NASA's Curiosity Mars Rover Snaps Its Highest-Resolution Panorama Yet

NASA - Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) patch.

March 4, 2020

Image above: NASA's Curiosity rover captured its highest-resolution panorama of the Martian surface between Nov. 24 and Dec. 1, 2019. Image Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS.

NASA's Curiosity rover has captured its highest-resolution panorama yet of the Martian surface. Composed of more than 1,000 images taken during the 2019 Thanksgiving holiday and carefully assembled over the ensuing months, the composite contains 1.8 billion pixels of Martian landscape. The rover's Mast Camera, or Mastcam, used its telephoto lens to produce the panorama; meanwhile, it relied on its medium-angle lens to produce a lower-resolution, nearly 650-million-pixel panorama that includes the rover's deck and robotic arm.

Image above: Along with an almost 1.8-billion-pixel panorama that doesn't feature the rover, NASA's Curiosity captured a 650-million-pixel panorama that features the rover itself. Image Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS.

Both panoramas showcase "Glen Torridon," a region on the side of Mount Sharp that Curiosity is exploring. They were taken between Nov. 24 and Dec. 1, when the mission team was out for the Thanksgiving holiday. Sitting still with few tasks to do while awaiting the team to return and provide its next commands, the rover had a rare chance to image its surroundings from the same vantage point several days in a row. (Look closer: A special tool allows viewers to zoom into this panorama.)

It required more than 6 1/2 hours over the four days for Curiosity to capture the individual shots. Mastcam operators programmed the complex task list, which included pointing the rover's mast and making sure the images were in focus. To ensure consistent lighting, they confined imaging to between noon and 2 p.m. local Mars time each day.

Curiosity Mars Rover Snaps 1.8 Billion-Pixel Panorama (narrated video)

Video above: NASA Curiosity Project Scientist Ashwin Vasavada guides this tour of the rover's view of the Martian surface. Image Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech/MSSS.

"While many on our team were at home enjoying turkey, Curiosity produced this feast for the eyes," said Ashwin Vasavada, Curiosity's project scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which leads the Curiosity rover mission. "This is the first time during the mission we've dedicated our operations to a stereo 360-degree panorama."

In 2013, Curiosity produced a 1.3-billion-pixel panorama using both Mastcam cameras; its black-and-white Navigation Cameras, or Navcams, provided images of the rover itself. Imaging specialists carefully assemble Mars panoramas by creating mosaics composed of individual pictures and blending their edges to create a seamless look.

Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) or Curiosity rover. Animation Credits: NASA/JPL

Malin Space Science Systems in San Diego built and operates Curiosity's Mastcam. JPL, a division of Caltech in Pasadena, manages the project for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington and built the Navigation Cameras and the rover.

Related links:

Mastcam: https://mars.nasa.gov/msl/spacecraft/instruments/mastcam/

360-degree panorama:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fva2pH41FM&list=PLTiv_XWHnOZpzQKYC6nLf6M9AuBbng_O8&index=2

1.3-billion-pixel panorama: https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.php?feature=3834

Mars Science Laboratory (Curiosity): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/msl/index.html

Images (mentioned), Animation (mentioned), Video (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Tony Greicius/Alana Johnson/JPL/Andrew Good.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Multitude of Research Today Focuses on Space Effects on Biology and Station

ISS - Expedition 62 Mission patch.

March 3, 2020

Today’s space biology work aboard the International Space Station observed samples swabbed from an astronaut’s skin and bone cells living in media bags. Other ongoing studies explored space piloting techniques and microgravity’s effects on the orbiting lab’s structure.

NASA astronaut Andrew Morgan swabbed his nose, forehead and forearm early Tuesday before stowing the samples in a science freezer. Scientists on the ground will analyze the samples for the Standard Measures study that seeks to understand how humans adapt to spaceflight.

Image above: NASA astronauts Andrew Morgan and Jessica Meir pose for a portrait inside the cupola, the International Space Station’s “window to the world.” Image Credit: NASA.

In the afternoon, Morgan joined fellow Expedition 62 Flight Engineer Jessica Meir for more robotics training ahead of the SpaceX Dragon resupply mission due to launch Friday at 11:50 p.m. EST. The duo practiced on a computer the techniques they would use to capture the U.S. space freighter with the Canadarm2. Meir also activated the command panel that sends and receives vehicle telemetry and commands from Dragon as it approaches the station.

