quote:

ps is het niet mogelijk ( Lees; = er interresse) om een ruimte te creeren binnen WFL waar over ruimte/ ruimtevaart/ etc geouwehoerd kan worden zonder dat het vervalt in een "ik zag een ufo" topic???

dus mooie pics van de maanlandingen/ grootste russiche rakketten/ Werner von Braun + toekomst muziek... (laatste niet letterlijk dus)

"Toekomst Muziek", van concepten voor nieuwe missie, Bush's Maan/ Mars plan (of ESA's Aurora project), en ruimte exploratie middelen.


Er zijn wel een aantal topics in het verleden geweest en sommige lopen nog steeds, hierbij de links:
[CENTRAAL} MARS - de missies [DEEL 4] <-- loopt nog steeds!
-deze lopen niet meer...-
Rosetta met succes gelanceerd.
Lancering André Kuypers
Met André Kuipers de ruimte in..
Te weinig water op de maan voor plan Bush
Astronauten castreren voor lange missies?
NASA's X-43A = SUCCES!!!
Gravity Probe B: algemene relativiteitstheorie op pijnbank
het uitdijende heelal
Zwarte gaten

[-voor-de-duidelijkheid-]
Het is dus niet gewenst om hier dingen te posten als: "ik-zag-een-ufo", "maanlandingen-zijn-gefaked", "duurt-een-lichtjaar-langer-dan-'n-gewoon-jaar?" daarvoor is TRU in het leven geroepen.

daarnaast gebruik:
GOOGLE / wikipedia ze werken, echt waar...
en het is niet erg als dit een soort slowchat wordt, erger wordt het waarneer mensen van TRU gevraagd moeten worden om dit topic lopende te houden... :') maar blijft gerust vragen niemand is een expert op alles...
[/-voor-de-duidelijkheid-]

En dan om te beginnen: "Good Old Days"

Wernher Von Braun

lancering V-2 raket

quote:

Op woensdag 5 mei 2004 11:36 schreef k3vil het volgende:
Wat kan je nog meer vertellen over de V-serie raketten

quote:

The V-2 rocket was an early ballistic missile used by Germany during the latter stages of World War II against mostly British and Belgian targets

As early as 1927 members of the German Rocket Society had started experimenting with liquid-fueled rockets. By 1932 the Reichswehr started taking notice of their developments for potential long-range artillery use, and a team led by General Walter Dornberger was shown a test vehicle designed and flown by Wernher von Braun. Although the rocket was of limited ability, Dornberger saw Von Braun's genius and pushed for him to join the military.

Von Braun did so, as eventually did most of the other members of the society. In December 1934 Von Braun scored another success with the flight of the A2 rocket, a small model powered by ethanol and liquid oxygen, with work on the design continuing in an attempt to improve reliability.
[...]
The third rocket (a A4 -later V2- type which sucseeded the A5 which was based upon the A3...), launched on October 3, 1942, changed things by following its trajectory perfectly. It landed 193 km away, and became the first man-made object to enter space. (By the modern international definition, the first object to enter space was a V2 launched in the U.S. on May 10, 1946.)

quote:

Op woensdag 5 mei 2004 15:28 schreef pfaf het volgende:
een terugvindpostje.
En dan meteen een paar van de mooiste foto's ooit posten
Van Hubble uiteraard.

quote:

Op woensdag 5 mei 2004 15:28 schreef pfaf het volgende:
een terugvindpostje.
En dan meteen een paar van de mooiste foto's ooit posten
Van Hubble uiteraard.

De foto's horen eigenlijk bij de catogorie astronomie .......

quote:

Op donderdag 6 mei 2004 12:03 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:
oke oke dit is meer astronomie maar deze _moest_ ik gewoon meedelen aan jullie...

Ik kwam net op deze site;

Waar je nog meer een webcam voor kunt gebruiken , Deze gast heeft zijn webcam gekoppelt aan zijn sterrenkijker en weet zeer mooie pics te schieten, daarnaast is het ook nog eens een Nederlandse site... dus...

*gaat ook maar eens een webcam kopen

quote:

Op donderdag 6 mei 2004 12:20 schreef -CRASH- het volgende:
Volgens mij weten sommige mensen het verschil
tussen ruimtevaart en astronomie niet zo goed.

Heb je een CMOS of CCD webcam aangesloten
Webcam heb ik al
Dus hoef je me alleen nog een telescoop te geven

quote:

NASA Genesis Spacecraft On Final Lap Toward Home


lock down in deep space

the way home

Pasadena CA (SPX) May 06, 2004
NASA's Genesis spacecraft flew past Earth on Saturday in a loop that puts it on track for home ­ and a dramatic mid-air recovery Sept. 8. The Genesis mission was launched in August of 2001 to capture samples from the storehouse of 99-percent of all the material in our solar system ­ the Sun.

quote:

SPACE TRAVEL
A New 'Constellation' At NASA
by Frank Sietzen
Washington (UPI) May 11, 2004

NASA's headquarters in Washington, D.C., are now bustling with activity in the wake of President George W. Bush's plan, announced last Jan. 14, to revitalize the U.S. space program. Just as Project Apollo encompassed the attempt to reach the moon in the 1960s, the agency has named its new effort.

quote:

As Constellation's planners go about their early tasks, they have a shiny new logo to inspire them. Three spheres --Earth, the moon and Mars -- are arrayed in sequence, with the streak of a rocket passing through each. A Latin inscription on the emblem says "Audentes Fortuna Juvat," which, translated into English, says "Fortune Favors the Bold."

quote:

BEIJING (AP) -- China plans to launch a pair of astronauts into orbit in autumn 2005 in its second manned space mission, the official Xinhua News Agency reported Wednesday.

The flight will last five to seven days, Xinhua said, citing Qi Faren, the space program's chief designer.

It was the first time the Chinese government disclosed the size of the planned crew of the Shenzhou 6 capsule. Earlier reports said the launch would be some time in 2005.

quote:

ROCKET SCIENCE
Spaceship Soars To 212,000 Feet


only 117,000 feet to go
Mojave CA (UPI) May 14, 2004
A privately-built manned spacecraft has reached a record altitude of 212,000 feet over California on one of its final tests before officially entering space.
The craft, called SpaceShipOne, was built by aerospace pioneer Burt Rutan, who hopes to win the Ansari X-Prize of $10 million for the first private flight into space.

To win the X-Prize, the craft has to reach an altitude of 329,000 feet twice within three weeks. Twenty-five other teams across the world are competing for the prize.

Flying over the Mojave Desert, SpaceShipOne and its carrier aircraft White Knight moved a step closer to claiming the prize when pilot Mike Melvill took the vehicle closer to space than any non-governmental craft has been -- an altitude of 212,000 feet.

quote:

Op maandag 17 mei 2004 13:04 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:
wat denken jullie, is dit De manier om de ruimte in t gaan via prive projecten??

quote:

Hypersonics Research Speeds Up


The original Hyshot test vehicle undergoing wind tunnel tests several years ago. UQ photo.

Brisbane (SPX) May 18, 2004
The world's fastest air-breathing engine will fly in Australia in 2005 in a collaborative two-nation experiment that is expected to provide a major boost to the fledgling scramjet technology.
Australian and U.S. defence interests have signed a $4.6 million contract to conduct a controlled scramjet experiment at Mach 10, or about 11,000km an hour, at Woomera, South Australia, possibly in the second half of next year.

quote:

Space Exploration Alliance Plans 'Moon-Mars Blitz' On Capitol Hill
Washington (SPX) May 18, 2004
Twelve leaders of the Space Exploration Alliance announced today that their organizations would join in launching a "Moon-Mars Blitz" on Capitol Hill July 11-13. During this event, the organizations will bring their members to Washington to visit as many congressional members and staff as possible with a single message: "Fund NASA's requests for FY 2005 for starting the new Moon, Mars, and Beyond initiative."
The Space Exploration Alliance comprises leading space advocacy groups, industry associations and space policy organizations. It was formed to promote the new Vision for Space Exploration. The collaboration for the Moon-Mars Blitz is the opening shot illustrating the kind of campaigns that SEA members will be undertaking to help insure passage of the budget required to launch the new space initiative.

quote:

Op donderdag 27 mei 2004 14:19 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:

Eén van de taken die ESA-astronaut André Kuipers meekreeg op Missie DELTA was het vastleggen van Nederland op de gevoelige plaat.

quote:

Op maandag 31 mei 2004 16:00 schreef OldJeller het volgende:
Wat is het resultaat, Crash? Ik ben wel benieuwd..

quote:

Op maandag 17 mei 2004 13:04 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:

[..]

bron

Hmmm wie gaat er binnenkort mee naar boven...
Zo te zien schiet het al aardig op met die Xprize maar wat denken jullie, is dit De manier om de ruimte in t gaan via prive projecten??

quote:

Op maandag 31 mei 2004 16:25 schreef OldJeller het volgende:
Die site doet het niet..
Maar dat geeft niet, heb in iedergeval het orgineel gezien dus heb wel een idee..

quote:

For SpaceShipOne, reaching space takes three things: a pilot, a spacecraft, and enough to propellant to rocket away from Earth.

But the fuel in SpaceShipOne's tank is about as exotic as the spacecraft's design. SpaceShipOne, set to be the first non-governmental crewed vehicle to reach space, uses a combination of rubber and nitrous oxide -- also known as laughing gas -- as the powerhouse for test flights and an anticipated suborbital spaceshot set for June 21.

"These are all state of the art technologies," said Jim Benson, founding chairman and chief executive of SpaceDev, of SpaceShipOne's fuel process. "It's a very stable and non-toxic system."

Based in Poway, California, SpaceDev is responsible for refueling SpaceShipOne after each flight as well providing crucial elements of its hybrid rocket engine, a cross between traditional liquid and solid rocket motors.
[...]

quote:

SPACE TRAVEL
Moon To Mars: What's Beyond?
Moffet Field CA (SPX) Jun 21, 2004

On January 14, 2004, President George W. Bush announced a new vision for America's civil space program that calls for human and robotic missions to the Moon, Mars, and beyond:
"Today, humanity has the potential to seek answers to the most fundamental questions posed about the existence of life beyond Earth. Telescopes have found planets around other stars. Robotic probes have identified potential resources on the Moon, and evidence of water - a key ingredient for life - has been found on Mars and the moons of Jupiter."

