8/14/12 news

 
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
 
JSC TODAY HEADLINES
1.            POWER of One Award
2.            Recent JSC Announcement
3.            Environmental Brown Bag - Water In Space
4.            Find Out About the State of the Center Over Lunch
5.            Leadership Speaker Series with Engineering Director Steve Altemus
6.            Extended TDY FedTraveler Live Lab Tomorrow, Aug. 15
7.            Engaging Students in Science and Engineering with NASA Micro-Gravity Flight
8.            Training Opportunity: Building Bridges Toward LGBT Inclusion
________________________________________     QUOTE OF THE DAY
“ No [person] will make a great leader who wants to do it all himself, or to get all the credit for doing it.”
 
-- Andrew Carnegie
________________________________________
1.            POWER of One Award
The POWER of One Award has been a great success, but we still need your nominations. We're looking for stand-outs with specific examples of exceptional or superior performance. Our award criteria below will help guide you in writing the short write-up needed for submittal.
 
- Single Achievement: Truly went above and beyond on a single project or initiative
- Affect and Impact: How many were impacted? Who was impacted?
- Category: Which category should nominee be in?
*Gold: Agency Impact Award Level
*Silver: Center Impact Award Level
*Bronze: Organization Impact Award Level
- Effort and Time: Was additional time and effort in place?
- Mission and Goals: Were goals met?
- Stand Out: What stands out?
 
If chosen, the recipient can choose from a list of JSC experiences and have their name and recognition shared on JSC Today.
 
Jessica Ocampo x27804 https://powerofone.jsc.nasa.gov
 
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2.            Recent JSC Announcement
Please visit the JSC Announcements webpage to view the newly posted announcement:
 
JSCA 12-021: Key Personnel Announcement - Colonel Robert L. Kehnken, Ph.D.
 
Archived announcements are also available on the JSCA Web Page.
 
Linda Turnbough x36246 http://ird.jsc.nasa.gov/DocumentManagement/announcements/default.aspx
 
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3.            Environmental Brown Bag - Water In Space
Come see Laurie Peterson, Johnson Space Center's Sustainability Champion, present 'Water in Space: from Ingestion to Excretion,' at the Environmental Brown Bag. The majority of Peterson's NASA career has been spent working on spacecraft Environmental Control and Life Support Systems (ECLSS), an awesome microcosm to 'sustainability here on Earth.' She'll be reviewing how water is (and has been) stored, recycled, dispensed, used and ultimately re-collected on every U.S. spacecraft since Mercury through ISS. Bring your lunch to Building 45, Room 751, today, Aug. 14, from noon to 1 p.m.
 
Michelle Fraser-Page x34237
 
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4.            Find Out About the State of the Center Over Lunch
Don't miss out on this great opportunity to learn more about the state of the center!
 
Please join us for this month's JSC National Management Association Chapter luncheon with guest speaker Johnson Space Center Director Mike Coats.
 
Date: Aug. 28
Time: 11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Location: Gilruth Center, Alamo Ballroom
 
Seats are filling up fast. Please RSVP by close-of-business Aug. 21 at http://www.jscnma.com/Events
 
For RSVP technical assistance, please contact Lorraine Guerra at lorraine.guerra-1@nasa.gov or 281-483-4262.
 
Cassandra Miranda x38618
 
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5.            Leadership Speaker Series with Engineering Director Steve Altemus
The Office of Chief Financial Officer Leadership Development Working Group (LDWG)is proud to present the Leadership Speaker Series with JSC Director of Engineering Steve Altemus. This is an excellent opportunity for you to get to know your leadership from around the center as they share their experiences, knowledge and tips-n-tricks on how to succeed as an effective leader.
 
What: Leadership Speaker Series
Who: Steve Altemus
When: Aug. 21 at 2:30 to 3:30 p.m.
Where: Building 30A Auditorium
 
Charlie Jones x42493
 
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6.            Extended TDY FedTraveler Live Lab Tomorrow, Aug. 15
Do you need some hands-on, personal help with FedTraveler.com? Join the Business Systems, Innovation and Process Improvement Office for an Extended TDY FedTraveler Live Lab tomorrow, Aug. 15, any time between 9 a.m. and noon in Building 20, Room 204. Our help desk representatives will be available to help you work through Extended TDY travel processes and learn more about using FedTraveler during this informal workshop. Bring your current travel documents or specific questions that you have about the system, and join us for some hands-on, in-person help with FedTraveler. If you'd like to sign up for this Extended TDY FedTraveler Live Lab. please login to SATERN, and register. For additional information, please contact Judy Seier at x32771.
 
Gina Clenney x39851
 
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7.            Engaging Students in Science and Engineering with NASA Micro-Gravity Flight
The IEEE Galveston Bay Section presents Dr. Lei Wu of the University of Houston-Clear Lake (UHCL). Wu will introduce the NASA Microgravity University program, which sponsors projects to promote science and engineering education. Collaborating with San Jacinto College, the UHCL team won a position in this program in 2012 using a gesture and voice-controlled robotics system designed by Wu's lab. His team and students representing UHCL and San Jacinto College will test this prototype April 20 to 28 on a NASA-provided, near-zero gravity flight.
 
The presentation will start at noon and finish by 1 p.m. on Aug. 23 in the Discovery Room of the Gilruth Center. We will offer lunch at 11:30 a.m. to the first 10 requestors for $8; there is no charge for the presentation. Please RSVP to Stew O'Dell at stewart.c.odell@nasa.gov and specify whether you are ordering lunch. Lunch is free for VTS members and unemployed IEEE members; advise when reserving.
 
Stew O'Dell x31855
 
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8.            Training Opportunity: Building Bridges Toward LGBT Inclusion
The Out & Allied Employee Resource Group (ERG) in conjunction with HR, EO, and EAP, invites you to attend the center's pilot training class entitled "Building Bridges Toward LGBT Inclusion." Building Bridges Toward LGBT Inclusion is designed to help employees increase their level of awareness and understanding of LGBT: co-workers, peers and allies. You will have the option to attend either the 10 to 11:30 a.m. or 1 to 2:30 p.m. session on Sept. 10in the Building 30 Auditorium. This training is open to all JSC team members, civil servants, and contractors. Attendance rosters will be taken on the day of training (there is no requirement to pre-register). We look forward to your participation as we strive to achieve excellence through fostering an environment that is inclusive for all. Note: If you require special accommodation for a specific disability, please contact Janelle Holt at x37504 no later than 5 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 5.
 
Anthony Santiago x41501
 
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________________________________________
JSC Today is compiled periodically as a service to JSC employees on an as-submitted basis. Any JSC organization or employee may submit articles. To see an archive of previous JSC Today announcements, go to http://www6.jsc.nasa.gov/pao/news/jsctoday/archives.
 
 
 
NASA TV: 1 pm Central (2 EDT) – Expedition 32 Russian & U.S. Spacewalks Preview Briefing
 
Human Spaceflight News
Tuesday – August 14, 2012
 

Astronaut Photo: Sahara Dust Enters Caribbean Skies taken by an ISS astronaut (July 2012)
 
HEADLINES AND LEADS
 
Astronaut Photo: Sahara Dust Enters Caribbean Skies
 
OurAmazingPlanet.com
 
Astronauts sailing around the Earth aboard the International Space Station recently spotted a dull haze blanketing the skies over the Caribbean — dust from Africa's vast Sahara Desert that had blown all the way across the Atlantic Ocean. The dust likely originated some 5,000 miles (8,000 kilometers) to the east, in the dry reaches of northern Mali, according to NASA figures, although some satellite data suggest the dust can come from as far east as Chad or Sudan.
 
A new space race: Companies vie to haul cargo, passengers
 
Nancy Trejos - USA Today
 
The commercial space race is on.
 
