Technological Developments are Making Space Exploration Possible and Offer Benefits on Earth

1. Technological Developments are Making Space Exploration Possible and Offer Benefits on Earth

2. The future of Space Transport Technology • Ion Drives • Engines that use xenon gas instead of chemical fuels • Xenon is electrically charged, accelerated, and then emitted as exhaust. • The thrust is much weaker than using chemical fuels, but even a little bit of force lasts a long period of time. • Benefit: Uses 10% (1/10) of the fuel that conventional spacecrafts use.

3. The future of Space Transport Technology • SolarSails • Solar sails would use the photons emitted from the sun to propel the sails. (Kind of like propelling boats using wind sails) • Use of solar sails is expected by 2015. • Benefit: It is estimated that spacecraft powered by solar sails could travel 5x faster than a current spacecraft.

4. Surviving There: Technologies for Living in Space

5. Environmental Hazards • Space is a vacuum, with no air or water – they need to be brought, recycled or created. • Cosmic rays are very harmful • Meteoroids could hit • Temperatures can range from unimaginably cold in a shadow to extremely hot in full sunlight. • Atmospheric gases that keep us alive on earth don’t exist in space. • Atmospheric pressure doesn’t exist in space, and that pressure helps regulate our heartbeat.

6. Psychological Challenges to Confined Living • Long trips in a confined living space may lead to psychological problems. Imagine spending every minute of every day with one person for two years. • Now imagine spending that two years in an enclosure not much bigger than this classroom. Stepping outside is strictly prohibited.

7. A Home in Space • Very careful planning must go into energy, the life-support systems, and all other equipment that goes into space.

8. Meeting Needs in Space • Medicine to control motion sickness • Fire-resistant suits • Compact breathing systems • Microelectronics • Wireless communication technology

9. Telescopes • Hans Lippersheymade one of the first telescopes, but Galileo has been credited for first using it to study the night sky.

10. 1. Refracting Telescope • Use two lenses to gather and focus starlight • Light comes in parallel • Lens bends the light • Eye piece lens bends it back so we can see • Benefit: They give much better images than equal size reflectors.

11. 2. Reflecting Telescope • Uses mirrors instead of lenses to gather and focus the light from the stars. • Were created by Isaac Newton to fix the problems that refracting telescopes had with focusing colours. • Benefit: Reflectors can be made much larger than refractors.

12. Interferometry: Combining Telescopes for Greater Power • Interferometry: Technique of combining telescopes to improve resolution (clarity of details). • The observatory below is in Hawaii. Keck 1 and Keck II are telescopes there; when they are used together, they can detect objects in space with better clarity and at a greater distance than any other current Earth-based observatory can.

13. Electromagnetic Spectrum • All the different types of energy can be plotted on a spectrum based on their wavelengths and frequencies. • Visible light is the only frequency that our eyes can pick up. Technology can pick up the rest.

14. Radio Telescopes • Purpose: Incoming signals are used to map out the composition and distribution of matter in space. • Radio waves are received from stars, galaxies, nebulae, the Sun, and even some planets – both in our own solar system and in others. • Limitation: Must be very large to attain great resolution. Found in Puerto Rico – the diameter Is the length of 3 football fields.

15. Advantages of Radio Telescopes • Radio telescopes are not affected by weather, clouds, pollution or atmosphere • Radio waves can be detected day and night. • Images that cannot be collected by optical equipment can be detected by radio telescopes.

16. Radio Interferometry • Benefit: Offer more accuracy in measurements • By arranging radio telescopes in arrays, they have more of a range and can offer even more accuracy. • The resolving capability of this array is equal to a radio telescope 27 km wide. Found in Sorocco, New Mexico

17. Triangulation

18. Triangulation Procedure • On a flat surface, measure off an accurate baseline • Select an object to be your viewing target on the opposite side of your area. • At one end of the baseline, use a protractor to determine the angle between your sight line to the object and the spot on the baseline where you are standing. • Stand at the other end of the baseline and again determine the angle from the spot to the object. • Make a scale drawing of a triangle using the length of the baseline and the two angles. • On your drawing, mark a perpendicular line from the baseline to the object. Measure this line and use the scale to convert it to actual length. This will give you the distance to the point opposite of your area.

