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| Image credit: ESA |
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| Canada Joins Galileo System |
| Oct 8, 2003 - The Canadian Space Agency announced today that it will be contributing to the development of Galileo, the space-based navigation system being created by the European Space Agency - similar to the US Global Positioning System. Canada will contribute $11 million which will open up the development stage of the project to accept bids from Canadian contractors. China announced a similar commitment last month. Galileo is expected to be fully operational by 2008. |
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| Image credit: ESA |
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| Searching for Moons Around Distant Planets |
| Oct 8, 2003 - The European Space Agency is working on a new mission that could be able to detect moons orbiting planets in other star systems. In 2008, the ESA will launch Eddington, which will detect the drop in light as planets as small as Mars pass in front of their parent stars. Astronomers should theoretically be able to detect moons going around those planets because of their gravity - if the planet dims the star a few minutes earlier or later than expected, it will have one or more moons. |
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| Image credit:: Keck |
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| Keck Uses Adaptive Optics for the First Time |
| Oct 8, 2003 - The 10-metre Keck II observatory took an important step forward recently when it began observations with its new adaptive optics system. The system uses a laser to create a fake star about 90 kilometres up in the sky - a computer can then use this to calculate how to remove the effect of atmospheric disturbances. Adaptive optics have been used on smaller telescopes, but this is the first time it's been employed on a telescope as large as the mighty Keck II; it took nine years to adapt the observatory. |
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| Image credit: Xinhua |
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| More Chinese Launch Plans Emerging |
| Oct 8, 2003 - News reports in China have stated that the Chinese are will attempt to join the nations capable of sending humans into space on October 15, a day after the meeting of Communist party members. The Shenzhou 5 spacecraft will carry a single astronaut (or yuhangyuan) into space for a single 90-minute loop around the Earth. It appears the Chinese are going to be very conservative on their first launch attempt, essentially matching the flight that Yuri Gagarin made more than 40 years ago. There hasn't been an official launch announcement from the government yet. |
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