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By Space Force
U.S. Space Force senior leaders discussed the Personnel Management Act during a panel at the Air and Space Force’s Air, Space and Cyber Conference at National Harbor, Maryland, Sept. 18.
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By NASA
3 min read
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)
While astronaut Gene Cernan was on the lunar surface during the Apollo 17 mission, his spacesuit collected loads of lunar dust. The gray, powdery substance stuck to the fabric and entered the capsule causing eye, nose, and throat irritation dubbed “lunar hay fever.” Credit: NASACredit: NASA Moon dust, or regolith, isn’t like the particles on Earth that collect on bookshelves or tabletops – it’s abrasive and it clings to everything. Throughout NASA’s Apollo missions to the Moon, regolith posed a challenge to astronauts and valuable space hardware.
During the Apollo 17 mission, astronaut Harrison Schmitt described his reaction to breathing in the dust as “lunar hay fever,” experiencing sneezing, watery eyes, and a sore throat. The symptoms went away, but concern for human health is a driving force behind NASA’s extensive research into all forms of lunar soil.
The need to manage the dust to protect astronaut health and critical technology is already beneficial on Earth in the fight against air pollution.
Working as a contributor on a habitat for NASA’s Next Space Technologies for Exploration Partnerships (NextSTEP) program, Lunar Outpost Inc. developed an air-quality sensor system to detect and measure the amount of lunar soil in the air that also detects pollutants on Earth.
Originally based in Denver, the Golden, Colorado-based company developed an air-quality sensor called the Space Canary and offered the sensor to Lockheed Martin Space for its NextSTEP lunar orbit habitat prototype. After the device was integrated into the habitat’s environmental control system, it provided distinct advantages over traditional equipment.
Rebranded as Canary-S (Solar), the sensor is now meeting a need for low-cost, wireless air-quality and meteorological monitoring on Earth. The self-contained unit, powered by solar energy and a battery, transmits data using cellular technology. It can measure a variety of pollutants, including particulate matter, carbon monoxide, methane, sulfur dioxide, and volatile organic compounds, among others. The device sends a message up to a secure cloud every minute, where it’s routed to either Lunar Outpost’s web-based dashboard or a customer’s database for viewing and analysis.
The oil and gas industry uses the Canary-S sensors to provide continuous, real-time monitoring of fugitive gas emissions, and the U.S. Forest Service uses them to monitor forest-fire emissions.
“Firefighters have been exhibiting symptoms of carbon monoxide poisoning for decades. They thought it was just part of the job,” explained Julian Cyrus, chief operating officer of Lunar Outpost. “But the sensors revealed where and when carbon monoxide levels were sky high, making it possible to issue warnings for firefighters to take precautions.”
The Canary-S sensors exemplify the life-saving technologies that can come from the collaboration of NASA and industry innovations.
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Last Updated Sep 17, 2024 Related Terms
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2 min read Printed Engines Propel the Next Industrial Revolution
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By NASA
6 min read
Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)
This artist’s concept depicts NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft in orbit around Jupiter. The mission is targeting an Oct. 10, 2024, launch.NASA/JPL-Caltech The first NASA spacecraft dedicated to studying an ocean world beyond Earth, Europa Clipper aims to find out if the ice-encased moon Europa could be habitable.
NASA’s Europa Clipper spacecraft, the largest the agency has ever built for a planetary mission, will travel 1.8 billion miles (2.9 billion kilometers) from the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida to Europa, an intriguing icy moon of Jupiter. The spacecraft’s launch period opens Thursday, Oct. 10.
Learn more about how NASA’s Europa Clipper came together – and how it will explore an ocean moon of Jupiter. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech Data from previous NASA missions has provided scientists with strong evidence that an enormous salty ocean lies underneath the frozen surface of the moon. Europa Clipper will orbit Jupiter and conduct 49 close flybys of the moon to gather data needed to determine whether there are places below its thick frozen crust that could support life.
Here are eight things to know about the mission:
1. Europa is one of the most promising places to look for currently habitable conditions beyond Earth.
There’s scientific evidence that the ingredients for life — water, the right chemistry, and energy — may exist at Europa right now. This mission will gather the information scientists need to find out for sure. The moon may hold an internal ocean with twice the water of Earth’s oceans combined, and it may also host organic compounds and energy sources under its surface. If the mission determines that Europa is habitable, it would mean there may be more habitable worlds in our solar system and beyond than we have imagined.
2. The spacecraft will fly through one of the most punishing radiation environments in our solar system — second only to the Sun’s.
