Dec 12
Dec 12
NASA looks to send landers to Europa in 2020, wants to break the ice
Posted in: camera, concept, NASA, research, robot, space, Today's Chili
There’s still a lot of mystery surrounding Jupiter’s moon Europa, but researchers at NASA seem fairly certain that there’s a watery ocean lurking beneath its icy exterior. Their theories may finally be put to the test later this decade, thanks to a concept mission crafted by astronomers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. According to Space.com, JPL researchers have come up with a plan that would send a pair of landers to Europa by 2026, in the hopes of finding out whether the rock has ever supported life forms. The endeavor certainly wouldn’t be easy, since Jupiter blankets its moon in heavy radiation, but researchers think they can mitigate these risks by sending in an extra lander as backup, and by keeping the mission short and sweet. Under the plan, each 700-pound robot would use a mass spectrometer, seismometers and a slew of cameras to search for any organic chemicals that may be lodged within the moon’s ice. Neither craft will sport a protective shield, so they’ll only stay around the planet for about seven days, so as to avoid any radiation damage. At this point, the mission is still in the concept phase, though the JPL is hoping to launch both landers by 2020. JPL researcher Kevin Hand was quick to point out, however, that this would be a “habitability mission,” and that NASA doesn’t expect to find any signs of current life on Europa. Lars von Trier was unavailable for comment.
NASA looks to send landers to Europa in 2020, wants to break the ice originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 12 Dec 2011 08:34:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Nov 02
DIY unmanned airship soars 95,000 feet above Earth, lays claim to new record (video)
Posted in: diy, launch, space, Today's Chili, video
Are you entertaining dreams of launching your own private spacecraft? All you need is about 30 grand in your bank account, and lots of spare time. Last weekend, a company called JP Aerospace sent its unmanned Tandem airship 95,085 feet above the ground — a height that, according to the company, establishes a new record for remotely controlled airships. In fact, JP Aerospace says this altitude is a full four miles higher than any other airship has ever flown. To pull this off, the team strapped its 30-foot-long aircraft with two balloons, and packed it with a pair of electric motors that manipulated the Tandem’s specially designed propellers. It’s a relatively simple method, and one that didn’t exactly break the bank, either. All told, it took about five years and some $30,000 to launch the aircraft, as part of the company’s Airship to Orbit project. The long-term goal is to use the Tandem or similar airships as a launch pad for rockets or other interstellar aircraft. No word yet on when that could happen, but you can float past the break for a brief video on the Tandem, coupled with a brief PR.
DIY unmanned airship soars 95,000 feet above Earth, lays claim to new record (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 02 Nov 2011 07:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Nov 01
NASA developing tractor beams, no plans for Death Star… yet (video)
Posted in: laser, NASA, research, science, space, Today's Chili, video
Fully functional LightSabre aside, a tractor beam has to be high on most geek wish-lists; lucky for you NASA has started working on one. Before you drop your sandwich (or whatever that object in your left hand is), this won’t be for sucking up star cruisers, but the more modest task of sample and space dust collection. The basic concept has already been proven, but now NASA’s Office of the Chief Technologist has given boffins $100,000 to make the dream a reality. Three potential methods are already on the table, which in lay-terms resemble laser tweezers, a light vortex and a conceptual rippling beam. Once developed, it could signal the end of traditional mechanical sample collecting — and just plain luck — consigning robotic arms to the history books. Check the video after the break for science-tastic mock up of how it might work.
Continue reading NASA developing tractor beams, no plans for Death Star… yet (video)
NASA developing tractor beams, no plans for Death Star… yet (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 02 Nov 2011 00:48:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Oct 31
The Secrets Behind the Most Famous Earth Image of All Time
Posted in: NASA, space, Today's Chili, top
This is Blue Marble. It was the most accurate, highest resolution image of Earth ever—until they created the next-gen Blue Marble. It’s the most famous, since it’s the iPhone’s default image. Now its creator has revealed all its secrets. More »
Oct 27
NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity gains DAN apparatus, new lust for water
Posted in: galaxy, NASA, science, space, Today's Chili, us, usa
“You can think of DAN as a reconnaissance instrument.” That’s a quote from Igor Mitrofanov of the Space Research Institute, Russia, who is being deemed the “principal investigator” of the Dynamic Albedo of Neutrons. Shortened to DAN for obvious reasons, this guy will soon be affixed to NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity, with one primary purpose: to “check for any water that might be bound into shallow underground minerals along the rover’s path.” In total, ten instruments on Curiosity will be dedicated to investigating whether the area selected for the mission has ever offered environmental conditions favorable for life and favorable for preserving evidence about life. We’re told that while in active mode, it’s sensitive enough to detect water content as low as one-tenth of one percent in the ground beneath the rover, but there’s still no indication of when it’ll actually prove that Mars truly is the next major relocation hotspot. Something tells us Richard Branson will be ready, regardless.
NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity gains DAN apparatus, new lust for water originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 27 Oct 2011 14:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Oct 26
Angry Birds to ride Russian rockets into space, follow iPads bound for bored cosmonauts
Posted in: Apple, ipad, Ipad2, NASA, space, Today's Chili, Toys
Slingshots and unbridled rage might be enough to launch Rovio’s furious fowl across the battlefield, but they’ll need some outside help if they hope to break free of Earth’s atmosphere — it’s time to call the cosmonauts. Two upcoming Russian space launches are scheduled to ferry a pair of iPads and a plush Angry Birds toy to the International Space Station. The twin tablets will fly on an unmanned resupply vehicle early next week, and the irritated avian is playing the part of a jocular gravity indicator in a manned mission next month — part of a russian tradition of hanging a toy by a string to signal when the vessel has escaped the Earth’s gravity. NASA told collectSPACE that the iPads are only slated for recreational purposes, but mentioned that various tablets were being evaluated for future use. The plush bird? It’s coming home; cosmonaut Shkaplerov’s five year old daughter can’t be expected to give up her toys forever, can she?
Filed under: Tablet PCs
Angry Birds to ride Russian rockets into space, follow iPads bound for bored cosmonauts originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 26 Oct 2011 22:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Oct 23
Inhabitat’s Week in Green: quantum levitation, Zombie-Powered Vertical Farm and Macquariums
Posted in: car, eco, ev, green, solar, solar power, SolarPower, space, Today's Chili
Alternative transportation blasted off into the future this week as DeLorean revealed plans to launch an all-electric vehicle in 2013 and Richard Branson announced the official opening of the Virgin Galactic Gateway spaceport. Researchers also developed a next-gen quantum levitation technology that could lead to floating vehicles, and we spotted a cloud concept blimp that soars through the skies. We also brought you an exclusive interview with Revenge of the Electric Car director Chris Paine, and we shared a leaked brochure with specs on Toyota’s new Prius C.
Renewable energy also rocketed towards a more sustainable tomorrow as Japan’s team Tokai took first place in the World Solar Challenge and Apple filed a set of patents for next-generation solar technology. Meanwhile Facebook announced plans to launch a new energy efficiency app in 2012 and we launched a contest where you can win one of 25 $600 home energy audits. We also showcased a stunning set of satellite photos of the world’s power lines, and since Halloween is on its way, we brought you a Zombie-Powered Vertical Farm designed to keep its inhabitants safe from the Living Dead.
Speaking of Halloween, this week we shared instructions for making a DIY cardboard box robot costume, and we launched our 2011 Green Halloween Costume Contest for kids. We also brought you several developments from the realm of eco textiles — a material that repairs its own rips and tears and a Japanese company that recycles old bras into power-generating fuel. Finally, we showcased several slick developments in aqueous technology: an oil skimmer that cleans up spills four times faster, an artificial muscle that could one day propel nanobots through the body, and a quirky set of ‘Macquariums‘ made from Apple iMacs.
Inhabitat’s Week in Green: quantum levitation, Zombie-Powered Vertical Farm and Macquariums originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 23 Oct 2011 20:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Oct 23
Nikon D300s travels to the edge of space, survives to share the results
Posted in: diy, dslr, nikon, space, Today's Chili, video
If you’re going to go to the trouble of sending a camera to the edge of space, you might as well send one capable of doing the trip justice, right? That hasn’t always been the case with similar DIY attempts (for obvious reasons), but the team behind the so-called Cygnus “spacecraft” decided to go all out when they sent their weather balloon / beer cooler contraption aloft this month to photograph the curvature of the Earth. In this case, going all out meant sending a Nikon D300s DSLR equipped with Tokina 11-16mm f/2.8 lens, which managed to capture some stunning pictures like the one you see above — although some got a bit obscured by ice build-up. There’s more where that came from at the Flickr link below, and you can check out a video of the launch after the break.
[Thanks, Udi]
Continue reading Nikon D300s travels to the edge of space, survives to share the results
Nikon D300s travels to the edge of space, survives to share the results originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 23 Oct 2011 14:49:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Oct 21
Scientists capture birth of new planet on camera, mother and child doing just fine
Posted in: research, space, Today's Chili
After all the pushing, squeezing and screaming, the universe has finally given birth to a new planet, in an eruption that two scientists managed to capture on film. The newborn pile of planetary pudge, named LkCa 15 b, was discovered by Drs. Michael Ireland and Adam Kraus, who, over the course of 12 months, successfully documented the event using Keck telescopes and a technique called aperture mask interferometry. Their findings, published in Astrophysical Journal describe a Jupiter-like gaseous planet that likely began forming some 50,000 to 100,000 years ago. Located about 450 light years from Earth, it’s also the youngest planet ever observed, having dethroned the previous record-holder, which was about five times older. According to Ireland and Kraus, the LkCa 15 b is still being formed out of a circle of dust and gas (pictured above) surrounding a 2-million-year-old star. By observing a “young gas giant in the process of formation,” the researchers hope to find answers to fundamental questions that have long eluded them. “These very basic questions of when and where are best answered when you can actually see the planet forming, as the process is happening right now,” Kraus explained to the AP. Head past the break to see an artist’s rendering of the newborn, and if you get the chance, be sure to send flowers.
Continue reading Scientists capture birth of new planet on camera, mother and child doing just fine
Scientists capture birth of new planet on camera, mother and child doing just fine originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 21 Oct 2011 22:34:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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