NASA's ECOSTRESS Mission Sees Plants 'Waking Up' From Space

ISS - ECOSTRESS Mission logo.

February 5, 2020

Like many people, plants are less active at night. The agency's 'space botanist' can see when they begin to stir, and start their day.

Image above: The image shows plants "waking up" near Lake Superior. Red areas began to wake up at around 7 a.m. local time; green areas awoke around 8 a.m.; and blue areas, at about 9 a.m. The data was acquired by ECOSTRESS during the summer season.

Although plants don't sleep in the same way humans do, they have circadian rhythms - internal clocks that, like our own internal clocks, tell them when it's night and when it's day. And like many people, plants are less active at night. When the Sun comes up, they kick into gear, absorbing sunlight to convert carbon dioxide they draw from the air and water they draw from the soil into food, a process called photosynthesis. They also "sweat" excess water through pores on their leaves to cool themselves down, a process called evapotranspiration.

NASA's ECOsystem Spaceborne Thermal Radiometer on Space Station (ECOSTRESS) can see when plants "wake up" and begin these processes from space. The image above shows plants waking up (as evidenced by evapotranspiration) west of Lake Superior near the U.S.-Canada border. Plants in the red and pink areas began to awake at around 7 a.m. local time. Those in green areas awoke closer to 8 a.m., and those in blue areas, closer to 9 a.m.

ECOSTRESS launched to the International Space Station in June 2018. The space station's unique orbit enables the instrument to capture data over the same areas at different times of day. When the mission team analyzes the data, they gain new insight into how plants behave throughout the course of a day.

International Space Station (ISS)

For this image, the mission team collected and combined all of ECOSTRESS's morning data for the summer season. In doing so, they observed that the earliest risers were near the lake, with plant activity spreading gradually northwestward as the morning progressed.

ECOSTRESS' ability to detect plant behavior in this way can be especially helpful to resource managers and farmers, who can use the data to determine how much water their crops need, which ones are most water-efficient and which ones aren't getting enough water, even before they show visible signs of dehydration. What's more, the instrument can provide this data on a global scale over areas as small as a football field.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, built and manages the ECOSTRESS mission for the Earth Science Division in the Science Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington. ECOSTRESS is an Earth Venture Instrument mission; the program is managed by NASA's Earth System Science Pathfinder program at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.

Related link:

Evapotranspiration: https://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/10926

More information about ECOSTRESS is available here: https://ecostress.jpl.nasa.gov

Image, Animation, Text, Credits: NASA/Written by Esprit Smith, NASA's Earth Science News team/JPL/Rexana Vizza.

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ALMA catches beautiful outcome of stellar fight

ALMA - Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array logo.

5 February 2020

ALMA image of HD101584

Astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), in which ESO is a partner, have spotted a peculiar gas cloud that resulted from a confrontation between two stars. One star grew so large it engulfed the other which, in turn, spiralled towards its partner provoking it into shedding its outer layers.

Like humans, stars change with age and ultimately die. For the Sun and stars like it, this change will take it through a phase where, having burned all the hydrogen in its core, it swells up into a large and bright red-giant star. Eventually, the dying Sun will lose its outer layers, leaving behind its core: a hot and dense star called a white dwarf.

Location of HD101584 in the constellation of Centaurus

“The star system HD101584 is special in the sense that this ‘death process’ was terminated prematurely and dramatically as a nearby low-mass companion star was engulfed by the giant,” said Hans Olofsson of the Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden, who led a recent study, published in Astronomy & Astrophysics, of this intriguing object.

Thanks to new observations with ALMA, complemented by data from the ESO-operated Atacama Pathfinder EXperiment (APEX), Olofsson and his team now know that what happened in the double-star system HD101584 was akin to a stellar fight. As the main star puffed up into a red giant, it grew large enough to swallow its lower-mass partner. In response, the smaller star spiralled in towards the giant’s core but didn’t collide with it. Rather, this manoeuvre triggered the larger star into an outburst, leaving its gas layers dramatically scattered and its core exposed.

