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Two Canadian high school students have successfully launched a Lego man almost 80,000 feet above sea level–high enough to capture video of the plastic toy hovering above the curvature of the Earth.

Now the results of their experiment have gone viral, racking up more than 600,000 views on YouTube in just two daysand inspiring the young engineers to make their small astronaut his own Facebook page–Lego Man in Space.

The Toronto Starreports that the two teens, Matthew Ho and Asad Muhammed, were inspired to do the project about a year and a half ago when Ho saw a YouTube video of MIT students who sent a balloon to near space. Ho wanted to see if he could do it too.

The friends spent four and a half months working on the project, mostly on Saturdays. In a video interview with the Star, they said the hardest part was making the parachute, which they decided to hand-sew, even though neither of them had any sewing experience.

They also constructed a lightweight Styrofoam box to carry three point-and-shoot cameras, a wide-angle video camera and a cellphone with a downloadable GPS app. They purchased a professional weather balloon for $85 online. The helium that would lift it up came from a party supply store. For launch, they put two mitten warmers in the Styrofoam box to keep the cameras working at that altitude. The whole project cost them about $400.

After the balloon was constructed, the two waited until weather conditions would ensure that the Lego man would land in Canada and not somewhere in the U.S. because they didn’t want to take their chances with U.S. Homeland Security, the Star reports.

Ho and Muhammed estimate that it took their balloon craft one hour and five minutes to climb 80,000 feet before it finally popped. The descent took a little more than 30 minutes.

Besides online notoriety, the two also received a congratulatory note from Lego.

Robots – The Future For NASA?

Impossible. That’s what the 2009 Augustine committee reported about prospects for NASA’s human exploration of space, at least for the next seven years. NASA’s budget issues remain at the top of the list holding humans from space but the same future may not hold true for its robots.

Two recent robot adventurers, rovers Spirit and Opportunity, lend credence to the idea that NASA’s future may rapidly become reliant on robots to carry out missions in space. The Mars exploring rovers cost the agency more than $400 million apiece but have returned nearly six years of insightful data and imagery from the red planet’s surface.

Contrast this against the charge for merely launching human passengers into orbit via space shuttle, at roughly $450 million per launch, and the fiscal benefits become quickly apparent. Not to mention, space shuttles such as Endeavour cost the agency almost $1.7 billion to manufacture alone.

NASA’s Space Faring Robots of the Past

The Mars rovers aren’t the first robots to plumb the mysteries of space for NASA. In fact, robots have investigated and visited more locations in our solar system than any human–oftentimes to locales an astronaut couldn’t survive.

In 1973 the robotic space probe Mariner 10 traveled to the inner system planets of Mercury and Venus while its younger sister, Mariner 9, made the trip to Mars more than thirty years before Spirit and Opportunity. Alongside, Pioneer Venus 2 ejected robotic probes which dared an actual foot landing on the surface of Venus, a vacation spot bragging temperatures well over 800 degrees Fahrenheit.

One of those probes managed to survive the risky descent and dutifully report back for 45 minutes inside roasting temperatures and atmospheric pressure that no sane human would tempt. Clearly robots can take an exploratory role that would be too costly and too dangerous for a person.

While we have managed to put footprints and flags on our nearby Moon, robots have traveled to virtually all of the planets and even some of their moons. Of course, robots have visited our rocky celestial partner as well, among them include various NASA Pioneer spacecraft and an array of Soviet Luna spacecraft. Most of these robotic Moon explorers have taken a role as simple orbiters but a few have impacted the surface to pick through rocks and wander the barren surface.

NASA Robots on Earth

Many ideas and projects for robots at NASA have inevitably filtered down to worthy applications on Earth. After all, it is sometimes expensive or dangerous for a human to travel and visit locations on our own space rock.

One example is the Altus II, a robotic airplane developed by NASA. Originally designed as a scientific aircraft, in 2001 NASA presented the craft as a tool for fighting fires.

