Earth observation

Earth Observation is a global endeavour. It is the process of making measurements of the entire planet using satellites.

These measurements enable us to monitor changes to the environment and patterns of land use and can influence environmental policy. Within two years of satellite monitoring showing a hole in the ozone layer, for example, Europe and 24 non-European countries had signed up to The Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer.

This protocol protects the ozone layer by controlling the production and consumption of harmful chemicals. More than 160 countries have now formally approved the protocol.

Co-ordinating space missions

The UK recognises the importance of Earth Observation satellites and is involved in the following activities and strategies:

BNSC funds GIFTSS (Government Information From The Space Sector). GIFTSS develops partnerships between UK Government departments and agencies. The aim is to investigate and develop the use of satellite-based data to address challenges such as intelligent transport, long-term landuse monitoring and humanitarian aid distribution.

GMES (Global Monitoring for Environment and Security) is a European Union led initiative in partnership with the European Space Agency (ESA). GMES will build a co-ordinated system for Earth observation and monitoring and has a particular emphasis on climate change. With GMES, Europe's politicians will have access to independent environmental data to form and support their policy decisions.

CEOS (Committee on Earth Observation Satellites) provides an international forum in which to discuss international Earth Observation issues. The CEOS ensures that countries work together to get the most from international civil space missions that observe and study planet Earth.

CEOS consists of 23 members (most of which are space agencies) and 21 associates (associated national and international organisations). It is recognised as the major international forum for the co-ordination of Earth observation satellite programs and users of satellite data worldwide.

Envisat

Envisat is the world's largest and most complex environmental satellite. Launched in 2002, it is the size of an articulated lorry and takes many different measurements of the Earth's land, oceans, atmosphere and ice caps at the same time. This is so we can discover how one factor affects the other.

Envisat has already exceeded its original lifetime and remains in good health. The mission is now extended until 2010.

Data from the Envisat mission will build on information obtained from ERS (European Remote Sensing Satellite) 1 and 2. The ERS satellites have been watching over the Earth for more than 16 years, providing scientists with plenty of data about our planet. Already there is enough satellite information to show long-term trends in sea level rise and reduced ice cover in the Arctic.

Examples in the rest of this section show how scientists use satellites to help tackle climate change, pollution and improve land monitoring.

Successful Launch of NOAA-N

NOAA-N is the latest Space polar-orbiting satellite developed by NASA for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). NOAA-N will collect information about Earth's atmosphere and environment to improve weather prediction and climate research across the globe.

NOAA-N is the 15th in a series of polar-orbiting satellites dating back to 1978. NOAA uses two satellites, a morning and afternoon satellite, to ensure every part of the Earth is observed at least twice every 12 hours.

Severe weather is monitored and reported to the National Weather Service which broadcasts the findings to the global community. With the early warning, effects of catastrophic weather events can be minimized.

NOAA-N also has instruments to support an international search-and-rescue program. The Search and Rescue Satellite-Aided Tracking System, called COPAS-SARSAT, transmits to ground stations the location of emergency beacons from ships, aircraft and people in distress around the world. The program, in place since 1982, has saved about 18,000 lives.

NOAA-N is the first in a series of polar-orbiting satellites to be part of a joint cooperation project with the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMESTAT).

Deal struck on UK-ESA Research Centre and GMES

A European Space Agency (ESA) research centre will be established in the UK following an agreement made by Science and Innovation Minister, Lord Drayson today.

Lord Drayson and ESA Director General Jean-Jacques Dordain signed an agreement in principle to secure an ESA research centre in the UK at the ESA Ministerial taking place this week at The Hague. The research centre, which will be based at the Harwell science and innovation campus in Oxfordshire, could be up and running within a year.

Once established, ESA money will be directed to fund new work on climate change modelling that uses space data and the development of technologies for a new era of planetary exploration, including robotics and novel power sources.

Announcing the agreement, Lord Drayson said:

"I'm delighted to have struck this deal today. Laying the foundations for a possible centre was one of my aspirations at this meeting, but to come away with a signed agreement on a facility is great news for the UK and ESA.

"This centre represents a first for the UK. It will direct more ESA business and funding to our shores, which of course is very important for our economy - but also the establishment of a new ESA centre is extremely encouraging for British scientists working in space science as they will have closer involvement in international space station programmes."

During the two-day ministerial meeting, which concludes today, Lord Drayson also committed to invest £82 million in the ESA's flagship Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) programmes in a package of UK subscriptions totalling over £300 million.

Announcing the GMES commitment Lord Drayson said:

"The greatest challenge facing our generation is climate change. Despite the global economic downturn, it is vital that we increase the pace of research in this area.

"The GMES programme offers a crucial tool to aid our understanding and monitoring of climate change variables.

"I am pleased to have announced the UK's commitment to the second segment of the programme at the Ministerial today. Participation in GMES, alongside the other significant projects that the UK has committed to support at this meeting, will ensure the UK remains a key player in using space science to monitor climate change."

Other programmes backed by the UK include those that will search for life on Mars and develop telecommunications technology - which will strengthen the UK's role in the global space industry.

Lord Drayson added:

"It is the Government's priority, particularly in the current economic climate, to ensure the most out of every pound we invest in ESA. This is why we have selected the areas and programmes where the UK can compete and grow most effectively.

"Historically, the UK has made smart investments in robotics and microsatellites and this has enabled us to develop world-class leads in these areas.

"The UK is the fourth highest contributor to the European Space Agency's programmes, and I'm determined that we remain a significant player in European space."

The UK made contributions to seven optional ESA programmes, including:

1. Advanced Research in Telecommunication Systems (ARTES). This programme will make the most of the UK's reputation and expertise in satellite communications technology, where the UK has a vibrant and growing business.
   
   
2. Aurora Enhanced Exo Mars Mission Component and Exploration Programme. ExoMars will search for evidence of life on Mars. It is expected to launch Jan 2016 and will consist of a rover vehicle and stationary lander. The UK is the second largest contributor to the programme in terms of funding and the UK company Astrium has the contract to construct the Mars Rover.
   
   
3. Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) segment two. GMES will provide essential observations to monitor climate change. The programme includes a key satellite mission to measure the chemicals in the atmosphere. It is expected that the high-tech UK space industry will play a leading role in developing the satellites for this programme.

The UK also agreed investments in the ESA's mandatory programmes over the next three years; The Science Programme, funded by Science and Technology Facilities Council, STFC, pays for the design, build and launch of a series of science missions in astronomy, solar physics and planetary science. The UK's investment will be €234.5 million.

The General Budget, funded by STFC and the Natural Environment Research Council, pays for the basic infrastructure and overheads of the ESA programme. The UK's investment will be €110 million.

The ESA Ministerial is a meeting of 18 Ministers from across the Agency's Member States. Held every three years, the meeting's objective is to agree levels of investment to all ESA programmes.

Notes to editors

For interviews with the Science and Innovation Minister, Lord Drayson, please contact:

Clare Kingston
Tel: +44 (0)7827 282 030

For interviews with Daniel Sacotte, ESA Director Advice to Director General, please contact:

Franco Bonacina
Tel: +31 6 0874 6109

The confirmed UK subscriptions to the ESA Optional Programme are:

1. GMES Programmes: Total € 102.5 million, comprising of:-
   
   • European Earth Watch Programme - global monitoring of essential climate change variables - € 15 million
   • Global Monitoring for Environment and Security segment two - € 87.5 million
   
   
2. European Space Exploration Programme - Aurora - Enhanced Exo Mars Mission Component - an increased subscription to € 165 million
   
   
3. European Space Exploration Programme - Aurora - Mars Robotic Exploration Preparation Programme Component - € 6.5 million
   
   
4. Advanced Research in Telecommunication Systems (ARTES) - total subscription to seven elements of this programme - € 121million
   
   
5. Space Situational Awareness - € 1 million
   
   
6. General Support Technologies Programme - total subscription of €3million across the four programme elements

The British National Space Centre (BNSC) coordinates civil space policy across UK Government. A voluntary partnership of 11 Government departments and research councils, BNSC represents the UK at the European Space Agency.

The European Space Agency (ESA) represents 18 Member States. The Agency's projects are designed to find out more about the Earth, the Solar System and the Universe, as well as to develop satellite-based technology and services, and to promote the competitiveness of European industry.

For more information, contact the DIUS press office on 0203 300 8105.

NASA TV to Broadcast Space Station Cargo Ship Arrival

The residents of the International Space Station will receive a new shipment of fuel, food, supplies and holiday gifts on Sunday, Nov. 30. Docking of the cargo delivery spacecraft, known as ISS Progress 31, is set for 6:23 a.m. CST. NASA Television will begin coverage of the event at 5:45 a.m.

The unpiloted Russian resupply craft is carrying more than two tons of supplies for the station's crew, Expedition 18 Commander Mike Fincke and Flight Engineers Yury Lonchakov and Sandy Magnus. The ISS Progress 31 launched at 6:38 a.m. Wednesday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

NASA TV's broadcast will include commentary and available downlink television of the final hours of space shuttle Endeavour's STS-126 mission. Endeavour is scheduled to land Sunday at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

For NASA TV downlink, schedules and streaming video information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

For more about the crew's activities and station sighting opportunities, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

NASA Uses iTunes to Share Development Progress of Ares Rocket

Video updates reporting progress made on NASA's newest family of exploration vehicles -- the Ares I crew launch vehicle and Ares V heavy cargo launch vehicle -- are now featured on iTunes.

The Ares Projects quarterly progress reports offer viewers a rare glimpse at the on-going development work of the next-generation launch vehicles that will take explorers to the moon and beyond in coming decades. Beginning in 2015, the Ares I rocket will launch the Orion crew capsule, carrying astronauts and payloads to the International Space Station.

iTunes is the place to get an up-close look at the Ares rockets and learn more about key engine, hardware and system milestones as the rockets proceed through the design, review and development processes that will take them -- and their future crews -- to launch.

The video progress reports, which have been produced quarterly beginning in August 2006, have been used to visually share progress with the NASA team at all levels and to record the historical work being completed on America's newest fleet of spacecraft for future generations. Now, in an effort to share the Ares development with a broader audience, NASA is posting the full library of reports on iTunes. The programs range in length from 5-15 minutes.

The 10 quarterly reports produced to date spotlight the detailed evolution of the Ares vehicles, from earliest conception through various design phases and the most recent testing. The latest report in the series -- Ares quarterly progress report number 10 -- includes video segments about:

- Wind tunnel testing of scale models of the Ares I test vehicle, known as Ares I-X, and the Ares V rocket. The testing aids engineers in designing aerodynamic vehicles.

- Disassembly and inspection of part of the J-2X engine -- known as the powerpack -- that will produce the thrust needed to power the Ares I rocket to orbit. The powerpack pushes liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen into the engine's main combustion chamber. This test series helped address early design risks. Engineers are now evaluating hardware used as part of the recent testing.

- The first tests to weld together pieces of the rockets being developed. NASA recently tested a new robotic friction stir welding facility by fusing space shuttle fuel tank panels. Friction stir welding is an innovative technique invented in 1991 that uses forging pressure and frictional heating to produce high-strength bonds virtually free of defects.

- A test of a parachute for the Ares I rocket. The parachute will slow the rapid descent of the rocket's reusable first-stage motor as it falls back to Earth after detaching from the rocket during its climb to space. The parachute permits recovery of the motor for use on future Ares I flights.

The Ares Projects team at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the development of the Ares rockets. NASA's Johnson Space Mission Center in Houston manages the Constellation Program, which includes the Ares I and Ares V rockets, the Orion crew module and the Altair lunar lander.