Wide-field view of the region of the sky where HD101584 is located

The team says the complex structure of the gas in the HD101584 nebula is due to the smaller star’s spiralling towards the red giant, as well as to the jets of gas that formed in this process. As a deadly blow to the already defeated gas layers, these jets blasted through the previously ejected material, forming the rings of gas and the bright bluish and reddish blobs seen in the nebula.

A silver lining of a stellar fight is that it helps astronomers to better understand the final evolution of stars like the Sun. “Currently, we can describe the death processes common to many Sun-like stars, but we cannot explain why or exactly how they happen. HD101584 gives us important clues to solve this puzzle since it is currently in a short transitional phase between better studied evolutionary stages. With detailed images of the environment of HD101584 we can make the connection between the giant star it was before, and the stellar remnant it will soon become,” says co-author Sofia Ramstedt from Uppsala University, Sweden.

Co-author Elizabeth Humphreys from ESO in Chile highlighted that ALMA and APEX, located in the country’s Atacama region, were crucial to enabling the team to probe “both the physics and chemistry in action” in the gas cloud. She added: “This stunning image of the circumstellar environment of HD101584 would not have been possible without the exquisite sensitivity and angular resolution provided by ALMA.”

While current telescopes allow astronomers to study the gas around the binary, the two stars at the centre of the complex nebula are too close together and too far away to be resolved. ESO’s Extremely Large Telescope, under construction in Chile’s Atacama Desert, “will provide information on the ‘heart’ of the object,” says Olofsson, allowing astronomers a closer look at the fighting pair.

Zooming into HD101584

More information:

This research was presented in a paper published in Astronomy & Astrophysics.

The team is composed of H. Olofsson (Department of Space, Earth and Environment, Chalmers University of Technology, Onsala Space Observatory, Sweden [Chalmers]), T. Khouri (Chalmers), M. Maercker (Chalmers), P. Bergman (Chalmers), L. Doan (Department of Physics and Astronomy, Uppsala University, Sweden [Uppsala]), D. Tafoya (National Astronomical Observatory of Japan), W. H. T. Vlemmings (Chalmers), E. M. L. Humphreys (European Southern Observatory [ESO], Garching, Germany), M. Lindqvist (Chalmers), L. Nyman (ESO, Santiago, Chile), and S. Ramstedt (Uppsala).

The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), an international astronomy facility, is a partnership of ESO, the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) and the National Institutes of Natural Sciences (NINS) of Japan in cooperation with the Republic of Chile. ALMA is funded by ESO on behalf of its Member States, by NSF in cooperation with the National Research Council of Canada (NRC) and the National Science Council of Taiwan (NSC) and by NINS in cooperation with the Academia Sinica (AS) in Taiwan and the Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute (KASI). ALMA construction and operations are led by ESO on behalf of its Member States; by the National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO), managed by Associated Universities, Inc. (AUI), on behalf of North America; and by the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan (NAOJ) on behalf of East Asia. The Joint ALMA Observatory (JAO) provides the unified leadership and management of the construction, commissioning and operation of ALMA.

ESO is the foremost intergovernmental astronomy organisation in Europe and the world’s most productive ground-based astronomical observatory by far. It has 16 Member States: Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Finland, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, along with the host state of Chile and with Australia as a Strategic Partner. ESO carries out an ambitious programme focused on the design, construction and operation of powerful ground-based observing facilities enabling astronomers to make important scientific discoveries. ESO also plays a leading role in promoting and organising cooperation in astronomical research. ESO operates three unique world-class observing sites in Chile: La Silla, Paranal and Chajnantor. At Paranal, ESO operates the Very Large Telescope and its world-leading Very Large Telescope Interferometer as well as two survey telescopes, VISTA working in the infrared and the visible-light VLT Survey Telescope. Also at Paranal ESO will host and operate the Cherenkov Telescope Array South, the world’s largest and most sensitive gamma-ray observatory. ESO is also a major partner in two facilities on Chajnantor, APEX and ALMA, the largest astronomical project in existence. And on Cerro Armazones, close to Paranal, ESO is building the 39-metre Extremely Large Telescope, the ELT, which will become “the world’s biggest eye on the sky”.

