Monthly Archives: February 2021

Astra, the company trying to make low Earth orbital missions more affordable, has been garnering quite a lot of attention lately as it gears up to go public by merging with the Special Purpose Acquisition Company (SPAC) Holicity Inc. (NASDAQ:HOL).

The market currently has a healthy appetite for space-based startups such as Astra. As an illustration of this phenomenon, Cathie Woods ARK Invest is about to launch a dedicated Space Exploration ETF, dubbed the ARKX. In a recent filing, ARK Invest described the objective of the ETF:

Xos Trucks Is Going Public by Merging With the SPAC NextGen Acquisition Corp. (NGAC) in Q2 2021

The Adviser believes that Space Exploration Companies can be grouped into four overarching categories, each of which contains relevant sub-elements. Orbital Aerospace Companies are companies that launch, make, service, or operate platforms in the orbital space, including satellites and launch vehicles. Suborbital Aerospace Companies are companies that launch, make, service, or operate platforms in the suborbital space, including drones, air taxis and electric aviation vehicles. Enabling Technologies Companies are companies that create the technologies required for successful value-add aerospace operations, including artificial intelligence, robotics, 3D printing, materials and energy storage. Aerospace Beneficiary Companies are companies that stand to benefit from aerospace activities, including agriculture, internet access, global positioning system (GPS), construction and imaging.

As is evident from the description above, Astra fits the investment objectives of the ARKX ETF. As one of the biggest asset management firms on the planet, with an AUM of over $50 billion, the components of ARKX are likely to see significant inflows. It is perhaps due to this realization that Holicity shares have been surging lately, with the stock registering a nearly 10 percent increase just yesterday.

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As a refresher, Astra and Holicity are expected to merge in Q2 2021, with the deal valuing Astra at $2.1 billion. The transaction would furnish the combined company with $500 million in cash, including $200 million in PIPE investments. For those unfamiliar with Astras business model, the company has already demonstrated orbital capability. The company currently has over 50 launches in its backlog, representing over $150 million in contracted revenue. Astra aims to make low Earth orbital missions more affordable by hyperscaling launches, eventually aiming to provide daily, low-cost access to the orbit. The companys rockets are designed for mass production, featuring an all-metal (Aluminum) construction. Astras entire launch system can fit inside 4 standard shipping containers and require only 6 employees at the launch site.

Astra expects to earn $67 million in revenue in 2022. By 2025, the company expects to rake in over $1.5 billion. Moreover, the company expects to become EBITDA positive by 2024.

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Astra Likely To Be of the Biggest Beneficiaries of Cathie Woods ARK Space Exploration ETF (ARKX) as the Orbital Launch Company Plans To Go Public by...

Photo: Gay Young

Students at Kumeyaay Elementary in San Diego built 3-D models of a Mars colony, which their teacher later collected and combined to create a Mars city.

Students at Kumeyaay Elementary in San Diego built 3-D models of a Mars colony, which their teacher later collected and combined to create a Mars city.

Science teacher Gay Young has followed just about every space expedition in recent memory. This week, shes taking her elementary students on the journey with her, as NASAs Perseverance rover touched down on Mars after a seven-month flight from Earth.

California teachers have struggled with creating engaging, hands-on learning activities for students during distance learning when supplies and safe laboratory environments are scarce. But this week, students around the state gathered virtually to watch as real rocket scientists attempted to land NASAs latest Red Planet rover.

I like to tie whats happening in the news to my lessons, and we needed something positive that can give our students hope. Kids love space, and I told them You might be the first generation to send humans to Mars! said Young, who teaches science for all grades at Kumeyaay Elementary in San Diego County.

On Thursday, thousands of California students watched live as the SUV-sized rover landed on the surface of Mars with a mission to help scientists identify signs of past microbial life on Mars, collect rock samples and pave the way for future human exploration.