Perhaps nothing signified its arrival like this spring's successful cargo flight of the Dragon spacecraft to the International Space Station that was launched by private firm SpaceX. SpaceX, run by billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, isn't the only firm vying to haul cargo and people into orbit since NASA relinquished its near-monopoly on U.S. space transportation by retiring the Space Shuttle program last year. At least a dozen companies are developing spaceships to replace the shuttle's duties or to carve their own commercial pathways in space.
 
Romney Taunts Chinese Moon Landing Plans
 
Evan McMorris-Santoro - Talking Points Memo
 
On the campaign trail in Florida – home of the Space Coast – Monday, Romney taunted Chinese plans to land an unmanned probe on the on the moon in 2013…
 
Aboard the Super Guppy on its last Seattle shuttle trainer delivery
 
Anthony Bolante - Puget Sound Business Journal
 
 
The NASA Super Guppy, a massive tadpole-shaped aircraft designed to move up to 39,000 cubic feet and 26 tons of aviation and spacecraft cargo, has nine seats. Two for pilots, two for flight engineers, two for loadmaster mission specialists and two for maintenance crews for a total of eight “mission essential” seats. In the case of Super Guppy N941, that left one seat available for a single non-crew passenger to fly aboard its mission from Travis Air Force Base in Northern California to Boeing Field in Seattle on Thursday. On assignment for the Puget Sound Business Journal with exclusive access to this specific flight with help from the Museum of Flight, I was granted the extremely rare opportunity to fly aboard and to document in news photos and video the Super Guppy as it transported the forward section of the space shuttle trainer to its new home at the Museum of Flight.
 
NASA names new chief astronaut: Shuttle veteran succeeds station record setter
 
Robert Pearlman - collectSPACE.com
 
NASA's astronauts have a new chief.
 
Peggy Whitson, who three years ago was named the 13th Chief of the Astronaut Office, making her the first woman to lead the U.S. Astronaut Corps, stepped down in July, a spokesman at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston confirmed for collectSPACE.com. Space shuttle veteran Robert Behnken, who most recently served as one of Whitson's deputies, has been named the new Chief Astronaut.
 
Making meals for a mission to Mars
 
Associated Press
 
In a building in Texas, scientists in white coats are stirring, mixing, measuring, brushing and, most important, tasting the end result of their cooking. Their mission: Build a menu for a manned voyage to Mars in the 2030s. The menu must feed six to eight astronauts and keep them healthy and happy. That’s no simple feat considering it is likely to take six months to get to the Red Planet, astronauts will have to stay there 18 months and then it will take another six months to return to Earth. Imagine having to shop for a family’s 2 1/2-year supply of groceries all at once and having enough meals planned in advance for that length of time.
 
Antarctica to Mars: The loneliest job in the world
 
BBC News
 
(Dr Alexander Kumar FRGS is the Concordia Station doctor (French Polar Institute/ Italian Antarctic Programme) and European Space Agency-sponsored Research MD)
 
Mars is once again in the spotlight after Nasa successfully landed its biggest ever robot on the Red Planet - an achievement that naturally raises the question of when man will first set foot on the red Planet. Already, researchers are hard at work trying to understand what it would take to succeed in such a mission. One of those is Dr Alexander Kumar, based at the Concordia research station in the centre of Antarctica, a place so remote - and so cold - that it is only possible to get in and out for three months of the year. He is trying to understand the physical and psychological effects of human space travel, particularly the role of extreme isolation. BBC Future spoke to Dr Kumar about life at the station and how his stay may be the fore runner for a manned mission to the red Planet.
 
Human Spaceflight Mission Still In Limbo
 
Jay Menon - Aerospace Daily
 
India has started developing critical technologies for its human spaceflight mission, but the government still hasn’t given final approval for the project. The Indian Space Research Organization announced in 2007 that the country was planning a manned spaceflight, to be launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Center in Sriharikota, near Chennai in southern India. However, the government on Aug. 9 said it “has not yet taken up the human spaceflight program, estimated, initially, in the year 2009, at 124 billion rupees [$2.25 billion].”
 
MEANWHILE, ON MARS…
 

 
Mars Looks Quite Familiar, if Only on the Surface
 
Kenneth Chang – New York Times
 
A conspiracy theorist might think that NASA’s newest Mars rover, the Curiosity, is actually just in the middle of a desert on Earth. Over the weekend, the Curiosity, which landed early on Aug. 6 after an eight-month flight, started sending back a 360-degree high-resolution panorama of its surroundings. As the accompanying NASA news release noted, the images show “a landscape closely resembling portions of the southwestern United States.”
 
President Obama congratulates Mars rover team
 
William Harwood – CBS News
 
In a phone call to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, President Obama congratulated the Mars Science Laboratory team Monday for the successful landing of NASA's Curiosity rover, joking that engineers should let him know ASAP if the spacecraft spots any martians. "We can't wait to start hearing back from Curiosity and finding out what's going on," Obama said. "We're fortunate to be part of a society that can reach beyond our planet and explore frontiers that were only imagined by our ancestors. So it's inspiring to all of us. I'm going to give you guys a personal commitment to protect these critical investments in science and technology, I thank you for devoting your lives to this cause and if, in fact, you do make contact with martians, please let me know right away. I've got a lot of other things on my plate, but I suspect that that will go to the top of the list. Even if they're just microbes, it will be pretty exciting."
 
Obama calls to congratulate Curiosity team on success
 
Todd Halvorson - Florida Today
 
NASA’s Curiosity rover is getting a “brain transplant” this week, and the team operating it received a congratulatory call on Monday from President Barack Obama. Noting that the six-wheeled rover “stuck her landing” after a seven-minute dive to the Martian surface, Obama lauded project engineers, scientists and managers for the “incredible success.”
 
Reprogrammed Mars rover getting ready to roll
 
Alan Boyle - NBCNews.com's Cosmic Log
 
NASA's Curiosity rover is almost fully reprogrammed for its two-year, $2.5 billion science mission on Mars, and mission managers say it should be ready to take its first short drive in about a week. The final phase of Curiosity's four-day software transition was getting under way Tuesday, NASA spokesman Guy Webster said. The software for science operations, known as R10, has already been installed successfully on the rover's primary computer and is currently managing the rover's functions. All that remained was to finish installing the same software on the backup computer. Curiosity's primary mission is due to last an entire Martian year, the equivalent of nearly two Earth years, but scientists hope the nuclear-powered rover will last even longer. The rover team is due to discuss the road ahead during a media teleconference at 1 p.m. ET (10 a.m. PT) Tuesday. Audio of the event will be streamed live online via NASA's website.
 
Search for Life Will Shape Future Mars Missions
 
Leonard David - Space.com
 
As NASA’s Curiosity rover prepares to get its wheels in motion on Mars, the space agency is set to issue a new look at where exploration of the Red Planet could go in the years and decades to come – based on the theme "Seeking the Signs of Life." The report, stemming from a Concepts and Approaches for Mars Exploration meeting in Houston in June, is headed for a late August/September release. Former veteran NASA program manager Orlando Figueroa has been leading the appraisal under the wing of a newly established Mars Program Planning Group (MPPG), which was tasked with reformulating the agency’s Mars Exploration Program.
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COMPLETE STORIES
 
Astronaut Photo: Sahara Dust Enters Caribbean Skies
 
OurAmazingPlanet.com
 
Astronauts sailing around the Earth aboard the International Space Station recently spotted a dull haze blanketing the skies over the Caribbean — dust from Africa's vast Sahara Desert that had blown all the way across the Atlantic Ocean.
 
The dust likely originated some 5,000 miles (8,000 kilometers) to the east, in the dry reaches of northern Mali, according to NASA figures, although some satellite data suggest the dust can come from as far east as Chad or Sudan.
 
In the photograph, captured in July 2012, the Saharan dust covers the skies over the island of Hispaniola — home to Haiti and the Dominican Republic — and the Turks and Caicos Islands, yet Cuba's skies are dust-free.
 
It takes about a week for the dust to travel from Africa's deserts to the Caribbean, and in recent years, researchers have learned that dust from the Sahara travels across the ocean and reaches the Western Hemisphere during every month of the year.
 