Links:

ESOcast 216 Light: ALMA Catches Beautiful Outcome of Stellar Fight
https://www.eso.org/public/videos/eso2002a/

Research paper: https://www.eso.org/public/archives/releases/sciencepapers/eso2002/eso2002a.pdf

Photos of ALMA: https://www.eso.org/public/images/archive/search/?adv=&subject_name=Atacama%20Large%20Millimeter/submillimeter%20Array

Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA): https://www.eso.org/public/teles-instr/alma/

Atacama Pathfinder EXperiment (APEX): https://www.eso.org/public/teles-instr/apex/

Images, Text, Credits: ALMA/ESO/NAOJ/NRAO, Olofsson et al. Acknowledgement: Robert Cumming/IAU and Sky & Telescope/Digitized Sky Survey 2. Acknowledgement: Davide De Martin/ESO/Bárbara Ferreira/Elizabeth Humphreys/Chalmers University of Technology Onsala/Hans Olofsson/Uppsala University/Sofia Ramstedt/Video: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO), Olofsson et al. Acknowledgement: Robert Cumming; N. Risinger (skysurvey.org), Digitized Sky Survey 2. Music: Astral Electronic.

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Station Crew Splits Up Thursday before Next Cargo Mission

ISS - Expedition 61 Mission patch.

February 4, 2020

The crew aboard the International Space Station is preparing to split up while also getting ready for a U.S. space delivery.

NASA astronaut Christina Koch is packing up and cleaning her crew quarters today ahead of her return to Earth early Thursday. She will board the Soyuz MS-13 crew ship on Wednesday about 9:30 p.m. EST with crewmates Alexander Skvortsov of Roscosmos and Luca Parmitano of ESA (European Space Agency).

Image above: Clockwise from left are, NASA astronauts Christina Koch, Andrew Morgan and Jessica Meir and ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Luca Parmitano. Parmitano is the Expedition 61 Commander leading Flight Engineers Koch, Morgan and Meir aboard the International Space Station. Image Credit: NASA.

The trio will undock Thursday at 12:50 a.m. then parachute to a landing in Kazakhstan at 4:12 a.m. (3:12 p.m. Kazakh time). NASA TV and ESA Web TV begins its live coverage Wednesday at 9 p.m. when the departing crew says farewell to their station counterparts and closes the Soyuz hatch.

Image above: Soyuz MS spacecraft infographic - Modules and Specs. Image Credit: ESA.

This will cap a 328-day-long mission for Koch that began on March 14. She is now in second place for the single longest spaceflight by a U.S. astronaut surpassed only by former astronaut Scott Kelly with 340 days during his final station mission.

Expedition 62 will officially begin when Koch and her Expedition 61 crewmates undock from the Poisk module. Continuing their stay in space will be Commander Oleg Skripochka of Roscosmos and NASA Flight Engineers Jessica Meir and Andrew Morgan. They will end their stay aboard the orbiting lab and return to Earth in April.

Image above: Soyuz MS-13 docked at the Inaternational Space Station (ISS). Image Credits: ESA/L. Parmitano, CC BY-SA 3.0 IGO

Meir and Morgan are getting ready for another mission that begins Sunday when Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus cargo craft lifts off at 5:39 p.m. It will rendezvous with the station Tuesday where the duo will be in the cupola to capture Cygnus at 3:30 a.m. with the Canadarm2 robotic arm.

Ground controllers will then remotely command the Canadarm2 to install Cygnus to the Unity module where it will stay for 90 days. Cygnus will be delivering over 8,000 pounds of new research gear and crew supplies.

Related links:

Expedition 61: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition61/index.html

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

Soyuz MS-13: https://www.nasa.gov/feature/soyuz-launches-arrivals-and-departures/

Poisk module: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/structure/elements/poisk-mini-research-module-2

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

ESA’s Web TV: https://www.esa.int/esawebtv.esa.int

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

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

Astronaut Christina Koch’s Space Station Science Scrapbook

ISS - International Space Station patch.

