Musk’s company SpaceX is supplying internet service to troops in Ukraine, and helping them beat the Russians.
Category: space – Page 493
NASA’s Webb In Full Focus, Ready for Instrument Commissioning
Alignment of NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is now complete. After full review, the observatory has been confirmed to be capable of capturing crisp, well-focused images with each of its four powerful onboard science instruments. Upon completing the seventh and final stage of telescope alignment, the team held a set of key decision meetings and unanimously agreed that Webb is ready to move forward into its next and final series of preparations, known as science instrument commissioning. This process will take about two months before scientific operations begin in the summer.
The alignment of the telescope across all of Webb’s instruments can be seen in a series of images that captures the observatory’s full field of view.
“These remarkable test images from a successfully aligned telescope demonstrate what people across countries and continents can achieve when there is a bold scientific vision to explore the universe,” said Lee Feinberg, Webb optical telescope element manager at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center.
Elon Musk’s SpaceX Shuts Down Russian Jamming Attack!
When it comes to responding to emerging threats, the Pentagon’s director for electromagnetic warfare suggested today that the US military’s electronic warfare organization should borrow a leaf from SpaceX.
SpaceX founder Elon Musk said that Russia had jammed Starlink terminals in Ukraine for hours at a time after SpaceX shipped Starlink terminals to Ukraine in February in an apparent effort to help Ukraine preserve its internet connection amid the war with Russia. Starlink was back up and running after a software upgrade, according to Musk, who added on March 25 that the constellation had “resisted all hacking & jamming attempts” in Ukraine.
Assuming Musk — who is known for being a showboater in his public pronouncements — is giving an accurate image, a private company thwarting Russian EW attempts with software updates is the kind of thing that makes Pentagon EW experts sit up and take notice.
“That’s wonderful from the standpoint of an EW technologist. Dave Tremper, head of electronic warfare for the Pentagon’s acquisition office, remarked, “That paradigm and how they executed that is sort of eyewatering to me.” “We need to be able to upgrade in the same way that Starlink was able to when a threat appeared. We need to be able to modify our electromagnetic posture quickly, and we need to be able to change what we’re attempting to do without sacrificing capabilities.”
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‘Doomed’ Moon Phobos Is Going To Crash Into Mars
Last week, NASA’s Perseverance Rover captured a gorgeous view of Phobos eclipsing the Sun, from the surface of Mars. From the point of view of any Martian microbes lurking out there, the eclipse may have seemed more ominous (yeah ok, there might not be living organisms up there, let alone ones sentient enough to grasp the concept of an eclipse) as the moon is destined by physics to one day slam into the red planet.
Phobos – the closest of Mars’ two moons – is set to get ever closer to the planet, before its final descent, while Deimos will drift ever outwards until it leaves Mars’ orbit.
We spy with our little eyes…
Rover landing gear! During the #MarsHelicopter’s 26th flight, it took photos of the entry, descent, & landing gear @NASAPersevere needed to safely land on Mars. You can see the protective backshell & massive dusty parachute. https://go.nasa.gov/3vkglFM
Israeli astronaut Stibbe returns safely to Earth after mission to space station
Members of first all-private mission to ISS splashdown off the Florida coast; Israeli president congratulates Eytan Stibbe on his journey.
Scientists model landscape formation on Titan, revealing an Earth-like alien world
Saturn’s moon Titan looks very much like Earth from space, with rivers, lakes, and seas filled by rain tumbling through a thick atmosphere. While these landscapes may look familiar, they are composed of materials that are undoubtedly different—liquid methane streams streak Titan’s icy surface and nitrogen winds build hydrocarbon sand dunes.
The presence of these materials—whose mechanical properties are vastly different from those of silicate-based substances that make up other known sedimentary bodies in our solar system—makes Titan’s landscape formation enigmatic. By identifying a process that would allow for hydrocarbon-based substances to form sand grains or bedrock depending on how often winds blow and streams flow, Stanford University geologist Mathieu Lapôtre and his colleagues have shown how Titan’s distinct dunes, plains, and labyrinth terrains could be formed.
Titan, which is a target for space exploration because of its potential habitability, is the only other body in our solar system known to have an Earth-like, seasonal liquid transport cycle today. The new model, published in Geophysical Research Letters April 25, shows how that seasonal cycle drives the movement of grains over the moon’s surface.