A good night’s sleep is a key aspect of human health, and this is especially true for astronauts working in the ultra-demanding environment of space.
After a long day of floating around in microgravity doing experiments, astronauts on the International Space Station retire to their sleep station, which is little more than a closet, for some shut-eye.
Inside the sleep station is a sleeping bag and laptop strapped to the wall, as well as some personal effects, like photos of an astronaut’s family or memorabilia from a favorite sports team.
It’s a far cry from the spacious beds we have on Earth, but it’s still better than the shared sleeping compartment on the space shuttle, which Mike Massimino, a former NASA astronaut, describes as “a big slumber party.” The trick, Massimino says, was to remember to strap your sleeping bag to the wall so your body wouldn’t drift around during the night.
But even when they’re strapped in, astronauts’ arms tend to float out in front of them while they sleep, making them look like tired zombies.
Astronauts are allotted an eight-hour period for sleep each night and are often expected to keep a log of their sleep schedule so scientists can learn how spaceflight affects this basic human function.
We might not get to see astronauts fly in a SpaceX Crew Dragon until next year, but preparations for that highly anticipated test flight are underway, including a recent space fashion show.
OK, so there was no catwalk or runway strutting, but NASA did share a few photos of astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley going through their "suit-up procedures" recently at SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, California.
We've seen this pair before getting familiar with the Crew Dragon, but this time they donned their new suits for a full launch day dry run, including SpaceX's ground operators.
The goal was to practice all the steps that will go down before a Falcon 9 rocket propels the pair from Kennedy Space Center in Florida to an eventual docking with the International Space Station.
Inside the Crew Dragon simulator, the team also ran through several emergency scenarios.
Crew Dragon is one of two new spacecraft, along with Boeing's Starliner, that NASA has selected for its Commercial Crew program, The aim is to return human spaceflight launches to American soil for the first time since the end of the space shuttle era.
NASA’s Robotic Refueling Mission 3 (RRM3) completed an initial set of tool operations designed by the Satellite Servicing Projects Division, making the idea of using water ice, oxygen or methane from other worlds as fuel for spacecraft seem plausible.
The ability to store and transfer cryogenic fuels will help enable interstellar voyages in the far future.
Currently, any spacecraft to far away destinations such as the Moon and Mars must carry all of its propellants with it from launch to termination.
NASA had to learn about this the hard way in April when a hardware issue during a Refueling Mission caused the cryogenic tanks to heat up unexpectedly and the gas had to be released.
“NASA’s proven experience and unique facilities are helping commercial companies mature their technologies at a competitive pace,” Jim Reuter, associate administrator of NASA’s Space Technology Mission Directorate (STMD) said in a NASA statement.
“We’ve identified technology areas NASA needs for future missions, and these public-private partnerships will accelerate their development so we can implement them faster.”
In addition to that, the Earth’s atmosphere, it shields the planet from too much of the sun’s energy.
Now, imagine, if you could put a solar panel into the Earth’s orbit at around 22,000 miles up.
See, the concept of space-based solar power was theorized 40 years back by a very renowned scientist named Peter Glaser.
After his discovery and in response to the periodical energy crises, the idea has since been adopted by the U.S. Department of Energy, NASA, and some of the major aerospace companies and countries like Japan and India.
Many studies have shown that there is no technological barrier to start implementing space-based solar power.
The significant impediment has been identified as being economics because it might be a challenge to provide SBSP at a competitive price.
After NASA’s Apollo 11 in 1969 which carried the first laser reflectors to the Moon, ISRO launched 2 tiny microlaser reflectors to the moon through Chandrayaan 2 from Satish Dhawan Space Centre, Sriharikota on 22 July 2019 at 2.43 PM IST (09:13 UTC).
He referred lunar mission as a symbol of ” faith and fearlessness”, also praised how ISRO scientists dealt with technical snag while addressing Indians from ” Man ki Baat”
Chandrayaan which means ” Moon vehicle ” in Sanskrit is aimed to deliver rover on the plane close to the uncharted lunar South Pole with the intention of investing water and other sources of energy on the moon.
The payloads that include terrain mapping cameras to prepare a 3D map to analyze specific areas while a collimated large array soft x-ray spectrometer will map the majority of major rock-forming elements.
Along with orbiter and rover, the lander wholly built with homegrown technology.
Chandrayaan 2 consists of three segments: Orbiter, Rover, and Lander.
