New Horizons Ultima Thule Flyby Events
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Load more
Recommended publications
-
Planetary Report Report
The PLANETARYPLANETARY REPORT REPORT Volume XXI Number 2 March/April 2001 Farewell, Mir Inside— The Planetary Society’s Cosmos 1: The First Solar Sail On the Cover: Volume XXI When Mir launched in February 1986, it was a show- Table of Number 2 case of Russian technology. But after 15 years of hard work, the aged space station has ended its run. Contents March/April 2001 This view of Mir over Earth’s blue skies was imaged during a fly-around by the space shuttle Atlantis follow- ing the joint docking activities between the two crews. Image: JSC/NASA Features Farewell to a Cold Warrior: Mir Station Obituary 4 As head of the Space Research Institute of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, Roald Sagdeev was there at the birth of the Mir space station. As an adviser to Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, he watched Mir’s changing role in international space policy. Then, after marrying From Susan Eisenhower, the American president’s granddaughter, he moved to the United States The and saw Mir from a different perspective. A member of The Planetary Society’s Board of Editor Directors, he shares with Society members his memories of the long-lived space station. 8 A Bold New Voyage: he Planetary Society is preparing to The Planetary Society Prepares to Fly a Solar Sail It’s the first time a membership organization has undertaken an actual space mission, and launch its first space mission: the T only The Planetary Society is audacious enough to do it. This is the story of how we plan to Cosmos 1 solar sail. -
Submission Completed
Your abstract submission has been received Print this page You have submitted the following abstract to GSA Annual Meeting in Denver, Colorado, USA - 2016. Receipt of this notice does not guarantee that your submission was complete or free of errors. PLUTO IS THE NEW MARS! MOORE, Jeffrey M.1, MCKINNON, William B.2, SPENCER, John R.3, HOWARD, Alan D.4, GRUNDY, William M.5, STERN, S. Alan3, WEAVER, Harold A.6, YOUNG, Leslie A.3, ENNICO, Kimberly1 and OLKIN, Cathy3, (1)NASA Ames Research Center, Space Science Division, MS-245-3, Moffett Field, CA 95129, (2)Washington University, Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences and McDonnell Center for the Space Sciences, One Brookings Drive, Saint Louis, MO 63130, (3)Southwest Research Institute, Boulder, CO 80302, (4)Department of Environmental Sciences, Univerisity of Virginia, PO Box 400123, Charlottesville, VA 22904-4123, (5)Lowell Observatory, Flagstaff, AZ 86001, (6)Applied Physics Laboratory, Johns Hopkins University, Laurel, MD 20723, [email protected] Data from NASA’s New Horizons encounter with Pluto in July 2015 revealed an astoundingly complex world. The surface seen on the encounter hemisphere ranged in age from ancient to recent. A vast craterless plain of slowly convecting solid nitrogen resides in a deep primordial impact basin, reminiscent of young enigmatic deposits in Mars’ Hellas basin. Like Mars, regions of Pluto are dominated by valleys, though the Pluto valleys are thought to be carved by nitrogen glaciers. Pluto has fretted terrain and halo craters. Pluto is cut by tectonics of several different ages. Like Mars, vast tracts on Pluto are mantled by dust and volatiles. -
New Horizons Pluto/KBO Mission Impact Hazard
New Horizons Pluto/KBO Mission Impact Hazard Hal Weaver NH Project Scientist The Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory Outline • Background on New Horizons mission • Description of Impact Hazard problem • Impact Hazard mitigation – Hubble Space Telescope plays a key role New Horizons: To Pluto and Beyond The Initial Reconnaissance of The Solar System’s “Third Zone” KBOs Pluto-Charon Jupiter System 2016-2020 July 2015 Feb-March 2007 Launch Jan 2006 PI: Alan Stern (SwRI) PM: JHU Applied Physics Lab New Horizons is NASA’s first New Frontiers Mission Frontier of Planetary Science Explore a whole new