SpaceX capsule and NASA crew make first splashdown in 45 years

Two NASA astronauts returned to Earth on Sunday in a dramatic, retro-style splashdown, their capsule parachuting into the Gulf of Mexico to close out an unprecedented test flight by Elon Musk’s SpaceX company.

It was the first splashdown by US astronauts in 45 years, with the first commercially built and operated spacecraft to carry people to and from orbit. The return clears the way for another SpaceX crew launch as early as next month and possible tourist flights next year.

Read More ... SpaceX capsule and NASA crew make first splashdown in 45 years

NASA launches Mars rover to look for signs of ancient life

Cape Canaveral: The biggest, most sophisticated Mars rover ever built — a car-size vehicle bristling with cameras, microphones, drills and lasers — blasted off Thursday as part of an ambitious, long-range project to bring the first Martian rock samples back to Earth to be analysed for evidence of ancient life.

NASA’s Perseverance rode a mighty Atlas V rocket into the morning sky in the world’s third and final Mars launch of the summer.

China and the United Arab Emirates got a head start last week, but all three missions should reach the red planet in February after a journey of seven months and 300 million miles (480 million kilometers).

Read More ... NASA launches Mars rover to look for signs of ancient life

NASA shares first pic of Jupiter’s moon Ganymede’s North Pole; internet says ‘fascinating’

Independent space research agency National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) shared a first ever photo of North Pole of Ganymede, a moon of Jupiter.

The official account of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory division took to twitter and posted the photo and wrote, “For the first time ever, @NASAJuno imaged the north pole of the largest moon in the solar system: Jupiter’s moon Ganymede.”

Read More ... NASA shares first pic of Jupiter’s moon Ganymede’s North Pole; internet says ‘fascinating’

Lunar Loo Challenge: NASA wants you to design a space toilet for missions to the moon

Lunar Loo Challenge: NASA wants you to design a space toilet for missions to the moon

NASA is announcing the “Lunar Loo Challenge,” a competition in partnership with HeroX to come up with the best space toilet for the agency’s future human lunar lander.

The winner of the space toilet challenge could win $35,000 for the top concept.

Although space toilets are already in use, they are designed for microgravity only. Microgravity is when there’s weightlessness in space. But the new toilets need to be able to work in lunar gravity as well which is approximately one-sixth of Earth’s gravity.

In addition to the main Technical category, NASA and HeroX have also created the Junior category to encourage those under the age of 18 to submit their own ideas as well.

The top three participants in the Junior category will not receive cash but will receive public recognition and an item of official NASA merchandise.

Three Indian companies get licence to manufacture NASA’s coronavirus ventilators

Three Indian companies get licence to manufacture NASA’s coronavirus ventilators

Washington:  Three Indian companies have got licences from NASA to manufacture its indigenously developed ventilators for critical COVID-19 patients.

The three Indian companies are Alpha Design Technologies Pvt Ltd, Bharat Forge Ltd and Medha Servo Drives Pvt Ltd, the space organisation said in a statement on Friday.

Apart from the Indian firms, 18 other companies, including eight American and three Brazilian, have been selected to manufacture the critical breathing devices.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which is an independent agency for space research, aeronautics and related programmes in the US, developed the ventilator specifically for coronavirus patients at its Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JLP) in Southern California.

The JPL engineers designed the special ventilator called VITAL in little over a month and received ‘Emergency Use Authorization’ from the Food and Drug Administration on April 30.

The VITAL (Ventilator Intervention Technology Accessible Locally) equipment uses one-seventh the parts of a traditional ventilator, relying on parts already available in supply chains, the space organisation said. This high-pressure ventilator offers a simple, affordable option for treating critical patients while freeing up traditional ventilators for those with the most severe COVID-19 symptoms. Its flexible design means it also can be modified for use in field hospitals, the NASA statement read.

“The VITAL team is very excited to see their technology licenced,” said Leon Alkalai, manager of the JPL Office of Strategic Partnerships. Our hope is to have this technology reach across the world and provide an additional source of solutions to deal with the on-going COVID-19 crisis,” he said.

NASA said VITAL was developed with input from doctors and medical device manufacturers.

NASA seeking volunteers for paid 8 months isolation in fake Mars mission

NASA seeking volunteers for paid 8 months isolation in fake Mars mission

NASA is inviting applications for a programme where it will pay volunteers for spending eight months in isolation. The research is being done to study the effects of isolation and confinement as participants work to complete simulated space missions.

Participants will be staying in a lab located in Moscow, and they will experience environmental aspects similar to those astronauts are expected to experience on future missions to Mars that will have crew members from different nations

NASA said, “As many around the world are staying at home in response to the global coronavirus pandemic, NASA is preparing for its next spaceflight simulation study. Results from ground-based missions like this help NASA prepare for the real-life challenges of space exploration and provide important scientific data to solve some of these problems and to develop countermeasures”

The ground based ‘SIRIUS-20’ mission will help NASA learn more about the physiological and psychological effects of isolation and confinement on humans.

Participants will be compensated, and there are varying levels of pay depending on whether you are associated with NASA.

