Space – Lifeboat News: The Blog

Apr 1
2022

Lightsail technology billows into the future

Alpha Centauri seems almost within grasp as promising research soars into reality.

Lightsails were once a thing of science fiction, evolving through several variations over the last 40 years. Now, science fiction is becoming reality. Advances in laser technology and new ultrastrong, ultralight materials open up the possibility of venturing beyond our solar system in the not-too-distant future.

Researchers from UCLA and the University of Pennsylvania recently published two papers outlining various shapes and heat-dissipating materials they tested to evaluate lightsails beyond previous limits. The research was conducted in conjunction with the Breakthrough Starshot Initiative, a project with the goal of sending a microchip-sized probe to the Alpha Centauri system, which, at just over 4 light-years away, is the closest and possibly most habitable neighboring star system. Breakthrough Starshot plans to use a high-powered laser array to propel tiny lightsail probes through space at a top speed of some 20 percent the speed of light. Incorporated into the sails would be minuscule scientific instruments, such as cameras, magnetometers, and communicators that could beam information back to Earth as they fly through the Alpha Centuari system.

A parachute that can withstand the heat

Aaswath Raman, a professor in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at UCLA, has laid out two elements key to creating a functioning lightsail: it must be extremely lightweight, and it needs to reflect or disperse heat incredibly well.

Mar 31
2022

Axiom Space Ax-1: Launch date, mission plans, and what comes next

Axiom Space has bold plans to send private citizens into space, as a stepping stone to developing a complete private space station.

Mar 31
2022

2,500-year-old burial mound found in Siberia’s ‘Valley of the Kings’

A 50-year-old woman was buried with a unique “male” pendant.

Archaeologists have discovered a large burial mound in the Siberian “Valley of the Kings” dating to more than 2,500 years ago. The ancient tomb holds the remains of five people, including those of a woman and toddler who were buried with an array of grave goods, such as a crescent moon-shaped pendant, bronze mirror and gold earrings.

The mounds were made by the Scythians — a term used to describe culturally-related nomadic groups that lived on the steppes between the Black Sea and China from about 800 B.C. to about A.D. 300.

Mar 31
2022

After 355 days aboard the ISS, astronaut Mark Vande Hei returns to Earth a changed man

As humanity’s spaceward expansion accelerates in the coming decades, somebody’s going to have to keep all those commercial astronauts alive.

Mar 31
2022

Physicists: We Are On The Verge Of Discovering Fifth Dimension And It Will Change Everything We Know About Physics

What a time to be alive… We are on the verge of discovering the fifth dimension and it will change everything we know about the Universe.

Scientists are sometimes questioned if they conduct fresh experiments in the lab or continue to repeat previous ones for which they have certain outcomes. While most scientists undertake the former, scientific advancement also relies on conducting the latter and validating whether what we think we know remains true in light of fresh knowledge.

Mar 31
2022

Guy Snaps Photo of Space Station So Detailed You Can See Spacewalking Astronauts on Exterior

In a new photo of the International Space Station, you can actually make out two astronauts clambering on its exterior during a space walk.

Mar 30
2022

Meet Earendel, the Most Distant Star Astronomers Have Observed

The Hubble Space Telescope has revealed a single star whose light has traveled for 12.9 billion years to Earth, having come from a universe just 900 million years old. It’s currently the most distant star known, and the team has dubbed it Earendel*.

The discovery is a huge jump, as the previous record-holder for more distant star existed in a universe 4 billion years old.

The iconic observatory had some help from nature’s own optics: The vast mass of a foreground cluster of galaxies, sitting just so between us and the distant star, acts like a lens, its gravity magnifying the star’s light thousands-fold. The discovery is published in the March 31st Nature.

Mar 30
2022

New Malware Loader ‘Verblecon’ Infects Hacked PCs with Cryptocurrency Miners

Hackers using a “complex and powerful” malware loader with the ultimate objective of deploying cryptocurrency miners on compromised systems.

Researchers have uncovered a new malware campaign spreading Mars info-stealer via Google ads.

Mar 30
2022

Researchers Expose Mars Stealer Malware Campaign Using Google Ads to Spread

Researchers have uncovered a new malware campaign spreading Mars info-stealer via Google ads.

Mar 30
2022

Space tourism: Huge balloon with a bar to take tourists to space for $125,000 a ticket

Imagine gliding into space in a pressurized capsule via a huge balloon the size of a football stadium. That’s how one startup plans to take tourists on suborbital journeys 100,000 feet above Earth.

Passengers will be able to observe stunning views during a six hour journey. They will also be able to sip on cocktails from a bar aboard the vessel. (Yes, there’s a bathroom.)

The voyage will happen “very gently and smoothly” and provide passengers “the quintessential astronaut experience,” Jane Poytner, co-founder and co-CEO of Space Perspective, told Yahoo Finance Live.