145-465: IMAGE ( Imager for Magnetopause-to-Aurora Global Exploration , Explorer 78 or MIDEX-1 ) was a NASA Medium Explorer mission that studied the global response of the Earth's magnetosphere to changes in the solar wind . It was believed lost but as of August 2018 might be recoverable. It was launched 25 March 2000, at 20:34:43.929 UTC , by a Delta II launch vehicle from Vandenberg Air Force Base on
290-452: A DPU. The three sensor heads are mounted side by side on top of the DPU. The middle sensor looks straight ahead, with a 107° field of view in the plane of the spin axis. The look directions of the two side sensors are offset from that of the middle sensor by 20°. This 20° offset compensates for a 20° blind spot in the center of each detector. The resulting field of view in the plane of the spin axis
435-408: A Greek root) were used by physicist and science-fiction author Geoffrey A. Landis in a story published in 1998, thus appearing before perinigricon and aponigricon (from Latin) in the scientific literature in 2002. The suffixes shown below may be added to prefixes peri- or apo- to form unique names of apsides for the orbiting bodies of the indicated host/ (primary) system. However, only for
580-462: A collimator, conversion unit, extraction lens, dispersive energy analyzer and time-of-flight mass analyzer with position-sensitive particle detection. Neutral particles enter the instrument through a collimator which filters charged particles. LENA converts neutrals to negative ions through a near specular glancing reflection from a tungsten surface. Negative ions from the surface are then collected by an extraction lens which focuses all negative ions with
725-628: A decade of reliance on the Russians. In 2019, NASA announced the Artemis program , intending to return to the Moon and establish a permanent human presence. This was paired with the Artemis Accords with partner nations to establish rules of behavior and norms of space commercialization on the Moon. In 2023, NASA established the Moon to Mars Program office. The office is designed to oversee
870-490: A different epoch will generate differences. The time-of-perihelion-passage as one of six osculating elements is not an exact prediction (other than for a generic two-body model ) of the actual minimum distance to the Sun using the full dynamical model . Precise predictions of perihelion passage require numerical integration . The two images below show the orbits, orbital nodes , and positions of perihelion (q) and aphelion (Q) for
1015-426: A fan-shaped field of 84° by 30°, which is swept across the plasmasphere by the spin of the satellite. EUV's spatial resolution is 0.6° of 0.1 R E in the equatorial plane seen from apogee . The sensitivity is 1.9 count/second- rayleigh , sufficient to map the position of the plasmapause with a time resolution of 10 minutes. The IMAGE satellite instrument complement includes three Far Ultraviolet (FUV) instruments. In
1160-647: A month after the Soviet Yuri Gagarin became the first human in space, executing a full orbital spaceflight. NASA's first orbital spaceflight was conducted by John Glenn on February 20, 1962, in the Friendship 7 , making three full orbits before reentering. Glenn had to fly parts of his final two orbits manually due to an autopilot malfunction. The sixth and final Mercury mission was flown by Gordon Cooper in May 1963, performing 22 orbits over 34 hours in
1305-583: A permanently manned space station and to do it within a decade. In 1985, NASA proposed the Space Station Freedom , which both the agency and President Reagan intended to be an international program. While this would add legitimacy to the program, there were concerns within NASA that the international component would dilute its authority within the project, having never been willing to work with domestic or international partners as true equals. There
1450-650: A possible source of antimatter at the center of the Milky Way and observing that the majority of gamma-ray bursts occur outside of the Milky Way galaxy. The Chandra X-ray Observatory was launched from the Columbia on STS-93 in 1999, observing black holes, quasars , supernova , and dark matter . It provided critical observations on the Sagittarius A* black hole at the center of the Milky Way galaxy and
1595-523: A secondary interstellar neutral atom stream), and answered a set of outstanding questions regarding the source region of kilometric continuum radiation, the role of solar wind pressure pulses in ionospheric outflow, and the relationship between proton and electron auroras during substorms. When the spacecraft went silent in December 2005, it had already been approved a mission extension until 2010. Costs for IMAGE are estimated at US$ 132 million, including
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#17327759249951740-489: A shutdown was not reported in the power supply's telemetry output and this lack was not documented. Because it was undocumented the spacecraft's hardware and software had no provision for attempting to reset the SSPC if it reported good status. This would result in the observed symptoms: no radio communication with an apparently undamaged spacecraft. Although such a short circuit would be almost impossible without fatal damage to
1885-540: A space station since the agency was created. In 1973, following the end of the Apollo lunar missions, NASA launched its first space station, Skylab , on the final launch of the Saturn V. Skylab reused a significant amount of Apollo and Saturn hardware, with a repurposed Saturn V third stage serving as the primary module for the space station. Damage to Skylab during its launch required spacewalks to be performed by
2030-467: A time relative to seasons, since this determines the contribution of the elliptical orbit to seasonal variations. The variation of the seasons is primarily controlled by the annual cycle of the elevation angle of the Sun, which is a result of the tilt of the axis of the Earth measured from the plane of the ecliptic . The Earth's eccentricity and other orbital elements are not constant, but vary slowly due to
2175-412: A two-year mission. Almost six years later, it unexpectedly ceased operations in December 2005 during its extended mission and was declared lost. The spacecraft was part of NASA's Sun-Earth Connections Program, and its data has been used in over 400 research articles published in peer-reviewed journals. It had special cameras that provided various breakthroughs in understanding the dynamics of plasma around
2320-589: Is 147°. The MENA DPU consists of a single 16-bit Harris RTX2010 microcontroller operating at 4.91 MHz, look-up tables used to process the raw data, a low-voltage power supply, a high-voltage controller, and, for each of the three sensors, the front end time of flight and pulse height electronics and high-voltage power supplies. The DPU communicates with the sensor heads and the Central Instrument Data Processor (CIDP). It monitors instrument health and safety and receives and processes
2465-435: Is 236 years early, less accurately shows Eris coming to perihelion in 2260. 4 Vesta came to perihelion on 26 December 2021, but using a two-body solution at an epoch of July 2021 less accurately shows Vesta came to perihelion on 25 December 2021. Trans-Neptunian objects discovered when 80+ AU from the Sun need dozens of observations over multiple years to well constrain their orbits because they move very slowly against
2610-418: Is a slit-type imager designed to detect energetic neutral hydrogen and oxygen atoms with energies ranging from 1 to 30 keV. The instrument determines the time of flight and incidence angle of the incoming ENAs. From these raw data it calculates their trajectory and velocity and generates images of the magnetospheric regions from which they are emitted. The imager consists of three identical sensor heads mounted on