Human pilots have often risked their lives piloting aircraft in an attempt to survey and monitor deadly, often vast, wildfires. Because the Altus II can fly for such long duration–at one time the craft held a 26-hour record for single-flight endurance–it can continually co-operate with both ground based firefighters and off-planet satellites to photograph and monitor fires below.

In the future, NASA is likely to entertain ideas for using this sort of UAV (unmanned aerial vehicle) in a role exploring and monitoring the surface of alien worlds, carrying out automated scientific experiments at high-altitude, and coordinating with other robots on the ground and in space alike.

A Future for NASA Robots

Sure to be the envy of every earth-bound grasshopper, the Jollbot is wiry, robotic contraption that may take a leap for NASA’s future exploration of space.

Robots that physically walk on some sort of leg or roll around on a set of wheels can easily be thwarted by unpredictable terrain. The Jollbot takes a different tack by literally forming a ball to roll across obstacles. If things get too tough, or if there are simply better places to explore, the Jollbot can hop its way to a distant new location or hurdle over a small patch of difficult ground before continuing its mission.

Such a robot could provide a far cheaper and far more efficient answer than previous attempts made by NASA at exploring other planets and moons. It also means that NASA could send many more of these robotic explorers than usual opening up the possibility of mapping and traversing entire landscapes in short periods of time, both on our home planet and anywhere in space we can afford to send them.

A much more human like robot is also being developed by NASA and DARPA–the Robonaut. Featuring an upper torso, human styled hands and arms, and even a head straight out of your favorite science fiction movie, the Robonaut has been proposed as the ideal space janitor and maintenance man.

Capable of being mounted in ways we humans might find offensive, the Robonaut could find itself perched on the end of a long, robotic arm for spacewalks intended to repair and maintain equipment such as found on the International Space Station or orbiting satellites. Partnered with humans, a Robonaut could make these spacewalks safer and easier, if not less time-consuming and costly.

Yet, the Robonaut isn’t by any means limited to jaunts in space. One lucky Robonaut has been mounted on a Segway HT, the hip, two-wheeled electric scooter that has periodically foiled human riders such as George Bush.

It is certainly possible that NASA could find even more inventive ways to mount a Robonaut, on Earth, in space, and into the distant future. Whatever the case, it is apparent that robots form an effective cast and crew for NASA’s future exploration of our planet and our universe.

Additional information and sources for this article include:

Augustine Plans Committee, Review of U.S. Human Space Flight (PDF)

Lee Billings, America’s Space Agency Faces Uncertain Future, Seed Magazine

NASA, Space Shuttle FAQ, Robonaut Shows Sensitive Side

Marshall Brain, How the Mars Exploration Rovers Work, HowStuffWorks.com

Staff & Wire Reports, NASA Offers Robot Plane as Firefighter, Space.com

University of Bath, Researcher Designs Robot that Jumps like a Grasshopper

Wikipedia, General Atomics ALTUS, Venus, Space Exploration

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Private Space Flight Traveling Out of This World
By Lance Winslow

Extreme Adventure Travel is about to take flight, and in doing so take well-to-do traveling public where no tourist has gone before. Indeed, they will boldly go, but they will also boldly pay for that opportunity, as well as take a little bit of risk as well. Private Space flight is alive and well and it’s ready to take the game to a higher level.

Soon you will be able to take a trip around the moon, go stay in an orbiting expandable space hotel, or perhaps within the next decade or more take a trip to the Mars Colony, which maybe a one way excursion? Okay let’s talk.

Recently, there was an interesting piece on the Technology Review from MIT “Delta-V Blog” written by Brittany Sauser on May 6, 2011 titled; “A Trip Around the Moon: Yours for $150 Million – Space Adventures announces a tourist seat aboard a new moon mission,” which stated

“Space Adventures, a commercial space company based in Virginia, will give you a seat on a trip around the moon. The company says one customer has already signed up for the mission. The “round-the-moon” participants will launch in a Russian Soyuz Spacecraft to the International Space Station where they will stay for 8-10 days before taking the 3.5 day trip to slingshot around the moon, coming within 100 kilometers of the surface. It will take a further 3.5 days to return to Earth.”

