Tag: spacecraft

A spacecraft is a vehicle or machine designed to fly in outer space. Spacecraft are used for a variety of purposes, including communications, earth observation, meteorology, navigation, space colonization, planetary exploration, and transportation of humans and cargo. On a sub-orbital spaceflight, a spacecraft enters space and then returns to the surface, without having gone into an orbit. For orbital spaceflights, spacecraft enter closed orbits around the Earth or around other celestial bodies. Spacecraft used for human spaceflight carry people on board as crew or passengers from start or on orbit (space stations) only, whereas those used for robotic space missions operate either autonomously or telerobotically. Robotic spacecraft used to support scientific research are space probes. Robotic spacecraft that remain in orbit around a planetary body are artificial satellites. Only a handful of interstellar probes, such as Pioneer 10 and 11, Voyager 1 and 2, and New Horizons, are on trajectories that leave the Solar System.

NASA Spacecraft Discovered a New Magnetic Process in Space

NASA Spacecraft Discovered a New Magnetic Process in Space

NASA’s Magnetospheric Multiscale mission, or MMS, has discovered a new type of magnetic process in the near-Earth environment, by which magnetic field lines explosively reconfigure occurring in a new and surprising way. Magnetic process is one of the most significant processes in the space that is filled with charged particles known as plasma around Earth, said researchers at the University of California, Berkeley in the US.

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NASA Juno Mission Organized 3-D Flight of Jupiter’s North Pole

NASA Juno Mission Organized 3-D Flight of Jupiter’s North Pole

Scientists working on NASA’s Juno mission to Jupiter shared a 3-D flyover video captured by NASA’s Juno spacecraft. Those are among the items revealed during the European Geosciences Union General Assembly in Vienna, Austria, on Wednesday, April 11. The data had been collected by Juno mission scientists of Jovian InfraRed Auroral Mapper (JIRAM). Imaging in the infrared part of the spectrum, JIRAM captures light emerging from deep inside Jupiter equally well, night or day. The instrument probes the weather layer down to 30 to 45 miles (50 to 70 kilometers) below Jupiter’s cloud tops.

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TESS Planet Hunter Launches this Month Searching Sky for New Worlds

TESS Planet Hunter Launches this Month Searching Sky for New Worlds

Tess Planet hunter is ready to launch next month on April 16. It is supposed to start up from Cape Canaveral, Florida. This planet hunter, a 700-pound spacecraft, is called the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). TESS will be on the lookout for planets that could support life, officials said Wednesday. TESS will be launched aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and is equipped with four wide-field cameras that will enable it to look for the majority of the night sky.

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Chinese Space Station Is Supposed to Fall into Earth On March 30

Chinese Space Station Is Supposed to Fall into Earth On March 30

China’s first prototype station, Tiangong-1, is supposed to fall into Earth at some point between March 30 and April 6. An out-of-control Chinese space station with “highly toxic” chemicals on board may hit a number of major world cities. New York and parts of Europe are among the most likely targets. In accordance with researchers a number of highly populated cities including New York, Barcelona, Beijing, Chicago, Istanbul, Rome and Toronto could also be hit.

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