The traveling dust has been linked to some troubling phenomena, from coral disease to allergies in humans to dangerous algae blooms known as red tides.
 
Dust blown in from Africa may also play a role in hurricane formation. Some researchers suspect the high-flying dry dust can break up the rotating storms, but others say more data are needed before reaching such conclusions.
 
A new space race: Companies vie to haul cargo, passengers
 
Nancy Trejos - USA Today
 
The commercial space race is on.
 
Perhaps nothing signified its arrival like this spring's successful cargo flight of the Dragon spacecraft to the International Space Station that was launched by private firm SpaceX.
 
SpaceX, run by billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk, isn't the only firm vying to haul cargo and people into orbit since NASA relinquished its near-monopoly on U.S. space transportation by retiring the Space Shuttle program last year.
 
At least a dozen companies are developing spaceships to replace the shuttle's duties or to carve their own commercial pathways in space.
 
The U.S. government's new approach of letting private companies take over the work NASA used to do in low orbit around the Earth — and pay for part of it — has opened the final frontier to free enterprise. And many advocates of commercial space ventures foresee a new and even grandiose era of U.S. space exploration, development and travel resulting from it.
 
"We're making space more American. We're making space more democratic. We're making space more available, approachable and real to the average American," says James Muncy, president of the space policy consulting firm PoliSpace in Alexandria, Va.
 
Even NASA says the sky is no limit to what a largely unfettered U.S. space industry can achieve.
 
"If NASA is the only game in town … our space aspirations will always be limited by the size of NASA's budget," says Philip McAlister, director of commercial spaceflight for NASA. "When you start turning this over to the private sector, there's no limit."
 
But this new strategy still comes with some government assistance and say.
 
In the last six years, NASA has doled out about $2 billion to private companies to design and build space taxis to the Space Station. Earlier this month, NASA pledged an additional $1.1 billion to three U.S. companies — aerospace giant Boeing, Musk's SpaceX start-up and high-tech firm Sierra Nevada— to finish the work.
 
Right now, NASA is paying the Russians more than $60 million a person for a ride to the Space Station, money it says it would rather give to U.S. companies. NASA says it would have cost the government about twice more than what it's giving the companies to develop the new spacecraft.
 
The savings, the space agency says, frees it to use its resources to explore deep space, specifically Mars, the moon and asteroids.
 
But a crucial step for the emerging industry is to be able to survive without NASA funding.
 
NASA is hopeful the companies will find other customers. That ultimately will breed competition and drive down prices for everyone, the agency reasons. And once the companies have customers, they'll have a better chance at attracting more investors.
 
Nobody can predict how big the market will be for commercial space transportation. And as in any burgeoning industry, some businesses will succeed and some will fail.
 
"We don't know which will be the companies that are going to make money in space," Muncy says. "It's like 1976 and we don't know who is going to be Apple computer and who is going to be one of the five companies that dies within a few years."
 
Entrepreneurs in charge
 
Perhaps it's no surprise that many of the companies trying to carve out a niche in space are run by savvy entrepreneurs who've made fortunes in other industries.
 
SpaceX, based in Hawthorne, Calif., is led by Musk, who started out in Silicon Valley and co-founded PayPal and Tesla Motors, the electric car company.
 
Sierra Nevada's Space Systems, headquartered in Louisville, Colo., has Mark Sirangelo as its corporate vice president. His résumé includes stints at a global communications firm, an investment bank and a technology design firm.
 
Blue Origin, a Kent, Wash.-based start-up, is backed by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. He runs it as secretively as he does Amazon.
 
Carissa Christensen, managing partner of Alexandria, Va.-space consulting firm the Tauri Group, says these entrepreneurs have a good shot at succeeding because they're equally passionate about space and business.
 
"They are different," she says. "They do have the track record of building successful businesses. … They have capital and they have the ability to sway markets and investors to get additional capital."
 
Perhaps the highest-profile space venture of all is British billionaire Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic.
 
Branson isn't going after NASA dollars. He's tapping into the desire of the wealthy to fulfill their dreams of becoming astronauts.
 
Virgin Galactic is building in Mojave, Calif., a reusable vehicle that can complete a suborbital flight, meaning it will fly above the planet's surface, then return to the atmosphere without hitting orbit. The company projects it will have its first commercial space tourism flight on the six-passenger, two-pilot SpaceShipTwo by next year, at $200,000 a seat.
 
"Now, is $200,000 still a lot of money? Yes, a lot to some people, but there's a lot of people out there who can afford that," says George Whitesides, CEO of Virgin Galactic. "We think it's going to be a great business for us."
 
The company has deposits from more than 535 people wanting a ride, Whitesides says.
 
A recent study by the Tauri Group that was commissioned by the Federal Aviation Administration's Office of Commercial Space Transportation and Space Florida, a state organization promoting aerospace economic development, supports Whitesides' assertion that there will be high demand for commercial suborbital spaceflights.
 
The study predicts that the flights could generate $600 million to $1.6 billion in revenue in their first decade of operations. About 8,000 people worldwide with net worth exceeding $5 million are interested in the trips. About 3,600 of them will fly within that first decade, the study predicts.
 
A total of six firms are trying to build suborbital vehicles. One of the cheapest tickets is on XCOR Aerospace's Lynx Mark 1, which will carry a pilot and one passenger on each flight. Andrew Nelson, chief operating officer of the Mojave, Calif., firm, says it's on track to take paying customers to space by next year. Each passenger seat goes for $95,000.
 
A majority of the passengers will be tourists, but Nelson also hopes to attract scientific and commercial researchers who want to experiment in space. Pharmaceutical and biotech companies are the likeliest candidates. "That will ramp up as the science community gets more accustomed to using the vehicles," he says.
 
Sirangelo of Sierra Nevada's Space Systems also is looking for other markets to tap besides the government. The company is developing Dream Chaser, which resembles a mini NASA space shuttle that can land on a runway rather than in the water.
 
"The whole idea of being versatile is key to any business," he says. "NASA is not the entire program and eventually will not be the majority, but it's a way to kick-start the program."
 
'A huge upside'
 
Michael Lopez-Alegria, president of trade group Commercial Spaceflight Federation, says there are many ways for the companies to make money without NASA. "I think there's a huge upside to the market," he says.
 
They can launch satellites into the Earth's orbit, for instance.
 
Virgin Galactic in July announced it would develop a satellite launcher called LauncherOne to help finance its commercial space program. "We think there's a real opportunity there," Whitesides says.
 
Some also see opportunity in hooking up with Las Vegas-based Bigelow Aerospace, which has already launched two expandable space stations. Robert Bigelow, owner of hospitality chain Budget Suites of America, is financing the effort.
 
SpaceX in May announced it had agreed to transport people to Bigelow's space habitats, which are flexible and can be configured for various uses. Bigelow is also working with Boeing. The idea is to give governments, corporations and scientists an alternative to doing research at the Space Station.
 
Venture capitalists, investment bankers and other investors are starting to notice the potential, says Richard David, co-founder of NewSpace Global, which tracks the top 100 companies involved in the industry, which is dubbed New Space.
 
"More and more companies are getting private funding and not having to rely exclusively or predominately on NASA," he says. "If they don't stop that reliance, then they position themselves for some serious challenges."
 
Advocates of commercial spaceflight have been waiting for the nascent industry's "Netscape moment." That refers to the August 1995 initial public offering of stock in Netscape, which created the then-popular Web browser. That triggered an avalanche of IPOs, then the dot-com boom.
 
Could the commercial space industry be on the verge of a similar moment?
 
"I think we're at the beginning of a really big shift," says David Livingston, host of popular Internet radio program The Space Show. "Space has not had their Netscape moment. That hasn't happened yet. But many people think that if there's to be a Netscape moment, we're getting closer."
 
