Month: May 2023

SpaceX’s second private astronaut mission to the International Space Station (ISS), Axiom-2, also known as Ax-2, sponsored by Axiom Space, received launch clearance from NASA on May 15, followed by a seal of approval from Mother Nature 19 May and finally completion of the Launch Readiness Review (LRR) on May 20th. Launch is currently scheduled for May 21 at 5:37 p.m. EDT (2:37 p.m. PDT) from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center’s historic Launch Complex 39A Launch site for all manned Apollo-Saturn V launches beginning with Apollo 8, along with Skylab, dozens of space shuttle launches and, as of 2017, SpaceX.

“Today we had a review where we brought together members of the team from Axiom Space, SpaceX and NASA to talk about the upcoming mission and at the end of that review the whole team voted ‘go’,” said Ken Bowersox . NASA’s Deputy Administrator for Space Operations, during the May 15 press conference.

The Ax-2 crew of four consists of a diverse group of US and Saudi Arabian astronauts with a wide range of scientific and flight experience both on Earth and in space. Their mission duration is 10 days on the ISS, where they will conduct various scientific, commercial and public activities aboard the football field-sized orbiting platform.

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Ax-2 Commander Dr. Peggy Whitson is the only crew member with spaceflight experience, but she has a groundbreaking track record and records during her time as a NASA astronaut. dr Whitson joined NASA’s group in 1996 and holds the record for most days spent in space by an American astronaut (665), most spacewalks by a woman (10) and first woman to command the ISS (Expedition 16 December 2007). ). . After retiring from NASA in June 2018, she became a consultant for Axiom Space and will now have the honor of being the first woman to lead a private space mission.

Axiom 2 Commander, Dr. Peggy Whitson. (Credit: Axiom Space/Jenn Duncan)

Ax-2 pilot John Shoffner is a lifelong space enthusiast and proponent of STEM education, and the only non-governmental crew member on Ax-2 to pay for his seat on the mission. Shoffner has been flying since he was 17 and has more than 8,500 flight hours under his belt. He has also performed more than 4,000 skydives with his wife Janine, whom he met while skydiving in 1999. As a compliment for his successful flight and skydiving career, Shoffner is also a successful life athlete having competed in motor sports, water skiing and cycling, among others. His seat at Ax-2 is funded by his success as a businessman, having founded and led several start-ups throughout his career.

Axiom 2 Pilot: John Shoffner. (Credit: Axiom Space/Jenn Duncan)

Ax-2 Mission Specialist Ali Alqarni is a Captain in the Royal Saudi Air Force (RSAF) and has nearly 2,400 flight hours on the F-15S, T-38, T-6 and Cessna 172. After a visit to NASA Working at the Johnson Space Center during his time with the RSAF during his US Air Force training, Alqarni became passionate about space and was selected by the Saudi Space Commission as the first astronaut in the Saudi National Astronaut Program . Alqarni is a successful athlete with experience in mountaineering and bungee jumping, as well as numerous survival training and military deployments.

Axiom 2 Mission Specialist, Ali Alqarni. (Source: Axiom Space)

Ax-2 Mission Specialist Rayyanah Barnawi makes history as the first Saudi woman to travel into space. She is a biomedical researcher with more than 10 years of experience in cancer stem cell research and was a research lab technician in the stem cell and tissue reengineering program at King Faisal Specialist Hospital and Research Center in Saudi Arabia when she was selected for Ax-2. Outside of research, Barnawi has extensive experience in the outdoors and as an athlete, having participated in hang gliding, scuba diving, hiking and rafting around the world. During her stay on the ISS, Barnawi will continue her work on breast cancer and stem cell research.

Axiom 2 Mission Specialist, Rayyanah Barnawi. (Source: Axiom Space)

On May 16, during their pre-mission quarantine, the Ax-2 crew discussed their experiences and enthusiasm for the mission in a press conference. dr Whitson noted how during their time in quarantine, the crew went over the mission’s schedules and procedures so that they were fully prepared for the mission before launch.

If launch is successful tomorrow, Ax-2 is scheduled to dock with the ISS at 9:30 a.m. EDT on May 22. If Ax-2 doesn’t make their first launch window, there will be a backup opportunity on May 22 and future launch date is uncertain if they are unable to fly this weekend.

“We’re looking at May 21st, and if we don’t launch it by the 22nd, we will be retiring from the Axiom-2 mission and concentrating on the SpaceX CRS-28 mission,” said Joel Montalbano, NASA Manager of the ISS program.

Ax-2 is not only the second private space mission to the ISS, but also comes one step closer to Axiom Space’s goal of building mankind’s first commercial space station. The first module is scheduled to be brought to the ISS in 2025 and will eventually reach orbit on its own as soon as other modules are connected.

