Trump picks Pam Bondi as attorney general after Matt Gaetz withdraws    Fake-alcohol deaths highlight SE Asia's methanol problem    Netanyahu attacks ICC war crimes arrest warrants    KSrelief provided over $7bln to support children around the world    Al-Jasser: Saudi Arabia to expand rail network to over 8,000 km    OMODA&JAECOO: Unstoppable global cumulative sales over 360,000 units    Saudi Arabia sees 73.7% rise in investment licenses in Q3 2024    9 erring body care centers shut in Riyadh    20,000 military emblems confiscated in Riyadh    Al-Samaani visits headquarters of Hague Conference on Private International Law    Al Hilal doesn't need extra support to bring new players, CEO says    Fate of Gaetz ethics report uncertain after congressional panel deadlocked    Indian billionaire Gautam Adani indicted in New York on fraud charges    Rafael Nadal: Farewell to the 'King of Clay'    Indonesia shocks Saudi Arabia with 2-0 victory in AFC Asian Qualifiers    Sitting too much linked to heart disease –– even if you work out    Yemeni Orchestra's captivating performances in Riyadh, showcasing shared cultural legacies    Future of Ronaldo's Al Nassr contract remains undecided, says Saudi Pro League CEO    GASTAT report: 45.1% of Saudis are overweight    Denmark's Victoria Kjær Theilvig wins Miss Universe 2024    Order vs. Morality: Lessons from New York's 1977 Blackout    India puts blockbuster Pakistani film on hold    The Vikings and the Islamic world    Filipino pilgrim's incredible evolution from an enemy of Islam to its staunch advocate    Exotic Taif Roses Simulation Performed at Taif Rose Festival    Asian shares mixed Tuesday    Weather Forecast for Tuesday    Saudi Tourism Authority Participates in Arabian Travel Market Exhibition in Dubai    Minister of Industry Announces 50 Investment Opportunities Worth over SAR 96 Billion in Machinery, Equipment Sector    HRH Crown Prince Offers Condolences to Crown Prince of Kuwait on Death of Sheikh Fawaz Salman Abdullah Al-Ali Al-Malek Al-Sabah    HRH Crown Prince Congratulates Santiago Peña on Winning Presidential Election in Paraguay    SDAIA Launches 1st Phase of 'Elevate Program' to Train 1,000 Women on Data, AI    41 Saudi Citizens and 171 Others from Brotherly and Friendly Countries Arrive in Saudi Arabia from Sudan    Saudi Arabia Hosts 1st Meeting of Arab Authorities Controlling Medicines    General Directorate of Narcotics Control Foils Attempt to Smuggle over 5 Million Amphetamine Pills    NAVI Javelins Crowned as Champions of Women's Counter-Strike: Global Offensive (CS:GO) Competitions    Saudi Karate Team Wins Four Medals in World Youth League Championship    Third Edition of FIFA Forward Program Kicks off in Riyadh    Evacuated from Sudan, 187 Nationals from Several Countries Arrive in Jeddah    SPA Documents Thajjud Prayer at Prophet's Mosque in Madinah    SFDA Recommends to Test Blood Sugar at Home Two or Three Hours after Meals    SFDA Offers Various Recommendations for Safe Food Frying    SFDA Provides Five Tips for Using Home Blood Pressure Monitor    SFDA: Instant Soup Contains Large Amounts of Salt    Mawani: New shipping service to connect Jubail Commercial Port to 11 global ports    Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques Delivers Speech to Pilgrims, Citizens, Residents and Muslims around the World    Sheikh Al-Issa in Arafah's Sermon: Allaah Blessed You by Making It Easy for You to Carry out This Obligation. Thus, Ensure Following the Guidance of Your Prophet    Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques addresses citizens and all Muslims on the occasion of the Holy month of Ramadan    







Thank you for reporting!
This image will be automatically disabled when it gets reported by several people.