Romney Taunts Chinese Moon Landing Plans
 
Evan McMorris-Santoro - Talking Points Memo
 
On the campaign trail in Florida – home of the Space Coast – Monday, Romney taunted Chinese plans to land an unmanned probe on the on the moon in 2013. Romney:
 
“This is still the greatest nation on earth. I know there are people around the world who are always critical of America, have something negative to say, say our greatest days are in the past. Baloney. We just won more Olympic medals than any other nation on Earth.
 
"You also just saw we just landed on Mars and took a good look at what’s going on there. And I know the Chinese are planning on going to the Moon and I hope they have a good experience doing that and I hope they stop in and take a look at our flag that was put there 43 years ago.“
 
Aboard the Super Guppy on its last Seattle shuttle trainer delivery
 
Anthony Bolante - Puget Sound Business Journal
 
 
The NASA Super Guppy, a massive tadpole-shaped aircraft designed to move up to 39,000 cubic feet and 26 tons of aviation and spacecraft cargo, has nine seats. Two for pilots, two for flight engineers, two for loadmaster mission specialists and two for maintenance crews for a total of eight “mission essential” seats.
 
In the case of Super Guppy N941, that left one seat available for a single non-crew passenger to fly aboard its mission from Travis Air Force Base in Northern California to Boeing Field in Seattle on Thursday.
 
That’s how I ended up on the flight.
 
On assignment for the Puget Sound Business Journal with exclusive access to this specific flight with help from the Museum of Flight, I was granted the extremely rare opportunity to fly aboard and to document in news photos and video the Super Guppy as it transported the forward section of the space shuttle trainer to its new home at the Museum of Flight.
 
The Super Guppy, built in 1962 and bought by NASA from the European Space Agency in 1997, is the only aircraft of its kind still flying today and its odd dimensions of 25 feet tall, 25 feet wide, 111 feet long make it just big enough to shoehorn the space shuttle trainer’s massive sections into its unique cargo bay.
 
The Super Guppy flight on Thursday is the third flight mission transporting the trainer sections in the past month, and it may be the last time the Super Guppy flies the skies of the Puget Sound. Many experts believe that the Super Guppy may be retired in the next few years.
 
Loading the trainer's forward section into the Super Guppy was completed on Wednesday while I flew a commercial airplane from Seattle-Tacoma International Airport to Sacramento International Airport near Travis Air Force Base in California. After staying in Sacramento for a mere seven hours, I woke up at 3:30 a.m. to drive to the base to meet the eight Super Guppy crew members at 5 a.m. as they prepared to fly the cargo to Boeing Field.
 
After two hours of air mission planning and preflight inspections, we departed Travis Air Force Base shortly after sunrise Thursday to fly through beautiful Pacific Northwest summer weather. En route, we counted numerous Pacific Northwest mountain peaks including Mount Shasta, Mount Bachelor, Mount St. Helens, Mount Adams and finally, Mount Rainier, as the flight approached Boeing Field in Seattle.
 
The Super Guppy’s pilots, including former astronaut Ken “Taco” Cockrell and Rick “Train” Hull, kept the crew banter light on the intercom throughout the flight as flight engineers Michael Robinson and Henry Taylor managed aircraft systems and assisted with navigation. Air mission loadmasters Jack Roberts and Jon Myrick monitored the Super Guppy’s special cargo, while maintenance crew James Isley and Frank Montes ensured that the aircraft functioned flawlessly for this mission. It did.
 
The Super Guppy was greeted by hundreds of aviation fans who lined up against the fence around the tarmac at Boeing Field to watch the Super Guppy do a low-approach fly-by and a ceremonial flyover of metropolitan Seattle and finally land, taxi to parking and deliver its cargo.
 
I had the unique opportunity to spend the whole flight with the crew, who welcomed my presence and allowed me to capture their mission in photos and video from takeoff to landing.
 
For the honor of documenting this mission — as a photojournalist who happens to be a National Guard aviator — Super Guppy and crew, I salute you.
 
NASA names new chief astronaut: Shuttle veteran succeeds station record setter
 
Robert Pearlman - collectSPACE.com
 
NASA's astronauts have a new chief.
 
Peggy Whitson, who three years ago was named the 13th Chief of the Astronaut Office, making her the first woman to lead the U.S. Astronaut Corps, stepped down in July, a spokesman at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston confirmed for collectSPACE.com.
 
Space shuttle veteran Robert Behnken, who most recently served as one of Whitson's deputies, has been named the new Chief Astronaut.
 
The position, which was first created and held by Mercury astronaut Deke Slayton in 1962, oversees the activities of the astronaut corps including managing training programs, appointing technical assignments and choosing the crews for upcoming space missions.
 
"The Chief of the Astronaut Office has an unenviable job – she or he has the power to make flight assignments as well as important career appointments, but each decision is guaranteed to make one or more astronauts unhappy," Michael Cassutt, co-author of Slayton's autobiography and a member of a 2011 National Academy of Sciences panel that reviewed the future direction of the Astronaut Office, said in an interview with collectSPACE. "Astronauts are intelligent, highly-skilled and motivated... who wants them to be grumpy?"
 
Behnken has inherited the position at a time of transition for the astronaut corps, as NASA looks beyond its retired space shuttle program toward hiring U.S. companies to fly its crews on private spacecraft to the International Space Station (ISS). At the same time, the agency is working with its industry contractors to develop a heavy-lift rocket and space capsule to take Americans beyond Earth orbit to an asteroid and ultimately Mars.
 
The Astronaut Office has 52 members at current who are either eligible for, already in training, or taking part in flight assignments. That count includes Whitson, who has now rejoined the ranks who are qualified to serve on board the space station.
 
NASA is also in the process of reviewing applicants for a new group of between nine and 15 astronaut candidates, or "ascans," to form its 21st class of trainees since 1959. Behnken will now head that selection, which began under Whitson's lead last November and is scheduled conclude with the announcement of the new class members in May 2013.
 
Record-setting Chief Astronaut
 
Whitson was announced as Chief Astronaut in September 2009 and took over responsibility from the out-going chief Steven Lindsey on Oct. 19 of that year.
 
Lindsey, who had been head of the Astronaut Office since September 2006, then went on to command the final flight of space shuttle Discovery before retiring from NASA in July 2011. His departure was one of many as the 30-year shuttle program came to its end.
 
"As chief astronaut, Whitson presided over a drastic downsizing of the astronaut office to reflect the shift from ISS and shuttle to ISS only," Cassutt said. "She did it quickly, she did it thoroughly, and she did it with a great deal of thought and planning."
 
"She also made a convincing case for the selection of two new classes of astronaut candidates... all while her station crew members continued to perform spectacularly," said Cassutt. "I can't imagine anyone else doing that job that well at this particular time."
 
Whitson wasn't just the first woman to be appointed chief, but also the first mission specialist to be chosen for the role. All of NASA's prior chief astronauts had been pilots, including first American in space Alan Shepard and Apollo moonwalker John Young, who held the title the longest.
 
Before becoming the chief, Whitson flew two long-duration expeditions on board the space station. Logging more than a year in orbit over the course of the two flights, she holds the world record for the most time in space by a woman.
 
Whitson's 376 days, 17 hours and 22 minutes in space (to date) rank her 20th on the list of worldwide space travelers for time spent off the Earth.
 
On her second stay aboard the orbiting laboratory in 2007, Whitson also became the first female commander of the International Space Station. Whitson also set the records for the most spacewalks and most time spacewalking by a woman.
 
If Behnken assigns Whitson to another station expedition crew, she will become the first NASA astronaut to serve three times on board the orbiting complex. Only Russian cosmonauts have matched that feat, including Gennady Padalka and Yuri Malenchenko who are flying their third expedition in space now.
 
Next in line
 
Like Whitson, Behnken flew as a mission specialist and a spacewalker, launching on board space shuttle Endeavour on two assembly flights to the International Space Station.
 
During his first mission to the orbiting laboratory, Behnken had the chance to work with Whitson in space during her second expedition stay aboard the station.
 
