Posted on by Fraser Cain

Space Elevator Group to Manufacture Nanotubes

LiftPort Group, the space elevator companies, today announced plans for a carbon nanotube manufacturing plant, the company’s first formal facility for production of the material on a commercial scale. Called LiftPort Nanotech, the new facility will also serve as the regional headquarters for the company, and represents the fruition of the company’s three years of research and development efforts into carbon nanotubes, including partnering work with a variety of leading research institutions in the business and academic communities.

Set to open in June of this year, LiftPort Nanotech will be located in Millville, New Jersey, a community with a history in glass and plastics production. Both the City of Millville and the Cumberland County Empowerment Zone are partnering to provide $100,000 in initial seed money for the new facility.

LiftPort Nanotech will make and sell carbon nanotubes to glass, plastic and metal companies, which will in turn synthesize them into other stronger, lighter materials (also known as composites) for use in their applications. Already being used by industries such as automotive and aerospace manufacturing, carbon nanotube composites are lighter than fiberglass and have the potential to be up to 100 times stronger than steel.

“We are pleased that LiftPort has selected Millville as the location for its new manufacturing facility and regional headquarters,” said Sandra Forosisky, Executive Director of the Cumberland Empowerment Zone. “Millville has a strong history in manufacturing, and we believe it is ideally suited for the emerging carbon nanotube industry.” Mayor James Quinn from the City of Millville added, “LiftPort’s presence will give Millville a competitive advantage in the emerging use of nanotube composites within our existing manufacturing base and its ability to attract additional manufacturing companies resulting in the creation of many new well paying jobs for our community.”

“We selected Millville due both to its central location to key business centers on the East Coast, as well as its experienced workforce,” said Michael Laine, president of LiftPort Group. “In addition, we selected the area because of its growing reputation for supporting the development of cutting edge technologies in a variety of arenas, such as low-cost, green energy.”

Today’s announcement represents the second major facility and first East Coast presence to be established by LiftPort Group, the Seattle-based company dedicated to the development of the first commercial elevator to space. The company was founded by Laine, one of the pioneers of the modern Space Elevator concept and the creator of the modern business model for building a commercial space elevator.

“We see the development of carbon nanotubes as critical to the building of the space elevator,” said Laine. “Opening a commercial production facility enables us to generate revenues in the shorter term by meeting the growing market need for this material. At the same time, it enables us to conduct research and development in this arena for our longer term goal of a commercial space elevator.”

A revolutionary way to send cargo into space, the space elevator (as proposed by LiftPort) will consist of a carbon nanotube composite ribbon stretching some 62,000 miles from earth to space. The elevator will be anchored to an offshore sea platform near the equator in the Pacific Ocean, and to a small counterweight in space. Mechanical lifters will move up and down the ribbon, carrying such items as satellites and solar power systems into space. More information can be obtained at the company’s web site at www.liftport.com.

Original Source: Liftport News Release

Posted on by Fraser Cain

First Centennial Prizes Announced

Image credit: Spaceward
NASA and its partner, the Spaceward Foundation, today announced prizes totaling $400,000 for four prize competitions, the first under the agency’s Centennial Challenges program.

NASA’s Centennial Challenges promotes technical innovation through a novel program of prize competitions. It is designed to tap the nation’s ingenuity to make revolutionary advances to support the Vision for Space Exploration and NASA goals. The first two competitions will focus on the development of lightweight yet strong tether materials (Tether Challenge) and wireless power transmission technologies (Beam Power Challenge).

“For more than 200 years, prizes have played a key role in spurring new achievements in science, technology, engineering and exploration,” said NASA’s Associate Administrator for Exploration Systems Mission Directorate, Craig Steidle. “Centennial Challenges will use prizes to help make the Vision for Space Exploration a reality,” he added.

“This is an exciting start for the Centennial Challenges program,” said Brant Sponberg, program manager for Centennial Challenges. “The innovations from these competitions will help support advances in aerospace materials and structures, new approaches to robotic and human planetary surface operations, and even futuristic concepts like space elevators and solar power satellites,” he said.

The Tether Challenge centers on the creation of a material that combines light weight and incredible strength. Under this challenge, teams will develop high strength materials that will be stretched in a head-to-head competition to see which tether is strongest.

