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From: "Moon, Larry J. (JSC-EA411)" <larry.j.moon@nasa.gov>
Date: December 6, 2013 3:58:13 PM CST
To: "Moon, Larry J. (JSC-EA411)" <larry.j.moon@nasa.gov>
Subject: FW: NASA and Human Spaceflight News Dec. 6, 2013
Sorry for the late news .,,,it was great to see so many of you yesterday at our final retirees luncheon of the year. Especially great to have Marion Lusk, Bud Castner, Lubert Leget, join us, and Walter Scott joined us from out of town .Jack Knight has pointed out that the first Thursday of January 2014 is January 2nd ,,,so we will delay our next months retirees luncheon to January 9th. Hope to see all of you next year.Have a great weekend.NASA and Human Spaceflight NewsFriday – December 6, 2013HEADLINES AND LEADSReport says Bolden tells space scientists to forget 'flagship missions'Lee Roop – Huntsville TimesThe same week Discover science magazine named the Mars Curiosity Rover the top science story of 2013, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden Jr. has told space scientists to forget about any future missions like it. Bolden is quoted today saying "flagship missions" like Curiosity, those that cost $1 billion or more, just aren't affordable in today's budget climate.Mo. Astronaut Calls From SpaceMaddie Heidenreich – KOMU- TVKOMU 8 News made a long distance call this week to Space. Right now, NASA Astronaut Col. Mike Hopkins is orbiting Outer Space performing innovative research for NASA. But his desire to invent actually began on a family farm in rural Missouri.Atlas 5 rocket carrying NRO spysat blasts offWilliam Harwood – CBS NewsA United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket roared to life and climbed away from its California launch pad overnight Thursday, kicking off a classified mission to boost a National Reconnaissance Office spy satellite into orbit.
From The Space Station To The Operating RoomSara Jerome – Medical Design OnlineRobotic arms based on International Space Station (ISS) technology may be a highly-effective tool for brain surgery, according to a new study.ISS crew over the moon with new gourmet menuMichelin-starred chef Alain Ducasse teams up with Breton food packagers to satisfy appetites on the satelliteKim Willsher – The GuardianIt may be one small step for cooking, but it is a giant leap for haute cuisine. Duck breast with capers, Breton lobster, organic quinoa with seaweed and celeriac puree, lemon chutney and chocolate cake are going where little fancy food has previously ventured … space, the final frontier.Heat shield delivered for NASA's Orion spacecraftAlex Macon – Galveston Daily NewsA heat shield designed to protect NASA's Orion spacecraft as it flies through the Earth's atmosphere at up to 20,000 mph arrived at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida Wednesday night.Former NASA astronaut visits SDSUKFMB TVSan Diego State University Thursday welcomed a former astronaut to talk about life in space. Joseph Tanner is a former NASA astronaut and currently a professor at the University of Colorado, Boulder.COMPLETE STORIESReport says Bolden tells space scientists to forget 'flagship missions'Lee Roop – Huntsville TimesThe same week Discover science magazine named the Mars Curiosity Rover the top science story of 2013, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden Jr. has told space scientists to forget about any future missions like it. Bolden is quoted today saying "flagship missions" like Curiosity, those that cost $1 billion or more, just aren't affordable in today's budget climate."We have to stop thinking about ... flagship missions.... The budget doesn't support that," Bolden was quoted saying in Washington by by veteran space reporter Marcia Smith. The comments came as Bolden spoke to NASA Advisory Council's Science Committee.According to the report, Bolden's plan is to fly "more, less expensive missions." Trying to win support for another flagship mission would mean "eternal battles" with the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB), Smith reports.Ironically, Bolden spoke Wednesday as the House Science, Space and Technology Committee was holding a hearing on the search for life in the universe. The topic of a mission to Jupiter's moon Europa came up, and Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-Tx) and others on the committee sounded enthusiastic. The moon has an ice-covered ocean, and scientists are tantalized by the prospect of some kind of life in that liquid environment.The Curiosity rover landed in August and has already generated detailed new information about the Red Planet. It has found proof of ancient flowing rivers on Mars and precursor chemicals needed for life including carbon, hydrogen and oxygen. The mission was behind schedule and over-budget, however.Could Congress force a major new program on the White House? Maybe. It did force President Obama to accept the Space Launch System in 2010, but president has requested funds for that project in his budget ever since in accordance with the agreement. Smith reports that such a budget request is "the only way to get a new program into the budget for the long term."Mo. Astronaut Calls From SpaceMaddie Heidenreich – KOMU- TVKOMU 8 News made a long distance call this week to Space. Right now, NASA Astronaut Col. Mike Hopkins is orbiting Outer Space performing innovative research for NASA. But his desire to invent actually began on a family farm in rural Missouri.KOMU 8 News arranged to talk to Hopkins alongside Koichi Wakata and Rick Mastracchio , two additional crew members on board the International Space Station.
