Space – Lifeboat News: The Blog

Jul 31
2022

Space Command moving to Alabama: 4 steps remain; what’s next?

The U.S. Space Command’s proposed move to Huntsville passed a big test July 13 when the Pentagon released a draft environmental assessment finding “no significant impacts on the human or natural environment” if the headquarters is built on the Redstone Arsenal site.

Although there remain four steps ahead of the move, Republican U.S. Sen. Tommy Tuberville of Alabama said the environmental assessment should be the last major hurdle for the plan to move the command from startup headquarters in Colorado to a permanent site. The move would bring 1,800 headquarters staff and their families to north Alabama.

“The Redstone Arsenal site is the (Department of the Air Force’s) Preferred Alternative for implementation of the Proposed Action,” the environmental assessment said. The proposed action is a permanent headquarters.

Jul 31
2022

Scientists Discover Unique Triple Star System

International scientists disocvered a tertiary, or triple, star system with a third star orbiting a binary of two stars. The stars are massive in size.

Jul 31
2022

With lunar orbiter, South Korea will join a revived race to explore the Moon

Spacecraft set to launch on 2 August will study surface weathering in a new way, measure magnetic fields, and peer into dark craters.

Jul 31
2022

Parts of the moon have stable temperatures fit for humans, researchers find

Researchers discovered that lunar pits and caves could provide stable temperatures around 63 degrees Fahrenheit, leading to new possibilities for experiments and life there.

Jul 31
2022

Development of solid-state electrolytes for sodium-ion battery–A short review

Nowadays, the development of renewable energy sources, such as wind, solar, and nuclear energy sources, has become imperative, due to the limited resource constraints of the traditional fossil fuels [1 ]. However, these renewable sources could not deliver a regular power supply as the sources are variable in time and diffuse in space. Thus, the focus has been shifted to the electrical energy storage to smooth the intermittency of the energy sources. Rechargeable battery has the ability to store chemical energy and convert it into electrical energy with high efficiency [ 2]. Lithium-ion battery (LIB), as one typical rechargeable electrochemical battery, has dominated the markets of portable electronic devices, electric vehicles, and hybrid electric vehicles in the past decades, due to its high output voltages, high energy densities, and long cycle life; even though the high cost and the shortage of lithium resources are inhibiting the application of LIB in large-scale energy storage [[3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9]].

Sodium-ion battery (SIB) is one promising alternative to LIB, with comparable performance to that of LIB, abundant sodium resources and low price of starting materials [[10], [11], [12], [13]]. As Na atom is heavier and larger than those of Li atom, the gravimetric and volumetric energy density of Na-ion battery are expected to not exceed those of the Li analogues [14]. However, energy density would not be considered as the critical issue in the field of large-scale grid support, for which the operating cost and the battery durability are the most important aspects [15,16].

Jul 30
2022

Metaphor at the Edge of the Human

Billions of years in the future, The Time Traveler stands before a black ocean, under a bloated sun. The shore is scaled with lichen and flecked with snow. The crab things and giant insects that menaced him on his visit millions of years in its past are gone. Apart from the lapping of dark waves, everything is utterly still.

He thinks he sees something shifting in the waves nearby but dismisses it as an illusion; assuming it to be a rock. Still a churning weakness and fear deters him from leaving the saddle of the time machine. Perhaps this anxiety is just prompted by the ultimate desolation of this world.

Studying the unknown constellations, he feels a chill wind. The old sun is being eclipsed by the moon, or some other massive body – for it is possible that the Earth has shifted into a new orbit around its star.

Jul 30
2022

A 25-ton Chinese rocket booster will crash to Earth today. What’s the risk?

This is the third time a Long March 5B booster has made an uncontrolled reentry.

Jul 30
2022

India’s AstroSat witnessing the ‘live’ formation of dwarf galaxies

Dwarf galaxies are small galaxies composed of a few billion stars. They are challenging to detect due to their low luminosity, low mass, and small size. However, it remains elusive how these dwarf and giant galaxies assemble their stars and evolve into modern-day galaxies.

India’s first dedicated multi-wavelength space observatory, AstroSat, cracked this mystery. A team of scientists using AstroSat shows how the star-forming complexes in the outskirts of a dwarf galaxy migrate towards the central region and contribute to its growth in mass and luminosity.

The team includes astronomers from India, the USA, and France. Professor Kanak Saha at the Inter-University Centre for Astronomy and Astrophysics (IUCAA), Pune, conceived this study. Mr. Anshuman Borgohain is the lead author of the paper.

Jul 30
2022

KELT-9b is an ultra-hot Jupiter

KELT-9b is an ultra-hot Jupiter planet that orbits an A type star named KELT-9 about 650 light years away. The reason for this insane heat is the intimate proximity the gas giant has to its host star, which is itself among some of the hottest stars we know, reaching temperatures of roughly 9900ºC (17,852ºF).

Jul 30
2022

Planet that orbits an A type star named KELT-9 about 650 light years away

The reason for this insane heat is the intimate proximity the gas giant has to its host star, which is itself among some of the hottest stars we know, reaching temperatures of roughly 9900ºC (17,852ºF).