The Beam Power challenge focuses on the development of wireless power technologies for a wide range of exploration purposes, such as human lunar exploration and long-duration Mars reconnaissance. In this challenge, teams will develop wireless power transmission systems, including transmitters and receivers, to power robotic climbers to lift the greatest weight possible to the top of a 50-meter cable in under three minutes.

The winners of each initial 2005 challenge will receive $50,000. A second set of Tether and Beam Power challenges in 2006 are more technically challenging. Each challenge will award purses of $100,000, $40,000, and $10,000 for first, second, and third place.

“We are thrilled with our partnership with NASA and we’re excited to take the Tether and Beam Power challenges to the next level,” said Meekk Shelef, president of the Spaceward Foundation.

The Centennial Challenges program is managed by NASA’s Exploration Systems Mission Directorate. The Spaceward Foundation is a public-funds non-profit organization dedicated to furthering the cause of space access in educational curriculums and the public.

For more information about the Challenges on the Internet, visit:

http://centennialchallenges.nasa.gov

Original Source: NASA News Release

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Greece Joins the ESA

Image credit: ESA
Following its ratification of the ESA Convention, Greece has now become ESA?s 16th Member State. The official announcement was made to the ESA Council on 16 March by Per Tegn?r, Chairman of the ESA Council.

Cooperation between ESA and the Hellenic National Space Committee began in the early 1990s and in 1994 Greece signed its first cooperation agreement with ESA. This led to regular exchange of information, the award of fellowships, joint symposia, mutual access to databases and laboratories, and studies on joint projects in fields of mutual interest.

In September 2003 Greece formally applied to join ESA. Subsequent negotiations were followed in the summer of 2004 by the signing of an agreement on accession to the ESA Convention by Jean-Jacques Dordain, ESA Director General on behalf of ESA, and by Dimitris Sioufas, the Minister for Development, on behalf of the Greek Government.

Greece already participates in ESA?s telecommunication and technology activities, and the Global Monitoring for Environment and Security Initiative. Now, with the deposition of its instrument of ratification of the Convention for the establishment of ESA with the French Government on 9 March 2005,

Original Source: ESA News Release

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Why Colonize the Moon First?

Artist's concept for a Lunar base. Credit: NASA

NASA has a new Vision for Space Exploration: in the decades ahead, humans will land on Mars and explore the red planet. Brief visits will lead to longer stays and, maybe one day, to colonies.

First, though, we’re returning to the Moon.

Why the Moon before Mars?

“The Moon is a natural first step,” explains Philip Metzger, a physicist at NASA Kennedy Space Center. “It’s nearby. We can practice living, working and doing science there before taking longer and riskier trips to Mars.”

The Moon and Mars have a lot in common. The Moon has only one-sixth Earth’s gravity; Mars has one-third. The Moon has no atmosphere; the Martian atmosphere is highly rarefied. The Moon can get very cold, as low as -240o C in shadows; Mars varies between -20o and -100o C.

Even more important, both planets are covered with silt-fine dust, called “regolith.” The Moon’s regolith was created by the ceaseless bombardment of micrometeorites, cosmic rays and particles of solar wind breaking down rocks for billions of years. Martian regolith resulted from the impacts of more massive meteorites and even asteroids, plus ages of daily erosion from water and wind. There are places on both worlds where the regolith is 10+ meters deep.

Operating mechanical equipment in the presence of so much dust is a formidable challenge. Just last month, Metzger co-chaired a meeting on the topic: “Granular Materials in Lunar and Martian Exploration,” held at the Kennedy Space Center. Participants grappled with issues ranging from basic transportation (“What kind of tires does a Mars buggy need?”) to mining (“How deep can you dig before the hole collapses?”) to dust storms–both natural and artificial (“How much dust will a landing rocket kick up?”).

Answering these questions on Earth isn’t easy. Moondust and Mars dust is so … alien.

Try this: Run your finger across the screen of your computer. You’ll get a little residue of dust clinging to your fingertip. It’s soft and fuzzy–that’s Earth dust.

Lunar dust is different: “It’s almost like fragments of glass or coral–odd shapes that are very sharp and interlocking,” says Metzger. (View an image of lunar dust.)

“Even after short moon walks, Apollo 17 astronauts found dust particles had jammed the shoulder joints of their spacesuits,” says Masami Nakagawa, associate professor in the mining engineering department of the Colorado School of Mines. “Moondust penetrated into seals, causing the spacesuits to leak some air pressure.”

