Deeply plotted with engrossing character development, The Expanse is truly great science fiction. It was recently canceled by SyFy for obscure reasons. Sign the petition to show Amazon (or somebody else) the value of picking it up. And if you haven’t tried it, do yourself a favor and check it out on Amazon Video.
X (formerly Twitter) Moms in Space
Logos!
We have logos!
The first is the mission badge for the colony in which the kids live. The colony calls itself Dawn, signifying the beginning of a new era in human development. The motto, “Ut melius faciat”, translates as “To do better”, a noble and ambitious sentiment for these first humans on Mars as they go about developing an entirely new culture.
The second is the official series logo. It too is a mission badge. Initially created by the younger sister as a gift to her older sibling, the parents liked the idea so much that they formalized it to be the official badge for kids born on Mars. The arms open to the sun, reflected in the helmet visor, signify this generation’s embracing of their future in this new era.
Both badges were developed by Graham Blake, illustrator extraordinaire.
Viking imagery redux
Some really nice reprocessing of old Viking imagery.
“I am fond of the Viking missions. Their orbits took them far above Mars (as far as 56,000 kilometers from the surface), giving them the ability to take sweeping images of entire hemispheres. Modern missions mostly don’t stray so far from Mars’ surface, and can’t fully capture the same sweeping vistas captured by the Viking Orbiters. ”
The Planetary Society To Mars, dammit
With the perfection of the Falcon 9, SpaceX is turning its attention to the BFR.
Ars Technica You need a vision
“The moon is certainly achievable, we have been there already, but from what I can see there is no vision there – you need a vision of going somewhere, doing something that is hard, going further than humans have ever been before,” she said.
the Guardian Info on NASA’s InSight Lander
“As early as May 5, 2018, NASA is set to launch Mars InSight, the very first mission to study the deep interior of Mars. We’ve been roaming the surface of Mars for a while now, but when InSight lands on Nov. 26, 2018, we’re going in.”
NASA Solar System Exploration Space Debris
At some point, we’re going to have to clean up a bit. In the meantime, Amber Yang is tracking orbital debris.
https://www.vox.com/videos/2018/4/25/17279414/19-year-old-space-debris-ai-solution-seer-tracking
Image: Vox
Off the table?
Well, somebody’s going to go to Mars. Just maybe not NASA.
“In its first 16 months, the Trump administration has reset NASA’s goals toward exploring the Moon and is planning significant investments in a “Gateway” in lunar orbit to serve both as a station for humans to live in deep space and as a way station for vehicles to cycle between the Moon’s surface and orbit.
“The simple answer is that space exploration is not a priority for this administration in spite of the rhetoric,” Grunsfeld said. “Mars is off the table as far as I can tell. The Gateway is the asteroid mission without the asteroid and is primarily to give the aerospace contractors something to do for the next decade while we wait for some real leadership.””
3D printing
With all the flashy transport-related progress from SpaceX and ULA and Blue Origin and NASA, it’s easy to miss the small developments that are just as important to our eventual habitation of Mars.
3D printing will be key to the development of colonies on Mars. From tools and parts to buildings and skateboards, colonists will create much of their world from scratch, eventually even producing their own plastics as the raw material.
““Once Nasa approved the wrench, we sent the file to the printer – essentially we emailed it to space and hit print,” says Jason Dunn, Made In Space’s co-founder and chief technology officer, sitting across the table in a conference room at the company’s headquarters in Moffett Field, Santa Clara County. “I get goosebumps every time I think about that story.”
For Dunn, that wrench is symbolic of an entirely new frontier in space exploration, one in which his eight-year-old company is a pioneer: manufacturing items in space, rather than relying only on those objects you can find room to pack on a rocket from Earth.”