region of the Solar System we didn’t even know existed until the 1990s Pluto is no longer an outlier! Pluto System is prototype of KBOs New Horizons gives the first close-up view of these newly discovered worlds New Horizons Now (overhead view) NH Spacecraft & Instruments 2.1 meters Science Team: PI: Alan Stern Fran Bagenal Rick Binzel Bonnie Buratti Andy Cheng Dale Cruikshank Randy Gladstone Will Grundy Dave Hinson Mihaly Horanyi Don Jennings Ivan Linscott Jeff Moore Dave McComas Bill McKinnon Ralph McNutt Scott Murchie Cathy Olkin Carolyn Porco Harold Reitsema Dennis Reuter Dave Slater John Spencer Darrell Strobel Mike Summers Len Tyler Hal Weaver Leslie Young Pluto System Science Goals Specified by NASA or Added by New Horizons New Horizons Resolution on Pluto (Simulations of MVIC context imaging vs LORRI high-resolution "noodles”) 0.1 km/pix The Best We Can Do Now 0.6 km/pix HST/ACS-PC: 540 km/pix New Horizons Science Status • -
New Horizons: Reconnaissance of the Pluto-Charon System and The
C.T. Russell Editor New Horizons Reconnaissance of the Pluto-Charon System and the Kuiper Belt Previously published in Space Science Reviews Volume 140, Issues 1–4, 2008 C.T. Russell Institute of Geophysics & Planetary Physics University of California Los Angeles, CA, USA Cover illustration: NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft was launched on 2006 January 19, received a grav- ity assist during a close approach to Jupiter on 2007 February 28, and is now headed for a flyby with closest approach 12,500 km from the center of Pluto on 2015 July 14. This artist’s depiction shows the spacecraft shortly after passing above Pluto’s highly variegated surface, which may have black-streaked surface deposits produced from cryogenic geyser activity, and just before passing into Pluto’s shadow when solar and earth occultation experiments will probe Pluto’s tenuous, and possibly hazy, atmosphere. Sunlit crescents of Pluto’s moons Charon, Nix, and Hydra are visible in the background. After flying through the Pluto system, the New Horizons spacecraft could be re-targeted towards other Kuiper Belt Objects in an extended mission phase. This image is based on an original painting by Dan Durda. © Dan Durda 2001 All rights reserved. Back cover illustration: The New Horizons spacecraft was launched aboard an Atlas 551 rocket from the NASA Kennedy Space Center on 2008 January 19 at 19:00 UT. Library of Congress Control Number: 2008944238 DOI: 10.1007/978-0-387-89518-5 ISBN-978-0-387-89517-8 e-ISBN-978-0-387-89518-5 Printed on acid-free paper. -
Arxiv:2001.00125V1 [Astro-Ph.EP] 1 Jan 2020
Draft version January 3, 2020 Typeset using LATEX default style in AASTeX61 SIZE AND SHAPE CONSTRAINTS OF (486958) ARROKOTH FROM STELLAR OCCULTATIONS Marc W. Buie,1 Simon B. Porter,1 et al. 1Southwest Research Institute 1050 Walnut St., Suite 300, Boulder, CO 80302 USA To be submitted to Astronomical Journal, Version 1.1, 2019/12/30 ABSTRACT We present the results from four stellar occultations by (486958) Arrokoth, the flyby target of the New Horizons extended mission. Three of the four efforts led to positive detections of the body, and all constrained the presence of rings and other debris, finding none. Twenty-five mobile stations were deployed for 2017 June 3 and augmented by fixed telescopes. There were no positive detections from this effort. The event on 2017 July 10 was observed by SOFIA with one very short chord. Twenty-four deployed stations on 2017 July 17 resulted in five chords that clearly showed a complicated shape consistent with a contact binary with rough dimensions of 20 by 30 km for the overall outline. A visible albedo of 10% was derived from these data. Twenty-two systems were deployed for the fourth event on 2018 Aug 4 and resulted in two chords. The combination of the occultation data and the flyby results provides a significant refinement of the rotation period, now estimated to be 15.9380 ± 0.0005 hours. The occultation data also provided high-precision astrometric constraints on the position of the object that were crucial for supporting the navigation for the New Horizons flyby. This work demonstrates an effective method for obtaining detailed size and shape information and probing for rings and dust on distant Kuiper Belt objects as well as being an important source of positional data that can aid in spacecraft navigation that is particularly useful for small and distant bodies. -