This vision set forth goals of: returning the Space Shuttle safely to flight; completing the International Space Station (ISS); phasing out the Space Shuttle when the ISS is complete (about 2010); sending a robotic orbiter and lander to the Moon; sending a human expedition to the Moon as early as 2015, but no later than 2020; conducting robotic missions to Mars in preparation for a future human expedition; and conducting robotic exploration across the solar system.

Ray Bradbury, celebrated author of The Martian Chronicles, testified to the Commission about the importance of exploration. When presented with this challenge of travel to Mars, he said, "Our children will point to the sky and say YES!"

Spaceflight is difficult, hazardous, and confronted by enormous distances, at least in human terms. Despite extensive safety precautions, during its 144 human space missions the United States has lost 17 astronauts. The pursuit of discovery is a risky business, and it will continue to be so for the foreseeable future.

Perhaps of greatest relevance are resources required by humans to live and work in space. For example, the common H2O (water) molecule can yield oxygen to breathe, water to drink, and oxygen and hydrogen as propellants. Fortunately, these potential resources exist in some form in abundance at the first two human destinations, the Moon and Mars.

Currently, there are many unknowns about the extraction of useful materials and the operations needed to support such activity. These issues will require expertise from both the aerospace and mining industries.

Enabling Technologies

There was significant agreement that helped the Commission identify 17 areas for initial focus. Surely others will emerge over time. At this juncture, we identify the following enabling technologies, which are not yet prioritized:

Affordable heavy lift capability - technologies to allow robust affordable access of cargo, particularly to low-Earth orbit.

Advanced structures - extremely lightweight, multi-function structures with modular interfaces, the building-block technology for advanced spacecraft.

High acceleration, high life cycle, reusable in-space main engine - for the crew exploration vehicle.

Advanced power and propulsion - primarily nuclear thermal and nuclear electric, to enable spacecraft and instrument operation and communications, particularly in the outer solar system, where sunlight can no longer be exploited by solar panels.

Cryogenic fluid management - cooling technologies for precision astronomical sensors and advanced spacecraft, as well as propellant storage and transfer in space.

Large aperture systems - for next-generation astronomical telescopes and detectors.

Formation flying - for free-space interferometric applications and near-surface reconnaissance of planetary bodies.

High bandwidth communications - optical and high-frequency microwave systems to enhance data transmission rates.

Entry, descent, and landing - precision targeting and landing on "high-g" and "low-g" planetary bodies.

Closed-loop life support and habitability - Recycling of oxygen, carbon dioxide, and water for long-duration human presence in space.

Extravehicular activity systems - the spacesuit of the future, specifically for productive work on planetary surfaces.

Autonomous systems and robotics - to monitor, maintain, and where possible, repair complex space systems.

Scientific data collection/analysis - lightweight, temperature-tolerant, radiation-hard sensors.

Biomedical risk mitigation - space medicine; remote monitoring, diagnosis and treatment.

Transformational spaceport and range technologies - launch site infrastructure and range capabilities for the crew exploration vehicle and advanced heavy lift vehicles.

Automated rendezvous and docking - for human exploration and robotic sample return missions.

Planetary in situ resource utilization - ultimately enabling us to "cut the cord" with Earth for space logistics.

A science research agenda can be organized around the following broad themes:

Origins - the beginnings of the universe, our solar system, other planetary systems, and life.

Evolution - how the components of the universe have changed with time, including the physical, chemical, and biological processes that have affected it, and the sequences of major events.

Fate - what the lessons of galactic, stellar, and planetary history tell about the future and our place in the universe.

A Notional Science Research Agenda

Origins

The Big Bang, the structure and composition of the universe including the formation of galaxies and the origin of dark matter and dark energy.

Nebular composition and evolution - gravitational collapse and stellar ignition.

Formation of our solar system and other planetary systems; clues to the origin of the solar system found in meteorites, cosmic dust, asteroids, comets, Kuiper Belt Objects, and samples of planetary surfaces.

Pre-biotic solar system organic chemistry - locations, histories, and processes; emergence of life on Earth; interplay between geological and astronomical processes.

Evolution

The Universe - processes that influence and produce large-scale structure, from sub-nuclear to galactic scales.

Stellar Evolution - nucleosynthesis and evolutionary sequences, including the influence of particles and fields on the space environment.

Planetary Evolution - the roles of impact, volcanism, tectonics, and orbital or rotational dynamics in shaping planetary surfaces; structure of planetary interiors.

Comparative Planetology - study of Earth as a terrestrial planet; divergence of evolutionary paths of Earth, Venus, and Mars; comparisons of giant planets and extrasolar planets.

Atmospheres - early evolution and interaction with hydrospheres; longterm changes and stability.

Search for Habitable Environments - identification and characterization of environments potentially suitable for the past existence and present sustenance of biogenic activity.

Fate

Biology of species in space - micro- and fractional gravity, long-term effects of exposure to variable gravity; radiation; avoidance and mitigation strategies.

Impact Threat - cataloguing and classification of near-Earth objects; estimation of the recent impact flux and its variations; flux variation with position in solar system; hazard avoidance and mitigation.

Natural hazard assessment - Advanced space-based characterization of meteorological, oceanic, and solid Earth natural hazards to diminish consequences and advance toward predictive capability.

Temporal variations in solar output - monitoring and interpretation of space weather as relevant to consequence and predictability.

Climate change - assessment of recent climatic variations; solar controls on climate change; quantitative modeling and testing of the greenhouse effect; and possible effects on planets and life.

Long-term variations of solar system environment - galactic rotation and secular variations; local supernovae.

-end of message-

quote:

Op dinsdag 22 juni 2004 16:29 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:
hmmm ik zie dat mijn tekst wat negatief overkomt maar ik vind de doelstellingen die gesteld zijn Super

Als ik een lijstje had mogen opstellen over waar de ruimtevaart zich op zou moeten focusen aankomende decenium (of decenia) dan zou ik dezelfde dingen op mijn verlanglijstje hebben staan...

* = in een optimistiche stemming!

quote:

Op dinsdag 22 juni 2004 16:31 schreef k3vil het volgende:

[..]

Ik vraag me af hoeveel daarvan echt kan worden gerealiseerd.

Hmm nu is er op Discovery iets over de ruimte. Telescopen op satelieten ofzo?

quote:

Op woensdag 23 juni 2004 09:18 schreef mechatronics het volgende:
Waar we eerst keihard aan moeten werken is die Scramjet. Wat ik overigens ook wel heel erg intressant vind is een lanceerstation ergens in een woestijn in de USA. Uiteraard is het het geval hoe minder kilo's hoe beter. En wat weegt nou het meest, precies, motor en brandstof, ik meen met die Saturn (maan) raket was het meer dan 95%. Nu is er dus iemand bezig in USA om een soort ruimtekannon te maken. Heel mooi, dan hen je je energiebron op aarde, en wat de ruimte in moet, dat gaat mee.
Ik kan wel ff iets provesorisch "tekenen"
i==_/\_
/--=====--\
==\===/
ii==\=/
iii==\/

i===I <= laser (en denk die "=" tekens ff weg)
Die chemische laser schijnt dus aan de onderkant, en door die vorm van het reflecterende metaal explodeert de lucht eronder, het is een puls-laser, niet continu. En door die explosies schiet ie omhoog, en de top ziet eruit als een soort turbine, waardoor ie blijft draaien, voor de lancering wordt dat ding al aan het draaien gezet. Als dit uitgewerkt zou worden en wat groter gemaakt zou kunnen worden kunnen we heel goedkoop van alles de ruimte inschieten. En veeel minder materiaal en veeel minder onderhoud schijnbaar.

Nog n puntje, waren de russen ooit niet bezig geweest om een raket naar Venus te sturen? Daar waar het verschrikkelijk zuur is en een behoorlijke zwaartekracht is etc....

quote:

Op woensdag 23 juni 2004 13:38 schreef mechatronics het volgende:
die eerste link, die eerste foto, das precies wat ik bedoelde!
*ja sorry, beetje nieuw nog hiero*

quote:

TECH SPACE
COLSA To Build Apple Xserve G5-Based Supercomputer
Huntsville AL (SPX) Jun 22, 2004

COLSA Corporation today announced Monday the purchase of 1566 dual processor 1U rack-mount 64-bit Xserve G5 servers from Apple to build a new supercomputer expected to be one of the fastest in the world.
The supercomputer, named MACH 5, is a breakthrough in price performance for high performance computing. It is expected to deliver a peak performance capability of more than
25 TFlops/second at a cost of $5.8 million and will be used to model the complex aero-thermodynamics of hypersonic flight for the US Army.

"We expect MACH 5 to rank as one of the most powerful supercomputers on the planet," said Dr Anthony DiRienzo, executive vice president at COLSA Corporation. "According to the November 2003 Top 500 supercomputer list, it would rank second only to Japan's $350 million Earth Simulator computer at less than two percent of the cost. We evaluated PC-based proposals from other vendors but none came close to delivering either the price, performance or manageability of the Apple Xserve G5."

quote:

Op woensdag 23 juni 2004 15:08 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:
Ik kwam het volgende bericht tegen:
[..]

bron

Ik wist dat de simulatie omtrend de supersone turbulente luchtstroming in een scramjet engine lijvige berekeningen met zich meebrengt (zeker als je supersoon turbulent vuur wil simuleren) maar ik wist niet dat ze dit soort apparatuur hiervoor nodig hadden.... Wel Supers dat ze het nu gaan berekenen.

NASA'a X-34A zal hiermee een gigantische boost krijgen!!!
NASA's X-43A = SUCCES!!! --> info op fok

quote:

Op woensdag 23 juni 2004 15:15 schreef k3vil het volgende:

[..]

