First Plane on Mars Potentially to Come! - http://clapway.com/2015/07/02/first-plane-on-mars-potentially-to-come870/

Why is NASA planning the first plane on Mars?

While the world’s attention towards space news was focused mainly on the furor of the third launch of the Space X rocket and its explosion as well as the planetary conjunction that would happen on Tuesday night, news was released about a future plane that could fly on Mars. This first plane on Mars news was released on the NASA website on the 29th of June. According to the post on their website, a prototype of the Preliminary Research Aerodynamics Design to Land on Mars is an aircraft that is shaped like an arrow without the stem attached.

What will it do?

The aircraft will be sent to Mars in order to survey the Mars landscape for likely places to land for future Mars missions. This intent to survey the still quite alien landscape is evident from the name of the aircraft. But first, the prototype must pass its first test at 100,000 feet high above Earth before it becomes the first plane on Mars. Once it survives the test at 100,000 feet in the sky, it will be tested a few more times to work out any additional kinks or add any other features before it is then ready to be sent to Mars. The high altitude is supposed to be very similar to the thin atmosphere present on Mars, thereby helping to gauge whether or not this aircraft will do its job sufficiently well on the red planet.

Al Bowers, the NASA Armstrong chief scientist and Prandtl-m program manager said, “The Prandtl-m could overfly some of the proposed landing sites for a future astronaut mission and send back to Earth very detailed high resolution photographic map images that could tell scientists about the suitability of those landing sites.”

First plane on mars will get there via cubesat

The plan is that once it ready to be launched to Mars, the aircraft will be folded up and squeezed into a CubeSat, from which it can unfold and deploy. Also to be attached to that CubeSat is a Mars rover. But let’s take one thing at a time for now.

 

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First Plane on Mars Potentially to Come!

NASA is Putting CubeSats on Mars - http://clapway.com/2015/06/13/nasa-is-putting-cubesats-on-mars-654/

Administration bets big on tiny satellites.

According to statements made yesterday, NASA is looking to put two CubeSats on Mars. The plan is to have the two nanosatellites piggyback on an Atlas V booster and join NASA’s InSight mission, which seeks to study the interior of Mars using a geophysical lander. The idea to take two CubeSats along for the ride is part of a larger move NASA is making towards more widespread use of the tiny satellites. Towards that end, the administration also has filed a request for proposals meant to promote a commercial launch industry dedicated to CubeSats.

 

What are CubeSats?

CubeSats are very small, modular, cube-shaped satellites. Each side is 10 centimeters (4 inches) long, and the cubes can weigh up to 1.33 kilograms (3 pounds). They are typically launched aboard larger spacecraft carrying multiple payloads, and feature a spring-loaded mechanism that allows them to separate from the spacecraft. Thanks to their handy size (as well as the availability of decommissioned Russian rockets), CubeSats are currently cheap to launch, at about $40,000 per cube. They have been used for research in the past, though their destination is usually lower Earth orbit.

 

Why bring CubeSats to Mars?

The CubeSat nanosatellites that will be sent to Mars with the InSight Lander are specifically designed for the mission. The nanosatellites, called MarCO (Mars Cube One) feature two radio antennae and two solar panels, allowing them to quickly relay information about the landing to Earth. If, for whatever reason, the cubes fail, the team can still fall back on the InSight lander to communicate with the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) overhead, which in turn would beam the information to Earth. The only downside would be a delay of over an hour as the MRO transmits the information. So, while NASA hopes to use the CubeSats to eliminate a nail-biting delay, no major catastrophe would come of their failure. Scientists have high hopes that this mission will help us better understand the processes behind planet formation, so it’s a relief to see backup communications in place. If the CubeSats work as planned, though, NASA will likely have more “bring-your-own” communications equipment in future Mars missions.

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NASA is Putting CubeSats on Mars

Bill Nye’s Crowd-Funded LightSail Has Lost Contact With Earth - http://clapway.com/2015/05/28/bill-nyes-crowd-funded-lightsail-has-lost-contact-with-earth123/

Bill Nye’s Kickstart-funded LightSail project has been temporarily halted, after the prototype satellite experienced a computer malfunction during its lower Earth orbit. The solar sail spacecraft launched just last week, and was backed by The Planetary Society, Nye’s organization. The mission for the spacecraft was to use energy solely from the sun to power its motion through space. Currently, communication between the LightSail and Earth has stopped.

The LightSail’s original mission: an experiment for solar sails

Just last week, the LightSail was launched atop the Atlas V rocket at Cape Canaveral, in Florida. The solar sail aircraft included a CubeSat equipped with a 344-square-foot mylar sail, which served to detect invisible, accelerating particles expelled from the sun. The solar “wind” would theoretically and physically work like the wind at sea, where the boat’s sails are used to propel the ship forward. The solar sail would be “pushed” through space by the force of solar wind.

However, the primary goal of the mission was to see if the sails on the LightSail could successfully expand in space. The deployment of the sails was scheduled to happen much later, only after a series of data “chirps” were sent back consistently to Earth, indicating the position of the spacecraft and other important information. Flight controllers have received successful chirps for two consecutive days, but over the weekend, the satellite stopped sending signals.

What next for Bill Nye’s LightSail?

The scientists monitoring the solar sail’s behavior have deduced that the satellite’s Linux-based software system ultimately couldn’t contain the size of the data emitted by the chirps sent to Earth. The more beacons transferred via the chirps, the larger the file size would grow. When the file reaches a size of 32 megabytes, the flight system could have reached maximum capacity and crashed.

The team at the Planetary Society has to unfortunately put the LightSail mission on hold until they can fix this technical issue. Currently, scientists are hoping to reboot the system, by giving it commands every time the spacecraft passes a ground control station. They’re also hoping that charged particles in space will strike an electrical component on the LightSail and help “wake it up.” For the time being, it seems, the solar sail spacecraft remains frozen.

THROUGH SUNDAY: For readers with young children, check out the Space Scouts Summer Adventure program here! It’s an educational adventure centered on space, technology and science with unique weekly packages crafted to inspire your burgeoning future astronauts. Click for more information.

Bill Nye’s Crowd-Funded LightSail Has Lost Contact With Earth