Behnken is the first Chief of the Astronaut Office who will have the potential to assign a family member to a mission crew. He is married to fellow astronaut Megan McArthur, who is still active in the corps.
 
In addition to selecting crews, Behnken will be responsible for the mission preparation activities and on-orbit support of all International Space Station crews and their support personnel. He'll also continue the work begun by Whitson by organizing the crew interface support for future heavy launch and commercially-provided transport vehicles.
 
Behnken is the 14th chief astronaut, preceded by:
Deke Slayton (1962-1963)
Alan Shepard (1963-1969)
Thomas Stafford (1969-1971)
Alan Shepard (1971-1974)
John Young (1974-1987)
Daniel Brandenstein (1987-1992)
Robert "Hoot" Gibson (1992-94)
Robert Cabana (1994-1997)
Kenneth Cockrell (1997-1998);
Charles Precourt (1998-2002)
Kent Rominger (2002-2006)
Steven Lindsey (2006-2009) and
Peggy Whitson (2009-2012)
 
Making meals for a mission to Mars
 
Associated Press
 
In a building in Texas, scientists in white coats are stirring, mixing, measuring, brushing and, most important, tasting the end result of their cooking.
 
Their mission: Build a menu for a manned voyage to Mars in the 2030s.
 
The menu must feed six to eight astronauts and keep them healthy and happy. That’s no simple feat considering it is likely to take six months to get to the Red Planet, astronauts will have to stay there 18 months and then it will take another six months to return to Earth. Imagine having to shop for a family’s 2 1/2-year supply of groceries all at once and having enough meals planned in advance for that length of time.
 
“Mars is different just because it’s so far away,” said Maya Cooper, senior research scientist with Lockheed Martin who is leading the efforts to build the menu.
 
Astronauts who travel to the space station have a wide variety of food available to them, some 100 or so different options, in fact. But it is all preprepared and freeze-dried with a shelf life of at least two years. The lack of gravity in space means smell — and taste — is impaired. So the food is bland.
 
On Mars, though, there is a little gravity, allowing NASA to consider significant changes to the current space menu. On Mars astronauts might be able to do things such as chop vegetables and cook a little on their own. Even though pressure levels are different than on Earth, scientists think it will be possible to boil water with a pressure cooker, too.
 
One option Cooper and her staff in the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, are considering is having the astronauts care for a “Martian greenhouse.” They would have a variety of fruits and vegetables — from carrots to bell peppers — in a hydroponic solution, meaning they would be planted in mineral-laced water instead of soil. The astronauts would care for their garden and then use those ingredients, combined with others, such as nuts and spices brought from Earth, to prepare their meals.
 
The top priority is to make sure that the astronauts get the proper amount of nutrients, calories and minerals to maintain their physical health and performance for the life of the mission, Cooper said.
 
The menu must also make the astronauts happy, Cooper explained. Studies have shown that eating certain foods — such as meatloaf and mashed potatoes or turkey on Thanksgiving — improves people’s mood and gives them satisfaction. That “link to home” will be key for astronauts on a Mars mission.
 
Already, Cooper’s team of three has come up with about 100 recipes, all vegetarian because the astronauts will not have dairy or meat products available. It isn’t possible to preserve those products long enough to take to Mars — and bringing a cow on the mission is not an option, Cooper jokes.
 
Antarctica to Mars: The loneliest job in the world
 
BBC News
 
(Dr Alexander Kumar FRGS is the Concordia Station doctor (French Polar Institute/ Italian Antarctic Programme) and European Space Agency-sponsored Research MD)
 
Mars is once again in the spotlight after Nasa successfully landed its biggest ever robot on the Red Planet - an achievement that naturally raises the question of when man will first set foot on the red Planet.
 
Already, researchers are hard at work trying to understand what it would take to succeed in such a mission. One of those is Dr Alexander Kumar, based at the Concordia research station in the centre of Antarctica, a place so remote - and so cold - that it is only possible to get in and out for three months of the year.
 
He is trying to understand the physical and psychological effects of human space travel, particularly the role of extreme isolation. BBC Future spoke to Dr Kumar about life at the station and how his stay may be the fore runner for a manned mission to the red Planet.
 
Can you describe where you are now?
 
I am in a place I have come to call ‘White Mars’ - the heart of Antarctica.
 
It is the coldest, darkest and most extreme environment on our planet. The outside temperature has again fallen below -80C (-112F) or -99.9C (-148F) with wind chill - the extreme limit of its scale. Inside, the window is frozen over, entombed with ice and it remains dark outside, as it has done so 24 hours a day for the past three months.  And we are at an equivalent altitude of 3800m above sea level, making it difficult to breathe.
 
We are completely alone and isolated here from February to November. The French refer to people who over-winter here as 'Hivernauts', but, unlike astronauts, we have no 'mission control'. 
 
Concordia base is unique in that it is jointly run by the French Polar Institute and Italian Antarctic Programme.  It consists of two cylindrical, three-story towers – a shape that stirs your imagination to think they could have arrived within a Saturn V rocket. It is strange to refer to it at home, but that is how it has come to feel.  The base is our life-support system in a region where there is nothing but ice for more than 1,000km (700 miles) in most directions.
 
What do you do there?
 
I am the only British member of a European crew of 13 currently living at Concordia station.  I am responsible for assessing documenting - and treating where necessary - any ailments in the mind or body. I have to expect the unexpected, prepare myself for anything and when it arrives deal with it onsite.
 
Alongside my role as the station doctor, I am conducting research for the European Space Agency’s Human Spaceflight programme, investigating the physiological and psychological effects of living in isolation at this extreme. My research will help to understand how far we can push humans, particularly in regard to extreme physiology and psychology.  The work may one-day help shape a manned mission to Mars, and more importantly, see it safely return.
 
What can Antarctica teach us about Mars?
 
Living here is the closest anyone can come to living on the surface of another planet.  I have also coined the term Planet Concordia to describe this feeling.  Despite significant differences in surface gravity and atmospheric pressure between Antarctica and the Polar Regions on Mars, the average Martian surface temperature is -55C (-67F), similar to our extreme cold temperatures at Concordia.
 
Our crew has been completely isolated since February. We are more isolated from civilization than the astronauts living onboard the International Space Station.  It is impossible for us to leave the base until mid-November.
 
Alongside studying and reacting to changes in crew dynamics, we have to deal with any day to day challenges involving life-support-system maintenance and equipment failure and breakdown.  We have to be completely self-sufficient.  All our food is canned, tinned, dried and prepackaged - there is no method of delivery here during winter.  We are alone - the same as any Mars Mission would be.
 
How does living in such a remote place affect you psychologically?
 
There are many important psychological factors associated with confinement, isolation and sensory deprivation.
 
One of my predecessors told me that “monotony” was the largest challenge from living in isolation at Concordia.  I disagree.  Like him, I have access to information – via the internet, telephone and the rest of the crew.  In fact we are surrounded by information, compared to the heroic age of polar exploration.  Life is not monotonous - there is huge potential to stimulate your mind – through hobbies, conversation and news from the outside world.  However, as winter progresses, overwintering crew members regress further into their own rooms and minds, which can be dangerous- living in isolation and isolating yourself from your only access to human contact on the station.
 
Things are different. Your senses are not bombarded in the way they are at home and in the winter darkness, they become ‘blunted’, meaning any new sensory stimulation remains a luxury.  We have an inventive chef - Giorgio Deidda - who continually strives to surprise us with new taste combinations.  He is spending his 3rd winter at Concordia and surprises the crew with nationally themed evenings and his own trademarked dishes including digestifs such as his whiskey sorbet.
 
But ultimately life changes from being in 'technicolor' to black and white over winter.  It’s almost as if our senses become under stimulated and wither in the darkness, ice and silence. So when a new stimuli comes along it can be disproportionately fascinating. It has been some time since I stubbed my toe walking around the station barefooted in the dark.  But I can tell you it hurt each and every-time, even more.  Also our reaction times have slowed down. Recently the wind caught a heavy door, slamming it into my face.  I suffered moderate concussion for three days.  In daylight with my normal senses back home, I know I would have stopped it first. 
 
