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From: "Moon, Larry J. (JSC-EA411)" <larry.j.moon@nasa.gov>
Date: July 18, 2014 12:30:08 PM CDT
To: "Moon, Larry J. (JSC-EA411)" <larry.j.moon@nasa.gov>
Subject: FW: NASA and Human Spaceflight News - Friday – July 18, 2014
Happy Flex Friday. Be safe out there with all the wet roads and have a great weekend.NASA and Human Spaceflight NewsFriday – July 18, 2014HEADLINES AND LEADSAstronaut Hank Hartsfield, led first flight of space shuttle Discovery, dies at 80Robert Pearlman - collectSPACE.comNASA astronaut Henry "Hank" Hartsfield, who in 1984 commanded the maiden mission of the space shuttle Discovery, died on Thursday (July 17). He was 80.Celebrate 45 years since man's first steps on moonMarcia Dunn – Associated PressNow's the time to get moonstruck.Apollo 11 anniversary: 3 Huntsville events will spotlight flight, city's space history and future
Lee Roop – Huntsville (AL) TimesHas the Apollo 11 anniversary made you want to know more about Huntsville's history in America's missile and space programs? The U.S. Space & Rocket Center is hosting three events Friday and Sunday where you can learn about that history from the people who made it. As a bonus, you can hear where NASA's going next from people making it happen.Apollo 11 anniversary: Space Camp is not all about astronauts anymoreJohn Corrigan – Huntsville (AL) TimesAs we celebrate the 45th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission, we look back on the black-and-white photos, fuzzy interviews, and faded textbook pages documenting arguably America's greatest achievement--landing men on the moon.US Too Dependent on Russian Rocket Engines, Experts Tell LawmakersElizabeth Howell - Space.comShould the Russian government yank its supply of rocket engines for United States launches, critical national-security satellite missions could be delayed up to four years, experts told a joint Senate hearing Wednesday (July 16).White House Seeking $40 Million To Explore Engine OptionsMike Gruss – Space NewsThe White House is asking Congress for $40 million next year to examine options for a new U.S.-built rocket engine, according to a U.S. lawmaker.#LightBoxFF: Transmissions from Space with NASA GoddardKrystal Grow – TIMEWelcome to this week's edition of TIME's LightBox Follow Friday, a series where we feature the work of photographers who are using Instagram in new and engaging ways. Each week we will introduce you to the person behind the feed through his or her pictures and share an interview with the photographer.NASA awards new HQ building contractJames Dean – Florida TodayA gleaming and "green" new headquarters building will rise at Kennedy Space Center over the next two years.Rocket science for lean times: Boeing's new gameJane Wells – CNBCBack when President John Kennedy urged the nation to get to the moon ASAP, or when America decided to send rovers to Mars, space programs benefited from a desire by the U.S. to explore beyond our planet—and stay one step ahead of potential adversaries.Soyuz TMA-14M Crew Discuss 'Regular and Normal' Mission to Space StationBen Evans – AmericaSpaceWith 10 weeks to go before they head into orbit for a six-month expedition to the International Space Station (ISS), the joint U.S.-Russian crew of Soyuz TMA-14M assembled before an audience of journalists, students, and social media yesterday (Wednesday, 16 July) at NASA's Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston, Texas, to discuss their upcoming mission. Russian cosmonauts Aleksandr Samokutyayev and Yelena Serova—the latter of whom will become only the fourth Russian woman in history to venture into space and the first to embark on a mission to the ISS—and U.S. astronaut Barry "Butch" Wilmore are expected to launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on the night of 25/26 September for a 167-day expedition that will feature several Visiting Vehicles and as many as three EVAs.An End to Stinky Space Clothes?Irene Klotz – Discovery NewsNASA is working on a low-tech solution to the problem of clothing its astronauts and others living aboard the International Space Station.Could We Find Alien Life in 20 Years? That's Up For DebateKeith Wagstaff – NBC NewsIn "Star Trek" lore, humans meet their first aliens in 2063. It turns out that we might not need to wait that long — at least according to some optimistic scientists who claim that we should find evidence of alien life within the next two decades.Two-faced? Rosetta's target comet may have a split personalityAmina Khan – Los Angeles TimesThe comet-chasing Rosetta spacecraft may have a surprise waiting when it narrows in on its target: It's a twofer!COMPLETE STORIESAstronaut Hank Hartsfield, led first flight of space shuttle Discovery, dies at 80Robert Pearlman - collectSPACE.com
NASA astronaut Henry "Hank" Hartsfield, who in 1984 commanded the maiden mission of the space shuttle Discovery, died on Thursday (July 17). He was 80.Hartsfield's death came as a result of complications from back surgery he had several months ago, according to his fellow astronaut and STS-41D crewmember Mike Mullane."Obviously, I have many, many memories of my time with Hank," Mullane wrote online on Thursday. "He was a great commander and pilot and I'll always feel honored to have been a member of his crew."Hartsfield became a NASA astronaut in September 1969, just two months after the first moon landing. He waited 13 years to make his first spaceflight, serving as the pilot on shuttle Columbia's STS-4 mission, the fourth and final test flight of the winged orbiter program.Launching on Columbia on June 27, 1982, Hartsfield and commander Thomas "Ken" Mattingly circled the Earth 112 times while performing experiments and operating a pair of classified missile launch-detection systems. Returning to Earth a week later on Independence Day, the STS-4 crew was greeted by then-President and First Lady Ronald and Nancy Reagan at Edwards Air Force Base in California.The STS-4 mission was the last to be flown before NASA declared the space shuttle operational."'Operational,' to me, is a tough term to explain," Hartsfield told collectSPACE.com in a 2006 interview. "In my view, the whole time we were flying [the space shuttle] it was a test vehicle, although we called it operational. We used it and did a lot of great things [but it was not] operational by the way I look at it, having been a test pilot and looking at airplanes."Hartsfield's second shuttle mission assignment came two years later as the commander Discovery's first flight, but the STS-41D mission set another first before ever leaving the launch pad.Originally scheduled to lift off in June 1984, Hartsfield and his crew of five were just four seconds from launch when a faulty main engine forced the shuttle program's first-ever abort, followed by a hydrogen fire on the pad. It took two months to recover, but Discovery safely launched on Aug. 30 on a six-day flight to deploy communication satellites and conduct science.During the mission, Hartsfield and his crewmates gained a nickname, the "Icebusters," after using the shuttle robotic arm to successfully knock off a hazardous ice buildup on the outside of the orbiter."We had to get rid of the icicle because if it stayed on there, the concern was that when we started entry [back into the Earth atmosphere] it was just about the right place to break off and then hit the [Orbital Maneuvering System] pod," Hartsfield explained in a 2001 NASA interview. "If you hit the OMS pod and broke those tiles... that's where the propellant is for the OMS engines, you know, and that is not a good thing to have happen.""I operated the arm and broke the icicle off," he recalled. "We were really relieved