Space Station Astronaut Available for Satellite Interviews

NASA astronaut Greg Chamitoff, who recently completed a six-month stay in space, will be available for satellite interviews from 7:30 to 9:30 a.m. CST on Thursday, Dec. 18.

Chamitoff returned to Earth on Nov. 30 with the STS-126 space shuttle crew. He arrived at the International Space Station in June with the STS-124 crew and lived and worked on the station as a flight engineer and science officer with the Expedition 17 and 18 crews.

During his stay, Chamitoff helped to activate the Kibo Laboratory, which was delivered during STS-124. He also initiated the first chess matches from space with the public and the kindergarten-through-third grade U.S. Chess Championship Team and its chess club teammates from Stevenson Elementary School in Bellevue, Wash.

Chamitoff was born in Montreal and grew up in San Jose, Calif. He holds bachelor's and master's of science degrees from California Polytechnic State University, a second master's of science degree from the University of Houston and a doctorate from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

To participate in the interviews, reporters should contact Karen Svetaka at 281-483-8684 by 3 p.m. Wednesday, Dec. 17. B-roll of Chamitoff's mission will be broadcast starting at 7 a.m., immediately before the interviews.

The NASA Live Interview Media Outlet channel will be used for the interviews. The channel is a digital satellite C-band downlink by uplink provider Americom. It is on satellite AMC 6, transponder 5C, located at 72 degrees west, downlink frequency 3785.5 Mhz based on a standard C-band 5150 Mhz L.O., vertical polarity, FEO is 3/4, data rate is 6.00 Mhz, symbol rate is 4.3404 Mbaud, transmission DVB, minimum Eb/N0 is 6.0 dB.

The interviews also will be broadcast live on NASA TV. For NASA TV streaming video, downlink and scheduling information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

For more information on the International Space Station, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

For more information about Chamitoff and his biography, visit:

http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/chamitoff.html

NASA's Top Science, Exploration and Discovery Stories of 2008

NASA landed on Mars, photographed distant worlds, added to the International Space Station, took part in a lunar science mission with India and made major progress toward returning astronauts to the moon as the agency celebrated its 50th birthday in 2008. Here on Earth, NASA researchers recorded the continued decline of Arctic sea ice, won awards for aviation breakthroughs, discovered the cause of storms that brighten the Northern Lights and helped create state-of-the-art swimsuits worn by Olympic gold medalists. Ten of the top accomplishments of America's space agency in its golden anniversary year are listed below:

INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION NEARS COMPLETION ON 10TH ANNIVERSARY

NASA completed four space shuttle missions in 2008 to deliver modules and hardware to the International Space Station, allowing it to grow in size, volume and space science capability. The flights also prepared the Space station to house six crew members for long-duration space missions and to expand scientific exploration. The activation in 2008 of the European Space Agency's Columbus module and Jules Verne Automated Transfer Vehicle, as well as the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Kibo laboratory, marked the beginning of new human spaceflight control centers in Germany, France and Japan that are working with existing control centers in the U.S., Russia and Canada. Nov. 20 was the 10th anniversary of the launch of Zarya, a Russian control module that was the station's first component. In the decade since Zarya arrived in orbit, the space station has grown to become the largest spacecraft ever built. Its mass has expanded to more than 313 tons, and its interior volume is more than 25,000 cubic feet, comparable to the size of a five-bedroom house. The space station now hosts 19 research facilities, including nine sponsored by NASA, eight by European Space Agency and two by Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/10th_main.html

PHOENIX WRAPS UP SUCCESSFUL MISSION TO MARS

NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander ceased communications Nov. 2 after successfully returning unprecedented science data to Earth. Launched Aug. 4, 2007, Phoenix safely touched down on Mars on May 25, 2008, at a site farther north than where any previous spacecraft had landed. Phoenix's soft landing on Mars was the first in 32 years and only the third in history. Cameras on Phoenix sent more than 25,000 images back to Earth. Preliminary science data shed light on whether the Martian arctic environment ever has been favorable for microbes; documented a mildly alkaline soil environment unlike any found by earlier missions; discovered small concentrations of salts that could be nutrients for life; located calcium carbonate; and detected perchlorate salt. The findings also advanced the goal of documenting the history of water on Mars. Phoenix exceeded its planned operational life of three to five months. Analysis of data from its instruments continues.