Hoe hoog kan je met zo'n scramjet komen? Of is dit ding niet bedoelt om de ruimte in te komen, al dan niet in zijn testfase.

quote:

The March 27 flight, originating from NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center, began with NASA's B-52B launch aircraft carrying the X-43A out to the test range over the Pacific Ocean off the California coast. The X-43A was boosted up to its test altitude of about 95,000 ft., where it separated from its modified Pegasus booster and flew freely under its own power.

quote:

Op dinsdag 3 augustus 2004 23:01 schreef -CRASH- het volgende:
En nog ff ( 7 jaartjes maar ) en dan issie bij Mercurius.

quote:

Op dinsdag 3 augustus 2004 23:08 schreef Viola_Holt het volgende:

[..]

alvast even een topic openen en dat zeven jaar openhouden !

quote:

Op dinsdag 3 augustus 2004 23:08 schreef Viola_Holt het volgende:

[..]

alvast even een topic openen en dat zeven jaar openhouden !

quote:

Op maandag 23 augustus 2004 22:51 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:

hi ik = terug nee nee geen ban ofzo gewoon vakantie en buiten bereik van internet cafe's ed.

quote:

Op dinsdag 3 augustus 2004 0:43 schreef Yvonne het volgende:

Marvin-THE-MARTiAN, baggeren in WFL. 3 weken weg

quote:

Nederland investeert in Gaia-missie
17 augustus 2004

In 2010 zal de Europese ruimtevaartorganisatie Gaia lanceren. Het belangrijkste wetenschappelijke doel van de Gaia-missie is het ontrafelen van de structuur en ontstaansgeschiedenis van de melkweg. Ook de Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek (NWO) draagt aan deze missie bij.

Meting van een miljard sterren

Gaia gaat van maar liefst een miljard sterren nauwkeurig de afstanden, ruimtelijke bewegingen en belangrijkste eigenschappen meten. Aangezien sterren slechts zeer langzaam langs de hemel bewegen vereist dit zeer gevoelige telescopen.
Gaia zal worden uitgerust met drie optische telescopen. De eerste twee, de ‘astrometers’ meten de posities van sterren uiterst nauwkeurig op. Door de metingen een aantal jaren later te herhalen wordt de beweging van een ster zichtbaar gemaakt.

[...] Het zal vijf jaar duren om de enorme hoeveelheid soms zeer zwakke objecten op te sporen, en nog eens drie jaar om er een reusachtig, driedimensionaal computermodel van te maken waarin niet alleen de huidige positie van elke ster is te zien, maar ook de bewegingsrichting, kleur en samenstelling.

Analyse

Nederland participeert in het analyseren van de belangrijkste eigenschappen van de sterren, in vaktaal: de fotometrische data analyse. Analyseren van de enorme berg gegevens is complex en intellectueel uitdagend. Voor de rekenkracht gaat vernieuwende gridtechnologie zorgen van DutchSpace. Dit is het eerste astronomische project dat deze nieuwe technologie gebruikt. De kennis zal ook het zoeken naar planeten rond andere sterren versnellen. Ook kunnen de ervaringen gebruikt worden bij andere astronomische projecten in Nederland, zoals LOFAR. Daarom heeft NWO bekend gemaakt 364.000 euro bij te dragen aan het onderzoek met Gaia, waarmee Nederland als een van de eerste landen concreet in Gaia-onderzoek participeert. [...]

(hmmm dat rijmt )

quote:

Op woensdag 8 september 2004 22:52 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:
netwerk hier lag vanmiddag langdurig op zijn gat... zag op 8u journaal (en later 10u) de eerste beelden... OMFG -de tering- ...

*zucht*

hadden ze ook een plan b of niet?!?...

quote:

Op woensdag 8 september 2004 23:13 schreef -CRASH- het volgende:

[..]

Nope..... No plan B

Hier een [film]
Waar je al kon zien dat er op grote hoogte al wat mis was.

quote:

The New Horizons Pluto-Kuiper Belt mission is designed to help us understand worlds at the edge of our solar system by making the first reconnaissance of Pluto and Charon – a "double planet" system and the last in our solar system to be visited by spacecraft. The mission would then visit one or more Kuiper Belt Objects, in the region beyond Neptune.

New Horizons is scheduled to launch in January 2006, swing past Jupiter for a gravity boost and scientific studies in February 2007, and reach Pluto and its moon, Charon, in July 2015. Then the spacecraft would head deeper into the Kuiper Belt to study one or more of the icy mini-worlds in that vast region, at least a billion miles beyond Neptune's orbit. Sending a spacecraft on this long journey could help us answer basic questions about these bodies’ surface properties, geology, interior makeup, and atmospheres.

quote:

Op dinsdag 12 oktober 2004 23:55 schreef SCwookie het volgende:
Maar nederland moet wel meedoen met die Bigelow prize hoewel dat ik niet verwacht

oh ja, ennum als je je inschrijft wil ik wel meedoen

quote:

Op woensdag 13 oktober 2004 20:29 schreef SCwookie het volgende:
[...] Ken je Astrostart.nl? is een leuke ruimtevaart/astronomie nieuws/forum site. we hebben een plaatjesbombardeerder nodig

quote:

New Propulsion Concept Could Make 90-Day Mars Round Trip Possible
_{Seattle WA (SPX) Oct 15, 2004}


In this artist's conception, a plasma station (lower left) applies a magnetized beam of ionized plasma to a spacecraft bound for Jupiter. Image credit: John Carscadden, University of Washington.

A new means of propelling spacecraft being developed at the University of Washington could dramatically cut the time needed for astronauts to travel to and from Mars, and could make humans a permanent fixture in space.

In fact, with magnetized-beam plasma propulsion, or mag-beam, quick trips to distant parts of the solar system could become routine, said Robert Winglee, a UW Earth and space sciences professor who is leading the project.

Currently, using conventional technology and adjusting for the orbits of both the Earth and Mars around the sun, it would take astronauts about 2.5 years to travel to Mars, conduct their scientific mission and return.
[...]
Under the mag-beam concept, a space-based station would generate a stream of magnetized ions that would interact with a magnetic sail on a spacecraft and propel it through the solar system at high speeds that increase with the size of the plasma beam.

Winglee estimates that a control nozzle 32 meters wide would generate a plasma beam capable of propelling a spacecraft at 11.7 kilometers per second. That translates to more than 26,000 miles an hour or more than 625,000 miles a day.
[...]
But to make such high speeds practical, another plasma unit must be stationed on a platform at the other end of the trip to apply brakes to the spacecraft.

"Rather than a spacecraft having to carry these big powerful propulsion units, you can have much smaller payloads," he said.
[...]
The mag-beam concept grew out of an earlier effort Winglee led to develop a system called mini-magnetospheric plasma propulsion. In that system, a plasma bubble would be created around a spacecraft and sail on the solar wind. The mag-beam concept removes reliance on the solar wind, replacing it with a plasma beam that can be controlled for strength and direction.

quote:

One Wee Hop For A Laser 'craft' Might Also Be A Giant Leap
_{Huntsville AL (SPX) Oct 18, 2004}


This almost imperceptible hop on June 7, 2004, was the first laser-fired 'rocket' launch in a vacuum. Photo credit: UAH's Laser Propulsion Group.

In rocket travel, half a millimeter hardly qualifies as a measurable distance. But the half-millimeter hop of a tiny plastic "craft" in a UAH lab this summer might turn out to be a giant leap in the history of rockets.

The June 7 hop in a lab in UAH's Optics Building was the first successful demonstration of laser-powered rocket propulsion in a vacuum, according to Dr. Andrew Pakhomov, an associate professor of physics at UAH and a leader in the fledgling field of beamed energy propulsion.
[...]
As part of a NASA-funded research project, UAH's Laser Propulsion Group is studying what has now become a new type of rocket engine. They use lasers firing pulses that last only tenths of nanoseconds - picoseconds or tenths of billionths of a second - at target materials, typically a piece of metal.

When the laser hits, the target absorbs some of the laser energy. Electrons fly away from energized atoms, turning them into ions which explode off the face of the metal.

Instant rocket.
This laser "ablation" technology is also efficient, with each pound of material generating five to ten times as much thrust as a pound of chemical rocket fuel and oxidizer.

That first half-millimeter hop sounds a lot more impressive when Cohen and Pakhomov say that the 35 millijoule laser pulse that caused it lasted only 100 picoseconds (10-10 seconds), generated about one Newton of thrust for a microsecond and burned off only about half of a microgram of the laser craft's silver coating.

Repeat that small laser pulse often enough to add up to one second of thrust and you generate almost enough force to accelerate one kilogram of material from zero to one meter per second (just over two mph) in one second.

And you burn off only half a gram of metallic "fuel."
[...]
Earlier experiments in laser propulsion used powerful laser pulses to heat air under a metal shroud to the point that it exploded like lightning, forming a plasma and a shock wave that pushed against the shroud. The system works, but it isn't very efficient (it needs really powerful lasers) and it requires that there be air inside the shroud.

Pakhomov and others realized early that firing the laser at the shroud or some other metallic target and peeling off, or ablating, the target one layer of ions at a time could be more efficient than firing it at the air - at least in theory.

quote:

Op woensdag 27 oktober 2004 17:47 schreef andromeda1968 het volgende:
Titan's eerste close-up


Eindelijk zijn er een aantal closeup plaatjes genomen van Titan, toen de Cassini langs de nevelige maan scheerde op 1200 kilometer afstand.

Dit zijn een van de meest nabije plaatjes ooit genomen van Saturnu's nevelige maan Titan. Ze werden genomen door Cassini's imaging sceince subsystem op 26 oktober toen het voorbij Titan vloog. Op het meest nabije punt was Cassini 1200 kilometer boven de maan, 300 keer dichter bij dan de eerste flyby op 3 juli 2004.

-KNIP-

En hier zichtbare kraters op Titan.
Met spanning volgen wetenschappers de beelden van de Cassini sonde van het oppervlak van de maan Titan. Ook oplettende AstroStart bezoekers houden de plaatjes in de gaten en dankzij E. Chessa hebben we een plaatje ontdekt waarop we kraters zien, jawel, kraters op het oppervlak van Titan.
Het plaatje werd op een afstand van 32865 kilometer boven het oppervlak van Titan gemaakt op 26 oktober 2004.



http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/home/index.cfm

quote:

Op woensdag 10 november 2004 13:57 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:
[-compleet offtopic-]
He -CRASH- je hebt je oude avatar weer trug ?! staat je goed
[/-compleet offtopic-]

quote:

Op woensdag 10 november 2004 18:33 schreef Phooka het volgende:
Minder flashy, maar wel OK...
9 dagen van 10 Newton thrust op een ruimteschip van 1000 kg, vanuit LEO...

Het programmaatje is nog euh... work in progress, maar de orbit propagator werkt! (met modified equinoctial elements, jaja)

[afbeelding]

quote:

Op woensdag 10 november 2004 18:42 schreef Quarks het volgende:

[..]

Leuk, maar anders resize je het even

quote:

Op dinsdag 9 november 2004 15:27 schreef -CRASH- het volgende:

[..]

