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Space News Update — December 17, 2013 —

Contents

In the News

Story 1:

Chinese Rover & Lander Beam Back Portraits with China’s Flag Shining on Moon’s Surface

Story 2:

A Sunny Outlook for NASA Kepler's Second Light

Story 3:

Mars One foundation inks deals with Lockheed, Surrey

Departments

The Night Sky

ISS Sighting Opportunities

NASA-TV Highlights

Space Calendar

Food for Thought

Space Image of the Week

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1. Chinese Rover & Lander Beam Back Portraits with China’s Flag Shining on Moon’s Surface

Yutu rover emblazoned with Chinese Flag as seen by the Chang‟e-3 lander on the moon on Dec. 15, 2013. Notice the rover tire tracks left behind in the loose lunar topsoil. Credit: China Space

China‟s ambitious lunar space exploration program achieved another stunning success Sunday night, Dec 15, when the countries inaugural Chang‟e-3 lunar lander and rover beamed back portraits of one another snapped from the Moon‟s surface – that also proudly displayed the brilliant red Chinese national flag shining atop an extraterrestrial body for the very first time in human history.

“I announce the complete success of the Chang‟e-3 mission,” said Ma Xingrui, chief commander of China‟s lunar program, during a live CCTV broadcast as the portraits were shown to a worldwide audience from huge screens mounted at the mission control at the Beijing Aerospace Control Center (BACC) in Beijing. A wave of cheers and high fives rocked around mission control as the startling imagery of the „Yutu‟ rover and Chang‟e-3 lander nestled atop the Moon‟s soil in the Bay of Rainbows was received around 11:42 p.m. Sunday, local Beijing time, 10:42 a.m. EST, via China‟s own deep space tracking network.

Chinese President Xi Jinping was on hand to personally witness the momentous events in real time. Xi Jinping‟s presence was a clear demonstration of China‟s confidence in its lunar team and the importance of this space spectacular to China‟s prestige and technological prowess.

China thus became only the 3rd country in the world to successfully soft land a spacecraft on Earth‟s nearest neighbor after the United States and the Soviet Union.

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China‟s „Yutu‟ rover had just rolled majestically onto the Moon‟s soil hours earlier on Sunday, Dec. 15, at 4:35 a.m. Beijing local time – barely seven hours after the Chang‟e-3 mothership touched down atop the lava filled plains of the Bay of Rainbows on Dec. 14.

Chang‟e 3 lander as seen by the rover Yutu on the moon on Dec. 15, 2013. The rover‟s wheels left behind noticeable tire tracks as it drove across the loose lunar topsoil. Credit: China Space

“The Central Committee of the Communist Party and the Central Military Commission [responsible for China‟s space program] sends congratulations to all the staff that participated in the successful completion of the mission and China‟s first soft landing on the moon,” said the Chinese vice premier Ma Kai during the CCTV broadcast. “The rover and lander are working properly and reaching the goals set. Chang‟e-3 is China‟s most complicated space mission,” said Kai. “This shows China is dedicated to the peaceful uses of space. There are many more complicated and difficult tasks ahead.”

Indeed so far the Chang‟e-3 mission has been primarily a highly successful demonstration of the extremely challenging engineering required to accomplish China‟s first lunar landing.

Now the science phase can truly begin. Over 4600 images have already been transmitted by Chang‟e-3 since the Dec. 14 touchdown.

After rolling all six wheels into the dirt, Yutu – which translates as Jade Rabbit – drove to a location about nine meters north of the lander, according to CCTV commentators.

The rover then turned around so that the red Chinese flag emblazoned on the front side would be facing the lander‟s high resolution color cameras for the eagerly awaited portraits of one another.

Yutu is nearly the size of a golf cart. It measures about 1.5 m x 1 m on its sides and stands about 1.5 m (nearly 5 feet) tall – nearly human height.

The 120 kg Yutu rover will now begin driving in a circle around the right side of the 1200 kg Chang‟e-3 lander – for better illumination – at a distance ranging from 10 to 18 meters.

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The rover will snap further photos of the lander as it traverses about from 5 specific locations – showing the front, side and back – over the course of the next 24 hours.

