SpaceX Cargo Craft Attached to Station

ISS - Expedition 59 Mission patch.

May 6, 2019

Two days after its launch from Florida, the SpaceX Dragon cargo spacecraft was installed on the Earth-facing side of the International Space Station’s Harmony module at 9:32 a.m. EDT.

The 17th contracted commercial resupply mission from SpaceX (CRS-17) delivers more than 5,500 pounds of research, crew supplies and hardware to the orbiting laboratory.

Image above: May 6, 2019: International Space Station Configuration. Six spaceships are docked at the space station including the SpaceX Dragon, Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus space freighter and Russia’s Progress 71 and 72 resupply ships and the Soyuz MS-11 and MS-12 crew ships. Image Credit: NASA.

Here’s some of the science arriving at station:

Scientists are using a new technology called tissue chips, which could help predict the effectiveness of potential medicines in humans. Fluid that mimics blood can be passed through the chip to simulate blood flow, and can include drugs or toxins. In microgravity, changes occur in human health and human cells that resemble accelerated aging and disease processes. This investigation allows scientists to make observations over the course of a few weeks in microgravity rather than the months it would take in a laboratory on Earth.

The Hermes facility allows scientists to study the dusty, fragmented debris covering asteroids and moons, called regolith. Once installed by astronauts on the space station, scientists will be able to take over the experiment from Earth to study how regolith particles behave in response to long-duration exposure to microgravity, including changes to pressure, temperate and shocks from impacts and other forces. The investigations will provide insight into the formation and behavior of asteroids, comets, impact dynamics and planetary evolution.

International Space Station (ISS). Animation Credit: NASA

These are just a few of the hundreds of investigations that will help us learn how to keep astronauts healthy during long-duration space travel and demonstrate technologies for future human and robotic exploration beyond low-Earth orbit to the Moon and Mars. Space station research also provides opportunities for other U.S. government agencies, private industry, and academic and research institutions to conduct microgravity research that leads to new technologies, medical treatments, and products that improve life on Earth.

After Dragon spends approximately one month attached to the space station, the spacecraft will return to Earth with about XX pounds of cargo and research.

Busy Monday as Astronauts Grapple Dragon and Store Critical Experiments

This morning, just two days following its nighttime launch from the Florida coast, SpaceX’s Dragon cargo spacecraft was captured and installed on the Earth-facing side of the International Space Station’s Harmony module at 9:32 a.m. EDT.

Expedition 59 astronauts David Saint-Jacques of the Canadian Space Agency and Nick Hague of NASA successfully employed the space station’s robotic arm to grapple Dragon at 7:01 a.m., which brings the number of spaceships docked at the space station to six. Other vehicles visiting include Russia’s Progress 71 and 72 resupply ships and the Soyuz MS-11 and MS-12 crew ships, as well as Northrop Grumman’s Cygnus space freighter.

Image above: At the Mission Control Center in Houston, Expedition 59 flight controllers monitor the capture and berthing of the SpaceX Dragon cargo craft to the Harmony module of the International Space Station on May 6. Image Credits: NASA/Josh Valcarcel.

Dragon’s arrival heralds a busy week for the crew. Today, NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Christina Koch unpacked and activated time-critical experiments after completing checkout of the spacecraft. Fresh biological samples, such as kidney cells, were stowed in science freezers and incubators for later analysis. New lab mice were also quickly transferred and housed in specialized habitats to enhance research for an immune system study that aims to keep astronauts healthy for long-duration missions in space, which will become even more commonplace as our destinations extend to the Moon and beyond.

SpaceX’s 17th cargo flight to the space station under NASA’s Commercial Resupply Services contract supports dozens of new and existing investigations. NASA’s research and development work aboard the space station contributes to the agency’s deep space exploration plans, including returning astronauts to the Moon’s surface in five years.