2755-562: Is an independent agency of the U.S. federal government responsible for the civil space program , aeronautics research, and space research. Established in 1958 , it succeeded the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) to give the U.S. space development effort a distinct civilian orientation, emphasizing peaceful applications in space science . It has since led most of America's space exploration programs, including Project Mercury , Project Gemini ,
2900-399: Is lowest. Despite this, summers in the northern hemisphere are on average 2.3 °C (4 °F) warmer than in the southern hemisphere, because the northern hemisphere contains larger land masses, which are easier to heat than the seas. Perihelion and aphelion do however have an indirect effect on the seasons: because Earth's orbital speed is minimum at aphelion and maximum at perihelion,
3045-491: Is one of the biggest sensors ever flown in space. Like a policeman's radar detector, the RPI's 10-watt transmitter sent out a burst of radio waves, which reflected off of clouds of charged particles between the plasmasphere's outer boundary all the way out to the boundary where the Earth's magnetic field is impacted by the solar wind. The RPI "radar" scans across a spectrum from 3 kilohertz (cycles per second) up to 3 megahertz, spanning
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#17327759249953190-590: The Faith 7 . The Mercury Program was wildly recognized as a resounding success, achieving its objectives to orbit a human in space, develop tracking and control systems, and identify other issues associated with human spaceflight. While much of NASA's attention turned to space, it did not put aside its aeronautics mission. Early aeronautics research attempted to build upon the X-1's supersonic flight to build an aircraft capable of hypersonic flight . The North American X-15
3335-495: The "line of nodes" where a planet's tilted orbit intersects the plane of reference; here they may be 'seen' as the points where the blue section of an orbit meets the pink. The chart shows the extreme range—from the closest approach (perihelion) to farthest point (aphelion)—of several orbiting celestial bodies of the Solar System : the planets, the known dwarf planets, including Ceres , and Halley's Comet . The length of
3480-756: The Army Ballistic Missile Agency would launch Explorer 1 , America's first satellite, on February 1, 1958. The Eisenhower Administration decided to split the United States' military and civil spaceflight programs, which were organized together under the Defense Department 's Advanced Research Projects Agency . NASA was established on July 29, 1958, with the signing of the National Aeronautics and Space Act and it began operations on October 1, 1958. As
3625-803: The Bell X-1 in a joint program with the U.S. Air Force . NACA's interest in space grew out of its rocketry program at the Pilotless Aircraft Research Division. The Soviet Union's launch of Sputnik 1 ushered in the Space Age and kicked off the Space Race . Despite NACA's early rocketry program, the responsibility for launching the first American satellite fell to the Naval Research Laboratory 's Project Vanguard , whose operational issues ensured
3770-677: The Big Bang . The James Webb Space Telescope , named after the NASA administrator who lead the Apollo program, is an infrared observatory launched in 2021. The James Webb Space Telescope is a direct successor to the Hubble Space Telescope, intended to observe the formation of the first galaxies. Other space telescopes include the Kepler space telescope , launched in 2009 to identify planets orbiting extrasolar stars that may be Terran and possibly harbor life. The first exoplanet that
3915-494: The Earth . The principal investigator was Jim Burch of the Southwest Research Institute . In January 2018, an amateur satellite tracker found it to be transmitting some signals back to Earth. NASA made attempts to communicate with the spacecraft and determine its payload status, but has had to track down and adapt old hardware and software to the current systems. On 25 February 2018, contact with IMAGE
4060-638: The Earth Observing System ; advancing heliophysics through the efforts of the Science Mission Directorate 's Heliophysics Research Program; exploring bodies throughout the Solar System with advanced robotic spacecraft such as New Horizons and planetary rovers such as Perseverance ; and researching astrophysics topics, such as the Big Bang , through the James Webb Space Telescope ,
4205-797: The Environmental Science Services Administration on a series of weather satellites and the agency launched its experimental Applications Technology Satellites into geosynchronous orbit. NASA's first dedicated Earth observation satellite, Landsat , was launched in 1972. This led to NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration jointly developing the Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite and discovering Ozone depletion . NASA had been pursuing spaceplane development since
4350-691: The Europa and observed that the moon may hold ice or liquid water. A joint NASA- European Space Agency - Italian Space Agency mission, Cassini–Huygens , was sent to Saturn 's moon Titan , which, along with Mars and Europa, are the only celestial bodies in the Solar System suspected of being capable of harboring life. Cassini discovered three new moons of Saturn and the Huygens probe entered Titan's atmosphere. The mission discovered evidence of liquid hydrocarbon lakes on Titan and subsurface water oceans on
4495-784: The Johnson Space Center as the lead center for the design, development, and manufacturing of the Space Shuttle orbiter , while the Marshall Space Flight Center would lead the development of the launch system. NASA's series of lifting body aircraft, culminating in the joint NASA-U.S. Air Force Martin Marietta X-24 , directly informed the development of the Space Shuttle and future hypersonic flight aircraft. Official development of
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4640-664: The Mars Global Surveyor orbiter and Mars Pathfinder , deploying the first Mars rover, Sojourner . During the early 2000s, the 2001 Mars Odyssey orbiter reached the planet and in 2004 the Sprit and Opportunity rovers landed on the Red Planet. This was followed in 2005 by the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and 2007 Phoenix Mars lander. The 2012 landing of Curiosity discovered that
4785-565: The Orbiting Geophysical Observatory in the 1960s and 1970s to look down at Earth and observe its interactions with the Sun. The Uhuru satellite was the first dedicated x-ray telescope, mapping 85% of the sky and discovering a large number of black holes . Launched in the 1990s and early 2000s, the Great Observatories program are among NASA's most powerful telescopes. The Hubble Space Telescope
4930-574: The S-band ( microwaves ) in the hopes of finding the Zuma satellite. On 24 January 2018, Richard Burley of NASA reported that they were trying to establish communication with the satellite using the NASA DSN. Two days later, Burley reported that engineers at Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC) successfully acquired the signal, and confirmed on 30 January 2018 that IMAGE is the source. It is not known when
5075-658: The STS-1 mission, designed to serve as a flight test for the new spaceplane. NASA intended for the Space Shuttle to replace expendable launch systems like the Air Force's Atlas , Delta , and Titan and the European Space Agency 's Ariane . The Space Shuttle's Spacelab payload, developed by the European Space Agency, increased the scientific capabilities of shuttle missions over anything NASA
5220-635: The STS-60 mission in 1994 and the Discovery rendezvoused, but did not dock with, the Russian Mir in the STS-63 mission. This was followed by Atlantis' STS-71 mission where it accomplished the initial intended mission for the Space Shuttle, docking with a space station and transferring supplies and personnel. The Shuttle- Mir program would continue until 1998, when a series of orbital accidents on