Thereafter Yutu will depart the landing site forever and begin its own lunar trek that‟s expected to last at least 3 months. The rover and lander will then be operating independently. They are equipped with eight science instruments including multiple cameras, spectrometers, an optical telescope, ground penetrating radar and other sensors to investigate the lunar surface and composition.

The radar instrument installed at the bottom of the rover can penetrate 100 meters deep below the surface to study the Moon‟s structure and composition in unprecedented detail, according to Ouyang Ziyuan, senior advisor of China‟s lunar probe project, in an interview on CCTV.

A UV camera will study the earth and its interaction with solar wind and a telescope will study celestial objects. This is done during the lunar day.

It will also investigate the moon‟s natural resources for use by potential future Chinese astronauts.

The two probes are now almost fully operational. Most of the science instruments are working including at least three cameras and the ground penetrating radar.

The rover will hibernate during the two week long lunar night. A radioisotopic heater will provide heat to safeguard the rover‟s computer and electronics – including the alpha particle X-ray instrument on the rover‟s robotic arm.

Chang‟e 3 targeted lunar landing site in the Bay of Rainbows or Sinus Iridium. This region is located in the upper left portion of the moon as seen from Earth.

Source: Universe Today Return to Contents

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2. A Sunny Outlook for NASA Kepler's Second Light

This conception illustration depicts how solar pressure can be used to balance NASA's Kepler spacecraft, keeping the telescope stable

enough to continue searching for transiting planets around distant stars. (Full size image)

Image Credit: NASA Ames/W Stenzel

You may have thought that NASA's Kepler spacecraft was finished. Well, think again. A repurposed Kepler

Space telescope may soon start searching the sky again.

A new mission concept, dubbed K2, would continue Kepler's search for other worlds, and introduce new

opportunities to observe star clusters, young and old stars, active galaxies and supernovae.

In May, the Kepler spacecraft lost the second of four gyroscope-like reaction wheels, which are used to

precisely point the spacecraft, ending new data collection for the original mission. The spacecraft required

three functioning wheels to maintain the precision pointing necessary to detect the signal of small Earth-sized

exoplanets, which are planets outside our solar system, orbiting stars like our sun in what's known as the

habitable zone -- the range of distances from a star where the surface temperature of a planet might be

suitable for liquid water.

With the failure of a second reaction wheel, the spacecraft can no longer precisely point at the mission's

original field of view. The culprit is none other than our own sun.

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The very body that provides Kepler with its energy needs also pushes the spacecraft around by the pressure

exerted when the photons of sunlight strike the spacecraft. Without a third wheel to help counteract the solar

pressure, the spacecraft's ultra-precise pointing capability cannot be controlled in all directions.

However, Kepler mission and Ball Aerospace engineers have developed an innovative way of recovering

pointing stability by maneuvering the spacecraft so that the solar pressure is evenly distributed across the

surfaces of the spacecraft. To achieve this level of stability, the orientation of the spacecraft must be nearly

parallel to its orbital path around the sun, which is slightly offset from the ecliptic, the orbital plane of Earth.

The ecliptic plane defines the band of sky in which lie the constellations of the zodiac.

This technique of using the sun as the 'third wheel' to control pointing is currently being tested on the

spacecraft and early results are already coming in. During a pointing performance test in late October, a full

frame image of the space telescope's full field of view was captured showing part of the constellation

Sagittarius. Photons of light from a distant star field were collected over a 30-minute period and produced an

image quality within five percent of the primary mission image quality, which used four reaction wheels to

control pointing stability. Additional testing is underway to demonstrate the ability to maintain this level of

pointing control for days and weeks.

Source: NASA Return to Contents

To capture the telltale signature of a distant

planet as it crosses the face of its host star and

temporarily blocks the amount of starlight

collected by Kepler, the spacecraft must

maintain pointing stability over these longer

periods. "This 'second light' image provides a

successful first step in a process that may yet

result in new observations and continued

discoveries from the Kepler space telescope,"

said Charlie Sobeck, Kepler deputy project

manager at NASA Ames Research Center in

Moffett Field, CA.

The K2 mission concept has been presented to

NASA Headquarters. A decision to proceed to

the 2014 Senior Review – a biennial assessment

of operating missions – and proposal for

budget to fly K2 is expected by the end of 2013.

