NASA Selects New Suborbital Technology Payloads, Total Tops 130

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NASA's Flight Opportunities Program has selected 13 space technology payloads for flights on commercial reusable launch vehicles, and a commercial parabolic aircraft. These flights provide cutting-edge technologies with a valuable platform to conduct tests, before they enter use in the harsh environment of space.

This latest selection represents the eighth cycle of NASA's Announcement of Flight Opportunities, and raises the total number of technologies selected for test flights facilitated by the Flight Opportunities Program of NASA's Space Technology Mission Directorate to 138.

Eleven of these new payloads will ride on parabolic aircraft flights, which provide brief periods of weightlessness. Two will fly on suborbital reusable launch vehicle test flights. The flights are expected to take place in 2014 and 2015. The selected proposals requested flights on Zero-G Corporation's Boeing 727 parabolic flight aircraft, UP Aerospace's Space-Loft rocket and Masten Space Systems' Xombie vertical takeoff/vertical landing rocket.

The payloads selected for parabolic aircraft flights are:

- "Reduced Gravity Flight Demo of SPHERES Universal Docking Ports" and "Reduced Gravity Flight Demonstration of SPHERES INSPECT," Principal Investigator (PI) Alvar Saenz Otero of Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, Mass.

- "Reinventing the Wheel: Parabolic Flight Validation of Reaction Spheres,"PI Alvin Yew of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.

- "Enhanced Dynamic Load Sensors for ISS Operational Feasibility for Advanced Resistive Exercise Device," PI Christopher Krebs of Aurora Flight Sciences Corp., in Manassas, Va.

- "Effects of Microgravity on Intracranial Pressure," PI Benjamin Levine of University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas

- "Validating Microgravity Mobility Models for Hopping/Tumbling Robots," PI Issa Nesnas of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif.

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NASA Selects New Suborbital Technology Payloads, Total Tops 130

What If America Lost the International Space Station?

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During recent congressional testimony, the question was put to NASA Administrator Charles Bolden, what if the current rift with Russia becomes so severe that the United States is denied access to the International Space Station?

Currently and at least until 2017 American astronauts can only hitch rides on the Russian Soyuz to get to the ISS, largely built with American tax payer's money. In theory Russia could stop such flights, especially in the event of a military confrontation in Eastern Europe. It is considered a low probability event, though, since Russia is unlikely to be able to operate the ISS without American help.

Bolden's answer was stark. If we lose access to the ISS he would recommend suspension of the development of the Orion deep space craft and the Space Launch System heavy lift rocket. The theory is that medical research on the ISS is vital for the sort of deep space missions that the Orion and the SLS are being built for.

The statement suggests that Bolden is severely history challenged. Decades ago the United States conducted a very robust deep space program. It was called Apollo which landing twelve men on the moon between 1969 and 1972.

History suggests that if the United States were to lose access to the ISS, it would not be necessary to suspend all hopes of human space flight as Bolden suggests. The Orion/SLS system would be repurposed for short term expeditions to the moon, using a commercially acquired lander such as being developed by the Golden Spike Company.

In the meantime NASA could help Bigelow Aerospace develop its proposed commercial space station built out of inflatable modules. The commercial space station could be supported by commercially developed, government financed spacecraft such as the SpaceX Dragon. Then the space agency could use that facility to conduct the needed research to prepare for long duration human expeditions to Mars.

Losing the ISS, either to Russian caprice or a disaster such as depicted in the film "Gravity," would be a catastrophe. But it would not mean the end of American space flight.

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What If America Lost the International Space Station?

Challenger Center for Space Science Education Welcomes Three New Board Members

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WASHINGTON (April 2, 2014) - Officials with Challenger Center for Space Science Education (Challenger Center) today announced three new members to its board of directors. Virginia "Ginger" Barnes of The Boeing Company, Dr. W. Michael Hawes of Lockheed Martin and international best-selling author, Kevin J. Anderson.

"It is my pleasure to welcome Ginger, Mike and Kevin to the team," said Gwen Griffin, chair of the board for Challenger Center. "Their diverse career experiences in STEM-related fields along with a shared passion to continue the mission of Challenger Center, adds terrific outreach capability to the board."

Barnes is vice president and program manager for Boeing's Space Launch System (SLS), NASA's new human-rated, heavy-lift launch vehicle program. Prior to this position, she served as president and chief executive officer of United Space Alliance, LLC, before returning to Boeing where she had worked for 29 years. During her tenure with Boeing, Barnes managed a number of defense and space programs and efforts, including ISS, fighter and support programs, defense modernization and weapons, and simulation and training. She left Boeing as vice president, chief operating officer and deputy program manager, overseeing the programmatic and financial aspects of the U.S. Army's modernization efforts. She holds an advanced degree in Business.