5365-477: The Space Race when the Soviet Union gave up its lunar ambitions. As the first human to step on the surface of the Moon, Neil Armstrong uttered the now famous words: That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind. NASA would conduct six total lunar landings as part of the Apollo program, with Apollo 17 concluding the program in 1972. Wernher von Braun had advocated for NASA to develop
5510-620: The Space Shuttle began in 1972, with Rockwell International contracted to design the orbiter and engines, Martin Marietta for the external fuel tank , and Morton Thiokol for the solid rocket boosters . NASA acquired six orbiters: the Enterprise , Columbia , Challenger , Discovery , Atlantis , and Endeavour The Space Shuttle program also allowed NASA to make major changes to its Astronaut Corps . While almost all previous astronauts were Air Force or Naval test pilots,
5655-620: The United States Congress created the Aviation Section of the U.S. Army Signal Corps in 1914 and established NACA in 1915 to foster aeronautical research and development. Over the next forty years, NACA would conduct aeronautical research in support of the U.S. Air Force , U.S. Army , U.S. Navy , and the civil aviation sector. After the end of World War II , NACA became interested in the possibilities of guided missiles and supersonic aircraft, developing and testing
5800-402: The inner planets, situated outward from the Sun as Mercury, Venus, Earth, and Mars. The reference Earth-orbit is colored yellow and represents the orbital plane of reference . At the time of vernal equinox, the Earth is at the bottom of the figure. The second image (below-right) shows the outer planets, being Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune. The orbital nodes are the two end points of
5945-405: The inner planets . Despite these successes, Congress was unwilling to fund further interplanetary missions and NASA Administrator James Webb suspended all future interplanetary probes to focus resources on the Apollo program. Following the conclusion of the Apollo program, NASA resumed launching interplanetary probes and expanded its space science program. The first planet tagged for exploration
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6090-428: The precession of the axes .) The dates and times of the perihelions and aphelions for several past and future years are listed in the following table: The following table shows the distances of the planets and dwarf planets from the Sun at their perihelion and aphelion. These formulae characterize the pericenter and apocenter of an orbit: While, in accordance with Kepler's laws of planetary motion (based on
6235-491: The 10-500 keV energy range and from these data generates images of ENA source regions in the inner magnetosphere. The two main HENA components are the sensor and the main electronics unit (MEU). The HENA sensor consists of alternately charged deflection plates mounted in a fan configuration in front of the entrance slit, three Microchannel plate detectors (MCP), a solid-state detector (SSD), two carbon-silicon-polyimide foils (one at
6380-472: The 1960s, blending the administration's dual aeronautics and space missions. NASA viewed a spaceplane as part of a larger program, providing routine and economical logistical support to a space station in Earth orbit that would be used as a hub for lunar and Mars missions. A reusable launch vehicle would then have ended the need for expensive and expendable boosters like the Saturn V . In 1969, NASA designated
6525-728: The 1968–1972 Apollo Moon landing missions, the Skylab space station, and the Space Shuttle . Currently, NASA supports the International Space Station (ISS) along with the Commercial Crew Program , and oversees the development of the Orion spacecraft and the Space Launch System for the lunar Artemis program . NASA's science division is focused on better understanding Earth through
6670-679: The 44 commercial companies that contracted with NASA to deploy their satellites to return to expendable launch vehicles. When the Space Shuttle returned to flight with the STS-26 mission, it had undergone significant modifications to improve its reliability and safety. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Russian Federation and United States initiated the Shuttle- Mir program . The first Russian cosmonaut flew on
6815-630: The Air Force as the military space lead. Plans for human spaceflight began in the U.S. Armed Forces prior to NASA's creation. The Air Force's Man in Space Soonest project formed in 1956, coupled with the Army's Project Adam, served as the foundation for Project Mercury . NASA established the Space Task Group to manage the program, which would conduct crewed sub-orbital flights with the Army's Redstone rockets and orbital flights with
6960-501: The Air Force's Atlas launch vehicles. While NASA intended for its first astronauts to be civilians, President Eisenhower directed that they be selected from the military. The Mercury 7 astronauts included three Air Force pilots, three Navy aviators, and one Marine Corps pilot. On May 5, 1961, Alan Shepard became the first American to enter space, performing a suborbital spaceflight in the Freedom 7 . This flight occurred less than
7105-410: The Apollo program. Despite attacks on the goal of landing astronauts on the Moon from the former president Dwight Eisenhower and 1964 presidential candidate Barry Goldwater , President Kennedy was able to protect NASA's growing budget, of which 50% went directly to human spaceflight and it was later estimated that, at its height, 5% of Americans worked on some aspect of the Apollo program. Mirroring
7250-685: The Army Ballistic Missile Agency's original Saturn I . The Apollo spacecraft was designed and built by North American Aviation , while the Apollo Lunar Module was designed and built by Grumman . To develop the spaceflight skills and equipment required for a lunar mission, NASA initiated Project Gemini . Using a modified Air Force Titan II launch vehicle, the Gemini capsule could hold two astronauts for flights of over two weeks. Gemini pioneered
7395-485: The Department of Defense's program management concept using redundant systems in building the first intercontinental ballistic missiles, NASA requested the Air Force assign Major General Samuel C. Phillips to the space agency where he would serve as the director of the Apollo program. Development of the Saturn V rocket was led by Wernher von Braun and his team at the Marshall Space Flight Center , derived from
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#17327759249957540-532: The ENA deposits in the SSD crystal. Thus, by analyzing the pulse height, HENA can determine the energy of an ENA incident on the SSD. And as mass is equal to the twice the energy divided by the velocity squared, once the energy and velocity of the ENA have been determined, its mass can be calculated. Calculating mass from the velocity and the SSD energy measurement is the primary technique used by HENA to determine composition of
7685-797: The ENAs. A second technique uses the pulse height of the MCP signal to distinguish between oxygen and hydrogen, the two most common neutral atoms expected in the magnetosphere. The Low-Energy Neutral Atom (LENA) imager on IMAGE is one of three instruments designed to make observations of the Earth's magnetospheric environment using neutral atom imaging. The objectives of LENA are to: (1) measure neutrals without interference from electrons, ions or UV; (2) distinguish neutral protons from oxygen ; (3) determine ion outflow on five minute time scales over broad range of local times; and, (4) measure energies as low as 10 eV with high counting statistics. The LENA instrument consists of
7830-461: The Earth reaches aphelion currently in early July, approximately 14 days after the June solstice . The aphelion distance between the Earth's and Sun's centers is currently about 1.016 71 AU or 152,097,700 km (94,509,100 mi). The dates of perihelion and aphelion change over time due to precession and other orbital factors, which follow cyclical patterns known as Milankovitch cycles . In