Astronomy Educator Profiles
Astronomy Educator Profiles Alexis Ann Acohido graduated of the University of Hawaii at Manoa in 2015, where she obtained her Bachelor’s of Science in mathematics. Born and raised on Oahu, she moved to Hawai‘i island last year and is currently part of the Public Information and Outreach department at Gemini Observatory in Hilo, Hawai‘i. In 2013, she was part of the Akamai Workforce Initiative and interned at the Institute for Astronomy on Maui where she worked on parallax ranging methods for point source objects. Alexis Ann Acohido Gemini Observatory Contact: [email protected] Christian Andersen is the Operations Manager at the Pacific International Space Center for Exploration Systems (PISCES), and leads the agency’s additive manufacturing & construction projects at its Laser Lava Lab. Andersen started his career conducting research in inertial confinement fusion at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Ecole Polytechnique, and Rutherford Appleton Laboratories. As Operations Manager, he’s worked on a variety of PISCES projects in transitioning aerospace technologies to terrestrial applications and analogue field testing. Andersen is also a Lecturer and Affiliate Faculty in the Physics & Astronomy Department at the University of Hawaii at Hilo, and the Vice- Chair of the Space Resources Technical Committee for the AIAA (American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics). He holds a B.S. in Physics from San Jose State University and a M.S. in Engineering from Christian Andersen U.C. Davis. PISCES Contact: [email protected] Virginia Aragon-Barnes had a passion for science and a natural curiosity about how and why things worked from a very early age. -
Westminsterresearch the Astrobiology Primer V2.0 Domagal-Goldman, S.D., Wright, K.E., Adamala, K., De La Rubia Leigh, A., Bond
WestminsterResearch http://www.westminster.ac.uk/westminsterresearch The Astrobiology Primer v2.0 Domagal-Goldman, S.D., Wright, K.E., Adamala, K., de la Rubia Leigh, A., Bond, J., Dartnell, L., Goldman, A.D., Lynch, K., Naud, M.-E., Paulino-Lima, I.G., Kelsi, S., Walter-Antonio, M., Abrevaya, X.C., Anderson, R., Arney, G., Atri, D., Azúa-Bustos, A., Bowman, J.S., Brazelton, W.J., Brennecka, G.A., Carns, R., Chopra, A., Colangelo-Lillis, J., Crockett, C.J., DeMarines, J., Frank, E.A., Frantz, C., de la Fuente, E., Galante, D., Glass, J., Gleeson, D., Glein, C.R., Goldblatt, C., Horak, R., Horodyskyj, L., Kaçar, B., Kereszturi, A., Knowles, E., Mayeur, P., McGlynn, S., Miguel, Y., Montgomery, M., Neish, C., Noack, L., Rugheimer, S., Stüeken, E.E., Tamez-Hidalgo, P., Walker, S.I. and Wong, T. This is a copy of the final version of an article published in Astrobiology. August 2016, 16(8): 561-653. doi:10.1089/ast.2015.1460. It is available from the publisher at: https://doi.org/10.1089/ast.2015.1460 © Shawn D. Domagal-Goldman and Katherine E. Wright, et al., 2016; Published by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. This Open Access article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Noncommercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by- nc/4.0/) which permits any noncommercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author(s) and the source are credited. The WestminsterResearch online digital archive at the University of Westminster aims to make the research output of the University available to a wider audience. -
March 21–25, 2016
