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Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator
The advanced Stirling radioisotope generator (ASRG) is a radioisotope power system first developed at NASA's Glenn Research Center. It uses a Stirling power conversion technology to convert radioactive-decay heat into electricity for use on spacecraft. The energy conversion process used by an ASRG is significantly more efficient than previous radioisotope systems, using one quarter of the plutonium-238 to produce the same amount of power. Despite termination of the ASRG flight development contract in 2013, NASA continues a small investment testing by private companies. Flight-ready Stirling-based units are not expected before 2028. Development Development was undertaken in 2000 under joint sponsorship by the United States Department of Energy (DoE), Lockheed Martin Space Systems, and the Stirling Research Laboratory at NASA's Glenn Research Center (GRC) for potential future space missions. In 2012, NASA chose a solar-powered mission (InSight) for the Discovery 12 interplanetary ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
ASRG Labeled Cutaway (English)
ASRG can stand for: *Anti-Spam Research Group, a research group within the Internet Research Task Force. *Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator, a type of power system for spacecraft. {{Disambig ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ulysses (spacecraft)
''Ulysses'' ( , ) was a Uncrewed spacecraft, robotic space probe whose primary mission was to orbit the Sun and study it at all latitudes. It was launched in 1990 and made three "fast latitude scans" of the Sun in 1994/1995, 2000/2001, and 2007/2008. In addition, the probe studied several comets. ''Ulysses'' was a joint venture of the European Space Agency (ESA) and the United States' NASA, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), under leadership of ESA with participation from Canada's National Research Council (Canada), National Research Council. The last day for mission operations on ''Ulysses'' was 30 June 2009. To study the Sun at all latitudes, the probe needed to change its orbital inclination and leave the Ecliptic, plane of the Solar System. To change the orbital inclination of a spacecraft to about 80° requires a large change in heliocentric velocity, the energy to achieve which far exceeded the capabilities of any launch vehicle. To reach the desired ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Uranus
Uranus is the seventh planet from the Sun. It is a gaseous cyan-coloured ice giant. Most of the planet is made of water, ammonia, and methane in a Supercritical fluid, supercritical phase of matter, which astronomy calls "ice" or Volatile (astrogeology), volatiles. Atmosphere of Uranus, The planet's atmosphere has a complex layered cloud structure and has the lowest minimum temperature () of all the Solar System's planets. It has a marked axial tilt of 82.23° with a Retrograde and prograde motion, retrograde rotation period of 17 hours and 14 minutes. This means that in an 84-Earth-year orbital period around the Sun, its poles get around 42 years of continuous sunlight, followed by 42 years of continuous darkness. Uranus has the third-largest diameter and fourth-largest mass among the Solar System's planets. Based on current models, inside its volatile Mantle (geology), mantle layer is a rocky core, and surrounding it is a thick hydrogen and helium atmosphere. Trace amount ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Titan Saturn System Mission
Titan Saturn System Mission (TSSM) was a joint NASA– ESA proposal for an exploration of Saturn and its moons Titan and Enceladus, where many complex phenomena were revealed by '' Cassini''. TSSM was proposed to launch in 2020, get gravity assists from Earth and Venus, and arrive at the Saturn system in 2029. The 4-year prime mission would include a two-year Saturn tour, a 2-month Titan aero-sampling phase, and a 20-month Titan orbit phase. In 2009, a mission to Jupiter and its moons was given priority over ''Titan Saturn System Mission'', although TSSM will continue to be assessed for possible development and launch. Origin and status The Titan Saturn System Mission (TSSM) was officially created in January 2009 by the merging of the ESA's Titan and Enceladus Mission (TandEM) with NASA's Titan Explorer (2007) study, although plans to combine both concepts date at least back to early 2008. TSSM was competing against the Europa Jupiter System Mission (EJSM) proposal for fund ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Europa Jupiter System Mission
Europa may refer to: Places * Europa (Roman province), a province within the Diocese of Thrace * Europa (Seville Metro), Seville, Spain; a station on the Seville Metro * Europa City, Paris, France; a planned development * Europa Cliffs, Alexander Island, Antarctica * Europa Island, a small island in the Mozambique Channel which is a possession of France * Europa Point, Gibraltar; the southernmost point of Gibraltar * Europa Road, Gibraltar * Plaça d'Europa, Barcelona, Spain; a square * Europa, Missouri, US; a community * Europe, known as Europa in many European languages Celestial bodies * Europa (moon), a moon of Jupiter * 52 Europa, an asteroid Buildings and structures * Europa building, the seat of the European Council and Council of the European Union in Brussels, Belgium * Europa Hotel (other) * Europa Hut, a Swiss mountain hut * Europa Tower, Vilnius, Lithuania * Europa-Park, A theme park in Rust, Germany People * Europa of Macedon, the daughter of Philip ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Saturn
Saturn is the sixth planet from the Sun and the second largest in the Solar System, after Jupiter. It is a gas giant, with an average radius of about 9 times that of Earth. It has an eighth the average density of Earth, but is over 95 times more massive. Even though Saturn is almost as big as Jupiter, Saturn has less than a third its mass. Saturn orbits the Sun at a distance of , with an orbital period of 29.45 years. Saturn's interior is thought to be composed of a rocky core, surrounded by a deep layer of metallic hydrogen, an intermediate layer of liquid hydrogen and liquid helium, and an outer layer of gas. Saturn has a pale yellow hue, due to ammonia crystals in its upper atmosphere. An electrical current in the metallic hydrogen layer is thought to give rise to Saturn's planetary magnetic field, which is weaker than Earth's, but has a magnetic moment 580 times that of Earth because of Saturn's greater size. Saturn's magnetic field strength is about a twen ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Titan (moon)