In sunlit areas, adds Nakagawa, fine dust levitated above the Apollo astronauts’ knees and even above their heads, because individual particles were electrostatically charged by the Sun’s ultraviolet light. Such dust particles, when tracked into the astronauts’ habitat where they would become airborne, irritated their eyes and lungs. “It’s a potentially serious problem.”

Dust is also ubiquitous on Mars, although Mars dust is probably not as sharp as moondust. Weathering smooths the edges. Nevertheless, Martian duststorms whip these particles 50 m/s (100+ mph), scouring and wearing every exposed surface. As the rovers Spirit and Opportunity have revealed, Mars dust (like moondust) is probably electrically charged. It clings to solar panels, blocks sunlight and reduces the amount of power that can be generated for a surface mission.

For these reasons, NASA is funding Nakagawa’s Project Dust, a four-year study dedicated to finding ways of mitigating the effects of dust on robotic and human exploration, ranging from designs of air filters to thin-film coatings that repel dust from spacesuits and machinery.

The Moon is also a good testing ground for what mission planners call “in-situ resource utilization” (ISRU)–a.k.a. “living off the land.” Astronauts on Mars are going to want to mine certain raw materials locally: oxygen for breathing, water for drinking and rocket fuel (essentially hydrogen and oxygen) for the journey home. “We can try this on the Moon first,” says Metzger.

Both the Moon and Mars are thought to harbor water frozen in the ground. The evidence for this is indirect. NASA and ESA spacecraft have detected hydrogen–presumably the H in H2O–in Martian soil. Putative icy deposits range from the Martian poles almost to the equator. Lunar ice, on the other hand, is localized near the Moon’s north and south poles deep inside craters where the Sun never shines, according to similar data from Lunar Prospector and Clementine, two spacecraft that mapped the Moon in the mid-1990s.

If this ice could be excavated, thawed out and broken apart into hydrogen and oxygen … Voila! Instant supplies. NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, due to launch in 2008, will use modern sensors to search for deposits and pinpoint possible mining sites.

“The lunar poles are a cold place, so we’ve been working with people who specialize in cold places to figure out how to land on the soils and dig into the permafrost to excavate water,” Metzger says. Prime among NASA’s partners are investigators from the Army Corps of Engineers’ Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory (CRREL). Key challenges include ways of landing rockets or building habitats on ice-rich soils without having their heat melt the ground so it collapses under their weight.

Testing all this technology on the Moon, which is only 2 or 3 days away from Earth, is going to be much easier than testing it on Mars, six months away.

So … to Mars! But first, the Moon.

Original Source: Science@NASA Article

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Keep an Eye on the Weather in Space

NASA is returning to the Moon–not just robots, but people. In the decades ahead we can expect to see habitats, greenhouses and power stations up there. Astronauts will be out among the moondust and craters, exploring, prospecting, building.

Good thing.

On January 20th, 2005, a giant sunspot named “NOAA 720” exploded. The blast sparked an X-class solar flare, the most powerful kind, and hurled a billion-ton cloud of electrified gas (a “coronal mass ejection”) into space. Solar protons accelerated to nearly light speed by the explosion reached the Earth-Moon system minutes after the flare–the beginning of a days-long “proton storm.”

Here on Earth, no one suffered. Our planet’s thick atmosphere and magnetic field protects us from protons and other forms of solar radiation. In fact, the storm was good. When the plodding coronal mass ejection arrived 36 hours later and hit Earth’s magnetic field, sky watchers in Europe saw the brightest and prettiest auroras in years: gallery.

The Moon is a different story.

“The Moon is totally exposed to solar flares,” explains solar physicist David Hathaway of the Marshall Space Flight Center. “It has no atmosphere or magnetic field to deflect radiation.” Protons rushing at the Moon simply hit the ground–or whoever might be walking around outside.

The Jan. 20th proton storm was by some measures the biggest since 1989. It was particularly rich in high-speed protons packing more than 100 million electron volts (100 MeV) of energy. Such protons can burrow through 11 centimeters of water. A thin-skinned spacesuit would have offered little resistance.

“An astronaut caught outside when the storm hit would’ve gotten sick,” says Francis Cucinotta, NASA’s radiation health officer at the Johnson Space Center. At first, he’d feel fine, but a few days later symptoms of radiation sickness would appear: vomiting, fatigue, low blood counts. These symptoms might persist for days.