FORTY-SEVENTH LUNAR AND PLANETARY SCIENCE CONFERENCE PROGRAM OF TECHNICAL SESSIONS MARCH 21–25, 2016 The Woodlands Waterway Marriott Hotel and Convention Center The Woodlands, Texas INSTITUTIONAL SUPPORT Universities Space Research Association Lunar and Planetary Institute National Aeronautics and Space Administration CONFERENCE CO-CHAIRS Stephen Mackwell, Lunar and Planetary Institute Eileen Stansbery, NASA Johnson Space Center PROGRAM COMMITTEE CHAIRS David Draper, NASA Johnson Space Center Walter Kiefer, Lunar and Planetary Institute PROGRAM COMMITTEE P. Doug Archer, NASA Johnson Space Center Nicolas LeCorvec, Lunar and Planetary Institute Katherine Bermingham, University of Maryland Yo Matsubara, Smithsonian Institute Janice Bishop, SETI and NASA Ames Research Center Francis McCubbin, NASA Johnson Space Center Jeremy Boyce, University of California, Los Angeles Andrew Needham, Carnegie Institution of Washington Lisa Danielson, NASA Johnson Space Center Lan-Anh Nguyen, NASA Johnson Space Center Deepak Dhingra, University of Idaho Paul Niles, NASA Johnson Space Center Stephen Elardo, Carnegie Institution of Washington Dorothy Oehler, NASA Johnson Space Center Marc Fries, NASA Johnson Space Center D. Alex Patthoff, Jet Propulsion Laboratory Cyrena Goodrich, Lunar and Planetary Institute Elizabeth Rampe, Aerodyne Industries, Jacobs JETS at John Gruener, NASA Johnson Space Center NASA Johnson Space Center Justin Hagerty, U.S. Geological Survey Carol Raymond, Jet Propulsion Laboratory Lindsay Hays, Jet Propulsion Laboratory Paul Schenk, -
Publication in the Bulletin
Lunar and Planetary Information Bulletin July 2019 • Issue 157 Contents Featured Story From the Desk of Lori Glaze News From Space Meeting Highlights Spotlight on Education In Memoriam Milestones New and Noteworthy Calendar Featured Story Featured Story A Personal Journey to Ultima Thule: New Horizons in the Kuiper Belt As the New Horizons science team gathered in Laurel, Paul Schenk, Brian May, Joel Parker, and Andy Chaikin discuss a possible shape model for Ultima Thule, January 1, 2019. Credit: E. Whitman. Maryland, during the last week of 2018, many of us reflected back on a similar gathering three-and-a-half years earlier. In the summer of 2015, we all came together on a voyage of exploration to the planet Pluto and its moons. At that time, we didn’t know very much about our target, and this time we knew even less about “Ultima Thule,” a small, lonely 30-kilometer- wide object known as 2014 MU69 that was orbiting the Sun almost half a billion kilometers beyond Pluto. Unlike what we knew about Pluto, we did not even know Ultima Thule’s surface composition, its shape, or even the length of its day. We knew Ultima Thule was much smaller than — and hence would be a very different beast from — Pluto. So as the New Horizons team arrived at the Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, to watch and enjoy the encounter sequence play out, we were completely in the dark. The only clues we had were stellar occultation observations of Ultima Thule from Argentina in 2017 that indicated it was elongate and might have either two separate or contacting lobes. -
Distant Ekos: 2017 OG69 and 9 New Centaur/SDO Discoveries: 2017 SN132, 2017 WH30, 2018 AX18, 2018 AY18, 2018 VM35, 2018 VO35, 2019 AB7, 2019 CR, 2019 CY4
IssueNo.118 February2019 ✤✜ s ✓✏ DISTANT EKO ❞✐ ✒✑ The Kuiper Belt Electronic Newsletter ✣✢ r Edited by: Joel Wm. Parker [email protected] www.boulder.swri.edu/ekonews CONTENTS News & Announcements ................................. 2 Abstracts of 6 Accepted Papers ......................... 4 Abstracts of 1 Submitted Paper ......................... 7 Titles of 55 Conference Contributions . 8 Newsletter Information .............................. 