"Welcome aboard Columbia," said Hopkins."You are looking at three guinea pigs right now, said Hopkins. "A lot of the research that's going on up here involves us and what happens to the human body in weightlessness. For example, we are doing a research on the spinal cord and how it changes in the weightless environment." Astronaut Mastacchino added, "Where it leads is 'who knows?' That's why we do this research cause great things can come out of it."People on Earth can also see the view from above through the crew's social media. "It's kind of fun to try and pick out those unique events that are happening up here on the station or unique views that we get to see either of the earth or of the station itself and share that with people," said Hopkins.More than 35 thousand people follow Hopkins on Twitter, but some of his true followers are still in Missouri. Hopkin's step mom, Paula Hertwig Hopkins is one of them."Being able to exchange the emails and the texts with him have been great," said Paula Hertwig Hopkins. "It's been wonderful that he is able to take out the time for me and be able to share that with me."Sometimes she even shares a special message. "A spiritual passage out of Psalms that says the sun rises and the sun sets and God knows about that," said Paula. "And I am able to share that bible passage with him and respond back and say, that is awesome, I never tire of seeing the earth, the entire creation is outstanding."So how does Hopkins have Mid-Missouri ties? "He grew up in rural Missouri," said Paula. "That is so cool in my mind and the fact that an individual to come out of rural Missouri with not a whole lot of money, but a whole lot of support from his mother and his father. Education was important and that drive and that spirit can put somebody basically to the international space station.""I would love to say hi to everybody in Missouri and thanks for all the support over the years," said Hopkins from Space. "I certainly wouldn't have got here without all of that. Missouri is a wonderful place. I haven't lived there long term since I finished high school and went off to college, but I certainly miss it and enjoy the time when I get to come back home."Hopkins smiled during the entire interview with KOMU 8 News."He smiles all the time, Paula said. "I will lie claim to the fact that his smile comes from his father. His father had a wonderful smile and his father smiled all the time. I don't care what the adversity was, his father smiled all the time. Mike has his dads smile."Thats not the only thing Hopkins inherited from his dad, Ogle Hopkins."Mike and Ogle liked to invent and so they had a couple projects they were working on in the garage when Mike would be home," Paula said. "When Hopkins went off to study and play football at the University of Illinois, Ogle would go, too. All those games that took place in Urbana, he would drive five or six hours that it took to get from the farm which was halfway between Richland and Osage Beach to go to all of those games."Paula said after college, Hopkins wanted so badly to be in space and applied multiple times. Then one day, Hopkins got the call and made a call to Paula. "I pulled over on the side of the road and Mike let me know I got it, I got in and I said Oh my gosh, I cannot believe it...and I wished his dad would have known," said Paula.Some bittersweet news after Hopkin's dad lost the battle to Cancer and wasn't here to see his son travel to space. Afterall, Hopkins listened to his dad's advice. "Give it another lick," said Paula. "It was his dad's saying. And he gave it another lick, and it worked."Now that it worked, Hopkins strives to help others through the space program."The human research we are doing is not only going to help us go further out to the universe and the solar system, but is also helping us right there on earth," said Hopkins.While Hopkins looks down on Earth, Paula thinks someone may be looking down on him, "Maybe the Lord opened up a little window and let his father peek down."Atlas 5 rocket carrying NRO spysat blasts offWilliam Harwood – CBS NewsA United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket roared to life and climbed away from its California launch pad overnight Thursday, kicking off a classified mission to boost a National Reconnaissance Office spy satellite into orbit.
