We have the first winners of NASA's Cube Quest Challenge

By Christopher Waldeck

NASA has awarded the first winners of the first round of it’s Cube Quest challenge. The entire challenge is a four ground tournament that aims to build flight qualified, small satellites, capable of advanced communications and propulsion near and beyond the moon. Teams that achieve the highest score will win a 5.5 million prize purse in NASA’s first ever in space challenge. Cube Quest is part of NASA’s Centennial Challenges Program, which accelerates technology by engaging non-traditional sources in competition. The ground tournaments started this past April and the first one just officially ended on August 26, 2015.


Here are the standings from NASA for the first ground experiment of the tournament.


The ground tournaments are a series of ground-based checkpoints that allow the judges to review the teams’ progress and to incentivize advancement with intermediate awards.

At Ground Tournament 1, (GT), 13 teams presented their spacecraft and mission designs to a panel of judges from NASA, industry and academia. Judges assessed all the team submissions — engineering designs, plans, analysis and models — as well as presentations by each team. Judges award points ranging from 0 to 5, 5 being exceeds expectations or analysis indicates excellent likelihood of achievement.


The five top-scoring teams for GT-1 are:

1. Team Miles of Tampa, Florida

2. MIT KitCube of Cambridge, Massachusetts

3. Cislunar Explorers of Ithaca, New York

4. Novel Engineering of Cocoa Beach, Florida

5. Ragnarok Industries of Wilmington, Delaware


In February 2016, G-2 or ground experiment 2 is set to begin and will take place in Cambridge Massachusetts. MonsiRoman, program manager of NASA’s Centennial Challenges believes that “Cubesats are a technology with commercial space potential. For 10 years, we have supported challenges that research the innovative solutions needed for NASA’s future exploration goals, and this event is one of many steps toward our journey to Mars and beyond.”

I’d like to especially congratulate Wesley Faler who is the lead on Team Miles and I had the pleasure of interviewing him after the Small Satellite Space Conference in Utah. This interview will be posted later this week regarding the win and the importance of small satellites. Team Miles won the first tournament and are currently ahead in the rankings. They’ll have to keep this momentum going through four more ground checkpoints in order to win the chance of deep space exploration with small satellites. I'd also like to congratulate NASA on seeing so much success so far and having so many talented people working on this initiative.

Beyond Pluto: 2nd Target Chosen for New Horizons Probe

by Calla Cofield, Space.com Staff Writer   |   August 28, 2015 06:15pm ET

NASA's New Horizons probe, which flew past Pluto last month, now has a second target to aim for.

The New Horizons team has selected an object named 2014 MU69, which lies roughly 1 billion miles (1.6 billion kilometers) beyond Pluto, as the next target for up-close study by the spacecraft, NASA announced today (Aug. 28).

However, the space agency still must officially approve a New Horizons mission extension for the second flyby to take place in 2019. [Destination Pluto: NASA's New Horizons Mission in Pictures]

"Even as the New Horizons spacecraft speeds away from Pluto out into the Kuiper Belt, and the data from the exciting encounter with this new world is being streamed back to Earth, we are looking outward to the next destination for this intrepid explorer," John Grunsfeld, chief of the NASA Science Mission Directorate, said in a statement.

The $720 million New Horizons probe traveled for nearly 10 years and 3 billion miles (4.8 billion km) to reach Pluto and its moons, becoming the first mission to study the dwarf planet system up close. It will take roughly 16 months for the probe to beam home all the data it collected during the encounter.

The successful July 14 flyby already ensures that New Horizons will go down in history as a roaring success, but the odds are good that the spacecraft will be collecting more data in the future. NASA commonly approves mission extensions for spacecraft that have finished their primary objective and are still in good working order.

Still, the New Horizons team must submit an extension proposal to NASA that will "be evaluated by an independent team of experts before NASA can decide about the go-ahead," the statement said.

