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NASA : Commander of Underwater NASA Mission Available for Interviews

Akihiko Hoshide was born in 1968 in Tokyo. He received a bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering from Keio University in 1992 and a master of science in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Houston, Cullen College of Engineering in 1997

NASA will venture to the depths of the Atlantic Ocean this month to investigate technologies and procedures for use in near- and long-term space missions. The commander of the seven-day mission, NASA astronaut Randy Bresnik, will be available for media interviews via phone or Skype between 2:15 and 2:45 p.m. EDT Friday, Sept. 12.

To participate in the interviews, contact William Jeffs at william.p.jeffs@nasa.gov by 5 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 10.

The 19th NASA Extreme Environment Mission Operations (NEEMO) mission begins Monday, Sept. 8. Bresnik will be joined by Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen, European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Andreas Mogensen, and Herve Stevenin, ESA’s Head of Extravehicular Activity Training at the European Astronaut Center in Cologne, Germany.

The crew members of NEEMO 19 will test technologies and training techniques for use aboard the International Space Station and future deep space exploration missions. Mission objectives include evaluating technologies to improve crew performance when executing standard space station procedures; testing tools and techniques to conduct spacewalk tasks in varying levels of gravity; and, investigating the capability of just-in-time training to decrease crew training time while increasing crew efficiency for space station and future exploration missions.

The NEEMO crew, along with two professional habitat technicians, will conduct this mission in Florida International University’s undersea research habitat Aquarius Reef Base, located about six miles off the coast of Key Largo, Florida, and 62 feet below the surface of the Atlantic Ocean.

Embry Riddle Aeronautical University will conduct robotics and engineering investigations focused on technologies to support future space exploration missions and underwater operations.

The crew members will share their experiences during NEEMO 19 on Twitter at:

http://www.twitter.com/Astro_Andreas

http://www.twitter.com/Astro_Jeremy

http://www.twitter.com/ESAstro_trainer

For more information about NEEMO, the crew members, and links to follow the mission on Facebook and Twitter, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/neemo

NASA
Guillermo Gonzalo Sánchez Achutegui
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NASA : Space Station Crew Members Tour NASA Facility, Talk Earth Science

NASA astronaut Rick Mastracchio and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Koichi Wakata, Expedition 38 flight engineers, are pictured during Cygnus cargo spacecraft preparation in the Harmony node of the International Space Station.

Image Credit:

NASA

Astronauts Rick Mastracchio of NASA and Koicha Wakata of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency will tour NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, at 10 a.m. EDT Wednesday, Sept. 17. Reporters are invited to join the tour.

While at Goddard, Mastracchio and Wakata will view the new Global Precipitation Measurement (GPM) control room and other satellite control centers. The GPM Core Observatory was launched into orbit in February while the two astronauts were aboard the International Space Station. The GPM team will brief Mastracchio, Wakata and the media on the observatory’s collection of data on rain, snowfall and other types of precipitation, data that is now available to the general public.

There also will be a brief question and answer opportunity with the astronauts. The tour and interview opportunity is expected to conclude no later than 11:30 a.m.

The visit is part of several days Mastracchio and Wakata will spend in the Washington area for events and activities to highlight their 188 days in orbit as members of the space station's Expedition 38/39 crews.

To participate in the event at Goddard, U.S. reporters and foreign media with green cards must contact Ed Campion at edward.s.campion@nasa.gov or 301-286-0697 by 5 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 16. Non-green card holding foreign media must provide passport or visa information no later than 4 p.m. Monday, Sept. 8, to allow time for processing and approval for access to Goddard.

