NASA - NASA TV Briefing Discusses Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer Results

WASHINGTON -- NASA will hold a news conference at 1:30 p.m. EDT on Wednesday, April 3, to discuss the first results of the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) experiment. AMS is a state-of-the-art cosmic ray particle physics detector located on the exterior of the International Space Station.

The briefing will be held in the James E. Webb Auditorium at NASA Headquarters at 300 E St. SW in Washington. It will be broadcast live on NASA Television and streamed on the agency's website.

The participants include:
-- William Gerstenmaier, NASA associate administrator for Human Exploration and Operations
-- Samuel Ting (participating by video link), AMS principal investigator, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
-- Michael Salamon, U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science program manager for AMS
-- Mark Sistilli, NASA AMS program manager

Media representatives may ask questions from participating NASA centers or by telephone. To participate by phone, reporters must contact Rachel Kraft at 202-358-1100 or rachel.h.kraft@nasa.gov by noon, April 3.

AMS was constructed, tested and operated by an international team of 56 institutes from 16 countries and organized under U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science sponsorship. NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston manages the AMS Integration Project Office.

AMS was launched on space shuttle Endeavour on May 16, 2011. Operations on the space station began three days later. AMS continues operations aboard the station today.

For NASA TV streaming video, scheduling and downlink information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/ntv

For more information about AMS and the International Space Station, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

Science Experiments, Hardware Upgrades and Spacewalk Preps for Crew

04.02.13

 

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Expedition 35 Commander Chris Hadfield and Flight Engineer Tom Marshburn work on the installation of the new High Rate Communications System hardware in the Density laboratory. Credit: NASA TV The six-member Expedition 35 crew living and working aboard the International Space Station were busy with science experiments, communication hardware upgrades and spacewalk preparations Tuesday while the three newest crew members continued orientation activities. Flight Engineer Tom Marshburn continued his work with the Energy experiment, which measures the changes in a crew member’s energy balance and total energy expenditure following long term space flight. Knowledge of energy requirements is of great importance to researchers to ensure a crew member’s health and good performance, as well as the overall success of a mission. Marshburn and Commander Chris Hadfield spent much of their day on the installation of the new High Rate Communications System hardware that will increase the number of station downlink video channels from four to six, and the number of space-to-ground audio channels from two to four. They removed the Video Baseband Processor in the old system with no issues, but struggled for a while to install the new Ku Comm Unit 2 due to tight tolerances and some stripped bolts. A workaround was devised to apply Braycote lubricant on the threads of the bolts and the installation was completed. The redundant Ku Comm Unit 1 is set to be installed a week from Thursday (April 11). There will be no downlink video on Wednesday due to the checkout of the new equipment. Flight Engineer Chris Cassidy installed a GLACIER freezer into EXPRESS Rack 2 and had some time set aside to observe Marshburn and Hadfield’s work on Ku Comm installation to become familiarized with the system. Flight Engineers Pavel Vinogradov and Roman Romanenko reviewed procedures for an upcoming Russian spacewalk set for April 19. During the excursion, the pair will install and retrieve experiment packages on the exterior of the Zvezda service module and to replace a reflector device that will facilitate the automated docking of the European Space Agency’s “Albert Einstein” Automated Transfer Vehicle-4 when it arrives at the orbiting complex in June. Flight Engineer Alexander Misurkin worked with Cascade, a Russian experiment that investigates cultivation processes of micro-organism, animal and human cells in microgravity. He also performed a variety of maintenance duties in the Russian segment of the station. Cassidy, Vinogradov, and Misurkin also had some time set aside for to continue their familiarization and orientation activities to help them get used to their new home aboard the orbiting outpost.

› Read more about Energy experiment 

› Read more about their launch and docking 

› Read more about Expedition 35

Tomatosphere Wins NSERC's Most Prestigious Award For Promoting Science

04.02.13

 

Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield displays the seeds he will return to Earth for the Tomatosphere project. (Canadian Space Agency/NASA)
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During a previous Tomatosphere program, students studied the growth of their tomato plants in Miss Smith's third grade class at Langley Fundamental Elementary, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The students took their plants home to grow in their gardens over the summer. (Tomatosphere)
View large image The Tomatosphere Project has won the 2013 Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada's (NSERC) Award for Science Promotion, which recognizes outstanding contributions to the promotion of science.

Tomatosphere was selected for stimulating and inspiring students to see the relevance of science not only in the classroom, but also in -- and out of -- this world. Since the project began in 2001, over 2 million Canadian students have taken part in Tomatosphere by growing tomatoes exposed to a space environment to learn about the exciting world of science, space exploration, food and nutrition.

Currently 600,000 tomato seeds for the project have been orbiting Earth aboard the International Space Station since July 2012, when the space shuttle Atlantis delivered them on STS-135, its final flight. Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield will bring the seeds back to Earth in May. They then will be distributed to 14,500 classrooms across Canada and the United States, where students will plant them and observe their germination rates.

The Tomatosphere project shares this award with the many educators and students who have nurtured their tomatoes plants from sprouts to seedlings (and maybe even tasted the fruits of their labor) in the name of science, learning and discovery!

Tomatosphere is sponsored by the Canadian Space Agency (CSA), Heinz Canada Ltd, HeinzSeed, Stokes Seeds and the University of Guelph. CSA also would like to recognize the work and dedication of the Tomatosphere team, including Dr. Michael Dixon of the University of Guelph; Dr. Robert Thirsk and Ron Thorpe, who co-founded the project; and Robert Morrow, the project's highly dedicated project manager.