7975-401: The Earth, Moon and Sun systems are the unique suffixes commonly used. Exoplanet studies commonly use -astron , but typically, for other host systems the generic suffix, -apsis , is used instead. The perihelion (q) and aphelion (Q) are the nearest and farthest points respectively of a body's direct orbit around the Sun . Comparing osculating elements at a specific epoch to those at
8120-422: The Earth, Sun, stars, and the Galactic Center respectively. The suffix -jove is occasionally used for Jupiter, but -saturnium has very rarely been used in the last 50 years for Saturn. The -gee form is also used as a generic closest-approach-to "any planet" term—instead of applying it only to Earth. During the Apollo program , the terms pericynthion and apocynthion were used when referring to orbiting
8265-403: The Earth, producing comprehensive global images of plasma in the inner magnetosphere. The IMAGE craft was placed in a 1,000 km (620 mi) × 46,004 km (28,586 mi) orbit around the Earth, with an inclination of 90.01° (passing over the poles ) and a 14.2 hour period . By acquiring images every 2 minutes in wavelengths invisible to the human eye, it allowed detailed study of
8410-403: The FUV instrument is to maximize photon collection efficiency and use efficiently the short time available for exposures. The FUV auroral imagers WIC and SI both have wide fields of view and take data continuously as the auroral region proceeds through the field of view. To minimize data volume, multiple images are taken and electronically co-added by suitably shifting each image to compensate for
8555-532: The IMAGE satellite's recovery. The satellite was transmitting data beyond simple telemetry, indicating that some of its six onboard instruments were still active. NASA engineers are attempting to determine the satellite's status, but since the software and hardware type used in the IMAGE Mission Operations Center have been discarded and no longer exist, they are in the process of adapting old software and databases to their modern systems and track down replacement hardware. On 25 February 2018, NASA again lost contact with
8700-468: The IMAGE team had stopped receiving any signals from the satellite, as previously happened in winter, and would continue to try sending commands. On 20 January 2019, a full year passed since the spacecraft's rediscovery date and it has remained out of contact since 5 August 2018. Efforts continue, especially following eclipses which might reset the electronics. NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration ( NASA / ˈ n æ s ə / )
8845-439: The Keplar space telescope confirmed was Kepler-22b , orbiting within the habitable zone of its star. NASA also launched a number of different satellites to study Earth, such as Television Infrared Observation Satellite (TIROS) in 1960, which was the first weather satellite. NASA and the United States Weather Bureau cooperated on future TIROS and the second generation Nimbus program of weather satellites. It also worked with
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#17327759249958990-421: The LBH N2 bands of the aurora. The Spectrographic Imager (SI), a monochromatic imager, images different types of aurora, filtered by wavelength. By measuring the Doppler-shifted Lyman-a, the proton-induced component of the aurora can be imaged separately. Finally, the GEO instrument observes the distribution of the geocoronal emission, which is a measure of the neutral background density source for charge exchange in
9135-448: The Martian interior. The 2021 Perseverance rover carried the first extraplanetary aircraft, a helicopter named Ingenuity . NASA also launched missions to Mercury in 2004, with the MESSENGER probe demonstrating as the first use of a solar sail . NASA also launched probes to the outer Solar System starting in the 1960s. Pioneer 10 was the first probe to the outer planets, flying by Jupiter , while Pioneer 11 provided
9280-443: The Moon ; they reference Cynthia, an alternative name for the Greek Moon goddess Artemis . More recently, during the Artemis program , the terms perilune and apolune have been used. Regarding black holes, the term peribothron was first used in a 1976 paper by J. Frank and M. J. Rees, who credit W. R. Stoeger for suggesting creating a term using the greek word for pit: "bothron". The terms perimelasma and apomelasma (from
9425-402: The Moon and going to Mars. Embracing this approach, NASA's Commercial Crew Program started by contracting cargo delivery to the International Space Station and flew its first operational contracted mission on SpaceX Crew-1 . This marked the first time since the retirement of the Space Shuttle that NASA was able to launch its own astronauts on an American spacecraft from the United States, ending
9570-404: The Moon and returning him safely to Earth by the end of the 1960s and installed James E. Webb as NASA administrator to achieve this goal. On May 25, 1961, President Kennedy openly declared this goal in his "Urgent National Needs" speech to the United States Congress, declaring: I believe this Nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on
9715-427: The Moon and returning him safely to Earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish. Kennedy gave his " We choose to go to the Moon " speech the next year, on September 12, 1962 at Rice University , where he addressed the nation hoping to reinforce public support for
9860-409: The Russians be included. In 1993, the Clinton Administration announced that the Space Station Freedom would become the International Space Station in an agreement with the Russian Federation. This allowed the Russians to maintain their space program through an infusion of American currency to maintain their status as one of the two premier space programs. While the United States built and launched
10005-507: The Russians to fly to the International Space Station for four days, despite the opposition of NASA to the idea. Advocates of this new commercial approach for NASA included former astronaut Buzz Aldrin , who remarked that it would return NASA to its roots as a research and development agency, with commercial entities actually operating the space systems. Having corporations take over orbital operations would also allow NASA to focus all its efforts on deep space exploration and returning humans to
10150-422: The Solar System. Mars has long been a planet of intense fascination for NASA, being suspected of potentially having harbored life. Mariner 5 was the first NASA spacecraft to flyby Mars, followed by Mariner 6 and Mariner 7 . Mariner 9 was the first orbital mission to Mars. Launched in 1975, Viking program consisted of two landings on Mars in 1976. Follow-on missions would not be launched until 1996, with
10295-404: The Space Shuttle Columbia disaster in 2003, NASA was forced to rely on Russian Soyuz launches for its astronauts and the 2011 retirement of the Space Shuttle accelerated the station's completion. In the 1980s, right after the first flight of the Space Shuttle, NASA started a joint program with the Department of Defense to develop the Rockwell X-30 National Aerospace Plane. NASA realized that
10440-418: The Space Shuttle allowed NASA to begin recruiting more non-military scientific and technical experts. A prime example is Sally Ride , who became the first American woman to fly in space on STS-7 . This new astronaut selection process also allowed NASA to accept exchange astronauts from U.S. allies and partners for the first time. The first Space Shuttle flight occurred in 1981, when the Columbia launched on
10585-514: The Space Shuttle and expand space exploration beyond low Earth orbit. Constellation was intended to use a significant amount of former Space Shuttle equipment and return astronauts to the Moon. This program was canceled by the Obama Administration . Former astronauts Neil Armstrong , Gene Cernan , and Jim Lovell sent a letter to President Barack Obama to warn him that if the United States did not get new human spaceflight ability,
