NASA Hires SpaceX to Launch Another New Space Telescope

NASA announced on Tuesday the 2nd they've awarded a contract to SpaceX to launch a small research satellite designed to study the violent processes behind the creation and destruction of chemical elements. The telescope's launch on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is expected in 2027, although no more specific date was given. Added to the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, and Europa Clipper (not simply a telescope) both of which will ride Falcon Heavy to space is why I said "Another."

The Compton Spectrometer and Imager (COSI) mission features a gamma-ray telescope that will scan the sky to study gamma-rays emitted by the explosions of massive stars and the end of their lives. These supernova explosions generate reactions that fuse new atomic nuclei, a process called nucleosynthesis, of heavier elements.

Using data from COSI, scientists will map where these elements are forming in the Milky Way galaxy. COSI's observations will also yield new insights into the annihilation of positrons, the antimatter equivalent of electrons, which appear to be originating from the center of the galaxy. Another goal for COSI will be to rapidly report the location of short gamma-ray bursts, unimaginably violent explosions that flash and then fade in just a couple of seconds. These bursts are likely caused by merging neutron stars.

The COSI mission will be sensitive to so-called soft gamma rays, a relatively unexplored segment of the electromagnetic spectrum. The telescope is based on a design scientists have flown on research balloon flights.

COSI is relatively small satellite, less than a ton, and built by Northrop Grumman. It will ride alone on a Falcon 9 because of the peculiar orbit it requires takes as much energy as delivering a much larger satellite to geosynchronous orbit.  COSI will operate in an unusual orbit about 340 miles over the equator, an orbit chosen to avoid interference from radiation over the South Atlantic Anomaly, the region where the inner Van Allen radiation belt comes closest to Earth’s surface.

SpaceX's Falcon 9 will deliver COSI directly into its operational orbit after taking off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, then will fire its upper stage in a sideways maneuver to make a turn at the equator. This type of maneuver, called a plane change, takes a lot of energy, or delta-V, on par with the delta-V required to put a heavier satellite into a much higher orbit.

The contract is what appears to be SpaceX's preferred type, "firm-fixed price," like they bid to design the Deorbit Vehicle for the Space Station, for $69 million. In 2019 NASA paid SpaceX about $43 million for the launch of the similarly sized IXPE X-ray telescope into a similar orbit as COSI. The 37% higher price seems pretty close to the damage done by inflation. What else that you buy isn't up in price since 2019? 

Artist's concept rendering of COSI with some cool gamma ray colors that are quite invisible in real life. Image credit: Northrop Grumman/European Southern Observatory (background image)