October 2015
Finding Earth-like worlds: the tale of how Kepler-452b was discovered
... stellar parameters. The first spectroscopic follow up observations were made at McDonald Observatory, and the results are a bit disappointing. The initial analysis indicated that the star could be as much as 20- 25% larger than the Sun, and...
February 2016
Danish Surprise for ISS Crew
... anyone. It was hard to keep that secret!” Andreas later spoke about the moment when they all bit into the chocolate and saw the notes. At first the crew thought it was a fortune cookie. Then...
March 2016
Space Mining – the Reality of Tomorrow?
... the advent of the Southern Ape Man shows every almost “everything” has happened in the last tiny bit of Super Month time. When Peter Diamandis talks of abundance and Ray Kurzweil of singularity, they are suggesting...
November 2016
Rosetta - an eventful cruise phase
... activate the small onboard thrusters for several hours during the period of ground contact. Of course we were a bit nervous: we had never performed with Rosetta such long duration burns, and we had only a couple of weeks...
April 2017
Surviving radiation for space colonisation
... regolith. The Sun generates a lot of this type of particle from its fusion reactions and there is quite a bit in the solar wind. The nuclei are all ions, their electrons stripped away as they are accelerated...
August 2017
Space invaders and the usual suspects - disruptive trends in Earth observation
... some consolidation in this new sector is starting. US government support In the US, public institutions support this new economy. A bit like the early support to DigitalGlobe, the US government (through the NGA) has declared many times its...