Feb. 3, 2020

After almost a year in space, NASA astronaut Christina Koch is coming home. When Koch returns to Earth, she will have lived in space for 328 days, setting the record for the longest single spaceflight by a woman. On Dec. 28, 2019, she surpassed the previous record of 288 days held by NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson. Her extended mission will provide researchers the opportunity to observe effects of long-duration spaceflight on a woman as the agency plans to return to the Moon under the Artemis program and prepare for human exploration at Mars. During this record-setting mission, Koch spent many of her hours on science activities aboard the space station and wore many hats: farmer, biologist, physicist, engineer, test subject and many more.

Christina Koch - Space Station Scientist

Here is a look back at Koch’s efforts as she conducted research in microgravity on Mizuna mustard greens, combustion, bioprinting and kidney diseases, among others.

Official portrait of NASA astronaut Christina Koch. Image Credit: NASA

Human Health and Performance

Astronauts facilitate and conduct numerous experiments during their missions, and they also are experiments themselves, helping us understand how the human body adapts to spaceflight. Investigations in which Koch participated as a research subject volunteer are helping provide standard baseline measurements with better health data from space that will allow researchers to compare data more accurately; evaluate strategies for improved individual and team performance; and ensure astronauts maintain healthy immune systems. Here, Koch is helping store samples for a Human Research Program experiment.

Space Crop Production

Astronauts grew leafy greens frequently during Koch’s time aboard. She conducted a number of botany studies in microgravity that will help us better understand the role of gravity and the spaceflight environment on plant biology at many levels: cellular, tissue, whole plant and community. In the bottom picture, Koch collects and packs Mizuna mustard greens grown in space. Some of the leaves were consumed by the crew as a taste test, while the rest were stowed in a science freezer for analysis on Earth. In addition to providing fresh food for the crew, results of this research will help engineers to design improved sustainable biological life support systems.

New Robotic Partners

Inside Japan's Kibo laboratory module, Koch monitors a test of the free-flying Astrobee robotic assistant. Astrobee is designed to help scientists and engineers develop and test new technologies to assist astronauts with routine chores, and give ground controllers additional eyes and ears on the space station. The set of three autonomous robots, powered by fans and vision-based navigation, perform crew monitoring, take environmental samples and assist logistics management on the orbiting laboratory.

Keeping the Flames Burning

Koch works on the Advanced Combustion via Microgravity Experiments (ACME) Chamber insert, which is attached to the maintenance work area for hardware replacement. ACME is a set of five independent studies researching how fire behaves in space with the goal of improving fuel efficiency, reducing pollutant production in combustion on Earth and preventing spacecraft fires. The crew members set up the hardware, gas bottles, etc. for each set of tests, which scientists run from Earth at NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio.

Studying Kidney Health

Although serious medical conditions caused by poor kidney health – including osteoporosis and kidney stones – could occur during spaceflight, none of these has been observed during long-duration missions. Here Koch works inside the Life Sciences Glovebox conducting research for the Kidney Cells investigation that seeks innovative treatments for kidney stones, osteoporosis and toxic chemical exposures. This experiment examines how kidney health is affected by microgravity and other factors of space travel, including water conservation and recycling, and altered diets. The results of these studies will help protect the health of astronauts and contribute to better treatments for kidney-related conditions on Earth.

One of the Coldest Places in the Universe

Koch floats through the station with science hardware in tow. The equipment is stowed inside a cargo transfer bag retrieved from the SpaceX Dragon resupply ship. The hardware is part of the Cold Atom Laboratory that produces clouds of atoms chilled to about one ten billionth of a degree above absolute zero: much colder than the average temperature of deep space. At these low temperatures, atoms have almost no motion, allowing scientists to study fundamental behaviors and quantum characteristics that are difficult or impossible to probe at higher temperatures.