To view the Ares quarterly progress reports on iTunes, visit:

http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewPodcast?id=296275310

To learn more about the Ares rockets and view the Ares quarterly progress reports on NASA's Ares web site, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ares

For more information about NASA's Constellation Program, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/constellation

For additional interactive features and podcasts about NASA, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia

NASA Conducts Pilot Cognition Studies

NASA is investigating the best methods for monitoring brain activity as part of a study designed to help airplane pilots realize when they are operating under dangerous levels of stress, fatigue and distraction.

Studies under way at NASA's Glenn Research Center in Cleveland are employing functional near infrared spectroscopy, also know as fNIRS, and other imaging technology to measure blood flow in the brain's cortex and the concentration of oxygen in the blood. This emerging technology offers a non-invasive, safe, portable and inexpensive method for monitoring indicators of neural activity.

Through the studies, researchers hope to find ways to improve the interaction between the increasingly sophisticated automation being used in aircraft and the humans who operate those aircraft. The goal is to aid pilot decision-making to improve aviation safety.

Angela Harrivel, a NASA biomedical engineer who leads the research, and research associates are working on fNIRS at Glenn with 15 test subjects.

"No matter how much training pilots have, conditions could occur when too much is going on in the cockpit," said Harrivel. "What we hope to achieve by this study is a way to sensitively -- and, ultimately, unobtrusively -- determine when pilots become mentally overloaded."

Harrivel and the project are working with the test subjects, who don headgear fitted with optical or electrical sensors and sit in a moving cockpit simulator that creates the sensation of flying. The tests measure electrical activity in the brain to validate spectroscopic data obtained through the fNIRS sensors.

The volunteers perform basic functional tasks and participate in more complex flight simulations. Future tests will challenge the subjects with stress-inducing conditions as they use a joystick and flight instruments to try to stay "airborne" in the simulator.

"Flying an aircraft involves multitasking that potentially can push the limits of human performance," Harrivel said. "When we increase stress and difficulty we can see how the subject reacts, measuring brain activity during overload."

The Aviation Safety Program of NASA's Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate in Washington sponsored the research. It is overseen by the program's Integrated Intelligent Flight Deck Project.

Video of the testing will air on NASA Television's Video File. For NASA TV downlink, schedule and streaming video information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

For information about NASA's Integrated Intelligent Flight Deck Project visit:

http://www.aeronautics.nasa.gov/avsafe/iifd

For information about NASA and agency programs, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov

NASA Calls for Comment on Draft Ares V Request for Proposals

NASA has released a draft request for proposals, or RFP, regarding Phase I of its Ares V launch vehicle. The rocket will perform heavy lift and cargo functions as part of the next generation of spacecraft that will return humans to the moon. Phase I will define operational concepts, develop requirements, and refine design concepts for the Ares V.

This document is a draft of the final version of the RFP for Phase I, expected in January 2009. By responding to this draft RFP, potential offerors can provide input on the requirements, small business goals and contract structure. The industry input received will be combined with NASA's expertise for potential inclusion in the final version of the RFP for Phase I, which will ask for bids on five Ares V work packages.

A pre-solicitation conference is scheduled for Dec. 3, 2008, at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. The conference is designed for information sharing about the Ares V Phase I for potential offerors.

For a copy of the draft RFP for Phase I, designated NNM09274026R, and more information about the conference, visit:

http://prod.nais.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/eps/sol.cgi?acqid=131145#Draft%20Document

For more information about the Ares program, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ares

Shuttle and Station Astronauts Send Special Greetings to Military

The combined crews of space shuttle Endeavour and the International Space Station have sent a special greeting to members of the American military in time for the upcoming holiday season.

From orbit 220 miles above Earth, Commander Chris Ferguson (captain, U.S. Navy), Pilot Eric Boe (colonel, U.S. Air Force), Expedition 18 Commander Mike Fincke (colonel, U.S. Air Force), Mission Specialist Shane Kimbrough (lieutenant colonel, U.S. Army), Mission Specialist Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper (captain, U.S. Navy) and Mission Specialist Steve Bowen (captain, U.S. Navy) sent greetings to the soldiers, airmen, sailors and marines around the world who are away from their families this holiday season. The crew thanked the service members for their commitment and dedication and wished them well.

The combined crews will be celebrating Thanksgiving aboard the International Space Station. During the mission, the astronauts have been working to service the space station's solar arrays and deliver and install cargo and equipment necessary to expand the crew size from three to six people next year. Endeavour is scheduled to return home Sunday, Nov. 30.

The special message to members of the military will be available during Tuesday's video file on NASA Television. The video file will air at 9:00 a.m. CST on the standard-definition channel and also will be available on the NASA TV high-definition channel 105. The high-definition highlights will air at 8:30 a.m., 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. For more information about how to receive NASA TV, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

For the latest information about Endeavour's mission to the International Space Station, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/shuttle

NASA Awards Project Management Support Contract for Kennedy

NASA has selected Science Applications International Corporation of Houston to provide project management support services at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The contract begins on Feb. 1, 2009, with a two-year base period and three one-year options to extend performance. The contract has a maximum potential value of approximately $69.3 million.

The contract is a cost-plus-fixed-fee contract and has a total potential core value of $59.3 million if all options are exercised. An additional indefinite delivery, indefinite quantity contract line item is included with a possible ceiling of $10 million.

Science Applications International Corporation will provide engineering and technical services, project and business management and administrative support to Kennedy's Ground Operations Project Office in support of NASA's Constellation Program.

For information about NASA and agency programs, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov

NASA Prepares for New Juno Mission to Jupiter

NASA is officially moving forward on a mission to conduct an unprecedented, in-depth study of Jupiter.

Called Juno, the mission will be the first in which a spacecraft is placed in a highly elliptical polar orbit around the giant planet to understand its formation, evolution and structure. Underneath its dense cloud cover, Jupiter safeguards secrets to the fundamental processes and conditions that governed our early solar system.

"Jupiter is the archetype of giant planets in our solar system and formed very early, capturing most of the material left after the sun formed," said Scott Bolton, Juno principal investigator from the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio. "Unlike Earth, Jupiter's giant mass allowed it to hold onto its original composition, providing us with a way of tracing our solar system's history."

The spacecraft is scheduled to launch aboard an Atlas rocket from Cape Canaveral, Fla., in August 2011, reaching Jupiter in 2016. The spacecraft will orbit Jupiter 32 times, skimming about 4,800 kilometers (3,000 miles) over the planet's cloud tops for approximately one year. The mission will be the first solar powered spacecraft designed to operate despite the great distance from the sun.

"Jupiter is more than 644 million kilometers (400 million miles) from the sun or five times further than Earth," Bolton said. "Juno is engineered to be extremely energy efficient."

The spacecraft will use a camera and nine science instruments to study the hidden world beneath Jupiter's colorful clouds. The suite of science instruments will investigate the existence of an ice-rock core, Jupiter's intense magnetic field, water and ammonia clouds in the deep atmosphere, and explore the planet's aurora borealis.

"In Greek and Roman mythology, Jupiter's wife Juno peered through Jupiter's veil of clouds to watch over her husband's mischief," said Professor Toby Owen, co-investigator at the University of Hawaii in Honolulu. "Our Juno looks through Jupiter's clouds to see what the planet is up to, not seeking signs of misbehavior, but searching for whispers of water, the ultimate essence of life."

Understanding the formation of Jupiter is essential to understanding the processes that led to the development of the rest of our solar system and what the conditions were that led to Earth and humankind. Similar to the sun, Jupiter is composed mostly of hydrogen and helium. A small percentage of the planet is composed of heavier elements. However, Jupiter has a larger percentage of these heavier elements than the sun.

"Juno's extraordinarily accurate determination of the gravity and magnetic fields of Jupiter will enable us to understand what is going on deep down in the planet," said Professor Dave Stevenson, co-investigator at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. "These and other measurements will inform us about how Jupiter's constituents are distributed, how Jupiter formed and how it evolved, which is a central part of our growing understanding of the nature of our solar system."

Deep in Jupiter's atmosphere, under great pressure, hydrogen gas is squeezed into a fluid known as metallic hydrogen. At these great depths, the hydrogen acts like an electrically conducting metal which is believed to be the source of the planet's intense magnetic field. Jupiter also may have a rocky solid core at the center.

"Juno gives us a fantastic opportunity to get a picture of the structure of Jupiter in a way never before possible," said James Green, director of NASA's Planetary Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "It will allow us to take a giant step forward in our understanding on how giant planets form and the role that plays in putting the rest of the solar system together. "

The Juno mission is the second spacecraft designed under NASA's New Frontiers Program. The first was the Pluto New Horizons mission, launched in January 2006 and scheduled to reach Pluto's moon Charon in 2015. The program provides opportunities to carry out several medium-class missions identified as top priority objectives in the Decadal Solar System Exploration Survey, conducted by the Space Studies Board of the National Research Council in Washington.

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., manages the Juno mission. Lockheed Martin of Denver is building the spacecraft. The Italian Space Agency is contributing an infrared spectrometer instrument and a portion of the radio science experiment.

For more information about the Juno mission, visit: http://juno.nasa.gov

Space Exploration

Space exploration is our human response to curiosity about Earth, the moon, the planets, the sun and other stars, and the galaxies. Piloted and unpiloted space vehicles venture far beyond the boundaries of Earth to collect valuable information about the universe. Human beings have visited the moon and have lived in space stations for long periods. Space exploration helps us see Earth in its true relation with the rest of the universe. Such space exploration could reveal how the sun, the planets, and the stars were formed and whether life exists beyond our own world.

The space age began on Oct. 4, 1957. On that day, the Soviet Union launched Sputnik (later referred to as Sputnik 1), the first artificial satellite to orbit Earth. The first piloted space flight was made on April 12, 1961, when Yuri A. Gagarin, a Soviet cosmonaut, orbited Earth in the spaceship Vostok (later called Vostok 1).

Unpiloted vehicles called space probes have vastly expanded our knowledge of outer space, the planets, and the stars. In 1959, one Soviet probe passed close to the moon and another hit the moon. A United States probe flew past Venus in 1962. In 1974 and 1976, the United States launched two German probes that passed inside the orbit of Mercury, close to the sun. Two other U.S. probes landed on Mars in 1976. In addition to studying every planet except Pluto, space probes have investigated comets and asteroids.

The first piloted voyage to the moon began on Dec. 21, 1968, when the United States launched the Apollo 8 spacecraft. It orbited the moon 10 times and returned safely to Earth. On July 20, 1969, U.S. astronauts Neil A. Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed their Apollo 11 lunar module on the moon. Armstrong became the first person to set foot on the moon. United States astronauts made five more landings on the moon before the Apollo lunar program ended in 1972.

During the 1970's, astronauts and cosmonauts developed skills for living in space aboard the Skylab and Salyut space stations. In 1987 and 1988, two Soviet cosmonauts spent 366 consecutive days in orbit.

On April 12, 1981, the United States space shuttle Columbia blasted off. The shuttle was the first reusable spaceship and the first spacecraft able to land at an ordinary airfield. On Jan. 28, 1986, a tragic accident occurred. The U.S. space shuttle Challenger tore apart in midair, killing all seven astronauts aboard. The shuttle was redesigned, and flights resumed in 1988. A second tragedy struck the shuttle fleet on Feb. 1, 2003. The Columbia broke apart as it reentered Earth's atmosphere, killing all seven of its crew members.

In the early years of the space age, success in space became a measure of a country's leadership in science, engineering, and national defense. The United States and the Soviet Union were engaged in an intense rivalry called the Cold War. As a result, the two nations competed with each other in developing space programs. In the 1960's and 1970's, this "space race" drove both nations to tremendous exploratory efforts. The space race had faded by the end of the 1970's, when the two countries began to pursue independent goals in space.