to see that go away."Hartsfield returned to orbit for his third and final flight as commander of Challenger's STS-61A mission in October 1985. In addition to being the first flight to be funded and directed by a foreign country (the former West Germany, overseeing the European-built Spacelab module mounted in Challenger's payload bay), the eight-member 61A crew set the record for the most astronauts to launch and land on the same spacecraft.The seven-day flight conducted more than 75 experiments over the course of 112 orbits, marking the last time space shuttle Challenger would fly in space. The orbiter was lost in flight in January 1986.With STS-61A's landing, Hartsfield had logged a total of 20 days, 2 hours and 50 minutes in space, having circled the Earth 321 times."I flew on Columbia, Challenger and Discovery," Hartsfield told collectSPACE.com in 2009. "I was fortunate to be the commander of the first flight of Discovery, and [it] turned out to be a pretty doggoned good bird."Henry Warren Hartsfield, Jr. was born on Nov. 21, 1933 in Birmingham, Alabama. He earned his bachelor of science degree in physics at Auburn University in 1954, performed graduate work in physics and astronautics at the Air Force Institute of Technology and Duke University, and received his master of science degree in engineering science from the University of Tennessee in 1971.Hartsfield joined the Air Force in 1955 and graduated from the test pilot school at Edwards Air Force Base, where he was serving as an instructor when he was recruited as an astronaut trainee for the Manned Orbital Laboratory. The project would have seen Hartsfield fly to space onboard a Gemini spacecraft to work on a reconnaissance platform, had it not been canceled in 1969.With the end of the MOL program, Hartsfield and six other trainees transferred to NASA's astronaut corps. Before his own three shuttle flights, Hartsfield served on the support crews for the fifth moon landing, Apollo 16 in April 1972, and for all three missions to the United States' first space station, Skylab, between May 1973 and February 1974.Hartsfield retired from the Air Force in 1977 but continued at NASA well beyond his time flying in space. He served as the deputy chief of the astronaut office and the deputy director of flight crew operations at Johnson Space Center in Houston before holding management positions at NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C. and at Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.Before leaving NASA in 1998 to become an executive at the Raytheon Corp., Hartsfield helped set the ground work for the International Space Station, serving as the deputy manager of the space station projects office, among other positions related to the orbiting laboratory. He retired from Raytheon in 2005.Awarded Air Force and NASA medals and the recipient of the 1973 Gen. Thomas D. White Space Trophy, Hartsfield was inducted into the Alabama Aviation Hall of Fame in 1983 and U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame in 2006. Hartsfield was bestowed an honorary doctor of science degree from his alma mater, Auburn University, in 1986.Hartsfield is survived by his wife Judy Frances Massey, daughter Judy and two grandchildren. He was preceded in death by his daughter Keely, who worked as a contractor to the space shuttle program and died in March 2014.Celebrate 45 years since man's first steps on moonMarcia Dunn – Associated PressNow's the time to get moonstruck.Forty-five years ago Sunday, Apollo 11's Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first humans to set foot on another world. Armstrong's "one small step ... one giant leap" on the dusty lunar surface July 20, 1969, still stirs hearts.You can join the celebration, without needing to travel to the launch site at Florida's Kennedy Space Center, where NASA will honor Armstrong on Monday with a renaming ceremony of the historic Operations and Checkout Building. Both Aldrin and Michael Collins, the Apollo 11 command module pilot who orbited the moon, will be there.At the very least, walk out and wink at the moon this weekend."For those who may ask what they can do to honor Neil, we have a simple request," the Armstrong family said in a statement after his death in 2012. "Honor his example of service, accomplishment and modesty, and the next time you walk outside on a clear night and see the moon smiling down at you, think of Neil Armstrong and give him a wink."Some other easy ways to get swept up in moon fever:—Follow along on Twitter as the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum recreates, in 140 characters or less per tweet, the eight-day flight, which began with the Saturn V liftoff on July 16, 1969, and ended with a Pacific spashdown on July 24, 1969—Tune in to NASA TV via cable, satellite or computer late Sunday night. The space agency will broadcast restored footage of Armstrong and Aldrin's lunar footsteps, beginning at 10:39 p.m. EDT, the exact time Armstrong opened the Eagle's hatch 45 years ago. Take pleasure in knowing this is the first major Apollo 11 anniversary in which the events fall on the same day of the week as they did in 1969.—Check out your local science museum or planetarium for anniversary events. The Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in New York City, for example, has a bevy of astronauts on tap as part of its space and science festival. Aldrin is the featured speaker Friday. The five-day festival runs through Sunday.The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex will have an appearance Sunday by former astronaut Bruce McCandless, who served as the Mission Control capsule communicator, or capcom, in Houston as Armstrong and Aldrin walked on the moon. It's his voice that the moonwalkers heard. McCandless later went on to his own fame as the free-flying, untethered spaceman who tested NASA's manned maneuvering unit, or jetpack, during a shuttle flight in 1984.The USS Hornet Museum in Alameda, California, also has nabbed Aldrin for its 45th anniversary festivities — Splashdown 45 — next Saturday, July 26. The aircraft carrier recovered the Apollo 11 crew and capsule, the Columbia, from the Pacific following splashdown. President Richard Nixon was on board to welcome Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins home.—Slooh Observatory will broadcast high-definition images of the lunar surface Sunday night, along with a panel discussion, beginning at 8:30 P.M. EDT.—Pull out the popcorn and relive NASA's early glory days through documentaries and films. Some choices: "The Right Stuff" from 1983, "For All Mankind" documentary from 1989, "Apollo 13" from 1995, "From the Earth to the Moon" TV miniseries from 1998, and "The Dish" from 2000, certainly the funniest and sweetest as it chronicles Australia's key role in the moon landing.Apollo 11 anniversary: 3 Huntsville events will spotlight flight, city's space history and future