The Window to the World

Here Koch looks through the station's "window to the world," the seven-windowed cupola. She was photographing landmarks as the orbiting lab flew 259 miles above the Pacific Ocean off the coast of South America. While astronauts look out this window for fun, they also use it to make valuable Earth observations such as unexpected weather events, which robotic sensing platforms cannot capture. The station is home to many Earth observation experiments and some of the highest quality optics ever flown on a human-occupied spacecraft. For example, the International Space Station Agricultural Camera (ISSAC) collected data from the red and near-infrared bands of the light spectrum to reveal changes in vegetation on the northern Great Plains far below.

Mixing It Up

Here Koch checks out hardware for the Capillary Structures experiment. The investigation studies a new method of using structures of specific shapes to manage fluid and gas mixtures for more reliable life support systems on future space missions. Capillary systems can be simpler to use than current water-purification and air-cleaning systems because they rely on specific geometric shapes and fluid dynamics rather than complex machinery. Similar technology also could be used in water recovery systems, desalination plants and other facilities on Earth.

Getting a Closer Look

Koch uses a microscope to observe and photograph growing protein crystal samples as part of the Microgravity Crystals experiment. Protein crystals grown in microgravity are larger and more organized than those grown on Earth in the presence of gravity. Understanding how and why this is can help researchers from all fields better develop, formulate, manufacture and store various products, including pharmaceuticals.

Printing Tissue

The BioFabrication Facility installed during Koch’s time on station will be tested for its ability to print organ-like tissues, taking a step toward proving the viability of making human organs in space. The orbiting laboratory is a great place to perform this type of research because printing the tiny, complex structures found inside human organs, such as capillary structures, may be done easier in microgravity since it has proven difficult so far to accomplish in Earth’s gravity environment.

Ready for Deployment

Koch works inside Japan's Kibo laboratory module setting up a small satellite deployer loaded with three CubeSats developed by the nations of Japan, Rwanda and Egypt. The deployer was placed inside Kibo's airlock before the Japanese robotic arm grappled it and moved it outside Kibo where it ejected all three CubeSats into Earth orbit.

Related links:

Christina Koch: https://www.nasa.gov/astronauts/biographies/christina-hammock-koch/biography

Astrobee: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Facility.html?#id=1891

Advanced Combustion via Microgravity Experiments (ACME): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=1651

How fire behaves in space: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/combustion-research-microgravity-clean-burning-fuel-space-station

Kidney Cells: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7819

Cold Atom Laboratory: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Facility.html?#id=7396

International Space Station Agricultural Camera (ISSAC): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=79

Capillary Structures: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7329

Microgravity Crystals: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7977

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

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, Video, Text, Credits: NASA/Michael Johnson/JSC/International Space Station Program Science Office/Morgan Re.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Station Preps for Crew Departure and New U.S. Cargo Ship

ISS - Expedition 61 Mission patch.

February 3, 2020

NASA astronaut Christina Koch and two fellow Expedition 61 crewmembers are in their final week aboard the International Space Station. The other three lab residents are gearing up for next week’s arrival of a U.S. space freighter.

Koch will wrap up a 328-day mission aboard the orbiting lab on Thursday. Koch blasted off to join the station crew on March 14 with Expedition 59-60 crewmates Nick Hague and Alexey Ovchinin. Hague and Ovchinin have since returned home on Oct. 3.

Image above: NASA astronaut Christina Koch works on the Cold Atom Lab that enables research into the quantum effects of gases chilled lower than the average temperature of the universe. Image Credit: NASA.

Koch will land in Kazakhstan Thursday at 4:12 a.m. EST (3:12 p.m. Kazakh time) aboard the Soyuz MS-13 crew ship with Alexander Skvortsov of Roscosmos and Luca Parmitano of ESA (European Space Agency). Skvortsov and Parmitano began their mission with NASA astronaut Andrew Morgan on July 20. Morgan is due to return to Earth in April.

When Koch lands, her mission-stay will be second only to former astronaut Scott Kelly. He lived aboard the station for 340 continuous days for the single longest spaceflight by a U.S. astronaut.