A major dispute in the development of space programs has been the proper balance of piloted and unpiloted exploration. Some experts favor unpiloted probes because they may be cheaper, safer, and faster than piloted vehicles. They note that probes can make trips that would be too risky for human beings to attempt. On the other hand, probes generally cannot react to unexpected occurrences. Today, most space planners favor a combined, balanced strategy of unpiloted probes and piloted expeditions. Probes can visit uncharted regions of space or patrol familiar regions where the data to be gathered fall within expected limits. But in some cases, people must follow the probes and use human ingenuity, flexibility, and courage to explore the mysteries of the universe.

NASA Team to Investigate Launch Failure

An Alliant Techsystems suborbital rocket carrying two NASA hypersonic experiments was destroyed shortly after liftoff from NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia Friday, Aug. 22. No injuries or property damage were immediately reported.

The exact launch time was 5:10 a.m. EDT. The anomaly that caused the failure occurred approximately 27 seconds into flight and is not known.

Most debris from the rocket is thought to have fallen in the Atlantic Ocean. However, there are conflicting reports of debris being sighted on land. This debris could be hazardous. People who think they may have encountered rocket debris are advised not to touch it and to report it to the Wallops Emergency Operations Center at 757-824-1300.

NASA is very disappointed in this failure but has directed its focus on protecting public safety and conducting a comprehensive investigation to identify the root cause. NASA is assembling a multidiscipline team, along with the rocket's maker Alliant Techsystems, or ATK, of Minneapolis, to begin the investigation promptly.

Astronauts Transfer Cargo, Fourth Spacewalk Monday

Cargo transfers aboard the shuttle and station complex are more than 76 percent complete. More troubleshooting took place on a Urine Processor Assembly inside the station's Water Recovery System after it shut down several times during testing. Shuttle astronauts Steve Bowen and Shane Kimbrough prepare for the fourth STS-126 spacewalk Monday at 1:45 p.m. EST.

NASA to Brief Media about Test of Orion Launch Abort System Motor

NASA, ATK, Orbital Sciences Corp. and Lockheed Martin representatives will hold a teleconference at 2:30 p.m. MST today, Thursday, Nov. 20, to discuss the results of the first full-scale test fire of the motor for a new launch abort system.

Reporters should dial 888-469-1980 or 517-308-9161 and give the passcode "motor test" to participate in the call.

The launch abort system will sit atop the Orion crew exploration vehicle. The abort motor is designed to pull the crew module away from the Ares I launch vehicle in an emergency situation on the launch pad or during the first 300,000 feet after launch.

The test takes place today at 1 p.m. at the ATK Launch Systems facility in Promontory, Utah. This is the first time such a test has been conducted since the Apollo Program tested its launch escape system in the 1960s. The demonstration is the culmination of a series of motor and component tests conducted earlier this year in preparation for a test with a mock-up of the Orion crew capsule scheduled for the spring of 2009.

NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., manages the Orion launch abort system. Alliant Techsystems, or ATK, is responsible for the launch abort motor under contract to Orbital Sciences Corporation of Dulles, Va. Orbital is building the entire launch abort system for the Orion crew exploration vehicle. Lockheed Martin Corporation of Denver is the prime contractor for Orion.

Audio of the teleconference will be streamed live at:

http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio

For more information about the Orion crew capsule and the Constellation Program, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/orion

Racers Get Ready! NASA's Great Moonbuggy Registration Begins

Registration is open for NASA's 16th annual Great Moonbuggy Race, taking place April 3-4, 2009, in Huntsville, Ala.

Each year, NASA challenges high schools and colleges across the country and the world to design and build lightweight, human-powered moonbuggies. Innovative students put their own spin on the historic lunar rovers that carried Americans across the surface of the moon during the Apollo era. Builders with "the right stuff" then converge on Huntsville to test their engineering savvy - and their endurance.

The race was founded at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville in 1994. The U.S. Space and Rocket Center hosts the two-day event. The nationally renowned space museum and tourist attraction constructs a punishing course - a half-mile of hills and craters simulating the lunar surface - on the looping sidewalks and paths around its grounds.

Participating institutions may register up to two moonbuggies and teams each year. Registration for the 2009 race closes Feb. 1. For complete rules, moonbuggy design parameters and registration, visit:

http://moonbuggy.msfc.nasa.gov

High school teams will compete April 3. College teams will take the course April 4. Prizes are awarded to the three teams in each division that finish with the fastest race times. NASA and industry sponsors present additional awards for innovative buggy design, team spirit, best newcomer and other achievements.

Participation in the race has increased annually from just eight college teams in 1994 to 46 high school and college teams in 2008, with hundreds of students coming from 17 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, Canada, India and Germany to participate.

NASA, ATK Successfully Test First Orion Launch Abort Motor

Flames shot more than 100 feet high in a successful 5.5-second ground test firing Thursday, Nov. 20, of a launch abort motor for NASA's next generation spacecraft, the Orion crew exploration vehicle. NASA and the Orion industry team conducted the firing at the Alliant Techsystems, or ATK, facility in Promontory, Utah.

The abort motor will provide a half-million pounds of thrust to lift the crew module off the Ares I rocket, pulling the crew away safely in the event of an emergency on the launch pad or during the first 300,000 feet of the rocket's climb to orbit. Thursday's firing was the first time a motor with reverse flow propulsion technology at this scale has been tested. It also is the first test of its kind since the beginning of the Apollo Program.

"This milestone brings the Constellation Program one step closer to completion of the Orion vehicle that will carry astronauts to the International Space Station in 2015 and return humans to the moon by 2020," said Mark Geyer, Orion project manager at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. "The launch abort system must be ready to operate in many different environmental conditions, and tests such as this one are critical to assure this safety feature will protect our astronauts."

Thursday's test firing was the culmination of a series of motor and component tests conducted this year in preparation for the next major milestone, a test scheduled for the spring of 2009 with a full-size mock-up of the Orion crew capsule.

The abort motor stands more than 17 feet tall and is three feet in diameter. During Thursday's ground firing, the motor was fixed in a vertical test stand with its four exhaust nozzles pointing skyward at ATK's facility.

On ignition, the abort motor fired for 5.5 seconds. The high impulse motor was developed to expend the majority of its propellant in the first three seconds, delivering the half million pounds of thrust needed to pull the capsule away from its launch vehicle in an emergency abort.

While similar to the Apollo Program's launch abort motor, Orion's abort motor incorporates today's technology into a more robust design. The launch abort motor uses a composite case and an exhaust turn-flow technology instead of a tower, which results in weight savings, improved performance and improved success in crew survival during an abort. Instead of the rocket plume exiting a rear nozzle, the manifold is placed at the forward end of the motor. The rocket thrust enters the manifold and is turned 155 degrees and forced out the four nozzles, creating a forward-pulling force.

To prove this new technology, a series of tests were performed leading up to the full-scale demonstration. Earlier tests included five subscale test firings incorporating reverse flow propulsion; full-scale structural integrity testing on the composite case, igniter bottle and manifold; and surveillance testing during casting to ensure the propellant chemistry met abort motor requirements.

ATK is the subcontractor responsible for the launch abort motor within NASA's Orion Project. Orbital Sciences Corporation in Dulles, Va., is responsible for integrating the launch abort system motor into the vehicle for Lockheed Martin Corporation of Denver, the prime contractor for Orion. The Orion Project Office is located at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston and receives management and technical support for the Launch Abort System from NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., and NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.

For images and video of the test firing and more information about NASA's Constellation Program, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/constellation

NASA Spacecraft Detects Buried Glaciers on Mars

NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has revealed vast Martian glaciers of water ice under protective blankets of rocky debris at much lower latitudes than any ice previously identified on the Red Planet.

Scientists analyzed data from the spacecraft's ground-penetrating radar and report in the Nov. 21 issue of the journal Science that buried glaciers extend for dozens of miles from edges of mountains or cliffs. A layer of rocky debris blanketing the ice may have preserved the underground glaciers as remnants from an ice sheet that covered middle latitudes during a past ice age. This discovery is similar to massive ice glaciers that have been detected under rocky coverings in Antarctica.

"Altogether, these glaciers almost certainly represent the largest reservoir of water ice on Mars that is not in the polar caps," said John W. Holt of the University of Texas at Austin, who is lead author of the report. "Just one of the features we examined is three times larger than the city of Los Angeles and up to one-half-mile thick. And there are many more. In addition to their scientific value, they could be a source of water to support future exploration of Mars."

Scientists have been puzzled by what are known as aprons - gently sloping areas containing rocky deposits at the bases of taller geographical features - since NASA's Viking orbiters first observed them on the Martian surface in the 1970s. One theory has been that the aprons are flows of rocky debris lubricated by a small amount of ice. Now, the shallow radar instrument on the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has provided scientists an answer to this Martian puzzle.

"These results are the smoking gun pointing to the presence of large amounts of water ice at these latitudes,” said Ali Safaeinili, a shallow-radar instruments team member with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

Radar echoes received by the spacecraft indicated radio waves pass through the aprons and reflect off a deeper surface below without significant loss in strength. That is expected if the apron areas are composed of thick ice under a relatively thin covering. The radar does not detect reflections from the interior of these deposits as would occur if they contained significant rock debris. The apparent velocity of radio waves passing through the apron is consistent with a composition of water ice.

Scientists developed the shallow radar instrument for the orbiter to examine these mid-latitude geographical features and layered deposits at the Martian poles. The Italian Space Agency provided the instrument.

"We developed the instrument so it could operate on this kind of terrain," said Roberto Seu, leader of the instrument science team at the University of Rome La Sapienza in Italy. "It is now a priority to observe other examples of these aprons to determine whether they are also ice."

Holt and 11 co-authors report the buried glaciers lie in the Hellas Basin region of Mars' southern hemisphere. The radar also has detected similar-appearing aprons extending from cliffs in the northern hemisphere.

"There's an even larger volume of water ice in the northern deposits,” said JPL geologist Jeffrey J. Plaut, who will be publishing results about these deposits in the American Geophysical Union's Geophysical Research Letters. "The fact these features are in the same latitude bands, about 35 to 60 degrees in both hemispheres, points to a climate-driven mechanism for explaining how they got there."

The rocky debris blanket topping the glaciers apparently has protected the ice from vaporizing, which would happen if it were exposed to the atmosphere at these latitudes.

"A key question is, how did the ice get there in the first place?” said James W. Head of Brown University, Providence, R.I. "The tilt of Mars' spin axis sometimes gets much greater than it is now. Climate modeling tells us ice sheets could cover mid-latitude regions of Mars during those high-tilt periods. The buried glaciers make sense as preserved fragments from an ice age millions of years ago. On Earth, such buried glacial ice in Antarctica preserves the record of traces of ancient organisms and past climate history."

JPL manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. For more about the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/mro

NASA Plans Test of 'Electronic Nose' on International Space Station

NASA astronauts on space shuttle Endeavour's STS-126 mission will install an instrument on the International Space Station that can "smell" dangerous chemicals in the air. Designed to help protect crew members' health and safety, the experimental "ENose" will monitor the space station's environment for harmful chemicals such as ammonia, mercury, methanol and formaldehyde.

The ENose fills the long-standing gap between onboard alarms and complex analytical instruments. Air-quality problems have occurred before on the International Space Station, space shuttle and Russian Space Station Mir. In most cases, the chemicals were identified only after the crew had been exposed to them, if at all. The ENose, which will run continuously and autonomously, is the first instrument on the station that will detect and quantify chemical leaks or spills as they happen.