11 1 NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS Request for Nominations for 9th “Paolo Farinella” Prize To honor the memory and the outstanding figure of Paolo Farinella (1953-2000), an extraordinary scientist and person, a prize has been established in recognition of significant contributions in one of the fields of interest of Paolo, which spanned from planetary sciences to space geodesy, fundamental physics, science popularization, security in space, weapons control and disarmament. The prize has been proposed during the “International Workshop on Paolo Farinella, the scientist and the man”, held in Pisa in 2010, and the 2019 edition is supported by the “Observatoire de la Cote d’Azur” in France. Previous recipients of the “Paolo Farinella Prize” were: • 2011: William F. Bottke, for his contribution to the field of “Physics and dynamics of small solar system bodies” • 2012: John Chambers, for his contribution to the field of “Formation and early evolution of the solar system ” • 2013: Patrick Michel, for his contribution to the field of “Collisional processes in the Solar System” • 2014: David Vokrouhlicky, for his -
Comparative Kbology: Using Surface Spectra of Triton
COMPARATIVE KBOLOGY: USING SURFACE SPECTRA OF TRITON, PLUTO, AND CHARON TO INVESTIGATE ATMOSPHERIC, SURFACE, AND INTERIOR PROCESSES ON KUIPER BELT OBJECTS by BRYAN JASON HOLLER B.S., Astronomy (High Honors), University of Maryland, College Park, 2012 B.S., Physics, University of Maryland, College Park, 2012 M.S., Astronomy, University of Colorado, 2015 A thesis submitted to the Faculty of the Graduate School of the University of Colorado in partial fulfillment of the requirement for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences 2016 This thesis entitled: Comparative KBOlogy: Using spectra of Triton, Pluto, and Charon to investigate atmospheric, surface, and interior processes on KBOs written by Bryan Jason Holler has been approved for the Department of Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences Dr. Leslie Young Dr. Fran Bagenal Date The final copy of this thesis has been examined by the signatories, and we find that both the content and the form meet acceptable presentation standards of scholarly work in the above mentioned discipline. ii ABSTRACT Holler, Bryan Jason (Ph.D., Astrophysical and Planetary Sciences) Comparative KBOlogy: Using spectra of Triton, Pluto, and Charon to investigate atmospheric, surface, and interior processes on KBOs Thesis directed by Dr. Leslie Young This thesis presents analyses of the surface compositions of the icy outer Solar System objects Triton, Pluto, and Charon. Pluto and its satellite Charon are Kuiper Belt Objects (KBOs) while Triton, the largest of Neptune’s satellites, is a former member of the KBO population. Near-infrared spectra of Triton and Pluto were obtained over the previous 10+ years with the SpeX instrument at the IRTF and of Charon in Summer 2015 with the OSIRIS instrument at Keck. -
New Horizons SOC to Instrument Pipeline ICD
New Horizons SOC to Instrument Pipeline ICD September 2017 SwRI® Project 05310 Document No. 05310-SOCINST-01 Contract NASW-02008 Prepared by SOUTHWEST RESEARCH INSTITUTE® Space Science and Engineering Division 6220 Culebra Road, San Antonio, Texas 78228-0510 (210) 684-5111 FAX (210) 647-4325 Southwest Research Institute 05310-SOCINST-01 Rev 0 Chg 0 New Horizons SOC to Instrument Pipeline ICD Page ii New Horizons SOC to Instrument Pipeline ICD SwRI Project 05310 Document No. 05310-SOCINST-01 Contract NASW-02008 Prepared by: Joe Peterson 08 November 2013 Revised by: Brian Carcich August, 2014 Revised by: Tiffany Finley March, 2016 Revised by: Tiffany Finley October, 2016 Revised by: Brian Carcich December, 2016 Revised by: Tiffany Finley, Brian Carcich, PEPSSI team April, 2017 Revised by: Tiffany Finley, PEPSSI team September, 2017 Contributors: ALICE specifics prepared by: Maarten Versteeg, Joel Parker, & Andrew Steffl LEISA specifics prepared by: George McCabe & Allen Lunsford LORRI specifics prepared by: Hal Weaver & Howard Taylor MVIC specifics prepared by: Cathy Olkin PEPSSI specifics prepared by: Stefano Livi, Matthew Hill, Lawrence Brown, & Peter Kollman REX specifics prepared by: Ivan Linscott & Brian Carcich SDC specifics prepared by: David James SWAP specifics prepared by: Heather Elliott Southwest Research Institute 05310-SOCINST-01 Rev 0 Chg 0 New Horizons SOC to Instrument Pipeline ICD Page iii General Approval Signatures: Approved by: ____________________________________ Date: ____________ Hal Weaver, JHU/APL, Project Scientist