http://www.nasa.gov/phoenix

ARES I ROCKET PASSES IMPORTANT DESIGN MILESTONE

NASA successfully completed the preliminary design review for the new Ares I rocket in 2008. Starting in 2015, the rocket will launch the Orion crew exploration vehicle, its crew of four to six astronauts, and small payloads to the International Space Station. The rocket also will be used as part of space missions to explore the moon and beyond in coming decades. The preliminary design review is the first such milestone in more than 35 years for a U.S. rocket that will carry astronauts into space. The review examined the design of Ares I to confirm the planned technical approach will meet NASA's requirements for the fully integrated vehicle and ensure all of the rocket's components and supporting space systems are designed to work together. NASA is preparing for the rocket's first test flight in 2009. Hardware for the test flight, including the forward skirt and the upper stage simulator, began arriving at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida this fall.

http://www.nasa.gov/ares

ARCTIC SEA ICE DECLINE CONTINUES

In September, Arctic sea ice coverage reached the second-lowest level recorded since the dawn of the space satellite era, according to observations from the NASA-supported National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado. While slightly above the record-low set in September 2007, this season further reinforces the strong negative trend in summer sea ice coverage observed during the past 30 years. In March, when the Arctic reached its annual maximum sea ice coverage during the winter, scientists from NASA and the data center reported that thick, older sea ice was continuing to decline. NASA developed the capability to observe the extent and concentration of sea ice from space using passive microwave sensors.

http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2008/sep/HQ_08234_Artic_Sea_Ice.html

LIGHTING UP THE NIGHT

Researchers using a fleet of five NASA satellites discovered in 2008 that explosions of magnetic energy occurring a third of the way to the moon power substorms that cause sudden brightenings and rapid movements of the aurora borealis, or Northern Lights. The cause is magnetic reconnection, a common process that occurs throughout the universe when stressed magnetic field lines suddenly snap to a new shape, like a rubber band that has been stretched too far. These substorms often accompany intense space storms that can cause power outages and disrupt radio communications and global positioning system signals. Space Scientists are studying the beginning of substorms using a network of 20 ground observatories located throughout Canada and Alaska and five THEMIS, or Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms, satellites.

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/themis/auroras/themis_power.html

HUBBLE FINDS PLANET CIRCLING A DISTANT STAR

Astronomers announced in 2008 that NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has taken the first visible-light snapshot of a planet circling another star. Observations taken 21 months apart by the coronagraph on Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys showed the object orbiting around a star named Fomalhaut. The planet, called Fomalhaut b, is approximately 10 times the distance of Saturn from our sun. Estimated to be as much as three times Jupiter's mass, Fomalhaut b is located 25 light-years away in the constellation Piscis Australis, or the "Southern Fish." Fomalhaut has been a candidate for planet hunting since an excess of dust was discovered around the star in the early 1980s by NASA's Infrared Astronomy Satellite. The planet is brighter than expected for an object of three Jupiter masses. One possibility is that it has a Saturn-like ring of ice and dust reflecting starlight. Space Scientists theorize that the ring might eventually coalesce to form moons.

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/hubble/science/fomalhaut.html

NASA COMPLETES FIRST TESTS ON NEXT-GENERATION ROCKET ENGINE

NASA engineers successfully completed in 2008 the first series of tests in the early development of the J-2X engine that will power the upper stages of the Ares I and Ares V rockets. Ares I will launch the Orion spacecraft that will take astronauts to the International Space Station and on to the moon by 2020. Ares V will carry cargo and components into orbit for trips to the moon and later to Mars. NASA conducted nine tests of heritage J-2 engine components from December to May as part of a series designed to verify J-2 performance data and explore performance boundaries. Engineers at NASA's Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Miss., conducted the tests on a heritage J-2 "powerpack," which, in a fully assembled engine, pumps liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen into the engine's main combustion chamber to produce thrust. The test hardware consisted of J-2 components used from the Apollo program in the1960s through the X-33 program in the 1990s.

http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2008/may/HQ_08116_power_pack_tests.html