Voor Saturnus en Titan is er een apart topic....
[Centraal] Cassini-Huygens

quote:

Op woensdag 10 november 2004 18:33 schreef Phooka het volgende:
Minder flashy, maar wel OK...
9 dagen van 10 Newton thrust op een ruimteschip van 1000 kg, vanuit LEO...

Het programmaatje is nog euh... work in progress, maar de orbit propagator werkt! (met modified equinoctial elements, jaja)

[afbeelding]

quote:

Op woensdag 10 november 2004 21:45 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:

[..]

aha, prive plannen om een reis naar Mars te maken?!?

Goed werk, wil je het programmaatje ook met ons delen of is het daarvoor nog veel te veel "in progress"...

quote:

Op maandag 23 augustus 2004 22:51 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:

[..]

MESSENGER: nog ff en dan issie bij Mercurius

hi ik = terug nee nee geen ban ofzo gewoon vakantie en buiten bereik van internet cafe's ed.

maar goed, het lezen van een aantal sf boeken doet ook wonderen...

quote:

Op vrijdag 12 november 2004 19:42 schreef EMW het volgende:

[..]

Welke boeken kun jij mij echt aanraden?

Tevens tvp

quote:

Op vrijdag 12 november 2004 19:42 schreef EMW het volgende:
Welke boeken kun jij mij echt aanraden?

Tevens tvp

quote:

Op dinsdag 16 november 2004 20:05 schreef EMW het volgende:

The Space Movie
Destiny in Space 1994

quote:

Op dinsdag 16 november 2004 20:15 schreef -CRASH- het volgende:

[..]




Solarmax was ookwel mooi om te zien

quote:

Op dinsdag 16 november 2004 19:57 schreef -CRASH- het volgende:
BRON: Europe reaches the Moon

16 November 2004 ESA PR 60-2004.

ESA’s SMART-1 is successfully making its first orbit of the Moon,
a significant milestone for the first of Europe's Small Missions for
Advanced Research in Technology (SMART) spacecraft.

[afbeelding]

This image shows the Moon as seen by SMART-1 during the approach phase.
[afbeelding]

quote:

Op woensdag 17 november 2004 01:00 schreef FrankR het volgende:

[..]

Zouden ze misschien fotos kunnen maken van de apollo 11 landingsplaats, kunnen ze metteen de geruchten uit de wereld helpen dat het nooit gebeurd is.

quote:

Op vrijdag 19 november 2004 02:59 schreef -Pepe- het volgende:
Ben bij een open forum geweest over de marsmissies bij een symposium van de Geological Society of America, met alle missie-bazen e.d. zoals steve squires. Was wel interessant, vooral erg mooie plaatjes en info over de afgelopen, huidige en toekomstige missies.

quote:

Op vrijdag 19 november 2004 10:24 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:

[..]

linkje ... meer info???

quote:

Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter On Schedule For August Launch
_{Denver CO (SPX) Jan 10, 2005}



Even as the Spirit and Opportunity rovers complete a year of successful operation on Mars, the next major step in Mars Exploration is taking shape with preparation of NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for launch in just seven months.

quote:

Op donderdag 16 februari 2006 10:27 schreef Frutsel het volgende:
PASADENA, California (AP) -- Researchers are tracking a gigantic storm on Saturn that is unleashing lightning bolts more than 1,000 times stronger than those found on Earth.
---

The image shows the storm as it appeared to the Cassini imaging system on Jan. 27, 2006. No lightning flashes are visible in the image.

quote:

Op donderdag 16 februari 2006 20:22 schreef Fir3fly het volgende:
Is het vandaag "oude-topics-schop-dag?"

quote:

Op donderdag 16 februari 2006 21:15 schreef Speth het volgende:
Waarom willen de ruimtevaartorganisaties toch zo graag de maan als waystation naar Mars? Dat is totaal niet efficient tenzij een landing op de maan een of andere toegevoegde waarde heeft voor de missie.

Er kunnen wellicht brandstoffen worden gewonnen op de maan, zodat die niet op Aarde mee te hoeven worden gelanceerd, maar die technologie laat nog wel even op zich wachten, bovendien heeft de auteur van "the case for mars" al eens berekend dat het zelfs dan helemaal niet efficient is om een tussenlanding op de maan te maken, je kan evengoed meteen doorvliegen.

Uiteindelijk zal een basis op Mars veel makkelijker te maintainen zijn dan een basis op de maan, afgezien van de afstand, maar die extra afstand is niet onoverkomelijk. Ik vraag me af of het uiteindelijk zelfs niet goedkoper is om op Mars te beginnen ipv op de maan.

Tevens tvp.

quote:

Op donderdag 16 februari 2006 21:15 schreef Speth het volgende:

[...]

Uiteindelijk zal een basis op Mars veel makkelijker te maintainen zijn dan een basis op de maan, afgezien van de afstand, maar die extra afstand is niet onoverkomelijk. Ik vraag me af of het uiteindelijk zelfs niet goedkoper is om op Mars te beginnen ipv op de maan.

Tevens tvp.

quote:

Maar dan een vraag aan jou: Waarom zou het makkelijker zijn om een basis op Mars te runnen dan op de Maan?? Daarnaast zou je op de Maan "escape pods" klaar kunnen hebben staan naast je basis welke niet veel groter hoeven te zijn dan waarmee de Apollo astronauten terugkeerde naar de Aarde; zodat in het geval van nood men ook de basis kan evacueren en kan terugkeren naar Aarde binnen een dag of drie... Iets wat

quote:

Op vrijdag 17 februari 2006 15:19 schreef Speth het volgende:

[..]

Of je nou naar mars of naar de maan gaat, je gebruikt evenveel brandstof om aan de aarde te ontsnappen. [...]

quote:

In general physics, delta-v is simply the change in velocity. [...]
In astrodynamics delta-v is a scalar measure for the amount of "effort" needed to carry out an orbital maneuver, i.e., to change from one orbit to another. A delta-v is typically provided by the thrust of a rocket engine. [...]

quote:

In astronautics and aerospace engineering, the Hohmann transfer orbit is an orbital maneuver that moves a spacecraft from one orbit to another using the lowest possible delta-v for the specific transfer. [...] A Hohmann transfer orbit will take a spacecraft from low Earth orbit (LEO) to geosynchronous orbit (GEO) in just over five hours (geostationary transfer orbit), from LEO to the Moon in about 5 days and from the Earth to Mars in about 260 days. However, Hohmann transfers are very slow for trips to more distant points, so when visiting the outer planets it is common to use a gravitational slingshot to increase speed in-flight.

quote:

Interplanetary budget: Maneuver and required Delta-v

--------------- From:--------------------To:------------- [m/s]
"Opstijgen"
Earth surface - Low Earth Orbit = 9.300 - 10.000
Low Earth Orbit - Geostationary Transfer Orbit = 2.500
Geostationary Transfer Orbit - Geostationary Orbit = 1.500
Geostationary Transfer Orbit (perigee) - Earth escape orbit = 700

Earth escape orbit - Low Lunar Orbit = 700
Earth escape orbit - Mars Transfer Orbit = 600
Low Earth Orbit - Mars surface = 4.800

Terug naar huis
Low Lunar Orbit - Lunar surface 1600
Mars surface - Low Mars Orbit 4100

quote:

Op vrijdag 17 februari 2006 18:18 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:

[..]


[..]


[..]


[..]

Er gaat véél meer energie zitten in een vlucht naar Mars dan naar de Maan... -vandaar- dat we er nog nooit zijn geweest (afgezien van robot missies)

quote:

Op vrijdag 17 februari 2006 19:01 schreef Speth het volgende:

[..]

Akkoord, zoals ik zei, ik heb het niet berekend.. Maar toch, op Mars heb je in ieder geval hoop op een basis die enige zelfstandigheid ontwikkeld, op de maan is dit gewoon veel moeilijker..

quote:

Op woensdag 22 februari 2006 12:31 schreef Frutsel het volgende:
[...]
De raketmodule zal door het draagvliegtuig tot ongeveer 20 kilometer hoogte worden gebracht. Na loskoppeling vervolgt de raketmodule met behulp van een eigen vaste brandstofraket haar weg naar ongeveer 100 kilometer hoogte. Deze hoogte wordt ‘suborbital’ genoemd omdat men zich wel in de ruimte bevindt, maar nog geen voldoende hoogte --> snelheid heeft om een omloopbaan om de aarde vast te houden. De raketmodule zal ongeveer vier tot vijf minuten op deze hoogte verblijven waarbij de passagiers van gewichtloosheid en een ongetwijfeld magnifiek uitzicht zullen kunnen genieten. Hierna zal het ruimteschip haar glijvlucht terug naar de aarde maken en horizontaal landen.

De ‘spaceports’ [...]

quote:

Space Adventures To Build Spaceport In Singapore
by Staff Writers
Arlington VA (SPX) Feb 21, 2006
Space Adventures Ltd. said Monday it plans to develop an integrated spaceport in Singapore that will offer sub-orbital spaceflights and operate astronaut training facilities and a public education and interactive visitor center.
[...]
Spaceport Singapore will cost an estimated minimum of $115 million, to be funded by a consortium of Singapore investors, and by Sheikh Saud Bin Saqr Al Qasimi, the Crown Prince of Ras Al-Khaimah, who last week announced he had partnered with Space Adventures on a spaceport in his country, part of the United Arab Emirates. KPMG Corporate Finance in Singapore also has begun to raise funds for the project.

quote:

Op woensdag 22 februari 2006 22:02 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:

[..]

Zo, lekker bezig!!

quote:

NASA Aims at May 10 for Next Shuttle Flight
_{By Tariq Malik Staff Writer posted: 28 February 2006 4:53 p.m. ET}


NASA’s is aiming for a May 10 target to launch its next space shuttle flight – the second to fly since the Columbia accident – though much work remains before the mission lifts off, the agency’s shuttle chief said Tuesday.

Space shuttle program manager Wayne Hale told reporters that he is “optimistic” NASA’s STS-121 shuttle mission will lift off this May based on ongoing work to prepare the Discovery orbiter and its fuel tank for flight.

“As of today I see no reason to say anything other than we’re progressing toward May,” Hale said during a press conference at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center (KSC). “There is a lot of work that needs to be done.”

An “aggressive” effort is underway to reach STS-121’s current launch window, which runs through May 22, though a significant, time-consuming glitch could push the flight into July, NASA officials said.

