#arkyd

[takenews-blog1]

Planetary Assets’ Arkyd-6 prototype imaging satellite tv for pc has left the constructing

New Post has been published on https://takenews.net/planetary-assets-arkyd-6-prototype-imaging-satellite-tv-for-pc-has-left-the-constructing/

Planetary Assets’ Arkyd-6 prototype imaging satellite tv for pc has left the constructing

Employees put together Planetary Assets’ Arkyd-6 know-how demonstrator satellite tv for pc for cargo on the firm’s headquarters in Redmond, Wash.

  Planetary Assets has been engaged on its Arkyd-6 imaging satellite tv for pc for years, and as we speak the corporate reported that the printer-sized spacecraft has lastly begun its journey to an Indian launch pad.

Arkyd-6 is taken into account a know-how trailblazer for the asteroid-observing probes that Planetary Assets plans to construct at its headquarters in Redmond, Wash.

The corporate’s first demonstrator satellite tv for pc, the Arkyd-3R, was deployed from the Worldwide House Station’s Kibo airlock in 2015. The Arkyd-6 is twice as huge, and is predicted to offer Earth imagery within the midwave infrared slice of the electromagnetic spectrum.

Infrared imaging will ultimately turn out to be useful for observing near-Earth asteroids and figuring out that are the richest potential targets for robotic mining operations. Water ice is the first goal, not less than for the early going, since H2O might be changed into hydrogen rocket gasoline in addition to breathable oxygen and drinkable water for house vacationers.

Planetary Assets’ president and CEO, Chris Lewicki, has stated the primary steps within the firm’s asteroid prospecting marketing campaign might nicely be taken by 2020.

Arkyd-6 represents one small step towards that purpose. How small? Roughly four by eight by 12 inches, in accordance with what’s generally known as the 6U Cubesat normal.

A video clip reveals the satellite tv for pc present process closing meeting, protecting packing, and placement right into a carry-on suitcase that’s rolled out to a ready car (with somebody dressed up in an Arkyd-6 costume standing beside the automobile door).

The digicam follows the automobile because it drives over the Evergreen Level Floating Bridge to Seattle, the place the satellite tv for pc was presumably handed off to Spaceflight Industries. Spaceflight is dealing with payload processing for Arkyd-6’s launch as a secondary payload on India’s PSLV-C40 house mission.

The PSLV rocket is because of elevate off from India’s Satish Dhawan House Heart to place the Cartosat-2ER imaging satellite tv for pc and greater than two dozen smaller spacecraft into orbit.

This received’t be the final we hear from Planetary Assets’ newly delivered child.

“Within the weeks main as much as launch day, we’ll be sharing with you info on the Arkyd-6, its mission and the crew who constructed it – so be looking out!” Planetary Assets says.

[takenews-blog1]

Planetary Resources’ prototype #asteroid prospector set for January liftoff in #India

New Post has been published on https://takenews.net/planetary-resources-prototype-asteroid-prospector-set-for-january-liftoff-in-india/

Planetary Resources’ prototype #asteroid prospector set for January liftoff in #India

India’s Polar Satellite tv for pc Launch Car lifts off on a February house mission.

Redmond, Wash.-based Planetary Sources’ expertise demonstrator satellite tv for pc for asteroid prospecting is due for launch in early January, together with greater than two dozen different satellites, aboard India’s Polar Satellite tv for pc Launch Car.

The newest phrase on the schedule for the PSLV-C40 mission got here at present from Seattle-based Spaceflight, which is offering launch and mission providers for Planetary Sources’ Arkyd-6 and 10 different satellites.

Arkyd-6 is simply concerning the dimension of an inkjet printer, but it surely’s designed to seize pictures in midwave infrared wavelengths and ship them again to Earth. The imaging expertise is destined for use in future generations of Planetary Sources’ asteroid-surveying spacecraft.

PSLV-C40 would be the first mission to raise off from India’s Satish Dhawan Area Heart since a PSLV mission failed in August. The first payload is a Cartosat-2 imaging satellite tv for pc, however plenty of secondary payloads shall be getting a piggyback journey to polar orbit.

Spaceflight’s lineup contains Arkyd-6 in addition to Finland’s ICEYE-X1 radar-imaging satellite tv for pc, 4 Spire World Lemur-2 Earth commentary satellites, Astro Digital’s Landmapper-BC3 imaging satellite tv for pc, AMSAT’s Fox-1D amateur-radio analysis satellite tv for pc, plus others.

Spaceflight is a service providing of Spaceflight Industries, which additionally has an orbital imaging subsidiary referred to as BlackSky below its wing.

“PSLV-C40 is an ideal instance of how our versatile, full-service rideshare mannequin is enabling new industrial house companies to exist whereas increasing into new markets,” Spaceflight President Curt Blake stated in a information launch. “This mission brings new clients from outdoors the trade into house whereas persevering with partnerships with current clients for his or her ongoing satellite tv for pc constellations.”

However wait … there’s extra: PSLV-C40’s manifest additionally lists 4 Planet Dove imaging satellites, Telesat’s LEO-1, SSTL’s Carbonite-2 video-transmitting satellite tv for pc and NovaSAR-S radar satellite tv for pc, a satellite tv for pc for Kepler Communications, France’s PicSat house telescope, six South Korean mini-satellites and extra ride-alongs.