Astronauts on the International Space Station (ISS), by the way, were safe. The ISS is heavily shielded, plus the station orbits Earth inside our planet’s protective magnetic field. “The crew probably absorbed no more than 1 rem,” says Cucinotta.

One rem, short for Roentgen Equivalent Man, is the radiation dose that causes the same injury to human tissue as 1 roentgen of x-rays. A typical dental x-ray, for example, delivers about 0.1 rem. So, for the crew of the ISS, the Jan. 20th proton storm was like 10 trips to the dentist–scary, but no harm done.

On the Moon, Cucinotta estimates, an astronaut protected by no more than a space suit would have absorbed about 50 rem of ionizing radiation. That’s enough to cause radiation sickness. “But it would not have been fatal,” he adds.

Right: The Jan. 20th proton storm photographed from space by a coronagraph onboard the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO). The many speckles are solar protons striking the spacecraft’s digital camera. [More]

To die, you’d need to absorb, suddenly, 300 rem or more.

The key word is suddenly. You can get 300 rem spread out over a number of days or weeks with little effect. Spreading the dose gives the body time to repair and replace its own damaged cells. But if that 300 rem comes all at once … “we estimate that 50% of people exposed would die within 60 days without medical care,” says Cucinotta.

Such doses from a solar flare are possible. To wit: the legendary solar storm of August 1972.

It’s legendary (at NASA) because it happened during the Apollo program when astronauts were going back and forth to the Moon regularly. At the time, the crew of Apollo 16 had just returned to Earth in April while the crew of Apollo 17 was preparing for a moon-landing in December. Luckily, everyone was safely on Earth when the sun went haywire.

“A large sunspot appeared on August 2, 1972, and for the next 10 days it erupted again and again,” recalls Hathaway. The spate of explosions caused, “a proton storm much worse than the one we’ve just experienced,” adds Cucinotta. Researchers have been studying it ever since.

Cucinotta estimates that a moonwalker caught in the August 1972 storm might have absorbed 400 rem. Deadly? “Not necessarily,” he says. A quick trip back to Earth for medical care could have saved the hypothetical astronaut’s life.

Surely, though, no astronaut is going to walk around on the Moon when there’s a giant sunspot threatening to explode. “They’re going to stay inside their spaceship (or habitat),” says Cucinotta. An Apollo command module with its aluminum hull would have attenuated the 1972 storm from 400 rem to less than 35 rem at the astronaut’s blood-forming organs. That’s the difference between needing a bone marrow transplant ? or just a headache pill.

Modern spaceships are even safer. “We measure the shielding of our ships in units of areal density–or grams per centimeter-squared,” says Cucinotta. Big numbers, which represent thick hulls, are better:

The hull of an Apollo command module rated 7 to 8 g/cm2.

A modern space shuttle has 10 to 11 g/cm2.

The hull of the ISS, in its most heavily shielded areas, has 15 g/cm2.

Future moonbases will have storm shelters made of polyethelene and aluminum possibly exceeding 20 g/cm2.

A typical space suit, meanwhile, has only 0.25 g/cm2, offering little protection. “That’s why you want to be indoors when the proton storm hits,” says Cucinotta.

But the Moon beckons and when explorers get there they’re not going to want to stay indoors. A simple precaution: Like explorers on Earth, they can check the weather forecast–the space weather forecast. Are there any big ‘spots on the sun? What’s the chance of a proton storm? Is a coronal mass ejection coming?

All clear? It’s time to step out.

Original Source: Science@NASA Article

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Second Chinese Mission Announced

Chinese space officials have confirmed that their next mission, Shenzhou VI, could launch as early as September 2005. This next mission will carry a two astronauts, who will orbit the Earth for five days and perform a series of experiments in space. This will be the first flight for China since Yang Liwei was sent into orbit in October 2003. If this next flight is successful, China will follow this mission with spacewalks by 2007, and then orbital docking. China has also said that it’s looking to recruit women as astronauts for future missions.

Posted on by Fraser Cain

ESA and Russia Get Closer

Image credit: ESA
Today in Moscow, ESA Director General, Jean-Jacques Dordain and the Head of the Russian Federal Space Agency, Anatoly Perminov signed an agreement for long-term cooperation and partnership in the development, implementation and use of launchers.

