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By Daniel Fischer Every page present in Europe & the U.S.!
| Ahead | Awards 
The latest issue!
| A German companion - only available here! Current mission news: MGS (latest pictures!) + Cassini + Stardust |
"Opportunity Ledge" was once drenched in water, four lines of evidence suggest, Spirit's rock "Humphrey (seen here and here) also saw water, Mars Express is entering Mars' shadow - and the loss of Beagle 2 may be explained. Mars Express Releases of March 1 and Feb. 24 and coverage of March 8: BBC, New Sci., AP, ST, RP, NZ. March 4: BBC. March 2: BBC, Welt. MER Press Releases of March 5 [JPL], March 2 [JPL] and Feb. 26 [JPL], Science@NASA [NASA], MPG and Ball Releases on the water findings, JPL Spotlights on rover tracks and the Mars Bunny [SD, SN], Opportunity Pancam views of a solar eclipse by Deimos (animated by Bruenjes) and a JPL Release about the eclipses plus coverage of March 9: AstroBio, BBC, SciAm, SC, BdW, NZ. March 8: S&T, SF Gate, New Sci., SC (other story), NZ. March 7: AFP. March 6: LAT, FT, BBC, AP, ST. March 5: SN, SC (other, another and another story). March 4: NSU, CSM, SC ABC, (other story). March 3: AstroBio (other story [SD]), Plan. Soc., SciAm, FT, LAT, New Sci., BBC, APOD, Daily Cam., Guard., CSM, AP (other story), SC, BdW. March 2: SN, S&T, Ast., AFP, Dsc., BBC, FT (other, earlier story), LAT, UPI, HC, VOA, SC, Wired, ST, RP, Mars Soc. D, NZ (fr�her). March 1: SN, SpaceRev, BBC, SR, SC, Feb. 29: SC. Feb. 28: SciAm. Feb. 27: Dsc., LAT, BBC, New Sci., SC. Feb. 26: FT, AFP, SC. Feb. 25: Dsc, Scotsman, AB (other and another story). Hydrogen peroxide in atmosphere: JACH PR, Wired. Does life's rapid appearance imply a Martian origin? A paper by Davies.
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Rosetta launched, left Earth orbit!Europe's Rosetta cometary probe has been successfully launched into an orbit around the Sun, which will allow it to reach the comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko in 2014 after three flybys of the Earth and one of Mars - and during this 10-year journey, the probe will pass close to at least one asteroid. The mission began - some 20 years after first envisioned - at 7:17 UTC on 2 March when a European Ariane 5 launch vehicle lifted off from the Guiana Space Centre. The launcher successfully placed its upper stage and payload into an eccentric coast orbit (200 x 4000 km). At 9:14 UTC the upper stage ignited its own engine to reach an escape velocity in order to leave the Earth's gravity field and enter heliocentric orbit. The Rosetta probe was released 18 minutes later.ESA's Operations Centre (ESOC) in Darmstadt, Germany, has established contact with the probe as it flies away from Earth at a relative speed of about 3.4 km/s. ESOC will be in charge of Rosetta operations and orbit determination throughout the mission. During the next eight months, the spacecraft's onboard systems will be checked and its science payload will be commissioned. Then, it will be placed into hibernation mode for most of the ten years of its journey through the Solar System. Rosetta will be reactivated for planetary flybys, however, which will be used to modify its trajectory through gravity assist manoeuvres, or asteroid flybys, observation of asteroids being one of the mission's secondary objectives. The first planetary encounter will be in March 2005, as Rosetta flies by the Earth for the first time. The gravity assist will boost Rosetta into an orbit that will take it to Mars two years later. During its close encounter with Mars in February 2007, Rosetta will approach to a distance of about 200 km and conduct science observations. This Martian flyby will be followed by another Earth flyby in November the same year. Both planetary encounters will increase the probe's orbital energy and boost it well into the asteroid belt. A third and last flyby of the Earth in November 2009 will send Rosetta toward the orbit of comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko. Then, by mid-2011, when it is about 800 million km from the Sun, Rosetta will ignite its main engine for a major deep-space manoeuvre that will place it onto an interception trajectory with the comet, which will take nearly three years to be reached. Rosetta will be reactivated for good in January 2014, as it enters a six-month approach phase, closing in slowly on the nucleus of comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko. The comet will then still be far from the Sun and its nucleus should be dormant. Rosetta will enter an orbit about 25 km above the nucleus in August 2014. It will then conduct detailed mapping of its surface and a landing site will be selected for Philae, its 100 kg lander. Philae will be dropped from an altitude of about 1000 meters and, due to the tiny gravity of the nucleus, it will touch down at walking speed. The lander will even have to anchor itself to the surface with a harpoon to avoid bouncing back. Philae will operate from the surface for at least a week, sending back very high resolution pictures and as information about the upper crust of the nucleus. These data will be relayed to Earth by the orbiter. Rosetta will continue its observations of the comet's nucleus for over a year, at least until December 2015, and will have a ringside seat to monitor the "awakening" of the comet's activity as it comes closer to the Sun and reached its perihelion, in October 2015. Rosetta, a 3 tonne spacecraft with solar arrays spanning an impressive 32 metres, is the first probe designed to travel beyond the orbit of Mars to rely on solar cells for its power supply. And Rosetta went ... back to the Final Assembly Buildingor BAF where a new block of thermal protection will be installed on the Ariane 5 rocket - the launch had to be postponed for a 2nd day in a row to allow for a minor repair to the external thermal protection on the rocket's core cryogenic stage; it will probably be set now for Tuesday, March 2nd, or Wednesday. A visual inspection of the cryogenic core stage had detected that a 10 x 15-cm piece of the protection was missing, giving reason for the countdown to be stopped. The inspection had been made prior to the start of the stage's fuelling. This thermal protection insulates the stage's cold cryogenic propellants against the warmer external environment. To replace the missing piece of insulation, the rocket will be moved on its mobile launch table back to the BAF, where a new block of thermal protection will be installed. Once the new piece is in place, the adhesive requires approximately 36 hours for its drying/curing process.Rosetta launch delayed by 24 hours due to high windsIt was probably the shortest broadcast by Arianespace ever, lasting only a few seconds: A quarter past 7 a.m. UTC, 20 minutes before the scheduled launch of the Ariane 5 in Kourou, the CEO appeared on the screen at the various launch parties in Europe. His full announcement was: "We have a weather no-go because of the winds at altitude. As we only have an instant launch window for this evening, it is not possible to go ahead with the launch and it is not possible to do anything other than come back tomorrow, same place, same time for the second attempt." No weather outlook was given for that day or the following one (as it is customary e.g. with NASA's shuttles) - the terse statement left ESA organizers at the control center in Darmstadt, Germany, in a rather confused state, but at least the full buffet was offered to the numerous guests all at once ... |
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ISS etc. UpdateISS Report [SR] on a problematic EVA, ESA PR on Matroshka, a NASA PR [SR] on RTF, "Exploration " Briefing Charts and coverage of March 8: Dateline Alabama, Dsc., SC (other story). March 5: ST. March 4: HC, FT. March 3: TIME, FT (other story), SC, ST, Welt. March 2: FT, SD. March 1: SpaceRev, Guardian, BBC, SD, Guard., UPI, ST, NZ. |
Feb. 28:
HC,
ST.