Artist's impression of NASA's New Horizons spacecraft encountering a Pluto-like object in the distant Kuiper Belt. NASA announced today (Aug. 28, 2015) that it has selected 2014 MU69 as its first choice for the probe's secondary mission.
Credit: NASA/JHUAPL/SwRI/Alex Parker

View full size image

That proposal is due in 2016, but the New Horizons team must start planning for an encounter with 2014 MU69 right away. The team will execute a series of four maneuvers in October and November of this year to put the probe on a path to encounter the new object. Any later course corrections will require more fuel and "add mission risk," the statement said. If the extension is approved, the probe is expected to reach 2014 MU69 on Jan. 1, 2019.

Alan Stern, principal investigator for New Horizons at the Southwest Research Institute in Boulder, Colorado, called 2014 MU69 a "great choice," for the secondary mission. Discovered in 2014 by the Hubble Space Telescope, scientists estimate it is just under 30 miles (48 km) in diameter, or between 0.5 and 1 percent the size of Pluto.

In 2014, Hubble identified five objects that New Horizons could potentially reach after its encounter with Pluto. The list was later narrowed down to two prime candidates, including 2014 MU69.

The Kuiper Belt is a largely unexplored region of the solar system; NASA's twin Voyager probes passed through it, but did not make close encounters with any objects, including Pluto. Scientists believe objects in the Kuiper Belt have remained largely unchanged since the formation of the solar system 4.6 billion years ago, and may therefore serve as a kind of time capsule, containing clues about the formation of Earth and its cosmic family.

Follow Calla Cofield @callacofield.Follow us @Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.

Here is the link to the original article:

http://www.space.com/30415-new-horizons-pluto-mission-next-target.html

U.S. Air Force to Award Integration Studies to Space X

By Mike Gruss - August 27, 2015, Retrieved from SpaceNews.com

SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket. Credit: SpaceX

Washington - The U.S. Air Force disclosed plans to award SpaceX a contract worth about 1 million to study the ins and outs of mating national security satellite.

According to a justification and approval document posted to the Federal Business Opportunities website Aug. 26, the $962,000 contract would cover 10 studies as the service prepares to enter a new era of competitively awarded launch missions.

For nearly a decade, the Defense Department has relied exclusively on United Launch Alliance’s Atlas 5 and Delta 4 rockets to launch its operational military and intelligence satellites. But in May, the Air Force certified the Falcon 9 rocket to launch national security missions.

The Falcon 9 remains grounded following a June 28 failure, its first in 18 missions, but SpaceX expects to have it flying again in the coming month or two.

Air Force leaders are expected to release a final request for proposals to launch a GPS 3 navigation satellite soon. SpaceX is expected to bid on that mission, and a victory in that competition would mark its arrival as a true player in the national security launch market.

The Air Force document says additional Falcon 9-satellite integration studies could be required through fiscal year 2022 as the service completes a second round of competitively bid missions. SpaceX of Hawthorne, California, has been under contract for other integration studies with the Defense Department since at least March 2014.

Denver-based ULA has previously performed these studies on the Atlas 5 and Delta 4 rockets, the document said.

Here is the link to the original article on SpaceNews.com by Mike Gruss.

- See more at: http://spacenews.com/u-s-air-force-to-award-integration-studies-to-spacex/#sthash.zSnatytd.dpuf

U.S. Army Shelves One Small Rocket Program, Pursues Another

In this article from SpaceNews.com by Mike Gruss on August 24, 2015, the United States army has shelved one of it's rocket program in favor of another. Despite being interested in small satellite development since 2006, there proposals to this day have come up short. Without these small rockets, the United states military has been forced to rely on piggyback launch activities from companies such as SpaceX. 

Here is the original article:

By Mike Gruss, August 24, 2015

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. — The U.S. Army’s efforts to field a rocket for launching small, low-orbiting satellites on short notice continue to come up empty, even as several commercially oriented companies pursue similar capabilities, the service’s top space official said.

The Army’s latest effort, a May 2014 request for information from industry on responsive launchers, has drawn no viable responses to date, according to Lt. Gen. David Mann, commander of Army Space and Missile Defense Command here. That survey was hatched while the Army was still pursuing a separate project in partnership with NASA called SWORDS, or the Soldier-Warfighter Operationally Responsive Deployer for Space.

