Following October's news that Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin spaceflight company planned to build its own commercial space station in low Earth orbit, NASA announced on Thursday it has selected the program for funding through a Space Act Agreement to further develop the the station's design. The funding is part of NASA’s Commercial LEO Development program, which aims to "develop a robust commercial space economy in LEO, including supporting the development of commercially owned and operated LEO destinations." 

Blue Origin

“We are pleased that NASA supports the development of Orbital Reef, a revolutionary approach to making Earth orbit more accessible to diverse customers and industries,” Brent Sherwood, Senior Vice President of Advanced Development Programs for Blue Origin, said in a prepared statement. The station would be an orbital "mixed-use space business park" that would offer any number of turnkey services as well as reduced operational costs for burgeoning low-g industries "in addition to meeting the ISS partners’ needs." 

Blue Origin is partnering with Sierra Space in this project with the former focusing on the architecture and infrastructure of the station — everything from its design and construction to managing lift logistics using the New Glenn heavy launch system — while the latter is tasked with developing the station's LIFE (Large Integrated Flexible Environment). Boeing is also helping out, designing the operations-maintenance-science module and leveraging its Starliner crew capsule. Genesis Engineering Solutions is involved as well. It's working on a single person spacecraft that tourists and employees alike will be able to putter around in. 

Thursday's announcement, ironically, comes a the end of a year in which Blue Origin protested NASA's “fundamentally unfair” decision to award a lunar lander contract to rival SpaceX to the GAO, which quickly dismissed the claims. Blue Origin then sued NASA — literally, sued NASA —"in an attempt to remedy the flaws in the acquisition process found in NASA's Human Landing System," a spokesperson for Blue Origin told Engadget in August. The company subsequently lost that suit as well but, hopefully, Thursday's deal will serve as a balm for Bezos' critically wounded ego.

Northrop Grumman

The Orbital Reef team hopes to have its first modules in orbit by the end of the decade with further expansions happening throughout the 2030s. But Orbital Reef isn't the only egg in NASA's commercial LEO basket. Northrop Grumman announced on Thursday that it too had signed a Space Act Agreement — to the tune of $126 million — to design a "free flying" space station that will be a permanent presence in LEO for at least 15 years.

"Our station will enable a smooth transition from International Space Station-based LEO missions to sustainable commercial-based missions where NASA does not bear all the costs, but serves as one of many customers,” Steve Krein, Northrop Grumman's vice president of civil and commercial space, said in a statement. The company plans to leverage its existing Cygnus spacecraft, its Mission Extension Vehicle (MEV) and its Habitation and Logistics Outpost (HALO), as the basis for the station's design. 

As part of its agreement with NASA, these development proposals will have to account for every aspect of the station's "commercialization, operations and capabilities," according to Northrop Grumman, "as well as space station requirements, mission success criteria, risk assessments, key technical and market analysis requirements, and preliminary design activities."

Rocket Lab is finally shedding more light on its next-gen Neutron vehicle. The company has provided multiple details making clear the rocket is built for reusability from the ground up. It'll center on Archimedes, a 1-meganewton liquid oxygen/methane engine built to be used many times over. And with a lighter carbon composite body, the companydoesn't need many — seven Archimedes engines power the first stage, while the second stage just needs one.

Neutron could also put an end to tossing away (or trying to recover) the fairings that protect the payload. The rocket will have a "Hungry Hippo" fairing that's part of the first stage design — they simply open when releasing the second stage, and close again when it's time to land. That should save money, as you might guess, but it also promises faster turnaround times and lighter second stages.

The tapered shape of the rocket itself is built for reusability with a wider, more stable base. Neutron won't need a launch tower or girder to take off, Rocket Lab said. The company previously said the machine could carry up to eight metric tons to low Earth orbit versus the Electron's modest 0.3 tons (660lbs).