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3. Mars One foundation inks deals with Lockheed, Surrey

Artist's concept of the unmanned Mars One lander. Credit: Lockheed Martin

A privately funded unmanned Mars mission will launch in 2018, officials with the non-profit Mars One foundation announced Tuesday. The mission will include an orbiting communications relay station, a lander equipped with a robotic arm, water generating gear, experimental thin-film solar panels and student experiments.

Dutch entrepreneur Bas Lansdorp, Mars One founder and CEO, told reporters the foundation has signed contracts with two major aerospace firms, Lockheed Martin and Surrey Satellite Technology, to develop mission concept studies, a first step toward eventual construction and launch.

The lander will be based on the design of the 2007 Phoenix Mars lander that Lockheed Martin developed for NASA. The communications satellite -- the first such "geostationary" comsat in orbit around the red planet -- will incorporate technologies developed by Surrey and used in a variety of operational spacecraft.

Lansdorp said the Lockheed Martin contract was valued at slightly more than $250,000 while the Surrey agreement came to about $60,000.

Development of the actual spacecraft and the rocket, or rockets, needed to launch them will be funded primarily by sponsors and corporate donors, Lansdorp said, along with donations from the public through a crowd-funding campaign.

He would not disclose internal projections for the mission's eventual cost other than to tell reporters he expected it to be less than NASA's next Mars lander, the $425 million Phoenix-derived Insight mission scheduled for launch in 2016.

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The unmanned Mars One technology demonstration mission is a precursor to the foundation's seemingly quixotic long-range goal of launching humans to Mars starting in 2025, assuming funding and technology hurdles can be overcome. The foundation envisions launching follow-on crews of four astronauts every two years to establish a permanent outpost on the red planet.

The Mars One mission concept calls for one-way flights by volunteers who would spend the rest of their lives on the red planet. Previous estimates for the cost of a manned mission to Mars start at $100 billion. But those estimates include landers and rockets to return visiting crews to Earth, rather than a lifetime Mars colony.

In the meantime, Lansdorp said, the focus is on getting the 2018 mission off the ground. Ed Sedivy, chief engineer of civil space operations at Lockheed Martin Space Systems, said company engineers and designers with experience building NASA's Mars orbiters and landers already were working on the Mars One 2018 mission concept study.

Martin Sweeting, Surrey Satellite Technology chairman, said his company has been "interested in driving the cost of exploration down and increasing the tempo of exploration and widening participation for many years." "We've been doing work in the past on projects to look at supporting sustained human habitation on the moon, for example," he said. "Mars One is really a logical step for us, and something we find exciting in trying to develop."

While the 2018 mission architecture is still being assessed, Sedivy said the least expensive option would be to launch the Mars One lander and orbiter on a single rocket. But that will depend on how much separation is required between the orbiter's arrival and the lander's descent to the surface.

The Mars One communications satellite will be the first Martian spacecraft operating in a geostationary orbit that will permit continuous observations of the landing site. "It will function as a data relay from the surface of Mars to Earth," Lansdorp said. "It will be in a fixed location over the Mars lander, which will allow a live video feed from the surface of Mars to Earth. We expect this will bring [Mars] a lot closer to everybody on Earth. Anyone here on Earth can log into our website and see what's it like on Mars." While the comsat will be "nice to have," providing a continuous link between the lander and the public on Earth, "it's crucial for our manned missions because then we really need to have that 24/7 connection between Earth and Mars," Lansdorp said.

"It will carry a weather experiment and it will demonstrate the production of liquid water on the surface of Mars," Lansdorp said. "And it will carry a power experiment that will deploy a thin film solar panel on the surface of Mars. We make use of thin film solar panels for our human mission, and this will be the demonstrator of that."

A key element of the 2018 mission is participation by students around the world. Mars One plans an international contest to select an experiment designed by university students that will be launched aboard the lander. The foundation also plans to organize STEM-type challenges to involve younger students in a bid to "inspire kids into Mars exploration," Lansdorp said.

"This is very important for Mars One, because with these challenges on our unmanned missions we can inspire young students even before we send humans to Mars, which will, of course, be an even bigger source of inspiration on Earth."

Source: Spaceflight Now Return to Contents

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The Night Sky

Source: Sky and Telescope Return to Contents

Tuesday, December 17

The bright Moon shines in the dim Club of Orion this evening (for the Americas). No, the Moon

doesn't always stay quite within the constellations of the zodiac. Lower left of the Moon is Jupiter,

and lower right of it is Betelgeuse.