Related articles:

Astronaut Commands Robotic Arm to Capture Dragon Cargo Craft
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2019/05/astronaut-commands-robotic-arm-to.html

SpaceX Dragon Heads to Space Station After Successful Launch
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2019/05/spacex-dragon-heads-to-space-station.html

Drone Ship Power Issue Forces Scrub of CRS-17 Launch
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2019/05/drone-ship-power-issue-forces-scrub-of_48.html

Hermes to Bring Asteroid Research to the ISS
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2019/04/hermes-to-bring-asteroid-research-to-iss.html

Dragon’s 17th Flight Carries Science to the Space Station
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2019/04/dragons-17th-flight-carries-science-to.html

Related links:

Expedition 59: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/expeditions/expedition59/index.html

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

Immune system study: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/explorer/Investigation.html?#id=7868

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

Moon and Mars: https://www.nasa.gov/topics/moon-to-mars

Images (mentioned), Animation (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Norah Moran.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

NASA’s First Planetary Defense Technology Demonstration to Collide with Asteroid in 2022

NASA logo.

May 6, 2019

The Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) – NASA’s first mission to demonstrate a planetary defense technique – will get one chance to hit its target, the small moonlet in the binary asteroid system Didymos. The asteroid poses no threat to Earth and is an ideal test target: measuring the change in how the smaller asteroid orbits about the larger asteroid in a binary system is much easier than observing the change in a single asteroid's orbit around the Sun. Work is ramping up at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, and other locations across the country, as the mission heads toward its summer 2021 launch – and attempts to pull off a feat so far seen only in science fiction films.

Image Credits: Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory

Observing Didymos

To navigate the DART spacecraft to its intended target – a binary asteroid that consists of a small moon (Didymos B) orbiting a larger body (Didymos A) – scientists need to understand how the system behaves. Scientists have been making efforts to observe Didymos from Earth since 2015, and now, an international campaign coordinated by Northern Arizona University’s Cristina Thomas, DART’s Observing Working Group Lead, is making critical observations using powerful telescopes worldwide to understand the state of the asteroid system before DART reaches it. Current observations will help researchers to better understand the extent of the impact made when DART slams into its target – Didymos B – in September 2022.  

The most recent observation campaign took place on Cerro Paranal in northern Chile, where scientists viewed Didymos using the Very Large Telescope, which is run by the European Southern Observatory. The “VLT” comprises four telescopes, each with 8.2-meter mirrors; two of them were used in the recent observations. 

“The Didymos system is too small and too far to be seen as anything more than a point of light, but we can get the data we need by measuring the brightness of that point of light, which changes as Didymos A rotates and Didymos B orbits,” said APL’s Andy Rivkin, DART investigation team co-lead, who participated in the observations. The brightness changes indicate when the smaller moon, Didymos B, passes in front of or is hidden behind Didymos A from our point of view. These observations will help scientists determine the location of Didymos B about Didymos A and inform the exact timing of DART’s impact to maximize the deflection.

The investigation team will observe Didymos again from late 2020 into the spring of 2021.  Final ground-based observations will occur as the spacecraft travels toward the asteroid, as well as after impact occurs.

Research with Impact

The telescope observations are key to understanding Didymos, but they’re not quite enough to fully understand Didymos B, DART’s target. 

“Even though we are performing ground-based observations, we don’t know much about Didymos B in terms of composition and structure,” said Angela Stickle, DART’s Impact Simulation Working Group Lead from APL.  “We need to anticipate a wide range of possibilities and predict their outcomes, so that after DART slams into Didymos B we’ll know what our measurements are telling us.”

Structure is essential to the equation; in Didymos, researchers aren’t sure whether DART will impact an asteroid composed of solid rock, loose rubble or something “softer,” more akin to sand.  A softer surface would absorb more of DART’s force and may not be pushed as drastically as if DART hit a harder surface.