Lee Roop – Huntsville (AL) TimesHas the Apollo 11 anniversary made you want to know more about Huntsville's history in America's missile and space programs? The U.S. Space & Rocket Center is hosting three events Friday and Sunday where you can learn about that history from the people who made it. As a bonus, you can hear where NASA's going next from people making it happen.1. "City of Smoke and Fire" is a free panel discussion Friday at 4 p.m. on Huntsville's history in rocketry and propulsion that started before NASA even existed. Panelists will discuss the Army Ballistic Missile Agency formed here in 1956, NASA's Saturn V and space shuttle programs and what space people are calling "America's Next Great Ship – NASA's Space Launch System."Panelists include Dr. Bill Lucas, former director of Marshall Space Flight Center; Jim Odom, retired NASA engineer and Hubble Space Telescope program manager; Steve Cash, former space shuttle propulsion office manager; and Alex Priskos, Space Launch System booster element manager.2. The "Space Exploration Celebration" Friday from 5:30-9 p.m. is a ticketed reunion of space workers and the public that supports the space program. This event features a talk by current NASA Associate Administrator Robert Lightfoot and appearances by astronauts Robert "Hoot" Gibson and Bob Springer. There is a $25 ticket charge, and more information is here.3. Spend Sunday afternoon at back-to-back events starting with a 1:30 p.m. panel discussion of the Apollo missions with Dr. Chuck Lundquist, Brooks Moore, Kenny Mitchell, Ed Buckbee and Alex McCool moderated by astronaut Don Thomas. Moore and McCool were featured in AL.com's coverage of the Apollo 11 mission. At 3 p.m., Thomas will discuss "The Day a Woodpecker Attacked the Space Shuttle" and sign copies of his book "Orbit of Discovery."All of the events take place in the Saturn V Hall of the space center's Davidson Center for Space Exploration. That's where a real Saturn V is hanging suspended from the ceiling, and a chance to see that rocket is a bonus feature of all three events.Apollo 11 anniversary: Space Camp is not all about astronauts anymoreJohn Corrigan – Huntsville (AL) TimesAs we celebrate the 45th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission, we look back on the black-and-white photos, fuzzy interviews, and faded textbook pages documenting arguably America's greatest achievement--landing men on the moon.But what about today?Enter Zachary Mutty and Emma Loudn--recent graduates of Space Academy at the U.S. Space and Rocket Center.You might be wondering why these kids would willingly spend a week of their vacation learning about a defunct program. After all, NASA shut down the Space Shuttle operation in August of 2011.Well, there's a whole lot more to space than astronauts."I've always wanted to be an aerospace engineer," Mutty, a high school sophomore from Spotsylvania, Virginia, said."I'm really interested in being an astrophysicist," said Loudn, a high school junior from Park City, Utah. "Space is so huge-it's infinite. I don't think there's a single boring thing that the space program has learned. There are always new questions being raised."Working with simulated spacecraft design and mission control, Mutty and Loudn bunkered down in Huntsville during the second week of July. They're just two of hundreds of students from all 50 states and more than 60 foreign countries who attend Space Camp as well as Aviation Challenge and robotics camp each year.Space Camp opened in 1982 as the brainchild of local icon Dr. Wernher von Braun, the rocket scientist who directed the Marshall Space Flight Center and laid the groundwork for propelling the Apollo 11 spacecraft to the moon.Von Braun believed young people deserved an experience similar to exploring outer space and for more than 30 years, children have shared in that surreal experienceHowever, it's been almost half a century since Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin walked on the moon.Mutty's parents were only a year or two old, and some of these space campers' parents weren't even born yet."My mom remembers sitting with her grandparents watching it on TV," Loudn said.Due to the power of the internet, Mutty and Loudn have been able to watch the landing and appreciate the groundbreaking, intricate process behind launching the Saturn V rocket."Considering phones in our pockets today have (more) computing power than the space shuttle had, it's incredible," Mutty said."It was an absolutely incredible engineering and technological feat that proved to be beneficial not just for the United States but for everyone," Loudn said. "It unified humankind."With the space program's current limbo -- Marshall Space Flight Center is working on a deep-space rocket, but the mission for that rocket and long-term funding isn't yet clear -- the future remains as mysterious as the vast black surrounding of Earth."I hope that we continue to go farther and farther," Mutty said. "We have so many galaxies and so many things to do-we have so much to still learn. If you look into the sky, we don't know what half the stuff is."Forty-five years from now, what achievements will Mutty, Loudn, and the rest of the space cadets be celebrating?US Too Dependent on Russian Rocket Engines, Experts Tell LawmakersElizabeth Howell - Space.comShould the Russian government yank its supply of rocket engines for United States launches, critical national-security satellite missions could be delayed up to four years, experts told a joint Senate hearing Wednesday (July 16).United Launch Alliance's (ULA) Atlas 5 rocket is the workhorse of heavy satellite launches in the United States, but the booster requires a Russian RD-180 engine to get off the ground.Recent geopolitical disputes between Russia and the United States have thrown this arrangement, which has been in place for decades, into turmoil. In Twitter remarks in May, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin threatened to ban all sales of RD-180 engines to the United States intended for use in military launches."If you look at what has happened to us now in the past few months, it points to a vulnerability," Gen. William Shelton, head of Air Force Space Command, told senators in remarks broadcast on the web from Washington, D.C."We decided to rely on a foreign supplier — with probably the most advanced rocket engine in the world, by the way — and that has worked extremely well," added Shelton, who said that it is nevertheless time to look to new strategies for the future.The hearing included the Senate subcommittee on strategic forces and the committee on commerce, science and transportation.Limited engine stockpileThe Atlas 5 and ULA's Delta 4 carry the bulk of Air Force satellites into space, under a package deal in which the Air Force agreed to buy up to 36 evolved expendable launch vehicles from ULA. Fourteen other missions are up for bids. (This deal has come under fire by SpaceX, which wants the chance to compete for military launches with its Falcon 9 rocket.)ULA has just 15 RD-180 engines left in its stockpile. The U.S. military currently uses about six to seven rockets a year, but other government agencies such as NASA also require Atlas 5 launches, Shelton said. The Delta 4 can only carry smaller and medium-sized satellites, but that rocket could take on some of the burden."We've got to ramp up the production of our Delta factory, which would take some time. That would stretch out launches maybe 12 to 20 months, and for the heavier missions maybe 48 months," Shelton said.While SpaceX could be certified as early as this year, the Falcon 9 rocket is only capable of taking on medium-sized or smaller satellites, said Alan Estevez, the principal deputy under-secretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics.It would take five to eight years to develop an American alternative to the RD-180 engine, he estimated. Estevez's department is doing a financial assessment of how to replace the RD-180, which should be complete in September.Space station also affectedAccess to space could also affect the International Space Station, although a representative for NASA said that relations with Russia remain smooth so far."There's no change to behavior at all," said NASA associate administrator Robert Lightfoot. "Our teams are working together with the Russians very well to continue space station operations."That said, Rogozin also quipped via Twitter a few months ago that if the United States wants to send its astronauts to space alone, it should use a trampoline. All American crewmembers have launched to the orbiting lab aboard Russian Soyuz capsules since NASA retired its space shuttle fleet in 2011.While NASA is encouraging the development of private American astronaut taxis through its commercial crew program, such spaceships likely won't be ready until 2017 at the earliest. Lightfoot said that even with more money, it would be difficult to push the readiness date up given there are certain checks and milestones that would have to be achieved.Russians also operate several "key components" on the space station, added Lightfoot, saying that NASA would have to look at the situation more closely if relations between the two nations soured further.White House Seeking $40 Million To Explore Engine OptionsMike Gruss – Space NewsThe White House is asking Congress for $40 million next year to examine options for a new U.S.