Jupiter is surrounded by a gigantic magnetic field 20,000 times stronger than Earth’s. As the field spins, it captures and accelerates charged particles, creating radiation that can damage spacecraft. Mission engineers designed a spacecraft vault to shield sensitive electronics from radiation, and they plotted orbits that will limit the time Europa Clipper spends in most radiation-heavy areas around Jupiter.
3. Europa Clipper will orbit Jupiter, studying Europa while flying by the moon dozens of times.
The spacecraft will make looping orbits around Jupiter that bring it close to Europa for 49 science-dedicated flybys. On each orbit, the spacecraft will spend less than a day in Jupiter’s dangerous radiation zone near Europa before zipping back out. Two to three weeks later, it will repeat the process, making another flyby.
4. Europa Clipper features NASA’s most sophisticated suite of science instruments yet.
To determine if Europa is habitable, Europa Clipper must assess the moon’s interior, composition, and geology. The spacecraft carries nine science instruments and a gravity experiment that uses the telecommunications system. In order to obtain the best science during each flyby, all the science instruments will operate simultaneously on every pass. Scientists will then layer the data together to paint a full picture of the moon.
5. With antennas and solar arrays fully deployed, Europa Clipper is the largest spacecraft NASA has ever developed for a planetary mission.
The spacecraft extends 100 feet (30.5 meters) from one end to the other and about 58 feet (17.6 meters) across. That’s bigger than a basketball court, thanks in large part to the solar arrays, which need to be huge so they can collect enough sunlight while near Jupiter to power the instruments, electronics, and other subsystems.
6. It’s a long journey to Jupiter.
Jupiter is on average some 480 million miles (about 770 million kilometers) from Earth; both planets are in motion, and a spacecraft can carry only a limited amount of fuel. Mission planners are sending Europa Clipper past Mars and then Earth, using the planets’ gravity as a slingshot to add speed to the spacecraft’s trek. After journeying about 1.8 billion miles (2.9 billion kilometers) over 5½ years, the spacecraft will fire its engines to enter orbit around Jupiter in 2030.
7. Institutions across the U.S. and Europe have contributed to Europa Clipper.
Currently, about a thousand people work on the mission, including more than 220 scientists from both the U.S. and Europe. Since the mission was officially approved in 2015, more than 4,000 people have contributed to Europa Clipper, including teams who work for contractors and subcontractors.
8. More than 2.6 million of us are riding along with the spacecraft, bringing greetings from one water world to another.
As part of a mission campaign called “Message in a Bottle,” the spacecraft is carrying a poem by U.S. Poet Laureate Ada Limón, cosigned by millions of people from nearly every country in the world. Their names have been stenciled onto a microchip attached to a tantalum metal plate that seals the spacecraft’s electronics vault. The plate also features waveforms of people saying the word “water” in over 100 spoken languages.
More About Europa Clipper
Europa Clipper’s three main science objectives are to determine the thickness of the moon’s icy shell and its interactions with the ocean below, to investigate its composition, and to characterize its geology. The mission’s detailed exploration of Europa will help scientists better understand the astrobiological potential for habitable worlds beyond our planet.
Managed by Caltech in Pasadena, California, NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory leads the development of the Europa Clipper mission in partnership with the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, for NASA’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The main spacecraft body was designed by APL in collaboration with JPL and NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, and NASA’s Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia. The Planetary Missions Program Office at Marshall executes program management of the Europa Clipper mission.
NASA’s Launch Services Program, based at Kennedy, manages the launch service for the Europa Clipper spacecraft, which will launch on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy.
Find more information about Europa here:
https://europa.nasa.gov
Europa Clipper Teachable Moment See Europa’s Chaos Terrain in Crisp Detail Europa Clipper Gets Its Super-Size Solar Arrays News Media Contacts
Gretchen McCartney
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
818-393-6215
gretchen.p.mccartney@jpl.nasa.gov
Karen Fox / Molly Wasser
NASA Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600
karen.c.fox@nasa.gov / molly.l.wasser@nasa.gov
2024-125
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Last Updated Sep 17, 2024 Related Terms
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By NASA
NASA, ESA/Matthias Maurer An astronaut aboard the International Space Station snapped this picture of the Moon as the station orbited 265 miles above the U.S. state of Minnesota on Dec. 17, 2021.
Astronauts aboard the orbital lab take images using handheld digital cameras, usually through windows in the station’s cupola, for Crew Earth Observations. Crew members have produced hundreds of thousands of images of the Moon and Earth’s land, oceans, and atmosphere.
On Saturday, Sept. 14, 2024, International Observe the Moon Night, everyone on Earth is invited to learn about lunar science, participate in celestial observations, and honor cultural and personal connection to the Moon. Find an event to join in the celebration.
Image credit: NASA, ESA/Matthias Maurer
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