Speaking Aug. 12 during the Space and Missile Defense Symposium here, Mann said the SWORDS program, intended to field a liquid-methane-fueled rocket able to launch satellites weighing 25 kilograms on 24 hours’ notice for $1 million, has been shelved.

In March 2013, the Army awarded Quantum International, based here, a $19 million contract to develop the SWORDS vehicle, with an orbital test flight scheduled for summer 2014. KT Engineering and Teledyne Brown Engineering, both of Huntsville, were subcontractors on the program.

But the test flight never happened, and the contract expired in October 2014.

“We’ve kind of fallen short, quite frankly,” Mann said. “We did not really achieve the results we’re looking for. We really did not feel that it was moving from where it needed to go. … That’s the reason we’re trying to partner with industry. That’s the reason we’re trying to figure out what other possibilities are out there.”

Without elaborating, Mann pointed to cost restraints and specific requirements as part of the problem.

The Army has been interested in a small-satellite launch capability since at least 2006, according to slides from a June 2014 industry day that followed the request for information.

“We’ve kind of fallen short, quite frankly,” said U.S. Army Lt. Gen. David Mann, head of the Army’s Space and Missile Defense Command. “We did not really achieve the results we’re looking for. We really did not feel that it was moving from where it needed to go. … That’s the reason we’re trying to partner with industry. That’s the reason we’re trying to figure out what other possibilities are out there.” Credit: C. Shamwell

The lack of a small rocket has forced the Army to rely on piggyback launch opportunities for a pair of nanosatellite programs it has in development. Three Kestrel Eye imaging satellites are slated to fly aboard an upcoming launch of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket — currently grounded following a failure — while three experimental communications satellites are slated to launch on a National Reconnaissance Office mission in September.

“A dedicated nanosatellite launcher will extend the miniature electronics revolution into space by enabling combatant commands to have a launch-on-demand capability,” said an Army/ NASA fact sheet on SWORDS.

One of the ideas behind SWORDS was to focus on commercial, off-the-shelf hardware. Mann mentioned the SWORDS program in congressional testimony in March 2014, but just two months later the Army was asking industry for alternative ideas.

For the latest program, which does not have a formal name, the Army envisions awarding multiple study contracts, each for as long as three years, and then selecting at least one for an orbital flight test.

According to briefing slides from the June 2014 industry day, the service is open to solid, liquid or hybrid rockets and views the Missile Defense Agency as a potential partner.

When asked about responses to the request for information solicitation, Mann said, “Nothing yet.”

But Mann said the Army has not given up on finding a low-cost responsive launch capability and is interested in continuing its partnership with NASA.

“I think we will find a way ahead,” he said. “I think everyone is really challenged right now by the fiscal environment. It’s a question of when, not if.”

In the commercial space industry, the story is different. Several startup companies are developing small rockets in hopes of tapping what has been a hot commercial market for cubesats and other nanosatellites in recent years. These include LauncherOne, part of Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic company, as well as Rocket Lab and Generation Orbit.

Here is the link below to the original article:

- See more at: http://spacenews.com/u-s-army-shelves-one-small-rocket-program-pursues-another/#sthash.8c9RPi2k.dpuf

Virgin Galactic currently hosts nine companies from UK's small satellite industry. This article from  UK Telegraph discusses how Virgin Galactic is looking to focus on less astronaut occupied space travel and more on small satellite space travel. It is believed that much of this has to do with the Virgin Galactic crash that involved a fatal death of 39-year old astronaut Michael Alsbury.

AC Charania, director of strategy and business development at Virgin Galactic, is bullish with his pitch to the visitors: “We are the Uber of small launch,” he claims.

You can find more information about the original article here:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/industry/11816213/Virgin-Galactic-boldly-goes-into-small-satellites-telling-future-astronauts-you-have-to-wait.html

Samsung Looks to join the Satellite Internet Space race

In an article for Wired, Klint Finley details Samsung's plan for expanding the reach of the internet for billions of people. In a paper published this week, Farooq Khan, head of Samsung Research America, outlines an idea for using thousands of small low earth orbit (LEO) satellites to provide high-speed internet all over the planet. Samsung plans to adopt a plan like this in order to improve it's reach and efficiency in it's market. 