Fuel tank checks

Much of the work remaining involves the verification of external tank modifications aimed at preventing potentially harmful chunks of foam from separating during launch and striking the orbiter’s heat shield.

According to video from NASA’s first post-Columbia accident flight – STS-114 also aboard Discovery – a total of 16 pieces of foam separated from the orbiter’s fuel tank during its July 26, 2005 launch, including a large chunk from a protective ramp that was previously believed to be safe, according to a NASA report.

The problem was similar to one which doomed the space shuttle Columbia and its seven-astronaut crew in early 2003. A briefcase-sized piece of foam fell from that orbiter’s tank at launch and breached the heat shield along its left wing, allowing hot atmospheric gases to enter the hole during reentry and destroy the craft on Feb. 1, 2003.

Engineers were able to remove about 37 pounds (16 kilograms) of foam in a pair of Protuberance Air Load (PAL) ramps from ET-119 for the STS-121 flight. But engineers are awaiting results from a string of ongoing wind tunnel tests to verify the fix will not compromise fuel tank integrity, since PAL ramps were designed to shield pressure and fuel lines from the air pressures at launch.

Study is also underway to determine how much material can be shaved from ice frost ramps, each covered in about 1.5-pounds (0.6-kilograms) of foam, that run vertically along the external tank, Hale said.

Tim Wilson, NASA’s external tank tiger team lead for the agency’s Engineering and Safety Center, said his group is watching over the agency’s fuel tank preparations.

“Foam will still come off the tank after we’ve done all these mitigation efforts,” Hale stressed, adding that pieces the size of a matchbox or smaller are expected. “We believe the pieces will be small.”

If the Discovery’s STS-121 launch, commanded by veteran astronaut Steven Lindsey, goes as expected, NASA could launch two additional orbiters later this year, Hale added.

“It does depend on what happens on those flights,” Hale said. “I am very optimistic that, if we can fly in May or July, that we can get three flights up in this year.”

Other challenges

NASA launch director Michael Leinbach said there other, non-foam related challenges also facing Discovery’s STS-121 flight.

Shuttle workers found that main engine seals used for Discovery’s three main engines are not as thick as specifications call for. While they passed leak checks, study is ongoing to ensure their flight worthiness, Leinbach said. The seals could be replaced without detaching Discovery’s engines, he added.

Engineers also found a small metallic particle on a filter that leads into an engine valve. Analysis has shown it to be too small to clog up any plumbing downstream it shake loose, but shuttle officials are concerned it may provide an ignition source for the volatile liquid oxygen used during launch.

“We’ve tried to remove the particle and we can’t get it out,” Leinbach said, adding that engineers have attempted using a bore sight instrument to extract the particle through test ports.

Analysis is ongoing to determine whether the engine will have to be opened up – which could risk even more contamination – for cleaning, or if the particle can be left as is, he added.

Any extensive unplanned change or modification could push Discovery’s flight outside of its May launch window into July, where a lift off could occur between July 1 and July 19.

“If we run into a big gotcha, we won’t have much time to resolve it,” Leinbach said, adding under current plans there are no added contingency days in Discovery’s preflight schedule. “Barring the big gotcha in processing, we’re confident we can make May.”

Next fuel tank on the way

Leinbach said shuttle workers are eager to greet Discovery’s external tank, which shipped out Saturday from NASA’s Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans, Louisiana.

The tank, NASA’s first PAL rampless vessel to fly, will arrive at KSC by barge at about 1:00 p.m. EST (1800 GMT) Wednesday.

“We’re just really glad to get another piece of flight hardware here and to get on with the mission process,” Leinbach said.

quote:

Op woensdag 1 maart 2006 14:58 schreef haphaphap het volgende:
Iemand een mooie luchtfoto van Nederland gemaakt uit de ruimte? Ben op zoek geweest maar kan niet echt mooie vinden of ik kijk niet op juiste pagina's :P

quote:

Op vrijdag 3 maart 2006 21:25 schreef Frutsel het volgende:
Asteroid Mission Cancelled

LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- NASA on Thursday canceled a mission to visit two asteroids, five months after the program was put on hold because of cost overruns and technical problems.

The cancellation is the latest setback for NASA, which has been forced to delay science missions to focus on developing a new manned spacecraft to return to the moon in the next decade.

The project was capped at around $371 million, project scientists said previously. But scientists asked for an additional $40 million last year.

The Dawn spacecraft was supposed to lift off in June on a nine-year voyage to two of the solar system's largest asteroids, Ceres and Vesta, which reside in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.

Asteroids are believed to be remnants from the solar system's formation about 4.5 billion years ago, and studying them could provide clues into how the sun and planets formed.

Dawn would have been the first spacecraft to orbit the two asteroids, which scientists believe formed in different parts of the solar system and had different evolutionary processes.

Dawn was part of a NASA program called Discovery that aims to explore the solar system on what the space agency considers to be a shoestring budget. The program includes the Stardust mission, which returned to Earth in January with samples of comet dust.

The Dawn mission was managed by NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

=====
Best wel balen. NASA heeft al veel tegenslagen gehad. Nog even en alles wordt stopgezet.

quote:

Op vrijdag 3 maart 2006 23:36 schreef Speth het volgende:
Iemand enig idee wat new horizons gekost heeft? Was dit gewoon een heel dure missie ofzo? Ik had juist het idee dat NASA weer goed bezig was de laatste jaren.

quote:

Spacecraft to Slam into the Moon

^{By Leonard David Senior Space Writer posted: 07 March 2006 06:32 am ET}



Scientists are plotting out a “crash course” in learning what happens when a European lunar probe slams into the Moon.

The European Space Agency’s (ESA) SMART-1 spacecraft—now circling the Moon—is headed for a planned early September impact with Earth’s celestial neighbor.

The ESA probe would plow into the lunar surface, giving it a glancing blow as it speeds in at nearly 5,000 miles per hour (2 kilometers per second).

SMART-1 is Europe’s first robotic lunar mission. The name SMART stands for Small Mission for Advanced Research in Technology

The spacecraft was launched on September 27, 2003. Making use of its ion-propulsion engine to slowly nudge it outward from Earth, the probe powered its way into lunar orbit on November 15, 2004.

Outfitted with miniaturized instruments, SMART-1’s goal has been to gauge key chemical elements in the lunar surface, as well as look into the theory that the Moon was formed following the violent collision of a smaller planet with Earth long ago.

ESA’s lunar probe completes a loop around the Moon every five hours—but that’s about to end later this year.

Rehearsal mode

Engineers and scientists are now targeting SMART-1 for possible impact on the Moon around September 1-2. The current uncertainty range for the exact time of impact is 15 hours.

At the end of June, SMART-1 is slated to carry out two maneuvers. These will fine-tune the exact time of impact. Those slight thrust firings will lead to the spacecraft flying over the Moon at its lowest point at below186 miles (300 kilometers) in altitude.

In early July, the plan calls for assessing the success of the maneuver and determining the spacecraft’s orbit and expected impact time. Later that month, the probe will zip as close as 124 miles (200 kilometers) from the barren lunar landscape.

In early August, SMART-1 will make an overflight of its eventual impact site, racing over that area at just 75 miles (120 kilometers) height in what’s termed as “rehearsal” mode for the early September run-in with the Moon.

According to Bernard Foing, ESA SMART-1 project scientist, an inventory is being made of the composition and mechanical properties of the spacecraft—including aluminum, copper, titanium, and other materials, as well as the probe’s remaining hydrazine fuel.

That data will be used to support observations of what is kicked up from the Moon itself on impact, contrasted to bits, pieces, and fuel tossed into the mix due to SMART-1’s high-speed slap.

Boom and bust finale

Here on Earth, sky watchers worldwide are getting ready for the projected September 1-2 lunar boom and bust finale of SMART-1.

Foing told SPACE.com that he is now engaged in assembling a “coordinated campaign” of ground-based observations. This activity would support SMART-1 measurements and monitor the artificial crash that mimics in a small way, an asteroid or comet hit on the Moon.

Numbers of observatories around the world have indicated interest in watching the outcome from SMART-1’s collision with the Moon, Foing has reported.

At impact, the ESA spacecraft will weigh a little over 628 pounds (285 kilograms), punching the Moon at a grazing incidence near 37 degrees south latitude. The near-side impact is timed so that it will be illuminated to assist in observations from Earth.

A current orbit simulation of the SMART-1 impact for September 2 is at lunar longitude 44.54 degrees West and 36.22 South in Lacus Excellentiae, 10 degrees south of Mare Humorum. A far more refined target point will come as the event draws closer.

Crater-making crash

Back on July 31, 1999, the Moon was on the receiving end of NASA’s Lunar Prospector.

That farewell fall of space hardware struck within a crater near the lunar south pole—in an attempt to detect water ice stirred up by the wallop. No visible debris plume was reported.

According to Foing, the hope is that those Earth-based observers intending to take part in September’s thump of the Moon can make pre-hit predictions of SMART-1’s impact magnitude, cloud ejecta dynamics, exospheric effects and other observable manifestations brought about by the crash.

Coordinated measurements by observers here on Earth are high on the priority list, Foing noted. Impact observations would include: Infrared imaging of thermal flash; visible/infrared imaging of ejected clouds; hydrazine flame detection; post-characterization of ejecta; as well as exospheric effects if lunar material is blasted high off the Moon’s surface.

In addition, Foing said, there is also intent to conduct follow up searches for the crater produced by SMART-1’s crash into the Moon via the sensor eyes of future, follow-on lunar orbiters.

quote:

Op woensdag 8 maart 2006 22:25 schreef Frutsel het volgende:
WASHINGTON - Na een reis van zeven maanden bereikt een onbemande sonde van de Amerikaanse ruimtevaartorganisatie NASA vrijdag de planeet Mars. De Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) moet vanuit een baan om Mars onder meer gaan uitzoeken of er lang genoeg water op de rode planeet is geweest om leven mogelijk te maken.

Het contact met het controlecentrum in de Verenigde Staten is vrijdag een half uur lang verbroken als de sonde de achterkant van de planeet passeert. Daarna wordt duidelijk of de MRO in de juiste baan om Mars is gekomen of dat het ruimteschip verder door het heelal vliegt.