Robots to install telescopes to peer into cosmos from the moon
Published in The Saudi Gazette on 15 - 07 - 2019

As the United States races to put humans back on the moon for the first time in 50 years, a NASA-funded lab in Colorado aims to send robots there to deploy telescopes that will look far into our galaxy, remotely operated by orbiting astronauts.
The radio telescopes, to be planted on the far side of the moon, are among a plethora of projects underway by the US space agency, private companies and other nations that will transform the moonscape in the coming decade.
"This is not your grandfather's Apollo program that we're looking at," said Jack Burns, director of the Network for Exploration and Space Science at the University of Colorado, which is working on the telescope project.
"This is really a very different kind of program and very importantly it's going to involve machines and humans working together," Burns said in an interview at his lab on the Boulder campus.
Sometime in the coming decade, Burns' team will send a rover aboard a lunar lander spacecraft to the far side of the moon. The rover will rumble across the craggy and rough surface — featuring a mountain taller than any on earth — to set up a network of radio telescopes with little help from humans.
Astronauts will be able to control the rover's single robotic arm from an orbital lunar outpost called Gateway, which an international consortium of space agencies is building. The platform will provide access to and from the moon's surface and serve as a refueling station for deep space missions.
The goal is to give astronauts control of the rover "in a quicker fashion and more like doing some sort of video game," said Ben Mellinkoff, a graduate student at the university. His project is telerobotics, or using artificial intelligence to give users better control over robotic movements from afar.
"It has a lot of potential, especially applied toward space exploration," he says.
The rover, being built at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., will plant the shoebox-sized telescopes on the moon's regolith - the dust, soil and broken rock that covers its surface. Unfettered by the noisy radio interference and light that hinders Earth-bound space observations, the telescopes will peer into the cosmic void, looking back in time to the early formation of our solar system, Burns says.
Working out of a small lab on the Boulder campus, Mellinkoff and two fellow graduate students have built a prototype of the robot named Armstrong (named for the first man on the moon, Neil Armstrong). It is made from computer parts and powered by two modified portable cell phone chargers.
On a recent visit, Mellinkoff controlled the robotic arm using an X-box gaming controller, driving it toward an assortment of shoe-sized objects created with 3-D printing and resembling the radio telescopes to be planted on the moon.
"It's really going to be a platform for us to start different science studies that we couldn't do from the surface of Earth," said Keith Tauscher, a physics graduate student.
Tauscher is working on a lunar orbiter designed to take advantage of the radio silence of the far side of the moon to discover when the first stars and black-holes formed during the formation of the universe. The lab has dubbed this mission "the Dark Ages Polarimeter Pathfinder, or "DAPPER."
The work in Boulder and elsewhere underscores NASA's plan to build a lasting presence on the moon, unlike the fleeting Apollo missions in the 1960s and '70s.
Vice President Mike Pence in March announced an accelerated timeline to put humans on the moon in 2024 "by any means necessary," cutting the agency's previous 2028 goal in half and putting researchers and companies into overdrive in the new space race.
The Americans are not alone in their latest moon quest, unlike a half-century ago. In January, the China National Space Administration landed a spacecraft on the far side of the moon, with a long-term aim of building a base on the moon. India was scheduled to send a rover to the moon this month.
Another key difference between the Apollo program and the Artemis program, as NASA chief Jim Bridenstine named the new lunar initiative in May, is bringing in help from commercial partners such as Elon Musk's SpaceX and Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin. Those companies are working to slash the cost of rocket launches with a longer-term ambition of doing their own projects on the moon and eventually Mars.
"It's a new way of operating in which the private sector is intimately entangled with NASA," Burns said.
He predicts that in roughly 20 years, the moon will be dotted with inflatable hotels for deep-pocketed tourists and mining sites where robotic drills dig under the moon's south pole for frozen water that can be synthesized into rocket fuel for missions back to Earth or further out to Mars. — Reuters


Clic here to read the story from its source.