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Category: satellites – Page 180

Today sees the launch of the biennial UK Space Conference, taking place at Manchester Central, from 30 May through to 1 June. This year’s conference is designed to inspire, enable and connect the UK and international space community.

The multiple plenary and parallel sessions feature informative and interactive presentations, workshops and debates covering a wide range of topics from space science through to how satellite data is being used by many industries here on Earth. The programme has been designed to provide a compelling forum to discuss the changing economic and technological landscape impacting the UK space sector.

Stuart Martin, CEO of the Satellite Applications Catapult, said: “The UK Space Conference provides an invaluable opportunity for those involved or interested in the space sector to gain up-to-date information, network with peers, establish new contacts, exchange information and improve links with government, industry, academia, customers, suppliers, and the financial community.

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The research agency hopes its XS-1 jumpstarts a whole new industry of very-low-cost satellite launches.

Boeing did such a good job plotting out the commercial future of a reusable satellite-launching plane that they’re going to get to build it — and just maybe, launch a whole new low-cost satellite industry.

On Thursday, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, announced that Boeing had won the contract for Phases 2 and 3 of the XS-1 “space plane,” a reusable craft meant to launch 10 satellites in 10 days by 2021 or so, a goal that is key to the future of global military satellite communications.

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Elon Musk’s SpaceX plans to start launching satellites into orbit in 2019 to provide high-speed internet to Earth.

In November, the company outlined plans to put 4,425 satellites into space in a Federal Communications Commission (FCC) filing. But the document gave little detail on the timeline.

However on Wednesday, Patricia Cooper, SpaceX’s vice president of satellite government affairs, said later this year, the company will start testing the satellites themselves, launch one prototype before the end of the year and another during the “early months“ of 2018. Following that, SpaceX will begin its satellite launch campaign in 2019.

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The 33rd annual Space Symposium wrapped up recently in Colorado and New Atlas was on hand to check out some of the exhibits and talks. Amidst the rocket models, jet engines and satellites, we found a quiet corner to sit down with Scott Fouse, the vice president of Lockheed Martin’s Advanced Technology Center. For our One Big Question series, we wanted to get his thoughts on what reaching for the stars will look like in the future, so we asked him: What will space exploration look like in 2040?

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Fusion-driven rockets, remote control systems for space robots, and satellites that build themselves up in orbit are among the made-in-Washington projects getting a share of $49.9 million in NASA grants.

Seven businesses in Washington state will benefit from NASA’s latest round of Small Business Innovation Research grants and Small Business Technology Transfer grants, announced today.

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In aerospace, parts are complicated, and manufacturing them can be very expensive and time consuming. When rocket engine parts can take up to a year to make, it is very difficult to start a new rocket company and for aerospace companies to be cost effective, innovative and nimble.

These barriers to entry are why you don’t see many start-up space companies and why the industry has relied on the same basic engine designs as those built during the Apollo program.

3D printing is changing all that. At Virgin Orbit, we are building a rocket system that will send small satellites into orbit. We aim to open access to space for small satellites to improve life on earth through services such as internet connectivity to the under connected and data for planning, production, disaster mitigation etc.

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For people in that area, and it may be worth while to try reaching out to them for funding for anti aging stuff.

Why is RAND opening a Bay Area office?

The San Francisco Bay Area is really at the center of technology and transformation. That’s also been a focus at RAND since our very first report, Preliminary Design of an Experimental World-Circling Spaceship, in 1946, which foretold the creation of satellites more than a decade before Sputnik.

Today, our researchers are working on important questions related to autonomous vehicles, drones, cybersecurity, education technology, virtual medicine—the same questions driving Silicon Valley startups and billion-dollar Bay Area corporations. At the same time, we’re looking at issues surrounding social inequality, drug policy, water resource management, and transportation, all of which directly relate to the Bay Area.

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After more than two years of landing its rockets after launch, SpaceX finally sent one of its used Falcon 9s back into space. The rocket took off from Cape Canaveral, Florida, this evening, sending a communications satellite into orbit, and then landed on one of SpaceX’s drone ships floating in the Atlantic Ocean. It was round two for this particular rocket, which already launched and landed during a mission in April of last year. But the Falcon 9’s relaunch marks the first time an orbital rocket has launched to space for a second time.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk appeared on the company’s live stream shortly after the landing and spoke about the accomplishment. “It means you can fly and refly an orbital class booster, which is the most expensive part of the rocket. This is going to be, ultimately, a huge revolution in spaceflight,” he said.

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