10730-554: The Space Shuttle began flying, selling it as an orbital laboratory, repair station, and a jumping off point for lunar and Mars missions. NASA found a strong advocate in President Ronald Reagan , who declared in a 1984 speech: America has always been greatest when we dared to be great. We can reach for greatness again. We can follow our dreams to distant stars, living and working in space for peaceful, economic, and scientific gain. Tonight I am directing NASA to develop
10875-686: The Space Shuttle, while a massive technological accomplishment, would not be able to live up to all its promises. Designed to be a single-stage-to-orbit spaceplane, the X-30 had both civil and military applications. With the end of the Cold War , the X-30 was canceled in 1992 before reaching flight status. Following the Space Shuttle Columbia disaster in 2003, President Bush started the Constellation program to smoothly replace
11020-483: The Space Shuttle. Due to technical challenges, the spacecraft was cancelled in 2001. Despite this, it was the first time a commercial space company directly expended a significant amount of its resources into spacecraft development. The advent of space tourism also forced NASA to challenge its assumption that only governments would have people in space. The first space tourist was Dennis Tito , an American investment manager and former aerospace engineer who contracted with
11165-580: The Space Station Freedom was controversial, with much of the debate centering on cost. Several redesigns to reduce cost were conducted in the early 1990s, stripping away much of its functions. Despite calls for Congress to terminate the program, it continued, in large part because by 1992 it had created 75,000 jobs across 39 states. By 1993, President Bill Clinton attempted to significantly reduce NASA's budget and directed costs be significantly reduced, aerospace industry jobs were not lost, and
11310-463: The Sun is 0.7 million km, and the radius of Jupiter (the largest planet) is 0.07 million km, both too small to resolve on this image. Currently, the Earth reaches perihelion in early January, approximately 14 days after the December solstice . At perihelion, the Earth's center is about 0.983 29 astronomical units (AU) or 147,098,070 km (91,402,500 mi) from the Sun's center. In contrast,
11455-602: The U.S. risked become a second or third-rate space power. As early as the Reagan Administration, there had been calls for NASA to expand private sector involvement in space exploration rather than do it all in-house. In the 1990s, NASA and Lockheed Martin entered into an agreement to develop the Lockheed Martin X-33 demonstrator of the VentureStar spaceplane, which was intended to replace
11600-536: The US's premier aeronautics agency, NACA formed the core of NASA's new structure by reassigning 8,000 employees and three major research laboratories. NASA also proceeded to absorb the Naval Research Laboratory's Project Vanguard, the Army's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), and the Army Ballistic Missile Agency under Wernher von Braun . This left NASA firmly as the United States' civil space lead and
11745-425: The actual closest approach between the Sun's and the Earth's centers (which in turn defines the timing of perihelion in a given year). Because of the increased distance at aphelion, only 93.55% of the radiation from the Sun falls on a given area of Earth's surface as does at perihelion, but this does not account for the seasons , which result instead from the tilt of Earth's axis of 23.4° away from perpendicular to
11890-440: The companion papers. Extensive ground-based testing was performed with visible and near UV simulators mounted on a rotating platform to estimate their on-orbit performance. The High-Energy Neutral Atom (HENA) imager on IMAGE is one of three instruments designed to make observations of the Earth's magnetospheric environment using neutral atom imaging. The HENA instrument determines the velocity, trajectory, energy, and mass of ENAs in
12035-422: The conservation of angular momentum ) and the conservation of energy, these two quantities are constant for a given orbit: where: Note that for conversion from heights above the surface to distances between an orbit and its primary, the radius of the central body has to be added, and conversely. The arithmetic mean of the two limiting distances is the length of the semi-major axis a . The geometric mean of
12180-523: The craft's temperature to determine if it was completely dead or consuming the power expected in safe mode was inconclusive. A careful failure analysis revealed that, among plausible causes for an abrupt bidirectional loss of communication, the Solid State Power Converter (SSPC) for the transponder had, among its features, an "instant trip" shutdown in response to a high-current ( 100 A ) short circuit . Critically, such
12325-526: The distance measured between the barycenter of the 2-body system and the center of mass of the orbiting body. However, in the case of a spacecraft , the terms are commonly used to refer to the orbital altitude of the spacecraft above the surface of the central body (assuming a constant, standard reference radius). The words "pericenter" and "apocenter" are often seen, although periapsis/apoapsis are preferred in technical usage. The words perihelion and aphelion were coined by Johannes Kepler to describe
12470-445: The distribution of He+ in Earth's plasmasphere by detecting its resonantly-scattered emission at 30.4-nm. It records the structure and dynamics of the cold plasma in Earth's plasmasphere on a global scale. The 30.4-nm feature is relatively easy to measure because it is the brightest ion emission from the plasmasphere, it is spectrally isolated, and the background at that wavelength is negligible. Measurements are easy to interpret because
12615-478: The entire AM radio band and beyond. Every five minutes, an image was built from the returned radio signals that will contain information about the direction, speed and density of distant plasma clouds. The instrument was developed by a team led by Dr. Bodo Reinisch, University of Massachusetts at Lowell . The Central Instrument Data Processor (CIDP) provided acquisition, compression, storage and telemetry formatting of science data from all imagers, routes commands to
12760-552: The entrance slit, the other placed just in front of the back MCP), and a series of wires and electrodes to steer secondary electrons ejected from the foils (or the SSD) to the MCPs. Power for the MCPs and deflection plates and for secondary electron steering is provided by high-voltage power supplies that reside with the sensor. The MEU contains HENA's data processing unit (DPU), the analog electronics (which amplifies and processes signals from
12905-420: The first close up view of the planet. Both probes became the first objects to leave the Solar System. The Voyager program launched in 1977, conducting flybys of Jupiter and Saturn , Neptune , and Uranus on a trajectory to leave the Solar System. The Galileo spacecraft, deployed from the Space Shuttle flight STS-34 , was the first spacecraft to orbit Jupiter, discovering evidence of subsurface oceans on
13050-515: The first crew to make it habitable and operational. Skylab hosted nine missions and was decommissioned in 1974 and deorbited in 1979, two years prior to the first launch of the Space Shuttle and any possibility of boosting its orbit. In 1975, the Apollo–Soyuz mission was the first ever international spaceflight and a major diplomatic accomplishment between the Cold War rivals, which also marked
13195-402: The first humans to see the Earth as a globe in space, the first to witness an Earthrise , and the first to see and manually photograph the far side of the Moon. The first lunar landing was conducted by Apollo 11. Commanded by Neil Armstrong with astronauts Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins , Apollo 11 was one of the most significant missions in NASA's history, marking the end of