Hawes serves as the director for human space flight programs within Lockheed Martin's Washington office, where he represents the company in dealings with the Administration and Congress. Previously, he spent 33 years with NASA holding numerous senior management roles, including deputy associate administrator for the International Space Station (ISS). He also is an adjunct faculty member of the George Washington University College of Engineering, where he teaches engineering management and systems engineering. He holds advanced degrees in Engineering Management.

The award-winning author of more than 125 books, Anderson has more than 23 million copies of his works in print in 30 languages. His involvement with Challenger Center began with his Star Challengers young-adult fiction series which he created with his wife Rebecca Moesta and Challenger Center Founding Chair June Scobee Rodgers. The books are designed to spark student interest in the space program and careers in STEM fields. He holds degrees in Astronomy and Physics.

About Challenger Center

Using space exploration as a theme and simulation as a vehicle, Challenger Center for Space Science Education and its international network of more than 40 Challenger Learning Centers create positive educational experiences that raise students' expectations of success, foster long-term interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM), and inspire students to pursue studies and careers in these areas. Challenger Learning Centers across the U.S., Canada, the United Kingdom, and South Korea reach more than 400,000 students each year through simulated space missions and educational programs and engage more than 40,000 educators through missions and teacher workshops. Founded in 1986, Challenger Center was created to honor the seven astronauts of shuttle flight STS-51-L: Commander Dick Scobee, Gregory Jarvis, Christa McAuliffe, Ronald McNair, Ellison Onizuka, Judith Resnik, and Michael J. Smith.

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Challenger Center for Space Science Education Welcomes Three New Board Members

The 5 Biggest Questions for Detroit Red Wings During the Home Stretch in 2013-14

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The Detroit Red Wings are in a playoff spot with seven games remaining in their season. They currently sit in the No. 1 wild-card spot, having either more points or games in hand than the teams below them.

But there are still substantial questions that need to be answered for Detroit as it heads down the stretch run of the regular season.

Here are the five biggest questions for the Red Wings as they march toward a 23rd straight playoff berth.

"Biggest" in this sense refers to questions that directly impact the Red Wings' ability to make the playoffs and be successful in the postseason.

Graig Abel/Getty Images

It will happen eventually.

Pavel Datsyukwillreturn to the Red Wings lineup once his knee allows him to do so.It won't be tonight against the Boston Bruins, according to Red Wings beat writer Helene St. James of the Detroit Free Press.

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The 5 Biggest Questions for Detroit Red Wings During the Home Stretch in 2013-14

Shailene Woodley Flashes Cleavage in a Plunging V-Neck Gown at the Berlin Premiere of DivergentSee the Pic!

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by Chima Simone Tue., Apr. 1, 2014 6:00 PM PDT

Shailene Woodley continues to turn heads on the red carpet as she makes the rounds at European premieres for Divergent.

Although this time the carpet was black and her white dress was red-hot!

The 22-year-old actress arrived at the Berlin premiere Tuesdayflashing more than a hint of her dcolletage in a daring, ivory Zuhair Murad gown with gold chain detail and a deep V neckline that extended all the way to her waistline.

Her rose-colored lips and perfectly coiffed short hair complemented the smoldering look, but did nothing to divert attention from the slinky, revealing silk dress.

PHOTOS: Check out Shailene Woodley's most outrageous quotes!

Theo James as arm candy, however, is a sublime distraction.

The handsome British actor is accompanying her on this Divergentpromotional blitz and he looked absolutely wonderful dressed in dark blue suit that, unfortunately, revealed none of his hunky chest whatsoever.

But we can dream.

PHOTOS: See more of Shailene Woodley's best looks!

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Shailene Woodley Flashes Cleavage in a Plunging V-Neck Gown at the Berlin Premiere of DivergentSee the Pic!

Regolith of small asteroids formed by thermal fatigue

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The centimeter-sized fragments and smaller particles that make up the regolith -- the layer of loose, unconsolidated rock and dust -- of small asteroids is formed by temperature cycling that breaks down rock in a process called thermal fatigue, according to a paper published today in the Nature Advance Online Publication.