Wednesday, December 18

The Moon and Jupiter shine together after they rise in early evening, with Pollux and Castor to

their left. Although Jupiter looks close to the Moon, it's 1,600 times farther away.

Thursday, December 19

Once the waning gibbous Moon rises after dinnertime, you'll find Jupiter above it, Pollux and

Castor left of Jupiter, and Procyon to the Moon's right or lower right. Much farther right of

Procyon, watch for brilliant Sirius coming up.

Friday, December 20

This evening, use a telescope to watch Io disappear

into eclipse by the shadow of Jupiter around 9:15

p.m. Eastern Standard Time, barely off Jupiter's

western limb. Forty-five minutes later, Ganymede

emerges onto dark sky in front of Jupiter's western

limb. Then around 11:23 p.m. EST, the Great Red

Spot (strong orange this season) transits Jupiter's

central meridian.

To keep up with any and all such events this month

worldwide, see "Action at Jupiter" in the December

Sky & Telescope, pages 51 and 52.

Saturday, December 21

Today is the shortest day of the year in the Northern

Hemisphere, and the longest day in the Southern

Hemisphere. Winter in the north begins at the

solstice: at 12:11 p.m. Eastern Standard Time. Happy

Yule.

If there's one constellation that everyone should know

at this time of year, it's wintry Orion climbing up in

the east-southeast. As always when Orion is on the

rise, the three-star Belt of Orion in its middle is nearly

vertical. Show someone Orion this week and they'll

know it for a lifetime.

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ISS Sighting Opportunities

For Denver:

Date Visible Max Height Appears Disappears

Tue Dec 17, 5:59 PM 2 min 12° 10 above NNW 11 above N

Wed Dec 18, 5:10 PM 4 min 14° 10 above NW 10 above NNE

Thu Dec 19, 6:00 PM 1 min 11° 10 above NNW 10 above N

Fri Dec 20, 5:12 PM 2 min 11° 10 above NNW 10 above N

Sat Dec 21, 6:00 PM 1 min 12° 10 above NNW 12 above N

Sighting information for other cities can be found at NASA’s Satellite Sighting Information

NASA-TV Highlights (all times Eastern Time Zone)

December 18, Wednesday 3 p.m. - Orbital-1 Pre-Launch Briefing - WFF (All Channels)

December 19, Thursday

6:45 p.m. - Replay of the Orbital-1 Science Briefing (Recorded Dec. 18) - HQ (All Channels) 7:45 p.m. - Replay of the Orbital-1 Pre-Launch Briefing (Recorded Dec. 18) - HQ (All

Channels) 8:30 p.m. - Video B-Roll of Orbital Sciences/Cygnus Launch Preparations - HQ (All Channels) 9 p.m. - Coverage of the Launch of the Orbital Sciences/Cygnus-1 Cargo Mission to the ISS

(Launch scheduled at 9:19 p.m. EST) - JSC/WFF (All Channels)

Watch NASA TV online by going to the NASA website. Return to Contents

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Space Calendar

Dec 17 - Cassini, Orbital Trim Maneuver #366 (OTM-366)

Dec 17 - Comet P/2010 TO20 (LINEAR-Grauer) At Opposition (4.994 AU)

Dec 17 - Asteroid 2013 VC10 Near-Earth Flyby (0.036 AU)

Dec 17 - [Dec 13] Asteroid 2013 XG17 Near-Earth Flyby (0.061 AU)

Dec 17 - Asteroid 51827 Laurelclark Closest Approach To Earth (1.644 AU)

Dec 17 - 55th Anniversary (1958), Project Mercury Created

Dec 17 - 110th Anniversary (1903), Wright Brothers' First Airplane Flight

Dec 18 - Asteroid 8925 Boattini Closest Approach To Earth (1.543 AU)

Dec 18 - Hyper-Kamiokande EU Open Meeting, London, United Kingdom

Dec 19 - [Dec 14] Cygnus-2/ Flock-1 (1-28) Antares Launch (International Space Station)

Dec 19 - Comet 87P/Bus Perihelion (2.102 AU)

Dec 19 - Comet 218P/LINEAR At Opposition (3.068 AU)