For now, we wish Axiom-2 a safe and prosperous mission to the ISS as humanity continues its journey further and up to the stars!

As always, keep up the science and keep looking up!

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The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) was designed to explore the mysteries of the Universe, not least what the first galaxies looked like. These galaxies formed during the epoch of reionization (also known as “Cosmic Dawn”), which lasted about 100 to 500 million years after the Big Bang. By observing these galaxies and comparing them to galaxies closer to our present one, astronomers hope to test the laws of physics at the largest scale and find out what role (if any) dark matter and dark energy played.

Unfortunately, early in its campaign, JWST discovered galaxies from this period that were so massive that they were inconsistent with our understanding of how the Universe formed. The most widely accepted theory of how all this is related is known as the Lambda Cold Dark Matter (LCDM) cosmological model, which best describes the structure and evolution of the Universe. According to the latest results from the Cosmic Dawn Center, these galaxies may be even more massive than previously thought, further challenging our understanding of the cosmos.

The research team was led by the Cosmic Dawn Center (DAWN) and included researchers from the Niels Bohr Institute (NBI) at the University of Copenhagen, the European Southern Observatory (ESO) and the Kavli Institute for Particle Astrophysics and Cosmology (KIPAC). Stanford University, and astronomers and astrophysicists from the Université de Genève, the University of Texas at Austin, the University of Colorado, and UC Santa Cruz. The article describing their findings appeared in the May 10 issue of the Astronomical Journal.

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The galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 with the five galaxies chosen for closer examination. Image credits: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI/Giménez-Arteaga et al. (2023), Peter Laursen (Cosmic Dawn Center).

Among the first images shared by JWST was the stunning view of the SMACS 0723 galaxy cluster known as Webb’s First Deep Field (see above). This image was acquired with Webb’s Near-Infrared Spectrograph (NIRSpec) and provided a detailed look at how the galaxies in this cluster appeared 4.6 billion years ago. In addition, the image was filled with gravitational lensing, allowing astronomers to get a closer look at more distant objects, including the most distant galaxy ever seen (GL-z13, now known as GLz-12) and several dated Green Pea “-Galaxies to the Early Universe.

The only problem is that Webb noticed more galaxies than expected during this period, and some were more massive than had been thought possible. According to the LCDM model, there simply hasn’t been enough time since the Big Bang for so many galaxies to form or become so massive. This led to all sorts of claims, including the notion that the Big Bang model was wrong, a highly questionable claim by proponents of the steady-state hypothesis. While these findings did not upset our entire cosmological understanding, they nonetheless called for an explanation.

To clarify Webb’s earlier observations, a Ph.D. A student at the Cosmic Dawn Center (Clara Giménez Arteaga) and colleagues further analyzed the data. In their paper, they describe how they observed five galaxies in the SMACS 0723 deep field with redshifts (z) from 5 to 9 that look to us as if they had it about 12.7 to 13.2 billion years ago. Based on their analysis, the team believe what we’re seeing at work here is an effect that could mean these galaxies are even larger than they appear. As Arteaga explained in an NBI press release:

“We used the standard method to calculate stellar masses from the images James Webb took, but on a pixel-by-pixel basis, rather than looking at the entire galaxy. In principle, one might expect the results to be the same: add up the light from all pixels and get the total stellar mass, as opposed to calculating the mass of each pixel and adding up all the individual stellar masses. But they are not.”

The stellar mass of the five galaxies, showing the mass derived using the two different methods. Photo credit: Giménez-Arteaga et al. (2023), Peter Laursen (Cosmic Dawn Center).

Typically, astronomers calculate the stellar mass of galaxies by measuring the amount of light emitted and deriving the population required for that amount. However, when Arteaga and her team took a closer look at the sample of five galaxies, they found that viewing the galaxies as a unit made up of multiple stellar groupings (instead of a large mass) would change the picture drastically. Based on this alternative method, they found that the inferred stellar masses of these five galaxies would be up to 10 times larger.

The team then compared the mass of the five galaxies using the two methods and found that the values ​​were always much higher, analyzing them pixel by pixel (instead of the inferred brightness approach). Arteaga and her team theorize that this is related to the composition of the galaxies, which is far from unique:

“Star populations are a mixture of small and faint stars on the one hand and bright, massive stars on the other. If we only look at the combined light, the bright stars tend to completely outshine the faint stars, leaving them unnoticed. Our analysis shows that bright, star-forming clumps can dominate the overall light, but most of the mass is found in smaller stars.”

Proper resolution is very important for accurately estimating stellar mass, one of the main properties that astronomers use to characterize galaxies. While this is relatively easy for galaxies relatively close to the Milky Way, it remains a challenge for more distant galaxies. The effect highlighted by Arteaga and her colleagues has been observed before, but only in galaxies occurring in later epochs of cosmic history. Thanks to Webb’s superior resolution, this is the first time it has been applied to the most distant galaxies.