NASA TV will begin its live launch broadcast Friday at 11:30 p.m. Dragon’s rendezvous and capture coverage starts Monday at 5:30 a.m. with its robotic capture planned for 7 a.m.

International Space Station (ISS). Animation Credit: NASA

Meir tackled a pair of advanced life sciences studies during the afternoon checking hardware that enables the printing of human tissue and the nourishment of bone cells. First, she tested the operation of the BioFabrication Facility that seeks to overcome the detrimental effects of printing biological structures in Earth’s gravity. Afterward, Meir replenished the media used to support bone cells being observed to gain therapeutic insights into Earth ailments such as osteoporosis.

Roscosmos Commander Oleg Skripochka spent Tuesday morning exploring how to pilot a spacecraft or control a robotic rover under a variety of microgravity conditions. Later, he checked heart research gear before looking at data on the physical stresses that mission events such as spacecraft dockings place on the station.

Related links:

Expedition 62: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition62/index.html

Standard Measures: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7711

Canadarm2: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/structure/elements/mobile-servicing-system.html

NASA TV: https://www.nasa.gov/nasatv

BioFabrication Facility: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Facility.html?#id=7599

Osteoporosis: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=1149

How to pilot a spacecraft: https://www.energia.ru/en/iss/researches/human/24.html

Heart research: https://www.energia.ru/en/iss/researches/human/11.html

Physical stresses: https://www.energia.ru/en/iss/researches/develop/07.html

Space Station Research and Technology: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/index.html

International Space Station (ISS): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

Image (mentioned), Animation (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Mark Garcia.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

Milky Way’s warp caused by galactic collision, Gaia data suggests

ESA - Gaia Mission patch.

March 2, 2020

Astronomers have pondered for years why our galaxy, the Milky Way, is warped. Data from ESA’s star-mapping satellite Gaia suggest the distortion might be caused by an ongoing collision with another, smaller, galaxy, which sends ripples through the galactic disc like a rock thrown into water.

Milky Way warp

Astronomers have known since the late 1950s that the Milky Way’s disc – where most of its hundreds of billions of stars reside – is not flat but somewhat curved upwards on one side and downwards on the other. For years, they debated what is causing this warp. They proposed various theories including the influence of the intergalactic magnetic field or the effects of a dark matter halo, a large amount of unseen matter that is expected to surround galaxies. If such a halo had an irregular shape, its gravitational force could bend the galactic disc.

Faster than expected

The warped galactic disc of the Milky Way wobbles like a spinning top

Video above: The warp completes one rotation around the galactic centre in 600 to 700 million years. Our mother star, the Sun (shown in the animation as the small yellow dot) requires only 220 million years to complete one orbit.

With its unique survey of more than one billion stars in our galaxy, Gaia might hold the key to solving this mystery. A team of scientists using data from the second Gaia data release has now confirmed previous hints that this warp is not static but changes its orientation over time. Astronomers call this phenomenon precession and it could be compared to the wobble of a spinning top as its axis rotates.

Moreover, the speed at which the warp precesses is much faster than expected – faster than the intergalactic magnetic field or the dark matter halo would allow. That suggests the warp must be caused by something else. Something more powerful – like a collision with another galaxy.

“We measured the speed of the warp by comparing the data with our models. Based on the obtained velocity, the warp would complete one rotation around the centre of the Milky Way in 600 to 700 million years,” says Eloisa Poggio of the Turin Astrophysical Observatory, Italy, who is the lead author of the study, published in Nature Astronomy. “That’s much faster than what we expected based on predictions from other models, such as those looking at the effects of the non-spherical halo.”

The star power of Gaia
 

Waiting for Gaia

Video above: Gaia, with its unprecedented ability to measure the positions and velocities of a vast amount of stars, provides an entirely new level of understanding of the evolution of our galaxy, the Milky Way.

The warp’s speed is, however, slower than the speed at which the stars themselves orbit the galactic centre. The Sun, for example, completes one rotation in about 220 million years.

Such insights were only possible thanks to the unprecedented ability of the Gaia mission to map our galaxy, the Milky Way, in 3D, by accurately determining positions of more than one billion stars in the sky and estimating their distance from us. The flying saucer-like telescope also measures the velocities at which individual stars move in the sky, allowing astronomers to ‘play’ the movie of the Milky Way’s history back- and forward in time over millions of years.