This agreement, which comes within the general framework of the Agreement between ESA and the Russian Federation for Cooperation and Partnership in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space for Peaceful Purposes, will strengthen cooperation between ESA and Russia, ESA?s first partner in the long-term cooperation on access to space.

ESA-Russian partnership is based on two main pillars: the exploitation of the Russian Soyuz launcher from Europe?s Spaceport in French Guiana and cooperation, without exchange of funds, on research and development in preparation for future launchers.

The Soyuz at Europe?s Spaceport programme covers the construction of the Soyuz launch facilities in French Guiana and the adaptations that Soyuz will need to enable it to be launched from French Guiana. A number of ESA Member States have signed up for this optional ESA programme and their contributions will be supplemented by a loan to Arianespace from the European Investment Bank, guaranteed by the French Government as a temporary measure pending the creation by the European Commission of a guarantee reserve mechanism. Complementary funding from the European Union is also envisaged.

Work to prepare the Spaceport for Soyuz is already underway in French Guiana as the first launch from Europe?s Spaceport is scheduled to take place in 2007.

Today?s agreement will also allow work to begin on the second pillar: preparation activities for the development of future space transport systems. Europe and the Russian Federation will collaborate in developing the technology needed for future launchers. Russian and European engineers will work together to develop reusable liquid engines, reusable liquid stages and experimental vehicles.

ESA?s aim is to have a new generation launcher ready by 2020.

Original Source: ESA News Release

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Space Elevator? Build it on the Moon First

A speech by Arthur C. Clarke in the 1960s, explaining geostationary satellites gave Pearson the inspiration for the whole concept of space elevators while he was working at the NASA Ames Research Center in California during the days of the Apollo Moon landings.

“Clarke said that a good way to understand communications satellites in geostationary orbit was to imagine them at the top of a tall tower, perched 35,786 km (22,236 miles) above the Earth,” Pearson recalls, “I figured, why not build an actual tower?”

He realized that it was theoretically possible to park a counterweight, like a small asteroid, in geostationary orbit and then extend a cable down and affix it at the Earth’s equator. In theory, elevator cars could travel up the long cable, and transfer cargo out of the Earth’s gravity well and into space at a fraction of the price delivered by chemical rockets.

… in theory. The problem then, and now, is that the material required to support even just the weight of the cable in the Earth’s gravity doesn’t exist. Only in the last few years, with the advent of carbon nanotubes – with a tensile strength in the ballpark – people have finally moved past the laughing stage, and begun investigating it seriously. And while carbon nanotubes have been manufactured in small quantities in the lab, engineers are still years away from weaving them together into a long cable that could provide the necessary strength.

Pearson knew the technical challenges were formidable, so he wondered, “why not build an elevator on the Moon?”

On the Moon, the force of gravity is one sixth of what we feel here on Earth, and a space elevator cable is well within our current manufacturing technology. Stretch a cable up from the surface of the Moon, and you’d have an inexpensive method of delivering minerals and supplies into Earth orbit.

A lunar space elevator would work differently than one based on Earth. Unlike our own planet, which rotates every 24 hours, the Moon only turns on its axis once every 29 days; the same amount of time it takes to complete one orbit around the Earth. This is why we can only ever see one side of the Moon. The concept of geostationary orbit doesn’t really make sense around the Moon.

There are, however, five places in the Earth-Moon system where you could put an object of low mass – like a satellite… or a space elevator counterweight – and have them remain stable with very little energy: the Earth-Moon Lagrange points. The L1 point, a spot approximately 58,000 km above the surface of the Moon, will work perfectly.

Imaging that you’re floating in space at a point between the Earth and the Moon where the force of gravity from both is perfectly balanced. Look to your left, and the Moon is approximately 58,000 km (37,000 miles) away; look to your right and the Earth is more than 5 times that distance. Without any kind of thrusters, you’ll eventually drift out of this perfect balancing point, and then start accelerating towards either the Earth or the Moon. L1 is balanced, but unstable.

Pearson is proposing that NASA launch a spacecraft carrying a huge spool of cable to the L1 point. It would slowly back away from the L1 point as it unspooled its cable down to the surface of the Moon. Once the cable was anchored to the lunar surface, it would provide tension, and the entire cable would hang in perfect balance, like a pendulum pointed towards the ground. And like a pendulum, the elevator would always keep itself aligned perfectly towards the L1 point, as the Earth’s gravity tugged away at it. The mission could even include a small solar powered climber which could climb up from the lunar surface to the top of the cable, and deliver samples of moon rocks into a high Earth orbit. Further missions could deliver whole teams of climbers, and turn the concept into a mass production operation.