13340-470: The four Great Observatories , and associated programs. The Launch Services Program oversees launch operations for its uncrewed launches . NASA traces its roots to the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA). Despite being the birthplace of aviation, by 1914 the United States recognized that it was far behind Europe in aviation capability. Determined to regain American leadership in aviation,
13485-480: The front imaging MCP. This MCP, the "start" MCP, provides a start signal for the TOF analysis and registers the position at which the ENA penetrated the entrance slit. The ENA then continues through the sensor to the backplane and strikes either the foil in front of the 2-D imaging MCP or the SSD. In the first case, secondary electrons ejected from the back foil trigger a stop pulse in the 2-D imaging MCP, which also registers
13630-483: The horizontal bars correspond to the extreme range of the orbit of the indicated body around the Sun. These extreme distances (between perihelion and aphelion) are the lines of apsides of the orbits of various objects around a host body. Distances of selected bodies of the Solar System from the Sun. The left and right edges of each bar correspond to the perihelion and aphelion of the body, respectively, hence long bars denote high orbital eccentricity . The radius of
13775-402: The host Earth . Earth's two apsides are the farthest point, aphelion , and the nearest point, perihelion , of its orbit around the host Sun. The terms aphelion and perihelion apply in the same way to the orbits of Jupiter and the other planets , the comets , and the asteroids of the Solar System . There are two apsides in any elliptic orbit . The name for each apsis is created from
13920-420: The imagers and interfaces with the spacecraft systems. The CIDP was developed by SwRI . On 18 December 2005, the satellite failed to make an expected contact at 16:20 UTC. An earlier contact had ended successfully at 07:39 the same day with no sign of trouble. Over the following days and weeks, commands were sent "blind" to reset the transmitter, change antennas, and otherwise attempt to re-establish contact with
14065-659: The interaction of the solar wind with the magnetosphere and the magnetosphere's response during a magnetic storm . From its distant orbit, the spacecraft produced a wealth of images of the previously invisible region of space in the inner magnetosphere, exceeded all its scientific goals. A senior review in 2005, just previous to its loss, described the mission as "extremely productive", having confirmed several theoretical predictions (e.g. plasmasphere plumes, pre-midnight ring-current injection, and continuous antiparallel reconnection), discovered numerous new and unanticipated phenomena (e.g. plasmasphere shoulders, subauroral proton arcs, and
14210-451: The last flight of the Apollo capsule. Flown in 1975, a U.S. Apollo spacecraft docked with a Soviet Soyuz capsule. During the 1960s, NASA started its space science and interplanetary probe program. The Mariner program was its flagship program, launching probes to Venus , Mars , and Mercury in the 1960s. The Jet Propulsion Laboratory was the lead NASA center for robotic interplanetary exploration, making significant discoveries about
14355-585: The magnetosphere. The FUV instrument complement looks radially outward from the rotating IMAGE satellite and, therefore, it spends only a short time observing the aurora and the Earth during each spin (120-seconds period). Detailed descriptions of the WIC, SI, GEO, and their individual performance validations can be found in the January 2000 issue of the Space Science Reviews . One primary requirement of
14500-515: The majority of the International Space Station, Russia, Canada, Japan, and the European Space Agency all contributed components. Despite NASA's insistence that costs would be kept at a budget of $ 17.4, they kept rising and NASA had to transfer funds from other programs to keep the International Space Station solvent. Ultimately, the total cost of the station was $ 150 billion, with the United States paying for two-thirds.Following
14645-403: The mission over, declaring that "Preliminary analysis indicated the craft's power supply subsystems failed, rendering it lifeless". Despite this, they continued to try and establish contact. In early 2006, NASA convened a board of experts to figure out what went wrong. After several months they created a report in which they theorized that IMAGE had tripped a power breaker and might fix itself. It
14790-634: The moon of Enceladus , which could harbor life. Finally launched in 2006, the New Horizons mission was the first spacecraft to visit Pluto and the Kuiper Belt . Beyond interplanetary probes, NASA has launched many space telescopes . Launched in the 1960s, the Orbiting Astronomical Observatory were NASA's first orbital telescopes, providing ultraviolet, gamma-ray, x-ray, and infrared observations. NASA launched
14935-450: The orbit) is the line connecting the two extreme values . Apsides pertaining to orbits around the Sun have distinct names to differentiate themselves from other apsides; these names are aphelion for the farthest and perihelion for the nearest point in the solar orbit. The Moon 's two apsides are the farthest point, apogee , and the nearest point, perigee , of its orbit around
15080-467: The orbital motions of the planets around the Sun. The words are formed from the prefixes peri- (Greek: περί , near) and apo- (Greek: ἀπό , away from), affixed to the Greek word for the Sun, ( ἥλιος , or hēlíos ). Various related terms are used for other celestial objects . The suffixes -gee , -helion , -astron and -galacticon are frequently used in the astronomical literature when referring to
15225-429: The orbiting body when the latter is located: 1) at the periapsis point, or 2) at the apoapsis point (compare both graphics, second figure). The line of apsides denotes the distance of the line that joins the nearest and farthest points across an orbit; it also refers simply to the extreme range of an object orbiting a host body (see top figure; see third figure). In orbital mechanics , the apsides technically refer to
15370-588: The perihelion passage. For example, using an epoch of 1996, Comet Hale–Bopp shows perihelion on 1 April 1997. Using an epoch of 2008 shows a less accurate perihelion date of 30 March 1997. Short-period comets can be even more sensitive to the epoch selected. Using an epoch of 2005 shows 101P/Chernykh coming to perihelion on 25 December 2005, but using an epoch of 2012 produces a less accurate unperturbed perihelion date of 20 January 2006. Numerical integration shows dwarf planet Eris will come to perihelion around December 2257. Using an epoch of 2021, which
15515-409: The perturbing effects of the planets and other objects in the solar system (Milankovitch cycles). On a very long time scale, the dates of the perihelion and of the aphelion progress through the seasons, and they make one complete cycle in 22,000 to 26,000 years. There is a corresponding movement of the position of the stars as seen from Earth, called the apsidal precession . (This is closely related to
15660-409: The plane of Earth's orbit. Indeed, at both perihelion and aphelion it is summer in one hemisphere while it is winter in the other one. Winter falls on the hemisphere where sunlight strikes least directly, and summer falls where sunlight strikes most directly, regardless of the Earth's distance from the Sun. In the northern hemisphere, summer occurs at the same time as aphelion, when solar radiation
15805-488: The planet takes longer to orbit from June solstice to September equinox than it does from December solstice to March equinox. Therefore, summer in the northern hemisphere lasts slightly longer (93 days) than summer in the southern hemisphere (89 days). Astronomers commonly express the timing of perihelion relative to the First Point of Aries not in terms of days and hours, but rather as an angle of orbital displacement,