For Young, lessons around the rover, named Perseverance, launched back in August. Over the course of the school year, her students have learned about Earth science and climate change by making a greenhouse and coming up with ways to grow food on Mars. Other lessons included magnetic fields, force and even the emotional hurdle of being alone in space.

As part of the months-long build-up to the landing, Young also had her students build a Mars colony using household products like toilet paper rolls, cereal boxes and other scrap materials. Because students are still in remote learning, she collected their models and combined them all at the school site to share with students the space city they had designed.

Students watch live as NASA scientists shares updates and details about the Perseverance rover landing.

I was playing with my Silly Putty because I was so nervous, but Im happy that it landed, said Youngs student, Alexa Harrison, who added that the most exciting part for her was learning about the GPS technology the rover needs to land in the right spot. I would want to work at NASA to study the rock and dirt they bring back.

Across California, teachers are bringing this weeks space exploration to the classroom and aligning lessons with the states science standards. In 2013, California adopted the Next Generation Science Standards, which require more hands-on lessons that are centered around real-life scientific experiences that students may encounter in their lives and communities.

But many teachers have struggled with implementing the new standards, either due to lack of updated textbooks or now the physical constraints of online learning, which limit opportunities for hands-on experiments and field trips.

Science teaching experts at NASAs Jet Propulsion Laboratory created a five-week curriculum called Mission to Mars Student Challenge that is aligned with the state standards in engineering, Earth science and other topics to cut down on teacher prep work. Nearly 163,000 California students signed up to follow along with the weekly updates and lessons, which had students creating their own rover designs, testing models and learning what it takes to travel in space.

Guadalupe De La O, a high school teacher at Alliance Renee & Meyer Luskin Academy High School in Los Angeles, is hoping the landing inspires some of her students to pursue careers in science, technology, engineering and math, collectively known as STEM.

We talk a lot about how this work involves a lot of testing and revision, which requires patience and persistence to problem-solve, said De La O, who teaches STEM. One of the most challenging activities is they had to code a rover that would maneuver on Mars. For a lot of my students, this was their first time coding. But every time they had a little success they would want to try more and more.

Diving deep into the space mission also provided students with an uplifting current event to focus on as many continue to face trauma brought on by the pandemic.

This is an experience for everybody, De La O said. My students are mostly Black and Latino and their community in South Central is being really hit hard right now by the pandemic. So it was really important for me to get them involved, so they know that they can pursue this if they want, and give us a little hope this year.

In San Francisco, astronomy students at Galileo Academy of Science and Technology spent a month designing the ins and outs of their own Mars rover mission last semester and on Thursday watched the live stream together as a class.

We watched it happen in real-time, which was a nice break from what we usually do, said Emily Stollmeyer, an astronomy and physics teacher at Galileo, who added that many of her students are struggling with distance learning during the pandemic. Anything exciting is really awesome and needed right now.

Fifth-grade teacher Kimberly Franklin created a virtual escape room where students gather evidence and clues about a Mars mission.

Kimberly Franklin, a 5th-grade teacher at Bell Gardens Elementary School in Montebello Unified, created a virtual escape room that guides students through a series of questions and problems related to the Mars expedition they must research online in order to unlock new clues and successfully reach the end of the challenge.

While individual teachers like Franklin have made it a personal mission to bring space to their classroom, other schools have crafted interdisciplinary lessons around the Mars landing. At Mulholland Middle School in Lake Balboa near Los Angeles, seventh-grade teachers across subjects teamed up to create lessons through the lens of the Mars expedition.

In history, students learned about rockets and how the first people to come up with a multi-stage rocket were in China. In English, students had to write an argumentative essay about the cost-effectiveness of space travel. Students learn about force and gravity in their science classes as well as the geology of both Earth and Mars. Calculations and word problems in a math class then tie together the space-themed lessons.

Were studying Mars this week, and next week well examine rock samples from our science kits. Ill use my desk camera, so they can view it up close, said Laura Silverman, a teacher at Mulholland who is known around campus for having a mural of a Mars rover in her classroom.