This original story was written and published by the Canadian Space Agency on March 26, 2013.

 

First Light for ISERV Pathfinder, Space Station's Newest 'Eye' on Earth

03.25.13

 

This "first light" image from ISERV shows the mouth of the Rio San Pablo in Veraguas, Panama, as it empties into the Gulf of Montijo. This wetland supports an important local fishery and provides habitat for many mammals and reptiles, as well as several species of nesting and wintering water birds. The image was captured Feb. 16. (ISERV)
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Canadian Space Agency astronaut and Expedition 34 Flight Engineer Chris Hadfield sets up the ISS SERVIR Environmental Research and Visualization System (ISERV) in the Destiny laboratory of the International Space Station. (NASA)
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From the Earth-facing window of the International Space Station's (ISS) Destiny module, nearly 95 percent of the planet's populated area is visible during the station's orbit. This unique vantage point provides the opportunity to take photos of Earth from space. With the installation and activation of the ISS SERVIR Environmental Research and Visualization System (ISERV), NASA will be able to provide even higher resolution images of Earth!

The ISERV camera system's mission is to gain experience and expertise in automated data acquisition from the space station. ISERV is expected to provide useful images for disaster monitoring and assessment and environmental decision making. A system like ISERV could aid in delivering imagery and data to help officials in developing nations monitor impacts of disasters such as floods, landslides and forest fires. Its images also could help decision makers address other environmental issues.

The instrument recently transmitted back its first images to scientists on Earth from its location in the Window Observational Research Facility (WORF). ISERV is a commercial camera, telescope and pointing system operated remotely from Earth by researchers at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.

This "first light" image, captured on Feb. 16, shows the mouth of the Rio San Pablo in Veraguas, Panama, as it empties into the Gulf of Montijo. This wetland supports an important local fishery and provides habitat for many mammals and reptiles, as well as several species of nesting and wintering water birds.

Acting on commands from the ground, ISERV can photograph specific areas of the Earth's surface as the space station passes over them. The goal for ISERV is to help scientists gain operational experience and expertise and to influence the design of a more capable system for future space station expeditions. The space station provides researchers a unique opportunity to develop ISERV's capability by conducting global observations from space.

"ISERV's full potential is yet to be seen, but we hope ISERV or a successor will really make a difference in people's lives," said ISERV Principal Investigator Burgess Howell, a scientist at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. "For example, if an earthen dam gives way in Bhutan, we want to be able to show officials, via our images, where the bridge or a road is washed out, or where a power substation has been inundated. This kind of information is critical to focus and speed rescue efforts."

Watch video highlights of SERVIR's new camera system on ISS from https://servirglobal.net:



An operational system with ISERV's optical characteristics could, in many cases, acquire near-real-time images of areas on the ground and transmit them within hours of the event. This would provide information that could shape disaster relief decisions and possibly prevent loss of life or injuries.

"ISERV could become a tool to enhance and expand NASA's hazard and disasters work across the whole disaster management cycle," added Frank Lindsay, manager of the NASA Applied Sciences Disasters Program at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "The bottom line is that this camera opens up some opportunities we did not have before and clearly is a pathfinder for more assets on the space station for our applications."

ISERV's software maintains knowledge of the space station's exact location and attitude in orbit at any given moment. With this information, it calculates the next chance to view a particular area. If there's a good viewing opportunity, the SERVIR team will send instructions to the camera. ISERV will take a series of high-resolution photographs of the area at rates of three to seven frames per second, totaling as many as 100 images per pass.

"The camera's nominal resolution is about 10 feet," Howell explained. "That's about the size of a small car -- and potentially valuable for disaster assessments."

At first, the instrument will be used only by SERVIR and its existing hubs in Mesoamerica, East Africa and the Hindu Kush-Himalaya region. After proving itself, ISERV could be made available to the broader disaster-response community and the NASA science community.

The team is assessing how the geometry of the window affects its imagery, how much sunlight the instrument needs to capture clear images, how the atmosphere affects that clarity and more. This characterization phase will last from several weeks to a few months.

The exposure, time of day and location, as well as the land cover (savannah, rivers, forests, etc.) and other characteristics will be documented, catalogued and archived for every scene acquired.

SERVIR consists of a coordination office and student research laboratory at Marshall, active hubs in Kenya and Nepal and a network affiliate in Panama. The coordination office develops application prototypes for the SERVIR and integrates new and relevant technologies from NASA and other scientific research partner organizations to meet the needs of host countries. SERVIR's primary technical work occurs at the hubs, which are staffed by local and regional experts from those countries. The hubs coordinate with other international and national organizations in their respective regions regarding climate change, environmental monitoring, disasters, weather and mapping.

SERVIR, jointly funded by NASA and U.S. Agency for International Development, (USAID), is operated within NASA's Earth Sciences Program at NASA Headquarters. Four other NASA centers work with Marshall on the program, including NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md.; NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffet Field, Calif.; NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.; and NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va.

 

 

Janet Anderson
Marshall Space Flight Center, Huntsville, Ala.
256-544-0034
Janet.L.Anderson@nasa.gov

 NASA

Guillermo Gonzalo Sánchez Achutegui

ayabaca@gmail.com

ayabaca@hotmail.com

ayabaca@yahoo.com

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