Astronauts arrive for NASA’s 1st home launch in decade

Astronauts arrive for NASA’s 1st home launch in decade

Cape Canaveral: The two astronauts who will end a nine-year launch drought for NASA arrived at Kennedy Space Center on Wednesday, May 20 exactly one week before their historic SpaceX flight.

It will be the first time a private company, rather than a national government, sends astronauts into orbit.

NASA test pilots Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken flew to Florida from their home base in Houston aboard one of the space agency’s jets.

It’s an incredible time for NASA and the space program, once again launching U.S. crews from Florida, and hopefully in just a week from about right now, Hurley told reporters minutes after arriving.

Hurley was one of the four astronauts who arrived at Kennedy on July 4, 2011, for the final space shuttle flight, so it’s incredibly humbling to be here to start out the next launch from the United States.

We feel it as an opportunity but also a responsibility for the American people, for the SpaceX team, for all of NASA,” Behnken added.

The two are scheduled to blast off next Wednesday afternoon atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, bound for the International Space Station. They’ll soar from the same pad where Atlantis closed out the shuttle program in 2011, the last home launch for NASA astronauts.

Since then, the only way to the space station for astronauts has been on Russian rockets launched from Kazakhstan.

Hurley and Behnken still don’t know how long they’ll spend at the space station: anywhere between one and four months. Only one American is up there right now astronaut Chris Cassidy and could use a hand.

Hurley said he got an email from Cassidy on Tuesday night in which he wrote that he’s looking forward to seeing our ugly mugs on board.

Greeting the astronauts at Kennedy’s former shuttle landing strip where the center’s director, former shuttle commander Robert Cabana, and NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine.

You really are a bright light for all of America right now, Bridenstine told them. The welcoming committee was reduced drastically in size because of the coronavirus pandemic. There were no handshakes for the astronauts, who did not wear masks but kept their distance at separate microphones. Cabana and Bridenstine wore masks except while addressing the crowd; so did the approximately 20 journalists standing more than 20 feet (6 meters) away.

During these tough times, Bridenstine said, this is a moment when we can all look and be inspired as to what the future holds.” NASA’s commercial crew program has been years in the making. Boeing, the competing company, isn’t expected to launch its first astronauts until next year.

As the trailblazers, Hurley and Behnken are establishing new prelaunch traditions. They shared two at Bridenstine’s request Wednesday.

Hurley, a former Marine and fighter pilot, followed military tradition and put a mission sticker on the SpaceX flight simulator in Houston on Tuesday, after completing training. Behnken, an Air Force colonel, followed Russian custom and planted a tree. He had help back home from his wife, who’s also an astronaut, and their 6-year-old son.

My son will always have that lemon tree that he was a part of planting, Behnken said. Hopefully, it makes it through Houston’s hot summer this year and becomes a tradition for some other folks as well.

NASA develops high-pressure ventilator to fight COVID-19

NASA develops high-pressure ventilator to fight COVID-19

Washington: NASA engineers have developed a new, easy-to-build high-pressure ventilator tailored specifically to treat COVID-19 patients.

The device, called VITAL (Ventilator Intervention Technology Accessible Locally), passed a critical test this week at the Icahn School of Medicine in New York, an epicentre of COVID-19 in the US, NASA said.

VITAL is designed to treat patients with milder symptoms, thereby keeping country’s limited supply of traditional ventilators available for patients with more severe COVID-19 symptoms, it said.

“We specialise in spacecraft, not medical-device manufacturing,” said Michael Watkins, Director of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).

“But excellent engineering, rigorous testing and rapid prototyping are some of our specialties. When people at JPL realized they might have what it takes to support the medical community and the broader community, they felt it was their duty to share their ingenuity, expertise and drive,” Watkins said.

NASA is now seeking FDA approval for the device via an emergency use authorization, a fast-track approval process developed for crisis situations that takes just days rather than years, the US space agency said.

We were very pleased with the results of the testing we performed in our high-fidelity human simulation lab,” said Matthew Levin, Associate Professor at the Icahn School of Medicine.

“The NASA prototype performed as expected under a wide variety of simulated patient conditions.

The team feels confident that the VITAL ventilator will be able to safely ventilate patients suffering from COVID-19 both here in the US and throughout the world,” Levin said.

VITAL can be built faster and maintained more easily than a traditional ventilator, and is composed of far fewer parts, many of which are currently available to potential manufacturers through existing supply chains, NASA said.

Its flexible design means it also can be modified for use in field hospitals being set up in convention centres, hotels, and other high-capacity facilities across the country and around the globe, the agency said.

Like all ventilators, VITAL requires patients to be sedated and an oxygen tube inserted into their airway to breathe.

The new device wouldn’t replace current hospital ventilators, which can last years and are built to address a broader range of medical issues.

Instead, VITAL is intended to last three to four months and is specifically tailored for COVID-19 patients, according to NASA.

“Intensive care units are seeing COVID-19 patients who require highly dynamic ventilators,” said J D Polk, NASA’s chief health and medical officer.

“The intention with VITAL is to decrease the likelihood patients will get to that advanced stage of the disease and require more advanced ventilator assistance,” Polk said.