Space Roundup Jan 31st, 2021
Hello, dear space fans! :)
This has been a week full of interesting news in the space sector, so let's get started with the updates of the week! 5,4,3,2,1…liftoff!
Science discoveries
The Hubble space telescope has detected a very rare ‘Molten Ring’, a gravitational lens that helps us see further in space by bending the light: watch it below, it’s the picture of the week. You can read more about it here.
200 light-years away, astronomers have found a very unique six-exoplanet system, five of which are locked in a rare rhythmic dance around their central star. This challenges previous theories about planet formation.
And if wasn’t enough for a week, astronomers discovered the first cloudless, Jupiter-like planet.
Getting ready for Mars!
Less than twenty days away from the Perseverance rover's arrival to Mars, NASA is making final adjustments to make sure everything’s fine for the great day. The MAVEN satellite will help with the telecommunications relay efforts so that no data gets lost. Additionally, the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter could also change its orbit to better support the Mars 2020 mission after landing.
And what about the other countries? In less than 10 days (10 days!) the United Arab Emirates' first mission to Mars, the Hope orbiter, will arrive at the Red Planet. Save the date: Feb. 9, 2021. Then, on Feb 10th, it will be the turn for the Chinese orbiter to arrive (the lander will land in May approx.)
Launches, tests, and aborts
Last week SpaceX crushed the record of most satellites launched in a single rocket (143!) and China successfully launched 31 remote sensing satellites on board a Long March 4C rocket.
NASA performed an engine test for its RS-25 this week (watch the video here) and has scheduled a new SLS Green test run for late February.
SpaceX has been clashing with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) the whole week, waiting for the required permissions to fly the SN9 Starship prototype. Something’s broken in that communication between SpaceX and the government, and they better fix it if they want to achieve their crazy challenging timelines to get to Mars. Anyways it seems this week is the week for the next Starship test. We’ll see!
Picture of the week
As mentioned above, this is the Molten Ring the Hubble space telescope recently discovered. The existence of these gravitational lenses bending the light thanks to their huge mass was theoretically predicted by Albert Einstein decades ago.
Upcoming launches & events
Feb. 1 SpaceX Falcon 9 • Starlink V1.0-L17
Feb. 1 Two NASA astronauts to take their second spacewalk outside the ISS.
Feb. 1 SpaceX Starship SN9 test flight? Crossing fingers…
Feb. 2 Soyuz 2.1b | Lotos-S1
Feb. 4 SpaceX Falcon 9 • Starlink V1.0-L18
Space jobs
Do you want to play an active role in space exploration? Here are some open positions in the aerospace industry:
DevOps Test Engineer Chantilly, VA, United States (USA), TriSept Corporation
Spacecraft Operations Engineer for Heliophysics Missions Operations - Terma Group - Darmstadt
And that’s it for this week! :)
If you enjoy my Space Roundup, PLEASE SHARE IT (by clicking the SHARE button below) or consider supporting me on Patreon to help me share our excitement about human space flight with the world:
Cheers from sunny Spain!
Juan, the Curious Astronaut