Now that the landing has been successful, students are looking forward to what other space exploration might come next. Im really happy that the Mars rover landed, said Charles Bandy, a student in Youngs class. That makes history!

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California students watch and learn through hands-on projects as Mars rover lands - EdSource

This week in Washington IP news, both the Senate and the House of Representatives get back into their schedule of committee hearings with the Biden Administration starting to take shape in D.C. The Senate Committee on Armed Services gets the week in IP and tech hearings underway with a look at emerging technologies with military applications and their impacts on U.S. national security. On Thursday, the House Science Committee explores decisions lawmakers can take to rebuild U.S. research networks affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, and on Friday morning the House Homeland Security and Oversight Committees explore the role that private tech firms and actors played in the federal governments data security breach that leveraged network vulnerabilities at SolarWinds. Elsewhere, the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation explores the possible ramifications of Section 230 reforms while the American Enterprise Institute will look at the intersection of public space exploration programs and private space commercialization enterprises.

Senate Committee on Armed Services

Emerging Technologies and Their Impact on National Security

At 9:30 AM on Tuesday in SD-106 Dirksen Senate Office Building.

Military rivalry among major foreign powers often spurs technological advancement and many emerging technologies that have yet to fully mature, including artificial intelligence and quantum computing, have major national security implications as nations on the leading edge of these systems will have a great advantage in battlefield scenarios. With the recent election cycle over and President Biden inaugurated in the White House, many pundits have focused on how the new administration can address military threats posed by technologically-advanced foreign rivals through the National Defense Strategy or the National Security Council. The witness panel for this hearing will include Dr. Eric E. Schmidt, Co-Founder, Schmidt Futures; Brad L. Smith, President, Microsoft Corporation; and Gen. Herbert J. Carlisle (Ret.), President and CEO, National Defense Industrial Association.

House Subcommittee on Cyber, Innovative Technologies, and Information Systems

Innovation Opportunities and Vision for the Science and Technology Enterprise

At 11:00 AM on Tuesday in 2118 Rayburn House Office Building.

The early days of the Biden Administration has included some Executive Branch action on elevating the role of technological innovation and scientific inquiry in the political process, including an executive order issued one week after the inauguration establishing an advisory council to the President on science, technology and innovation. This hearing, which will focus on the current innovation landscape for defense technologies and tech investment opportunities for the U.S. Department of Defense, features a witness panel including the Honorable Christine Fox, Former Acting Deputy Secretary of Defense, Assistant Director for Policy and Analysis, Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory; Dr. Victoria Coleman, Former DARPA Director, Senior Advisor to the Director, CITRIS, UC Berkeley; and Klon Kitchen, Resident Fellow, American Enterprise Institute.

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office

Learn Online How Examiners Approach Petitions Practice

At 1:00 PM on Tuesday, online video webinar.

Petitions practice at the USPTO can be a crucial tool for overcoming office rejections or abandonment issues. This training webinar offered by the agency introduces patent applicants to the activities of the USPTOs Office of Petitions as well as recent updates to petitions practices, petitions that are most commonly filed by patent applicants as well as best practices in petition filing.

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office

Trademark Basics Boot Camp, Module 4: Application Filing Walk-Through

At 2:00 PM on Tuesday, online video webinar.

This is the fourth module in the USPTOs eight-part Trademark Basics Boot Camp designed for teaching small businesses and entrepreneurs about introductory topics in trademark applications and registration. This module focuses on the agencys Trademark Electronic Application System (TEAS) including TEAS basics, pre-filing checklist for applicants and a live demonstration of a trademark filing using TEAS.

American Enterprise Institute

To the Moon, Mars, and Beyond: Space Exploration and Public Policy

At 2:00 PM on Tuesday, online video webinar.