"The ENose is a 'first-responder' that will alert crew members of possible contaminants in the air and also analyze and quantify targeted changes in the cabin environment," said Margaret A. Ryan, the principal investigator of the ENose project at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, or JPL, in Pasadena, Calif. JPL built and manages the device.

Station crew members will unpack the ENose on Dec. 9 to begin the instrument's six-month demonstration in the crew cabin. If the experiment is successful, the ENose might be used in future space missions as part of an automated system to monitor and control astronauts' in-space environments.

"This ENose is a very capable instrument that will increase crew awareness of the state of their air quality," said Carl Walz, an astronaut and director of NASA's Advanced Capabilities Division, part of the Exploration System Mission Directorate, which funds the ENose. "Having experienced an air-quality issue during my Expedition 4 mission on the space station, I wish I had the information that this ENose will provide future crews. This technology demonstration will provide important information for environmental control and life-support system designers for the future lunar outpost."

Specifically, the shoebox-sized ENose contains an array of 32 sensors that can identify and quantify several organic and inorganic chemicals, including organic solvents and marker chemicals that signal the start of electrical fires. The ENose sensors are polymer films that change their electrical conductivity in response to different chemicals. The pattern of the sensor array's response depends on the particular chemical types present in the air.

The instrument can analyze volatile aerosols and vapors, help monitor cleanup of chemical spills or leaks, and enable more intensive chemical analysis by collecting raw data and streaming it to a computer at JPL's ENose laboratory. The instrument has a wide range of chemical sensitivity, from fractional parts per million to 10,000 parts per million. For all of its capabilities, the ENose weighs less than nine pounds and requires only 20 watts of power.

The ENose is now in its third generation. The first ENose was tested during a six-day demonstration on the STS-95 shuttle mission in 1998. That prototype could detect 10 compounds, but could not analyze data immediately. The second-generation ENose could detect, identify and quantify 21 different chemicals. It was extensively ground-tested. The third-generation ENose includes data-analysis software to identify and quantify the release of chemicals within 40 minutes of detection. While it will look for 10 chemical types in this six-month experiment, the new ENose can be trained to detect many others.

For more information about the ENose and the Advanced Environmental Monitoring and Control Project, visit:

http://aemc.jpl.nasa.gov/instruments/enose.cfm

For more information about NASA's exploration program, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/exploration

For more information about the International Space Station, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

Endeavour, Space Station News Conference Set for Friday

The 10 crew members aboard space shuttle Endeavour and the International Space Station will hold a news conference at 2:05 p.m. CST on Friday, Nov. 21.

Reporters may ask questions in person only from NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida and NASA Headquarters in Washington.

To participate in the news conference, U.S. journalists must call the public affairs office at their preferred NASA center by 1 p.m. Friday. Media will need to be in place at participating locations at least 20 minutes prior to the start of the news conference.

NASA Television will provide live coverage of the 40-minute news conference. For NASA TV downlink, schedule and streaming video information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

During Endeavour's STS-126 mission, astronauts are preparing the station to house six crew members for long-duration missions and conducting four spacewalks to service the station's two Solar Alpha Rotary Joints.

For more information about the STS-126 mission and its crew, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/shuttle

For more information about the space station and its crew, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

NASA's QuikSCAT Ocean-Observing Satellite Mission Honored

An Earth-observing satellite that has provided early detection of ocean storms and advanced the scientific exploration of global ocean wind patterns has been recognized for helping scientists better understand our home planet. NASA and the U.S. Department of the Interior Tuesday presented William T. Pecora Awards to NASA's Quick Scatterometer, or QuikSCAT, mission team and Samuel N. Goward of the University of Maryland, College Park.

The two agencies present individual and group Pecora Awards annually to honor outstanding contributions in the field of remote sensing and its application to understanding Earth. The award was established in 1974 to honor the memory of William T. Pecora, former director of the U.S. Geological Survey and under secretary of the Department of the Interior.

Bob Doyle, deputy director of the U.S. Geological Survey, and Margaret Luce, acting deputy director of NASA's Earth Science Division, presented this year's awards in Denver at the 17th William T. Pecora Memorial Remote Sensing Symposium.

Since 1999, the QuikSCAT team has advanced Earth science research and contributed to improved environmental predictions using measurements of global radar backscatter of wind speed and direction over the ice-free oceans. The QuikSCAT mission was conceived, developed and launched less than two years after the unexpected loss of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Advanced Earth Observing Satellite-1 spacecraft, which carried the NASA scatterometer.

Goward, professor of geography at the University of Maryland, was recognized for his "outstanding and sustained scientific leadership in advancing remote-sensing science and especially the continuation of the Landsat Program." Goward played a key role on the Landsat 7 science team in planning the acquisition of the most robust, cloud-free global archive of Landsat imagery ever assembled.

QuikSCAT measurements have had enormous impact on marine forecasts by enabling early detection of the location, direction, structure and strength of ocean storms. Data from the satellite are made available within two hours of acquisition to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and other international weather forecasting centers to enhance marine watches and warnings, and to improve the quality of global and regional weather forecasts. QuickSCAT data also help monitor changes in Arctic sea ice and icebergs, as well as snow and soil moisture changes on land.

"We at NASA are very proud of the accomplishment of QuikSCAT," NASA Associate Administrator Christopher Scolese said. "The mission has improved our understanding of Earth, proved valuable to the research and operational communities, and demonstrated great cooperation among NASA centers, industry, and academia. It also has developed some of the best leaders in NASA and aerospace."

The QuikSCAT mission team includes personnel from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.; NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.; Ball Aerospace and Technology Corp. of Boulder, Colo.; the University of Colorado's Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics in Boulder; and numerous principal investigators funded by NASA's Ocean Vector Winds science team.

Goward's career has been dedicated to advancing geographic education and Earth observation science. He currently leads an interagency research team to quantify the recent history of forest disturbance for the North American Carbon Program. Because of his many contributions to remote-sensing education, science and programs, Goward also has been awarded the U.S. Geological Survey John Wesley Powell Award and the American Society of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing Estes Memorial Award.

For more information about the William T. Pecora Award, visit:

http://remotesensing.usgs.gov/pecora.php

For more information about NASA and agency programs, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov

NASA Tests First Deep-Space Internet

NASA has successfully tested the first deep space communications network modeled on the Internet.

Working as part of a NASA-wide team, engineers from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., used software called Disruption-Tolerant Networking, or DTN, to transmit dozens of space images to and from a NASA science spacecraft located about more than 32 million kilometers (20 million miles) from Earth.

"This is the first step in creating a totally new space communications capability, an interplanetary Internet," said Adrian Hooke, team lead and manager of space-networking architecture, technology and standards at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

NASA and Vint Cerf, a vice president at Google, Inc., in Mountain View, Calif., partnered 10 years ago to develop this software protocol. The DTN sends information using a method that differs from the normal Internet's Transmission-Control Protocol/Internet Protocol, or TCP/IP communication suite, which Cerf co-designed.

The Interplanetary Internet must be robust enough to withstand delays, disruptions and disconnections in space. Glitches can happen when a spacecraft moves behind a planet, or when solar storms and long communication delays occur. The delay in sending or receiving data from Mars takes between three-and-a-half to 20 minutes at the speed of light.

Unlike TCP/IP on Earth, the DTN does not assume a continuous end-to-end connection. In its design, if a destination path can't be found, the data packets are not discarded. Instead, each network node keeps custody of the information as long as necessary until it can safely communicate with another node. This store-and-forward method, similar to basketball players safely passing the ball to the player nearest the basket, means that information does not get lost when no immediate path to the destination exists. Eventually, the information is delivered to the end user.

"In space today, an operations team has to manually schedule each link and generate all the commands to specify which data to send, when to send it, and where to send it," said Leigh Torgerson, manager of the DTN Experiment Operations Center at JPL. "With standardized DTN, this can all be done automatically."

Engineers began a month-long series of DTN demonstrations in October. Data were transmitted using NASA's Deep Space Network in demonstrations occurring twice a week. Engineers use NASA's Epoxi spacecraft as a Mars data-relay orbiter. Epoxi is on a mission to encounter Comet Hartley 2 in two years.

"There are 10 nodes on this early interplanetary network," said Scott Burleigh of JPL, lead software-engineer for the demonstrations. "One is the Epoxi spacecraft itself and the other nine, which are on the ground at JPL, simulate Mars landers, orbiters and ground mission-operations centers."

This month-long experiment is the first in a series of planned demonstrations to qualify the technology for use on a variety of upcoming space missions, said Jay Wyatt, manager of the Space Networking and Mission Automation Program Office at JPL. In the next round of testing, a NASA-wide demonstration using new DTN software loaded on board the International Space Station is scheduled to begin next summer.

In the next few years, the Interplanetary Internet could enable many new types of space missions. Complex missions involving multiple landed, mobile and orbiting spacecraft will be far easier to support through the use of the Interplanetary Internet. It could also ensure reliable communications for astronauts on the surface of the moon.

The Deep Impact Networking Experiment is sponsored by the Space Communications and Navigation Office in NASA's Space Operations Mission Directorate in Washington. NASA's Science Mission Directorate and Discovery Program in Washington provided experimental access to the Epoxi spacecraft. The Epoxi mission team provided critical support throughout development and operations.

NASA Invites Students to Name New Mars Rover

NASA is looking for the right stuff, or in this case, the right name for the next Mars rover. NASA, in cooperation with Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures' movie WALL-E from Pixar Animation Studios, will conduct a naming contest for its car-sized Mars Science Laboratory rover that is scheduled for launch in 2009.

The contest begins Tuesday, Nov. 18, and is open to students 5 to 18 years old who attend a U.S. school and are enrolled in the current academic year. To enter the contest, students will submit essays explaining why their suggested name for the rover should be chosen. Essays must be received by Jan. 25, 2009. In March 2009, the public will have an opportunity to rank nine finalist names via the Internet as additional input for judges to consider during the selection process. NASA will announce the winning rover name in April 2009.

Disney will provide prizes to students submitting winning essays, including a trip to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., where the rover is under construction. The grand prize winner will have an opportunity to place a signature on the spacecraft and take part in the history of space exploration.

"Mars exploration has always captured the public imagination," said Mark Dahl, program executive for the Mars Science Laboratory at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "This contest will expand our ability to inspire students' interest in science and give the public a chance to participate in NASA's next expedition to Mars."

Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures in Burbank, Calif., will make it possible for WALL-E, the name of its animated robotic hero and summer 2008 movie, to appear in online content inviting students to participate in the naming contest. The online WALL-E content will provide young viewers with a current connection to the human-robotic partnership that is transforming discovery and exploration. The contest coincides with Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment's release of WALL-E on DVD and Blu-ray. The naming contest partnership is part of a Space Act Agreement between NASA and Disney designed to use the appeal of WALL-E in educational and public outreach efforts.

"All of us at Disney are delighted to be working with NASA in its educational and public outreach efforts to teach schoolchildren about space exploration, robot technology and the universe in which they live," said Mark Zoradi, president of Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures Group. "WALL-E is one of the most lovable and entertaining characters that Pixar has ever created, and he is the perfect spokes-robot for this program."

The Mars Science Laboratory rover will be larger and more capable than any craft previously sent to land there. It will check whether the environment in a carefully selected landing region ever has been favorable for supporting microbial life. The rover will search for minerals that formed in the presence of water and look for several chemical building blocks of life.

"We are now in a phase when we're building and testing the rover before its journey to Mars," said John Klein, deputy project manager for the Mars Science Laboratory at JPL. "As the rover comes together and begins to take shape, the whole team can't wait to call it by name."

Additional assignments include imaging its surroundings in high definition, analyzing rocks with a high-powered laser beam, inspecting rocks and soil with a six-foot robotic arm, and cooking and sniffing rock powder delivered from a hammering drill to investigate what minerals are in Martian rocks.