Any practical uses are still distant. Rocket Lab said it was still in the midst of a "competitive process" to pick a production facility, launch site and engine test facility on the US East coast. The firm previously said it hoped for a first flight in 2024. Even so, the new details are important — they hint at a future where Rocket Lab carries more (and more varied) payloads at lower costs, making space that much more accessible.

In 2018, astronauts aboard the International Space Station plugged a 2mm "hole" in a Soyuz MS-09 vehicle that had docked with the station in June of that year. While the pressure leak never posed an immediate threat to those aboard, it set off a bizarre turn of events that saw Russia open an investigation to find out if the incident was the result of sabotage.

Per an RIA Novosti article spotted by Ars Technica, the country's Roscosmos space agency recently completed its probe of the event and sent the results to Russian law enforcement officials, opening the door for them to announce criminal charges. Roscosmos didn't' say anything official about the cause of the pressure leak, but that hasn't stopped Russian media from spreading misinformation.

The RIA Novosti article references Russian media reports that allege the hole may have been drilled by NASA astronaut Serena Auñón-Chancellor, a crew member of the ISS at the time of the incident. Specifically, per Russia's TASS news agency, the country's Izvestia newspaper claimed Aunon-Chancellor may have drilled the hole out of a "desire to return to Earth because of a blood clot or a fight with her onboard the International Space Station." Citing its own source, TASS claims "the hole had been drilled in weightlessness by a person not acquainted with the spaceship's design."

According to NASA, the possibility that its astronauts were involved in creating the pressure leak is non-existent. As Ars Technica notes, NASA knew the location of all of its astronauts before the leak started and the moment it began. None of the US astronauts aboard the ISS at the time of the incident were near the Russian compartment where the Soyuz was docked when it started leaking air. The US shared this information with Russia when Roscosmos began its investigation in 2018.

"These attacks are false and lack any credibility," NASA Administrator Bill Nelson told the outlet. "I fully support Serena and stand behind all of our astronauts." We've reached out to NASA for additional information.

The accusations come at a time when the relationship between NASA and Roscosmos is already fraught. On November 15th, Russia conducted an anti-satellite missile test that created a debris field that forced astronauts on the ISS to seek shelter aboard their spacecraft. The US condemned the trial, accusing the country of putting everyone aboard the ISS, including Russian cosmonauts, in danger.

As you might have suspected this Cyber Monday morning, the big stories on Engadget involve good deals or even an all-time low price on gadgets, accessories for said gadgets or services to run on them. (We’ve linked to the best deals we’ve found down below, but stock and prices may have changed since the time of writing.)

That said, according to early figures, it might have been a more muted Black Friday online than in previous years. Adobe estimates its combined Black Friday and Thanksgiving Day internet sales were less than last year, for the first time ever — even if it was only a mere dip from $9 billion in 2020 to $8.9 billion last week.

Adobe thinks the dip reflected the multitude of internet deals out there that began ahead of Black Friday — some as early as October.

— Mat Smith

Scientists used Mars' ambient noise to map just underneath the planet’s surface

They analyzed the data collected by the seismometer installed by NASA's InSight lander.

NASA

A team of scientists have created the first detailed image of what lies right underneath the planet's surface, showing three billion years of its history, by listening to Martian winds.

More precisely, they analyzed the ambient noise (in the absence of marsquakes) collected by the seismometer that was installed by the InSight lander. On Earth, that kind of ambient seismic noise is generated by the ocean, human activity and winds, but only the last one is present on Mars.

Continue reading.

Sponsored by CISCO

Your work-from-anywhere solution

Spider-Man' advance ticket buyers will be rewarded with NFTs

Is that better than a giant plastic soda cup?

AMC is extending its fondness for the blockchain to the freebies you get with ticket pre-orders. The theater chain and Sony Pictures are giving away 86,000 NFTs to Stubs Premiere, A-List and Investor Connect members who buy or reserve tickets for Spider-Man: No Way Home showings on December 16th. Redeem a code through a special website and you'll get one of 100 designs. Will it be worth millions? My limited-edition Jurassic Park cup I got from a movie theater in the ‘90s suggests not.