Feb. 27:
FT,
SC,
ST,
NZ,
RP.
Feb. 26:
SN,
HC,
FT,
AFP,
SC,
Welt.
Feb. 25:
ABC,
BBC,
FT
(OpEd),
ST,
Heise.
Feb. 24:
FT
(other story),
HC,
AP.
The HST crisis: text of and a House PR and remarks on a resolution to save Hubble, a letter writing campaign and coverage of March 8: SpaceRev. March 6: FT. March 5: S&T. March 4: SC. March 1: Physics Today. Feb. 26: Denver Post. Feb. 23: Bergen Record. |
Hubble Ultra Deep Field published!The deepest portrait of the visible universe ever achieved by humankind is actually two separate images taken by Hubble's ACS and NICMOS - possibly with galaxies up to redshifts of 7 and 12, respectively: Homepage, HST Press Release [NASA, ESA, SR], BBC, AP, SC.New CMBR observations with the VSA in Tenerife could indicate a more complex inflationary phase after the Big Bang: Jodrell Bank Press Release. No changes in the constants of Nature are evident in recent astronomical observations: ZEIT. Sonofusion working after all? Purdue Univ., Rensselear Press Releases,. Physics News Update (item 3). Another galaxy distance recordhas been claimed, breaking the one noted just weeks ago in the last Update (small items) with a redshift of 10.00 - which was measured spectroscopically: a paper by Pelló & al., an ESO Press Release (with link to the original paper as printed), BBC, and coverage by S&T, SC, AP, New Sci., RP, NZ.The re-ionization of the Universe was a lengthy process with two spikes, spectra of distant quasars say: CfA Press Release, BdW. Dark energy's evolution: a very long paper by Riess & al., Physics News Update, SMH. Quasisoft X-ray sources - a new kind of Black Holes?Mysterious, powerful X-ray sources found in nearby galaxies may represent a new class of objects, according to Chandra data - they are not as hot as typical neutron-star or black-hole candidate X-ray sources and could be a large new population of black holes with masses several hundred times that of the Sun: Chandra Press Release, SC, BdW.Inner accretion disk of a neutron star observed - unprecedented details of the swirling flow of gas hovering just a few km from its surface have been resolved with RXTE: U Toronto, NASA and GSFC Press Releases, SC. Mysterious giant far-IR jets found close to the solar system - are they 'fossils'? A paper by Weinberger & Armsdorfer, ORF. |
A large dust disk around the nearby star AU Michas been detected between 50 AU and 210 AU radius, a region where dust lifetimes exceed the present stellar age - thus AU Mic is the nearest star where we directly observe the solid material required for planet formation: a paper by Kalas & al., IfA and Berkeley Press Releases, pictures, SC, SciAm."Winking star" explained as double system with a slowly moving big dust screen: CfA Press Release, BdW. The model has just been confirmed by radial velocity observations: a paper by Johnson & al.! Laser AO detects dust disks around heavy stars, probably formed like the Sun: Berkeley PR [SR]. Silicates found in stardust for the first time: Wash. Univ. PR. Presolar carbon in IDP: LLNL, Wash. Univ. Press Releases, BdW. Meteorite role in chirality of life? ASU Press Release, NSU. Galileo negotiations succeedThe United States and the European Commission, joined by the European Union member states, held a successful round of negotiations in Brussels on 24-25 February 2004: EU Press Release, AW&ST, AFP, SpaceRev, ST. Soyuz to launch first two spacecraft: Arianespace [SN], ESA Press Releases, AFP, ST. Why China is a partner: Peop. Daily.Landsat 5 at work for 20 years, was planned for three: GSFC Release [SR]. Amateur satellite launched on the same rocket also still alive: Wired. Indian lunar mission advances to 2007 - "we can save time because the spacecraft and the launch vehicle are available virtually off the shelf and work on fabricating the payload has already begun": Space News. Tumbleweed "rover" tested in Antarctica, may be suitable for other planets: JPL Release.
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Compiled and written by Daniel Fischer