“It’s like having a car and trying to measure the velocity and direction of travel of this car over a very short period of time and then, based on those values, trying to model the past and future trajectory of the car,” says Ronald Drimmel, a research astronomer at the Turin Astrophysical Observatory and co-author of the paper. “If we make such measurements for many cars, we could model the flow of traffic. Similarly, by measuring the apparent motions of millions of stars across the sky we can model large scale processes such as the motion of the warp.”

Sagittarius?

The Sagittarius dwarf galaxy in Gaia's all-sky view

The astronomers do not yet know which galaxy might be causing the ripple nor when the collision started. One of the contenders is Sagittarius, a dwarf galaxy orbiting the Milky Way, which is believed to have burst through the Milky Way’s galactic disc several times in the past. Astronomers think that Sagittarius will be gradually absorbed by the Milky Way, a process which is already underway.

“With Gaia, for the first time, we have a large amount of data on a vast amount stars, the motion of which is measured so precisely that we can try to understand the large scale motions of the galaxy and model its formation history,” says ESA’s Gaia deputy project scientist Jos de Bruijne. “This is something unique. This really is the Gaia revolution.”

As impressive as the warp and its precession appear on the galactic scale, the scientists reassure us that it has no noticeable effects on life on our planet.

Far enough

The Milky Way's Warp

“The Sun is at the distance of 26 000 light years from the galactic centre where the amplitude of the warp is very small,” Eloisa says. “Our measurements were mostly dedicated to the outer parts of the galactic disc, out to 52 000 light years from the galactic centre and beyond.”

Gaia previously uncovered evidence of collisions between the Milky Way and other galaxies in the recent and distant past, which can still be observed in the motion patterns of large groups of stars billions of years after the events occurred.

Meanwhile, the satellite, currently in the sixth year of its mission, keeps scanning the sky and a Europe-wide consortium is busy processing and analysing the data that keeps flowing towards Earth. Astronomers across the world are looking forward to the next two Gaia data releases, planned for later in 2020 and in the second half 2021, respectively, to tackle further mysteries of the galaxy we call home.

Notes for editors:

“Evidence of a dynamically evolving Galactic warp” by E. Poggio et al. is published in Nature Astronomy: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-020-1017-3

Related links:

Gaia data releases: https://www.cosmos.esa.int/web/gaia/release%20

Gaia: http://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Gaia

Images, Videos, Text, Credits: ESA/Jos de Bruijne/INAF – Turin Astrophysical Observatory/Ronald Drimmel/Eloisa Poggio/Stefan Payne-Wardenaar; Magellanic Clouds: Robert Gendler/ESO/ESA/Gaia/DPAC, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO/Stefan Payne-Wardenaar; Inset: NASA/JPL-Caltech; Layout: ESA.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

NASA Approves Development of Universe-Studying, Planet-Finding Mission

NASA - Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST) patch.

March 2, 2020

Image above: This graphic shows a simulation of a WFIRST observation of M31, also known as the Andromeda galaxy. Hubble used more than 650 hours to image areas outlined in blue. Using WFIRST, covering the entire galaxy would take only three hours. Image Credits: DSS, R. Gendle, NASA, GSFC, ASU, STScI, B. F. Williams.

NASA’s Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST) project has passed a critical programmatic and technical milestone, giving the mission the official green light to begin hardware development and testing.

The WFIRST space telescope will have a viewing area 100 times larger than that of NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, which will enable it to detect faint infrared signals from across the cosmos while also generating enormous panoramas of the universe, revealing secrets of dark energy, discovering planets outside our solar system (exoplanets), and addressing a host of other astrophysics and planetary science topics.

WFIRST’s design already is at an advanced stage, using components with mature technologies. These include heritage hardware --primarily Hubble-quality telescope assets transferred to NASA from another federal agency -- and lessons learned from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope – the agency’s flagship infrared observatory, targeted for launch next year.

With the passage of this latest key milestone, the team will begin finalizing the WFIRST mission design by building engineering test units and models to ensure the design will hold up under the extreme conditions during launch and while in space.

Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope (WFIRST). Image Credit: NASA

WFIRST has an expected development cost of $3.2 billion. Including the cost of five years of operations and science, and a ride-along technology demonstration instrument capable of imaging planets around other stars, brings the maximum cost of WFIRST to $3.934 billion.