Although many critics of space program funding feel that space exploration doesnt provide enough concrete benefits here on earth, the history of scientific research supporting human life outside of Planet Earth has led to many advancements in everyday consumer products including coffee makers, baby formula and hair curlers. In recent years, private firms have been commercializing space technologies and that activity has renewed interest among lawmakers to spur action in public programs. This event will feature a discussion with a panel including Tim Fernholz, Senior Reporter, Quartz; Sara Seager, Professor of Planetary Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology; Stan Veuger, Resident Scholar, AEI; Matthew C. Weinzierl, Joseph and Jacqueline Ebling Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School; and moderated by James Pethokoukis, DeWitt Wallace Fellow, AEI.

House Subcommittee on Cyber, Innovative Technologies, and Information Systems

Near-Peer Advancements in Space and Nuclear Weapons

At 3:00 PM on Tuesday in 2118 Rayburn.

Both Russia and China are at the top of the list when it comes to foreign economic and military rivals to the United States and policymakers have grown increasingly worried in recent months about deepening strategic ties between those two nations and the prospects that their partnership could threaten American dominance in space and nuclear weapons. Russia and China have been engaging in joint military exercises and this has put pressure on military officials to develop strategic responses. The witness panel for this hearing will include Gen. Robert Kehler (Ret.), Affiliate, Center for International Security and Cooperation, Stanford University; Madelyn Creedon, Nonresident Fellow, The Brookings Institution; Todd Harrison, Director, Aerospace Security Project, Center for Strategic & International Studies; and Tim Morrison, Senior Fellow, The Hudson Institute.

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office

Noche de Ciencias 2021

At 5:30 PM on Tuesday, online video webinar.

Hosted in partnership with the Society of Hispanic Professional Engineers, Noche de Ciencias is a national program designed to introduce K-12 students to various career fields in science and engineering through hands-on activities designed to teach concepts behind innovation and intellectual property. This event, which will also take place on Thursday evening at 5:30 PM, is presented in collaboration with SHPE and Alexandria City Public Schools.

Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works

Building Back Better: Investing in Transportation While Addressing Climate Change, Improving Equity, and Fostering Economic Growth and Innovation

At 10:15 AM on Wednesday in G-50 Dirksen.

The transportation sector is a major contributor of carbon-based emissions into the environment and statistics released by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) show that transportation contributes 28 percent of U.S. greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, the largest percentage contribution from any industrial sector. Further, GHG emissions in the transportation sector increased more in absolute terms between 1990 and 2018 than any other sector. Electric vehicles and alternative fuels hold great promise for the future and many lawmakers are focused on supporting the advancement of those technologies to address climate change. The witness panel for this hearing has yet to be announced.

New America

Ranking Digital Rights Launches the 2020 RDR Corporate Accountability Index

At 11:00 AM on Wednesday, online video webinar.

Public advocacy groups have been increasing their calls for holding large corporations accountable for the data collection and privacy practices and the annual Corporate Accountability Index produced by Ranking Digital Rights (RDR) provides a snapshot of how well Big Tech companies are doing at protecting consumers. This year, New America hosts the release event for the 2020 RDR Corporate Accountability Index, which will include discussion of how policymakers, advocates and corporate shareholders can cooperate on issues of fundamental consumer rights in the Internet Age. Speakers at this event will include Rebecca MacKinnon, Founding Director, Ranking Digital Rights; Jessica Dheere, Director, Ranking Digital Rights; Nabiha Syed, President, The Markup; Marta Tellado, President and CEO, Consumer Reports; and Marina Madale, General Manager, Sustainability and Shared Value, MTN.

House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology

Building Back the U.S. Research Enterprise: COVID Impacts and Recovery

At 10:00 AM on Thursday, online video webinar.

