black holes and gray matter. in one thousand tangos.

             

New Gigantic Telescopes Will Crack the Secrets of the Skies

At projected costs ranging from $900 million to $1.6 billion each, the Giant Magellan Telescope, the Thirty Meter Telescope and the European Extremely Large Telescope — which will have segmented mirrors measuring 24.5 meters, 30 meters and 39.3 meters across, respectively — will dwarf existing optical telescopes (the current largest is 10.4 meters).

Scientists hope the competing telescopes — all expected to be running within a decade — will enable them to observe the early universe… “We’re basically talking about the gap between 100 million and 500 million years after the universe began; that’s the time when the first stars and chemical elements and black holes and other exotica came into existence for the first time.”

Move Over, Drones - Here Come Disposable Satellites

While most of the country has been focused on the growing number of drones in this country – both military and civilian – Raytheon has already moved on to the next generation of surveillance. Last month, the company announced that it is developing tiny, near-disposable satellites for use in getting battlefield surveillance quickly.

The satellites, dubbed ‘SeeMe’ would be launched from a jet into orbit, and within a few minutes would be able to provide soldiers on the ground with a zoomed-in, birds-eye view of the battlefield. Those image would be transmitted to current communications devices, and the company is working to develop a way to transmit them to smartphones, as well. […]

The goal of the project is to get the cost of each satellite below $500,000, compared to the tens of millions of dollars for a typical satellite.

“We are leveraging our ability to mass produce small items that meet the rigorous standards of space,” added Raytheon’s Randy Gricius in the release.

What caught my eye about this development was the focus on mass producing the satellites. I think we’re entering now the cusp of a new era is spaceflight – away from the customized, single mission solutions of the past and on to joining the rest of industry in mass producing cheap products that can serve a variety of needs.

Dennis Tito, the millionaire investment whiz who became the first paying passenger to visit the International Space Station in 2001, is said to be planning a privately backed, 501-day mission to Mars in 2018. […] Tito, a former rocket engineer, made his fortune as the founder of Wilshire Associates, a multibillion-dollar investment firm based in California. He made history in 2001 when he paid a reported $20 million for a ride aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft to the space station. At the time, the eight-day round trip was highly controversial and required changes in the policies governing space station operations. Since then, six other high-net-worth individuals have taken similar flights with little or no controversy. The current published price for such flights is upwards of $40 million. [photo]

Dennis Tito, the millionaire investment whiz who became the first paying passenger to visit the International Space Station in 2001, is said to be planning a privately backed, 501-day mission to Mars in 2018. […]

Tito, a former rocket engineer, made his fortune as the founder of Wilshire Associates, a multibillion-dollar investment firm based in California. He made history in 2001 when he paid a reported $20 million for a ride aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft to the space station. At the time, the eight-day round trip was highly controversial and required changes in the policies governing space station operations. Since then, six other high-net-worth individuals have taken similar flights with little or no controversy. The current published price for such flights is upwards of $40 million. [photo]

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