Extensive modeling and simulation, part of a large international campaign that started in 2014, is being done in conjunction with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and other members of the investigation team to help researchers predict what will happen to DART’s target after impact.  They’ve considered these various factors—along with the added momentum from DART’s impact and the resulting debris ejected from the crater it creates – as they’ve run various simulations. These simulations help the team shape its expectations for impact.

Eyes on DART and Didymos

Researchers will have the ability to eventually see the Didymos asteroid system close-up – albeit briefly – thanks to DART’s onboard DRACO imager and a planned ride-along CubeSat, the Italian Space Agency’s LICIACube.

Released just before impact, the shoebox-sized LICIACube would document DART’s impact and its aftermath. The CubeSat recently passed its preliminary design review and has moved into the next phase of development. 

DRACO – the Didymos Reconnaissance and Asteroid Camera for Op-nav – is DART’s only onboard instrument. It will serve primarily as DART’s optical navigation system, capturing images that help the spacecraft reach its target.

DRACO will feed its images into the APL-developed Small-body Maneuvering Autonomous Real-Time Navigation (SMART Nav) algorithm – the system that, in the spacecraft’s final hours, will precisely and automatically guide DART into Didymos B. SMART Nav is preparing to undergo a series of tests on simulated spacecraft avionics, which will boost engineers’ confidence that the system will be ready to operate successfully when the mission will be relying on it.

Wired for Success

While much of the work on DART so far has been modeling and simulation, many parts of the spacecraft have started to take shape.  A full-scale mock-up of DART now serves as a placeholder for the assembly of cables and connectors that will eventually make up the wiring harness. The mission has signed off on the manufacturing of several flight hardware components, specifically the spacecraft’s solar arrays—which passed the critical design review stage—as well as the radio and power system electronics.

In a recent design change, DART will now be able to complete its mission by relying on small hydrazine thrusters in addition to having the ability to utilize the electric propulsion system, NASA’s Evolutionary Xenon Thruster Commercial (NEXT-C) ion engine, which will also push the start of the primary launch window to July of 2021, shortening the mission flight time.  “For a mission that relies on one chance, it’s a move that will provide DART with more options to ensure it hits its mark,” said Ed Reynolds, DART project manager at APL.

NASA recently selected the SpaceX Falcon 9 to send DART on its mission. Read more about it here: https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-awards-launch-services-contract-for-asteroid-redirect-test-mission

Asteroids: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/asteroids/main/index.html

Image (mentioned), Text, Credits: NASA/Tricia Talbert/Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory/Justyna Surowiec.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

For InSight, Dust Cleanings Will Yield New Science

NASA - InSight Mission patch.

May 6, 2019

Image above: This is NASA InSight's second full selfie on Mars. Since taking its first selfie, the lander has removed its heat probe and seismometer from its deck, placing them on the Martian surface; a thin coating of dust now covers the spacecraft as well. Image Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech.

The same winds that blanket Mars with dust can also blow that dust away. Catastrophic dust storms have the potential to end a mission, as with NASA's Opportunity rover. But far more often, passing winds cleared off the rover's solar panels and gave it an energy boost. Those dust clearings allowed Opportunity and its sister rover, Spirit, to survive for years beyond their 90-day expiration dates.

Dust clearings are also expected for Mars' newest inhabitant, the InSight lander. Because of the spacecraft's weather sensors, each clearing can provide crucial science data on these events, as well — and the mission already has a glimpse at that.

On Feb. 1, the 65th Martian day, or sol, of the mission, InSight detected a passing wind vortex (also known as a dust devil if it picks up dust and becomes visible; InSight's cameras didn't catch the vortex in this case). At the same time, the lander's two large solar panels experienced very small bumps in power — about 0.7% on one panel and 2.7% on the other — suggesting a tiny amount of dust was lifted.

Images above: Two images to compare the before and after of NASA InSight's selfie on Mars. Images Credits: NASA/JPL-Caltech.

Those are whispers compared to cleanings observed by the Spirit and Opportunity rovers, where dust-clearing wind gusts occasionally boosted power by as much as 10% and left solar panels visibly cleaner. But the recent event has given scientists their first measurements of wind and dust interacting "live" on the Martian surface; none of NASA's solar-powered rovers have included meteorological sensors that record so much round-the-clock data. In time, data from dust cleanings could inform the design of solar-powered missions as well as research on how wind sculpts the landscape.

"It didn't make a significant difference to our power output, but this first event is fascinating science," said InSight science team member Ralph Lorenz of Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland. "It gives us a starting point for understanding how the wind is driving changes on the surface. We still don't really know how much wind it takes to lift dust on Mars."

Engineers regularly calculate a "dust factor," a measure of how much dust is covering the panels, when analyzing InSight's solar power. While they saw no change in dust factor around the time of this passing dust devil, they saw a clear increase in electrical current, suggesting it did lift a little bit of dust.

Key to measuring these cleanings are InSight's weather sensors, collectively known as the Auxiliary Payload Sensor Suite, or APSS. During this first dust event, APSS saw a steady increase in wind speed and a sharp drop in air pressure — the signature of a passing dust devil.

The wind direction changed by about 180 degrees, which would be expected if a dust devil had passed directly over the lander. APSS measured a peak wind speed of 45 miles per hour (20 meters per second). But it also detected the biggest air pressure drop ever recorded by a Mars surface mission: 9 pascals, or 13% of ambient pressure. That pressure drop suggests there may have been even stronger winds that were too turbulent for sensors to record.

"The absolute fastest wind we've directly measured so far from InSight was 63 miles per hour (28 meters per second), so the vortex that lifted dust off our solar panels was among the strongest winds we've seen," said InSight participating scientist Aymeric Spiga of the Dynamic Meteorology Laboratory at Sorbonne University in Paris. "Without a passing vortex, the winds are more typically between about 4-20 miles per hour (2-10 meters per second), depending on time of day."

This dust lifting happened at 1:33 p.m. local Mars time, which is also consistent with the detection of a dust devil. On both Mars and Earth, the highest levels of dust devil activity are usually seen between about noon and 3 p.m., when the intensity of sunlight is strongest and the ground is hot compared with the air above it.

InSight landed on Nov. 26, 2018, in Elysium Planitia, a windy region on the Martian equator. The lander has already detected many passing dust devils, and Lorenz said it's likely the spacecraft will see a number of large dust cleanings over the course of its two-year prime mission.

Each of InSight's dinner-table-size solar panels has gathered a thin dust layer since landing. Their power output has fallen about 30% since then, due both to dust as well as Mars to moving farther from the Sun. Today the panels produce about 2,700 watt-hours per sol — plenty of energy for daily operations, which require roughly 1,500 watt-hours per sol.

The mission's power engineers are still waiting for the kind of dust cleaning Spirit and Opportunity experienced. But even if they don't see one for a while, they have ample power.

About InSight

JPL manages InSight for NASA's Science Mission Directorate. InSight is part of NASA's Discovery Program, managed by the agency's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. Lockheed Martin Space in Denver built the InSight spacecraft, including its cruise stage and lander, and supports spacecraft operations for the mission.

A number of European partners, including France's Centre National d'Études Spatiales (CNES) and the German Aerospace Center (DLR), are supporting the InSight mission. CNES provided the Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure (SEIS) instrument to NASA, with the principal investigator at IPGP (Institut de Physique du Globe de Paris). Significant contributions for SEIS came from IPGP; the Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research (MPS) in Germany; the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich) in Switzerland; Imperial College London and Oxford University in the United Kingdom; and JPL. DLR provided the Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package ((HP³) instrument, with significant contributions from the Space Research Center (CBK) of the Polish Academy of Sciences and Astronika in Poland. Spain's Centro de Astrobiología (CAB) supplied the temperature and wind sensors.

Related links:

Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure (SEIS): https://mars.nasa.gov/insight/mission/instruments/seis/

Heat Flow and Physical Properties Package (HP³): https://mars.nasa.gov/insight/mission/instruments/hp3/

For more information about InSight, visit: https://mars.nasa.gov/insight/

For more information about Mars, visit: https://mars.nasa.gov

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

Best regards, Orbiter.ch

Recognising sustainable behaviour

ESA - Clean Space logo.

6 May 2019

Solving the growing problem of space debris will require everyone who flies rockets and satellites to adhere to sustainable practices, which doesn’t always happen. Now there will be a way to recognise those who do.

Distribution of space debris in orbit around Earth

We increasingly rely on satellites for every-day activities like navigation, weather forecasting and telecommunications, and any loss of these space-based services could have a serious effect on our modern economies.

Yet vital orbital pathways around Earth are becoming more congested with trash, such as abandoned satellites and rocket upper stages or debris fragments from old satellites that have exploded.

“There are numerous debris reduction and mitigation guidelines that can be applied at the design, manufacturing, launching, operating or disposal stage of any mission, but the challenge has been getting the global community to apply these in a consistent way,” says Holger Krag, Head of ESA’s Space Debris Office.

“Applying these guidelines generally adds cost or reduces the useful life of a satellite, even if only slightly, so it’s always been a tough sell,” says Holger.

Clean Space: how to build a satellite that won’t end up as dangerous debris

In a bid to address this issue, and to foster global standards in debris mitigation, the World Economic Forum will work with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Media Lab and ESA to launch a new ‘Space Sustainability Rating’ (SSR), a concept initiated by the Forum’s Global Future Council on Space Technologies.

“The global economy depends on our ability to operate satellites safely in order to fly in planes, prepare for severe weather, broadcast television and study our changing climate,” says Danielle Wood, founder and director MIT Media Lab’s Space Enabled research group.

“In order to continue using satellites in orbit around Earth for years to come, we need to ensure that the environment around Earth is as free as possible from trash leftover from previous missions.”

International Collaboration

The new rating system will also be supported by Bryce Space and Technology, a firm providing services in strategy, market analytics and policy for the space industry with offices in the US and UK, and a team from the University of Texas at Austin, USA with expertise in orbital dynamics and space law.

Similar to rating systems such as the LEED certification used by the construction industry, the Space Sustainability Rating aims to ensure long-term sustainability by encouraging and rewarding responsible behaviour amongst all space actors, including designers, manufacturers, launch providers, spacecraft operators and even government agencies.

Debris analysts at work

“Together with our collaborators, we aim to put in place a system that has the flexibility to stimulate and drive innovative sustainable design solutions,” says Stijn Lemmens, a senior space debris mitigation analyst at ESA.

“We also aim to put in the spotlight those missions that contribute positively to the space environment.”

Today, there are more than 22 000 debris objects regularly tracked in orbit using radars and other methods, and any one of these could damage or destroy a functioning satellite if a collision were to occur.

In 2018, ESA-operated satellites had to conduct 27 debris avoidance manoeuvres, a number that is growing year by year.

Sentinel-1A fragment impact in space

Later this year, ESA Member States will consider a range of new proposals related to space debris at the Space19+ council meeting. These include developing and demonstrating an automated collision avoidance system, an urgent need in view of the enormous constellations of small satellites that will be deployed by commercial companies in the next few years, and developing a European industrial capacity to conduct in-orbit servicing by flying a first-of-its-kind debris-removal mission.

The new SSR initiative is to be announced today at the Satellite 2019 conference in Washington, D.C., an international forum for companies, academia and agencies working in space.

Editor’s note: ESA’s 2019 Space Debris Environment report is available here: https://www.sdo.esoc.esa.int/environment_report/

Related links:

Satellite 2019 conference: https://satellite19.mapyourshow.com/8_0/sessions/session-details.cfm?scheduleid=93

LEED certification: http://leed.usgbc.org/leed.html

Bryce Space and Technology: https://www.brycetech.com/services.html

Space Enabled research group: https://www.media.mit.edu/groups/space-enabled/overview/

Global Future Council on Space Technologies: https://www.weforum.org/communities/the-future-of-space-technologies

Media Lab: https://www.media.mit.edu/

ESA Clean Space: https://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Safety/Clean_Space

Videos, Images, Text, Credits: ESA/Genevieve Porter/R. Palmari/Ecole Estienne Paris/Marianne Tricot.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

Astronaut Commands Robotic Arm to Capture Dragon Cargo Craft

SpaceX - Dragon CRS-17 Mission patch.

May 6, 2019

While the International Space Station was traveling over the north Atlantic Ocean, astronauts David Saint-Jacques of the Canadian Space Agency and Nick Hague of NASA grappled Dragon at 7:01 a.m. EDT using the space station’s robotic arm Canadarm2.

Ground controllers will now send commands to begin the robotic installation of the spacecraft on bottom of the station’s Harmony module. NASA Television coverage of installation is scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. Watch online at http://www.nasa.gov/live.

Image above: The SpaceX Dragon CRS-17 Cargo Craft captured and attached to the CanadaArm2. Image Credit: NASA TV.

The Dragon lifted off on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida Saturday, May 4 with more than 5,500 pounds of research, equipment, cargo and supplies that will support dozens of investigations aboard the orbiting laboratory.

Here’s some of the research arriving at station:

NASA’s Orbiting Carbon Observatory-3 (OCO-3) examines the complex dynamics of Earth’s atmospheric carbon cycle by collecting measurements to track variations in a specific type of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Understanding carbon sources can aid in forecasting increased atmospheric heat retention and reduce its long-term risks.

SpaceX CRS-17: Dragon capture

The Photobioreactor investigation aims to demonstrate how microalgae can be used together with existing life support systems on the space station to improve recycling of resources. The cultivation of microalgae for food, and as part of a life support system to generate oxygen and consume carbon dioxide, could be helpful in future long-duration exploration missions, as it could reduce the amount of consumables required from Earth.

Related articles:

SpaceX Dragon Heads to Space Station After Successful Launch
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2019/05/spacex-dragon-heads-to-space-station.html

Drone Ship Power Issue Forces Scrub of CRS-17 Launch
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2019/05/drone-ship-power-issue-forces-scrub-of_48.html

Hermes to Bring Asteroid Research to the ISS
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2019/04/hermes-to-bring-asteroid-research-to-iss.html

Dragon’s 17th Flight Carries Science to the Space Station
https://orbiterchspacenews.blogspot.com/2019/04/dragons-17th-flight-carries-science-to.html

Related links:

Orbiting Carbon Observatory-3 (OCO-3): https://ocov3.jpl.nasa.gov/

Photobioreactor: https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/news/photobioreactor-better-life-support

SpaceX: http://www.nasa.gov/spacex

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

For updates during the mission, visit https://www.nasa.gov/commercialresupply.

Image (mentioned), Video, Text, Credits: NASA/Norah Moran/NASA TV/SciNews.

Greetibgs, Orbiter.ch

Long March-4B launches two Tianhui II-01 satellites

CASC - China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation logo.

May 4, 2019

Image above: A Long March 4B rocket lifts off Tuesday from the Taiyuan space center in northeastern China. Image Credit: Xinhua.

A Long March-4B launch vehicle launched two Tianhui II-01 satellites from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, Shanxi Province, northern China, on 29 April 2019, at 22:52 UTC (30 April, 06:52 local time).

Long March-4B launches two Tianhui II-01 satellites

According to official sources, the Tianhui II-01 satellites will be used for scientific experiments, land resource surveys, geographic surveys, and mapping.

 Tianhui mapping satellite. Image Credit: Günter Space Page

The three-stage Long March 4B rocket, standing nearly 15 stories tall, turned south from Taiyuan, dropping its spent rocket bodies on Chinese territory. The Long March 4B’s upper stage delivered the two Tianhui mapping satellites to an orbit more than 310 miles (500 kilometers) high, with an inclination of 97.5 degrees to the equator, according to U.S. military tracking data.

For more information about China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC): http://english.spacechina.com/n16421/index.html

Images (mentioned), Video, Text, Credits: CASC/China Central Television (CCTV)/SciNews.

Greetings, Orbiter.ch

LS2 Report: before the return of the cold

CERN - European Organization for Nuclear Research logo.

May 4, 2019

Since the start of January, the liquid helium flowing through the veins of the LHC’s cooling system has gradually been removed from the accelerator and, one by one, the eight sectors of the LHC have been brought back to room temperature. “It takes about four weeks to bring a single sector from its nominal temperature of 1.9 K (-271°C) back to room temperature,” explains Krzysztof Brodzinski, an engineer working on the operation of the LHC’s cryogenic system. At least 135 tonnes of helium are required to supply the whole of the LHC’s cryogenic system. Once it has been brought up to the surface, some of this precious cooling agent is stored at CERN and the remainder (about 80 tonnes) is entrusted to the suppliers for the duration of LS2.

Image above: One of the LHC cold boxes, located in an underground cavern at point 4 of the ring. Liquid helium is stabilised and stored in a tank at a temperature of approximately 4.5 K (Image: CERN).

The 70 helium compressors are the first links in the LHC’s cryogenic chain. They compress the helium, which is then cooled through expansion in the turbines of the cold boxes. During LS2, all the compressors will be sent away for a full service, mostly to two specialist centres, in Germany and Sweden. “Each of the 70 compressors must be taken apart and then reassembled, in order to check the condition of all parts and make replacements if necessary,” explains Gérard Ferlin, leader of the Operations section in the Cryogenics group. “The 70 electric motors that power the compressors will be sent to Italy to be serviced.”

As for the cold compressors used to lower the temperature of the helium from 4.5 K to 1.9 K, they’re off to Japan. Six of them (of the 28 in the accelerator) showed signs of weakness after the last four years of LHC running and need to be worked on by specialists.

Graphic above: Schedule for warming up all the LHC sectors for LS2 (Image: CERN).

Of course, here at CERN too, the Cryogenics group has a lot on its plate: over 4000 preventive and corrective maintenance operations are planned between now and mid-2020, when cooling of the first sectors of the LHC will start all over again! “Many maintenance operations have been planned for a long time, particularly on the LHC’s eight cold boxes (one per sector). The sensors, thermometers, valves, turbines, filters, etc. will be checked and validated or replaced,” explains Gérard Ferlin. “We will also use the opportunity of LS2 to do some advance upgrades of one of the cold boxes with a view to increasing its power ready for the HL-LHC.”

Throughout LS2, the instrumentation team in the Cryogenics group will also support the DISMAC (Diode Insulation and Superconducting Magnets Consolidation – an article on this subject is coming soon) project team, particularly for the validation of the instrumentation of the cryogenic system. This is especially important given that certain magnets are being replaced and new diagnostic instrumentation is being installed on a pre-determined selection of beam screens.

Note:

CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, is one of the world’s largest and most respected centres for scientific research. Its business is fundamental physics, finding out what the Universe is made of and how it works. At CERN, the world’s largest and most complex scientific instruments are used to study the basic constituents of matter — the fundamental particles. By studying what happens when these particles collide, physicists learn about the laws of Nature.

The instruments used at CERN are particle accelerators and detectors. Accelerators boost beams of particles to high energies before they are made to collide with each other or with stationary targets. Detectors observe and record the results of these collisions.

Founded in 1954, the CERN Laboratory sits astride the Franco–Swiss border near Geneva. It was one of Europe’s first joint ventures and now has 23 Member States.

For more information about European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), Visit: https://home.cern/

Image (mentioned), Graphic (mentioned), Text, Credits: CERN/Anaïs Schaeffer.

Best regards, Orbiter.ch