Samsung also details how companies like SpaceX, Google, and Virgin are also in the space race to expand access to the internet. Samsung is hardly alone and there is a surplus of competition, but at least we can see that progress is being made to improve the quality of access thanks to the benefits of expense and transportation of small satellites. 

Here is the full article:
http://www.wired.com/2015/08/samsung-looks-join-satellite-internet-space-race/

British Trade Mission Focuses On Smallsats

by Jeff Foust — August 12, 2015, Spacenews.com

- See more at: http://spacenews.com/british-trade-mission-focuses-on-smallsats/#sthash.o0bxXBoa.NUz2Vx5e.dpuf

Article retrieved from SpaceNews.com

LOGAN, Utah — A trade mission to the United States this week organized by the British government seeks to introduce small satellite startup companies based in the U.K. with companies and investors in the U.S.

Nine British companies working with smallsat technologies and applications are participating in the week-long mission, including a stop at the Conference on Small Satellites here, seeking to identify new business opportunities and investments.

“There are a lot of new ideas coming through, so we picked cubesats as a theme for an entrepreneur’s mission,” said Tim Just, head of space for Innovate U.K., an economic development agency, during an interview here Aug. 11.

The companies participating in the trip, he said, include both existing firms seeking to grow their businesses as well as those just starting operations. Some of the companies produce satellite components, such as electronics and deployable structures for smallsats, while others are involved in services provided by such satellites, including analysis of Earth observation data.

Just said bringing the companies over to the U.S. together offers several advantages, including arranging more meetings. He estimated that the participating companies will make four times the number of contacts with U.S companies and investors than if they traveled on their own. “We can do a month’s worth of work in a week,” he said.

The near-term success of the trip, Just said, will be based on the number of contacts the companies make on the trip. “Ultimately, we will be looking at measuring the deal flow and the impact” on the companies, he said.

This week’s trade mission is the first space-related one run by Innovate U.K., and includes visits in California with Lockheed Martin, Virgin Galactic, and investors. Just said he is considering a second trade mission, for satellite applications, tied to the SpaceCom conference in Houston in November.

- See more at: http://spacenews.com/british-trade-mission-focuses-on-smallsats/#sthash.o0bxXBoa.NUz2Vx5e.dpuf

Business Innovations Helping Small Satellites

By Evan Hall, Aug. 12, 2015, UPR.Org

• 

  The NASA booth at the S

The 29th Small Satellite Conference on the campus of Utah State University, which concludes Thursday, is a gathering of public and private groups involved in space engineering. Small satellite technology is changing. The public’s relationship with satellite development is changing as well.

One of the conference’s roundtable sessions allowed Rex Ridenoure, CEO of Elliptic Enterprise Corporation, to share his experience working on his company’s LightSail satellite. He said that the Planetary Society, headed by Bill Nye, partnered with Elliptic Enterprise to use crowdfunding to help finance research for the project. The response was overwhelming.

“While all of this is going on, the Planetary Society’s got a Kickstarter going for this project and it’s setting records for space-themed Kickstarters,” he said. “So, everybody’s following this mission and they set a record for the most donors ever for a Kickstarter for space.”

Engineers are also finding ways to attract business by creating cost-efficient satellites. At the roundtable, Nicholas Dallmann of the Los Alamos National Laboratory explained that the Prometheus satellite project was created with the customer in mind.

“We looked at not only just our development costs, but also the cost to build, launch, operate, and maintain this system,” he said. “I think that where we were most effective was when we kept focus on total cost of ownership and our mission; that every decision we made, we tried to make with those things in mind.”   

Over 120 exhibition booths from universities, private companies, and government agencies were present at the conference.

Link to Original article found on Utah Public Radio:

http://upr.org/post/business-innovations-helping-small-satellites

Buy room on a rocket like you were buying an airplane ticket.

By Christopher Waldeck, Small Satellite Space News Editor in Chief

New Zealand’s Rocket Lab wants to further innovate the obvious convenience of CubeSats. Rocketlab CEO Peter Beck made the announcement that he was building an online reservation system for anyone wanting to launch their small satellites into space. Now the ability to reserve a spot for a satellite on a rocket is as customizable and simple as purchasing an airline ticket. This announcement was made at this weekend’s small satellite conference in Utah.