And it looks as if this could occur as early as 2015-2016, however if you are willing to wait until 2022 to 2025 you might be able to catch a tourist trip to Mars, but you may not have the guarantee of coming back, would it still be worth it? For many it would. There was an interesting piece on this in the Wall Street Journal on May 14, 2011 titled; “How We Can Fly to Mars in This Decade-And on the Cheap The technology now exists and at half the cost of a Space Shuttle flight. All that’s lacking is the political will to take more risks,” by Robert Zubrin.

The article discussed SpaceX and their plans, and they are pretty confident they can pull it off. As most people who follow these things realize, humans have had the technology to go to Mars since the 1970s, but political will, and costs have stopped the attempt. That’s too bad, but perhaps private space tourism can pick up where NASA and the Federal Budget left off? Indeed, I hope you will please consider all this and think on it.

Lance Winslow is the Founder of the Online Think Tank, a diverse group of achievers, experts, innovators, entrepreneurs, thinkers, futurists, academics, dreamers, leaders, and general all around brilliant minds. Lance Winslow hopes you’ve enjoyed today’s discussion and topic. http://www.WorldThinkTank.net – Have an important subject to discuss, contact Lance Winslow.

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“To boldly go where no man has gone before,” a phrase we all know, and one we grew up with. Today, it is more than likely that private citizens will actually get that chance. No, they may not go very far into space, but they may very well someday visit a space hotel, a space station, a lunar colony, or at least experience weightlessness in low Earth orbit. Right now, there are waiting lists, and folks made deposits worth tens of thousands of dollars to private space companies to experience that dream.

Virgin Galactic is finishing up its first private spacecraft, and it is nearing completion of its Earth-based spaceport in New Mexico. NASA has also already contracted with several private space companies to help it with its needs to move people and supplies from Earth to the international space station. Many worry that private companies may not be able to handle all of NASA’s slated and future missions. However, I would submit to you that it was private companies which built all of the satellites, and all of the components of the international space station. It was also private enterprise, and free markets which built the space shuttle. It was built by private companies under contract.

The Wall Street Journal had a great article on the privatization of space on August 17, 2011. The article was written by Andy Pasztor and titled “Private Space Taxis Race to the Launchpad,” and the article spoke of NASA’s contract with SpaceX, which also gives hope for investors who’d like to invest in the future of private space operations. Once these private companies and corporations have the money they need to move the ball forward, they will most likely be five or six times as the efficient as NASA using the same amount of money.

Now then, many folks on the Space Coast of Florida have lost their jobs due to NASA’s budget cuts. Yes, I understand their plight, but I also believe that many of those folks will be able to get jobs in the private sector, as their expertise, knowledge, and worldly know how is worth a pretty penny. NASA has given contracts to many more companies such as; Armadillo Aerospace, Near Space Corporation, Up Aerospace Incorporated, Virgin Galactic, SpaceX, Masten Space Systems, XCOR, and several others.

There has been some talk about the challenges that NASA was facing hiring the Russians to get us back and forth to the International Space Station. Meanwhile, the competition is on because the Chinese are building their own, albeit much smaller, space station. Unfortunately the Chinese will not have a toilet in their space station, and it is quite possible that they will use “flying toilets” – a term used by those living in the “Kibera Slum” in Nairobi Kenya, which basically amounts to discharging human waste into a plastic bag, and then throwing it outside onto a neighbor’s roof.

We know that China has contributed to space junk, and it will be unfortunate if they also contribute to flying orbiting toilets. Because even if you get hit with a bag of human feces, if it is traveling at 17,000 miles an hour in orbit, it can do some real damage, and that’s no bull crap either. But jokes aside, this space race is on, and it’s time for the United States to pick up the pace and take us into the 21st century.

Perhaps we can realize the science fiction futures written by writers such as; Isaac Asimov, Arthur C Clarke, Ben Bova, and Gene Roddenberry. In fact, it is interesting that DARPA has also started a group which will focus on building 100 years space craft. There have been a few space ventures, and space entrepreneurs who have already set targets of going to Mars, even if it’s only a one-way affair. In other words, if you go, you may not come back in this lifetime, but you will definitely go down (or up rather) in history.