But perhaps the main factor is dealing with the degree of separation from our lives back home ‘on Earth’.
 
Could technology help overcome that isolation?
 
Surprisingly, I often envy the previous polar expeditions’ lack of communications.  Nowadays, with heightened technological capability and wide satellite communications access for those overwintering in Antarctica, messages, problems and bad news are transmitted into our minds – whether it is a loved one passing away or salary difficulties.  Such news is airdropped into the station by email, telephone, Facebook and video call, sometimes exploding like a bomb.  There is no release - you are in a prison of your own mind here.
 
But being disconnected can bring new unexpected challenges.  A fellow crew-member recently described to me how he “felt dead” and “not real”.  Certainly depersonalization and “derealisation” have been recognized as features of significant psychological stress.  He went on to say that when he went on Facebook it was as if his “previous life was continuing whilst his empty body continued on here in the Antarctic wasteland”.
 
How do you deal with the isolation?
 
A sense of camaraderie is crucial as well as regular hobbies.  Reading and listening to music makes a huge impact.  I recently rediscovered Jerry Lee Lewis – which when played after lunch, lifts peoples’ spirits more than any drug can, perhaps providing an element of ‘escapism’ from station life. 
 
But everyone has different tastes. For example, I often have a late night cup of tea and toast with Dr Igor Petenko, our Russian Meteorologist, while listening to his favourite classical music.
 
Martian crews would also need to deal with physiological challenges – has your experience given you any insight into these?
 
All ground-based attempts to recreate Mars lack one crucial factor – the lack of zero gravity – responsible for some of the most restrictive and challenging elements faced by humans in space. I was recently in contact with Britain's only current astronaut-in-training - Tim Peake – who reminded me that even over relatively short periods, weightlessness can affect everything from balance and cardiovascular health to muscle mass and bone density.
 
In addition inter-planetary astronauts are going to have to deal with things like cosmic rays, Mars surface radiation and storms of dust or ‘fines’ - particles that are smaller than dust particles.
 
Luckily, here at Concordia, we don’t have to deal with those kinds of things. Being But there are some physiological challenges we experience that are similar – such as disturbed sleep patterns, increased cardiovascular stress from long periods of relative inactivity and Vitamin D depletion due to the lack of sunlight.  Whilst here, I track changes in the crews circadian rhythms brought on by the long periods of darkness, alongside mood changes, social interaction and levels of stress.   
 
Living in the Antarctic winter darkness, it is difficult to perceive the passage of time. In situations like this it is very important to maintain a regular busy routine to avoid the risk of ‘free-run’ – a process where internal body clocks disintegrate cycling and resetting continually.
 
Even if you avoid extremes like this, waking up in the darkness feels like a groundhog day of sorts.  It takes an extraordinary amount of time for your mind to fire up, like an engine starting up in the cold.  My research testing people’s cognitive performance during this period of complete darkness also demonstrates slowness in the mind, memory difficulties and inability to concentrate – not a good combination when operating life support systems in deep space or in temperatures of -80C (-112F).
 
What can be done to alleviate the problems for future Martian astronauts?
 
Romain Charles – one of the crew members of the Mars 500 experiment, who spent 520 days in isolation simulating a mission to Mars told me there is no such thing as a one way mission to Mars.  For a trip to Mars, he said, the astronauts must have a plan to come back to Earth eventually.  Even if it’s a small hope, it must be there, to remain sane.  Living at Concordia, we only talk about and look forward to one date - the arrival of the first plane, our first contact with the outside world, expected in November.
 
The Apollo lunar missions also give us some clues. Astronauts reported being kept very busy, adhering to a tight schedule to maximize research and to make sure they did not have time to think about the distance and separation from their home planet.  It is similar here - if you let your mind wander during the Antarctic winter to dwell upon such negativity, I have seen it can be very dangerous and spiral out of your control. Interestingly, it appears those with predefined roles and technical responsibilities requiring busy, daily routines display the least problems.
 
Personally, I have maintained a relatively normal sleep pattern keeping myself busy and through exercise. But overwintering in such isolation is a personal journey and challenge.  I liken overwintering to dredging the ocean’s depths of your mind.  You never know what you will find, but have to feel confident- knowing you can deal with anything.
 
Has your time in Concordia led you to any conclusions about the ideal crew for a manned Mars mission?
 
Although it is difficult to say how many crew members would be ideal - balancing skills, ability for self-sufficiency and finite resources available, against increased medical risk, I believe it would need a psychologically and physically screened diverse, multinational crew – ideally with past space experience or having spent time at a place like Concordia. They would need to be mentally resilient and have a full complement of skills to ensure that they can all contribute to the mission, remain active and in a way distracted from dwelling on their isolation.   All those interested must be driven by the innate curiosity and enthusiasm to answer life’s greatest question in the same way those had who replied to a fabled advertisement once offered by Sir Ernest Shackleton, "Men wanted for hazardous journey. Small wages. Bitter cold. Long months of complete darkness.”
 
That said, providing an interactive, safe, stimulating and supportive spacecraft environment would prove as important as selecting a crew made of the ‘right stuff’.
 
You say a mixed-sex crew would be ideal – why?
 
At Concordia, we have one female crewmember among a crew of 12 men.  There is the potential for it to cause problems - previous Antarctic missions have been plagued by jealousy.
 
An exclusively male crew was used during the recent Mars 500 mission without major conflicts, much to the surprise of psychologists.  Importantly it showed that such a mission could be possible. 
 
But we have come a long way from the early male dominated polar expeditions.  Women play an equally important role in space.  Charles [from the Mars 500 mission] believes that any crew should made up of both males and females - both sexes bringing balance to a mission. 
 
Finally, you are the only doctor on the base, so what happens if you get sick?
 
I can't talk about medical issues on the base here, but from my time living and working here, I have learnt to hope and pray that I am never put in the same position as the Russian doctor Leonid Rogozov who in 1961, had to remove his own appendix with local anaesthetic.  In terms of Mars missions, it may be a good idea to send two doctors... just in case.
 
Human Spaceflight Mission Still In Limbo
 
Jay Menon - Aerospace Daily
 
India has started developing critical technologies for its human spaceflight mission, but the government still hasn’t given final approval for the project.
 
The Indian Space Research Organization announced in 2007 that the country was planning a manned spaceflight, to be launched from the Satish Dhawan Space Center in Sriharikota, near Chennai in southern India.
 
However, the government on Aug. 9 said it “has not yet taken up the human spaceflight program, estimated, initially, in the year 2009, at 124 billion rupees [$2.25 billion].”
 
Currently, “the government has taken up only development of a few critical technologies required for human spaceflight,” a senior government official says.
 
The mission envisages sending a two-person crew in a 3-ton spacecraft to low Earth orbit for about a week. The rocket will be India’s three-stage Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle.
 
“Once the project gets the final approval it will take at least six to seven years for the launch,” the official says. ISRO had initially hoped that it would be able to launch the mission in 2016.
 
According to observers, the huge cost and the recent twin failures of the homegrown GSLV could be the reasons for the delay in getting the final nod for the project. “The successful PSLV [Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle] rocket cannot be used for such a mission as it does not have capacity, and GSLV Mk.2 has a limitation that it can take only two persons,” a scientist says. “GSLV Mk.3, which is under development, certainly can take three persons with some more space left.”
 
The government pruned the budget allocation for the mission in India’s current financial year, which ends March 31, 2013, to 600 million rupees from 980 million in 2011. With no clear road map and considering the cost, India is also weighing its options for collaborating on human spaceflight, the scientist says. “Continuous discussions on collaboration in manned space programs are under way globally, and we will decide on the right model at the right time,” he says.
 
After ISRO’s successful launch of the Chandrayaan-1 lunar probe in 2008, India is currently focusing on Mars. The federal government on Aug. 5 gave the go-ahead to launch a Mars orbiter in November 2013.
 