JPL, a division of the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, manages the Mars Science Laboratory Project for the NASA Science Mission Directorate, Washington.

Information about the contest is available at http://marsrovername.jpl.nasa.gov . More information on Mars Science Laboratory is at http://marsprogram.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/ .

NASA Receives First Stage Rocket Hardware for Ares I-X Test Flight

NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida welcomed the arrival Nov. 10 of important hardware for the Ares I-X rocket's upcoming test flight.

Called the forward skirt, the component is part of the rocket's first stage. The Ares I-X launch will be the first test flight for NASA's next crew launch vehicle. The launch is targeted for July 2009 from Kennedy and will provide an early opportunity to test and prove hardware, facilities and ground operations associated with the Ares I rocket.

The forward skirt began its trip Nov. 7 from Major Tool & Machine Inc. of Indiana, a subcontractor to Alliant Techsystems Inc., or ATK, of Utah. ATK is the prime contractor for the first stage of the Ares I rocket.

The rocket's first stage provides the primary propulsion -- 2.6 million pounds of thrust -- for the vehicle from liftoff to stage separation, which occurs 120 seconds into the flight. Part of the first stage, the nearly 14,000-pound forward skirt is constructed entirely of armored steel and stands seven feet tall and 12 1/4 feet wide. The main deceleration parachutes that slow the return of the rocket's boosters to Earth after launch are attached to this hardware. The forward skirt was designed as an empty, buoyant space to be used as ballast, keeping the first stage afloat for recovery.

"We could not be more pleased that the vehicle first stage hardware is beginning to arrive," said Pepper Phillips, director of the Constellation Project Office at Kennedy. "This is one of many major milestones and is a testament to the tremendous NASA and contractor team working together to ensure a successful test flight for the new program."

The upper stage simulator was the first major piece of the Ares I-X rocket to arrive at Kennedy on Nov. 4. During the next few months, all of the additional hardware needed to complete the test vehicle will be delivered to Kennedy, beginning with a piece that simulates a fifth segment for the four-segment solid rocket booster and concluding with delivery of the complete motor set in January 2009.

United Space Alliance of Florida, under a subcontract to ATK, will complete the integration and assembly of the forward skirt in Kennedy's Assembly and Refurbishment Facility. The hardware then will be moved to the Vehicle Assembly Building for stacking operations in high bay 3 during the spring of 2009.

"The forward skirt has 12 parachute brackets, with each bracket restraining two parachute spools," said Bob Herman, ATK's Florida site director. "For the Ares I-X launch, six of these spools will be used to measure parachute loads passed on to the forward skirt. ATK is proud to play a critical role in helping NASA achieve its vision to return to the moon."

The rocket's deceleration subsystem includes the pilot, drogue and main parachutes. The pilot parachute is deployed at an altitude of 16,210 feet and pulls out the drogue parachute. When the drogue parachute opens, it slows the vehicle and orients it to descend tail first. The main parachutes are deployed as the forward skirt extension separates from the forward skirt. They are used to slow the final decent of the first stage to 48 mph, allowing a safe impact with the water.

The Ares I-X rocket is a combination of existing and simulator hardware that will resemble the Ares I crew launch vehicle in size, shape and weight. It will provide valuable data to guide the final design of the Ares I, which will launch astronauts in the Orion crew exploration vehicle. The test flight also will bring NASA one step closer to its exploration goals of returning humans to the moon for sustained exploration of the lunar surface and missions to destinations beyond.

NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., manages the first stage for the Ares I-X project, which is located at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Video b-roll of the arrival will be available on NASA Television's Video File feed. For NASA TV streaming video, schedules, and downlink information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

For more information about the Ares I-X test flight and NASA's next-generation spacecraft, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ares

NASA Satellites Capture Images of Southern California Wildfires

Images from NASA satellites give a wider perspective of the full extent and devastation of the wildfires raging in Southern California.

A pair of images from NASA's Aqua satellite show the Los Angeles metropolitan area on Nov. 16, 2008. The top image posted on NASA's Web site shows the Southern California area as a vast plume of smoke billows out over the Pacific Ocean.

The bottom image provides a closer view of the area around Los Angeles and two large fires burning there: the Freeway Complex Fire and the Sayre Fire. The Freeway Complex Fire has burned nearly 24,000 acres in Orange, Los Angeles and Riverside counties.

Fanned by high winds, blazes stretching from Santa Barbara to Anaheim, Calif., have scorched an estimated 35,000 acres, according to news reports.

To view and download the images and for additional information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/fires/main/usa/cal_fires_2008_1117.html

Nations Around the World Mark 10th Anniversary of International Space Station

Nations around the world will join together to mark a milestone in space exploration this week, celebrating the 10th birthday of a unique research laboratory, the International Space Station.

Now the largest spacecraft ever built, the orbital assembly of the space station began with the launch from Kazakhstan of its first bus-sized component, Zarya, on Nov. 20, 1998. The launch began an international construction project of unprecedented complexity and sophistication.

The station is a venture of international cooperation among NASA, the Russian Federal Space Agency, Canadian Space Agency, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, and 11 members of the European Space Agency, or ESA: Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. More than 100,000 people in space agencies and contractor facilities in 37 U.S. states and throughout the world are involved in this endeavor.

"The station's capability and sheer size today are truly amazing," said International Space Station Program Manager Mike Suffredini. "The tremendous technological achievement in orbit is matched only by the cooperation and perseverance of its partners on the ground. We have overcome differences in language, geography and engineering philosophies to succeed."

Only a few weeks after the U.S.-funded, Russian-built, Zarya module was launched from Kazakhstan, the space shuttle carried aloft the Unity connector module in December 1998. Constructed on opposite sides of Earth, Unity and Zarya met for the first time in space and were joined to begin the orbital station's assembly and a decade of peaceful cooperation.

Ten years later, the station's mass has expanded to more than 627,000 pounds, and its interior volume is more than 25,000 cubic feet, comparable to the size of a five-bedroom house. Since Zarya's launch as the early command, control and power module, there have been 29 additional construction flights to the station: 27 aboard the space shuttle and two additional Russian launches.

One hundred sixty seven individual representing 14 countries have visited the complex. Crews have eaten some 19,000 meals aboard the station since the first crew took up residence in 2000. Through the course of 114 spacewalks and unmatched robotic construction in space, the station's truss structure has grown to 291 feet long so far. Its solar arrays now span to 28,800 square feet, large enough to cover six basketball courts.

The International Space Station hosts 19 research facilities, including nine sponsored by NASA, eight by ESA and two by JAXA. Cooperation among international teams of humans and robots is expected to become a mainstay of space exploration throughout our solar system. The 2005 NASA Authorization Act recognized the U.S. orbital segment as the first national laboratory beyond Earth, opening it for additional research by other government agencies, academia and the private sector.

"With the International Space Station, we have learned so many things -- and we're going to take that knowledge and apply it to flying to the moon and Mars," said Expedition 18 Commander Mike Fincke, now aboard the station. "Everything we're learning so close to home, only 240 miles away from the planet, we can apply to the moon 240,000 miles away."

To take a virtual tour of the International Space Station and learn more about the current mission, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

To find out how to see the station from your own backyard, visit:

http://www.spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/sightings

Space Technology 5 (ST5)

Space Technology 5 (ST5) flight tested its miniaturized satellites and innovative space technologies in the harsh environment of Earth's magnetosphere. In orbit, space technology ST5's satellites mapped the intensity and direction of magnetic fields within the inner magnetosphere. These measurements will allow us to directly infer the presence of electrical currents carried by energetic charged particles.

Studying this region may help us understand the space technology weather that disrupts our communication, navigation, and power systems. For, while the magnetosphere acts as Earth's "suit of armor," deflecting most of the charged particles blasting out from the Sun, some do get through. These particles cause geomagnetic storms that can cause widespread power blackouts and damage space technology satellites, sometimes permanently. They are also potentially harmful to any space technology astronauts on duty in orbit.

Currently space technology scientists don't know enough about solar activity to accurately forecast space technology weather and thereby minimize its harmful effects on space technology and ground based systems. We know that solar flares (explosions on the Sun's surface) and coronal mass ejections (ejected gas bubbles) project the Sun's plasma outward. We know that the solar wind carries this plasma through interplanetary space technology, where it eventually reaches Earth's "protective shield," the inner magnetosphere. We know that this "shield" deflects much of the solar wind plasma and solar energetic particles emanating from the Sun.

However, "radiation belts" still surround the Earth space technology at altitudes of ~ 3,000 to 30,000 kilometers (1,864 to 18,641 miles) and present a hazard to satellites orbiting at these distances. And, some of the mass and energy carried by space technology solar wind does get through.

The advanced space technologies flight validated on ST5 will enable the success of future micro-sat or nanosat missions, such as the Magnetospheric Constellation. Such space technology missions will provide global coverage of the magnetosphere as it reacts to major events on the Sun and during geomagnetic storms and substorms. The result will be a better understanding of the Earth's magnetosphere and a great improvement in our operational response to these events.

NASA's New High-Performance Engine for Ares Rocket Passes Review

NASA's newest high-performance rocket engine, the J-2X, successfully completed its critical design review Thursday at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.

The J-2X engine, developed for NASA by Pratt and Whitney Rocketdyne of Canoga Park, Calif., is the first element of NASA's Constellation Program to pass this design milestone. The engine will power the upper stage of NASA's next-generation Ares I rocket and the Earth departure stage of the Ares V heavy cargo launch vehicle. The Constellation Program is responsible for developing this new fleet of rockets, as well as the Orion crew capsule and the Altair lunar lander that will send explorers to the International Space Station, the moon and beyond.

"The approval today by the upper stage engine critical design review board signals the beginning of manufacturing and full-scale testing of this high-performance engine," said Steve Cook, manager for the Ares Projects at Marshall. "This is a testament to the team's hard work during the past three years and validates our continued development of this important element of Ares I and V rockets."

The board is comprised of engineers and project managers, including representatives from the Safety and Mission Assurance organization, who reviewed the detailed designs of the new engine. The critical design review demonstrated the maturity of the engine's design and concluded that the planned technical approach meets NASA's requirements for propulsion of the Ares I upper stage. Full-scale testing will begin in the fall of 2010.

"The design of this propulsion system confirms that Ares I is proceeding on a solid foundation -- built on years of experience by an eager team of engineers," said Teresa Vanhooser, chairperson for the J-2X Critical Design Review Board. "Our goal is to build the safest and most reliable system possible to carry our future explorers on missions of exploration."

The J-2X engine is expected to be the most efficient engine of its type ever built. The high efficiency is achieved by using advanced design turbopumps, fuel injectors and a large extension added to the nozzle -- the large, bell-shaped structure through which exhaust gases are expelled with great force as they are burned by the engine. These enhancements deliver greater thrust, or liftoff power, while burning fuel more efficiently.

The J-2X development follows the Constellation Program's goals to seek commonality between the Ares I and Ares V systems, and use proven hardware and knowledge from 50 years of American spaceflight experience to streamline development and reduce program, technical and budget risks.

"We now are ready for the challenges ahead as we move to build and test this new engine," said Mike Kynard, manager of the Upper Stage Engine Element for the Ares Projects at Marshall. "The J-2X engine design process has been a rewarding endeavor, offering a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to develop this high-performance rocket engine that will play a vital role in America's future in space."

Marshall manages the Ares projects and is responsible for design and development of the Ares I and Ares V vehicles. NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston manages the Constellation Program, which includes the Ares I, the Ares V, the Orion and the Altair. NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida is responsible for program ground and launch operations. The program also includes multiple project-element teams at NASA centers and contract organizations around the United States.