She and her two homebound crewmates prepared today for the flight back to Earth. The trio familiarized themselves with the return procedures and the gravity loads they will experience upon reentering Earth’s atmosphere.

Image above: Flying over Arctic Ocean, near Australia, seen by EarthCam on ISS, speed: 27'549 Km/h, altitude: 432,82 Km, image captured by Roland Berga (on Earth in Switzerland) from International Space Station (ISS) using ISS-HD Live Now application with EarthCam's from ISS on February 3, 2020 at 15:27 UTC. Image Credits: Orbiter.ch Aerospace/Roland Berga.

Expedition 62 officially begins when Koch and her crewmates undock Thursday at 12:50 a.m. Morgan and fellow NASA astronaut Jessica Meir will continue their stay in space with Commander Oleg Skripochka of Roscosmos.

Meir and Morgan are getting ready for the next Cygnus space freighter and its cargo of several tons of science experiments and crew supplies. Cygnus will launch Sunday at 5:39 p.m. and rendezvous with the station two days later for a robotic capture at 4:30 a.m.

Related links:

Expedition 61: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition61/index.html

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

Soyuz MS-13 crew ship: https://www.nasa.gov/feature/soyuz-launches-arrivals-and-departures/

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.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

NASA’s MAVEN Explores Mars to Understand Radio Interference at Earth

NASA - MAVEN Mission patch.

Feb. 3, 2020

NASA’s MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile EvolutioN) spacecraft has discovered “layers” and “rifts” in the electrically charged part of the upper atmosphere (the ionosphere) of Mars. The phenomenon is very common at Earth and causes unpredictable disruptions to radio communications. However, we do not fully understand them because they form at altitudes that are very difficult to explore at Earth. The unexpected discovery by MAVEN shows that Mars is a unique laboratory to explore and better understand this highly disruptive phenomenon.

MAVEN Explores Mars to Understand Radio Interference at Earth

Video above: NASA’s MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution) spacecraft has discovered “layers” and “rifts” in the electrically charged part of the upper atmosphere (the ionosphere) of Mars. The phenomenon is very common at Earth and causes unpredictable disruptions to radio communications. However, we do not fully understand them because they form at altitudes that are very difficult to explore at Earth. The unexpected discovery by MAVEN shows that Mars is a unique laboratory to explore and better understand this highly disruptive phenomenon. Video Credits: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

“The layers are so close above all our heads at Earth, and can be detected by anyone with a radio, but they are still quite mysterious,” says Glyn Collinson of NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, lead author of a paper on this research appearing February 3 in Nature Astronomy. “Who would have thought one of the best ways to understand them is to launch a satellite 300 million miles to Mars?”

If your favorite radio station has ever jammed or been replaced by another station, a likely cause are layers of electrically charged gas, called “plasma”, in the very upper-most region of the atmosphere, called the “ionosphere”. Forming suddenly and lasting for several hours, these layers act like giant mirrors in the sky, causing radio signals from far away to bounce over the horizon where they can interfere with local transmissions, like two people trying to talk over one another. The layers also can cause interference with radio communications by aircraft and shipping, and can blind military radar.

Image above: Graphic illustrating radio signals from a remote station (bent purple line) interfering with a local station (black tower) after being reflected off a plasma layer in the ionosphere. Image Credits: NASA Goddard/CI lab.

At Earth, the layers form at an altitude of about 60 miles (approximately 100km) where the air is too thin for an aircraft to fly, but too thick for any satellite to orbit. The only way to reach them is with a rocket, but these missions last only tens of minutes before falling back to Earth. “We’ve known they exist for over 80 years, but we know so little about what goes on inside them, because no satellite can get low enough to reach the layers,” says Collinson, “at least, no satellite at Earth”.