NASA TEAM A RECIPIENT OF CELEBRATED COLLIER TROPHY

NASA was part of a team that received one of the most prestigious awards in aviation in June. Judges for the Robert J. Collier Trophy, awarded by the National Aeronautic Association, chose the Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast, or ADS-B, team of public and private groups to receive the 2007 honor. According to the selection committee, "ADS-B is a ground-breaking effort for next-generation airborne surveillance and cockpit avionics. Its implementation will have a broad impact on the safety, capacity and efficiency of the national airspace system." Researchers at NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, Calif., and NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., were part of the extensive team that developed and tested ADS-B.

http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2008/jun/HQ_08148_Collier_Trophy.html

NASA RETURNS TO THE MOON WITH INSTRUMENTS ON INDIAN SPACECRAFT

NASA has partnered with India to fly two space science instruments aboard the country's first lunar explorer, Chandrayaan-1. The Indian Space Research Organization launched Chandrayaan-1 on Oct. 22 from Sriharikota, India. It entered lunar orbit on Nov. 8. NASA's Moon Mineralogy Mapper is surveying mineral resources of the moon, and the Miniature Synthetic Aperture Radar is mapping the moon's polar regions and looking for ice deposits in the permanently shadowed craters. Data from the two instruments is contributing to NASA's increased understanding of the lunar environment as the agency implements the nation's space exploration policy, which calls for robotic and human missions to the moon.

http://moonmineralogymapper.jpl.nasa.gov/

http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/Mini-RF/main/index.html

NASA TESTS HELP RECORD-BREAKING OLYMPIANS ROCKET THROUGH WATER

NASA know-how helped swimsuit designers create a body suit worn by an assortment of gold medalists and world record holders at the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. Among the medalists wearing Speedo's LZR Racer were Americans Michael Phelps -- winner of more Olympic gold medals than any athlete in the modern era -- and Natalie Coughlin. Aerospace engineer Steve Wilkinson at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., played a role in developing the swimsuit by testing dozens of fabrics in Langley's 7-by-11-inch low speed wind tunnel. Warnaco Inc., the U.S. licensee of the Speedo swimwear brand, approached Langley to test fabric samples because the NASA center has researched drag reduction for aircraft and boats for decades. Just as reducing drag helps planes fly more efficiently, reducing drag helps swimmers go faster. Studies indicate viscous drag or skin friction is almost a third of the total restraining force on a swimmer. Wind tunnel tests measured the drag on the surface of the fabrics. Speedo's research and development team, Aqualab, took the results and used them to help create advanced "space-age" swimsuit designs.

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/technology/features/2008-0813-swimsuit.html

NASA Television's Video File newsfeed will include items featuring these top stories beginning at 12 p.m. EST today, Dec. 15. For NASA TV streaming video, schedules, and downlink information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

Visitors to NASA's Web site can vote on the top NASA story of the year at:

http://www.nasa.gov/news/08_YIR_poll.html

Why NASA have to focus on the Moon, not Mars

Newly, the Planetary Society called for main changes in US space exploration tactics. Distinctively, it suggested bypass the Moon in favour of Mars. The only scientists, Harrison Schmitt to have walked on the Moon resign from the society in complaint.

This really harks back to the Planetary Society's initial stages. In its early time, the only shape of manned space discovery it favoured was a Mars expedition. All new ideas that concerned humans in space be counterproductive and adverse, to heed the Planetary Society tell it.

This passion with Mars was a awful idea then, and it's a bad idea at present. However, a few of the reasons superior against it hit me as poor - adequately poor that they grow weaker attempts to fight for a more organized and balanced space attempt.

An exclusive spotlight on Mars does have one object going for it. If you think that any recommencement of manned space exploration will inexorably finish the way Apollo did, with follow-on programmers cancelled and flight ready hardware consign to museums as quickly as the programmer’s first aim is met, then choosing the most attractive single destination makes intelligence.

However . . . haven't we learn something from doing that once? To me, it makes far-off more sense to attempt to build a programmed that won't hurtle and blaze as soon as it scores its first objective. That means scientifically building capability and communications, and doing initial things first even if they are not the most thrilling parts.

Whether going away to the Moon, in itself, builds capability that will be openly needed for Mars is more arguable, however. The two environments are too dissimilar; a lot of the hardware will have to be disparate too.

Capabilities for in-orbit meeting of large expedition would be useful, but present US ideas for the revisit to the Moon unambiguously shun orbital assembly. The reasons for this appear to me to be feeble and wrong. Supplying coal for a Mars voyage from the lunar facade is often recommended, but it's tough to make it pay off - Moon base are costly, and buying new rockets to launch fuel as of Earth is comparatively cheap.