Mastracchio’s official biography is available at:

http://www.jsc.nasa.gov/Bios/htmlbios/mastracc.html

Wakata's official biography is available at:

http://iss.jaxa.jp/en/astro/biographies/wakata/index.html

For more information on NASA’s GPM Core Observatory, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/gpm

For more on NASA Earth science launches, research and applications, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/earthrightnow

For more information about the International Space Station, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

NASA

Guillermo Gonzalo Sánchez Achutegui

NASA: NASA Administrator Marks Completion of World’s Largest Spacecraft Welding Tool for Space

Sparks Fly as NASA Pushes the Limits of 3-D Printing Technology

Testing Continues With More Complex 3-D Printed Rocket Components

Engineers just completed hot-fire testing with two 3-D printed rocket injectors. Certain features of the rocket components were designed to increase rocket engine performance. The injector mixed liquid oxygen and gaseous hydrogen together, which combusted at temperatures over 6,000 degrees Fahrenheit, producing more than 20,000 pounds of thrust.

Image Credit:

NASA photo/David Olive

NASA has successfully tested the most complex rocket engine parts ever designed by the agency and printed with additive manufacturing, or 3-D printing, on a test stand at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.

NASA engineers pushed the limits of technology by designing a rocket engine injector --a highly complex part that sends propellant into the engine -- with design features that took advantage of 3-D printing. To make the parts, the design was entered into the 3-D printer's computer. The printer then built each part by layering metal powder and fusing it together with a laser, a process known as selective laser melting.

The additive manufacturing process allowed rocket designers to create an injector with 40 individual spray elements, all printed as a single component rather than manufactured individually. The part was similar in size to injectors that power small rocket engines and similar in design to injectors for large engines, such as the RS-25 engine that will power NASA's Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, the heavy-lift, exploration class rocket under development to take humans beyond Earth orbit and to Mars.

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3-D Printed Rocket Injector Roars to Life: The most complex 3-D printed rocket injector ever built by NASA roars to life on the test stand at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama.

"We wanted to go a step beyond just testing an injector and demonstrate how 3-D printing could revolutionize rocket designs for increased system performance," said Chris Singer, director of Marshall's Engineering Directorate. "The parts performed exceptionally well during the tests."

Using traditional manufacturing methods, 163 individual parts would be made and then assembled. But with 3-D printing technology, only two parts were required, saving time and money and allowing engineers to build parts that enhance rocket engine performance and are less prone to failure.

Two rocket injectors were tested for five seconds each, producing 20,000 pounds of thrust. Designers created complex geometric flow patterns that allowed oxygen and hydrogen to swirl together before combusting at 1,400 pounds per square inch and temperatures up to 6,000 degrees Fahrenheit. NASA engineers used this opportunity to work with two separate companies -- Solid Concepts in Valencia, California, and Directed Manufacturing in Austin, Texas. Each company printed one injector.

"One of our goals is to collaborate with a variety of companies and establish standards for this new manufacturing process," explained Marshall propulsion engineer Jason Turpin. "We are working with industry to learn how to take advantage of additive manufacturing in every stage of space hardware construction from design to operations in space. We are applying everything we learn about making rocket engine components to the Space Launch System and other space hardware."

Additive manufacturing not only helped engineers build and test a rocket injector with a unique design, but it also enabled them to test faster and smarter. Using Marshall's in-house capability to design and produce small 3-D printed parts quickly, the propulsion and materials laboratories can work together to apply quick modifications to the test stand or the rocket component.

"Having an in-house additive manufacturing capability allows us to look at test data, modify parts or the test stand based on the data, implement changes quickly and get back to testing," said Nicholas Case, a propulsion engineer leading the testing. "This speeds up the whole design, development and testing process and allows us to try innovative designs with less risk and cost to projects."

Marshall engineers have tested increasingly complex injectors, rocket nozzles and other components with the goal of reducing the manufacturing complexity and the time and cost of building and assembling future engines. Additive manufacturing is a key technology for enhancing rocket designs and enabling missions into deep space.