Gelijkenis

De MRO heeft na de lancering in augustus vorig jaar een afstand van ongeveer 500 miljoen kilometer afgelegd. Mars is een gewild onderzoeksobject van de NASA en de Europese ruimtevaartorganisatie ESA vanwege de gelijkenis met de planeet aarde.

In de afgelopen decennia zijn tientallen onbemande ruimtevaartuigen naar Mars gestuurd. De meeste daarvan waren bedoeld om vanuit een baan rond de planeet onderzoek te verrichten.

Enkele ruimtevaartuigen zijn op Mars geland. De VS hebben plannen voor een bemande ruimtevlucht naar Mars rond 2020.

quote:

Op donderdag 9 maart 2006 08:24 schreef Frutsel het volgende:
thx Crash...
ik kon al zoveel Ruimtevaart topics niet meer terugvinden

quote:

Op donderdag 9 maart 2006 15:03 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:

[..]

dan moet je eens onder mijn posts kijken

quote:

Op donderdag 9 maart 2006 23:20 schreef speknek het volgende:
Zou dat echt zo zijn? Ik zou zeggen dat je beter niet kan hebben dat die geisers aan het oppervlak komen, spuw je zo alle microben de ruimte in . Maar het is in ieder geval een aardige indicatie dat er hete lavabronnen in het water zitten, ook op andere planeten/manen. Dat was natuurlijk al zo goed als zeker, maar toch.

quote:

Op vrijdag 10 maart 2006 00:10 schreef Speth het volgende:

[..]

Nee, de warmte van het water is te danken aan interne frictie van de maan, veroorzaakt door Saturnus. Aangezien enceladus vrijwel geheel uit ijs bestaat is het onwaarschijnlijk dat er lava spuwende vulkanen te vinden zijn zoals op onze oceaanbodem.

(!!!let op het veelvuldig gebruik van: evetnueel/ wellicht/ kunnen/ onwaarschijnlijk/ zouden kunnen komen )

quote:

Op zaterdag 11 maart 2006 14:02 schreef speknek het volgende:
Hebben niet alle stenen planetoiden een kern van lava?
http://pds.jpl.nasa.gov/planets/captions/saturn/encelads.htm

edit, met een vorm van getijdewerking om de verhitting draaiend te houden tenminste.

quote:

Interior
The current model of the interior of the Moon was derived using seismometers left behind during the manned Apollo program missions. These instruments were used to measure the propagation of seismic waves through the interior due to quakes and impacts.

The mass of the moon is sufficient to eliminate any voids within the interior, so it is believed to be composed of solid rock throughout. The low density indicates a low metal abundance. The crust layer of the moon varies in depth, but has an average thickness of about 68 km. The crust is thicker in the highland regions and thinnest in the maria. The far side is generally thicker than the near side, which could explain the paucity of lunar mares on side hidden from the Earth.

The lunar mantle is roughly 1000 km in depth, with a small core having a radius of about 300 to 425 km. The outer portion of the core may still be molten, but the remainder of the Moon is geologically inactive. Most of the current seismic activity appears to be triggered by tidal interaction with the Earth. The center of gravity of the Moon is offset from the center of figure by about 2 km in the direction of the Earth.

Scientists currently do not have good measurements of the interior temperatures of the Moon, even within the upper crust.

quote:

Op zaterdag 11 maart 2006 14:02 schreef speknek het volgende:
Hebben niet alle stenen planetoiden een kern van lava?
http://pds.jpl.nasa.gov/planets/captions/saturn/encelads.htm

edit, met een vorm van getijdewerking om de verhitting draaiend te houden tenminste.

quote:

Years Of Observing Combined Into Best-Yet Look At Mars Canyon
_{by Staff Writers // Tempe AZ (SPX) Mar 14, 2006}


A simulated fly-through using the newly assembled imagery is available online. The fly-through plus tools for wandering across and zooming into the large image is also available.

A ragged geological scar crosses the belly of Mars. Long enough to reach from New York City to Los Angeles, this great rift in the martian crust is named Valles Marineris, or Mariner Valley. It was discovered in 1972 by the Mariner 9 spacecraft.

Formed out of several parallel, connecting troughs, Valles Marineris dwarfs Earth's Grand Canyon in every respect, being wider, longer, deeper, and older. It easily earns the title of Grandest Canyon of All.
[... naar de rest van het bericht]

quote:

Op dinsdag 14 maart 2006 11:42 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:
*woohoo*
[..]

Het is welliswaar nog geen "NASA World Wind Mars" maar je kunt er in ieder geval je hart ophalen en je waarlijk op Mars wanen

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Op dinsdag 28 maart 2006 09:16 schreef Frutsel het volgende:
[...] Dawn
Een maand geleden werd het project Dawn nog geschrapt wegens kostenoverschrijdingen en technische problemen. Die problemen lijken nu te zijn opgelost. De bedoeling is dat een sonde naar de asteroïden Vesta en Ceres reist, die rond de zon cirkelen tussen Mars en Jupiter.
[...]

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Op maandag 17 april 2006 12:54 schreef Frutsel het volgende:
Nog een interessant stuk over een komeet die de aarde in mei passeert en die in stukken gevallen is. (zie ook de Frontpage waarop één of andere gast beweert dat delen er van op 25-5 gaan inslaan)

http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2006/24mar_73p.htm

Weet nie of het een apart topic waardig is en waar het anders in zou moeten

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Op maandag 17 april 2006 14:47 schreef -skippybal- het volgende:
Kunnen we die kometen hier in Nederland ook zien?

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Op dinsdag 23 mei 2006 00:07 schreef Phooka het volgende:
Had ik deze hier al neergeplempt? Ik heb d'r ook doorheen mogen kruipen om de besturing van de upper stage te controleren, zo'n 7 dagen voor de lancering...

[afbeelding]

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Op dinsdag 23 mei 2006 22:43 schreef -CRASH- het volgende:

[..]

GUILTY

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Op dinsdag 23 mei 2006 23:08 schreef Phooka het volgende:

[..]

Hahaha - hm. Ach ja, ik mis Frans Guyana... Naast de lanceerbasis zijn er ook veel andere interessante zaken, daar.

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Op woensdag 24 mei 2006 22:47 schreef -CRASH- het volgende:

[..]

LIVE Coverage: Delta 4 Rocket Poised to Launch GOES-N Weather Satellite


UH...... Je gaat toch niet naar Cape Canaveral hé

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Op maandag 29 mei 2006 20:02 schreef Freek99 het volgende:
Op 1 juli 2006 zal na ruim een jaar opnieuw de Space shuttle Discovery gelanceerd worden. Wat verwachten jullie van deze missie en zullen er opnieuw problemen zijn met het hitteschild?

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Op donderdag 22 juni 2006 11:45 schreef Freek99 het volgende:
Voor de mensen die niet weten op welke tijd Space Shuttle Discovery vertrekt en waar de lancering live te volgen is: klik hier

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Op zaterdag 1 juli 2006 22:03 schreef -CRASH- het volgende:

[..]

En ze zijn nog niet weg
vanwege de onweers wolken in de buurt.

Te volgen op Nasa TV

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Op vrijdag 4 augustus 2006 08:23 schreef Frutsel het volgende:
Twee 'planeten zonder ster' ontdekt
Sterrenkundigen hebben twee bijzondere planeten ontdekt. Terwijl de meeste planeten om een ster draaien, doen deze twee dat om elkaar. De ontdekking staat in het Britse blad New Scientist.

Verrassing
De sterrenkundigen zijn verrast door de vondst en weten niet precies hoe dergelijke hemellichamen hebben kunnen ontstaan. De planeten liggen op ongeveer 400 lichtjaren van de aarde.

Afstand
De tussenliggende afstand is ongeveer 240 keer zo groot als die tussen de aarde en de zon. De planeten zijn gevonden met behulp van een telescoop in Chili.

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SPACE.com Exclusive: Spectacular Meteor Shower Possible for 2007


A spectacular meteor shower might be in the offing late next summer, SPACE.com has learned.

It may not last very long, but could produce a bevy of bright, swift shooting stars for favorably positioned skywatchers. The prediction is found in a technical report, co-authored by two astronomers who are targeting Sept. 1, 2007 as the date for the potential display.

The meteors are called "Aurigids" because they appear to fan-out from the constellation of Auriga, the Charioteer.

At least a strong shower

Meteor showers occur whenever we ride into the dusty debris left behind in a comet's orbit. The debris left behind by Kiess, a comet last seen in 1911, is what produces the Aurigids. The comet takes approximately 2,500 years to orbit the Sun, but there are also dense trails of dust traveling along its orbit. Earth has had glancing blows in the past with a few of these dust trails in 1935, 1986 and 1994.

In 2007, however, the Earth is expected to pass very close to the center of a dust trail, which astronomers Esko Lyytinen of Finland and Peter Jenniskens of NASA's SETI Institute in California said, should result in "a spectacularly rich shower of bright meteors."

Verder lezen klik bovenstaande link

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Op donderdag 17 augustus 2006 21:04 schreef -CRASH- het volgende:

SPACE.com Exclusive: Spectacular Meteor Shower Possible for 2007
*knip*

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NASA's Spitzer Digs Up Troves of Possible Solar Systems in Orion
^{For Release: August 14, 2006}

Spitser Image Gallery
Astronomers have long scrutinized the vast and layered clouds of the Orion nebula, an industrious star-making factory visible to the naked eye in the sword of the famous hunter constellation. Yet, Orion is still full of secrets.

A new image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope probes deep into the clouds of dust that permeate the nebula and its surrounding regions. The striking false-color picture shows pinkish swirls of dust speckled with stars, some of which are orbited by disks of planet-forming dust.

Spitzer, with its powerful infrared vision, was able to unearth nearly 2,300 such planet-forming disks in the Orion cloud complex, a collection of turbulent star-forming clouds that includes the well-known Orion nebula.

The disks -- made of gas and dust that whirl around young suns -- are too small and distant to be seen by visible-light telescopes; however, the infrared glow of their warm dust is easily spotted by Spitzer's infrared detectors. Each disk has the potential to form planets and its own solar system.

"This is the most complete census of young stars with disks in the Orion cloud complex," said Dr. Thomas Megeath of the University of Toledo, Ohio, who led the research. "Basically, we have a census of potential solar systems, and we want to know how many are born in the cities, how many in small towns, and how many out in the countryside."