When it comes to space hotels, it appears that Bigelow Aerospace is on the leading-edge of expandable and inflatable habitats for low Earth orbit; where will they take them next? There are at least 12 countries that have plans to build spaceports, or have signed letters of intent or agreements with private space companies such as Virgin Galactic. There are also hundreds of thousands of individuals who are waiting on waiting lists to go into space, so there is plenty of money to go around for those private space companies ready to take people into space, and bring them back safely.

Okay so, are there any risks? Indeed there are, one risk that we have considered is that we are approaching a period of solar maximum, and there will be solar flares which produce solar radiation which could damage orbiting space hotels, or spacecraft which happened to be in orbit at the wrong time. Luckily, NASA also has the ability to predict solar flares before they hit Earth in ample time to allow the safe return of space tourists prior to the arrival of the solar flare. Still, solar space scientists believe that starting in 2013 we might be in for a heck of a ride with regards to X-Flares of high magnitude challenging human space operations.

The Russians are also getting in on the game, and they are building a spaceport near the equator in South America. They hope to use this location to launch rockets carrying satellites, astronauts, cosmonauts, and supplies into space. Launching from near the equator gives them a 15% advantage, and it requires less fuel to reach escape velocity from that equatorial region of our planet. Yes, there will be challenges ahead for the privatization of space flight. However this is a great time to see what sorts of technologies humans are capable of.

Personally, I’m all in when it comes to private space flight, and I believe this is a step in the right direction, and a great leap for mankind’s future. Indeed I hope you will please consider all this and think about investing in private space companies, and book your tour into space as part of a dream that you will never forget during your life experience. Think on it.

Lance Winslow is a retired Founder of a Nationwide Franchise Chain, and now runs the Online Think Tank. Lance Winslow believes writing 24,500 articles by August 24th or 25th will be difficult because all the letters on his keyboard are now worn off now..

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By Leonard David

updated 1/14/2012 5:27:21 PM ET

Russia’s botched Mars probe mission Phobos-Grunt is fast approaching a fiery death, with just one or two days remaining before it falls from space, experts and Russian space officials say.

“The European Space Agency’s current re-entry prediction for Phobos-Grunt … points to the early evening (Central European Time) on Sunday, Jan. 15, with an uncertainty of plus/minus five orbits,” equal to plus or minus 7.5 hours, Heiner Klinkrad, head of the space debris office at ESA’s European Space Operations Center in Darmstadt, Germany, told Space.com in an email Saturday.

A statement from Russia’s Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) also pegged Sunday as the crash day for Phobos-Grunt, but went even further. According to the statement, released in Russian, the 14-ton spacecraft filled with fuel is expected to fall on Sunday and may crash in the Pacific Ocean, off the coast of Chile.

Russian space officials pegged the potential crash time as occurring at about 4:51 p.m. ET Sunday,  although major uncertainties still remain. There is a chance the spacecraft could fall earlier in the day, oron Monday.

Falling Russian Mars probe
ESA and a host of other space agencies and organizations have been closely monitoring the decay of the doomed Russian spacecraft. [Infographic: The Fall of Russia's Doomed Phobos-Grunt]

Russian space agency officials say they expect that, at most, 20 to 30 fragments of Phobos-Grunt may survive the fiery re-entry and reach Earth’s surface.

But given that most of Earth’s surface is covered with water, the odds that these leftovers — with a predicted total mass of less than 440 pounds (200 kilograms) — would fall onto dry land is very small, scientists say.

Russia launched the Phobos-Grunt mission on Nov. 9. The spacecraft was designed to fly to Phobos, one of two moons circling Mars.

Once at Phobos, the space probe was expected to collect samples from the Martian moon and then return them to Earth in 2014. However, shortly after launch, the spacecraft failed to boost itself out of Earth orbit to begin the trip to Mars.