15950-411: The planets of the Solar System as seen from above the northern pole of Earth's ecliptic plane , which is coplanar with Earth's orbital plane . The planets travel counterclockwise around the Sun and for each planet, the blue part of their orbit travels north of the ecliptic plane, the pink part travels south, and dots mark perihelion (green) and aphelion (orange). The first image (below-left) features
16095-514: The plasmaspheric He+ emission is optically thin, so its brightness is directly proportional to the He+ column abundance. Effective imaging of the plasmaspheric He+ requires global "snapshops" in which the high apogee and the wide field of view of EUV provide in a single exposure a map of the entire plasmasphere. EUV consists of three identical sensor heads, each having a field of view of 30° in diameter. These sensors are tilted relative to one another to cover
16240-418: The position measurements reveal its trajectory and thus its path length within the sensor. With these two pieces of information, time of flight and path length, HENA can calculate the ENA's velocity. The energy of the incident ENAs is measured with the SSD. When an ENA strikes the SSD, it generates a current pulse. The amplitude of this pulse (the pulse height) is directly proportional to the amount of energy that
16385-470: The position of the incident ENA. If the ENA strikes the SSD instead, the secondary electrons ejected by the impact are steered to the "coincidence" MCP, which provides the TOF stop signal; the position of impact is registered by the SSD. The start and stop signals are processed by the analog ToF electronics in the MEU and digitized for input into the DPU. The start and stop pulses give the ENA's time of flight, while
16530-496: The prefixes ap- , apo- (from ἀπ(ό) , (ap(o)-) 'away from') for the farthest or peri- (from περί (peri-) 'near') for the closest point to the primary body , with a suffix that describes the primary body. The suffix for Earth is -gee , so the apsides' names are apogee and perigee . For the Sun, the suffix is -helion , so the names are aphelion and perihelion . According to Newton's laws of motion , all periodic orbits are ellipses. The barycenter of
16675-625: The radiation levels on Mars were equal to those on the International Space Station , greatly increasing the possibility of Human exploration, and observed the key chemical ingredients for life to occur. In 2013, the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution ( MAVEN ) mission observed the Martian upper atmosphere and space environment and in 2018, the Interior exploration using Seismic Investigations Geodesy, and Heat Transport ( InSight ) studied
16820-481: The raw sensor data, producing one image every two minutes (i. e. each spacecraft spin period). It transmits this image, together with a selection of the raw sensor data, event rate data, and housekeeping data, to the CIDP for downlink to Earth. The Radio Plasma Imager (RPI) used pulses of radio waves to "sound" nearly the entire volume of the Earth's magnetic field. With its 502 m (1,647 ft) tip-to-tip antenna, it
16965-449: The same energy to a fixed location. In the extraction lens, the ions are accelerated by 20 kV prior to entering the electrostatic analyzer. Finally, the ions pass into a time-of-flight/position sensing section where ion mass, energy, and angle are determined. The Medium-Energy Neutral Atom (MENA) imager on IMAGE is one of three instruments designed to make observations of the Earth's magnetospheric environment using neutral atom imaging. MENA
17110-468: The satellite started broadcasting, but re-examination of old data recorded by Tilley and fellow satellite tracker Cees Bassa showed transmissions from the same satellite in October 2016 and May 2017. Bassa hypothesized that while the 2007 eclipse did not manage to reset the satellite, another one did the trick, probably sometime between 2014 and 2016. On 8 February 2018, NASA published a detailed account of
17255-443: The satellite to check for debris, change in spin rate or change in orbit indicative of a collision or other damage. The spacecraft was also commanded to slightly increase its spin rate and asymmetrically turn on its heaters. If observed, these would indicate that it could receive commands but not transmit. Neither change was seen and analysis later indicated that the temperature change would have been undetectable. An attempt to observe
17400-553: The satellite, but not in the same manner it did in 2005. Richard Burley, former IMAGE mission director, stated that he believes there is an issue with IMAGE's spin axis in relation to its medium-gain antenna placement. If NASA can regain control of the spacecraft, and the status of data and ground systems can be assessed, it will decide if it can fund a mission restart. On 4 March 2018, the Applied Physics Laboratory at Johns Hopkins University reported detecting
17545-507: The satellites were repaired and relaunched. Despite ushering in a new era of spaceflight, where NASA was contracting launch services to commercial companies, the Space Shuttle was criticized for not being as reusable and cost-effective as advertised. In 1986, Challenger disaster on the STS-51L mission resulted in the loss of the spacecraft and all seven astronauts on launch, grounding the entire space shuttle fleet for 36 months and forced
17690-477: The sensor and performs housekeeping monitoring), analog-to-digital converters , and a low-voltage power supply. HENA determines the velocity of the ENAs that it detects by measuring their time of flight (ToF) and trajectory through the sensor (from the entrance slit either to the back foil and two-dimensional imaging MCP detector or to the SSD. When an incoming ENA passes through the entrance foil, it produces secondary electrons, which are accelerated and steered to
17835-676: The separation of dark and regular matter during galactic collisions. Finally, the Spitzer Space Telescope is an infrared telescope launched in 2003 from a Delta II rocket. It is in a trailing orbit around the Sun, following the Earth and discovered the existence of brown dwarf stars . Other telescopes, such as the Cosmic Background Explorer and the Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe , provided evidence to support
17980-560: The setback caused by the Apollo 1 fire, which killed three astronauts, the program proceeded. Apollo 8 was the first crewed spacecraft to leave low Earth orbit and the first human spaceflight to reach the Moon . The crew orbited the Moon ten times on December 24 and 25, 1968, and then traveled safely back to Earth . The three Apollo 8 astronauts— Frank Borman , James Lovell , and William Anders —were
18125-508: The short term, such dates can vary up to 2 days from one year to another. This significant variation is due to the presence of the Moon: while the Earth–Moon barycenter is moving on a stable orbit around the Sun, the position of the Earth's center which is on average about 4,700 kilometres (2,900 mi) from the barycenter, could be shifted in any direction from it—and this affects the timing of
18270-405: The signal from the satellite, but it was too faint to lock onto. On 9 May 2018, Scott Tilley again detected a strong signal from IMAGE. Hours later NASA and APL engineers had locked onto the signal and were receiving telemetry. Commands were transmitted to IMAGE, but for unknown reasons the spacecraft only acknowledged receipt of a fraction of those commands. On 28 August 2018, NASA announced that
18415-405: The so-called longitude of the periapsis (also called longitude of the pericenter). For the orbit of the Earth, this is called the longitude of perihelion , and in 2000 it was about 282.895°; by 2010, this had advanced by a small fraction of a degree to about 283.067°, i.e. a mean increase of 62" per year. For the orbit of the Earth around the Sun, the time of apsis is often expressed in terms of