Some fight that even though the hardware and communications won't transfer straight, the experience will. Perhaps, rather. But astral experience won't contract with lots of the most significant issue for a Mars expedition.

For instance, NASA's Mission Control bureaucracy will countenance a painful society change for Mars, since Mission Control will have to turn into Mission Support. The infrastructure delays among Earth and Mars could be half an hour or else more, so the people on the earth can't partake minute by minute in Mars surface activities. The crew on the exterior will have to create their own decision and deal with their personal crisis. Even much of the apparatus monitors now done from the earth will have to be complete on Mars instead.

Can we practice this on the Moon? Surely we could. But will we? The interactions delay for the Moon is only a few second, and so the lure for Mission Control to carry on its micro-managing ways would probably show irresistible.

By far the significant reason to go rear to the Moon initial is just that we've barely started to explore it! The Moon may not be fairly as tempting as Mars, but it's still a composite and poorly unspoken world, with lots of questions yet not answered. The more directly we look, the more weirdness we find. (certainly, one area somewhere lunar experience may be of use later is for getting some thought of what's desired to thoroughly recognize a new world. It's probable to take additional time and effort than we now be expecting.)

In the similar way that the Moon was the rational first step, setting up superstore there lastingly is the logical next pace. If our aim is systematic exploration as well as progress of the solar system, fairly than Cold-War-style "space spectaculars", there is no cause to put off it, and all reason to do it before venture farther a field.

Lastly, in a similar seam, going backside to the Moon will also set up a useful pattern of patient attempt towards long-term objective. If not anything else, claim that Apollo was sufficient attention to the Moon amount to claiming that six short visits are enough to walk around a whole world - surely not the kind of instance the Mars enthusiast want to put!

Space Station Crew Exchanges Seasons Greetings with Earth

Soaring high above the Earth, the crew of the International Space Station has beamed down season's greetings that will air on NASA Television starting Friday, Dec. 12. The public can return the extraterrestrial good will and send greetings to the crew by visiting:

http://www.nasa.gov/externalflash/postcard

The e-mailed greetings can be sent through Jan. 5, 2009. Last year, thousands of messages were sent to the Expedition 16 crew from throughout the world.

The current station crew, Expedition 18 Commander Mike Fincke and Flight Engineers Sandra Magnus and Yury Lonchakov, will celebrate this holiday season 220 miles above Earth. Fincke and Lonchakov have been on the station since Oct. 14, and Magnus joined the crew Nov. 16. The main focus of their mission is to prepare the space station to house six crew members for long-duration Space missions beginning in May 2009.

The station crew's greetings will air on NASA TV as part of the daily Video File, beginning at 11 a.m. CST, Friday, Dec. 12. The video also will be broadcast in high definition on the NASA TV HD channel on Dec. 15-17 at 10 a.m., 12 p.m. and 3 p.m.

For NASA TV streaming video, scheduling and downlink information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

For more information about the space station and the Expedition 18 mission, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

NASA to Update Reporters about Constellation Program

NASA will host a media teleconference Wednesday, Dec. 17, at 4 p.m. EST, to brief reporters about recent developments and ongoing progress in NASA's Constellation Program. Constellation will build the spacecraft to carry astronauts to the International Space Station and return humans to the moon by 2020.

The teleconference participants are:
- Doug Cooke, associate administrator of the Exploration Space Systems Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington
- Jeff Hanley, Constellation program manager at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston
- Steve Cook, Ares projects manager at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.
- Mark Geyer, Orion project manager at NASA's Johnson Space Center

To participate in the call, reporters should dial 800-790-1836 and use the pass code "ESMD update." Replays of the call will be available through Dec. 24 by dialing 866-507-3617 and entering the pass code 52368.

Teleconference audio will be broadcast live at:

http://www.nasa.gov/newsaudio

For more information about NASA's Constellation Program, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/constellation

NASA TV to Air International Space Station Briefing and Spacewalk

NASA will hold a media briefing Dec. 18 to discuss an upcoming International Space Station spacewalk. NASA Television will provide live coverage of the Dec. 22 spacewalk of Expedition 18 Commander Mike Fincke and Flight Engineer Yury Lonchakov.