For more information about the Ares rockets, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ares

For more information about NASA's Constellation Program, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/constellation

Lunar Orbiter Image Recovery Project (LOIRP)

Between 1966 and 1967 NASA sent five Lunar Orbiter spacecraft to the Moon. Images from these spacecraft were used by mission planners to select the Apollo landing sites on the moon. In the late 1960s, after the Apollo era, Lunar Orbiter analog tapes were placed in storage in Maryland. In the mid-1980s, they were transferred to JPL, under the care of Nancy Evans, co-founder of the NASA Planetary Data System (PDS).

In the late 1980's Nancy and Mark Nelson from Caltech began a project to obtain surplus FR-900 tape drives, refurbish them, and digitize the analog data on the tapes. This project was partially successful in that they were able to obtain raw analog data but due to lack of funding they were unable to continue their efforts.

Nancy Evans subsequently retired from JPL and Mark Nelson returned to private industry. They obtained the tape drives as government surplus hardware in an attempt to raise private funds for digitizing the lunar images. They were not able to get the funds and the drives sat in a barn in Sun Valley, CA for the next several decades.

In 2007, Nancy Evans tried to find someone to take the drives. Dennis Wingo heard about this and contacted Keith Cowing. Wingo and Cowng subsequetly obtained the drives and tapes and brought them up to NASA Ames Research Center.

Hubble Directly Observes a Planet Orbiting Another Star

NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has taken the first visible-light snapshot of a planet circling another star.

Estimated to be no more than three times Jupiter's mass, the planet, called Fomalhaut b, orbits the bright southern star Fomalhaut, located 25 light-years away in the constellation Piscis Australis, or the "Southern Fish."

Fomalhaut has been a candidate for planet hunting ever since an excess of dust was discovered around the star in the early 1980s by NASA's Infrared Astronomy Satellite, IRAS.

In 2004, the coronagraph in the High Resolution Camera on Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys produced the first-ever resolved visible-light image of the region around Fomalhaut. It clearly showed a ring of protoplanetary debris approximately 21.5 billion miles across and having a sharp inner edge.

This large debris disk is similar to the Kuiper Belt, which encircles the solar system and contains a range of icy bodies from dust grains to objects the size of dwarf planets, such as Pluto.

Hubble astronomer Paul Kalas, of the University of California at Berkeley, and team members proposed in 2005 that the ring was being gravitationally modified by a planet lying between the star and the ring's inner edge.

Circumstantial evidence came from Hubble's confirmation that the ring is offset from the center of the star. The sharp inner edge of the ring is also consistent with the presence of a planet that gravitationally "shepherds" ring particles. Independent researchers have subsequently reached similar conclusions.

Now, Hubble has actually photographed a point source of light lying 1.8 billion miles inside the ring's inner edge. The results are being reported in the November 14 issue of Science magazine.

"Our Hubble observations were incredibly demanding. Fomalhaut b is 1 billion times fainter than the star. We began this program in 2001, and our persistence finally paid off," Kalas says.

"Fomalhaut is the gift that keeps on giving. Following the unexpected discovery of its dust ring, we have now found an exoplanet at a location suggested by analysis of the dust ring's shape. The lesson for exoplanet hunters is 'follow the dust,'" said team member Mark Clampin of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.

Observations taken 21 months apart by Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys' coronagraph show that the object is moving along a path around the star, and is therefore gravitationally bound to it. The planet is 10.7 billion miles from the star, or about 10 times the distance of the planet Saturn from our sun.

The planet is brighter than expected for an object of three Jupiter masses. One possibility is that it has a Saturn-like ring of ice and dust reflecting starlight. The ring might eventually coalesce to form moons. The ring's estimated size is comparable to the region around Jupiter and its four largest orbiting satellites.

Kalas and his team first used Hubble to photograph Fomalhaut in 2004, and made the unexpected discovery of its debris disk, which scatters Fomalhaut's starlight. At the time they noted a few bright sources in the image as planet candidates. A follow-up image in 2006 showed that one of the objects is moving through space with Fomalhaut but changed position relative to the ring since the 2004 exposure. The amount of displacement between the two exposures corresponds to an 872-year-long orbit as calculated from Kepler's laws of planetary motion.

Future observations will attempt to see the planet in infrared light and will look for evidence of water vapor clouds in the atmosphere. This would yield clues to the evolution of a comparatively newborn 100-million-year-old planet. Astrometric measurements of the planet's orbit will provide enough precision to yield an accurate mass.

NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, scheduled to launch in 2013 will be able to make coronagraphic observations of Fomalhaut in the near- and mid-infrared. Webb will be able to hunt for other planets in the system and probe the region interior to the dust ring for structures such as an inner asteroid belt.

Endeavour Crew Set For Friday Launch

The flight of space shuttle Endeavour includes several significant steps to install new crew equipment inside the International Space Station and service the solar array joints of the laboratory. During STS-126, the crew of space shuttle Endeavour and the space station will:

-- Exchange crew members. Sandra Magnus will swap places with current station resident Greg Chamitoff.

-- Conduct four spacewalks. Working in teams of two, astronauts will emerge from the space station’s Quest airlock and work on the two large joints that turn the station’s massive solar array “wings.” They are to service the starboard side joint and perform preventative maintenance on the port side joint.

-- Install new crew quarters, a galley, waste water recycling system and oxygen generator inside the space station. The equipment has been packed inside refrigerator-sized racks that require forklifts to lift them on Earth. But in space, a single astronaut can move a rack around with little problem.

Endeavour and its crew are to land at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center after 15 days in space.

Additional Resources
› STS-126 Press Kit (4.9 Mb PDF)
› STS-126 Mission Summary (475 kb PDF)
› About the Crew
› Shuttle Launch Manifest

Cassini Finds Mysterious New Aurora on Saturn

Saturn has its own unique brand of aurora that lights up the polar cap, unlike any other planetary aurora known in our solar system. This odd aurora revealed itself to one of the infrared instruments on NASA's Cassini spacecraft.

"We've never seen an aurora like this elsewhere," said Tom Stallard, a scientist working with Cassini data at the University of Leicester, England. Stallard is lead author of a paper that appears in the Nov. 13 issue of the journal Nature. "It's not just a ring of auroras like those we've seen at Jupiter or Earth. This aurora covers an enormous area across the pole. Our current ideas on what forms Saturn's aurora predict that this region should be empty, so finding such a bright aurora here is a fantastic surprise."

The new views are available online at: http://www.nasa.gov/cassini and http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov.

Auroras are caused by charged particles streaming along the magnetic field lines of a planet into its atmosphere. Particles from the sun cause Earth's auroras. Many, but not all, of the auroras at Jupiter and Saturn are caused by particles trapped within the magnetic environments of those planets.

Jupiter's main auroral ring, caused by interactions internal to Jupiter's magnetic environment, is constant in size. Saturn's main aurora, which is caused by the solar wind, changes size dramatically as the wind varies. The newly observed aurora at Saturn, however, doesn't fit into either category.

"Saturn's unique auroral features are telling us there is something special and unforeseen about this planet's magnetosphere and the way it interacts with the solar wind and the planet's atmosphere," said Nick Achilleos, scientist at University College London, working with the Cassini magnetometer team at Imperial College. "Trying to explain its origin will no doubt lead us to physics which uniquely operates in the environment of Saturn."

The new infrared aurora appears in a region hidden from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope, which has provided views of Saturn's ultraviolet aurora. Cassini observed it when the spacecraft flew near Saturn's polar region. In infrared light, the aurora sometimes fills the region from around 82 degrees north all the way over the pole. This new aurora is also constantly changing, even disappearing within a 45 minute-period.

The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory, a division of the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena, manages the mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington, D.C. The Cassini orbiter was designed, developed and assembled at JPL. The visual and infrared mapping spectrometer team is based at the University of Arizona, Tucson.

Dusty Shock Waves Generate Planet Ingredients

Shock waves around dusty, young stars might be creating the raw materials for planets, according to new observations from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.

The evidence comes in the form of tiny crystals. Spitzer detected crystals similar in make-up to quartz around young stars just beginning to form planets. The crystals, called cristobalite and tridymite, are known to reside in comets, in volcanic lava flows on Earth, and in some meteorites that land on Earth.

Astronomers already knew that crystallized dust grains stick together to form larger particles, which later lump together to form planets. But they were surprised to find cristobalite and tridymite. What's so special about these particular crystals? They require flash heating events, such as shock waves, to form.

The findings suggest that the same kinds of shock waves that cause sonic booms from speeding jets are responsible for creating the stuff of planets throughout the universe.

"By studying these other star systems, we can learn about the very beginnings of our own planets 4.6 billion years ago," said William Forrest of the University of Rochester, N.Y. "Spitzer has given us a better idea of how the raw materials of planets are produced very early on." Forrest and University of Rochester graduate student Ben Sargent led the research, to appear in the Astrophysical Journal.

Planets are born out of swirling pancake-like disks of dust and gas that surround young stars. They start out as mere grains of dust swimming around in a disk of gas and dust, before lumping together to form full-fledged planets. During the early stages of planet development, the dust grains crystallize and adhere together, while the disk itself starts to settle and flatten. This occurs in the first millions of years of a star's life.

When Forrest and his colleagues used Spitzer to examine five young planet-forming disks about 400 light-years away, they detected the signature of silica crystals. Silica is made of only silicon and oxygen and is the main ingredient in glass. When melted and crystallized, it can make the large hexagonal quartz crystals often sold as mystical tokens. When heated to even higher temperatures, it can also form small crystals like those commonly found around volcanoes.

It is this high-temperature form of silica crystals, specifically cristobalite and tridymite, that Forrest's team found in planet-forming disks around other stars for the first time. "Cristobalite and tridymite are essentially high-temperature forms of quartz," said Sargent. "If you heat quartz crystals, you'll get these compounds."

In fact, the crystals require temperatures as high as 1,220 Kelvin (about 1,740 degrees Fahrenheit) to form. But young planet-forming disks are only about 100 to 1,000 Kelvin (about minus 280 degrees Fahrenheit to 1,340 Fahrenheit) -- too cold to make the crystals. Because the crystals require heating followed by rapid cooling to form, astronomers theorized that shock waves could be the cause.

Shock waves, or supersonic waves of pressure, are thought to be created in planet-forming disks when clouds of gas swirling around at high speeds collide. Some theorists think that shock waves might also accompany the formation of giant planets.

The findings are in agreement with local evidence from our own solar system. Spherical pebbles, called chondrules, found in ancient meteorites that fell to Earth are also thought to have been crystallized by shock waves in our solar system's young planet-forming disk. In addition, NASA's Stardust mission found tridymite minerals in comet Wild 2.

Other authors of the paper include C. Tayrien, M.K. McClure, A.R. Basu, P. Mano, Dan Watson, C.J. Bohac, K.H. Kim and J.D. Green of the University of Rochester; A Li of the University of Missouri, Columbia; E. Furlan of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., and G.C. Sloan of Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y.

JPL manages the Spitzer Space Telescope mission for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Science operations are conducted at the Spitzer Science Center at the California Institute of Technology, also in Pasadena. Caltech manages JPL for NASA. Spitzer's infrared spectrograph, which made the observations, was built by Cornell University, Ithaca, N.Y. Its development was led by Jim Houck of Cornell.

More information about Spitzer is at http://www.spitzer.caltech.edu/spitzer and http://www.nasa.gov/spitzer . More information about exoplanets and NASA's planet-finding program is at http://planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov .

Mars Phoenix Lander Finishes Successful Work on Red Planet

NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has ceased communications after operating for more than five months. As anticipated, seasonal decline in sunshine at the robot's arctic landing site is not providing enough sunlight for the solar arrays to collect the power necessary to charge batteries that operate the lander's instruments.

