Lost in Space — Space Technology
As humans, we have always been curious about what lies beyond the sky and have always wanted to explore it. Our curiosity for space led to the development of space technology. Let us have a look at what space technology has brought to the table.
The world has benefited greatly from space technology, especially in terms of communications, positioning services, Earth observation, and economic activity related to government-funded space programs. Humanity’s outer space capability has grown remarkably since 1957 when Sputnik was launched.
Sputnik 1 was the first artificial Earth satellite. The Soviet Union launched it into an elliptical low Earth orbit on 4 October 1957, orbiting for three weeks before its batteries died, then silently for two more months before falling back into the atmosphere.
The main uses of this form of technology are:
1. Space activities having a positive impact today (such as Earth observation for weather and climate)
2. Space activities that could have a positive impact in the next 5 to 20 years (such as communications satellite mega-constellations)
3. Space activities that could have a positive impact in the more distant future (such as widespread space manufacturing and industrialization)
History
In the latter half of the 20th century, rockets were developed that were powerful enough to overcome the force of gravity to reach orbital velocities, paving the way for space exploration to become a reality.
In the 1930s and 1940s, Nazi Germany saw the possibilities of using long-distance rockets as weapons. Late in World War II, London was attacked by 200-mile-range V-2 missiles, which arched 60 miles high over the English Channel at more than 3,500 miles per hour. After World War II, the United States and the Soviet Union created their own missile programs.
On Oct. 4, 1957, the Soviets launched the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, into space. Four years later on April 12, 1961, Russian Lt. Yuri Gagarin became the first human to orbit Earth in Vostok 1. His flight lasted 108 minutes, and Gagarin reached an altitude of 327 kilometers (about 202 miles).
The first U.S. satellite, Explorer 1, went into orbit on Jan. 31, 1958. In 1961, Alan Shepard became the first American to fly into space. On Feb. 20, 1962, John Glenn’s historic flight made him the first American to orbit Earth.
The ten top developments in space technology are –
10 — Cumar: Ireland’s first-ever space mission
Ok, this won’t make waves globally, perhaps, but this summer we finally got news of Ireland’s first-ever space program, Cumar.
Hinted at by all-round space legend Prof Susan McKenna-Lawlor way back at Inspirefest 2015, the name was finally revealed in August at an Astronomy Ireland event, fittingly, under the stars.
Cumar’s mission, MaKenna-Lawlor said, would be to gain new understanding of space weather.
Negotiations are in progress to include in the spacecraft’s payload experiments from Chinese, Canadian, German, Japanese, Slovakian and British teams, each aiming to gain further insights into different aspects of space weather and its effect on society, the planet, and technology.
In addition to scientific equipment, Cumar will be carrying a sculpture already commissioned from an Irish sculptor, who will use space-qualified materials for its construction.
9 — ISS: A year-long pursuit
Right now, whizzing above your head a few times a day, two astronauts are busy working away on the International Space Station (ISS).
This is nothing new. The ISS has housed dozens of astronauts over the years, who have handed the baton over to replacements every few months and come back down to Earth with stories to tell and pictures to show.
However, for NASA astronaut Scott Kelly and cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko, things are markedly different. They are seven months into a year-long mission on the spacecraft, something never done before.
The trials and tribulations their bodies are going through are estimated, but not fully known. The logic is, if humans ever want to get to Mars, we’re going to have to spend a long time in space. So why not learn what effects that can have on the human body?
While in space, the duo are expected to develop blurry vision, lose their balance, see a bone density reduction never experienced before, enjoy a melting away of muscle mass and develop an undercooked heart, which has to work far less in space to pump blood around the body.
8 — Hubble Telescope is now 25 years of age
NASA’s Hubble Telescope was sent up to space back in 1990 to start taking photographs, giving us a glimpse into worlds we’d barely heard of, or never knew existed.
In 25 years, it has delighted us with pictures of nebulas, stars, clusters, eclipses, and no end of astrological phenomena.
Floating just above Earth, it’s consistently upgraded and maintained camera lenses offer us great shots of the universe around us.
And just like anyone else’s landmark birthday, we celebrated it by looking back at its best photos and accomplishments.
7 — MESSENGER’s farewell pictures
Back in April 2015, NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft spiraled towards a destructive, crushing death amid its last tour of Mercury. Responsible for pretty much all of our real knowledge of the planet nearest the sun, MESSENGER had been circling Mercury for years taking photos of its surface.
However, with fuel running low, the doomed spacecraft prepared itself for its final trip down to death, sending us majestic pictures along the way.
Standing for ‘Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry, and Ranging’ spacecraft, MESSENGER sent us this tie-dye of Mercury’s surface, hours before its demise.
6 — Planets beyond Pluto?
Way back in January 2016, scientists found two planets, potentially as big as Earth, lurking beyond Pluto in our solar system, in a discovery that “may be truly revolutionary for astronomy”.