For more information about SLS, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/sls

NASA Administrator Marks Completion of World’s Largest Spacecraft Welding Tool for Space Launch System

NASA’s new Vertical Assembly Center (VAC), a 170-foot-high marvel of machinery that will be used to assemble elements of the agency's Space Launch System (SLS), now is complete and ready to weld parts for the rocket that will send humans to an asteroid and Mars.

Media are invited to join NASA Administrator Charles Bolden at the ribbon cutting for the enormous new tool at 11 a.m. EDT Friday, Sept. 12, at the agency's Michoud Assembly Facility in New Orleans where the core stage is being built. The event will air live on NASA Television and the agency's website.

Bolden and other officials from NASA and Boeing, the prime contractor for the SLS core stage and avionics, will be available for a brief media opportunity following the ceremony.

The Vertical Assembly Center will be used to join domes, rings and barrels segments to complete the SLS fuel tanks. The tool also will be used to perform evaluations of the completed welds. Towering more than 200 feet tall, with a diameter of 27.6 feet, the core stage will store cryogenic liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen to feed the vehicle’s RS-25 engines.

Bolden also will visit NASA's Stennis Space Center near Bay St. Louis, Mississippi, following the Michoud events, and will be available to talk to media at 2:15 p.m. CDT at the base of the historic B-2 Test Stand, along with other NASA representatives. The B-2 Test Stand was used to test the S-1C stage on the Saturn V moon rocket and the Main Propulsion Test Article, the configuration of three main engines flown on space shuttle missions. The stand will next be used to test the core stage of SLS and its configuration of four RS-25 engines.

Media who wish to attend both the Michoud and Stennis events must contact Chip Howat at carl.j.howat@nasa.gov or 504-214-6745 no later than 4 p.m. CDT Thursday, Sept. 11. Media must arrive at 13800 Old Gentilly Road, Bldg. 101 visitor's lobby, by 9:15 a.m. Friday, Sept. 12, for access to the facility. Official media credentials with photo identification are required for access.

Those interested only in attending the Stennis event must contact Paul Foerman at paul.foerman-1@nasa.gov or 228-688-1880 no later than 4 p.m. CDT Thursday, Sept. 11.

For more information about SLS, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/sls

For NASA TV streaming video, schedules and downlink information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/nasatv

NASA

Guillermo Gonzalo Sánchez Achutegui

NASA: NASA Television to Broadcast Sept. 10 Return of Space Station Crew

NASA astronaut Steve Swanson, Expedition 40 commander, along with cosmonauts Alexander Skvortsov and Oleg Artemyev, both flight engineers with the Russian Federal Space Agency, return to Earth Sept. 10 after six month aboard the International Space Station.

Three crew members aboard the International Space Station are scheduled to end almost six months on the orbiting laboratory on Sept. 10 and NASA Television will provide complete coverage.

Expedition 40 Commander Steve Swanson of NASA and Flight Engineers Alexander Skvortsov and Oleg Artemyev of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) will undock their Soyuz spacecraft from the station at 7:02 p.m. EDT Sept. 10, for a landing in Kazakhstan at 10:25 p.m. (8:25 a.m. Sept. 11, Kazakh time). Their return will end 169 days in space since launching from Kazakhstan March 26 for a mission that covered almost 72 million miles in orbit.

At the time of undocking, Expedition 41 formally will begin aboard the station under the command of Max Suraev of Roscosmos. Suraev and his crewmates, Reid Wiseman of NASA and Alexander Gerst of the European Space Agency, will operate the station as a three-person crew for two weeks until the arrival of three new crew members. NASA astronaut Barry Wilmore and Russian cosmonauts Alexander Samokutyaev and Elena Serova are scheduled to launch from Baikonur, Kazakhstan, Sept. 25, (U.S. time), on a six-hour flight to the space station.

NASA TV coverage will begin Tuesday, Sept. 9, with a change of command ceremony when Swanson will turn over control of station operations to Suraev, and will continue Sept. 10 and 11 with Expedition 40 landing and post-landing activities.