The FY2020 Consolidated Appropriations Act funds the WFIRST program through September 2020.  The FY2021 budget request proposes to terminate funding for the WFIRST mission and focus on the completion of the James Webb Space Telescope, now planned for launch in March 2021. The Administration is not ready to proceed with another multi-billion-dollar telescope until Webb has been successfully launched and deployed.

WFIRST is managed at Goddard, with participation by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center, also in Pasadena, and a science team comprised of members from U.S. research institutions across the country.

For more information about NASA’s WFIRST mission, visit: https://www.nasa.gov/wfirst

Image (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Sean Potter.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Crew Gears Up for Dragon Cargo Mission amid Earth Studies

ISS - Expedition 62 Mission patch.

March 2, 2020

The Expedition 62 crew is gearing up for next week’s space delivery aboard a U.S. cargo craft continuing the upkeep of International Space Station systems.

SpaceX has completed a successful static fire test of its Falcon 9 rocket at Kennedy Space Center. The Dragon resupply ship will be perched atop the Falcon 9 when it blasts off toward the station on Friday at 11:50 p.m. EST.

Image above: The Strait of Gibraltar connects the Atlantic Ocean with the Mediterranean Sea and separates Spain on the European continent from Morocco on the African continent. Image Credit: NASA.

Flight Engineers Andrew Morgan and Jessica Meir will be in the cupola Monday to capture Dragon at approximately 7 a.m. Morgan will command the Canadarm2 to reach out and grapple Dragon as Meir monitors its approach and rendezvous. NASA TV will broadcast both the launch and capture activities live.

The NASA duo practiced their robotics activities today and configured the station to receive the more than 5,600 pounds of cargo packed inside Dragon. Morgan started the day setting up a specialized habitat to house mice being delivered next week aboard the U.S. space freighter. Meir was also making space and organizing the Japanese Kibo laboratory module to make room for the new hardware.

Image above: Flying over Uruguay, seen by EarthCam on ISS, speed: 27'549 Km/h, altitude: 430,80 Km, image captured by Roland Berga (on Earth in Switzerland) from International Space Station (ISS) using ISS-HD Now Live application with EarthCam's from ISS on March 2, 2020 at 18:02 UTC. Image Credits: Orbiter.ch Aerospace/Roland Berga.

Commander Oleg Skripochka of Roscosmos worked on Earth observation research today ending one experiment and starting another. He finalized a run of the student-operated EarthKAM investigation this morning shutting down gear and stowing hardware. In the afternoon, the veteran cosmonaut set up and activated an experiment that observes the atmosphere at nighttime in near-ultraviolet wavelengths.

Related links:

Expedition 62: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition62/index.html

Canadarm2: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/structure/elements/mobile-servicing-system.html

NASA TV: https://www.nasa.gov/nasatv

Specialized habitat to house mice: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=8150

Kibo laboratory module: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/structure/elements/japan-kibo-laboratory

EarthKAM: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=87

Commercial Resupply:  http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/structure/launch/index.html

Space Station Research and Technology: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/index.html

International Space Station (ISS): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

Images (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Mark Garcia/Orbiter.ch Aerospace/Roland Berga.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

Space Station 20th: Long-duration Missions

ISS - 20th Anniversary 1998-2018 patch / NASA - International Space Station (ISS) 20th patch.

March 2, 2020

Space stations provide the capability to support long-duration human space flights and the research needed to study the effects of extended periods of weightlessness on humans. The results of the investigations will inform future human exploration missions. Prior to space stations, the longest flight lasted only 18 days, although at the time (1970) it set an endurance record. The small size of the spacecraft not only precluded a longer stay due to lack of storage for consumables but also limited any significant medical monitoring or countermeasures equipment.

Space stations that preceded ISS (Top to bellow) Salyut, Skylab 1, Salyut 6, Salyut 7 and Mir. The images do not show the stations to the same scale.