MEANWHILE, ON MARS…
 

 
Mars Looks Quite Familiar, if Only on the Surface
 
Kenneth Chang – New York Times
 
A conspiracy theorist might think that NASA’s newest Mars rover, the Curiosity, is actually just in the middle of a desert on Earth.
 
Over the weekend, the Curiosity, which landed early on Aug. 6 after an eight-month flight, started sending back a 360-degree high-resolution panorama of its surroundings.
 
As the accompanying NASA news release noted, the images show “a landscape closely resembling portions of the southwestern United States.”
 
At a news conference on Wednesday, John P. Grotzinger, a professor of geology at the California Institute of Technology who serves as the mission’s project scientist, compared the view with a place just a few hours’ drive from Pasadena, Calif., and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the rover’s birthplace.
 
“You would really be forgiven for thinking that NASA was trying to pull a fast one on you,” he said, “and we actually put a rover out in the Mojave Desert and took a picture — a little L.A. smog coming in there.”
 
He added, “To a certain extent, the first impression you get is how Earth-like it seems.”
 
Where the Curiosity actually sits is a 96-mile-wide crater named Gale near the Martian equator.
 
To the north, the images show part of the crater rim that is believed to have been eroded by flowing water.
 
To the south is a 3.4-mile-high peak that the scientists call Mount Sharp, which Curiosity is meant to reach and to climb. By investigating the layers of sedimentary rock on Mount Sharp, mission scientists hope to reconstruct the climate and environment of early Mars and tell whether it could have been once been habitable for life.
 
The photos also show marks that Curiosity has made at the landing site. As Curiosity was lowered to the surface of Mars, blasts from the descent-stage engines created indentations in the nearby soil, exposing the bedrock below. This exposed bedrock is likely to be one of the first areas of scientific exploration on the rover’s planned two-year journey.
 
“What’s cool about this is that we got some free trenching,” Dr. Grotzinger said. After the flawless landing, the first week of operations of the rover on the ground also proceeded almost perfectly, too, as engineers started checking out the rover’s system, deployed the high-gain antenna, and raised the mast that holds the cameras.
 
So far, no significant trouble has arisen. The weather instrument experienced a problem that engineers figured out a day later.
 
The rover’s internal temperatures are slightly warmer than expected, possibly because the crater is warmer than predicted or because NASA’s computer models of Curiosity were not quite right.
 
“We’re still looking why that is,” said Jennifer Trosper, one of the mission managers.
 
Worries about overheating could put constraints on when certain instruments can be used. But the heat is also a boon, reducing the energy Curiosity needs to warm up its joints and wheels before moving.
 
Over the weekend, NASA upgraded the software that runs the rover’s computer.
 
On Monday morning, President Obama called to congratulate the Curiosity team. “You guys are examples of American know-how and ingenuity,” he said. “It’s really an amazing accomplishment.”
 
He did have one request for them: “If in fact you do make contact with Martians, please let me know right away,” the president said.
 
“I’ve got a lot of other things on my plate, but I suspect that that would go to the top of the list. Even if they’re just microbes, it will be pretty exciting.”
 
President Obama congratulates Mars rover team
 
William Harwood – CBS News
 
In a phone call to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, President Obama congratulated the Mars Science Laboratory team Monday for the successful landing of NASA's Curiosity rover, joking that engineers should let him know ASAP if the spacecraft spots any martians.
 
"We can't wait to start hearing back from Curiosity and finding out what's going on," Obama said. "We're fortunate to be part of a society that can reach beyond our planet and explore frontiers that were only imagined by our ancestors. So it's inspiring to all of us.
 
"I'm going to give you guys a personal commitment to protect these critical investments in science and technology, I thank you for devoting your lives to this cause and if, in fact, you do make contact with martians, please let me know right away. I've got a lot of other things on my plate, but I suspect that that will go to the top of the list. Even if they're just microbes, it will be pretty exciting."
 
Curiosity completed a successful descent to the floor of Gale Crater on Aug. 6, using a rocket-powered flying crane to lower the one-ton nuclear-powered rover to the surface. If all goes well, the rover will spend at least two years exploring the crater, looking for carbon compounds critical for life as it is known on Earth and for evidence of past or present habitability.
 
While congratulating the entire MSL team, Obama singled out the entry, descent and landing team, led by Adam Steltzner, for the so-called "sky crane" technique that delivered the rover directly to the surface of Mars after an autonomous seven-minute plunge through the atmosphere.
 
"What you did on Mars was incredibly impressive, those 76 pyrotechnics going on in perfect succession, the 500,000 lines of code working exactly the way you guys had ordered them, it's really mind boggling what you've been able to accomplish," the president said. "Being able to get that whole landing sequence to work the way you did, it's a testimony to your team.
 
"I especially want to congratulate Charles Elachi, the head of JPL, the entry, descent and landing lead, Adam (Steltzner for) the sky crane system. What you accomplished embodied the American spirit and your passion and your commitment is making a difference and your hard work is now paying dividends, because our expectation is that Curiosity is going to be telling us things that we did not know before and laying the groundwork for an even more audacious undertaking in the future, and that's a human mission to the red planet."
 
But the Obama administration is scaling back funding for planetary exploration. In NASA's fiscal 2013 budget request, the administration reduced spending for planetary exploration by 20 percent, most of it coming from the Mars program, with additional cuts expected in later years. As a result, NASA was forced to withdraw from two planned Mars missions that would have been conducted jointly with the European Space Agency in 2016 and 2018. No other "flagship" missions like Curiosity's are currently in development.
 
The budget debate has no impact on current operations, however, and JPL engineers spent the weekend installing and verifying surface operations software in Curiosity's redundant computers, overwriting the no-longer-needed entry, descent and landing programming and replacing initial checkout programs with more sophisticated routines. The upgrade also adds the ability to operate the rover's science instruments, robot arm and mobility system.
 
The software upgrade, from version 9.4 to 10.0, was expected to be completed over the next day or so. Over the weekend, JPL posted the first high-resolution color images from the rover, part of an initial 360-degree panorama of its surroundings in Gale Crater.
 
Additional photos, completing the panorama mosaic, are expected soon, along with high-resolution images from Curiosity's descent camera, which captured the final minutes of the rover's landing.
 
The president said Curiosity is an inspiration to the youth of the nation, "and that kind of inspiration is the by-product of work of the sort you guys have done."
 
"You guys should be remarkably proud," he concluded. "It is really what makes us best as a species is this curiosity that we have, this yearning to discover and know more and push the boundaries of knowledge. You are perfect examples of that and we couldn't be more grateful to you. So congratulations, keep up the good work."
 
Obama calls to congratulate Curiosity team on success
 
Todd Halvorson - Florida Today
 
NASA’s Curiosity rover is getting a “brain transplant” this week, and the team operating it received a congratulatory call on Monday from President Barack Obama.
 
Noting that the six-wheeled rover “stuck her landing” after a seven-minute dive to the Martian surface, Obama lauded project engineers, scientists and managers for the “incredible success.”
 
“It’s really mindboggling what you’ve been able to accomplish. And being able to get that whole landing sequence to work the way you did is a testimony to your team,” Obama said.
 
The complex atmospheric entry and descent involved a supersonic parachute, retrorockets and a novel “sky crane” system that gently delivered Curiosity to the floor of ancient Gale Crater.
 
The rover landed near an 18,000-foot-tall mountain that promises to shed unprecedented light on the geological history of the fourth planet from the sun.
 
“What you’ve accomplished embodies the American spirit, and your passion and your commitment is making a difference,” Obama said.
 
“And your hard work is now paying dividends, because our expectation is that Curiosity is going to be telling us things that we did not know before, and laying the groundwork for an even more audacious undertaking in the future, and that’s a human mission to the red planet.”
 
Obama in 2010 challenged NASA to send astronauts to an asteroid by 2025 and to Mars by the mid-2030s.
 
