In Today’s Deep Space Extra… Lunar cubesats prepare for near-future liftoff. NASA is seeking applicants for a one-year analog mission to simulate life on Mars.
Human Space Exploration
Stuck valves on Boeing’s Starliner keep critical Space Station test flight on hold
Coalition Member in the News – Aerojet Rocketdyne, Boeing, United Launch Alliance
Space.com (8/12): Boeing teams continue to “work around the clock” to fix the valve issues that prevented a liftoff last week, the company said in a statement yesterday. So far, teams have repaired nine of the spacecraft’s 13 problematic valves. “Over the past couple of days, our team has taken the necessary time to safely access and test the affected valves, and not let the launch window dictate our pace,” John Vollmer, Starliner vice president and program manager, said in the statement. NASA and Boeing will host a joint teleconference at 1:00 p.m. EDT, Friday, August 13, to discuss OFT-2.
NASA wants you to spend a year simulating life on Mars, for science
NPR (8/9): NASA is seeking applicants for what it calls a “one-year analog mission in a habitat to simulate life on a distant world.” The agency plans to observe humans in a Mars-like situation on Earth so it can study the challenges that might crop up during a future mission to the Red Planet. Grace Douglas, the lead scientist for NASA’s Advanced Food Technology research effort at NASA’s Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston, says the simulated mission will benefit future actual trips to space.
Space Science
Lunar cubesats head to the launch pad
SpaceNews.com (8/11): NASA’s Cislunar Autonomous Positioning System Technology Operations and Navigation Experiment (CAPSTONE) cubesat is scheduled to launch in the fourth quarter of this year on a Rocket Lab rocket. Meanwhile, Artemis I, the inaugural integrated launch of the SLS rocket and Orion spacecraft is carrying cubesats as secondary payloads. Several of those cubesats will perform lunar studies, including LunaH-Map, Lunar Flashlight, Lunar IceCube, and LunIR.
How big is a black hole? How messily it ‘eats’ may be a clue
Space.com (8/12): Astrophysicists believe they may now know how to better estimate the mass of super massive black holes and those that are smaller by observing how they flicker as they gravitationally draw in matter that surrounds them. The findings are published in the journal Science.
Other News
Startup wants to develop cargo services for Chinese space station
SpaceNews.com (8/13): Beijing-based company InterSpace Explore is aiming to develop a spacecraft capable of supplying China’s space station, with a first demonstration launch set for 2022. Interspace Explore founder Fu Shiming, a former employee of state-owned spacecraft maker China Academy of Space Technology (CAST) and a member of the Tiangong-2 space lab project, said at a press conference that the development of spacecraft by private enterprises can supplement the domestic space economy and provide efficient solutions for space resource utilization.
Space Force to kick off new program to attract small businesses and startups
SpaceNews.com (8/12): SpaceWERX is a new U.S. Space Force outreach initiative expected to award up to $50 million to small businesses and startups able to provide technology relevant to national security missions. SpaceWERX has scheduled an August 19 event to listen to proposals that could be funded with Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) phase 2 contracts.
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