Previous studies suggested that the regolith of asteroids one kilometer wide and smaller was made from material falling to the surface after impacts and from boulders that were pulverized by micrometeoroid impacts. Recent laboratory experiments and impact modeling conducted by a team of researchers from Observatoire de la Cte d'Azur, Hopkins Extreme Materials Institute at Johns Hopkins University, Institut Suprieur de l'Aronautique et de l'Espace and Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) have shown that the debris from large impacts reaches escape velocities and breaks free from the gravitational pull of these asteroids, indicating this mechanism is not the dominant process for regolith creation.

The team's research showed that thermal fragmentation, which is induced by mechanical stresses caused by temperature variations of the rapidly spinning asteroid's short night and day, to be the process primarily responsible for breaking up rocks larger than a few centimeters on asteroids.

"We took meteorites as the best analog of asteroid surface materials that we have on the Earth," said Dr. Marco Delbo of the Observatoire de la Cte d'Azur. "We then submitted these meteorites to temperature cycles similar to those that rocks experience on the surfaces of near-Earth asteroids and we found that microcracks grow inside these meteorites quickly enough to entirely break them on timescales much shorter than the typical lifetime of asteroids."

Model extrapolation of these experiments also showed that thermal fragmentation caused rocks to break down an order of magnitude faster than from micrometeoroid impacts, particularly at distances of 1 astronomical unit (about 93 million miles) with the speed of breakdown slowing at distances further from the Sun.

"Even asteroids significantly farther from the Sun showed thermal fatigue fragmentation to be a more relevant process for rock breakup than micrometeoroid impacts," said Dr. Simone Marchi, a scientist in the SwRI Space Science and Engineering Division.

The results of this study suggest that thermal fragmentation, combined with solar radiation pressures that sweep away surface particles, could completely erode small asteroids at distances closer to the Sun (about 28 million miles) in about 2 million years.

The French Agence National de la Recherche SHOCKS, BQR of the Observatoire de la Cte d'Azur, the University of Nice-Sophia Antipolis, the Laboratory GeoZur, the French National Program of Planetology, and NASA's Solar System Exploration Research Virtual Institute funded this research.

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The above story is based on materials provided by Southwest Research Institute. Note: Materials may be edited for content and length.

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Regolith of small asteroids formed by thermal fatigue

French, American team finds regolith of small asteroids formed by thermal fatigue

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2-Apr-2014

Contact: Maria Martinez Stothoff maria.martinez@swri.org 210-522-3305 Southwest Research Institute

The centimeter-sized fragments and smaller particles that make up the regolith the layer of loose, unconsolidated rock and dust of small asteroids is formed by temperature cycling that breaks down rock in a process called thermal fatigue, according to a paper published today in the Nature Advance Online Publication.

Previous studies suggested that the regolith of asteroids one kilometer wide and smaller was made from material falling to the surface after impacts and from boulders that were pulverized by micrometeoroid impacts. Recent laboratory experiments and impact modeling conducted by a team of researchers from Observatoire de la Cte d'Azur, Hopkins Extreme Materials Institute at Johns Hopkins University, Institut Suprieur de l'Aronautique et de l'Espace and Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) have shown that the debris from large impacts reaches escape velocities and breaks free from the gravitational pull of these asteroids, indicating this mechanism is not the dominant process for regolith creation.

The team's research showed that thermal fragmentation, which is induced by mechanical stresses caused by temperature variations of the rapidly spinning asteroid's short night and day, to be the process primarily responsible for breaking up rocks larger than a few centimeters on asteroids.

"We took meteorites as the best analog of asteroid surface materials that we have on the Earth," said Dr. Marco Delbo of the Observatoire de la Cte d'Azur. "We then submitted these meteorites to temperature cycles similar to those that rocks experience on the surfaces of near-Earth asteroids and we found that microcracks grow inside these meteorites quickly enough to entirely break them on timescales much shorter than the typical lifetime of asteroids."

Model extrapolation of these experiments also showed that thermal fragmentation caused rocks to break down an order of magnitude faster than from micrometeoroid impacts, particularly at distances of 1 astronomical unit (about 93 million miles) with the speed of breakdown slowing at distances further from the Sun.

"Even asteroids significantly farther from the Sun showed thermal fatigue fragmentation to be a more relevant process for rock breakup than micrometeoroid impacts," said Dr. Simone Marchi, a scientist in the SwRI Space Science and Engineering Division.

The results of this study suggest that thermal fragmentation, combined with solar radiation pressures that sweep away surface particles, could completely erode small asteroids at distances closer to the Sun (about 28 million miles) in about 2 million years.