The advantage of connecting an elevator to the Moon instead of the Earth is the simple fact that the forces involved are much smaller – the Moon’s gravity is 1/6th that of Earth’s. Instead of exotic nanotubes with extreme tensile strengths, the cable could be built using high-strength commercially available materials, like Kevlar or Spectra. In fact, Pearson has zeroed in on a commercial fibre called M5, which he calculates would only weigh 6,800 kg for a full cable that would support a lifting capacity of 200 kg at the base. This is well within the capabilities of the most powerful rockets supplied by Boeing, Lockheed Martin and Arianespace. One launch is it takes to put an elevator on the Moon. And once the elevator was installed, you could start reinforcing it with additional materials, like glass and boron, which could be manufactured on the Moon

So, what would you do with a space elevator connected to the Moon? “Plenty,” says Pearson, “there are all kinds of resources on the Moon which would be much easier to gather there and bring into orbit rather than launching them from the Earth. Lunar regolith (moon dirt) could be used as shielding for space stations; metals and other minerals could be mined from the surface and used for construction in space; and if ice is discovered at the Moon’s south pole, you could supply water, oxygen and even fuel to spacecraft.”

If water ice does turn up at the Moon’s south pole, you could run a second cable there, and then connect it at the end to the first cable. This would allow a southern Moon base to deliver material into high-Earth orbit without having to travel along the ground to the base of the first elevator.

It’d be great for rocks, but not for people. Even if a climber moved up the cable at hundreds of kilometres an hour, astronauts would be traveling for weeks, and be exposed to the radiation of deep space. But when you’re talking about cargo, slow and steady wins the race.

Pearson first published his idea of a lunar elevator back in 1979 and he’s been pitching it ever since. This year, though, NASA’s not laughing, they’re listening. Pearson’s company, Star Technology and Research, was recently awarded a $75,000 grant from NASA’s Institute for Advanced Concepts (NIAC) for a six-month study to investigate the idea further. If the idea proves to be promising, Pearson could receive a larger grant to begin overcoming some of the engineering challenges, and look for partners inside and NASA and out to help in its development.

NIAC looks for ideas which are way outside NASA’s normal comfort zone of technologies – for example… an elevator on the Moon – and helps develop them to the point that many of the risks and unknowns have been ironed out.

Pearson hopes this grant will help him make the case to NASA that a lunar elevator would be an invaluable contribution to the new Moon-Mars space exploration vision, supporting future lunar bases and industries in space. And it would give engineers a way to understand the difficulties of building elevators into space without taking on the immense challenge of building it on Earth first.

Written by Fraser Cain

Posted on by Nancy Atkinson

Magnetic Bubble Could Protect Astronauts on Long Trips

A graphic of a superconducting magnetic bubble that could protect spacecraft. Credit: MIT.
A graphic of a superconducting magnetic bubble that could protect spacecraft. Credit: MIT.

It’s the year 2027 and NASA’s Vision for Space Exploration is progressing right on schedule. The first interplanetary spacecraft with humans aboard is on course for Mars. However, halfway into the trip, a gigantic solar flare erupts, spewing lethal radiation directly at the spacecraft. But, not to worry. Because of research done by former astronaut Jeffrey Hoffman and a group of MIT colleagues back in the year 2004, this vehicle has a state-of-the-art superconducting magnetic shielding system that protects the human occupants from any deadly solar emissions.

New research has recently begun to examine the use of superconducting magnet technology to protect astronauts from radiation during long-duration spaceflights, such as the interplanetary flights to Mars that are proposed in NASA’s current Vision for Space Exploration.

The principal investigator for this concept is former astronaut Dr. Jeffrey Hoffman, who is now a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

Hoffman’s concept is one of 12 proposals that began receiving funding last month from the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts (NIAC). Each gets $75,000 for six-months of research to make initial studies and identify challenges in developing it. Projects that make it through that phase are eligible for as much as $400,000 more over two years.

The concept of magnetic shielding is not new. As Hoffman says, “the Earth has been doing it for billions of years!”