Packed with toxic fuel
One unique aspect of the Phobos-Grunt re-entry is its large cache of onboard fuel.

While the dry mass of the wayward satellite is just 2.5 tons, the probe totes about 11 tons of toxic propellant, which went unused when the craft became marooned in Earth orbit and didn’t head outbound to Mars. [Photos of the Phobos-Grunt Mars Mission]

Orbital debris experts suggest that Phobos-Grunt’s fuel tanks, reportedly made of aluminum that contains unsymmetrical dimethylhydrazine, or UDMH, will explode high above the Earth. Those heat-succumbing tanks would therefore release the load of propellant to burn up in Earth’s atmosphere.

“The ‘it just burns up’ issue remains, invisible frankly,” said Martin Ross, director of The Aerospace Corp.’s Center for Launch Emissions and Atmospheric Research in El Segundo, Calif.

“What is needed is a full accounting of the material that gets vaporized and re-condenses into small particles that may remain in the upper atmosphere for many years,” Ross told Space.com. “Some of these particles may influence chemistry, since the vaporized materials are exotic in some cases, in that region of the atmosphere in subtle ways. It remains a question mark.”

Flying in space is hard
Phobos-Grunt is also outfitted with a nose-cone shaped descent vehicle wrapped in a thermal protection system. It was meant to haul back to Earth samples collected at Phobos. That hardware was designed to sky-dive through Earth’s atmosphere to a hard landing without parachute in the Sary Shagan missile test range in Kazakhstan — if the Mars mission achieved success.

Nestled inside that re-entry sample capsule is the Planetary Society’s tiny Living Interplanetary Flight Experiment (LIFE) biomodule, which carries a select set of microorganisms.

“Trackers won’t be able to predict where debris may fall until just a few hours before the event, so it’s impossible to say whether the biomodule will be recovered,” the Planetary Society said in a statement.

“What we’ve seen is heartbreaking reinforcement of an oft-repeated maxim. Space is hard! We are disappointed that our remarkable test of the hardiness of living organisms will not get the 34 months in deep space we had hoped for,” said the Planetary Society’s chief executive officer, Bill Nye, also known as the Science Guy.

“We also offer our condolences to the China National Space Administration; it’s their first Mars mission and a disappointment,” Nye added.

Like LIFE, China’s Yinghuo-1 orbiter hoped to catch a ride to Mars on Phobos-Grunt in order to study the Red Planet.

Crash from the past
Russia has a bit of history regarding satellites falling from space and tumbling onto land.

Due to a propulsion system failure, the Cosmos 954 spacecraft — a Soviet nuclear-powered radar ocean reconnaissance satellite — fell into Canada’s Northwest Territories in January 1978. It had been in space for only four months.

Large amounts of radioactive material from the satellite’s fall were scattered from Great Slave Lake into northern Saskatchewan and Alberta.

Subsequently, a joint U.S.-Canadian cleanup operation picked up roughly 0.1 percent of Cosmos 954′s power source. The spacecraft’s nuclear reactor worked on uranium, enriched with isotope of uranium-235.

Canadian authorities determined that all but two of the Cosmos 954 fragments recovered were radioactive. Some fragments located proved to be of lethal radioactivity.

The spacecraft’s plummet into Canada also marked the first time that the adjudicative process built into the United Nations’ Convention on International Liability for Damage Caused by Space Objects was put to the test.

Canada’s claims against the Soviet Union added up to more than $6 million. In 1981, the Soviets coughed up $3 million to settle the Canadian claim of reimbursement.

Unlike the Cosmos satellite, Russia’s Phobos-Grunt is a solar-powered spacecraft. One instrument on the probe does carry a small amount of the radioactive element cobalt-57. However, Lev Zelenyi, director of the Space Research Institute in Moscow and chairman of the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Solar System Exploration Board, has stated that the amount contained in that instrument is less than 10 micrograms and no significant problems are anticipated.

Standby alert
As Phobos-Grunt draws closer and closer to its fiery finale, a worldwide team of skywatchers is on standby alert in the hopes of spotting the fall.