19. Parallax • The apparent shift in position of a nearby object when the object is viewed from two different places. • Try it – hold out your arm and put stick out your thumb. Close your right eye, now open it and close your left eye. • Purpose: It is used to find out how far a star is away from earth. • Longer baseline = more accurate results. • Astronomers use a star’s parallax to determine what angles to use for triangulation Image on next page as well

21. Determining a Star’s Composition • This is done through the science of spectroscopy. • Definition: The study of spectra produced when a beam of light is passed through a prism. • A spectroscope is the instrument that helps us interpret the “fingerprint” of the elements that make up a star.

22. Determining a Star’s Composition • White light – the combination of all colours • The colours can be seen when shone through a prism – this creates a spectrum of light. • Using a spectroscope, astronomers look at the spectrum of different stars and compare the spectra to known data.

23. Determining a Star’s Direction of Motion • Doppler Effect: The apparent change in frequency of sound, light, and other waves as the observer and the wave source move towards or away from each other. • We know the motion of the vehicle by the pattern of the waves.

25. Which direction? • How do you know?

26. Determining a Star’s Direction of Motion • Light travels in waves just like sound • When a star approaches, wavelengths compress and get shorter. The spectral lines move to the blue (where shorter wavelengths are) • When a star moves farther away, wavelengths lengthen. The spectral lines move to the red(where longer wavelengths are). Which of these are moving farther and which are moving closer?

27. PAT Style Questions Use the following information to answer the next question. Air, water, and other wastes are recycled aboard the International Space Station. Most of the food that the crewmembers eat is dehydrated. Oxygen is carried in liquid form. • The main reason that the ISS has adopted strategies such as those above is to overcome • The excessive cost of living in space • The lack of storage space aboard a space station • The scarcity of resources on a space station • Issues related to on-board experiments

28. PAT Style Questions Use the following information to answer the next question. Although artificial satellites and piloted spacecraft were achievements of late 20th century, the technology and principles of space travel were discussed much earlier. • The power of rockets to lift objects into space is described by a scientific law first developed by • Keplar • Newton • Pascal • Rutherford

29. PAT Style Questions Use the following information to answer the next question. The most powerful rocket is the Energia multistage rocket, which was used by the Soviet Space Shuttle. In multistage rockets, each stage is separated and discarded once its fuel has been consumed. • The successive discarding of stages is done in order to • Reduce the weight of the fuselage and increase the mass ratio of the rocket • Reduce the cost of launching • Minimize the efforts of the scientists • Decrease the speed of the rocket

30. PAT Style Questions • Space shuttles are used for deploying satellites into orbit, carrying out scientific experiments, and repairing orbiting satellites. Which of the following functions is also a function of a space shuttle? • Taking photographs in space • Returning previously deployed satellites to Earth • Forecasting weather conditions • Observing celestial bodies

31. PAT Style Questions • Ion drives are engines that use xenon gas instead of chemical fuels. Solar sails use the • Energy of the wind to propel spacecraft • Electromagnetic energy of the sun to power the spacecraft • Heat energy of the sun to push the spacecraft • Recycled energy of conventional hydrocarbon fuels to propel the spacecraft

32. PAT Style Questions • The “payload” of a spacecraft refers to the • Materials carried aboard • Rocket fuel • Oxidizer • Combustion chamber

33. PAT Style Questions Use the following information to answer the next question. As a result of zero gravity, crewmembers aboard spacecraft experience weightlessness. • Weightlessness causes physical complications that may include all of the following except • Blocked sinuses • anemia • Extra weight gain • Loss of bone tissue

34. PAT Style Questions A Russian cosmonaut, ValeriPolyakov, completed a 438-day tour of duty aboard the Mir Space Station in 1995. • Which of the following aspects of living in space is the least hazardous for humans? • Lower food consumption • Psychological issues • Microgravity • The presence of environmental dangers

35. PAT Style Questions • In order for an object to be launched into space, the object has to • Withstand the range of temperatures in space • Overcome the force of Earth’s gravity • Withstand the presence of other celestial bodies • Overcome problems due to pollution

36. PAT Style Questions • Russia became the first country to launch an artificial satellite in 1957. This satelite was called • Luna • Alouette • Soyuz • Sputnik

37. Review • List the three main types of spacecraft currently being used. • In a rocket, what does a payload refer to? • What limits how long an astronaut can stay out in space in his or her space suit? • Explain why a space suite must have both a heating unit and a cooling unit. • Why is it necessary to recycle almost all of the water used on a spacecraft such as the International Space Station? • Why do you require at least three satellites to determine your position? • What is remote sensing? • What does GPS stand for?