-built rocket engine, according to a U.S. lawmaker.The proposed amendment to the 2015 defense budget request, originally submitted in February, was disclosed by Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) July 16 during a hearing on U.S. space launch capabilities. U.S. government witnesses agreed during the hearing that developing a new U.S. rocket engine is a priority, but were unable to map out a clear path forward."We want to do this right," said Alan Estevez, principal deputy to the U.S. undersecretary of defense for acquisition, technology and logistics.The unusual joint hearing of the Senate Armed Services and Commerce, Science and Transportation committees, which oversee the Pentagon and NASA, respectively, focused mainly on the engine issue, which has come to the fore in recent months due to questions about the long-term availability of the Russian-built power plant for one of the two primary rockets in the U.S. fleet. The Russian RD-180 engine powers United Launch Alliance's Atlas 5, which launches nearly all of civilian science and weather satellites and, together with the company's Delta 4, virtually all national security missions.The White House position on the new engine, while supportive, appears to be more cautious than that of the House, which in June passed a defense spending bill that provides $220 million next year for a crash program to develop a new liquid-fueled rocket engine. In reaction to the bill, the White House said it opposes the expenditure, arguing that new engine would take eight years to develop at a cost of $1.5 billion, and require another $3 billion investment in a new rocket to go with it.The Obama administration instead advocated studying "several cost-effective options" for reducing U.S. reliance on Russian engine technology, including "multiple awards that will drive innovation, stimulate the industrial base, and reduce costs through competition."The Senate Appropriations defense subcommittee, for its part, has drafted a Pentagon spending bill that includes just $25 million for engine development.During the hearing, government witnesses said a new engine could take five to eight years and cost $2 billion to develop.Sessions called the time line "unacceptable" and said he was hoping for a quicker solution.Estevez and Gen. William Shelton, commander of Air Force Space Command, said the Air Force does not yet know the best route to develop an engine. The Air Force is studying the question and hopes to have some answers by September, they said.Mitch Mitchell, vice president of program assessments at the Aerospace Corp., who led a high-profile report on RD-180 risk mitigation strategies for the Defense Department, said no single company currently has all the answers. "That's going to take some time," he said.Shelton and other panel members laid out a worst-case scenario in which Russia's leadership refused to sell any more RD-180 engines to the United States. That could delay missions by 12-48 months, cost more than $1.5 billion and put some of the Air Force's satellite constellations at risk."It is dire if that should happen," Shelton said.While many national security satellites currently slated for Atlas 5 launches could be moved to the Delta 4, the change would come at a significant cost.Shelton and Robert Lightfoot, NASA's associate administrator, stressed, however, they had not seen any indications of a production slowdown on RD-180 engines, which today are used exclusively on the Atlas 5.Space Exploration Technologies Corp.'s Falcon 9 rocket, which is undergoing certification to carry U.S. military satellites, cannot launch seven of the 10 types of missions the Atlas 5 currently flies, Shelton said. He did not specify how often the Atlas 5 flies in these unique mission configurations.If all goes smoothly, Shelton said, SpaceX, which is seeking to break ULA's stranglehold the U.S. national security launch market, could earn certification as early as December 2014. The Air Force is reviewing data from three recent SpaceX flights that were required as part of the certification process.However, Shelton said there have already been disagreements between SpaceX and the service on three of the engineering review boards the two sides have completed. Sixteen more review boards remain, he said.#LightBoxFF: Transmissions from Space with NASA GoddardKrystal Grow – TIMEWelcome to this week's edition of TIME's LightBox Follow Friday, a series where we feature the work of photographers who are using Instagram in new and engaging ways. Each week we will introduce you to the person behind the feed through his or her pictures and share an interview with the photographer.This week on #LightBoxFF, TIME speaks with Rebecca Roth, who runs the Instagram feed at NASA Goddard (@nasagoddard), the agency's research lab in Greenbelt, MD. Roth says that social media has drastically changed the way NASA communicates with the world, and has made space exploration accessible and immediate to a new generation.LightBox: How has communication at NASA Goddard changed with social media, and what does Instagram provide that other platforms don't?RR: Social media has opened a direct line of communication for NASA Goddard with the public, and not only here in the United States but all over the world. In the past we were limited to reaching media via faxes and press releases and then reaching the public with mostly content on our web pages, and so much would go unnoticed. Now we get to post and engage with the public in the places were they are already spending their time; Instagram, Flickr, Twitter, Facebook, etc. It's wonderful because we are able to create and share videos, images and stories with the public and teach them something new everyday…and in real time.Because Instagram is mostly optimized for mobile users and is all about images, it's been a great way to reach people who maybe were not already interested in 'space stuff.' A stunningly beautiful image maybe catches someone's eye, and then they'll read the caption, learn all about the satellite that caught that image, and share that image with their friends.LightBox: In a facility like NASA Goddard, where amazing research and incredible projects are happening all the time, how do you decide what photos to post, and where do those images actually come from?RR: We try to share every story on at least one of our social media platforms, but when it comes to our Instagram account, I've tried hard to post really compelling images with great stories laced with tidbits of interesting information. I always try to share different types of images and limit posts to one or two a day. Many of our images come from stories about the various missions we manage at NASA Goddard like the Hubble Space Telescope, the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) and from