Earth’s magnetic field deflects cosmic rays, and an added measure of protection comes from our atmosphere which absorbs any cosmic radiation that makes its way through the magnetic field. Using magnetic shielding for spacecraft was first proposed in the late 1960’s and early 70’s, but was not actively pursued when plans for long-duration spaceflight fell by the wayside.

However, the technology for creating superconducting magnets that can generate strong fields to shield spacecraft from cosmic radiation has only recently been developed. Superconducting magnet systems are desirable because they can create intense magnetic fields with little or no electrical power input, and with proper temperatures they can maintain a stable magnetic field for long periods of time.

One challenge, however, is developing a system that can create a magnetic field large enough to protect a bus-sized, habitable spacecraft. Another challenge is keeping the system at temperatures near absolute zero (0 Kelvin, -273 C, -460 F), which gives the materials superconductive properties. Recent advances in superconducting technology and materials have provided superconductive properties at higher than 120 K (-153 C, -243 F).

There are two types of radiation that need to be addressed for long-duration human spaceflight, says William S. Higgins, an engineering physicist who works on radiation safety at Fermilab, the particle accelerator near Chicago, IL. The first are solar flare protons, which would come in bursts following a solar flare event. The second are galactic cosmic rays, which, although not as lethal as solar flares, they would be a continuous background radiation to which the crew would be exposed. In an unshielded spacecraft, both types of radiation would result in significant health problems, or death, to the crew.

The easiest way to avoid radiation is to absorb it, like wearing a lead apron when you get an X-ray at the dentist. The problem is that this type of shielding can often be very heavy, and mass is at a premium with our current space vehicles since they need to be launched from the Earth’s surface. Also, according to Hoffman, if you use just a little bit of shielding, you can actually make it worse, because the cosmic rays interact with the shielding and can create secondary charged particles, increasing the overall radiation dose.

Hoffman foresees using a hybrid system that employs both a magnetic field and passive absorption. “That’s the way the Earth does it,” Hoffman explained, “and there’s no reason we shouldn’t be able to do that in space.”

One of the most important conclusions to the second phase of this research will be to determine if using superconducting magnet technology is mass effective.

“I have no doubt that if we build it big enough and strong enough, it will provide protection,” Hoffman said. “But if the mass of this conducting magnet system is greater than the mass just to use passive (absorbing) shielding, then why go to all that trouble?”

But that’s the challenge, and the reason for this study. “This is research,” Hoffman said. “I’m not partisan one way or the other; I just want to find out what’s the best way.”

Assuming Hoffman and his team can demonstrate that superconducting magnetic shielding is mass effective, the next step would be doing the actual engineering of creating a large enough (albeit lightweight) system, in addition to the fine-tuning of maintaining magnets at ultra-cold superconducting temperatures in space. The final step would be to integrate such a system into a Mars-bound spacecraft. None of these tasks are trivial.

The examinations of maintaining the magnetic field strength and the near-absolute zero temperatures of this system in space is already occurring in an experiment that is scheduled to be launched to the International Space Station for a three-year stay. The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) will be attached to the outside of the station and search for different types of cosmic rays. It will employ a superconducting magnet to measure each particle’s momentum and the sign of its charge. Peter Fisher, a physics professor also from MIT works on the AMS experiment, and is cooperating with Hoffman on his research of superconducting magnets. A graduate student and a research scientist are also working with Hoffman.

NIAC was created in 1998 to solicit revolutionary concepts from people and organizations outside the space agency that could advance NASA’s missions. The winning concepts are chosen because they “push the limits of known science and technology,” and “show relevance to the NASA mission,” according to NASA. These concepts are expected to take at least a decade to develop.

Hoffman flew in space five times and became the first astronaut to log more than 1,000 hours on the space shuttle. On his fourth space flight, in 1993, Hoffman participated in the first Hubble Space Telescope servicing mission, an ambitious and historic mission that corrected the spherical aberration problem in the telescope’s primary mirror. Hoffman left the astronaut program in 1997 to become NASA’s European Representative at the US Embassy in Paris, and then joined MIT in 2001.

Hoffman knows that to make a space mission possible, there’s a lot of idea development and hard engineering which precedes it.

“When it comes to doing things in space, if you’re an astronaut, you go and do it with your own hands,” Hoffman said. “But you don’t fly in space forever, and I still would like to make a contribution.”

Does he see his current research as important as fixing the Hubble Space Telescope?

