Cassini-Huygens
Mission to Saturn and Titan An exciting ongoing mission to the ringed
planet, Saturn. Launched on 15th October 1997 the last of NASAs' large space
probes will arrive at its target on 1st July 2004. The Huygens probe (a
European Space Agency mission attached to Cassini) will probe the large
enigmatic moon Titan.
Close up views of the several alien
worlds that orbit Jupiter from another highly successful NASA space mission.
The resilient Galileo spacecraft doesn't know when to call it quits. So, NASA
has outlined the details of one last mission extension, which includes five
more flybys of the Jovian moons before a final plunge into the crushing
pressure of the giant planet's atmosphere. Galileo has been orbiting Jupiter
for more than five years and survived radiation exposure more than three times
what it was built to withstand. Galileo's mission has previously been extended
twice and during that time it has returned an enormous wealth of scientific
information, including evidence of a sub-surface ocean on Jupiter's moon
Europa.
Latest amazingly detailed pictures from the NASA
spacecraft orbiting and mapping Mars.
News and countdowns for American Space Shuttle
missions and ongoing construction of the International Space Station.
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STARDUST is a comet sample return mission which will also be returning interstellar dust grains. These samples will be returned to Earth for analysis. A mass spectrometer derived from instruments flown on Giotto and Vega Halley missions will also be included on the payload to provide both complementary and corroborative data to the sample return results. For the comet Wild 2 encounter, the objective is to recover more than one thousand particles larger than 15 microns in diameter as well as volatile molecules on the same capture medium. The sample return objective for fresh interstellar grains is to collect over 100 particles in the 0.1 micron to 1 micron size range. They will be collected in a manner designed to preserve, at minimum, the elemental and isotopic composition for major elements in individual submicron particles. (A mission that gave me the opportunity to send my signature on a microchip into space.)
Beagle 2 - the
British Mars Lander On 20 December 2000, the European Space Agency (ESA)
announced the selection of a landing site for the British Mars lander, Beagle
2, that will be carried to the red planet aboard
ESA's Mars Express Orbiter.
The Beagle 2 project is the British led effort to land on Mars as part of the
European Space Agency's Mars Express Mission to be launched in June 2003.
Big Bear Solar Observatory
Latest research on the nearest star - our own Sun.
Microwave Anistropy Probe MAP is an
ongoing NASA Explorer Mission that is measuring the temperature of the cosmic
background radiation over the full sky with unprecedented accuracy. This map of
the remnant heat of the Big Bang will provide answers to fundamental questions
about the origin and fate of our universe.
SETI@Home
A well planned and
coordinated scientific experiment that harnesses the power of hundreds of
thousands of Internet-connected computers in the Search for Extraterrestrial
Intelligence (SETI). You can participate by running a free screensaver program
that downloads and analyses radio telescope data. There is a small but
captivating possibility that your computer will detect the faint murmur of a
civilization beyond Earth.
The SETI@home program is a special kind of screensaver. Like other screensavers it starts up when you leave your computer unattended, and it shuts down as soon as you return to work. What it does in the interim is unique. While you are getting coffee, or having lunch or sleeping, your computer will be helping the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence by analyzing data specially captured by the world's largest radio telescope.
Copyright © 1997-2002 John Gruson