An international team of astronomers has used data from the James Webb Space Telescope to report the discovery of the earliest galaxies confirmed to date. Image credit: NASA/ESA/CSA/STScI

Unfortunately, even Webb is limited when it comes to observing galaxies that existed about 13 billion years ago, when the universe was barely 1 billion years old. The next step will therefore be to look for signatures that correlate with the true mass of these galaxies, which do not require high-resolution imaging. As Arteaga summarized:

“Other studies from much later eras have also noted this discrepancy. If we can determine how common and severe the effect is in earlier epochs and quantify it, we will be closer to inferring robust stellar masses of distant galaxies, which is one of the greatest current challenges in studying galaxies in the early Universe.”

Further reading: NBI, The Astronomical Journal

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By Vijay Jayaraj

Japan has struggled to boost its economy since an earthquake and tsunami severely damaged Fukushima’s nuclear reactors. While the country’s first response to the 2011 disaster was to abandon a once-robust nuclear program, a decade later Japan is not only returning to nuclear fission, but is also attempting to burn more fossil fuels than once could have been imagined.

In a way, Japan is an example of what is happening in developed economies around the world. More countries are recognizing the importance of nuclear energy, and a growing number of Westerners are reluctant to give up fossil fuels despite publicly vowing to do so.

Japan: An economy based on nuclear power, oil, coal and gas

Tokyo’s move away from nuclear power was entirely due to unwarranted fears surrounding the technology. However, once it became clear that Fukushima was more of a natural disaster than a major engineering failure, the country began reversing its nuclear cuts and is now firmly on track with an ambitious plan to deploy power reactors.

Historically, much of Japan’s electricity needs have been met by fossil fuels, particularly coal. Then, in the late 2000s, Japan, like most of the developed economies of Europe and North America, faced pressure to reduce coal use to address a perceived climate emergency. However, Japan is now realizing that with the latest technology, it can continue to use coal, which significantly reduces pollution.

Covering a new clean coal-fired power plant receiving US$384 million in public funding, Nikkei Asia reports that the country’s initiatives are bearing fruit and providing much-needed electricity.

“Japan, which gets about a third of its electricity from coal, sees the project as key to its policy of safely achieving energy security and economic and environmental efficiency,” said Nikkei Asia.

Citing Japan’s latest energy plan, the publication said coal is “currently an important energy source with excellent stability of supply and economic efficiency because it has the least geopolitical risk in terms of procurement, is cheap and easy to store.”

It’s likely that Japan will fall back to its coal power if needed.

The country’s decision to oppose the global anti-coal movement may seem unique, but more and more countries find themselves in a situation where they have no choice but to remain dependent on fossil fuels.

Nuclear and Fossil Fuels: An Emerging Global Pattern

The US and France rely heavily on nuclear energy. More than 50 percent of all electricity generated in Slovakia, Ukraine and Belgium comes from nuclear power plants.

Germany is an outspoken opponent of nuclear power and is somewhat the exception when it comes to shutting down nuclear power plants in the midst of an energy crisis. Still, Germany has consistently failed on its promise to reduce emissions from burning fossil fuels and is now turning back to coal. In 2022, Germany imported 44.4 million tons of coal, an eight percent increase from 2021. That’s no surprise.

Global leaders in the fight against fossil fuels include leaders from the UK, US, EU, Canada and Australia. Nonetheless, many of them, particularly in the EU, remain heavily reliant on fossil fuels for a variety of reasons.

In the EU, gas shortages due to disruptions in Russian gas supplies and a shamefully incompetent transition policy towards renewable energy created a shortage of fuel for power generation.

Thomas Moller-Nielsen writes in the Brussels Times that “the increase in coal consumption in the EU is particularly ironic given that the Union has previously urged the big polluters to take urgent action to combat climate change .” Indeed, in an unprecedented role reversal, China recently called on European leaders to take “positive action” to counter man-made global warming.”

So we are dealing with a situation where the reality of energy demand is forcing these advanced economies to resort to trustworthy fossil fuels and highly efficient nuclear power. Unreliable solar and wind turbines cannot meet demand, and attempts to do so are likely to result in national bankruptcies.

This comment was first published in the Daily Caller on May 5, 2023 and can be accessed here.

Vijay Jayaraj is a Research Associate at the CO2 Coalition, Arlington, Virginia. He holds a Masters in Environmental Sciences from the University of East Anglia, UK and is based in India.

tags: Fossil Fuels, Nuclear Energy, Vijay Jayaraj, Fukushima, Japan, Fukushima Japan

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