“Experienced observers know that the probability of seeing any given satellite re-entry is very small, so they maintain very low expectations,” said Canada-based Ted Molczan, a leader in the citizen network of observers. “Those who are keen to observe one [a re-entry of space hardware] will monitor the trend in the decay estimates.

“If it appears that re-entry will occur at about the time Earth’s rotation drags their location through the plane of the orbit, then they may go out and have a look, still fully expecting to see nothing, but knowing they have maximized their personal odds,” Molczan said.

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NASA hopes to answer questions about the Moon

A team of NASA scientists will be monitoring a pair of spacecrafts orbiting the Moon, hoping to answer some age-old questions in what’s being described as the biggest Moon mission since man first landed there more than 40 years ago. NBC’s George Lewis reports.

http://video.msnbc.msn.com/nightly-news/45819973

A pair of NASA spacecraft is getting set to orbit the moon this weekend, a move that will kick off the probes’ effort to study Earth’s nearest neighbor from crust to core.

NASA’s twin Grail spacecraft are slated to start circling the moon one day apart, with Grail-A arriving on Saturday and Grail-B following on Sunday. The two probes will then fly around the moon in tandem, mapping the lunar gravity field in unprecedented detail and helping scientists better understand how the moon formed and evolved.

“This mission will rewrite the textbooks on the evolution of the moon,” Grail principal investigator Maria Zuber, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said in a statement.

Precision flying
The $496 million Grail mission (short for Gravity Recovery And Interior Laboratory) launched on Sept. 10 from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.

The two washing-machine-size probes have taken their sweet time since, charting circuitous, energy-efficient courses that will get them to the moon after more than three months of flying. Contrast that with NASA’s manned Apollo 11 mission, which prioritized speed and got there in three days back in 1969.

Grail-A and Grail-B won’t be ready to start their science campaign immediately upon arriving at the moon. Rather, they’ll spend another two months circling lower and lower, eventually settling into orbits just 34 miles above the lunar surface, researchers said.

The twin probes will begin taking measurements in March. They’ll chase each other around the moon for 82 days, staying 75 to 225 miles apart. [ Video: Grail's Mission to Map Moon Gravity ]

Regional differences in the moon’s gravitational field will cause the two spacecraft to speed up or slow down slightly, changing the distance between them as they fly. Using microwave signals that they bounce back and forth to each other, Grail-A and Grail-B will gauge these distance variations constantly.

And they’ll do so with incredible precision. The Grail probes will be able to determine how far apart they are from each other to within a few microns — less than the width of a human red blood cell, researchers have said.

Mapping the moon’s interior
The Grail team will use the twin probes’ measurements to construct highly detailed maps of the lunar gravity field. These maps should help scientists plan out future lunar landings, of both robotic and manned spacecraft, officials have said.

And the mission’s observations should yield other benefits as well.

Specifically, Grail’s data should reveal the moon’s structure in great detail, allowing scientists to draw insights about how the rocky body formed and how it has changed over time.

“Grail is a journey to the center of the moon,” Zuber told reporters Wednesday (Dec. 28). The two probes’ measurements, along with data collected by other spacecraft, she added, “will enable us to reconstruct the moon’s early evolution.”

This information, in turn, could shed light on how other large objects in the inner solar system came to be, researchers have said.

An extended mission?
Grail’s primary science work should wrap up in June. But the Grail team hopes NASA grants the two spacecraft a mission extension through next December, Zuber said. She and her colleagues want to take Grail even lower, to just 15 miles or so above the lunar surface.

“I call it flying over the treetops of the moon,” Zuber said of the proposed extended mission. “We will take the spacecraft down as low as we can, to map, have a sensitivity to the shallowest, shallowest structures of the lunar crust.”

Researchers also want Grail to raise public awareness about the moon, and to help engage kids in math and science. To this end, special cameras aboard the probes will be used to encourage middle school students to participate in lunar research and follow along with Grail, during both its nominal mission and any extended campaign.

