Tag: NASA

Impact Lab > NASA
Analysis, New Discoveries, New Viewpoints

Monday night sky show

amazing night sky

Look up on Monday!

If the day after Christmas strikes you as a letdown, make a note to yourself now to get outside on Monday evening. NASA tells us there’s going to be a conjunction of heavenly bodies.

The action begins shortly before sunset. Around 4:30 pm to 5:00 pm local time, just as the sky is assuming its evening hue, Venus will pop into view, glistening bright in the deepening twilight. No more than 6 degrees to the right lies the crescent Moon, exquisitely slender, grinning like the Cheshire cat with his head cocked at humorous attention. This is a wonderful time to look; there are very few sights in the heavens as splendid as Venus and the Moon gathered close and surrounded by twilight blue…

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Science & Technology News, Space

NASA plans first space washing machine that could microwave laundry

 space washing machine

A space laundry machine designed by UMPQUA (left) and Astronaut Buzz Aldrin walks on the surface of the Moon (right).

What  if you could put dirty clothes into a washing machine, leave, and only coming back once the freshly cleaned clothes have been dried out by microwaves.  That out-of-this-world-laundry concept could someday become a reality for astronauts and space explorers headed for the moon, asteroids or Mars.

 

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Photo Perspectives, Science & Technology News, Space

Lunar scientists’ plan for sustainable and affordable Moon base

paulspudispl

Settlement on the Moon

It’s been a dream for a long time to have a human settlement on the Moon, but in this age of budget cuts and indecisive plans for NASA’s future, a Moon base may seem too costly and beyond our reach.  But a noted lunar scientist, Dr. Paul Spudis from the Lunar and Planetary Institute and a colleague, Tony Lavoie from the Marshall Space Flight Center, have come up with a plan for building a lunar settlement that is not only affordable but sustainable. It creates a Moon base along with a type of ‘transcontinental railroad’ in space which opens up cislunar space – the area between Earth and the Moon – for development.

 

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Analysis, Breakthrough Thinking, Education, Historical Perspectives, Space

NASA To unfurl the largest Solar Sail ever flown in space

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Come sail away.

In a series of upcoming technology demonstration missions, NASA is hoping to prove that giant solar sails are a practical way to explore the cosmos, even though warp drive engines and rocket powered spacecraft make for better movie fodder.

Starting in 2015, NASA will be launching a series of three experiment driven missions, including one that will confirm the feasibility of using solar sails as a viable means of cheap propulsion. The giant 125×125 foot sail is seven times as large as those previously flown in space, but will one day need to be considerably larger to shuttle astronauts around…

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Great New Product, Great Videos, New Inventions, Robots, Science & Technology News, Space

‘Sticky boom’ – a sticky solution for grabbing objects in space

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ein_J_EuAb8&hd=1[/youtube]

For one spacecraft to grab onto another spacecraft in space is a very challenging task. Although the robotic arms on the space shuttles and International Space Station (ISS) have made it look easy over the years, the process requires complex manipulator arms and special fixtures on the objects the arms are grasping, limiting the technology’s use. A small startup company is testing a new approach, though, that could greatly expand the applications of robotic arm technology to include, for example, cleaning up orbital debris and servicing the ISS.

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New Discoveries, Science & Technology News, Space, Star Wars

Star Wars-like planet orbiting two suns discovered

planets

The planet named Kepler-16b, will have an extraordinary double sunset at the end of each day.

Astronomers discover a real-life Tatooine. A spectacle made popular by the “Star Wars” saga — a planet with two suns — has now been confirmed in space for the first time, astronomers revealed.

 

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