“Well, not in the immediate sense,” he said. “But on the other hand, if we ever are going to have a human presence throughout the solar system we need to be able to live and work in regions where the charged particle environment is pretty severe. If we can’t find a way to protect ourselves from that, it will be a very limiting factor for the future of human exploration.”

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Launch Date Set for Solar Sail

The Cosmos 1 team announced today that the world?s first solar sail spacecraft will be set for launch on March 1, 2005 from a submerged submarine in the Barents Sea. Cosmos 1 ? a project of The Planetary Society ? is sponsored by Cosmos Studios.

?With the spacecraft now built and undergoing its final checkout, we are ready to set our launch date,? said Louis Friedman, Executive Director of The Planetary Society and Project Director of Cosmos 1. ?The precedent-setting development of the first solar sail spacecraft has had its ups and downs like a roller coaster ride, but now the real excitement begins.?

Cosmos 1?s mission goal is to perform the first controlled solar sail flight as the spacecraft is propelled by photons from sunlight. The Cosmos 1 launch period will extend from March 1 to April 7, 2005. The actual launch date will be determined by the Russian Navy, which directs the launch on the Volna rocket ? a rocket taken from the operational intercontinental ballistic missile inventory.

?This whole venture is audacious and risky,? noted Bruce Murray, who co-founded The Planetary Society with Carl Sagan and Louis Friedman. ?It is a testament to the inspiring nature of space exploration and to the desire of people everywhere to be part of the adventure of great projects.?

Sagan, Murray and Friedman founded The Planetary Society in 1980 to advance the exploration of other worlds and to seek other life. Launching a spacecraft to test an innovative and untried flight technology helps to fulfill the bold mission they envisioned for the organization. Sagan remained the President of The Planetary Society until his death in December, 1996.

Cosmos 1 will rocket into space on a submarine-launched ballistic missile, the Volna, from beneath the surface of the Barents Sea. A network of Russian, American and Czech ground stations will track and receive data from the spacecraft.

International cooperation is just one of the novel aspects of this privately funded mission. It is the first space mission conducted by a popular space interest organization, the first sponsored by a media company, and the first to test flight using only sunlight pressure. Sailing by light pressure is the only technology known that might carry out practical interstellar flight.

?Starting the countdown clock for the launch of Cosmos 1 on Carl?s birthday could not be more appropriate? said Ann Druyan, Cosmos 1 Program Director and Carl Sagan?s professional collaborator and widow. ?We have converted the delivery system for a weapon of mass destruction into a means for pioneering a way to set sail for the stars,? she added. ?That?s Carl Sagan 101, a perfect embodiment of his life and vision.?

Druyan?s science-based media company, Cosmos Studios, has provided most of the funding for this project.

Several solar sail spacecraft have been proposed over the last few years, but none except Cosmos 1 has been built. NASA, and the European, Japanese and Russian space agencies all have solar sail research and development programs. Deployment tests have been conducted by the space agencies and more are being planned.

The Planetary Society, without government funds, but with support of Cosmos Studios and Society members, put together an international team of space professionals to attempt this first actual solar sail flight. The Space Research Institute (IKI) in Moscow oversaw the creation of the flight electronics and mission control software while NPO Lavochkin, one of Russia?s largest aerospace companies, built the spacecraft. American consultants have provided additional components, including an on-board camera built by Malin Space Science Systems.

Solar sailing is done not with wind, but with reflected light pressure – its push on giant sails can continuously change orbital energy and spacecraft velocity. Once injected into Earth?s orbit, the sail will be deployed by inflatable tubes, which pull out the sail material and make the structure rigid. The 600-square-meter sail of Cosmos 1 will have eight blades, configured like a giant windmill. The blades can be turned like helicopter blades to reflect sunlight in different directions, and the sail can ?tack? as orbital velocity is increased. Each blade measures 15 meters in length and is made from 5-micron-thin aluminized, reinforced mylar ? about 1/4 the thickness of a trash bag.

Once Cosmos 1 is deployed in orbit, the solar sail will be visible to the naked eye throughout much of the world, its silvery sails shining as a bright pinpoint of light traveling across the night sky.

You can visit the following sites for comprehensive background materials on Cosmos 1, including the progress of the countdown to launch: http://planetary.org/solarsail and http://solarsail.org.

Original Source: Planetary Society News Release