November 2016
Rosetta - an eventful cruise phase
... activate the small onboard thrusters for several hours during the period of ground contact. Of course we were a bit nervous: we had never performed with Rosetta such long duration burns, and we had only a couple of weeks...
April 2017
Surviving radiation for space colonisation
... regolith. The Sun generates a lot of this type of particle from its fusion reactions and there is quite a bit in the solar wind. The nuclei are all ions, their electrons stripped away as they are accelerated...
August 2017
Space invaders and the usual suspects - disruptive trends in Earth observation
... some consolidation in this new sector is starting. US government support In the US, public institutions support this new economy. A bit like the early support to DigitalGlobe, the US government (through the NGA) has declared many times its...
September 2017
Binary stars and their extraordinary lives
Stars light the Universe and provide the chemical elements which are the keys to all life as we know it. Stars also link apparently disparate branches of physics, from the microscopic quantum world to cosmological general relativity. Binary stars ...
March 2018
Shifting lines and new horizons in Earth observation markets
... of new spacefaring countries in their own capacities for domestic and export markets. The current picture looks a bit like the California gold rush of 1849 with lots of metaphorical ‘gold miners’ looking to strike it rich in EO data...
August 2018
Earth observation game-changer
... miniaturisation has not been achieved. Each SAR mission is a tremendous cost to parties involved, implementing every bit of savings is a natural part of the process. Regardless of how difficult it has seemed, massive technical advancements in this...