Titan is the largest moon of Saturn and the List of Solar System objects by size, second-largest in the Solar System. It is the only Natural satellite, moon known to have an atmosphere denser than the Atmosphere of Earth, Earth's and is the only known object in space—other than Earth—on which there is clear evidence that stable bodies of liquid exist. Titan is one of seven List of gravitationally rounded objects of the Solar System, gravitationally rounded moons of Saturn and the second-most distant among them. Frequently described as a Planetary-mass moon, planet-like moon, Titan is 50% larger in diameter than Earth's Moon and 80% more Mass, massive. It is the second-largest moon in the Solar System after Jupiter's Ganymede (moon), Ganymede and is larger than Mercury (planet), Mercury; yet Titan is only 40% as massive as Mercury, because Mercury is mainly iron and rock while much of Titan is ice, which is less dense. Discovered in 1655 by the Dutch astronomer Christiaan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
TiME (spacecraft)
Titan Mare Explorer (TiME) is a proposed design for a lander for Saturn's moon Titan. TiME is a relatively low-cost, outer-planet mission designed to measure the organic constituents on Titan and would have performed the first nautical exploration of an extraterrestrial sea, analyze its nature and, possibly, observe its shoreline. As a Discovery-class mission it was designed to be cost-capped at US$425 million, not counting launch vehicle funding. It was proposed to NASA in 2009 by Proxemy Research as a scout-like pioneering mission, originally as part of NASA's Discovery Program. The TiME mission design reached the finalist stage during that Discovery mission selection, but was not selected, and despite attempts in the U.S. Senate failed to get earmark funding in 2013. A related Titan Submarine has also been proposed. Discovery-class finalist TiME was one of three Discovery Mission finalists that received US$3 million in May 2011 to develop a detailed concept study. The o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
General Purpose Heat Source
The general-purpose heat source is a U.S. DOE-designed radioactive heat source for radioisotope thermoelectric generators (RTG) or Stirling radioisotope generators (SRG). It is meant for space applications and is packaged as a stackable module. Characteristics GPHSs are fueled with plutonium-238 dioxide. Each module has a temperature of over 600 degrees Celsius and delivers 250 watts at the time of manufacture. They measure 9.8 cm wide x 9.4 cm deep x 5.4 cm high and weigh no more than 1.44 kg each. Safety GPHSs are designed with safety in mind and employ iridium-clad plutonium-238 dioxide pellets. The generated alpha particles are blocked by the cladding, thus no further radiation shielding is necessary. The pellets are encased within nested layers of carbon-based material and placed within an aeroshell housing to comprise the complete module. The modules can withstand extreme conditions including a launch-pad explosion or a high-speed reentry. Overheating ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Watt
The watt (symbol: W) is the unit of Power (physics), power or radiant flux in the International System of Units (SI), equal to 1 joule per second or 1 kg⋅m2⋅s−3. It is used to quantification (science), quantify the rate of Work (physics), energy transfer. The watt is named in honor of James Watt (1736–1819), an 18th-century Scottish people, Scottish inventor, mechanical engineer, and chemist who improved the Newcomen engine with his own Watt steam engine, steam engine in 1776, which became fundamental for the Industrial Revolution. Overview When an object's velocity is held constant at one meter per second against a constant opposing force of one Newton (unit), newton, the rate at which Work (physics), work is done is one watt. \mathrm. In terms of electromagnetism, one watt is the rate at which electrical work is performed when a current of one ampere (A) flows across an electrical potential difference of one volt (V), meaning the watt is equivalent to the vo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Plutonium(IV) Oxide
Plutonium(IV) oxide, or plutonia, is a chemical compound with the formula Pu O2. This high melting-point solid is a principal compound of plutonium. It can vary in color from yellow to olive green, depending on the particle size, temperature and method of production. Structure PuO2 crystallizes in the fluorite motif, with the Pu4+ centers organized in a face-centered cubic array and oxide ions occupying tetrahedral holes. PuO2 owes its utility as a nuclear fuel to the fact that vacancies in the octahedral holes allows room for fission products. In nuclear fission, one atom of plutonium splits into two. The vacancy of the octahedral holes provides room for the new product and allows the PuO2 monolith to retain its structural integrity. At high temperatures PuO2 tends to lose oxygen, becoming sub-stoichiometric PuO2−x, with the introduction of lower valence Pu3+. This continues into the molten liquid state where the local Pu-O coordination number drops to predominantly 6-fold, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mars 2020
Mars 2020 is a NASA mission that includes the rover ''Perseverance (rover), Perseverance'', the now-retired small robotic helicopter ''Ingenuity (helicopter), Ingenuity'', and associated delivery systems, as part of the Mars Exploration Program. Mars 2020 was launched on an Atlas V rocket at 11:50:01 Coordinated Universal Time, UTC on July 30, 2020, and landed in the Martian crater Jezero (crater), Jezero on February 18, 2021, with confirmation received at 20:55 UTC. On March 5, 2021, NASA named the landing site Octavia E. Butler Landing. As of , ''Perseverance'' has been on Mars for Sol (day on Mars), sols ( days, total days; ). ''Ingenuity'' operated on Mars for Sol (day on Mars), sols ( days, total days; ) before sustaining serious damage to its rotor blades, possibly all four, causing NASA to retire the craft on January 25, 2024. ''Perseverance'' is investigating an Astrobiology, astrobiologically relevant ancient environment on Mars for its Geology of Mars, surface ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