A look at Orion's demographics reveals that the potential solar systems populate a variety of environments. Megeath and his colleagues found that about 60 percent of the disk-sporting stars in the Orion cloud complex inhabit its bustling "cities," or clusters, containing hundreds of young stars. About 15 percent reside in small outer communities, and a surprising 25 percent prefer to go it alone, living in isolation.

Prior to the Spitzer observations, scientists thought that up to 90 percent of young stars, both with and without disks, dwelled in cities like those of Orion.

"The Orion image shows that many stars also appear to form in isolation or in groups of just a few stars," said team member Dr. John Stauffer of NASA's Spitzer Science Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. "These new data may help us to determine the type of environment in which our sun formed."

Astronomers do not know whether our middle-aged sun grew up in the stellar equivalent of the city or countryside, though most favor a large city scenario. Newborn stars like the ones in Orion tend to drift away from their siblings over time, so it is hard to trace an adult star's origins.

Megeath and his colleagues estimate that about 60 to 70 percent of the stars in the Orion cloud complex have disks. "It is an interesting question why this number isn't 100 percent. Eventually, we may be able to understand why some stars don't have disks," said Megeath.

Spitzer's infrared vision also dug up 200 stellar embryos in the Orion cloud complex, most of which had never been seen before. Stellar embryos are still too young to have developed disks.

The Orion cloud complex is about 1,450 light-years from Earth and spans about 240 light-years of space. Spitzer's wide field of view allowed it to survey most of the complex, an area of the sky equivalent to 28 full moons. The featured image shows a slice of this survey, the equivalent of four full moons-worth of sky, and includes the Orion nebula itself.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., manages the Spitzer Space Telescope mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Science operations are conducted at the Spitzer Science Center. Caltech manages JPL for NASA. Spitzer's infrared array camera, which made the observations, was built by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. The instrument's principal investigator is Dr. Giovanni Fazio of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics.

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Op donderdag 31 augustus 2006 16:27 schreef the_disheaver het volgende:
is het al bekend wanneer STS-115 (atlantis) de lucht in gaat?

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SMART-1 to Crash the Moon

August 30, 2006: Amateur astronomers, grab your telescopes. A spaceship is about to crash into the Moon, and you may be able to see the impact.

The spacecraft: SMART-1, a lunar orbiter belonging to the European Space Agency (ESA).


The impact site: Lacus Excellentiae (The Lake of Excellence), an ancient, 100-mile wide crater in the Moon's southern hemisphere.

The time to watch: Saturday, September 2nd at 10:41 p.m. PDT (Sept. 3rd, 0541 UT).

Right: The impact site, with current moon phase shown. Updated daily. Image courtesy: ESA.

Why is SMART-1 crashing? There's nothing wrong with the spacecraft, which is wrapping up a successful 3-year mission to the Moon. SMART-1's main job was to test a European-built ion engine. It worked beautifully, propelling the craft in 2003 on a unique spiral path from Earth to the Moon. From lunar orbit, SMART-1 took thousands of high-resolution pictures and made mineral maps of the Moon's terrain. One of its most important discoveries was a "Peak of Eternal Light," a mountaintop near the Moon's north pole in constant, year-round sunlight. Peaks of Eternal Light are prime real estate for solar-powered Moon bases.

But now SMART-1 is running low on fuel. It has to come down sometime—and soon—so ESA mission scientists decided to crash it in a place where the crash can be seen from Earth and studied.

When SMART-1 hits the ground, it will explode in a flash of light. This won't be the sort of explosion we'd see on Earth. The Moon has no oxygen to support fire or combustion. Instead, the flash will be caused by rocks and soil made so hot by the impact that they suddenly glow.

The area will be in complete darkness at the moment of impact, so much the better to see the flash. How bright will it be? No one knows. Estimates range from 7th to 15th magnitude. In other words, it might be bright enough for backyard telescopes--or so dim that even big professional observatories won't see a thing. The only way to find out is to look. Observing tips may be found here (ALPO), here (ESA) and, in many languages, here (REA Brazil).

"We'll be watching," says Bill Cooke, the head of NASA's Meteoroid Environment Office at the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. "Measuring the brightness of SMART-1's impact is important to our research."

His group at the Marshall Space Flight Center has spent the last year watching things hit the Moon—not spacecraft, but meteoroids. "The Moon is under constant bombardment from meteoroids," says Cooke. "They hit the ground and explode just like SMART-1 will do." The Moon actually sparkles, slowly and faintly, as one space rock after another hits the ground.


Above: Possible SMART-1 impact times and coordinates. Image courtesy: ESA.

Cooke's group has a knack for this kind of work: Using only two small telescopes, they've spotted eight meteoroid impacts this year, almost doubling the number of confirmed sightings in all of the history of astronomy before 2006. Cooke attributes their success to improvements in digital video cameras, which they use to record the brief flashes.

Lunar impacts interest NASA greatly. Astronauts are going back to the Moon and "we need to know what kind of danger meteoroids pose to both people and Moon bases," explains Cooke. How often do they hit? And what kind of damage do they do?

Think of SMART-1 as a controlled, man-made meteoroid impact, he says. "We know exactly how much kinetic energy SMART-1 packs. And, if all goes well, we're going to see how bright a flash it makes. This will help us interpret our meteoroid data."

When SMART-1 hits, it won't plunge straight into the ground. "The spacecraft will enter Lacus Excellentiae at a shallow angle, only a few degrees from horizontal," notes Cooke. For this reason, it will gouge a long, narrow crater, about a meter wide and many meters long. The grazing impact should kick up a plume of debris—no one knows how high. If it rises high enough, the plume might catch some sunlight and become visible to telescopes on Earth. The chances of this, however, are slim. The main event is the flash of heat and light at the "point" of impact.

Another side-effect of the shallow approach is uncertainty about when, exactly, SMART-1 will strike. The spacecraft is due to glide low over the floor of Lacus Excellentiae several times on Sept. 3rd. Mission controllers believe it will hit on orbit number 2890 at 0541 UT. But it could equally well hit one orbit earlier or one orbit later. Possibilities are summarized in the table, above. The nominal impact time favors observers in western parts of North America and across the Pacific Ocean. Depending on when SMART-1 hits, however, almost anyone could catch the flash.

quote:

LUNAR FLASH:
Europe's SMART-1 spacecraft crashed into the Moon this morning at 0542 UT. The resulting flash was too faint for most backyard telescopes, but a team of astronomers using the big 3.6m CFH telescope in Hawaii did photograph the explosion:

^{Credit: Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope / 2006 More Images}

The flash in this animation is an infrared flash. It shows heat generated by the spacecraft's 4500 mph impact into the lunar surface near the edge of Lacus Excellentiae (34.4 S, 46.2 W).

Lacus Excellentiae was in darkness when SMART-1 hit--the better to see the flash. Tomorrow, however, the sun will come up, illuminating the impact site. Amateur and professional astronomers will scour the area for additional signs of the crash.

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Op maandag 17 april 2006 14:34 schreef -CRASH- het volgende:

[..]

"73P/Schwassmann-Wachmann 3 is approaching Earth--and fast"
[afbeelding]
says amateur astronomer Guillaume Poulin (Mont-Mégantic Observatory)
who made this movie of fragment B traveling 36,000 mph on April 11th.

Not shown in Poulin's movie are 19 other fragments of the comet also heading our way.
The swarm will pass only 6 million miles from Earth on May 12th-14th, providing a
marvelous view to anyone with a backyard telescope:
Lees Verder....

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Op vrijdag 10 november 2006 21:51 schreef Schonedal het volgende:

[..]

Als je het artikel goed doorleest hebben ze het over mei 2006, dus die komeet is allang voorbij.

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Op vrijdag 10 november 2006 21:30 schreef Frutsel het volgende:
zag net beelden op CNN van een mega-hurricane op saturnus...
interessante foto's!

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Op vrijdag 10 november 2006 19:14 schreef -CRASH- het volgende:
NASA Loses Contact With Mars Global Surveyor

NASA's Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) spacecraft has failed to check in with Earth for the fifth straight day in a row, after losing contact during a routine adjustment of its solar array.

On Nov. 2, MGS mangers sent commands for the spacecraft to adjust the position of one of its solar power arrays to better track the sun. Returning data indicated a problem with the motor that moves the array, so a backup motor and control circuitry were switched on.

No signal was received on Nov. 3 and 4, but a weak signal was received on Nov. 5, suggesting the spacecraft had switched to a safe mode and was awaiting further instructions from Earth. The signal cut out completely later that day and nothing has been heard since.
Lees Verder....

Dat is geen goed teken......

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Op zaterdag 25 november 2006 16:05 schreef Nieuwschierig het volgende:
Apollo 16, op weg naar de maan.

[afbeelding]

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Op vrijdag 1 december 2006 15:53 schreef Phooka het volgende:

[..]

Hé, wat cool! Op dit plaatje kan je de Tower Clearance Maneuver goed zien! Waar heb je 'm vandaan?

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Op donderdag 23 november 2006 20:45 schreef Frutsel het volgende:
. De Mars Global Surveyor-missie kostte $247 en zou oorspronkelijk twee jaar duren. Onlangs werd de missie nog twee jaar verlengd.

====
Dag lieve MGS ...

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Op donderdag 18 januari 2007 12:53 schreef The_stranger het volgende:
Weet neit of 'ie al gepost is, maar vond het volgende filmpje wel mooi om te zien:

http://www.filecabi.net/video/shuttle-time30.html

Is een filmpje opgenomen met een externe camera op een van de rocketboosters welke op 45km hoogte afgeworpen worden.

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Op donderdag 18 januari 2007 18:45 schreef Nieuwschierig het volgende:

[..]

Wow, mooie film. Zo zit ie nog in de ruimte, zo ligt ie in de zee. Leuk reisje in die paar minuten

quote:

"We are treating the Venus flyby as a full dress rehearsal for the first flyby of Mercury in January 2008," says Sean Solomon, the mission's principal investigator at the Carnegie Institution of Washington. "All of the spacecraft's science instruments will be turned on during the flyby."

Of particular interest is the laser experiment, which aims to measure the location of Venus' cloud decks. "It could either fizzle or be a major result," says Ralph McNutt, MESSENGER's project scientist at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab. "We've never sent a laser to Venus before. This could give us some unique information about the planet's clouds."

see captionThe name of the laser is MLA--short for Mercury Laser Altimeter. It was designed to map the rocky topography of Mercury, but MLA turns out to have some nice properties for the study of Venus. Solomon explains: "Venus' atmosphere and clouds are nearly transparent at several infra-red wavelengths." The wavelength of the laser (1064 nm) is close to one of these spectral "windows," so it may be able to penetrate deep into the atmosphere. "It's a long shot, but we may even see returns from the surface of Venus," he speculates.

