The deliciously named O / OREOS ( Organism / Organic Exposure to Orbital stress ) projection will use tacky nanosatellites to read the effect of space experience on organic molecules . Paul Gilster of Centauri Dreams has the details .
Keeping distance mission separate can be a hard challenge when so many planet are launched on a unmarried Eruca vesicaria sativa . Take O / OREOS ( Organism / Organic Exposure to Orbital tenseness ) . The small planet ride into space on an Air Force Minotaur IV rocket on the 19th , a launchwe noted here in connection with the NanoSail - five hundred solar cruise sales demonstrator . For NanoSail - D was itself carry into space as part of the FASTSAT payload double-decker ( Fast , Affordable Science and Technology Satellite ) , and FASTSAT and type O / OREOS were colligate under a mission called Space Test Program S26 . Not to observe a number of other planet from universities and manufacture that hitched a drive on the same booster .
All of this produces not just confusion but acronym fatigue . Nonetheless , interesting scientific discipline is in the works . O / OREOS is all about conducting astrobiology science experiment on the chintzy using nanosatellites ( CubeSats ) , help scientist design succeeding experiment on how organic molecules are change by picture to space . Says Pascale Ehrenfreund ( a projection scientist at George Washington University :
“ The O / OREOS science squad is excited to find the first genuine - clock time measure from samples onboard two science experimentation . This will demo that CubeSat technologies can be used for future missions to address fundamental exobiology objectives . ”
The satellite will conduct experiments , some lasting as longsighted as six months , autonomously after receiving the command from the ground place in Santa Clara , California . The Space Environment Viability of Organics experimentation ( SEVO ) target to monitor four classes of organic molecules as they are expose to space consideration , using corpuscle now known to be wide distributed throughout the galaxy . The organics , housed in micro - surround , are to be exposed to radiation therapy through solar ultraviolet as well as visible light , trapped atom radiation ( i.e. , energetic proton and electron trapped by the Earth ’s magnetosphere ) and cosmic radiation . researcher will look for changes in UV , visible and near - infrared light assimilation .
Image : This artist ’s concept present complex organic molecules , live as polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon . These large speck , comprised of carbon paper and hydrogen , are distributed throughout the Milky Way and other galaxy like it . They play a substantial role in star and planet formation and are very unwashed on Earth . They form any time carbon - based materials are not burned completely . They can be discover in sooty exhaust fumes from elevator car and aeroplane , and in charcoal grey broil hamburgers and burnt toast . Aromatic molecules describe in meteorite might have been good to the pedigree of lifespan on Earth . Image credit : NASA / JPL - Caltech
The Space Environment Survivability of Live Organisms ( SESLO ) payload , meanwhile , will count at the natural action of microorganism conform to the space environment , measure their growth and wellness while discover to weightlessness and radiation sickness . The experimentation will grow band of microbes – Halorubrum chaoviatoris and B subtilis – of the kind find in salt pond and filth in a dehydrated and dormant land . The O / OREOS researchers will evaluate their universe density and color changes while the germ consume dye liquid ingredients .
CubeSats are a utilitarian way to move because they ’re so much less expensive than the choice , as Ehrenfreund note :
“ Secondary payload nanosatellites , like O / OREOS are an advanced way to extend and enhance scientist ’ chance to acquit research in lowly Earth sphere by provide an choice to the International Space Station or space shuttle investigations . With O / OREOS we can analyze the stability of organics in the local space environment in real - clock time and trial flight computer hardware that can be used for next loading to address fundamental exobiology objectives . ”
All of that , of track , spiel into the much larger picture of contributing to our cognition of life ’s extraction and statistical distribution in the universe . Not bad for a nanosatellite no larger than a loaf of bread of bread that weighs a mere 5.4 kilo , operating in a scurvy - Earth orbit some 644 kilometer above the surface . O / OREOS is the first NASA cubesat to fly with two distinct and independent science experimentation on an self-reliant satellite , and is build from off - the - shelf commercial and NASA - contrive parts to operate as an automatize , self - contained infinite laboratory . The O / OREOSmission dashboardis operating , as is the Twitter provender @NASA_OOREOS .
This billet originally appear onCentauri Dreams .
AstrobiologyChemistryNASAsatellitesScienceSpace
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