With the emphasis on small space news stories
Russia's "Noah's Ark" mission returns to Earth
Do you remember the mid-August story about a mission Russia which was ready to launch to carry mice and fruit flies into orbit to determine their susceptibility to radiation?
The Bion-M No. 2 biosatellite is being readied for its planned Aug. 20 launch atop a Soyuz-2.1b rocket from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Onboard are 75 mice and other specimens to be exposed to 30 days of radiation before a parachute-aided return to Russia.
Bion-M No. 2 is being dubbed a "Noah's Ark," because it's loaded with the mice, more than 1,000 fruit flies, cell cultures, microorganisms and plant seeds.
The satellite carrying 75 mice, over 1,500 flies, cell cultures, microorganisms, plant seeds and more returned to Earth on Sept. 19 in the steppes of the Orenburg region after spending 30 days in Earth orbit.
After launch, the craft was placed into a polar orbit roughly 230 to 236 miles (370 to 380 kilometers) in altitude at an inclination of roughly 97 degrees. Bion-M No. 2's payload of select biological specimens were thereafter exposed to a high level of cosmic radiation.
There were reports that the Bion-M No. 2 biosatellite started a small fire where it landed but teams of specialists were on scene to make preliminary examinations of the mice, flies and all. They were all expected to have been delivered to the Institute of Biomedical Problems of the Russian Academy of Sciences (IBMP) by the evening of Sept. 20.
Russia’s Bion-M No. 2 descent module, on the steppes of the Orenburg region. (Image credit: Roscosmos/Ivan Timoshenko)
NASA's tests of lasers for deep space to Earth communications wrap up
NASA's Psyche Spacecraft is on its long journey to the asteroid bearing that name (it's actually 16 Psyche). It launched in October of 2023 and is expected to arrive at the asteroid in 2029. A side mission to keep the spacecraft and the ground support crew from forgetting everything they need to know, has been to test replacing the radio links used to download data from Psyche to Earth. Replacing them with what? Space Lasers.
NASA's Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) experiment, a technology demonstration carried aboard the Psyche mission, has completed its 65th and final test, successfully exchanging laser signals across 218 million miles (351 million kilometers), surpassing all technical goals after two years of operations, according to a statement from the space agency.
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During its run, DSOC achieved 65 successful passes between Earth and Psyche as the spacecraft journeyed toward its asteroid target. The system encodes data into pulses of laser light, transforming digital information into streams of photons...
Use of laser data links over terrestrial or LEO data links isn't remotely new, but using them for deep space is new. The information in the article is low, especially in regard to the questions and concerns I have (I used to design radio communications systems, so it's sort of my home turf). I'm sure they wouldn't engage in tests like this without calculations to show expectations for just about everything and I'd like to know if there were any unexpected results - good or bad. In that last quote, I threw out a sentence the author wrote because it's in that never-never land of either worded horribly or just plain wrong.
Artist's conception of the satellite Psyche in close approach to metal-rich asteroid 16 Psyche. Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/ASU
Being slightly experienced with lasers and communication links, I wonder what the beam spread on the laser was, and how aiming was accomplished. Y'know, the nuts and bolts of the system.
ReplyDeleteI share your frustration, SiG.
Unfortunately, I don't know the RF frequencies or the optical band to try to approximate those numbers. The linked paper at JPL talks about them using the Mount Palomar observatory to receive the optical downlinks but don't say if it was the 200" Hale telescope it's famous for or one of the smaller telescopes there. They dance around the subject of having radio antennas and optical antennas mounted together.
DeleteThis is a relatively important paragraph from the link.
"Managed by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California, the experiment consists of a flight laser transceiver mounted on the Psyche spacecraft, along with two ground stations to receive and send data from Earth. A powerful 3-kilowatt uplink laser at JPL’s Table Mountain Facility transmitted a laser beacon to Psyche, helping the transceiver determine where to aim the optical communications laser back to Earth."
Oops! flight laser. Not sure how that other link got there.
DeleteMy dumb question for today:
ReplyDelete"an inclination of roughly 97 degrees" Um, isn't 90 like, y'know, as up as you can get?
You know, I copied that from the original text and didn't notice that. Didn't even notice I left the Space.com link out of what I wrote.
DeleteOn a more relevant note, yeah, there's only 90 degrees between due east and due north - the usual "as up as you can get" I just question if it's a typo or if it's a reference plane I'm not used to seeing. None of the comments on the website point that error out. They're mostly just questioning why do this mission.
I'm pretty sure it's a typo that our AI overlords overlooked; from basic "elevation-azimuth" to super-galactic plane, 90 seems the "uppermost".
DeleteTypo makes more sense than "a reference plane I'm not used to seeing" because this was basically LEO chosen to allow the lab to get into areas around the poles where the Earth's fields dive in toward the poles. Yeah, those are "a few degrees" off the north and south poles, with the north pole movement attracting a lot of attention. It just somehow seems "oddly familiar" - like I've seen that kind of number before.
Delete