Space Exploration

ESA announced a space summit to be held on 16th February in Toulouse, France, to help tackle the “unprecedented societal, economic and security challenges faced by Europe”. The summit aims to identify the necessary steps in rectifying these issues. The summit will consist of two parts chaired by the French Presidency of the EU, also chairing the ESA Council at ministerial level.

NASA will launch a mini asteroid scout mission called NEA Scout with the uncrewed first Artemis testflight in spring, the agency said. The target is 2020 GE, a near-Earth asteroid that is less 18 meters in size; asteroids smaller than 100 meters have never been explored up close before, NASA said. NEA stands for near Earth asteroid.

Plus Ultra Space Outposts, a European company developing a lunar satellite constellation, and ispace Europe have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) for working together on joint lunar missions, ispace announced. The MoU comprises the deployment of communication and navigation satellites into lunar orbit as early as 2024.

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris charged the National Space Council to focus on the rules and norms governing space, leveraging space to tackle the climate crisis, and building a diverse space and STEM workforce, NASA said. The agency also announced a “strategic, first-of-its-kind partnership" with the European Space Agency (ESA) to observe Earth, its climate and changing environment.

The European Space Agency (ESA) wants to accelerate the use of space in Europe with an annual budget of € 7.15 billion, the agency said. The largest envelopes are invested in Earth Observation (€ 1.6 billion), Navigation (€ 1.5 billion), and Space Transportation (€ 1 billion). Copernicus suffers a budget shortfall of € 750 million due to the withdrawal of the UK.

The European Space Agency (ESA) completed its astronaut selection, moving on to the next stage with 1391 applicants invited to a full day of testing. The candidates were selected from over 23 000 European applications, ESA said. The agency had issued the call for new astronauts in March last year.

Airbus Crisa, an affiliate company of Airbus, has signed a contract with Northrop Grumman to develop the Power Management and Distribution (PMAD) system for the Habitation and Logistics Outpost (HALO), Airbus announced. The contract worth over US $50M marks Airbus’ first contribution to the Lunar Gateway, part of NASA’s Artemis program.

Space infrastructure company, Masten, announced they were already preparing for their second Moon mission, although Mission 1 has not left Earth yet. The company claims that they are capable of launching Mission 2 as early as six months after Mission 1.  Masten’s first mission to the Moon, landing near the Haworth Crater, is scheduled for the end of 2023.

A research team led by Profs. Lin Yangting and Lin Honglei from the Institute of Geology and Geophysics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (IGGCAS) observed water signals in Moon surface reflectance spectral data. The discovery is the first evidence of in-situ detection of water on our natural satellite.

The James Webb Space Telescope team successfully deployed the telescope’s 6.4-metre long gold-coated primary mirror, completing the final stage of deployments. Science operations are due to start this summer. The two wings of Webb’s primary mirror had to folded to fit inside Ariane 5’s fairing.