The powerful Russian-designed RD-180 engine at the base of the Atlas 5 ignited and throttled up at 11:14 p.m. PST (GMT-8), generating 860,000 pounds of thrust and lighting up the night sky with torrent of flame.The towering rocket slowly climbed away from Space Launch Complex 3E on the California coast northwest of Los Angeles and arced away on a southerly trajectory toward an orbit around Earth's poles. Such polar orbits are favored by imaging spy satellites because the spacecraft pass over the entire planet as it rotates below.
While the payload was classified, the mission logo painted on the side of the rocket's payload fairing showed an octopus, arms extended around planet Earth, above the phrase "Nothing is Beyond Our Reach."
The climb to space appeared to go smoothly but as usual with such classified missions, commentary and video tracking ended about three-and-a-half minutes after liftoff, before the rocket's hydrogen-fueled Centaur second stage engine ignited.
The National Reconnaissance Office does not reveal the nature of its major payloads, but veteran space observers speculated the satellite launched aboard the Atlas 5 was an imaging radar spacecraft capable of around-the-clock observations regardless of lighting or cloud cover.
Two other such Boeing-built Future Imagery Architecture -- FIA -- radar satellites are believed to have been launched in 2010 and 2012. Plans for state-of-the-art optical FIA spysats were scrapped in 2005 because of technical problems and higher-than-expected costs.
The Atlas 5 Centaur second stage also carried a dozen small CubeSats, or "nanosatellites," into space in a pair of dispensers. The small, cube-shaped satellites were designed to carry out a variety of science and technoloy demonstration investigations ranging from advanced communications research to space weather observations and materials science.From The Space Station To The Operating RoomSara Jerome – Medical Design OnlineRobotic arms based on International Space Station (ISS) technology may be a highly-effective tool for brain surgery, according to a new study."A machine is inherently more precise and accurate than a human, as it can move in increments of microns while humans move in increments of millimeters," said Garnette Sutherland, neurosurgery professor at the University of Calgary in Canada, who worked on the study.The research, published by the Journal of Neurosurgery, focused on an image-guided surgical tool known as neuroArm, manufactured by IMRIS Inc. The machine was designed "to work in conjunction with an MRI machine, as well as actually inside an MRI. This gives surgeons the ability to continually monitor their progress through detailed, three-dimensional images." Surgeons operate the system remotely, via a "sensory immersive" workstation."Surgical robots have the potential to improve surgical precision and accuracy through motion scaling and tremor filters, although human surgeons currently possess superior speed and dexterity," the journal article said.The study predicted that robotic technology is going to play an increasingly pivotal role in surgery: "NeuroArm is a step toward a future in which a variety of machines are merged with medicine."The technology behind the NeuroArm was originally developed by the Canadian Space Agency and was used on board the space shuttle and the ISS, according to a write-up from NASA.Robotic surgical devices have come under criticism recently."There have been widely publicized horror stories, including patients who have bled out after a robotic instrument inadvertently nicked a blood vessel or those who have been injured in other ways, such as accidental punctures, tears or burns," the Wall Street Journal recently reported.The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists falls among the skeptics.The group believes that "robotic surgery is not the only or the best minimally invasive approach to hysterectomy … nor is it the most cost-effective," according to the WSJ.Intuitive Surgical's da Vinci robotic surgical system received mixed reviews from the FDA in a recent report.But patient outcomes were largely smooth in the University of Calgary study."Only 1 adverse event was encountered in the first 35 neuroArm cases, with no patient injury. The adverse event was uncontrolled motion of the left neuroArm manipulator, which was corrected through a rigorous safety review procedure,' the study said.This isn't the only piece of ISS tech attempting to make the leap from space to the operating room. A research team at Canada's Centre for Surgical