The so-called MoonKam project, which will snap photosof the lunar surface for students on Earth, is led by former NASA astronaut Sally Ride and her educational company Sally Ride Science.

Explore the slideshow ‘Year in Space 2011′ on msnbc.com

By NASA Headquarters, Washington, D.C. — Published: September 15, 2011

NASA has selected the design of a new Space Launch System (SLS) that will take the agency’s astronauts farther into space than ever before, create high-quality jobs here at home, and provide the cornerstone for America’s future human space exploration efforts.

This new heavy-lift rocket — in combination with a crew capsule already under development, increased support for the commercialization of astronaut travel to low Earth orbit, an extension of activities on the International Space Station until at least 2020, and a fresh focus on new technologies — is key to implementing the plan laid out by President Obama and Congress. The booster will be America’s most powerful since the Saturn V rocket that carried Apollo astronauts to the Moon and will launch humans to places no one has gone before.

“This launch system will create good-paying American jobs, ensure continued U.S. leadership in space, and inspire millions around the world,” said Charles Bolden from NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C. “President Obama challenged us to be bold and dream big, and that’s exactly what we are doing at NASA. While I was proud to fly on the space shuttle, tomorrow’s explorers will now dream of one day walking on Mars.”

This launch vehicle decision is the culmination of a months-long, comprehensive review of potential designs to ensure the nation gets a rocket that is not only powerful, but also evolvable so it can be adapted to different missions as opportunities arise and new technologies are developed.

“Having settled on a new and powerful heavy-lift launch architecture, NASA can now move ahead with building that rocket and the next-generation vehicles and technologies needed for an ambitious program of crewed missions in deep space,” said John P. Holdren, assistant to the President for Science and Technology. “I’m excited about NASA’s new path forward and about its promise for continuing American leadership in human space exploration.”

The SLS will carry human crews beyond low Earth orbit in a capsule named the Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle. The rocket will use a liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen fuel system, where RS-25D/E engines will provide the core propulsion, and the J2X engine is planned for use in the upper stage. There will be a competition to develop the boosters based on performance requirements.

The decision to go with the same fuel system for the core and the upper stage was based on a NASA analysis demonstrating that use of common components can reduce costs and increase flexibility. The heavy-lift rocket’s early flights will be capable of lifting 77 to 110 tons before evolving to a lift capacity of 143 tons.

The early developmental flights may take advantage of existing solid boosters and other existing hardware. These flights will enable NASA to reduce developmental risk, drive innovation within the agency and private industry, and accomplish early exploration objectives.

“NASA has been making steady progress toward realizing the president’s goal of deep space exploration while doing so in a more affordable way,” said Lori Garver from NASA Headquarters. “We have been driving down the costs on the Space Launch System and Orion contracts by adopting new ways of doing business and project hundreds of millions of dollars of savings each year.”

NASA elected to initiate a competition for the booster stage based on performance parameters rather than on the type of propellant because of the need for flexibility. The specific acquisition strategy for procuring the core stage, booster stage, and upper stage is being developed and will be announced at a later time.

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If anyone questioned whether Comet Lovejoy would become the star of the season — and a lot of people did — the pictures of the past few days have removed any doubt. In the Southern Hemisphere, the death-defying comet is truly this year’s “Star of Wonder.”

Not only do we have an amazing video of the long-tailed iceball rising from the horizon, as seen from the International Space Station, we also have the stunning pictures and video released today by the European Southern Observatory. Skywatchers at the ESO’s Paranal Observatory in Chile captured the comet against the glittering backdrop of the Milky Way.

“For me, this comet is a Christmas present to the people who will stay at Paranal over Christmas,” said Guillaume Blanchard, who snapped a picture of dawn at Paranal with the Milky Way and Lovejoy dominating the sky.

Gabriel Brammer put together a time-lapse sequence of the comet rising just before the sun. For devotees of the night sky, it’s the latest must-see video. The clip also features the pencil-thin laser beam that Paranal’s Very Large Telescope uses as a guide star for its astronomical observations. Expand the video to full screen to increase the awesomeness.

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