our fleet of Earth observing satellites like Landsat 8.Goddard is also home to the world's largest clean room where currently our engineers are assembling components of the James Webb Space Telescope. It's scheduled for launch in 2018 where it will find the first galaxies that formed in the early universe, and we've posted some great pictures from that cleanroom. We also post employees in laboratories making discoveries and building new technologies, scientists out in the field, even VIP visitors who visit Goddard.LightBox: How do people tend to react to the images posted, and what is the most popular photo currently on the feed?RR: We tend to receive a huge percent of very positive comments. I'd say the top three types of comments would be; "Thank you NASA", "That is cool, I've never seen anything like it" and "Thanks for the great caption." We try hard to include easily digestible, educational captions with all of our images. Our most viewed image on Instagram has over 412,000 "likes", it's from the polar vortex this past winter.LightBox: Do you think Instagram and social media has changed the way the public interacts with NASA/NASA Goddard?RR: I do believe it has made a difference. We are able to reach and interact with people of all ages, from all walks of life, from all over the world in a way that we were never able to in the past. Our mission is to increase the amount of great educational content being shared on social media sites and to do it in a way that really has an impact on people, and we feel we've been able to do that.NASA awards new HQ building contractJames Dean – Florida TodayA gleaming and "green" new headquarters building will rise at Kennedy Space Center over the next two years.NASA on Thursday announced the award of a two-year, $64.8 million contract to build the multi-story structure to Hensel Phelps Construction Co. of Orlando.The new building will be the centerpiece of what KSC calls the Central Campus, an initiative to replace aging Industrial Area facilities with more energy-efficient structures occupying a smaller footprint.It will replace the center's existing headquarters, a roughly 50-year-old building that eventually will be razed.NASA did not detail the new building's design Thursday, but a contract solicitation last year said it would stand eight stories tall and total about 200,000 square feet.The first floor will house a cafeteria with an indoor-outdoor seating area, a credit union, barber shop, post office, large lobby with displays, gift shop, library and other services.Floors two through seven feature offices, conference rooms and break areas, topped by an eighth floor of mechanical support systems.An artist's rendering shows one side of the rectangular structure anchored by a slightly taller, curving white tower.The project was expected to be completed in two phases, according to a 2012 press release.Overall, Central Campus plans call for the demolition of about 900,000 square feet of space and construction of modern facilities taking up half as much area.NASA estimates the consolidation and reduced operations and maintenance costs will save $400 million over 40 years."We're going to see a dramatic return on investment with new facilities," Trey Carlson, KSC's master planner, said in the 2012 release."With a constrained budget forecast, we owe it to ourselves to look at options of how to operate the Center in a more sustainable manner."With the shuttle program's retirement in 2011 and tight budgets for space programs and keeping the center running, KSC is trying to "right-size" a sprawling inventory of more than 700 facilities on the 140,000-acre spaceport, a number of which NASA no longer need.Some facilities, like a launch pad, former shuttle hangars and a runway, are being leased to commercial companies or other government agencies. Others are being knocked down.The consolidation effort is a "major component" of the center's recently released 20-year master plan."The Central Campus concept supports efforts to slowly, but strategically, recapitalize dispersed non-hazardous functions and capabilities into more efficient facilities with a smaller operational footprint," states the plan's executive summary.NASA in 2011 awarded an architectural contract worth up to $25 million for design and engineering development of the Central Campus Complex.The new headquarters building will strive to achieve platinum certification under the U.S. Green Building Council Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards.Contract options announced Thursday include seven dual station electric vehicle battery charge stations in parking areas and the use of LED light fixtures instead of fluorescent and compact light fixtures.Rocket science for lean times: Boeing's new gameJane Wells – CNBCBack when President John Kennedy urged the nation to get to the moon ASAP, or when America decided to send rovers to Mars, space programs benefited from a desire by the U.S. to explore beyond our planet—and stay one step ahead of potential adversaries.In those days, NASA had a bigger budget and was able to give lots of money to a few key contractors for large projects. The benefits seemed obvious. Americans would get to the moon and Mars first, ahead of the Russians. Also, the technology coming out of those endeavors made lives down on Earth easier—GPS, cordless tools, smoke detectors, satellite TV.Then the Cold War ended, a couple of space shuttle missions turned disastrous, and everything got a lot more expensive. NASA took a back seat in both hearts and minds.Read More An inside look at Boeing's space taxiThe last decade, however, has seen a renewed interest in space, thanks to private sector billionaires with deep pockets and a long time horizon: Elon Musk, Richard Branson, Paul Allen, Robert Bigelow, Jeff Bezos. They've changed the way the space business is conducted, and NASA has adapted to survive.So have older partners like Boeing."What we will do in the future has been less certain," said John Elbon, Boeing's VP and general manager for space exploration. "There's been a lot of morphing, a lot of new competition, a lot of change in programs, and so that's changed the way we approach things."One of new approaches is the way NASA is only partially funding three competitors for a space taxi to take astronauts to the International Space Station. One of the bidders is Boeing, and if it loses the contract to a relative start-up like SpaceX or Sierra Nevada, it will further signal that a past relationship with NASA doesn't guarantee a future one.However, some programs are being handled in more traditional ways, programs that are so expensive and considered so important that only a government agency with billions of dollars can fund it. One such program is the Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, which Boeing will have a huge part in. NASA just awarded the company $2.8 billion to build the core part of the heavy lift rocket, which will take a space capsule built by Lockheed Martin called the Orion deeper into space, possibly even sending astronauts to Mars someday."The SLS is an amazing rocket; it's bigger than the Apollo rocket that took us to the moon," Elbon said.Boeing will be using a lot of rocket science from the shuttle program in the SLS, but Elbon expects new technology to help reduce the cost of manufacturing and operating the one or two rockets a year NASA may need. What about reusing rockets? SpaceX is working on that technology."If an aircraft was thrown away after every flight, nobody would be able to afford to fly," SpaceX's Musk said in May, suggesting reusable rockets are necessary for space to become affordable.The SLS, however, will not be reusable."I think it's feasible