Hasta La Gadget!

Planetary Resources really wants to mine asteroids for valuable materials, but first it has to find them. So the company is partnering with NASA on a crowdsourcing project that would put the American public to work identifying and tracking near-Earth-objects (NEOs). All the data generated will be open sourced and made publicly available on the web. The effort will center on a series of challenges and contests designed to lure in citizen scientists and the results will be reviewed by Planetary Resources. Obviously, the company will be looking for mineable hunks of space rock, but it will also be giving back to the scientific community by using the data it collects to improve algorithms for detecting asteroids. And, obviously, the more of those we’re able to detect and track, the less likely we are to be caught off guard by a meteorite apocalypse. To be notified when the program kicks off, sign up for more info at the Planetary Resources site.

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Source: Planetary Resources

And communal space astronomy is go. Planetary Resources has successfully hit the $1 million crowdfunding target for its ARKYD telescope, which should now be on track for its promised 2015 launch. The project has also racked up 11,000 backers, and that means a new round of add-ons for the extra-committed. Backers can buy a special mission patch ($7), additional selfie photos (from $25) and even a half-size ARKYD replica ($650). There are a few more pragmatic reasons to invest, of course — the company has stretch goals that could bring a second ground station, selfies during the beta phase and even hunts for undiscovered planets. Would-be researchers who still want to pitch in can visit Kickstarter by June 30th.

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Source: Kickstarter

Picture an optical telescope, a really good optical telescope, and you have to think big. The most powerful consumer-grade models often stand taller than their operators. The grand, institutionally owned ones are hidden beneath giant domes above the clouds on mountaintops. The world’s best, the Hubble Space Telescope, is as big as a school bus and sits out in orbit, while its successor, the James Webb Space Telescope, will be roughly the size of a Boeing 737.

What, then, could a telescope smaller than a trash can possibly do? Quite a lot, as it turns out — if you can get it outside of the Earth’s pesky atmosphere, that is. Planetary Resources plans to take rocks floating aimlessly in the solar system and turn them into valuable commodities. But, before we get there, the company hopes to revolutionize space exploration in the same way that 3D printing and microfunding have revolutionized manufacturing. Planetary Resources co-founder and co-chairman Peter Diamandis chatted with us, telling us why the company made the unusual decision to put its first orbital optical telescope up for grabs on Kickstarter.

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