The COVID-19 pandemic has placed great strain on all aspects of the global economy, including basic scientific research activities that underpin much of the technological advancement benefitting society and the economy. While governmental funding helped to stabilize many research activities during the pandemics early stages, disruptions to travel- and group-related research activities have raised concerns about the resiliency of research institutions as the world hopes for a return to post-COVID normalcy in 2021. The witness panel for this hearing will include Dr. Sudip Parikh, CEO, American Association for the Advancement of Science; Dr. Christopher Keane, Vice President for Research, Washington State University; Dr. Felice J. Levine, Executive Director, American Educational Research Association; and Thomas Quaadman, Executive Vice President, Center for Capital Markets Competitiveness, U.S. Chamber of Commerce.

Information Technology and Innovation Foundation

If Congress Overhauls Section 230 to Make Platforms More Liable for User Speech, What Will Change?

At 12:00 PM on Thursday, online video webinar.

Attempts to overhaul Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which limits the legal liability faced by online platform providers for user content posted by third parties, have been supported by both sides of the political aisle. Proponents of maintaining Section 230 as is point to the incredible economic development enabled by reducing liability for companies providing Internet-based services, while critics seeking reform note that Internet technologies and their impact on society have changed greatly in the 25 years since the statute was passed into law. This event, which will discuss issues of intermediary liability, free speech and content moderation, will feature a discussion with a panel including Matthew Feeney, Director, Project on Emerging Technologies, Cato Institute; Emma Llans, Director, Free Expression Project, Center for Democracy & Technology; Matt Perault, Director, Center on Science & Technology Policy, Duke University; and moderated by Ashley Johnson, Policy Analyst, ITIF.

House Subcommittee on Energy and Water Development, and Related Agencies

Strategies for Energy and Climate Innovation

At 2:00 PM on Thursday, online video webinar.

The early days of the Biden Administration have set a much different tone on climate change compared to related policy under former President Trump. One of President Bidens first actions after his inauguration was signing an executive order that effected the United States rejoining the Paris Agreement on climate change. The U.S. Department of Energy has also recently announced that it would issue $100 million in funding for innovative clean energy projects through the departments Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E) program. The witness panel for this hearing will include Dr. Colin Cunliff, Senior Policy Analyst, Information Technology & Innovation Foundation; Robin Millican, Director, Breakthrough Energy; Dr. Shobita Parthasarathy, Professor of Public Policy and Director, Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program, University of Michigan; and Rich Powell, Executive Director, ClearPath.

House Committee on Oversight and Reform

House Committee on Homeland Security

Weathering the Storm: The Role of Private Tech in the SolarWinds Breach and Ongoing Campaign

At 9:00 AM on Friday, online video webinar.

In December, news reports broke the story that the U.S. federal government had been the target of a massive and ongoing data breach that was able to take root in part because of cybersecurity vulnerabilities at SolarWinds, a Texas firm that supplies the federal government with network monitoring equipment. Last week, Microsoft President Brad Smith said that the data breach, backed by foreign government actors and impacting Microsoft along with other private tech firms, was the largest and most sophisticated cyber attack that the world has ever seen. The witness panel for this hearing has yet to be announced.

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office

The Path to a Patent, Part VI: Learn How to Protect Your IP Abroad

At 1:00 PM ET on Friday, online video webinar.

This seminar, hosted by the USPTOs International Patent Legal Administration, is designed to teach patent owners and applicants about the benefits of international patent filings through either the Patent Cooperation Treaty (PCT) or Paris Convention filing systems used in non-PCT countries. This seminar will discuss the basics of both systems as well as considerations and options for patent applicants interested in exploring foreign filing.

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This Week in Washington IP: Rebuilding US Research Enterprises Post-COVID, Climate Change Innovation Strategies and Examining the SolarWinds Data...

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The seabass eggs, all 200 of them, were settled in their module and ready to go. The ground crew had counted the eggs carefully, checked each for an embryo, and sealed them tightly within a curved dish filled precisely to the brim with seawater.