for rockets of the size that SpaceX is working on," Elbon said. "For rockets like the SLS, at least with the tools that we have today, I don't think that's a reasonable design goal, at least at this point."Taxpayers will eye all of this with a critical eye. Why spend billions to go to Mars? Why even continue supporting the space station?"There's a job for us to do of educating the public on, first of all, the small amount that is spent, and secondly, the incredible benefits that come from that, that affect us here on Earth," Elbon said.He said the total NASA budget is 0.4 percent of national spending. What do we get for that? Research and, sometimes, results."Research in protein crystal growth (done on the space station) has very high potential of leading to a cure for Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. It's an awful disease," Elbon said. "Because of research done on (the) station, there's now a treatment for that being tested in Osaka, Japan."Still, in a company the size of Boeing, space contracts are a lot harder to win than orders for 787s, and the space division is not the revenue generator it once was."If you look at our balance sheet, our revenues, it's not a huge percentage of what the Boeing Company does," Elbon admited. "If you look at our brand and the things that we advertise, the things that we identify with—space, human space flight, is real important to what we do."Yet the company must survive in a much tougher environment facing smaller, nimbler, well-funded players who don't have to answer to shareholders. Elbon is optimistic."Boeing is an aerospace company," he said. "Human spaceflight is kind of the cutting edge of aerospace, and it's incredibly important that we're involved in that, that we're a leader in that."Soyuz TMA-14M Crew Discuss 'Regular and Normal' Mission to Space StationBen Evans – AmericaSpaceWith 10 weeks to go before they head into orbit for a six-month expedition to the International Space Station (ISS), the joint U.S.-Russian crew of Soyuz TMA-14M assembled before an audience of journalists, students, and social media yesterday (Wednesday, 16 July) at NASA's Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston, Texas, to discuss their upcoming mission. Russian cosmonauts Aleksandr Samokutyayev and Yelena Serova—the latter of whom will become only the fourth Russian woman in history to venture into space and the first to embark on a mission to the ISS—and U.S. astronaut Barry "Butch" Wilmore are expected to launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on the night of 25/26 September for a 167-day expedition that will feature several Visiting Vehicles and as many as three EVAs.The mission is scheduled to begin with a nocturnal launch from Baikonur, after which Soyuz TMA-14M will follow the now-customary six-hour rendezvous profile to reach the ISS. This will produce a docking at the station's space-facing (or "zenith") Poisk module. With the exception of Soyuz TMA-12M earlier this year, all piloted missions since March 2013—five in total—have successfully executed these "fast rendezvous" regimes. Although highly complex in terms of the timing of maneuvers and orbital mechanics, the fast rendezvous is tailored in part to help reduce stress on the crew and alleviate the risk of nausea or motion sickness in the cramped Soyuz.With Samokutyayev commanding Soyuz TMA-14M for the journey to the ISS, he will occupy the center seat aboard the spacecraft. A 44-year-old colonel in the Russian Air Force, Samokutyayev is a former squadron commander, veteran parachutist, and qualified diver and was selected as a cosmonaut in 2003. He first flew aboard Soyuz TMA-21, launching alongside Russian cosmonaut Andrei Borisenko and U.S. astronaut Ron Garan in April 2011. The trio spent 5.5 months aboard the ISS, forming the second half of Expedition 27 and the "core" of Expedition 28. During the course of the mission, Samokutyayev participated in a 6.5-hour EVA and accrued 164 days in orbit. Soyuz TMA-14M will be Samokutyayev's second space mission.Thirty-eight-year-old Yelena Serova will take the left-side "Flight Engineer-1" position aboard Soyuz TMA-14M. Selected as a cosmonaut candidate in 2006, she is a qualified aerospace engineer and veteran of both RSC Energia and Russian Mission Control and will be embarking on her first flight. In doing so, she will become only the fourth Russian woman—after Valentina Tereshkova in 1963, Svetlana Savitskaya in 1982, and Yelena Kondakova in 1994—to participate in a space mission, only the second to fly a long-duration expedition, and the first to fly aboard the ISS. Asked about this achievement by a member of the JSC audience, she was philosophical. Appearing non-plussed by the question, Serova replied that she does "not see my flying as such an outstanding event," adding with a smile that it is a "regular and normal occurrence; nothing special … as far as spaceflights go!"The final member of the Soyuz TMA-14M is 51-year-old Barry "Butch" Wilmore, who will occupy the right-hand "Flight Engineer-2" seat aboard the spacecraft. He was selected by NASA as a shuttle pilot in 2000 and a veteran of STS-129, an 11-day mission in November 2009. A captain in the U.S. Navy, Wilmore responded to one student's question about the psychological aspects of remaining in space for six months by drawing upon his military career. He explained that he had participated in several lengthy tours at sea, in the days before email and Twitter, and that he had learned to "compartmentalize" his tasks to remain focused. However, he added that his wife had been given an iPad and that he would be having weekly videoconferences with his family from orbit.Asked about the differences between training for a shuttle flight and an ISS expedition, Wilmore's response was simple: the Russian language. By his own admission, he struggled with languages and knows from experience that, despite English being the "standard" aboard the station, he and his crewmates frequently use a mixture of words from each other's native tongues ("Russlish") to make themselves known and help each other out.Following pressure and leak checks, the hatches between Soyuz TMA-14M and the space station will be opened and Samokutyayev, Serova, and Wilmore will board the ISS, to be greeted by the incumbent Expedition 41 crew of Russian cosmonaut Maksim Surayev, U.S. astronaut Reid Wiseman, and Germany's Alexander Gerst. The latter were launched in late May and will remain aboard the station until November.Aside from acclimatizing with their new environment, Samokutyayev, Serova, and Wilmore were united in their desire to head for a window almost as soon as they boarded the ISS. And one window—or, rather, windows—will top the list: the multi-windowed cupola, near the end of the Tranquility node. Reflecting on the fact that he had barely 20 minutes of "free" time on STS-129 to gaze at the beauty of the Home Planet, Wilmore said that would "look forward to sticking my nose in the cupola for at least two revolutions of the Earth." Of course, the cupola, launched in February 2010, was not yet in place when Wilmore lasted visited the ISS, but for Samokutyayev it was and he remembers it fondly as the first place he floated to when he arrived in April 2011. Answering a question from Jim Oberg, the cosmonaut described dreaming of having a 360-degree view of Earth and compared the cupola as like a hatch in the roof of his car.Oberg pressed him on which windows in the Russian Orbital Segment (ROS) he particularly enjoyed, and Samokutyayev replied that Window No. 9 was his personal favorite and enabled him to acquire good quality photography. This is one of 14 windows in the Zvezda service module and is set into a