Dec 19 - Comet C/2012 J1 (Catalina) At Opposition (3.805 AU)

Dec 19 - Comet C/2013 W2 (PANSTARRS) Closest Approach To Earth (3.936 AU)

Dec 19 - Asteroid 916 America Occults HIP 106938 (6.1 Magnitude Star)

Dec 19 - [Dec 12] Asteroid 2013 XG10 Near-Earth Flyby (0.029 AU)

Dec 19 - Asteroid 29075 (1950 DA) Closest Approach To Earth (1.245 AU)

Dec 19 - Asteroid 17898 Scottsheppard Closest Approach To Earth (1.258 AU)

Dec 19 - Asteroid 9618 Johncleese Closest Approach To Earth (1.433 AU)

Dec 19 - Asteroid 21459 Chrisrussell Closest Approach To Earth (1.563 AU)

Dec 19 - Asteroid 6227 Alanrubin Closest Approach To Earth (2.749 AU)

Dec 19 - 215th Anniversary (1798), Benares Meteorite Fall (Hit House in India)

Dec 20 - [Dec 13] GAIA Soyuz STB-Fregat-MT Launch

Dec 20 - Tupac Katari (TK-Sat 1) CZ-3B/E Launch

Dec 20 - Thaicom 6 Falcon 9 Launch

Dec 20 - Comet C/2013 V3 (Nevski) Closest Approach To Earth (0.864 AU)

Dec 20 - Comet 178P/Hug-Bell Closest Approach To Earth (1.345 AU)

Dec 20 - Asteroid 4455 Ruriko Occults HIP 110395 (3.8 Magnitude Star)

Dec 20 - Asteroid 2013 WR45 Near-Earth Flyby (0.045 AU)

Dec 20 - Asteroid 2012 CL19 Near-Earth Flyby (0.098 AU)

Dec 20 - Asteroid 4701 Milani Closest Approach To Earth (1.494 AU)

Dec 20 - Asteroid 67 Asia Closest Approach To Earth (1.767 AU)

Dec 20 - Asteroid 51824 Mikeanderson Closest Approach To Earth (2.176 AU)

Dec 21 - Winter Solstice, 17:11 UT

Dec 21 - Comet 52P/Harrington-Abell Closest Approach To Earth (0.989 AU)

Dec 21 - Asteroid 1740 Paavo Nurmi Closest Approach To Earth (1.329 AU)

Dec 21 - Asteroid 9879 Mammuthus Closest Approach To Earth (1.537 AU)

Dec 21 - Asteroid 3259 Brownlee Closest Approach To Earth (2.275 AU)

Dec 21 - 35th Anniversary (1978), Venera 12, Venus Landing

Dec 21 - 45th Anniversary (1968), Apollo 8 Launch (Frank Borman, Jim Lovell and Bill Anders)

Source: JPL Space Calendar Return to Contents

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Food for Thought

Can Stars Collide?

Potential stellar collision. Credit: Chandra

Imagine a really bad day. Perhaps you‟re imagining a day where the Sun crashes into another star, destroying most of the Solar System. No? Well then, even in your imagination things aren‟t so bad… It‟s all just matter of perspective.

Fortunately for us, we live in out the boring suburbs of the Milky Way. Out here, distances between stars are so vast that collisions are incredibly rare. There are places in the Milky Way where stars are crowded more densely, like globular clusters, and we get to see the aftermath of these collisions. These clusters are ancient spherical structures that can contain hundreds of thousands of stars, all of which formed together, shortly after the Big Bang.

Within one of these clusters, stars average about a light year apart, and at their core, they can get as close to one

another as the radius of our Solar System. With all these stars buzzing around for billions of years, you can imagine they‟ve gotten up to some serious mischief. Within globular clusters there are these mysterious blue straggler stars. They‟re large hot stars, and if they had formed with the rest of the cluster, they would have detonated as supernovae billions of years ago. So scientists figure that they must have formed recently.

How? Astronomers think they‟re the result of a stellar collision. Perhaps a binary pair of stars merged, or maybe two stars smashed into one another.