NASA coverage, all in EDT, includes:

Tuesday, Sept. 9:
-- 5:15 p.m. - Expedition 40/41 change of command ceremony

Wednesday, Sept. 10:
-- 3:15 p.m. - Farewells and hatch closure coverage (hatch closure at 3:35 p.m.)
-- 6:45 p.m. - Undocking (undocking at 7:02 p.m.)
-- 9:15 p.m. - Deorbit burn and landing coverage (deorbit burn at 9:31 p.m. and landing at 10:25 p.m.)

Thursday, Sept. 11:
-- 12 a.m. - Video File of hatch closure, undocking and landing activities
-- 12 p.m. - Video File of landing and post-landing activities and interview with Steve Swanson in Kazakhstan

For the NASA TV schedule and coordinate information, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/nasatv

For b-roll and other media resources, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/stationnews

For more information about the International Space Station, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/station

NASA

Guillermo Gonzalo Sánchez Achutegui

NASA : NASA Launches Satellite to Study How Sun's Atmosphere Is Energized

NASA Launches Satellite to Study How Sun's Atmosphere Is Energized

WASHINGTON -- NASA's Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) spacecraft launched Thursday at 7:27 p.m. PDT (10:27 p.m. EDT) from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif. The mission to study the solar atmosphere was placed in orbit by an Orbital Sciences Corporation Pegasus XL rocket.

"We are thrilled to add IRIS to the suite of NASA missions studying the sun," said John Grunsfeld, NASA's associate administrator for science in Washington. "IRIS will help scientists understand the mysterious and energetic interface between the surface and corona of the sun."

IRIS is a NASA Explorer Mission to observe how solar material moves, gathers energy and heats up as it travels through a little-understood region in the sun's lower atmosphere. This interface region between the sun's photosphere and corona powers its dynamic million-degree atmosphere and drives the solar wind. The interface region also is where most of the sun's ultraviolet emission is generated. These emissions impact the near-Earth space environment and Earth's climate.

The Pegasus XL carrying IRIS was deployed from an Orbital L-1011 carrier aircraft over the Pacific Ocean at an altitude of 39,000 feet, off the central coast of California about 100 miles northwest of Vandenberg. The rocket placed IRIS into a sun-synchronous polar orbit that will allow it to make almost continuous solar observations during its two-year mission.

The L-1011 took off from Vandenberg at 6:30 p.m. PDT and flew to the drop point over the Pacific Ocean, where the aircraft released the Pegasus XL from beneath its belly. The first stage ignited five seconds later to carry IRIS into space. IRIS successfully separated from the third stage of the Pegasus rocket at 7:40 p.m. At 8:05 p.m., the IRIS team confirmed the spacecraft had successfully deployed its solar arrays, has power and has acquired the sun, indications that all systems are operating as expected.

"Congratulations to the entire team on the successful development and deployment of the IRIS mission," said IRIS project manager Gary Kushner of the Lockheed Martin Solar and Atmospheric Laboratory in Palo Alto, Calif. "Now that IRIS is in orbit, we can begin our 30-day engineering checkout followed by a 30-day science checkout and calibration period."

IRIS is expected to start science observations upon completion of its 60-day commissioning phase. During this phase the team will check image quality and perform calibrations and other tests to ensure a successful mission.

NASA's Explorer Program at Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., provides overall management of the IRIS mission. The principal investigator institution is Lockheed Martin Space Systems Advanced Technology Center. NASA's Ames Research Center will perform ground commanding and flight operations and receive science data and spacecraft telemetry.

The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory designed the IRIS telescope. The Norwegian Space Centre and NASA's Near Earth Network provide the ground stations using antennas at Svalbard, Norway; Fairbanks, Alaska; McMurdo, Antarctica; and Wallops Island, Va. NASA's Launch Services Program at the agency's Kennedy Space Center in Florida is responsible for the launch service procurement, including managing the launch and countdown. Orbital Sciences Corporation provided the L-1011 aircraft and Pegasus XL launch system.