The discovery involved measurements of rocks located well beyond Neptune. A belt of space rocks, known as ‘extreme trans-Neptunian objects’ (ETNO), show unexpected symmetry, according to scientists who have been scouring the solar system looking for everything and anything.
Some of these ETNOs appear to be orbiting in a defined path reminiscent of our moon.
By analyzing the effects of what’s called the Kozai mechanism — which deals with large objects having smaller ones, much further away, orbiting around its gravitational pull — the researchers have thus theorized that just beyond what they can see could well be some more planets.
5 — Water on Enceladus
Okay, we’re getting into some seriously impressive discoveries now. Not taking anything away from Cumar, or Hubble’s shindig, but back in March 2006, Enceladus — Saturn’s sixth-largest moon — was found to have a warm ocean beneath its icy surface.
For years, Jupiter’s icy moon Europa has intrigued many as to whether life could exist beneath its surface, but with this discovery of hydrothermal activity on Enceladus, NASA said the implications of this find offer ‘unprecedented scientific possibilities’.
Hydrothermal activity is a common occurrence in our own oceans, where seawater infiltrates and reacts with the planet’s rocky crust and emerges as a heated, mineral-laden solution.
4 — Water on Mars
Step back Jupiter’s moon, try Mars’ Mars. After much speculation, NASA finally confirmed in September 2015, that the Martian surface of Mars does indeed have liquid water running on it, which potentially brings new hope for the discovery of life on the red planet.
It seems rather timely given the complementary release of The Martian film, with interest in Mars at a level not seen in decades.
The liquid water was discovered to be running down the ridges of canyons and crater walls during the planet’s summer months, with it having left visible streaks down their slopes.
However, the actual origin of the water remains a mystery, with some suggestions being that it is originating from vast underground salty aquifers, Martian ice or even condensation from the planet’s thin atmosphere.
3 — Earth 2.0
In July 2015, NASA discovered a new planet with strikingly similar features to our own. It was dubbed, rather unimaginatively, Earth 2.0, and its discovery sent everyone’s imaginations wild.
Kepler-452b, as the planet has been labeled by the agency, is in a solar system very similar to our own and is the right distance from its star to potentially be habitable. The planet is 6 billion years old, 60 percent larger than Earth, and receives 10 percent more energy from its star, which is 1.5 billion years older and 20 percent brighter than our sun, though it has the same temperature.
Its 385-day orbit is only 5 percent longer than Earth’s, while its mass and composition have yet to be determined, previous NASA research suggests that worlds this size have a good chance of being rocky.
Don’t pack your bags just yet, though. An Interstellar-like jaunt across the galaxy isn’t going to happen anytime soon. It’s 1,400 light-years away. To put that into perspective, Pluto is only five light-hours away.
“You and I probably won’t be traveling to these planets, but our children’s children’s children could be,” NASA’s Jeff Coughlin said. “This gives us something to aim for.”
2 — Pluto. Pluto, Pluto, Pluto.
NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft left Earth in 2006. During that time, we saw smartphones revolutionize communications, renewable energy developments point to a manageable future without fossil fuels, and economic collapses wreck economies all over the world.
Twitter has emerged, Instagram too. One Direction is now a thing, and a famous lion martyr has changed from Mufasa to Cecil.
Throughout all of this, New Horizons kept plugging away. Pluto was downgraded from ‘planet’ to ‘not planet’, New Horizons kept plugging away.
With a CPU smaller than you ever could imagine, it kept plugging away. Then, during the summer, it finally made it.
Despite a couple of scares in the hours leading up to its homing in on Pluto, it sent back some incredibly well-defined images of the planet in 2015(I mean ‘planet’ in the terms of My Very Educated Mother Just Showed Us Nine Planets, people).
1 — Philae, Rosetta, and an amazing comet landing
In November 2014, the Rosetta spacecraft released its helper Philae, which floated down onto a comet and landed.
Okay, it wasn’t as smooth as that, and its crash landing was quite the event, but it got there, it reported back, and humankind achieved one of its finest accomplishments. Step back, modern sewerage systems, go away penicillin, we just won the best game of tag ever.
Chasing down a comet, photographing it, measuring it, then landing a worker on it. Bravo. Philae landed in the shade and hadn’t a whole lot of juice after its cliff-smashing landing, but it actually woke up again during the summer, chatting with Rosetta and keeping us informed.
Since the landing, rafts of papers have been filed, with the life-building properties on Comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko a surprise to many. But then again, when we have Rosetta and Philae working at it, what can’t we do?
Space technology is a vast field… where developments are made on a daily bases, discoveries which blew our minds. We shall see how far this technology grows with us. Maybe soon enough we would leave this planet.
Follow us for more of amazing and latest science and technology articles. We are also there on social media. Follow us on Instagram to stay updated!
HAVE A GOOD DAY!