At Mars, spacecraft such as MAVEN can orbit at lower altitudes and can sample these features directly. MAVEN carries several scientific instruments that measure plasmas in the atmosphere and space around Mars. Recent measurements from one of these instruments detected unexpected sudden spikes in the abundance of plasma as it flew through the Martian ionosphere. Joe Grebowsky, former MAVEN project scientist at NASA Goddard, immediately recognized the spike from his previous experience with rocket flights through the layers at Earth. Not only had MAVEN discovered that such layers can occur at other planets than Earth, but the new results reveal that Mars offers what Earth cannot, a place where we can reliably explore these layers with satellites.



Image above: Graphic illustrating the MAVEN spacecraft encountering plasma layers at Mars. Image Credits: NASA Goddard/CI lab.

“The low altitudes observable by MAVEN will fill in a great gap in our understanding of this region on both Mars and Earth, with really significant discoveries to be had,” says Grebowsky, a co-author on the paper.

MAVEN observations are already overturning many of our existing ideas about the phenomena: MAVEN has discovered that the layers also have a mirror-opposite, a “rift”, where plasma is less abundant. The existence of such “rifts” in nature was completely unknown before their discovery at Mars by MAVEN, and overturns existing scientific models which say they cannot form. Additionally, unlike at Earth where the layers are short-lived and unpredictable, the Martian layers are surprisingly long-lived and persistent.

These new discoveries already have given us a better understanding of the fundamental processes that underpin these layers, and future exploration at Mars will allow us to build better scientific models of how they form. While, much like the weather, we cannot stop them from forming, perhaps someday the new insights from Mars may help us to forecast them at Earth, meaning more reliable radio communication for us all.

This research was funded by the MAVEN mission. MAVEN's principal investigator is based at the University of Colorado's Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics, and NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the MAVEN project. Partner institutions include Lockheed Martin, the University of California at Berkeley, and NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. NASA is exploring our Solar System and beyond, uncovering worlds, stars, and cosmic mysteries near and far with our powerful fleet of space and ground-based missions.

Related links:

Nature Astronomy: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550-019-0984-8

MAVEN (Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/maven/main/index.html

Video (mentioned), Images (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Bill Steigerwald/Nancy Jones/Goddard Space Flight Center, by Glyn Collinson.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Space Station Science Highlights: Week of January 27, 2020

ISS - Expedition 61 Mission patch.

Feb. 02, 2020

Scientific investigations taking place aboard the International Space Station the week of Jan. 27 included studies of hardening arteries and recycling in space. NASA astronaut Andrew Morgan and Luca Parmitano of ESA (European Space Agency) completed the fourth and final spacewalk to repair the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS-02) on Jan. 25 – a record-breaking ninth spacewalk for the Expedition 61 crew – and the Cygnus cargo craft departed the space station on Jan. 31. After its departure, Cygnus used the SlingShot system to deploy eight CubeSats studying different optical and communication technologies as well as atmospheric and natural phenomena.

Space to Ground: Luca's Record: 01/31/2020

Now in its 20th year of continuous human presence, the space station provides a platform for long-duration research in microgravity and for learning to live and work in space. Experience gained on the orbiting lab supports Artemis, NASA’s program to go forward to the Moon and on to Mars.

Here are details on some of the microgravity investigations currently taking place:

Monitoring blood vessel changes

Some crew members returning from their time on the space station have much stiffer arteries than when they went into space. An investigation sponsored by the Canadian Space Agency (CSA), Vascular Echo, examines changes in blood vessels and the heart while crew members are in space and their recovery after return to Earth. The results could provide insight into potential countermeasures to help maintain the health of crew members in space and to improve quality of life for people on Earth. The crew conducted scans and blood pressure measurements for the investigation during the week.

Recycling in space

Ground teams successfully initiated and completed the first of five sample prints using material already recycled once on the ground for Refabricator. This investigation demonstrates a process for repeated closed-loop recycling of a material for additive manufacturing or 3D printing in space. The technology eventually could allow crews on long space missions to keep reusing waste plastic materials for 3D printing, enabling sustainable fabrication and repair of tools and hardware and reducing waste. Refabricator represents a key component of NASA's In-Space Manufacturing (ISM) technology development.

