

NASA officially backs mission to explore Europa

Ne-yo at Kelly Rowland, nasa Pilipinas para sa launch ng gaming and entertainment resort – Video

Posted on by


Ne-yo at Kelly Rowland, nasa Pilipinas para sa launch ng gaming and entertainment resort
GMA News Online: http://www.gmanews.tv Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/gmanews Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/gmanews.

By: GMA News and Public Affairs

Read the original post:

Ne-yo at Kelly Rowland, nasa Pilipinas para sa launch ng gaming and entertainment resort - Video

NASA Admin. Gathers New Spacecrafts For Budget Speech | Video – Video

Posted on by


NASA Admin. Gathers New Spacecrafts For Budget Speech | Video
During the #39;State of NASA 2016 #39; speech, administrator Charles Bolden talked about the space agency #39;s Orion, Boeing #39;s CST-100, and SpaceX #39;s Dragon spacecrafts. He also announced that President...

By: VideoFromSpace

Continued here:

NASA Admin. Gathers New Spacecrafts For Budget Speech | Video - Video

NASA seeks $500M budget boost – CNN.com

Posted on by

Standing in front of three prototype spacecraft at the Kennedy Space Station in Florida, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden on Monday laid out the agency's accomplishments.

"These are tangible examples of our progress," Bolden said, referring to Boeing's CST-100 mock-up and two test vehicles already flown in space -- Lockheed Martin's Orion and SpaceX Dragon crew capsules.

The proposal asks Congress to increase funding for the commercial spaceflight program by 50%, from $800 million to $1.2 billion. If not approved and the commercial contractors meet their deadlines -- NASA might not meet its deadline of launching astronauts from the United States by late 2017, said David Radzanowski, NASA's chief financial officer.

Last year NASA awarded Boeing and SpaceX contracts for returning American astronauts into low-Earth orbit and to the International Space Station. Since the space shuttle program ended in 2011, NASA has paid Russia to transport its astronauts to the space station on Soyuz rockets.

In its annual report, released Friday, NASA's Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel said it could not review the certification process in the Commercial Crew Program due to a lack of transparency and information.

The independent safety panel has been required to submit an annual report to Congress since the shuttle Columbia disaster in 2003. The report can be influential toward congressional approval of NASA's budget.

"We are currently providing the information to the panel," Bolden told CNN following his speech in Florida.

The administrator said President Barack Obama's $18.5 billion budget for NASA is a vote of confidence in NASA's ambitious exploration programs.

More here:

NASA seeks $500M budget boost - CNN.com

NASA seeks $500M budget boost

Posted on by

Standing in front of three prototype spacecraft at the Kennedy Space Station in Florida, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden on Monday laid out the agency's accomplishments.

"These are tangible examples of our progress," Bolden said, referring to Boeing's CST-100 mock-up and two test vehicles already flown in space -- Lockheed Martin's Orion and SpaceX Dragon crew capsules.

The proposal asks Congress to increase funding for the commercial spaceflight program by 50%, from $800 million to $1.2 billion. If not approved and the commercial contractors meet their deadlines -- NASA might not meet its deadline of launching astronauts from the United States by late 2017, said David Radzanowski, NASA's chief financial officer.

Last year NASA awarded Boeing and SpaceX contracts for returning American astronauts into low-Earth orbit and to the International Space Station. Since the space shuttle program ended in 2011, NASA has paid Russia to transport its astronauts to the space station on Soyuz rockets.

In its annual report, released Friday, NASA's Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel said it could not review the certification process in the Commercial Crew Program due to a lack of transparency and information.

The independent safety panel has been required to submit an annual report to Congress since the shuttle Columbia disaster in 2003. The report can be influential toward congressional approval of NASA's budget.

"We are currently providing the information to the panel," Bolden told CNN following his speech in Florida.

The administrator said President Barack Obama's $18.5 billion budget for NASA is a vote of confidence in NASA's ambitious exploration programs.

See the article here:

NASA seeks $500M budget boost

NASA Mission Seeks Extraterrestrial Life on Jupiter's Moon

Posted on by

NASA has its sights set on a visit to Jupiter's icy moon Europa, where astrobiologists believe there could be possible extraterrestrial life forms.

"For the first time in the history of humanity we have the tools and technology and capability to potentially answer this question. And, we know where to go to find it," Kevin Hand, a NASA astrobiologist, said last year.

Getting a closer look could soon be a reality. The $18.5 billion NASA budget recently proposed by the White House for next year includes money earmarked "for Planetary Science including formulation of a mission to Jupiters moon Europa."

Under its icy shell, Europa, one of the many moons orbiting Jupiter, has an interior ocean that could perhaps be ten times deeper than those on Earth, and include two to three times the volume of all liquid water on our planet, according to Hand.

Southwest Research Institute/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/NASA

PHOTO: New Horizons took this image of the icy moon Europa rising above Jupiter's cloud tops with its Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI)on Feb. 28, 2007.

"The story of life on Earth may have begun in our oceans," he said in a NASA video interview. "And that's because, of course, if we've learned anything about life on Earth it's that where you find the liquid water you generally find life."

NASA has been experimenting with the concept of the Europa Clipper, a spacecraft that would orbit Jupiter and collect reconnaissance on Europa -- and possibly bring back signs of multi-cellular life.

JPL-Caltech/SETI Institute/NASA

PHOTO: A color view of the surface of Europa.

See more here:

NASA Mission Seeks Extraterrestrial Life on Jupiter's Moon

NASA wants $18.5 billion

Posted on by

Standing in front of three prototype spacecraft at the Kennedy Space Station in Florida, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden on Monday laid out the agency's accomplishments.

"These are tangible examples of our progress," Bolden said, referring to Boeing's CST-100 mock-up and two test vehicles already flown in space -- Lockheed Martin's Orion and SpaceX Dragon crew capsules.

The proposal asks Congress to increase funding for the commercial spaceflight program by 50%, from $800 million to $1.2 billion. If not approved and the commercial contractors meet their deadlines -- NASA might not meet its deadline of launching astronauts from the United States by late 2017, said David Radzanowski, NASA's chief financial officer.

Last year NASA awarded Boeing and SpaceX contracts for returning American astronauts into low-Earth orbit and to the International Space Station. Since the space shuttle program ended in 2011, NASA has paid Russia to transport its astronauts to the space station on Soyuz rockets.

In its annual report, released Friday, NASA's Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel said it could not review the certification process in the Commercial Crew Program due to a lack of transparency and information.

The independent safety panel has been required to submit an annual report to Congress since the shuttle Columbia disaster in 2003. The report can be influential toward congressional approval of NASA's budget.

"We are currently providing the information to the panel," Bolden told CNN following his speech in Florida.

The administrator said President Barack Obama's $18.5 billion budget for NASA is a vote of confidence in NASA's ambitious exploration programs.

Continued here:

NASA wants $18.5 billion

Daria Stanojevic – Intervju – Nasa nedelja – (TV Nasa 01.02.2015.) – Video

Posted on by


Daria Stanojevic - Intervju - Nasa nedelja - (TV Nasa 01.02.2015.)
facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/DARIA.OfficialProfile?ref=hl ref_type=bookmark Label and copyright: City Records Daria Stanojevic http://www.dariastanojevic.com You Tube distribution:...

By: Daria Stanojevic

More here:

Daria Stanojevic - Intervju - Nasa nedelja - (TV Nasa 01.02.2015.) - Video


  1. NASA