The countdown, and thenignition! For two full minutes, the precious eggs suffered a riotous shaking as the rockets engines exploded to life, followed by another eight minutes of heightened juddering as they ascended to the heavens. These embryonic fish were on their way to low Earth orbit. Next stop: the moon.

Well, they havent actually left yet. But after a recent simulation designed to re-create the intense shaking of a typical takeoff, researchers in France found that the eggs survived the ordeal well. Its a crucial discovery in the progress of the Lunar Hatch, a program that aims to determine whether astronauts could successfully rear fish on a future moon base.

Ultimately, Cyrille Przybyla, an aquaculture researcher at the French Research Institute for Exploitation of the Sea who led the research, dreams of designing a lunar fish farm that uses water already on the moon to help feed residents of the future Moon Village set to be established by the European Space Agency (ESA). The Lunar Hatch project is just one of around 300 ideas currently under evaluation by the ESA, and may or may not be selected for the final mission. Przybylas hope, though, is to offer lunar residents fresh, appetizing, protein-rich foodnot just packets of freeze-dried grub.

I proposed the idea to send eggs, not fish, because eggs and embryos are very strong, says Przybyla.

His experiments so far suggest that he is right. However, his teams research has also suggested that not all fish are equally spaceworthy.

To begin their search for the perfect astro-fish to serve on the moon, Przybyla and his colleagues whittled down a list of hundreds of species to just a handfulthose with modest oxygen requirements, low carbon dioxide output, a short hatching time, and a resistance to charged particles, since life forms are exposed to radiation during space travel. They then decided to probe the integrity of eggs produced by two speciesEuropean seabass and meagre.

Beakers containing the eggs were initially jiggled using a standard piece of lab equipment called an orbital shaker. They passed this first test. Then, they were exposed to much stronger vibrations using a different machine that shook them in a special sequence designed to simulate the launch of a Russian Soyuz rocket. The team argues that no spaceflight would ever induce juddering more extreme than that.

After shaking, 76 percent of the seabass eggs went on to hatch, a result that wasnt far off the 82 percent success rate of unshaken control samples. Compared to seabass, meagre eggs did even better: 95 percent of the shaken eggs hatched as opposed to 92 percent of those in the control group.

It was completely crazy, says Przybyla in delight. The environment was very hard for these eggs.

Przybyla suspects that, having evolved to withstand the adversities of aquatic environmentswhere they might endure strong currents, waves, and collisions with hard surfacesthe fish eggs are naturally space-ready.

Besides the nutritional boon of moon-farmed fish fillets, Przybyla suggests there will be other benefits for astronauts who may one day find themselves rearing animals in space.

From the psychological point of view, its better to have a reminder of Earthyou have a garden, you have a tank with fish, he says.

Luke Roberson, a researcher at NASAs Kennedy Space Center in Florida, agrees. Astronauts living on the International Space Station regularly spend time tending to and visiting the plants they grow on board, he says.

Add to that a pet fish or pet invertebrateit adds another level of psychological benefit. That makes it feel more human, says Roberson.

Designing self-contained and self-supporting systems for food production beyond Earth will be crucial for future space exploration programs, he adds. And he says Przybylas study is a great first step toward showing that aquaculture is a viable part of that future.

Roberson also points out that seabass is an interesting choice because the species is tolerant to varying levels of salinity. That might make it easier to accommodate them despite the moons limited water. And, he adds, the seabass could potentially be supplied with wastewater from other moon base systems that use water from the lunar environment to produce hydrogen-based rocket fuel.

However, there could be an even more appropriate choice of lunar seafood out there. Roberson and colleagues recently considered the pros and cons of various species as candidates for off-world aquaculture. Invertebrates, such as mussels and shrimp, it turns out, might be an even better bet than seabass: Vertebrate species take up a lot of spaceand they dont provide the caloric intake per mass, says Roberson.

Celestial prawn cocktail, anyone?

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The Plan to Rear Fish on the Moon - Hakai Magazine