Mission engineers last received a signal from the lander on Nov. 2. Phoenix, in addition to shorter daylight, has encountered a dustier sky, more clouds and colder temperatures as the northern Mars summer approaches autumn. The mission exceeded its planned operational life of three months to conduct and return science data.

The project team will be listening carefully during the next few weeks to hear if Phoenix revives and phones home. However, engineers now believe that is unlikely because of the worsening weather conditions on Mars. While the spacecraft's work has ended, the analysis of data from the instruments is in its earliest stages.

"Phoenix has given us some surprises, and I'm confident we will be pulling more gems from this trove of data for years to come," said Phoenix Principal Investigator Peter Smith of the University of Arizona in Tucson.

Launched Aug. 4, 2007, Phoenix landed May 25, 2008, farther north than any previous spacecraft to land on the Martian surface. The lander dug, scooped, baked, sniffed and tasted the Red Planet's soil. Among early results, it verified the presence of water-ice in the Martian subsurface, which NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter first detected remotely in 2002. Phoenix's cameras also returned more than 25,000 pictures from sweeping vistas to near the atomic level using the first atomic force microscope ever used outside Earth.

"Phoenix not only met the tremendous challenge of landing safely, it accomplished scientific investigations on 149 of its 152 Martian days as a result of dedicated work by a talented team," said Phoenix Project Manager Barry Goldstein at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

Phoenix's preliminary science accomplishments advance the goal of studying whether the Martian arctic environment has ever been favorable for microbes. Additional findings include documenting a mildly alkaline soil environment unlike any found by earlier Mars missions; finding small concentrations of salts that could be nutrients for life; discovering perchlorate salt, which has implications for ice and soil properties; and finding calcium carbonate, a marker of effects of liquid water.

Phoenix findings also support the goal of learning the history of water on Mars. These findings include excavating soil above the ice table, revealing at least two distinct types of ice deposits; observing snow descending from clouds; providing a mission-long weather record, with data on temperature, pressure, humidity and wind; observations of haze, clouds, frost and whirlwinds; and coordinating with NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter to perform simultaneous ground and orbital observations of Martian weather.

"Phoenix provided an important step to spur the hope that we can show Mars was once habitable and possibly supported life," said Doug McCuistion, director of the Mars Exploration Program at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "Phoenix was supported by orbiting NASA spacecraft providing communications relay while producing their own fascinating science. With the upcoming launch of the Mars Science Laboratory, the Mars Program never sleeps."

The University of Arizona leads the Phoenix mission with project management at JPL and development partnership at Lockheed Martin Corporation in Denver. International contributions came from the Canadian Space Agency; the University of Neuchatel, Switzerland; the universities of Copenhagen and Aarhus in Denmark; the Max Planck Institute in Germany; the Finnish Meteorological Institute; and Imperial College of London.

For additional information about Phoenix mission findings, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/phoenix

This Month in Exploration - November

Visit "This Month in Exploration" every month to find out how aviation and space exploration have changed throughout the years, improving life for humans on Earth and in space. While reflecting on the events that led to NASA's formation and its rich history of accomplishments, "This Month in Exploration" will reveal where the agency is leading us -- to the moon, Mars and beyond.

100 Years Ago

November 5, 1908: The Aéro Club of France awarded Wilbur Wright the Grand Gold Medal for his significant accomplishments in aviation.

75 Years Ago

November 20, 1933: Lieutenant Commander Thomas. G. W. Settle and Major Chester L. Fordney reached the stratosphere at an altitude of 61,237 feet in their hot air balloon over Akron, Ohio.

50 Years Ago

November 8, 1958: NASA launched Pioneer 2, however, the space probe experienced a launch failure and never reached its destination of the moon.

45 Years Ago

November 27, 1963: NASA completed its first successful launch of the Atlas-Centaur rocket (AC-2). This project was managed by Lewis Research Center (now Glenn) and demonstrated the first successful use of liquid hydrogen for propulsion of a space vehicle.

35 Years Ago

November 3, 1973: NASA launched Mariner 10 using an Atlas-Centaur rocket. This spacecraft was the first to explore Mercury and take close-range pictures of the planet. Mariner 10 was also the first spacecraft to use the gravitational pull of one planet (Venus) to reach another (Mercury).

30 Years Ago

November 13, 1978: NASA launched the Einstein Observatory HEAO-2 →, the first fully imaging X-ray telescope put into space.

25 Years Ago

November 28, 1983: NASA launched the space shuttle STS-9 mission to begin the first Spacelab mission and the first mission to carry six people in one spacecraft. NASA and the European Space Agency developed Spacelab-1 to enable advanced research experiments in space.

20 Years Ago

November 15, 1988: The Soviet Union launched the Buran space shuttle using an Energia booster rocket. During the unmanned flight, the shuttle orbited Earth twice before safely returning to the ground. The Buran project was cancelled in 1993.

15 Years Ago

November 1, 1993: Space shuttle ColumbiaSTS-58 successfully landed at Edwards Air Force Base, Calif., ending the fourth longest mission in US manned space history. Columbia was named after a small sailing vessel that operated out of Boston in 1792 and explored the mouth of the Columbia River.

10 Years Ago

November 20, 1998: Russia launched the Zarya control module from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, the first component for the International Space Station. Zarya, which means "sunrise," weighed 42,600 pounds and functioned as a space tugboat to provide early propulsion, steering, and communications for the space station. It was built by Russia, but was funded and owned by the U.S.

Five Years Ago

November 4, 2003: Scientists observed the largest solar flare → in recorded history. Several months later, scientists discovered the flare was much larger than originally estimated and it was re-classified as an X45. X-class solar flares can cause upper atmospheric storm activity and radio blackouts around the world.

Present Day

November 14, 2008: NASA will launch space shuttle Endeavour which will deliver equipment and supplies to help set the stage for enlarging the crew size aboard the International Space Station.

NASA CONTRACT INTEGRATES MISSION OPERATIONS, TRAINING FACILITIES

NASA has awarded a $667.3 million contract to Lockheed Martin Corp. of Gaithersburg, Md., to provide integrated support for the hardware, software, data and displays used to train for and execute human spaceflight missions.

The new Facilities Development and Operations Contract, or FDOC, combines work previously performed under two separate contracts, and the synergy is expected to augment the efficiency and effectiveness of the human spaceflight operations team. The FDOC replaces the Mission Support Operations Contract and incorporates portions of the work performed under the Space Program Operations Contract.

"This award offers the opportunity to effectively transition experienced mission operations capabilities from the Space Shuttle Program to the Constellation Program," said Associate Administrator for Space Operations Bill Gerstenmaier. "Specifically, this contract will make possible the efficient transformation of shuttle operations personnel, knowledge and facilities to enable success in future human spaceflight programs."

The contract provides consolidated systems services development and operations support within NASA's Mission Control Center in Houston and backup control centers for the space shuttle, International Space Station and Constellation programs. The FDOC team will ensure the availability, integrity and reliability of space station avionics software, space shuttle and space station integrated planning systems, shuttle and station simulators for crews and flight controllers, and space shuttle flight software production. In addition, it will support development of a Constellation training facility, simulators and mission control systems. The majority of the work for the contract will take place at or near NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.

The contract base period begins Jan. 1, 2009, and continues through Sept. 30, 2012. The contract includes two one-year extension options valued at $154.2 million and $155.5 million respectively. Exercising both options would extend the contract through Sept. 30, 2014, and increase the total contract value to $977 million.

For more information about NASA and its programs, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov

NASA Showcases Science at 2008 Supercomputing Conference

NASA will highlight some of its most inspiring science and engineering achievements at the International Conference for High-Performance Computing, Networking, Storage, and Analysis (SC08), at the Austin Convention Center, Austin, Texas, Nov. 15–21, 2008.

At NASA’s SC08 research exhibit, scientists and engineers will be on hand to explain more than 40 projects supporting some of NASA’s most critical mission work — all made possible by the agency’s powerful high-end computing (HEC) resources. Featured are presentations about how NASA is advancing the ability to predict tropical storms to help reduce loss of lives and property, and working to design the thermal protection system for America’s next-generation spacecraft, the Orion crew exploration vehicle (CEV). The exhibit also highlights innovative computational methods to reduce the sound from jet engines — a source of noise pollution for the public and potentially hazardous operating conditions for pilots.

“NASA’s high-performance computers are critical for the accurate simulations needed to support safe engineering designs for the Ares launch vehicles, and the CEV and launch abort system,” said Rupak Biswas, acting chief of the NASA Advanced Supercomputing Division at NASA’s Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif. “With a new generation of supercomputers now in place, NASA is planning even more significant extensions to its high-end computing resources in the coming years to meet the continuing surge in computational requirements,” Biswas said.

The computational infrastructure at Ames was recently expanded to include Pleiades, a 47,104 processor core SGI® Altix® ICE system to augment the Columbia supercomputer in supporting NASA’s four key mission areas. In addition, the NASA Center for Computational Sciences (NCCS) at Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., has nearly tripled the performance of its Discover cluster to 67 trillion calculations per second (teraflops) with the addition of an IBM® iDataPlex® system containing 4,096 processor cores. The expanded Discover will enable high-resolution modeling of climate, weather, solar activity, and astrophysical phenomena.

“Discover can now provide NASA researchers with even more critical computing power needed for current and future NASA Earth and space science studies,” said Phil Webster, NCCS project manager and chief of the Computational and Information Sciences and Technology Office at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

Conference participants will also see captivating images and videos generated using NASA computer data models and simulation results, shown on the nine-screen “mini-hyperwall,” a traveling version of the recently installed hyperwall-2 visualization system.

NASA’s exhibit (booth #1343) represents work supporting all four of the agency’s mission directorates — aeronautics, exploration systems, science, and space operations. This work is conducted by researchers at six NASA field centers: Ames Research Center; Goddard Space Flight Center; Glenn Research Center, Cleveland; Langley Research Center, Hampton, Va.; Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala.; and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.—in addition to various NASA research partners. The conference is sponsored by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and by the Association for Computing Machinery.

For more information about the NASA’s SC08 exhibit, please visit:

http://www.nas.nasa.gov/SC08/SC08.html

For more information about the SC08 conference, please visit:

http://sc08.supercomputing.org/

For information about NASA’s High-End Computing Program, please visit:

http://www.hec.nasa.gov/

New NASA Technique Measures Up, When it Comes to Sea Level Changing Glaciers

A NASA-led research team has used satellite data to make the most precise measurements to date of changes in the mass of mountain glaciers in the Gulf of Alaska, a region expected to be a significant contributor to global sea level rise over the next 50-100 years.

Geophysicist Scott Luthcke of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md., and colleagues knew from well-documented research that changes in the cryosphere -- glaciers, ice caps, and other parts of the globe covered year-round by ice -- are a key source of most global sea level rise. Melting ice will also bring changes to freshwater resources and wildlife habitat. Knowing that such ice-covered areas are difficult to observe consistently, the team worked to develop a satellite-based method that could accurately quantify glacial mass changes across seasons and years, and even discern whether individual glacier regions are growing or shrinking.

The study’s authors found that the annual ice mass lost from glaciers in the Gulf of Alaska has been 84 gigatons annually, about five times the average annual flow of the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon and equal to the entire amount of water in the Chesapeake Bay.

“The Gulf of Alaska region is 20 times smaller than the ice-covered area of Greenland, yet it contributes nearly half as much freshwater melt as Greenland and accounts for about 15 percent of present-day global sea level rise stemming from melting ice,” said Luthcke, lead author of the study which will appear this week in the Journal of Glaciology. “Considering that the Gulf of Alaska makes such a disproportionate contribution, it is vital that we know more about the nature of glacial change there.”