During the week, the crew also installed hardware for another recycling technology, the Made in Space - Recycler. It creates 3D printer filament from polymer materials and parts that have reached the end of their useful lives. Recycling would reduce the weight and mass of supplies that must be brought into space from Earth, important for deep space missions.

Answering burning questions

Animation above: Image from operations for the Combined Combustion investigation, which studies flame spread in confined spaces, where it may pose a more serious hazard than in open spaces. Microgravity allows scientists to better study the underlying physics of flame spread. Animation Credit: NASA.

The Confined Combustion investigation studies flame spread in confined spaces, specifically the interactions between spreading flames and surrounding walls. Flame spread in spaces such as buildings and vehicles may pose a more serious hazard than it does in open spaces. Because gravity complicates the process of fire growth, microgravity allows scientists to better study the underlying physics of flame spread. Crew members conducted operations for the experiment using different materials and baffle types.

Other investigations on which the crew performed work:

- Food Acceptability examines the effect of repetitive consumption of the food currently available during spaceflight. “Menu fatigue” from a limited choice of foods over time may contribute to the loss of body mass often experienced by crew members, potentially affecting astronaut health, especially as mission length increases.
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7562

- Standard Measures captures an ongoing, optimized set of measures from crew members to characterize how their bodies adapt to living in space. Researchers use these measures to create a data repository for high-level monitoring of the effectiveness of countermeasures and better interpretation of health and performance outcomes.
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7711

Image above: NASA astronaut Christina Koch works on the Cold Atom Lab (CAL), which enables research into the quantum effects of gases chilled to nearly absolute zero, colder than the average temperature of the universe. Image Credit: NASA.

- The Cold Atom Laboratory (CAL) produces clouds of atoms chilled to temperatures much colder than deep space so scientists can study fundamental behaviors and quantum characteristics that are difficult or impossible to probe at higher temperatures.
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Facility.html?#id=7396

- Astronauts show accelerated arterial stiffening, thicker artery walls, and other aging-like changes after spending six months in space. Vascular Aging monitors these changes using artery ultrasounds, blood samples, and other measures to identify risk and possible mechanisms for reducing that risk.
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7644

- The ISS Experience creates virtual reality videos from footage taken by astronauts of different aspects of crew life, execution of science and the international partnerships involved on the space station.
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7877

- The Structure and Response of Spherical Diffusion Flames (s-Flame), part of the ACME project, advances prediction of the structure and dynamics of soot-free and sooty flames. Results could contribute to engines with improved efficiency and reduced emissions on Earth.
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=2063

https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=1651

Image above: Plant pillows at Kennedy Space Center’s Space Station Processing Facility packed and ready for their upcoming flight on Northrop Grumman’s 13th resupply services (NG-13) mission. The pillows, a common method used to grow plants in space, are part of a series of VEG-03 experiments studying the growth of three types of leafy greens in a microgravity environment. Image Credit: NASA.

- Veggie Monitoring collects microbial samples from the surface of the station’s plant production system to help establish requirements to protect these systems, plants and crew from contamination on future long exploration missions.
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7949

Image above: The AstroRad vest floating inside the space station before a crew member puts in on to test fit, range of motion and other factors. The vest could help protect crew members from space radiation on missions to the Moon and Mars. Image Credit: NASA.

- For AstroRad, crew members provide feedback on a vest designed to protect them from radiation caused by unpredictable solar particle events (SPEs), including how easy the vest is to put on, fit and feel, and range of motion allowed.
https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7803

Related links:

Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS-02): https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=729

SlingShot: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Facility.html?#id=7847

Vascular Echo: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=1664

Refabricator: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7321

Made in Space - Recycler: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7745

Confined Combustion: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7886

ISS National Lab: https://www.issnationallab.org/

Spot the Station: https://spotthestation.nasa.gov/

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), Animation (mentioned), Video, Text, Credits: NASA/Carrie Gilder/John Love, Lead Increment Scientist Expedition 61.

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