According to Popular Mechanics, Rocket Lab, a private spaceflight company based out of New Zealand, will launch a series of Electron rockets into space, each carrying a series of CubeSats. CubeSats are a class of small "nano-satellites" designed for lightweight missions. They can be used as an explorer or a communications satellite. Their size allows for easy reservation and cancellation similar to reserving a ticket on an airplane. 

It works similar to the way booking a flight on a plane works. If you see a seat that you like then you can reserve your spot on it. You imply click on the platform, pick a rocket and it opens up a seating plan for customers to reserve their spots. The platform for reservation allows for you to choose your travel. This makes it easy and relatable to similar experiences that people have had reserving seats and this simplicity transcends to reserving a seat on a rocket that is being launched into space. The orbit range of where the rocket will launch will be determined to further customize which rockets are on the course best suited to the purpose of the nano-satellites that are attached to them.

The customers still have to design and build the CubeSats, but reserving the cargo space has become simpler thanks to Rocketlabs. Understanding the prices for attaching the satellites can make it easier for designing satellites and managing projects that might involve building and designing satellites. This will make it more accessible for those in business or educational organizations to budget and take on projects that involve launching these satellites. It also adds to their affordable and convenient benefits of being able to customize and postpone or selectively plan the launch of a satellite.

To conclude, as this industry expands, innovations are making it increasingly more affordable to enter it and use it’s benefits. Small satellites are becoming useful and more frequently used compared to traditional satellites. The conference in Utah provided numerous sponsors and exhibitors the chance to showcase just what can be done with this new industry. I think RocketLabs has tapped into a niche for one of the prime benefits of using a small satellite versus a large satellite and that is convenience for launching. I look forward to seeing where it goes from here. As always follow Small Satellite Space News for more information about this growing trend: http://smallsatspace.blogspot.com/

NASA Opens New CubeSat Opportunities for Low-Cost Space Exploration

 

NASA Logo.

Article retrieved from PRNewswire

WASHINGTON, Aug. 10, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Space enthusiasts have an opportunity to contribute to NASA's exploration goals through the next round of the agency's CubeSat Launch Initiative. Applicants must submit their proposals electronically by 4:30 p.m. EST, Nov. 24.

The CubeSat Launch Initiative provides access to space for CubeSats developed by NASA centers, accredited educational institutions and non-profit organizations, giving CubeSat developers access to a low-cost pathway to conduct research in the areas of science, exploration, technology development, education or operations consistent with NASA's Strategic Plan. NASA does not provide funding for the development of the small satellites.

NASA plans to select the payloads by Feb. 19, 2016, but selection does not guarantee a launch opportunity. Selected experiments will fly as auxiliary payloads on agency rocket launches or be deployed from the International Space Station beginning in 2016 and running through 2019. To date, NASA has selected 105 CubeSats from 30 states. Thirty-seven CubeSats have been launched, and 16 more are scheduled to go into space in the next 12 months.

The agency has made progress on a goal established during the White House Maker Faire last year to launch a small satellite from at least one participant in each state over the next five years. For this round, NASA is focusing on gaining participation in the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and 20 states not previously selected for the CubeSat Launch Initiative. These states are: Arkansas, Delaware,Georgia, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Maine, Minnesota, Mississippi, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, North Carolina,Oklahoma, Oregon, South Carolina, South Dakota, Washington and Wyoming.

CubeSats are in a class of research spacecraft called nanosatellites. The base CubeSat dimensions are 10x10x11 centimeters (about 4x4x4 inches), which equals one Cube, or 1U. CubeSats supported by this launch effort include volumes of 1U, 2U, 3U and 6U. CubeSats of 1U, 2U and 3U size typically have a mass of 1.33 kilograms (about three pounds) per 1U. A 6U CubeSat typically has a mass of 12 to 14 kilograms (26.5 to 30.9 pounds). The CubeSat's final mass depends on the selected deployment method.