The briefing from NASA's Johnson Space Center will air live on NASA TV Dec. 18 at 1 p.m. CST. Questions will be taken from journalists at participating NASA locations. The briefers are:
- Kirk Shireman, International Space Station deputy program manager
- David Korth, Expedition 18 spacewalk flight director

During the spacewalk, Fincke and Lonchakov will deploy and retrieve several Russian experiments on the space station's exterior. They also will install a device to measure electromagnetic forces imparted on space station hardware as the complex moves through low Earth orbit. Russian space specialists believe electromagnetic interference may have contributed to past problems on the Soyuz spacecraft's pyrotechnic bolts, which allow sections of the vehicle to separate properly during its return to Earth.

NASA TV coverage of the spacewalk will begin at 5:30 p.m. on Dec. 22. The spacewalk will start at approximately 6:15 p.m. and last six hours. It will be the fifth spacewalk of Fincke's career and the first for Lonchakov. Expedition 18 Flight Engineer Sandy Magnus will monitor the spacewalk from inside the space station.

For NASA TV streaming video, schedules, and downlink information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

For more information about the space station and the Expedition 18 crew, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Completes Prime Mission

NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has completed its primary, two-year science phase. The spacecraft has found signs of a complex Martian history of climate change that produced a diversity of past watery environments.

The orbiter has returned 73 terabits of science data, more than all earlier Mars missions combined. The spacecraft will build on this record as it continues to examine Mars in unprecedented detail during its next two-year phase of science operations.

Among the major findings during the primary science phase is the revelation that the action of water on and near the surface of Mars occurred for hundreds of millions of years. This activity was at least regional and possibly global in extent, though possibly intermittent. The spacecraft also observed that signatures of a variety of watery environments, some acidic, some alkaline, increase the possibility that there are places on Mars that could reveal evidence of past life, if it ever existed.

Since moving into position 186 miles above Mars' surface in October 2006, the orbiter also has conducted 10,000 targeted observation sequences of high-priority areas. It has imaged nearly 40 percent of the planet at a resolution that can reveal house-sized objects in detail, with one percent in enough detail to see desk-sized features. This survey has covered almost 60 percent of Mars in mineral mapping bands at stadium-size resolution. The orbiter also assembled nearly 700 daily global weather maps, dozens of atmospheric temperature profiles, and hundreds of radar profiles of the subsurface and the interior of the polar caps.

"These observations are now at the level of detail necessary to test hypotheses about when and where water has changed Mars and where future missions will be most productive as they search for habitable regions on Mars," said Richard Zurek, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter project scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

Included in the observations are hundreds of stereo pairs used to make detailed topography maps and classic images in support of other Mars missions. One image showed the Mars rover Opportunity poised on the rim of Victoria Crater, and another was of NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander during its descent to the surface. Orbiter data prompted the Phoenix team to change the spacecraft's landing site, and are being used to select the landing location for NASA's Mars Science Laboratory, which is scheduled for launch in 2011. For five months of Phoenix operations on Mars that ended in November, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and NASA's Mars Odyssey orbiter shared the vital communications roles of relaying commands to the lander, and data from Phoenix back to Earth.

The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has found repetitive layering in Mars' permanent polar ice caps. The patterns suggest climate change cycles continuing to the present. They may record possible effects of cyclical changes in Mars' tilt and orbit on global sunlight patterns. Recent climate cycles are indicated by radar detection of subsurface icy deposits outside the polar regions, closer to the equator, where near-surface ice is not permanently stable. Other results reveal details of ancient streambeds, atmospheric hazes and motions of water, along with the ever-changing weather on Mars.

Most observations from the orbiter will be discontinued for a few weeks while the sun is between Earth and Mars, which will disrupt communications. This month, the orbiter will begin a new phase, with science observations continuing as Mars makes another orbit around the sun, which takes approximately two Earth years.

"This spacecraft truly exemplifies the best in capabilities to support science and other Martian spacecraft activities," said Michael Meyer, lead scientist for the Mars Exploration Program at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "MRO has exceeded its own goals and our expectations. We look forward to more discoveries as we continue to look at the Red Planet in spectacular detail."

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena manages the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter for NASA's Science Mission Directorate, Washington. Lockheed Martin Space Systems, Denver, is the prime contractor for the project and built the spacecraft. For more information about the mission, visit: http://www.nasa.gov/mro .