Moisture Vaporators, Death Star Construction and Other Real Star Wars Tech

Thursday, December 17, 2015

Moisture Vaporators, Death Star Construction and Other Real Star Wars Tech

Moisture Vaporators, Death Star Construction and Other Real Star Wars Tech:

X-wing fighter flies by Earth? Actually, it is the ATV2 (Johannes Kepler) as it departs the ISS in 2011. Credit: NASA/Ron Garan

Remember that time an X-Wing fighter flew past the International Space Station? Or when R2D2 saved the ISS crew?

OK, yeah, those things didn't really happen, but since the first Star Wars movie came out in 1977, there has been a lot of technology developed that mimics the science and tech from the sci-fi blockbuster films. Of course, we now have real robots in space (Robonaut), drones are now everyday items, there are actual holograms (Voxiebox and Fairy Lights) and DARPA has been developing prosthetic limbs that Luke Skywalker would totally use, called the Reliable Neural-Interface Technology (RE-NET). Plus, Boeing is building blaster guns that will use "pew-pew" sound effects from Star Wars. Seriously. The lasers are silent, and so they need to add sound to know for sure they've been fired.

Since we all certainly have Star Wars on the brain today (The Force Awakens opens tonight), let's take a look at a few recent space-related developments that hint of inspiration from the movies:

ESA has announced some of the instruments that will be on board the 2018 ExoMars rover. One of them will work akin to the Skywalkers’ moisture vaporators on Tatooine. The Habitability, Brine Irradiation and Temperature package (HABIT) will will investigate the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere of Mars. According to one of the researchers leading the instrument, this proof-of-concept instrument will take water out of the atmosphere to produce liquid water. If it works, it could be used to create water for future astronauts on Mars. And if it works really well, it could work on a larger scale to support Mars exploration... perhaps making enough water to allow for farming.

“HABIT can be easily adapted to ‘water-farms’ for in-situ resource production,” Javier Martin-Torres from Lulea University of Technology in Sweden told New Scientist. “We will produce Martian liquid water on Mars, that could be used in the future exploration of Mars for astronauts and greenhouses.”

If it does work out, future Mars astronauts might need to watch out for Sandpeople tracks that are side-by-side.

Death Star Construction

So, just how do you build something the size of a Death Star out in deep space?

Instead of hauling all the materials long distances, the best way to build a Death Star is to construct one out of an already-existing asteroid, says Brian Muirhead, chief engineer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “It could provide the metals,” he told Wired. “You have organic compounds, you have water—all the building blocks you would need to build your family Death Star.”

Muirhead is working on NASA's Asteroid Redirect Mission, which will attempt to move a small asteroid in orbit around the Moon.

Watch the full video and interview below, it is really great:

Watch this on The Scene.

Speeder Bikes

Who hasn't dreamed of riding a speeder bike like the ones in Return of the Jedi? Instead of just dreaming about it, Mark DeRoche from a company called Aerofex has actually done something about it. His company is working a "low-altitude tandem duct aerial vehicle" called the Aero-X. According to the company's website, the Aero-X is a "hovercraft that rides like a motorcycle – an off-road vehicle that takes to the air. Designed for low-altitude sport and utility, the Aero-X bridges the gap between light aircraft and all-terrain vehicles."

It can carry two (smaller) people 10 feet (3 m) above any surface at airspeeds up to 45 mph (72 km/h). It can carry a total of 310 lb (140 kg), and can be customized for specific applications and aerial tasks such as agriculture, disaster relief, search and rescue, and patrolling borders and game parks.

See it in action below:

Or if you need to go a little more low-tech, you can make your own giant light sabers (3.66-meters/12-feet long), like one Star Wars fan did:

And so you can fully prepare for the awesome power of the force, here's the official trailer for The Force Awakens:

Lead image caption: X-wing fighter flies by Earth? Actually, it is the ATV2 (Johannes Kepler) as it departs the ISS in 2011. Credit: NASA/Ron Garan

The post Moisture Vaporators, Death Star Construction and Other Real Star Wars Tech appeared first on Universe Today.

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The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) is the United States government agency responsible for the civilian space program as well as aeronautics and aerospace research. President Dwight D. Eisenhower established the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) in 1958 with a distinctly civilian (rather than military) orientation encouraging peaceful applications in space science. The National Aeronautics and Space Act was passed on July 29, 1958, disestablishing NASA's predecessor, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA). The new agency became operational on October 1, 1958.

UFO SIGHTINGS PHOTO PHOTOGRAPHY

The Oxford English Dictionary defines a UFO as "An unidentified flying object; a 'flying saucer'." The first published book to use the word was authored by Donald E. Keyhoe. The acronym "UFO" was coined by Captain Edward J. Ruppelt, who headed Project Blue Book, then the USAF's official investigation of UFOs. He wrote, "Obviously the term 'flying saucer' is misleading when applied to objects of every conceivable shape and performance. For this reason the military prefers the more general, if less colorful, name: unidentified flying objects. UFO (pronounced Yoo-foe) for short." Other phrases that were used officially and that predate the UFO acronym include "flying flapjack", "flying disc", "unexplained flying discs", "unidentifiable object", and "flying saucer". The phrase "flying saucer" had gained widespread attention after the summer of 1947. On June 24, a civilian pilot named Kenneth Arnold reported seeing nine objects flying in formation near Mount Rainier. Arnold timed the sighting and estimated the speed of discs to be over 1,200 mph (1,931 km/h). At the time, he described the objects' shape as being somewhat disc-like or saucer-like, leading to newspaper accounts of "flying saucers" and "flying discs". In popular usage the term UFO came to be used to refer to claims of alien spacecraft. and because of the public and media ridicule associated with the topic, some investigators prefer to use such terms as unidentified aerial phenomenon (or UAP) or anomalous phenomena, as in the title of the National Aviation Reporting Center on Anomalous Phenomena (NARCAP).

UFO PHOTO PHOTOGRAPHY

UFO - Unidentified Flying Object An unidentified flying object, or UFO, in its most general definition, is any apparent anomaly in the sky that is not identifiable as a known object or phenomenon. Culturally, UFOs are associated with claims of visitation by extraterrestrial life or government-related conspiracy theories, and have become popular subjects in fiction. While UFOs are often later identified, sometimes identification may not be possible owing to the usually low quality of evidence related to UFO sightings (generally anecdotal evidence and eyewitness accounts). Stories of fantastical celestial apparitions have been told since antiquity, but the term "UFO" (or "UFOB") was officially created in 1953 by the United States Air Force (USAF) to serve as a catch-all for all such reports. In its initial definition, the USAF stated that a "UFOB" was "any airborne object which by performance, aerodynamic characteristics, or unusual features, does not conform to any presently known aircraft or missile type, or which cannot be positively identified as a familiar object." Accordingly, the term was initially restricted to that fraction of cases which remained unidentified after investigation, as the USAF was interested in potential national security reasons and/or "technical aspects" (see Air Force Regulation 200-2). During the late 1940s and through the 1950s, UFOs were often referred to popularly as "flying saucers" or "flying discs". The term UFO became more widespread during the 1950s, at first in technical literature, but later in popular use. UFOs garnered considerable interest during the Cold War, an era associated with a heightened concern for national security. Various studies have concluded that the phenomenon does not represent a threat to national security nor does it contain anything worthy of scientific pursuit (e.g., 1951 Flying Saucer Working Party, 1953 CIA Robertson Panel, USAF Project Blue Book, Condon Committee).

Photos of Nature | Nature Photography What is The Universe

Photos of Nature | Nature Photography What is The Universe

Thursday, December 17, 2015