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Op woensdag 6 juni 2007 09:09 schreef wdn het volgende:

[..]

2008.01 jummy

Oh is er al nieuws over het laseren van Venus? Of moeten we weer 6 maanden wachten

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A mission that was supposed to last just five years is celebrating its 30th anniversary this fall. Scientists continue to receive data from the Voyager 1 and 2 spacecraft as they approach interstellar space. The twin craft have become a fixture of pop culture, inspiring novels and playing a central role in television shows, music videos, songs and movies from the 1980s and 1990s. Many of these fictional works focus on what would happen if an alien race were able to locate Earth via Voyager's famous golden records, which include sounds and images of Earth.
The selections portray people young and old, male and female -- not to mention examples of many other species -- and include information about every continent on the planet, as well as Earth's location in space.

Earlier NASA missions included plaques with information about Earth, in case an intelligent alien race intercepted the probes. This spurred, John Casani, Voyager's first project manager, to appoint astronomer and author Carl Sagan to head a committee to come up with a message for Voyager.

In his book "Murmurs of Earth," Sagan later described how the committee created the record and chose its contents. Physicist Frank Drake suggested the idea of a record that would have pictures on one side and sounds on the other side. The group had less than six weeks to come up with a record that would represent the entire population of Earth -- in addition to the planet itself -- if it were ever discovered by an intelligent alien race.

Although the chances of extraterrestials finding the message are extremely slim, the Voyager golden record has become an icon. "It's the classic message in a bottle. The likelihood of finding it is small, but the payoff is huge if it is found," said Ann Druyan, a science media producer and author. Druyan was appointed creative director of the record project and later married Sagan.

Ed Stone, Voyager's project scientist and former JPL director, explained that although there is almost no chance of the record being found, the record is important as a message to ourselves.

"In a sense it's a unifying message," Stone said. "It's a message from Earth. It contains greetings in many languages, music from many cultures and images that portray our home planet. It's our attempt to say what is Earth, and it's a record of who we think we are." Druyan also explained that the coupling of music and science was an especially compelling reason to devote so much energy to the record.

"The record represented the idea that science and technology could come together with art," said Druyan, who also designed the sound essay.. "It's one of the few totally great stories that we have about humans. It cost the taxpayers virtually nothing, nobody got killed. It was a way to celebrate the glory of being alive on this tiny blue dot in 1977.

"This was the most romantic and beautiful project ever attempted by NASA. It had the sounds of a kiss, a mother saying hello to her newborn baby for the first time, all that glorious music. Remember, this was during the Cold War. Everyone was living with the knowledge that 50,000 nuclear weapons could go off at any time, and there was a lot of angst about the future. This was something positive -- a way to represent Earth and put our best foot forward. That was irresistible."

Carl Sagan's son Nick was six years old in 1977 when the Voyager records were being assembled. The records feature a recording of him as a child saying, "Hello from the children of planet Earth."

"I had no sense of the magnitude of it at the time," said Nick Sagan, who partially followed in his late father's footsteps by pursuing a career as a science fiction writer. "Literally it was my parents putting me in front of a microphone and saying, 'What would you say to extraterrestrials?'"

Sagan said he began to realize what the record meant as he got older, and as a teen he started to realize what a "strange but wonderful honor" it was.

"It's been a challenge for the rest of my life to live up to that honor. It's always there in my subconscious," he said. "My dad inspired so many people to do so many great things -- to not take things at face value and to look at evidence to search for the truth. It's something that I look to as a beacon."

Sagan said that he and his father discussed the Voyager discoveries in the context of their search for life. They got excited when the spacecraft photographed Titan and Europa, and Sagan noted a change in his father as the years went by.

"One of the things that surprised him was that we didn't find life during his lifetime," he said. "He started to realize that if there's no other life out there, and life is so rare, we need to protect ours. I saw a shift in him. That's when he started to become more socially and politically conscious."

In the end, Sagan believes that Voyager and other extraterrestrial missions are important because of their process rather than their discoveries.

"The question is: What's it all about?" he said. "If we do find life it will change us, but if not it will change things also. The act of looking will tell us so much, and we will learn so much about ourselves."

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^{In this image of the Hubble Ultra Deep Field,
several objects are identified as the faintest,
most compact galaxies ever observed
in the distant universe.}

NASA's Hubble and Spitzer Space Telescopes have joined forces to discover nine of the smallest, faintest, most compact galaxies ever observed in the distant universe. Blazing with the brilliance of millions of stars, each of the newly discovered galaxies is a hundred to a thousand times smaller than our Milky Way Galaxy. "These are among the lowest mass galaxies ever directly observed in the early universe" says Nor Pirzkal of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Md.
The conventional model for galaxy evolution predicts that small galaxies in the early universe evolved into the massive galaxies of today by coalescing. These nine Lego-like "building block" galaxies initially detected by Hubble likely contributed to the construction of the universe as we know it.

Pirzkal was surprised to find that the galaxies' estimated masses were so small. Hubble's cousin observatory, NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope was called upon to make precise determinations of their masses. The Spitzer observations confirmed that these galaxies are some of the smallest building blocks of the universe.

These young galaxies offer important new insights into the universe's formative years, just one billion years after the Big Bang. Hubble detected sapphire blue stars residing within the nine pristine galaxies. The youthful stars are just a few million years old and are in the process of turning Big Bang elements (primarily hydrogen and helium) into heavier elements. The stars have probably not yet begun to pollute the surrounding space with elemental products forged within their cores.

"While blue light seen by Hubble shows the presence of young stars, it is the absence of infrared light in the sensitive Spitzer images that was conclusive in showing that these are truly young galaxies without an earlier generation of stars," says Sangeeta Malhotra of Arizona State University in Tempe, Ariz., one of the investigators.

The galaxies were first identified by James Rhoads of Arizona State University and Chun Xu of the Shanghai Institute of Technical Physics in Shanghai, China, by their prominent and energetic light coming from glowing hydrogen. Three of the galaxies appear to be slightly disrupted - rather than being shaped like rounded blobs, they appear stretched into tadpole-like shapes. This is a sign that they may be interacting and merging with neighboring galaxies to form larger, cohesive structures.

The galaxies were observed in the Hubble Ultra Deep Field (HUDF) with Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys and the Near Infrared Camera and Multi-Object Spectrometer. Observations were also done with Spitzer's Infrared Array Camera and the European Southern Observatory's Infrared Spectrometer and Array Camera.

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Op zaterdag 8 september 2007 17:45 schreef -skippybal- het volgende:
Is die foto misschien ook groter te vinden?

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Op woensdag 5 mei 2004 15:28 schreef pfaf het volgende:
een terugvindpostje.
En dan meteen een paar van de mooiste foto's ooit posten
Van Hubble uiteraard.

[afbeelding]
nevel met stergeboorte

[afbeelding]
sterven van een zon-achtige ster

[afbeelding]
waterstof, zuurstof en zwavelstrormpje

[afbeelding]
en nog een neveltje

quote:

Ruimtesonde Dawn succesvol gelanceerd

27/09/2007 14:00

Donderdag omstreeks 13u34 Belgische tijd werd de ruimtesonde Dawn gelanceerd vanop Cape Canaveral, Florida. De sonde is op weg naar Vesta en Ceres, twee asteroïden die een baan tussen die van Mars en Jupiter hebben.

Het gebeuren was te zien op NASA-tv. Een Delta II-raket bracht de sonde doorheen de atmosfeer in een baan rond de aarde.

De neuskegel van de raket viel weg zoals gepland, en bracht Dawn 'echt' in de ruimte. Ingenieurs blijven Dawn nauwkeurig volgen, en wachten op de tweede en derde trap van de raket die Dawn op weg zullen helpen. De reis gaat naar de asteroïdengordel tussen Mars en Jupiter, waar de twee protoplaneten Ceres en Vesta liggen.

Met de Dawn-missie wil NASA deze twee hemellichamen nader onderzoeken, dit vooral om meer te weten komen over het ontstaan van ons zonnestelsel. Ceres en Vesta zijn in dat opzicht interessant: ze werden ongeveer gelijktijdig gevormd, maar via een ander proces, waardoor ze nu erg verschillend zijn.

Ceres is de kleinste dwergplaneet van ons zonnestelsel, met een oppervlak dat heel wat ijs zou bevatten en een diameter van ongeveer 950 km. Vesta is een rotsachtige asteroïde met een diameter van ongeveer 530 km.

De totale duur van de missie bedraagt bijna 8 jaar. Als alles volgens schema verloopt, zou Dawn in september 2011 Vesta bereiken. Een kleine drieënhalf jaar later, in februari 2015, zou ze Ceres aandoen, en nog enkele maanden later zou de hoofdmissie ten einde lopen. De mogelijkheid dat Dawn nadien nog andere asteroïden zou onderzoeken blijft echter open.

quote:

Op dinsdag 10 juli 2007 09:17 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:
Hi heren, terug van weggeweest. Even een berichtje:

Zoals sommige van jullie weten word er op de TU Delft gebouwd aan een satelliet van 10x10x30 [cm] met een massa van 3 [kg], de Delfi-C3. Nu word er na 2,5 jaar hard werken en vooral papier te hebben geproduceerd (= ook heel belangrijk!!) daadwerkelijk met -Flight- hardware gewerkt! Nu volgt er binnenkort nog een perspresentatie van de Delfi-C3 echter kunnen diegene die dat willen _digitaal_ al een blik werpen op de voortgang via de publieke Delfi-C3 Photoblog.

En om een idee te geven:
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Suc6, grtz
Marv.

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Op zondag 27 april 2008 14:05 schreef Marvin-THE-MARTiAN het volgende:

[..]

[ordinaire Spam]

Hij gaat dan eindelijk toch echt omhoog!! Momenteel zitten we op T-16 hours en ziet alles er goed uit. Voor nieuwsgierigen check de Delfi-C3 Site of volg het nieuws... Hoe dan ook Maandag ochtend om tien voor zes 's ochtends zal er in ieder geval reden tot een feestje zijn op L&R aan de TUDelft.

grtz Marv.

PS meer op Site: Nanosatellite Launch Service 4

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