Beginning with the first experimental space station Salyut in 1971, a series of Soviet and American platforms through the 1970s and 1980s played host to numerous long-duration missions, many setting ever-increasing endurance records up to 237 days. Beginning in 1986, the Soviet then Russian space station Mir hosted numerous long-duration missions during its 15 years of operation, extending the human spaceflight endurance record to 438 days, completed by cosmonaut Valeri V. Polyakov in March 1995. His 14-month spaceflight, long enough for a round-trip journey to Mars, remains the longest single space mission to date. Between October 1994 and March 1995, Mir hosted the first long-duration flight by a woman, cosmonaut Yelena V. Kondakova. As she and Polyakov prepared to return to Earth, astronaut Norman E. Thagard joined them in March 1995 as the first American to live aboard Mir, the first long-duration mission of the International Space Station (ISS) Phase 1 Program, also known as the Shuttle-Mir Program. In March 1996, Shannon W. Lucid arrived aboard Mir to begin the first long-duration flight by an American woman.

Top: Polyakov (right) assisting Kondakova with an experiment aboard Mir in 1994. Bellow: Polyakov minutes after this return to Earth after 438 days in space in 1995.

Top: Thagard, the first American aboard Mir. Bellow: Lucid, the first American
woman to complete a long-duration flight aboard Mir.

The ISS provides a platform where scientists can conduct multi-disciplinary international studies on the effects of long-duration spaceflight on human physiology and psychology using instruments and techniques that can be regularly updated to keep up with advancing technology. With ISS nearing 20 years of continuous occupancy by rotating teams of crewmembers, the various investigations have adequate numbers of subject experiences available to reach significant conclusions. The first long-duration crew of William M. Shepherd, Yuri P. Gidzenko and Sergei K. Krikalev arrived at ISS on Nov. 2, 2000. Their replacements, the Expedition 2 crew of Yuri V. Usachev, James S. Voss and Susan J. Helms, arrived on March 10, 2001, and included the first woman to complete a long-duration mission aboard ISS. During their mission, the Space Shuttle delivered the first research racks including the Human Research Facility Rack 1 dedicated to conducting studies on human adaptation to long-duration spaceflight. Additional facilities to support an expanded range of investigations arrived on subsequent Space Shuttle flights.

Top: Expedition 1, the first long-duration crew to live and work aboard ISS
(left to right) Krikalev, Shepard and Gidzenko. Bellow: ISS Expedition 2 crew, the first to include a woman (left to right) Helms, Usachev and Voss.

As of March 2020, ISS has hosted 170 long-duration crewmember flights of durations ranging from 48 to 340 days, with the majority in the five- to seven-month range. Of these, 152 were flown by males and 18 by females.  In exchange for their contributions to the ISS Program, the European Space Agency (ESA) has conducted 13 long-duration missions, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) eight, and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) three. The longest mission by an ESA astronaut was Luca S. Parmitano’s 201-day flight completed in 2020. Koichi Wakata holds the record for JAXA with his 188-day mission concluded in 2012, while Robert B. Thirsk’s 188-day flight in 2009 was the longest by a CSA astronaut.

Summary chart of long-duration experiences (longer than 90 days) completed aboard ISS.

Top: Parmitano after his return from his second long-duration mission to ISS.
Middle: Wakata being helped out of his spacecraft after returning from his second long-duration flight aboard ISS. Bellow: Thirsk relaxes after his ISS mission.

In November 2012, NASA and the Russian space agency Roscosmos agreed to jointly conduct a one-year mission aboard ISS to better understand the effects on humans of such a lengthy exposure to space flight. The two agencies selected veteran space travelers Scott J. Kelly and Mikhail B. Korniyenko as the two participants in the mission. The pair launched to ISS with fellow crewmember Gennadi I. Padalka on March 27, 2015, and landed 340 days later with cosmonaut Sergey A. Volkov on March 2, 2016. The two participated in 23 investigations across seven research disciplines before, during and after their stay aboard ISS as members of Expeditions 43, 44, 45 and 46. Scientists presented the preliminary findings of their studies in January 2017. More information about the experiments and their results is available here. Additional one-year missions aboard ISS are in the planning stages.

Top: One-Year crewmembers Kelly (left) and Korniyenko before the mission.
Middle: Kelly and Korniyenko aboard ISS. Bellow: Korniyenko (left) and Kelly (right) with fellow crewmember Volkov (middle) after their landing in Kazakhstan.