Clearly in a jovial mood, Obama made special mention of the “Mohawk Guy,” Boback Ferdowski, an engineer known for wearing unique hairstyles for critical mission events. For the Curiosity landing, Ferdowski took direction from his colleagues and wore a Mohawk with stars and stripes shaved and colored into it.
 
“It does sound like NASA has come a long way from the white shirt, black dark-rimmed glasses and pocket protectors,” Obama said. “You guys are a little cooler than you used to be.”
 
Obama also kidded about the possibility of finding life on Mars.
 
“If, in fact, you do make contact with Martians, please let me know right away. I’ve got a lot of other things on my plate, but I suspect that that will go to the top of the list,” Obama said. “Even if they’re microbes, it will be pretty exciting.”
 
Curiosity is not equipped to detect life directly. Rather, rover instruments will attempt to determine if Mars is, or ever was, habitable; if the planet currently has, or ever had, the key ingredients for the formation of microbial life.
 
A standing-room-only crowd was on hand in the mission control center at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., for the presidential call.
 
The call came amid a rover “brain transplant.”
 
Curiosity’s computers had been loaded with 500,000 lines of code that controlled the Mars Science Laboratory during Curiosity’s atmospheric entry, descent and landing.
 
A software swap to be completed this week will result in a rover that’s optimized for operating its scientific instruments on the surface of Mars.
 
Reprogrammed Mars rover getting ready to roll
 
Alan Boyle - NBCNews.com's Cosmic Log
 
NASA's Curiosity rover is almost fully reprogrammed for its two-year, $2.5 billion science mission on Mars, and mission managers say it should be ready to take its first short drive in about a week.
 
The final phase of Curiosity's four-day software transition was getting under way Tuesday, NASA spokesman Guy Webster said. The software for science operations, known as R10, has already been installed successfully on the rover's primary computer and is currently managing the rover's functions. All that remained was to finish installing the same software on the backup computer.
 
The software switchover called for removing the thousands of lines of code that were required for managing Curiosity's flight from Earth to Mars, as well as the instructions for the entry, descent and landing sequence known as the "seven minutes of terror." The R10 software package instead provides Curiosity with full use of its autonomous driving system and all the tools on its robotic arm. Curiosity's 4 gigabytes of data storage capacity wasn't enough to hold the entire software suite in its brain simultaneously.
 
The rover team put science operations on the back burner during the reprogramming.
 
"After the software transition, we go back to preparing the rover to be fully functional for surface operations," mission manager Art Thompson said today in a news release. "We are looking forward to the first drive in about a week."
 
The first short drive will be part of a routine to check out the rover's equipment as well as the characteristics of the landing site in Gale Crater.
 
Over the weekend, the Curiosity team released a partial panorama incorporating 79 high-resolution pictures from the rover's Mastcam imaging system. Each picture in the mosaic measures 1,200 by 1,200 pixels — and the full-resolution panorama, including the black patches of missing data, amounted to more than 120 megapixels.
 
Even the limited view strengthened the impression that Gale Crater was reminiscent of California's Mojave Desert. One part of the picture shows a section of the crater wall, north of the landing site, where a network of valleys enters Gale Crater from the outside. NASA's image advisory says this is the first view that scientists have had of a one-time river system from the Martian surface.
 
One big difference between Gale and Mojave is the presence of a 3-mile-high (5-kilometer-high) mountain in the middle of the Martian crater, known as Mount Sharp or Aeolis Mons. The partial panorama doesn't show the full rise of the mountain to its peak, but even the limited view shows a dark, distant dune field, and then the layered buttes and mesas of the mountain's environs farther beyond.
 
Eventually, scientists plan to send Curiosity up the mountainside to document billions of years of geological history on Mars. During the odyssey during which the rover will use a laser zapper, a drill, an onboard laboratory and other scientific instruments to determine how hospitable the region was to life in ancient times.
 
Curiosity's primary mission is due to last an entire Martian year, the equivalent of nearly two Earth years, but scientists hope the nuclear-powered rover will last even longer. The rover team is due to discuss the road ahead during a media teleconference at 1 p.m. ET (10 a.m. PT) Tuesday. Audio of the event will be streamed live online via NASA's website.
 
Search for Life Will Shape Future Mars Missions
 
Leonard David - Space.com
 
As NASA’s Curiosity rover prepares to get its wheels in motion on Mars, the space agency is set to issue a new look at where exploration of the Red Planet could go in the years and decades to come – based on the theme "Seeking the Signs of Life."
 
The report, stemming from a Concepts and Approaches for Mars Exploration meeting in Houston in June, is headed for a late August/September release. Former veteran NASA program manager Orlando Figueroa has been leading the appraisal under the wing of a newly established Mars Program Planning Group (MPPG), which was tasked with reformulating the agency’s Mars Exploration Program.
 
View full size imageThe planning group is taking a look at how NASA will continue exploring Mars beyond the missions currently operating today, which now includes the Curiosity rover. The $2.5 billion Mars rover Curiosity landed on the Red Planet on Aug. 5 (PDT) in a flawless touchdown. The flagship rover, which is already beaming home amazing photos of Mars, is expected to spend two years exploring Mars' Gale Crater to determine if the region could have ever supported microbial life.
 
Recently, deep cuts in NASA's budget for Mars led to the shakeup in the space agency’s plans for robotic exploration. Another factor behind the new report is the overlapping requirements of NASA’s long-range plan to dot the Red Planet with human footprints.
 
Deep budget cuts, new tech
 
Mars planners are assessing international partnerships that could be highly enabling, especially as exploration activities become increasingly complex. Such partnerships could be at the mission or instrument level, and they could involve scientists from around the globe.
 
The June get-together of Mars experts made a strong case that missions flown in the coming decade could yield realistic steps toward Mars Sample Return. That pathway also would push advances in our understanding of Mars and certify key technologies that can lead to a humans-to-Mars initiative.
 
For example, work is under way to develop inflatable heat shields and larger parachutes.
 
“These will be tested in a program about a year from now,” said Charles Elachi, director of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory here.
 
“You’ll see that in this Mars Program Planning Group output,” said John Grunsfeld, associate administrator for the Science Mission Directorate.
 
“They are looking at mixing technology with increasing capability over time … leading up to putting larger things on the surface,” Grunsfeld said. Adopting those technologies would help put objects even larger than the 1-ton Curiosity rover on Mars, he told SPACE.com.
 
Less expensive Mars probes are also on NASA’s agenda.
 
And there’s no lack of ideas. Gliders and balloons, ground-thumping penetrators, deep drilling platforms, slinky robot snakes, and even sensor-laden tumbleweed-like vehicles are on the table. Toss into the mix an assortment of Mars orbiters to perform a variety of tasks, such as sniffing out traces of biologically produced methane.
 
No gimmicks on Mars
 
“It can’t just be a gimmicky thing,” Doug McCuistion, director of the NASA Mars Exploration Program, told SPACE.com. “This is — and needs to remain — a scientifically driven program. So anything that comes out of Orlando’s Mars Program Planning Group I will expect to be scientifically and technologically viable and useful.”
 
McCuistion said the group is to provide pathways or portfolios with mission and technology options that can be adjusted, manipulated and sequenced differently based on programmatic factors as well as budgetary factors.
 
“So I’m expecting it to provide us some flexibility for planning. Lots of options, lots of ideas, lots of possibilities … all of which have feasibility that we can use to build the next portfolio set,” McCuistion said.
 
Seeking the signs of life
 
The goal is to establish a plan with a 20-year horizon, McCuistion added.
 
“We’re thinking into the early 2030s … partly because President Obama’s challenge was humans in the area of Mars in 2033. So we’re kind of using that as an anchor point to plan backwards from.
 
“The entire Mars science community is at that point of taking that next step,” McCuistion said. “The Mars Science Laboratory transitions us from 'Follow the water' to seeking the signs of life … so that’s where we are headed.”
 
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