Luthcke and colleagues found a way to remotely measure the “mass balance” of a glacier; that is, the net annual difference between ice accumulation and ice loss. Past measurements of glacial mass balance in remote mountain ranges have been sparse or imprecise. Ground-based sensors can provide long-term data, but such data points are scattered due to the inaccessibility of many remote mountain ranges. Altimeters aboard aircraft can measure changes in the height of glaciers, but the sampling is sporadic because flights are relatively infrequent.

Glaciers in the coastal environments on the edge of the Arctic or Antarctic shed and gain mass rapidly, a high mass turnover that is particularly sensitive to climate change. Warming seas can accelerate the motion of tidewater glaciers, and melt water on glacial surfaces can flow to the floors of glaciers and serve as a lubricant as the ice slides toward the sea. The subsequent addition of freshwater to the ocean contributes to one of two sources of global sea level rise; “eustatic” rise resulting from melted ice in the form of freshwater, with the other source set off by “thermal expansion,” sea level rise that occurs due to warming ocean temperatures.

The Goddard-led research team developed a new data analysis technique for NASA's Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE) mission. GRACE is made up of twin satellites that orbit Earth about 137 miles apart and 300 miles above Earth's surface. The positions of the two satellites change in response to variations in Earth's gravity field, which is stronger or weaker depending on the land or ice mass that they are flying over. Microwave ranging systems measure the distance between the two satellites down to the width of a human hair, so by measuring the change in the distance between the satellites over time, researchers can essentially "weigh" the changes in Gulf of Alaska glaciers.

Using data collected by the GRACE satellites from 2003-2007, as well as unique processing and analysis techniques, Luthcke and colleagues were able to measure the mass of the glaciers every 10 days across an area spanning 18,919 square miles, about the equivalent of Vermont and New Hampshire combined.

The team found the largest ice mass losses occurring in the Yakutat, Glacier Bay, and St. Elias regions. Those observations are consistent with recent studies from aircraft-based altimeters and other satellites.

“The consistent and direct measurement of ice-mass change made possible by the GRACE data and the analysis techniques applied in this study provide unprecedented observations that further our knowledge of the region’s complex ice evolution,” said Luthcke.

The most rapid glacial melt, according to Luthcke and colleagues, came in response to the summer heat wave of 2004, when the region's glaciers shed 374 gigatons of ice, or about 98 cubic miles of ice. In comparison, the record for Greenland ice melt was 500 gigatons, or about 131 cubic miles, during the summer of 2007.

"With such rapid change taking place in such a critical area, we need to be able to more reliably observe how these glaciers are responding," said Luthcke. "The direct measurement of ice-mass variation is important for improving our modeling capability and for ultimately predicting future changes."

Related link:

> The Workings of GRACE

DIGITAL LEARNING NETWORK HOSTS WORLDWIDE VIRTUAL PARTY FOR NASA

Schools all over the world will wish NASA a happy birthday as part of an all-day virtual birthday party through NASA's Digital Learning Network on Thursday, Nov. 13.

The virtual party begins at 9 a.m. EST with live videoconferences occurring every hour on the hour until 6 p.m. Schools from Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, Japan, Mexico City, India, Slovenia and New Zealand will participate in the live digital connection.

During each webcast, international schools will connect with a U.S. school and one of NASA's 10 field centers. Each Digital Learning Network site will host a 45-minute videoconference featuring a unique program in NASA's 50 years of discovery and exploration in science, aeronautics and space.

Webcast topics for NASA's 50th birthday party include (all times EST):

- Space shuttle, hosted at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 9 a.m.

- Project Mercury, hosted at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., at 10 a.m.

- The Viking Project, hosted at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., at 11 a.m.

- Hubble Space Telescope, hosted at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., at noon.

- Project Gemini, hosted at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston at 1 p.m.

- Stennis Space Center history, hosted at NASA's Stennis Space Center in Mississippi at 2 p.m.

- X-43, hosted at NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center in Edwards, Calif., at 3 p.m.

- Icing Tunnel, hosted at NASA's Glenn Research Center in Cleveland at 4 p.m.

- Arc Jet Facility, hosted at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif., at 5 p.m.

- Phoenix Mars Lander, hosted at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., at 6 p.m.

The birthday party is being held through a partnership among NASA, Discovery Education of Silver Spring, Md., the U.S. Distance Learning Association of Boston and Polycom of Pleasanton, Calif.

NASA's Digital Learning Network began in the spring of 2004 with three hub sites at Langley, Glenn and Johnson and now extends to all 10 field centers. Through interactive videoconferencing, the network allows the next generation of explorers to connect with scientists, engineers and researchers without leaving the classroom. The distance-learning events are designed to educate through demonstrations and live interactions with NASA experts.

To view the live webcasts on Nov. 13, visit:

http://dln.nasa.gov/dln/content/webcast

For more information about NASA's education programs, visit:

www.nasa.gov/education

First Rocket Parts Of NASA's New Launch System Arrive In Florida

The first major flight hardware of the Ares I-X rocket has arrived in Florida to begin preparation for the inaugural test flight of the agency's next-generation launch system. The test flight is targeted for July 12, 2009.

The Ares I-X upper stage simulator traveled to Port Canaveral aboard the Delta Mariner, a ship that also transports the Delta IV rocket for United Launch Alliance. The journey began Oct. 22 on the Ohio River as the barge traveled toward the Mississippi River for its voyage to Port Canaveral. By Nov. 6, the flight hardware will have been moved off the barge into high bay 4 of the Vehicle Assembly Building at NASA's Kennedy Space Center.

The upper stage simulator consists of 11 individual components that were designed and manufactured during a two-year period at NASA's Glenn Research Center in Cleveland. The components represent the size, outer shape and weight of the second stage of the Ares I rocket, and will be integrated together in the Vehicle Assembly Building. The upper stage simulator eventually will be stacked atop the solid rocket booster segments of the Ares I-X rocket.

The Ares I-X test flight will provide NASA an early opportunity to test and prove hardware, facilities and ground operations associated with the Ares I crew launch vehicle. It also will allow NASA to gather critical data during ascent of the integrated Orion crew exploration vehicle and the Ares I rocket. The data will ensure the entire vehicle system is safe and fully operational before astronauts begin traveling to orbit.

On Nov. 6, video B-roll of the arrival activities will be available on NASA Television's Video File feed. For NASA TV streaming video, schedules and downlink information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

For more information about the Ares I-X and NASA's next-generation spacecraft, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ares

'Ghost of Mirach' Materializes in Space Telescope Image

NASA's Galaxy Evolution Explorer has lifted the veil off a ghost known to haunt the local universe, providing new insight into the formation and evolution of galaxies.

The eerie creature, called NGC 404, is a type of galaxy known as "lenticular." Lenticular galaxies are disk-shaped, with little ongoing star formation and no spiral arms. NGC 404 is the nearest example of a lenticular galaxy, and therefore of great interest. But it lies hidden in the glare from a red giant star called Mirach. For this reason, NGC 404 became known to astronomers as the "Ghost of Mirach."

When the Galaxy Evolution Explorer spied the galaxy in ultraviolet light, a spooky ring materialized.

"We thought this celestial ghost was essentially dead, but we've been able to show that it has an extended ring of new stars. The galaxy has a hybrid character in which the well-known, very old stellar population tells only part of the story," said David Thilker of Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. "It's like the living dead."

Thilker and members of the Galaxy Evolution Explorer team spotted the Ghost of Mirach in images taken during the space telescope's all-sky survey. The Galaxy Evolution Explorer is a relatively low-cost NASA mission, launched in 2003, with an ambitious charge to survey the entire visible sky in ultraviolet light, a job never before accomplished. Because Earth's atmosphere absorbs ultraviolet photons -- a good thing for us living creatures who are susceptible to the damaging light -- ultraviolet telescopes must operate from space.

The first images of the Ghost of Mirach taken by the Galaxy Evolution Explorer hinted at a surrounding ultraviolet-bright extended structure. Subsequent, longer exposure observations indeed show that the lenticular galaxy is surrounded by a clumpy, never-before-seen ring of stars.

What is this mysterious ultraviolet ring doing around an otherwise nondescript lenticular galaxy? As it turns out, previous imaging with the National Science Foundation's Very Large Array radio telescope in New Mexico had discovered a gaseous ring of hydrogen that matches the ultraviolet ring observed by the Galaxy Evolution Explorer. The authors of this Very Large Array study attributed the gas ring to a violent collision between NGC 404 and a small neighboring galaxy 900 million years ago.

The ultraviolet observations demonstrate that, when the hydrogen from the collision settled into the plane of the lenticular galaxy, stars began to form in a ghostly ring. Young, relatively hot stars forming in stellar clusters sprinkled throughout NGC 404's ring give off the ultraviolet light that the Galaxy Evolution Explorer was able to see.

"Before the Galaxy Evolution Explorer image, NGC 404 was thought to contain only very old and evolved red stars distributed in a smooth elliptical shape, suggesting a galaxy well into its old age and no longer evolving significantly," said Mark Seibert of the Observatories of the Carnegie Institution of Washington in Pasadena, Calif. "Now we see it has come back to life, to grow once again."

"The Ghost of Mirach has been lucky enough to get a new lease on life through the rejuvenating, chance merger with its dwarf companion," added Thilker.

The findings indicate that the evolution of lenticular galaxies might not yet be complete. They may, in fact, continue to form stars in a slow, piecemeal fashion as they suck the raw, gaseous material for stars from small, neighboring galaxies. It seems the Ghost of Mirach might act more like a vampire than a ghost.

Caltech leads the Galaxy Evolution Explorer mission and is responsible for science operations and data analysis. NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., manages the mission and built the science instrument. The mission was developed under NASA's Explorers Program managed by the Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md. Researchers sponsored by Yonsei University in South Korea and the Centre National d'Etudes Spatiales (CNES) in France collaborated on this mission.

Graphics and additional information about the Galaxy Evolution Explorer is online at http://www.nasa.gov/galex/ and http://www.galex.caltech.edu .

NASA Hearing Daily From Weak Phoenix Mars Lander

NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has communicated with controllers daily since Oct. 30 through relays to Mars orbiters. Information received over the weekend indicates Phoenix is running out of power each afternoon or evening but reawakening after its solar arrays catch morning sunlight.

The fraction of each day with sun above the horizon is declining at the Martian arctic landing site. Dust raised by a storm last week continues to block some of the sunshine.

"This is exactly the scenario we expected for the mission's final phase, though the dust storm brought it a couple weeks sooner than we had hoped," said Phoenix Project Manager Barry Goldstein of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "We will be trying to gain some additional science during however many days we have left. Any day could be our last."

Mission engineers at JPL and at Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, are attempting this week to upload commands to be stored in the lander's flash memory for science activities to be conducted when the lander wakes up each day.

"Weather observations are our top priority now," said Phoenix Principal Investigator Peter Smith. "If there's enough energy, we will try to get readings from the conductivity probe that has been inserted into the soil, and possibly some images to assess frost buildup."

Phoenix landed on Mars May 25. It accomplished its main science goals during the three months originally planned as its prime mission, then continued operating, now in its sixth month.

The Phoenix mission is led by Peter Smith of the University of Arizona, Tucson, with project management at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory and development partnership at Lockheed Martin, Denver. International contributions come from the Canadian Space Agency; the University of Neuchatel, Switzerland; the universities of Copenhagen and Aarhus in Denmark; the Max Planck Institute in Germany; the Finnish Meteorological Institute; and Imperial College, London. The California Institute of Technology in Pasadena manages JPL for NASA.