Invention and Innovation (CSii) are initiating clinical trials of the Image-Guided Autonomous Robot (IGAR) for early diagnosis and treatment of breast cancer.ISS crew over the moon with new gourmet menuMichelin-starred chef Alain Ducasse teams up with Breton food packagers to satisfy appetites on the satelliteKim Willsher – The GuardianIt may be one small step for cooking, but it is a giant leap for haute cuisine.Duck breast with capers, Breton lobster, organic quinoa with seaweed and celeriac puree, lemon chutney and chocolate cake are going where little fancy food has previously ventured … space, the final frontier.Nasa has commissioned one of the most celebrated masters of Gallic gastronomy and a Breton canned meat company to come up with fresh, "special occasion" menus for astronauts and cosmonauts in the International Space Station (ISS).Alain Ducasse, the most Michelin-starred chef on the planet, has been sending food out of this world since 2006. So far, international astronauts have enjoyed what he describes as "food for extreme pleasure", including the Sicilian speciality caponata, roasted quails in a Madeiran wine sauce, celeriac puree with nutmeg and "melt in your mouth" apple slices.Ducasse's hi-tech food laboratory has also been commissioned by the European Space Agency to create meals for an eventual Mars mission lasting several months.Now he has teamed up with the Brittany family firm Hénaff – more famous for its tinned meat and pâté, favoured by long-distance mariners – to provide the containers to ensure the Ducasse delicacies lose none of their flavour on their 200-odd-mile journey to the ISS.A spokesperson for Ducasse told the Guardian: "We've been sending special dishes to the space station for seven years and change the menu regularly. We're happy to be working with Hénaff, who we chose because they meet American standards." However, she added: "We won't be sending tinned pâté into space."Before linking with Hénaff, Ducasse had feared he may have to move his space meal kitchen to Houston, Texas, to meet exacting US hygiene regulations.In total, Nasa and its astronauts have chosen 25 Ducasse recipes. The astronauts will try out the food at Houston during their training to ensure it is to their taste and they have no allergic reactions."Special occasion" meals are enjoyed on the space station – first inhabited in November 2000 and continuously occupied ever since – on birthdays, holidays, and whenever a crew member goes on a mission outside the station or there is a change-over of staff.The ISS orbits the Earth just over 15-1/2 times a day at an altitude of between 205 and 270 miles and an average speed of 17,100mph. On non-special occasions, crew members eat preserved food in vacuum-sealed plastic bags, which are, reportedly, as popular as the average school dinner.The first of the new dishes is expected to take off next June.Heat shield delivered for NASA's Orion spacecraftAlex Macon – Galveston Daily NewsA heat shield designed to protect NASA's Orion spacecraft as it flies through the Earth's atmosphere at up to 20,000 mph arrived at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida Wednesday night.The shield, which was extensively tested with high-temperature arc-jets at Johnson Space Center and the Ames Research Center, is built to withstand more than 4,000 degrees Fahrenheit.In January 2012, Lockheed Martin contractors at the Waterton Facility near Denver built the shield's structure, a titanium skeleton and carbon fiber skin. Ablative material — fireproof material used to protect spacecraft entering and leaving the Earth's atmosphere — was then added at Textron Defense Systems in Boston.When the Orion launches on its first unmanned test flight in September, the heat shield will be in place for the two-orbit journey at an altitude of about 3,600 miles.Former NASA astronaut visits SDSUKFMB TVSan Diego State University Thursday welcomed a former astronaut to talk about life in space.Joseph Tanner is a former NASA astronaut and currently a professor at the University of Colorado, Boulder.His focus Thursday was on the challenges of assembling the International Space Station while in space."It's such a huge structure. And you couldn't just put it up in one piece. Had to go up in multiple sections. That was a real engineering, cooperative, international and national challenge," Tanner said.His visit is part of a lecture series hosts by the university's chapter of American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.END
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