18560-549: The space shuttle be retired. In 2006, the Space Shuttle returned to flight, conducting several mission to service the Hubble Space Telescope , but was retired following the STS-135 resupply mission to the International Space Station in 2011. NASA never gave up on the idea of a space station after Skylab's reentry in 1979. The agency began lobbying politicians to support building a larger space station as soon as
18705-481: The space station spelled an end to the program. In 2003, a second space shuttle was destroyed when the Columbia was destroyed upon reentry during the STS-107 mission, resulting in the loss of the spacecraft and all seven astronauts. This accident marked the beginning of the retiring of the Space Shuttle program, with President George W. Bush directing that upon the completion of the International Space Station,
18850-436: The spacecraft rotation. In order to minimize resolution loss, the images have to be distortion -corrected in real time for both WIC and SI prior to co-adding. The distortion correction is using high speed look up tables that are pre-generated by least square fitting to polynomial functions by the on-orbit processor. The instruments were calibrated individually while on stationery platforms, mostly in vacuum chambers as described in
18995-443: The spacecraft, but no signal (not even an unmodulated carrier wave ) was received. Recovery efforts included using different NASA Deep Space Network (NASA DSN) antennas , using non-NASA ground stations in case there was some systematic NASA DSN error, transmitting no commands for several days to trigger a 72-hour watchdog timer , increasing transmit power in case the antenna was badly misaligned, and optical and radar observations of
19140-509: The spacecraft, instruments, launch vehicle, and ground operations. Its science payload consists of three suites of instruments : The Central Instrument Data Processor (CIDP) as well as the Command & Data Handling Subsystem (main on-board computer) were built around the mission-proven IBM RAD6000 avionics processors . The Extreme Ultraviolet Imager (EUV) of the IMAGE mission observes
19285-553: The spacecraft, the shutdown could be falsely triggered by a radiation-induced single event upset . It could be simply fixed by power-cycling the supply, but the spacecraft design left no way to send such a command, nor was one built in. The same problem with the same model of power supply had affected the Earth Observing-1 (EO-1) and Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP) satellites (launched after IMAGE), but they were able to recover. In January 2006, NASA declared
19430-405: The two bodies may lie well within the bigger body—e.g., the Earth–Moon barycenter is about 75% of the way from Earth's center to its surface. If, compared to the larger mass, the smaller mass is negligible (e.g., for satellites), then the orbital parameters are independent of the smaller mass. When used as a suffix—that is, -apsis —the term can refer to the two distances from the primary body to
19575-491: The two distances is the length of the semi-minor axis b . The geometric mean of the two limiting speeds is which is the speed of a body in a circular orbit whose radius is a {\displaystyle a} . Orbital elements such as the time of perihelion passage are defined at the epoch chosen using an unperturbed two-body solution that does not account for the n-body problem . To get an accurate time of perihelion passage you need to use an epoch close to
19720-579: The use of fuel cells instead of batteries, and conducted the first American spacewalks and rendezvous operations . The Ranger Program was started in the 1950s as a response to Soviet lunar exploration, however most missions ended in failure. The Lunar Orbiter program had greater success, mapping the surface in preparation for Apollo landings and measured Selenography , conducted meteoroid detection, and measured radiation levels. The Surveyor program conducted uncrewed lunar landings and takeoffs, as well as taking surface and regolith observations. Despite
19865-467: The various projects, mission architectures and associated timelines relevant to lunar and Mars exploration and science. Apsis An apsis (from Ancient Greek ἁψίς ( hapsís ) 'arch, vault'; pl. apsides / ˈ æ p s ɪ ˌ d iː z / AP -sih-deez ) is the farthest or nearest point in the orbit of a planetary body about its primary body . The line of apsides (also called apse line, or major axis of
20010-419: The wavelength region 120-190 nm, a downward-viewing auroral imager is only minimally contaminated by sunlight, scattered from clouds and ground, and radiance of the aurora observed in a nadir viewing geometry can be observed in the presence of the high-latitude dayglow. The Wideband Imaging Camera (WIC) provides broadband ultraviolet images of the aurora for maximum spatial and temporal resolution by imaging
20155-461: Was Venus , sharing many similar characteristics to Earth. First visited by American Mariner 2 spacecraft, Venus was observed to be a hot and inhospitable planet. Follow-on missions included the Pioneer Venus project in the 1970s and Magellan , which performed radar mapping of Venus' surface in the 1980s and 1990s. Future missions were flybys of Venus, on their way to other destinations in
20300-434: Was a joint NASA–U.S. Air Force program, with the hypersonic test aircraft becoming the first non-dedicated spacecraft to cross from the atmosphere to outer space. The X-15 also served as a testbed for Apollo program technologies, as well as ramjet and scramjet propulsion. Escalations in the Cold War between the United States and Soviet Union prompted President John F. Kennedy to charge NASA with landing an American on
20445-683: Was able to previously accomplish. NASA launched its first commercial satellites on the STS-5 mission and in 1984, the STS-41-C mission conducted the world's first on-orbit satellite servicing mission when the Challenger captured and repaired the malfunctioning Solar Maximum Mission satellite. It also had the capability to return malfunctioning satellite to Earth, like it did with the Palapa B2 and Westar 6 satellites. Once returned to Earth,
20590-491: Was again lost only to be reestablished on 4 March 2018. The signal disappeared once again on 5 August 2018. If recovery efforts succeed, NASA may decide to fund a restarted mission. IMAGE was the first spacecraft dedicated to imaging the Earth's magnetosphere. IMAGE was a spacecraft developed by the Medium-class Explorer (MIDEX) program, and it was the first spacecraft dedicated to observing the magnetosphere of
20735-472: Was also a concern with sharing sensitive space technologies with the Europeans, which had the potential to dilute America's technical lead. Ultimately, an international agreement to develop the Space Station Freedom program would be signed with thirteen countries in 1985, including the European Space Agency member states, Canada , and Japan . Despite its status as the first international space program,
20880-496: Was hoped that an eclipse when the spacecraft passed through the Earth's shadow in October 2007 would result in a sufficiently deep supply voltage sag that it would trigger a total bus reset, which would cause a power cycle of the suspect supply. However, attempts to contact the craft after this eclipse were not successful. On 20 January 2018 IMAGE was found by Canadian radio amateur and satellite tracker Scott Tilley to be broadcasting, and he reported it to NASA. He had been scanning
21025-497: Was launched in 1990 on STS-31 from the Discovery and could view galaxies 15 billion light years away. A major defect in the telescope's mirror could have crippled the program, had NASA not used computer enhancement to compensate for the imperfection and launched five Space Shuttle servicing flights to replace the damaged components. The Compton Gamma Ray Observatory was launched from the Atlantis on STS-37 in 1991, discovering
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