[tediousempire]

Highlight 43 - Arkyd

(Like the caption says, it’s a NASA photo. I, however, lifted it from Planetary Resources July 2015 press release)

I’m on a bit of an asteroid mining thing at the moment, so it’s natural that I’d want to write about Arkyd, Planetary Resources miniature asteroid prospecting spacecraft. But there’s some interesting things about the way Arkyd is meant to work that make it worth looking at all by itself.

What I won’t be talking about is anything to do with their Kickstarter campaign, but if you’d like you can browse the comment thread here to read the lamentations of people who are deeply offended that their ‘space selfies’ are late.

So first off, what is Arkyd? Well, in a sense it’s the loaf of bread sized thing in the picture at the top of the post. It’s also the name of what’s supposed to be a series of missions that Planetary Resources is planning to use to identify near earth asteroids for mining.

Like I said last time, we don’t know anywhere near enough about the size and composition of near earth asteroids to actually pull off an asteroid retrieval mission without first doing some prospecting. That’s where Arkyd comes in.

The idea is to build small, light, inexpensive spacecraft to do the surveying. Several of these craft then head out to flyby or intercept near earth asteroids and gather useful information like how big the asteroids are, and broadly speaking what they might be made of.

But it isn’t like NASA or the rest of the world’s space agencies are just being intentionally wasteful in their spacecraft design. If the Dawn mission that recently visited Ceres weighed over a ton and cost 450 million dollars, how light and cheap can Arkyd possibly get and still do useful work?

Probably pretty light, and in the context of space missions probably pretty cheap.

First there’s the obvious savings, Arkyd is going to be designed to survey near earth asteroids instead of several main belt asteroids. Dawn had to be able to pull off 10 km/sec of acceleration even after it detached from its rocket. Arkyd can probably get away with 2.

Next is electronics. Space is hell for electronics. I won’t go into exactly why, but ionizing radiation screws everything up. You can get around the radiation problem to an extent using hardened electronics, but they aren’t off the shelf components, and they aren’t on par with the latest technology. Arkyd is part of a push to essentially use off the shelf components anyway, and deal with the problems caused by radiation by a combination of redundancy and frequent partial or complete resets.

That change in the way the electronics are handled lets every instrument be smaller, lighter, less energy intensive, and more powerful. And that lets next week’s highlight, the CubeSat, do useful science for a cost of $150,000. For something like the prospecting versions of Arkyd, which needs to be able to maneuver and send information back to Earth from well beyond earth orbit the cost floor until launch costs come down is probably in the single digit millions of dollars.

And that price tag is big news in its own way. A spacecraft that can prospect an asteroid for ore is going to have capabilities broadly similar to those of the the larger spacecraft we’ve been sending out like Dawn or New Horizons. These missions expand our knowledge of what our solar system is, and how it was formed. They let us test new propulsion and control systems. They give us hauntingly beautiful background images for our computers. Imagine a dozen or more Dawns on different missions at the same time for the same cost. That’s why the push that Arkyd is a part of matters.

[osimint]

Space telescope funded by public donations meets $1 million goal

The first public space observatory, ARKYD, paid for in part by donations has hit its initial $1 million fundraising goal, putting the project on track for launch in 2015, writes the CSM on 20JUN13.

Planetary Resources developed ARKYD and its needed support infrastructure, such as a ground station, with additional money from private investors.

As a tech note, ARKYD's light-gathering mirror is only about 8 inches across, compared with Hubble's 13-foot mirror or the 21-foot mirror of the James Webb telescope.

The project is the first step toward Planetary Resources, Inc.'s ultimate aim of mining asteroids.

The $1 million mark ensures that a bare-bones telescope will get launched and maintained. And it ensures that the company will be able to deliver what they promised to donors. For instance:

For $450, you get to pick three targets for the telescope and receive the images that result.

Pony up $5,000, and the school or museum of your choice gets 25 targets, in addition to teaching tools that will help incorporate the observations into its science curriculum.

For $10,000 (24 people have contributed at this level so far), it's the school support plus extras, including tickets to the launch, among other items.

A total of $1.3 million would allow the company to build a second ground station to receive data from the craft. This would speed processing and distribution of images. If the company hits the $2 million mark, it will beef up the telescope for planet-hunting purposes.

CSM

[astropica-blog]

Yesterday, the ARKYD space telescope for everyone project from Planetary Resources got funded succesfully on Kickstarter: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1458134548/arkyd-a-space-telescope-for-everyone-0

Total funding ended at $1,505,366, the target was $1 Million.

The telescope is intended to hunt down asteroids, which in turn will be brought in to be able to mine them for resources. Next to hunting asteroids, it is capable of photographing anything in space and on Earth, except the Sun itself.

While it is not a competitor for the Hubble Space telescope which has a main mirror diameter of 2,4 meters, its 20cm mirror will enable the telescope to hunt down asteroids night and day.

More information can be found at the Planetary Resources website http://www.planetaryresources.com/supporters/

[justs0m3stuff]

These guys have definitely won the internet for the day. Check this out!

[thecelticfirebird]

That's it. Wow. Can't wait for what comes next!

[electricspacekoolaid]

Planetary Resources Live FInale With Bill Nye the Science Guy