flared "skirt" section between the main living and working compartments. It measures 16 inches (41 cm) in diameter. Upon hearing Samokutyayev's words, Wilmore told the audience that the crew actually designed its Soyuz TMA-14M spacecraft patch around Window No. 9. The patch shows an arriving Soyuz spacecraft, together with elements of the ISS structure—including solar arrays—brilliantly lit in the reddish-orange glow of orbital sunrise, as viewed through the large observation window. In a CollectSpace.com description of the patch, "the rising Sun announces dawn and a new expedition on the orbital research facility, expanding our knowledge and preparing for new destinations."When Samokutyayev, Serova, and Wilmore arrive at the station, they will do so at a particularly busy time. The fifth and final Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV)-5, named in honor of the Belgian priest and astronomer Georges Lemaître, is scheduled for launch atop an Ariane 5 booster from the Guiana Space Centre in Kourou, French Guiana, on 25 July. Provided by the European Space Agency (ESA), this cargo craft will remain docked at the aft end of Zvezda from mid-August until late January 2015. Also attached to the ISS—assuming current planning runs to schedule—will be SpaceX's fourth dedicated Dragon cargo mission (SpX-4), which will launch atop a Falcon 9 v1.1 rocket from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Fla., on 12 September, and berth at the Earth-facing (or "nadir") port of the Harmony node about two days later. Dragon will remain berthed at the station for about a month, before being robotically detached and returned to Earth on 18 October.In fact, almost the entirety of Samokutyayev, Serova, and Wilmore's six-month mission will see a continuous ebb and flow of Visiting Vehicles from Russia, the United States, Europe, and Japan. Following the departure of SpX-4, Orbital Sciences Corp. plans to launch its third Cygnus cargo mission (ORB-3) on 21 October. Following its berthing at the Harmony nadir port—in a fashion not dissimilar to yesterday's arrival of ORB-2—on the 24th, Cygnus will remain in place for about a month, prior to unberthing and a destructive re-entry on 28 November. Three days later, on 1 December, SpaceX's fifth Dragon (SpX-5) will rocket toward the orbital outpost, berthing at the Harmony nadir on the 3rd and remaining until 8 January 2015.Two weeks after the Dragon departs, on 25 January, ATV-5 "Georges Lemaître" will itself depart the ISS, bound for a destructive descent into the upper atmosphere. And a few days after that, on 1 February, Japan's fifth H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV-5), known as "Kounotori" (or "White Swan"), will launch atop a H-II booster from the Tanegashima Space Centre in southern Japan. It will berth at the Harmony nadir port about three days later, although the current volume of ISS-bound traffic also shows the launch of the sixth Dragon (SpX-6) in the same timeframe. These manifests are subject to much adjustment in the coming months. Assuming HTV-5 Kounotori launches in early February, it is expected to be unberthed and de-orbited on about 8 March, just a few days before Samokutyayev, Serova, and Wilmore board Soyuz TMA-14M for their return to Earth on 12 March.Added to the mixture will be two Russian Progress vehicles, one to be launched in late October and another in early February, both of which will deliver food, fuel, water, and equipment to the crew.Seven weeks into Samokutyayev, Serova, and Wilmore's mission, the previous crew of Surayev, Wiseman, and Gerst will return to Earth aboard Soyuz TMA-13M on 10 November, completing 166 days in orbit. Surayev will hand command of the station over to Wilmore and the end of Expedition 41 will give way to the start of Expedition 42. The crew will work as a trio for two weeks, prior to the launch of Soyuz TMA-15M from Baikonur on 24 November, carrying Russian cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov, U.S. astronaut Terry Virts, and Italy's first female spacefarer, Sam Cristoforetti. Joining the new crew will be the first space espresso coffee machine ever to be delivered to the ISS. Following a six-hour "fast rendezvous," the new arrivals will dock at the Earth-facing ("nadir") Rassvet module and expand Expedition 42 to six-person strength, under Wilmore's command.Juxtaposed onto these arrivals and departures, the crew will participate in many scientific, biomedical, and technological investigations, as well as supporting the future development of the ISS itself. Samokutyayev and Maksim Surayev will perform an EVA from the Russian segment in October, one of whose objectives will be to install experiments to collect space dust samples for analysis of microbial development on external surfaces. In January-February 2015, Wilmore and Virts are expected to undertake a pair of spacewalks, clad in U.S. Extravehicular Mobility Units (EMUs). By this stage, the EMUs are expected to have been cleared for future EVA operations, following a lengthy investigation in the aftermath of the EVA-23 water intrusion incident in July 2013. Wilmore and Virts, who have described themselves as "the cable guys," will be routing umbilicals and utilities in readiness for the delivery and installation of two ISS Docking Adapters (IDAs) for Commercial Crew operations in the second half of the present decade. Both IDAs are expected to be transported to the ISS by SpaceX Dragon cargo missions in the late spring and late fall of 2015.In anticipation of the upcoming mission by Samokutyayev, Serova, and Wilmore, the Soyuz TMA-14M spacecraft arrived at the Tyuratam railhead on 26 May, for delivery to Baikonur for final pre-launch processing. Wilmore is expected to join his two Russian crewmates at the cosmonauts' training center in Zvezdny Gorodok ("Star City"), on the forested outskirts of Moscow, in mid-August, and the trio will fly to Baikonur in Kazakhstan—along with their backups, Russian cosmonauts Gennadi Padalka and Mikhail Kornienko and U.S. astronaut Scott Kelly—in early September, approximately two weeks ahead of liftoff.Asked what they will most look forward to on their six months in space, the sensations of weightlessness and the view of Earth seemed to predominate. Wilmore responded with just two words: "the cupola." Samokutyayev agreed, adding that "the visual perception of Earth" and that mere cameras are no substitute for the human eye. As for Serova, the only "rookie" member of the Soyuz TMA-14M crew, she is particularly excited to experience the peculiar "free fall" of microgravity for the first time. Plus, of course, she hopes that Wilmore will allow her into the cupola, once or twice, to take a look through its 360-degree panoramic windows. "I understand it's amazing," she said. "Simply fantastic!"An End to Stinky Space Clothes?Irene Klotz – Discovery NewsNASA is working on a low-tech solution to the problem of clothing its astronauts and others living aboard the International Space Station.With no washing machines and dryers aboard the outpost and limited water, astronauts simply discard their laundry and break open new packages of freshly washed clothes delivered to them in orbit via pricy freighters.NASA is looking to trim its delivery bill, which currently runs in the neighborhood of $40,000 per pound to orbit, and is testing whether astronauts will be happy with lighter-weight fabrics. Currently, the crew's wardrobe is made of cotton, which may not seem terribly heavy but consider this: for a crew of six, clothing accounts for more than 900 pounds of cargo per year.Traditional cotton garments also produce lint that gets trapped in the station's air filters, which then need to be cleaned