Continue reading.

Cryptocurrency mining in Kazakhstan is leading to power shortages

China's crypto mining ban may be partly to blame.

Reuters

The Financial Times reports the country's electrical grid operator KEGOC said it would start rationing electricity for 50 registered miners after their demand reportedly invoked an emergency shutdown mode at three power plants in October. They'll also be the first users disconnected if there are grid failures. The energy ministry estimated electricity demand has jumped by eight percent so far in 2021 versus the more typical one or two percent. There have been blackouts in six regions since October.

Continue reading.

Tesla Model Y gets an AMD Ryzen chip upgrade in China

There's no word on a corresponding upgrade elsewhere.

Electrek has learned Tesla is shipping the electric crossover in China with an AMD Ryzen processor running the infotainment system instead of the usual Intel CPU. Performance variant owners have noticed the swap so far, but Tesla has historically used the same computing platform for all trim levels of a given model.

Continue reading.

The biggest news stories you might have missed

Black Friday 2021: The best Black Friday tech deals you can get for under $50

Black Friday 2021: The best Apple deals for Black Friday 2021

Black Friday 2021: The best gaming deals you can get

Xiaomi's upcoming EV factory will make up to 300,000 cars per year

Hitting the Books: How Amazon laundered the 'myth of the founder' into a business empire

LG appoints new CEO to lead its beleaguered electronics division

It's one thing to produce nanoscale devices, but it's another to study and improve on them — they're so small they can't reflect enough light to get a good look. A breakthrough might make that possible, however. UC Riverside researchers have built technology that squeezes tungsten lamp light into a 6-nanometer spot at the end of a silver nanowire. That lets scientists produce color imaging at an "unprecedented" level, rather than having to settle for molecular vibrations.

The developers modified an existing "superfocusing" tool (already used to measure vibrations) to detect signals across the entire visible spectrum. Light travels in a flashlight-like conical path. When the nanowire's tip passes over an object, the system records that item's influence on the beam shape and color (including through a spectrometer). With two pieces of specrtra for every 6nm pixel, the team can create color photos of carbon nanotubes that would otherwise appear gray.

This ability to compress light is notable by itself, but the inventors see it playing an important role in nanotechnology. Semiconductor producers could develop more uniform nanomaterials that find their way into chips and other densely-packed devices. The squeezed light could also improve humanity's understanding of nanoelectronics, quantum optics and other scientific fields where this resolution hasn't been available.

Never mind 3D-printing organs — eventually, the material could have a life of its own. Phys.orgreports scientists have developed a "living ink" you could use to print equally alive materials usable for creating 3D structures. The team genetically engineered cells for E. Coli and other microbes to create living nanofibers, bundled those fibers and added other materials to produce an ink you could use in a standard 3D printer.

Researchers have tried producing living material before, but it has been difficult to get those substances to fit intended 3D structures. That wasn't an issue here. The scientists created one material that released an anti-cancer drug when induced with chemicals, while another removed the toxin BPA from the environment. The designs can be tailored to other tasks, too.

Any practical uses could still be some ways off. It's not yet clear how you'd mass-produce the ink, for example. However, there's potential beyond the immediate medical and anti-pollution efforts. The creators envisioned buildings that repair themselves, or self-assembling materials for Moon and Mars buildings that could reduce the need for resources from Earth. The ink could even manufacture itself in the right circumstances — you might not need much more than a few basic resources to produce whatever you need.

NASA's Mars InSight lander provided researchers with the data needed to give us our first detailed look at the red planet's crust, mantle and core. That map doesn't include any information on the structures nearer its surface, however, and we need that to be able to get a more complete picture of how the planet was formed. Now, a team of scientists was able to create the first detailed image of what lies right underneath the planet's surface, showing three billion years of its history, by listening to Martian winds.