Professor Mark Morris of the University of California at Los Angeles in the Department of Physics and Astronomy helps to explain this idea. “When you see two stars colliding with each other, it depends on how fast they‟re moving. If they‟re moving at speeds like we see at the center of our galaxy, then the collision is extremely violent. If it‟s a head-on collision, the stars get completely splashed to the far corners of the galaxy. If they‟re merging at

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slower velocities than we see at our neck of the woods in our galaxy, then stars are more happy to merge with us and coalesce into one single, more massive object.”

There‟s another place in the Milky Way where you‟ve got a dense collection of stars, racing around at breakneck

speeds… near the super massive black hole at the center of the galaxy.

“The core of the Milky Way is one of those places where you find the extremes of nature. The density of stars there is higher than anywhere else in the galaxy, “Professor Morris continues. “Overall, in the center of our galaxy on scales of hundreds of light years, there is much more gas present than anywhere else in the galaxy. The magnetic field is stronger there than anywhere else in the galaxy, and it has its own geometry there. So it‟s an unusual place, an energetic place, a violent place, because everything else is moving so much faster there than you see

elsewhere.”

“We study the stars in the immediate vicinity of the black hole, and we find that there‟s not as many stars as one might have expected, and one of the explanations for that is that stars collide with each other and either eliminate one another or merge, and two stars become one, and both of those processes are probably occurring.”

Stars whip around it, like comets dart around our Sun, and interactions are commonplace.

There‟s another scenario that can crash stars together.

The Milky Way mostly has multiple star systems. Several stars can be orbiting a common center of gravity. Many

are great distances, but some can have orbits tighter than the planets around our Sun. When one star reaches the end of its life, expanding into a red giant, it can consume its binary partner. The consumed star then strips away 90% of the mass of the red giant, leaving behind a rapidly pulsating remnant.

What about when galaxies collide? That sounds like a recipe for mayhem. Surprisingly, not so much.

“That‟s actually a very interesting question, because if you imagine two galaxies colliding, you‟d imagine that to be

an exceptionally violent event,‟ Professor Morris explains. “But in fact, the stars in those two galaxies are relatively unaffected. The number of stars that will collide when two galaxies collide is possibly counted on the fingers of one or two hands. Stars are so few and far between that they just aren‟t going to meet each other with any significance in a field like that.”

“What you see when you see two galaxies collide, however, on the large scale, is that the tidal forces of the two

galaxies will rip each of the galaxies apart in terms of what it will look like. Streams of stars will be strewn out in various directions depending on the precise history of the interaction between the two galaxies. And so, eventually over time, the galaxies will merge, the whole configuration of stars will settle down into something that looks unlike either of the two initially colliding galaxies. Perhaps something more spheroidal or spherical, and it might look more like an elliptical galaxy than the spiral galaxy that these two galaxies now are.”

Currently, we‟re on a collision course with the Andromeda Galaxy, and it‟s expected we‟ll smash into it in about 4

billion years. The gas and dust will collide and pile up, igniting an era of furious star formation. But the stars themselves? They‟ll barely notice. The stars in the two galaxies will just streak past each other, like a swarm of angry bees.

Phew.

So, good news! When you‟re imagining a worse day, you won‟t have to worry about our Sun colliding with another star. We‟re going to be safe and sound for billions of years. But if you live in a globular cluster or near the center of

the galaxy, you might want to check out some property here in the burbs.

Source: Universe Today Return to Contents

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Space Image of the Week

Gibbous Europa

Image Credit: Galileo Project, JPL, NASA; reprocessed by Ted Stryk

Explanation: Although the phase of this moon might appear familiar, the moon itself might not. In fact, this gibbous phase shows part of Jupiter's moon Europa. The robot spacecraft Galileo captured this image mosaic during its mission orbiting Jupiter from 1995 - 2003. Visible are plains of bright ice, cracks that run to the horizon, and dark patches that likely contain both ice and dirt. Raised terrain is particularly apparent near the terminator, where it casts shadows. Europa is nearly the same size as Earth's Moon, but much smoother, showing few highlands or large impact craters. Evidence and images from the Galileo spacecraft, indicated that liquid oceans might exist below the icy surface. To test speculation that these seas hold life, ESA has started preliminary development of the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (JUICE), a spacecraft proposed for launch around 2022 that would further explore Jupiter and in particular Europa. Recent observations by the Hubble Space Telescope have uncovered new evidence that Europa, like Saturn's moon Enceladus, has ice venting from its surface.

Source: NASA Return to Contents