more often, notes Evelyne Orndoff, a textiles scientist working at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.The agency also is looking ahead to the day when cargo deliveries will be few and far between — if they exist at all — as astronauts begin flying missions that take them much farther than the space station, which orbits about 260 miles above Earth.As a trial run, each of the six crewmembers currently aboard the station (two Americans, three Russians and one European) has a package of test clothing awaiting them aboard the Orbital Sciences Cygnus cargo ship that reached the station on Wednesday.The packs contain a mix of exercise clothes and routine daywear — T-shirts, shorts, cargo pants — made of alternative fabrics, such as polyester, wool and modacrylic.For added life, some of the exercise shirts and all of the shorts have been treated with the antimicrobial 3-(Trimethoxsilyl)propyldimethyloctadecyl ammonium chloride, manufactured by PureShield, Inc., under the brand name Bio-Protect 500, NASA said.Other exercise shirts are made with yarn containing an antimicrobial copper ion, a fabric treatment marketed by Cupron. All of the clothes were purchased in retail stores or online, Orndoff told Discovery News.Crewmembers have been asked to wear and tell. Researchers want to know if the clothes are comfortable in space. Do they feel itchy? Do they like wearing them? And, perhaps most important, when do the clothes get too smelly to wear?That last question is particularly important since current guidelines limit undergarment changes to every two days and pants and shorts to 30 days. The new fabrics might last even longer."We have instructed everybody to wait as long as you feel comfortable, but as soon as you feel gross or something don't just force yourself through," Orndoff said."They hopefully will know when to draw the line and not try to compete with each other," she said.Could We Find Alien Life in 20 Years? That's Up For DebateKeith Wagstaff – NBC NewsIn "Star Trek" lore, humans meet their first aliens in 2063. It turns out that we might not need to wait that long — at least according to some optimistic scientists who claim that we should find evidence of alien life within the next two decades."I think in the next 20 years we will find out we are not alone in the universe."Those words, from Kevin Hand, deputy chief scientist for solar system exploration at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, made headlines on Monday when he spoke them during a panel discussion.He's not the first one to make predictions of that kind. Russian astronomer Andrei Finkelstein gave the same time frame three years ago, and Seth Shostak, senior astronomer at the SETI Institute, has said we will discover a signal from intelligent life by 2025, only 11 years from now.Later, Hand told NBC News that he stood by his statement. Between the search for signals from alien civilizations, advanced telescopes examining atmospheres of exoplanets — planets that orbit stars other than the sun — and potential missions to Europa and Enceladus (the water-covered moons of Jupiter and Saturn, respectively), he said, it's not a stretch to think that we might find signs of life relatively soon."There are not tremendous technological hurdles to getting this kind of exploration done," Hand said. "It's not like we have to develop warp drive to search for life on Mars and Europa."It's more a matter of will than scientific know-how, he said. NASA's $8.8 billion James Webb Space Telescope is a good start. Slated to launch into orbit by 2018, it could detect signs of oxygen, methane or other signs of biological life on distant planets, although some scientists think that an even larger, more advanced telescope is needed to accomplish that goal.NASA's Curiosity rover, currently exploring Mars, could still find that the Red Planet was once home to life.But not all scientists are willing to name a specific number of years until we find traces of aliens — or if we will ever find them at all."Kevin Hand is a brilliant scientist, and the search for other life in the universe is probably the greatest human quest there is," Berkeley astronomer Geoffrey Marcy, who has discovered more exoplanets than anyone else on Earth, told NBC News."Having said that, we don't know if life exists elsewhere," he said. "This is a quest for a holy grail that might be easy to find, or it might be that life in the universe is extraordinarily rare. We have no idea which of those two possibilities might be true."There are theories as to how common life is in the universe. But until we actually observe signs of life, we can't be sure, he said. If we do find something in the next 20 years, however, it could mean that we have a lot of alien neighbors."If you put your toe into the ocean and a shark bites it off, you can bet that there are other sharks out there," Marcy said. "If we put our toe into the cosmic ocean and we make contact with life, that could be a sign that the universe is teeming with it."While the two scientists might not agree on everything, they both believe human beings should be putting more resources into exploring space for signs of life.Finding it anywhere could mean "we live in a biological universe where life arises whenever the conditions are right," Hand said.The possibility of such a revolutionary discovery is worth funding advanced telescopes and missions to Mars, Europa and beyond.As Marcy put it, "There is one thing we can say for sure: If we don't look for life out there, we won't find it."Two-faced? Rosetta's target comet may have a split personalityAmina Khan – Los Angeles TimesThe comet-chasing Rosetta spacecraft may have a surprise waiting when it narrows in on its target: It's a twofer!Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko, sporting a hyphenated name, could also have a hyphenated body. Grainy images snapped by the European Space Agency spacecraft show that the comet seems to be made of two parts, a larger chunk and a smaller one."It's not just a reasonably round potato," said Rosetta project scientist Matt Taylor, describing the typical cometary profile. "It's this very interesting shape."Keep in mind that the images are too small to be certain, Taylor said — Rosetta was around 12,000 kilometers away when it took that shot on July 14, so it still has a ways to go before it can confirm this oddball profile.How Rosetta's target came to be so strangely shaped remains a mystery. It's possible that 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko is a contact binary, formed when two separate comets got smashed together early in the solar system's history. But it's possible that the gravity from a massive object like Jupiter kneaded the comet into its duck-bodied form.Whether or not it's a cometary chimera, the strange shape — which may not be all that uncommon — could help shed light on certain processes in the solar system."It gives you more of a story," Taylor said. "It complicates the picture — but it makes it a bit more of a fun picture as well."Rosetta is now just 8,200 kilometers or so from the strange knobbly comet. After its rendezvous with the comet, it will escort 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko as it slingshots around the sun to study how the comet shrinks and changes after its close encounter with our home star.The spacecraft will also deploy a lander that will touch down on the surface. That in itself will be a challenge, Taylor said, given that the gravity around the comet is similar to 100 millionths of what we experience here on Earth — and the team is going to have to make the landing stick.ENDMore at www.spacetoday.net
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