For more information about the IRIS mission, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/iris

NASA

Guillermo Gonzalo Sánchez Achutegui

Download this video in HD formats from NASA Goddard's Scientific Visualization Studio

NASA : NASA to Investigate Climate Impacts of Arctic Sea Ice Loss

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Image Credit:

NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/J. Beck

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A new NASA field campaign will begin flights over the Arctic this summer to study the effect of sea ice retreat on Arctic climate. The Arctic Radiation IceBridge Sea and Ice Experiment (ARISE) will conduct research flights Aug. 28 through Oct. 1, covering the peak of summer sea ice melt.

ARISE is NASA's first Arctic airborne campaign designed to take simultaneous measurements of ice, clouds and the levels of incoming and outgoing radiation, the balance of which determines the degree of climate warming. The campaign team will fly aboard NASA’s C-130 aircraft from Thule Air Base in northern Greenland the first week and from Eielson Air Force Base near Fairbanks, Alaska, through the remainder of the campaign.

In recent years the Arctic has experienced increased summer sea ice loss. Scientists expect the exposure of more open water to sunlight could enhance warming in the region and cause the release of more moisture to the atmosphere. Additional moisture could affect cloud formation and the exchange of heat from Earth’s surface to space. Researchers are grappling with how these changes in the Arctic affect global climate.

NASA’s C-130 aircraft will carry scientists over the Arctic starting this month from northern Greenland and Fairbanks, Alaska.

Image Credit:

NASA

"A wild card in what's happening in the Arctic is clouds and how changes in clouds, due to changing sea-ice conditions, enhance or offset warming," said Bill Smith, ARISE principal investigator at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Virginia.

ARISE was planned over the last year to take advantage of NASA’s existing capabilities for gathering data about ongoing changes in the Arctic. Satellites provided some information about clouds and the energy balance in the Arctic, but the multiple instruments flown during ARISE should provide further insight.

"The clouds and surface conditions over the Arctic as we observe them from satellites are very complex," Smith said. "We need more information to understand how to better interpret the satellite measurements, and an aircraft can help with that."

The array of instruments on ARISE should help scientists better observe how sea ice loss is affecting Arctic cloud formation and therefore the balance of incoming and outgoing radiation. Low-level clouds typically reflect more sunlight and offset warming, while higher clouds are typically less reflective and act to trap more heat in the atmosphere.

“It’s a complex business, but it depends on a lot of things we can, in fact, measure,” said Hal Maring, program manager for radiation sciences in the Earth Science Division at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

ARISE researchers will fly survey missions that target different cloud types and surface conditions, such as open water, land ice and sea ice. The missions will be timed to fly under the orbit paths of key satellite instruments, such as the Clouds and the Earth’s Radiant Energy Systems (CERES) instruments on multiple NASA satellites. Each morning, mission planners will look at satellite timings and weather forecasts to design flight plans that meet the most objectives of the campaign.

The NASA C-130, based at the Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia, will carry instruments that measure solar (incoming) and infrared (outgoing) radiation, ice surface elevation and cloud properties such as cloud particle size. This will be the first time that many of these instruments, including the mission's laser altimeter, have flown together.

The ARISE campaign is a joint effort of the Radiation Sciences, Cryospheric Sciences and Airborne Sciences programs of the Earth Science Division in NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington.

NASA monitors Earth's vital signs from land, air and space with a fleet of satellites and ambitious airborne and ground-based observation campaigns. NASA develops new ways to observe and study Earth's interconnected natural systems with long-term data records and computer analysis tools to better see how our planet is changing. The agency shares this unique knowledge with the global community and works with institutions in the United States and around the world that contribute to understanding and protecting our home planet.

To learn more about NASA's Earth science activities in 2014, visit:

http://www.nasa.gov/earthrightnow

NASA

Guillermo Gonzalo Sánchez Achutegui