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French, American team finds regolith of small asteroids formed by thermal fatigue

A Question of Atmospheres: On Earth and Beyond

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Scientists recently discovered the source of naturally occurring aerosol particles in Earth's atmosphere that play an important role in cloud formation. The particles in questions are known as 'climate-active organic aerosols,' and are vapors composed of large molecules that contain almost equal numbers of carbon, oxygen and hydrogen.

The international research team found that these vapors form shortly after the release of plant emissions into the air. The vapors condense on small particles, causing them to grow bigger and bigger. Eventually, they reach a size that is large enough to cause noticeable changes in the atmosphere - like reflecting sunlight, and acting as nuclei for cloud formation.

The research was published in the journal Nature, and shows a direct mechanism for how life on Earth can influence the production of particles that play a big role in processes affecting Earth's climate.

The study is useful for astrobiologists who are interested in the connections between Earth's biosphere and climate, and how climate change will affect the future habitability of our planet. But could studies like these also have implications in comparative planetology and the search for life beyond Earth?

As the new study shows, life on Earth can have a noticeable affect on the composition and behavior of our planet's atmosphere. There are now over 1,000 identified exoplanets in orbit around distant stars (and the number keeps growing). Scientists are now exploring techniques that could be used to study the atmospheres of these planets in detail. The ultimate goal is to find atmospheric biosignatures that would identify alien life.

Astrobiology Magazine spoke with Dr. Nancy Kiang of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies about the prospect of using climate-active organic aerosols as a biosignature. Dr. Kiang is a specialist when it comes to the interactions between Earth's biosphere and atmosphere, and how these interactions could produce signs of life at global scales.

First off, plants themselves could provide biosignatures on an exoplanet. If you observe how light reflects off a planet's surface, and if that surface is covered by a lot of plants, you can actually 'see' the plants due to the way in which their chlorophyll absorbs light. This is a spectral signature known as the "vegetation red edge."

"Satellites can see this to identify where plants are on our planet," said Dr. Kiang. "If we were to see a feature like this on another planet, it would tell us that advanced life had evolved on land. At least 20 percent of the planet's surface would have to be covered with vegetation AND cloud-free for a strong enough signal for a telescope to see."

Dr. Kiang points out that the results of the new study could actually pose more problems for this type of direct detection of plants on another planet.

"The catch is that plants promote cloud formation through transpiration of soil moisture back to the atmosphere," said Dr. Kiang. "Thus vegetation can help its own persistence and even its spread through enhancing the availability of moisture."

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A Question of Atmospheres: On Earth and Beyond

Next Media: NASA says study shows astronauts’ hearts change shape in space – Video

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Next Media: NASA says study shows astronauts #39; hearts change shape in space
Results from a new NASA study conducted on a dozen astronauts show that the heart becomes more rounded when exposed to near-zero gravity for extended periods...

By: The Malay Mail Online

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Next Media: NASA says study shows astronauts' hearts change shape in space - Video

NASA suspends relations with Russia, but Putin holds all the cards

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NASA has suspended certain activities with Russia. But the space station is exempt, and the rift highlights that, for the next few years, the US can't send astronauts into space without Russia.

The International Space Station, long a symbol of international cooperation in space even among former adversaries, could become the next pressure point as the US tries to raise the stakes for Moscow after Russia's takeover and annexation of Crimea.

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On Wednesday, Michael O'Brien, NASA's associate administrator for international and interagency relations issued a memo to the agency's staff suspending bilateral contacts with Russia unless a specific activity has been given an exemption.

"This suspension includes NASA travel to Russia and visits by Russian Government representatives to NASA facilities, bilateral meetings, email, and teleconferences or videoconferences." wrote Mr. O'Brien. A copy of the memo was posted on the website SpaceRef.com.

Bilateral contacts related to the operation of the space station are exempt, as are meetings held outside of Russia that involved additional countries such as those that might be include the participation of the station's other main partners, Canada, Europe, and Japan.

NASA's move is something of a diplomatic Post-it note; the two countries' space programs aren't engaged in many bilateral activities. Indeed, should operation of the space station come directly into play, the US and the other partners have the most to lose.

They have the heaviest investment in the $150 billion orbiting outpost, and they cannot get into space without Russia, which has served as America's taxi service for delivering and retrieving US crew members from the space station, as well as delivering cargo to the station.

So far, the Ukraine crisis has not interrupted US-Russia cooperation on the space station. But with the issuance of NASA's memo Wednesday, the question everyone is waiting to see answered is how Russian President Vladimir Putin responds.

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NASA suspends relations with Russia, but Putin holds all the cards