For additional information about NASA's CubeSat Launch Initiative, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/directorates/heo/home/CubeSats_initiative

Logo - http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20081007/38461LOGO

SOURCE NASA

RELATED LINKS
http://www.nasa.gov

Link to original article: http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/nasa-opens-new-cubesat-opportunities-for-low-cost-space-exploration-300126089.html

Space Vegetables are on the menu for the first time at the International Space Station

By Dante D'Orazio 

on August 9, 2015 05:19 pm, The Verge

Astronauts aboard the International Space Station are going to have a very special meal tomorrow. Red romaine lettuce is on the menu, and when they take a bite, it will mark the first time astronauts eat food that was grown on the ISS.

Casual observers may be surprised to hear that fresh vegetables haven't been growing on ISS for years. After all, if sci-fi movies have taught us anything, it's that every space ship needs a bountiful greenhouse to support its crew (the lush space garden fromSunshine is pictured above).

A greenhouse called Lada has been aboard the ISS since 2002 and has been used to study plant growth in microgravity for many years. But, until now, astronauts aboard the space station haven't been eating their science experiments.

Scott Kelly planted the romaine on July 8th,according to NASA, and the plants were harvested 33 days later after consistent watering. But the whole experiment is a bit more complicated than just planting some seeds and eating them when they grow. Since there aren't just beds of soil on the space station, astronauts had to use a plant growth system called Veggie.

The collapsable system takes pre-made seed "pillows" and blasts them with light from red and blue LEDs to let them grow. The system successfully produced plants in 2014, but they had to be brought back to Earth for testing. In particular, NASA had to ensure that the plants were safe for consumption — the open air environment on the station could easily transfer contaminants to the plants.

Now that space plants have the go-ahead from NASA, all astronauts need to do before consuming the romaine is to give the leaves a wipe down with food sanitizing wipes. Then they can feast on their space bounty, though they do need to save half of the haul to send it back to Earth for further study.

Beyond offering a food source for long-term trips — NASA says packaged food can only last a maximum of two to three years — space gardens could be key to astronaut health. Fresh fruits and vegetables could help improve mental health by giving astronauts something to nurture. They also give astronauts a little piece of Earth to bring with them on long journeys. In addition, a good, fresh meal goes a long way after months of eating packaged food. NASA says it is monitoring the effects of fresh produce on the crew in preparation for any future trip to Mars. Until then, Scott Kelly and the ISS will have some fresh food to enjoy during their months aboard the station.

Link to Original Article from The Verge: 

http://www.theverge.com/2015/8/9/9124023/iss-astronauts-eat-space-vegetables-first-time

Science Work, Spacewalk Preps as New Crew Readies for Launch

Posted on August 7, 2015 at 1:05 pm by Mark via blogs.NASA.gov

ISS044E030713 (08/05/2015) — Typhoon Soudelor photographed from the International Space Station on Aug. 5, 2015 while the storm was traveling in the western Pacific. The Soyuz TMA-17M (left) and the Progress 60 (right) cargo craft are visible.

The Expedition 44 crew members continued a wide variety of science experiments Friday as a pair of cosmonauts prepared for a spacewalk Monday morning. On the ground, a new Soyuz crew is preparing for their mission to swap a pair of station residents in September.

One-Year crew member Scott Kelly set up free-floating microsatellites for the long-running SPHERES-Slosh experiment which observes how liquids such as rocket fuel behave in space. New station residents Kjell Lindgren and Kimiya Yui explored vision changes in space as they scanned each other’s eyes with an ultrasound and measured their blood pressure for the Ocular Health study.

Spacewalkers Gennady Padalka and Mikhail Kornienko tested their spacesuits Friday. The cosmonauts will spend 6-1/2 hours upgrading hardware, retrieving an external experiment and photographing the exterior condition of the Russian modules.

In Russia, three new Soyuz crew members completed a series of mission simulations ahead of their departure to the Baikonur Cosmodrome launch site in Kazakhstan. Veteran cosmonaut Sergei Volkov will command the Soyuz TMA-18M spacecraft when he launches Sept. 2 with fellow crew members Andres Mogensen and Aidyn Aimbetov. Volkov will swap places with Padalka who will return to Earth Sept. 12 with Mogensen and Aimbetov.