More precisely, they analyzed the ambient noise (in the absence of marsquakes) collected by the seismometer that was installed by the InSight lander. On Earth, that kind of ambient seismic noise is generated by the ocean, human activity and winds, but only the last one is present on Mars. The Swiss Seismological Service (SED) and ETH Zurich have been regularly analyzing data collected by the seismometer as part of the Marsquake Service. Over the past years, SED was able to develop ways to analyze ambient noise data to define geological structures here on Earth, and those are the techniques they used on the data from InSight.

Based on the data the tool gathered, the top three meters of InSight's landing site is made of sand, while the next 20 meters are loose material, particularly volcanic rock fissured by meteorite impacts. Underneath that sand and rock lie lava flows divided by sediments that formed when the planet experienced cold and dry conditions. Researchers believe the uppermost lava flows were deposited around 1.7 billion years ago, while the deepest ones were deposited as far back as 3.6 billion years ago at a time when there was a lot more volcanic activity on the planet. 

The researchers recently published their study in Nature, and one of the things they emphasized is that it proves techniques to investigate our planet can also work on Mars. Other methods used to know more about Earth could also give us more information about the red planet, which may one day become humanity's second home. 

In mere hours, NASA will attempt to launch one of its most interesting missions in recent memory. At approximately 1:21AM ET, a Falcon 9 rocket from SpaceX is scheduled to lift off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California carrying the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) craft. In about a year, NASA will attempt to intentionally crash DART into an incoming asteroid to see if it can alter its course.

The test will mark the first time humans have attempted to change the path of an asteroid. The binary system NASA will target as part of the test doesn't pose a threat to Earth, but what the agency learns from the mission could be vital in the future. NASA has identified at least 23 objects that could potentially collide with Earth over the next 100 years. And developing a feasible defense strategy is key to protecting humanity from that threat.

You can watch the entire launch unfold on NASA’s Live YouTube channel. Live coverage will start at 12:30AM ET on November 24th.

NASA’s oft-delayed James Webb Space Telescope has suffered yet another setback. While it was most recently scheduled to lift off on December 18th, it now won’t launch until December 22nd at the earliest. The delay is due to an incident that occurred while technicians were preparing to attach the telescope to the Ariane 5 rocket that will ferry it into space.

“A sudden, unplanned release of a clamp band — which secures Webb to the launch vehicle adapter — caused a vibration throughout the observatory,” according to NASA. It’s now conducting additional testing to ensure the telescope wasn’t damaged during the incident. NASA says it will provide an update on the situation by the end of the week.

The successor to the Hubble Space Telescope has been plagued by delays. When development started in 1996, NASA expected to deploy the JWST in 2007. However, by 2005, it went back to the drawing board. The telescope was then deemed complete in 2016 but then delayed again due to its complex construction. It was only fully assembled in 2019 and then the pandemic caused yet another round of setbacks. Given the history of the JWST, you can understand why NASA wants to play it safe.

The ranks of orbit-capable spaceflight companies just grew ever so slightly. TechCrunchreports Astra has reached orbit for the first time when its Rocket 3 booster launched shortly after 1AM Eastern today (November 20th). The startup put a mass simulator into a 310-mile-high orbit as part of a demonstration for the US Air Force's Rapid Agile Launch Initiative, which shows how private outfits could quickly and flexibly deliver Space Force payloads.

This success has been a long time in coming. Astra failed to reach orbit three times before, including a second attempt where the rocket reached space but didn't have enough velocity for an orbital insertion. 

Company chief Chris Kemp stressed on Twitter that Astra was "just getting started" despite the success. It's a significant moment all the same. Companies and researchers wanting access to space currently don't have many choices — they either have to hitch a ride on one of SpaceX's not-so-common rideshare missions or turn to a handful of options like Rocket Lab. Astra hopes to produce its relatively modest rockets quickly enough that it delivers many small payloads in a timely fashion. That, in turn, might lower prices and make space more viable.