Of particular interest to scientists, Kelly’s selection as the American astronaut to participate in the one-year mission proved fortuitous: he has an identical twin brother, Mark E. Kelly, also an experienced astronaut. This provided a unique opportunity for scientists to study the effects of a one-year mission on one astronaut, using his twin with a virtually identical genetic profile as a ground-based control subject. Both astronauts agreed to participate in the NASA Twins Study, a panel of investigations looking into the health effects of the long-duration mission, with Scott conducting the experiments aboard ISS and Mark on the ground. After the mission, the investigators jointly published the results of the Twins Study in the prestigious journal Science. A short video describes three of the major findings.

Top: Twin astronauts Mark (left) and Scott Kelly. Bellow: Schematic of the NASA Twins Study research themes and publication plan.

 Astronaut Christina H. Koch holds the title for the longest single spaceflight by a woman after completing her 329-day mission in February 2020. Launched in March 2019, Koch participated in studies focused on standard measures, a consistent set of core measurements taken from all ISS crewmembers to characterize the effects of living in space for long durations. Investigations recorded measurements in the categories of behavioral health and performance, immunology, microbiology, biochemistry, sensorimotor adaptation and cardiovascular adaptation.

Top: Koch minutes after her return from her record-breaking mission.
Middle: Padalka shortly after his return from his fifth long-duration mission.
Bellow: Whitson after returning from her third long-duration flight to ISS.

Russian cosmonaut Gennadi I. Padalka currently holds the title as the world’s most space traveled individual. Over the course of five long-duration mission, one aboard Mir and four aboard ISS, Padalka has accumulated 878 days in space, or nearly 2.5 years. In addition, Padalka also holds the record for the most birthdays celebrated in space, one during each of his four stays aboard ISS. Peggy A. Whitson holds the record for most cumulative spaceflight time for a woman as well as for any American astronaut. Over the course of three long-duration missions aboard ISS, she spent a total of 639 days or about 1.75 years in space.

Information gathered during these and future long-duration missions aboard ISS will provide the information needed for future programs to send the first woman and the next man to land on the Moon, for astronauts to live and work aboard the Gateway and one day undertake the first expedition to Mars.

The International Space Station as it appeared in 2018.

Related articles:

NASA Counts Down to Twenty Years of Continuous Human Presence on International Space Station
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2019/11/nasa-counts-down-to-twenty-years-of.html

20 memorable moments from the International Space Station
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2018/11/20-memorable-moments-from-international.html

Related links:

ISS research and technology: https://www.nasa.gov/iss-science

Humans in Space: https://www.nasa.gov/topics/humans-in-space

International Space Station (ISS): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html

Images, Text, Credits: NASA/Kelli Mars/JSC/John Uri/ROSCOSMOS/ESA/CSA-ASC/JAXA.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

SpaceX CRS-20 Launch Targeted for March 6

SpaceX - Dragon CRS-20 Mission patch.

February 29, 2020

SpaceX is now targeting March 6 at 11:50 p.m. EST for launch of its 20th commercial resupply services mission (CRS-20) to the International Space Station. During standard preflight inspections, SpaceX identified a valve motor on the second stage engine behaving not as expected and determined the safest and most expedient path to launch is to utilize the next second stage in line that was already at the Cape and ready for flight. The new second stage has already completed the same preflight inspections with all hardware behaving as expected. The updated target launch date provides the time required to complete preflight integration and final checkouts.

Image above: A two-stage SpaceX Falcon 9 launch vehicle lifts off from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on June 29, 2018. SpaceX is targeting 11:50 p.m. EST Friday, March 6, 2020 for the launch of its 20th resupply mission to the International Space Station. Photo credit: NASA.

The cargo Dragon will lift off atop a Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida carrying more than 5,600 pounds of science investigations and cargo to the station, including research on particle foam manufacturing, water droplet formation, the human intestine and other cutting-edge investigations.

Related articles:

Improving Shoes, Showers, 3D Printing: Research Launching to the Space Station
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2020/02/improving-shoes-showers-3d-printing.html

Space Life and Physical Sciences Research and Applications SpaceX-20 Experiments and Payloads
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2020/02/space-life-and-physical-sciences.html

Related links:

Science investigations: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/spx-20-research-highlights

Cargo Resupply (CRS): https://blogs.nasa.gov/spacex/category/cargo-resupply-crs/

SpaceX: https://www.spacex.com/

International Space Station: http://www.nasa.gov/station

Image (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Linda Herridge.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch