AlphaRocketry

  SpaceX will reach the surface of the moon a bit ahead of schedule, it turns out. Elon Musk's company is providing the landing system for the first crewed touchdown of NASA's Artemis lunar exploration program, a milestone that the agency hopes to achieve in 2025. But a piece of SpaceX hardware will hit the gray dirt far sooner than that — in just five weeks or so. Satellite trackers have determined that the upper stage of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket that launched in February 2015 will slam into the moon on March 4, Ars Technica's Eric Berger reported on Monday (Jan. 24). The observers were led by Bill Gray, who runs Project Pluto, a company that supplies software to professional and amateur astro The rocket in question launched the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR), a joint effort of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA. DSCOVR studies our planet and the space weather environment from the Earth-sun Lagrange Point 1 (L1), a gravitationa...

Qualification testing of VIKAS Engine for Gaganyaan Programme Today, January 20, 2022, High Thrust VIKAS Engine for Gaganyaan programme has successfully undergone qualification test for a duration of 25 seconds at ISRO Propulsion Complex (IPRC), Mahendragiri, Tamil Nadu. With regard to the Vikas engine qualification for the Gaganyaan Programme, two engines have already undergone tests under nominal operating conditions for a total duration of 480 seconds. The test carried out today is to verify the robustness of the engine by operating beyond its nominal operating conditions (fuel-oxidiser ratio and chamber pressure). The performance of the engine met the test objectives and the engine parameters were closely matching with the predictions during the entire duration of the test. Further, three more tests are planned for a cumulative duration of 75 seconds under varying operating conditions. Subsequently, another high thrust Vikas engine will undergo a long-duration test for 240 ...

NASA's Curiosity rover has found some interesting organic compounds on the Red Planet that could be signs of ancient Mars life, but it will take a lot more work to test that hypothesis. Some of the powdered rock samples that Curiosity has collected over the years contain organics rich in a type of carbon that here on Earth is associated with life, researchers report in a new study.  But Mars is very different from our world, and many Martian processes remain mysterious. So it's too early to know what generated the intriguing chemicals, study team members stressed. "We're finding things on Mars that are tantalizingly interesting, but we would really need more evidence to say we've identified life," Paul Mahaffy, who served as the principal investigator of Curiosity's Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) chemistry lab until retiring from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, in December 2021, said in a statement. "So we'...

  A composite image of the effects of our Milky Way galaxy's monster black hole. (Image credit: NASA, ESA, and Gerald Cecil (UNC-Chapel Hill); Image Processing: Joseph DePasquale (STScI)) The supermassive black hole at the center of our Milky Way galaxy is leaking. The Milky Way's central black hole, known as Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*), has been "leaking" or emitting jet-like superheated beams for several thousand years. In a composite image captured with the Hubble Space Telescope, researchers have revealed bright X-ray radiation as well as bright clouds of molecular gas and heated ionized gas near the black hole.  Our galaxy's central monster black hole hasn't been directly photographed, nor has its "leaky" jet. But by using observations like the new image, scientists can see the effects of the black hole's "blowtorch-like jet" effects, providing evidence for its existence and how it behaves.  The composite image shows hydrogen gas as or...

  1.          Qualification testing of Cryogenic Engine for Gaganyaan Programme. Today, January 12, 2022, ISRO successfully conducted the qualification test of Cryogenic Engine for Gaganyaan programme for a duration of 720 seconds at ISRO Propulsion Complex (IPRC), Mahendragiri, Tamil Nadu. The performance of the engine met the test objectives and the engine parameters were closely matching with the predictions during the entire duration of the test. This successful long-duration test is a major milestone for the Human Space Programme – Gaganyaan. It ensures the reliability and robustness of the cryogenic engine for induction into the human-rated launch vehicle for Gaganyaan. Further, this engine will undergo four more tests for a cumulative duration of 1810 seconds. Subsequently, one more engine will undergo two short-duration tests & one long-duration test to complete the cryogenic engine qualification for Gaganyaan Programme. 2. ...

  Centaurus A is an elliptical galaxy located about 13 million light-years from Earth. This color composite image reveals the lobes and jets emanating from the active galaxy’s central black hole. Credit: ESO/WFI (Optical); MPIfR/ESO/APEX/A.Weiss et al. (Submillimetre); NASA/CXC/CfA/R.Kraft et al. (X-ray) New treasure trove of globular clusters holds clues about galaxy evolution. Using observations of the nearby elliptical galaxy Centaurus A, a team of astronomers led by the University of Arizona found an unprecedented number of possible globular clusters – old, dense groups of thousands of stars that all formed at the same time. A survey completed using a combination of ground and space-based telescopes yielded a treasure trove of previously unknown globular clusters – old, dense groups of thousands of stars that all formed at the same time – in the outer regions of the elliptical galaxy Centaurus A. The work presents a significant advance in understanding the architecture and...