Space Research Today, Issue 216: first online issue

SPACE RESEARCH TODAY

Message from the Editor

Richard Harrison, General Editor

Well, here we are with the first electronic issue of Space Research Today (SRT) Having been involved with the journal since 1991, I have to say that I am excited by this milestone. We can make full use of images and movies, have live links to source material, have no limits on pages and no concerns now about delays in postal distribution. As soon as each issue is completed by the editors, it can go online immediately, and it can be visible to a much wider audience than before. Having said all of that, I must make two points. First, I feel that we will probably evolve, in terms of content and how we expand on the advantages of being electronic, so you should expect some changes as we settle into this new mode–in fact, please feel free to suggest anything that you think may enhance the journal. Second, the change to electronic publication is not a simple step and I want to personally thank the Executive Editor, Leigh, who has engineered the change of format brilliantly. In addition, Leigh and I would like to thank Jean-Claude Worms for his enthusiasm and encouragement, and his drive to enable it to happen. Underlying all of this, despite the changes, is the same basic aim to report on and advertise COSPAR business and COSPAR people, enhanced by news on associated activities, meetings, news releases, and so on.

Returning to the point about our wider audience, I would like to take this opportunity to welcome new readers, and especially those that are new to COSPAR. I hope that the articles lead to you to an enduring interest in COSPAR and its activities.

We have a wide range of topics and geographical distribution in our articles in this issue, including a focus on Climate Action, with comments from our President, Pascale Ehrenfreund, on the UN-COSPAR symposium on space-based Earth observation supporting climate action, held in Vienna in February, followed by a detailed report from Ralph Kahn, chair of COSPAR Scientific Commission A, who chaired the Symposium. The issue also includes an article on NASA’s DART mission that successfully deflected an asteroid, and we continue our ‘extended abstracts’ of key papers published in COSPAR journals with a discussion on planetary landings with hazard avoidance, and on drug discovery for space radiation. We also review a new autobiography by a former COSPAR President, Gerhard Haerendel, whose career maps out the very history of our space research era. Among the meeting reports this time are COSPAR Capacity Building Workshops held in Chile and Morocco. This was not a complete list of the contents, of course, but for new readers it stresses the spread of topics that we have come to expect in SRT. Of course, anyone is very welcome to submit material for future issues; details on how to do this are covered in the Submissions section.

COSPAR Business

CLIMATE ACTION

UN-COSPAR Symposium 2023: Space-based Earth Observation Supporting Climate Action, 14 February 2023, Vienna, Austria

The full webcast is available for one year on UN WebTV, starting at 31:00 at: https://media.un.org/en/asset/k1r/k1r0aw2y85

The Committee on Space Research COSPAR was very pleased to co-organize the UN-COSPAR Symposium “Space-Observation Contributions Supporting Climate Action” that is sponsored by the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) as part of the UN Agenda for Sustainable Development.

COSPAR is the oldest and largest international scientific society devoted to promoting international cooperation in space research. COSPAR was founded in 1958 to provide a neutral forum for the scientific dialogue between scientists. Many nations have joined COSPAR since then. COSPAR members include today 46 national scientific institutions from all around the world, plus 13 international scientific unions. There are 12,000 space scientists from all around the world who participate in COSPAR’s activities, attend our assemblies, participate in panels and roadmaps, and publish in our journals.

COSPAR’s first mission is about dialogue among scientists. COSPAR’s second mission is about encouraging international cooperation between space stakeholders worldwide. COSPAR has eight scientific commissions that cover all space science disciplines, from Earth and atmospheric science, to planetary science, astrophysics, from solar and space plasma physics to life and microgravity science.

The topic of the symposium, held as part of the UNCOPUOS Scientific and Technical 60th session, 6-17 February 2023 at the United Nations Office in Vienna, Austria, is “Space-Observation Contributions Supporting Climate Action”.

Climate change is already affecting the entire

world, with extreme weather conditions such as drought, heat waves, fires, heavy rain, hurricanes, floods and landslides becoming more frequent, snow and rainfall patterns are shifting. The Emissions Gap Report 2022 of the United Nations Environment Programme discusses that without rapid societal transformation, there is no credible pathway to a 1.5°C future. The COP27 final agreement also highlights that “US$4 to $6 trillion a year needs to be invested in renewable energy until 2030 – including investments in technology and infrastructure – to allow us to reach net-zero emissions by 2050.” In summary, climate change will generate high economic costs and humanitarian crises, trigger migration and provoke social unrest and geopolitical conflicts.

Space applications are part of our daily lives. And space can contribute directly and indirectly to all the 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Through Earth observations we can monitor the Earth surface, atmosphere and oceans and their changes to better understand the Earth system and to assess the influence of human activities and the consequences of the rapidly changing climate that will include among many other factors, more severe extreme weather events and loss of biodiversity. We all need to better understand hazards and resulting risks.

On the next pages you can read the report on this Symposium by Ralph Kahn, Chair of COSPAR Scientific Commission A: Space Studies of the Earth’s Surface, Meteorology and Climate, who chaired the 2h UN-COSPAR Symposium.

Pascale EHRENFREUND COSPAR President

COSPAR Session on Space-Observation Contributions Supporting Climate Action

[Ralph Kahn – Chair, COSPAR Commission A – Earth Sciences - COSPAR Commission A]

‘‘To retain our credibility as scientists ... it is critical that we remain evenhanded in our analysis and our reporting of results’’

On Tuesday, 14 February 2023, COSPAR Commission A hosted a session in Vienna, Austria and virtually, on “Space-Observation Contributions Supporting Climate Action,” as part of the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (UN COPUOS) Symposium on the Agenda for Sustainable Development.

COSPAR President Pascale Ehrenfreund provided an overall introduction, summarizing the main attributes of COSPAR, emphasizing the urgency of addressing climate change based on scientific evidence, and highlighting the role that Earth observation from space plays in understanding the Earth System and in monitoring changes. COSPAR Commission A Chair Ralph Kahn followed with an introduction to the session presentations. He pointed out that COSPAR is primarily a scientifically oriented organization, whereas “Climate Action” tends to be the domain of “activists.” To retain our credibility as scientists, and for the contributions we make as scientists to continue carrying the weight of scientific truth, it is critical that we remain evenhanded in our analysis and our reporting of results.

As such, the seven subsequent presentations focused on different attributes of the Earth System and its evolution that we observe objectively from space, frequently, on a global scale, and to a degree that is generally not possible any other way. Most presentations also covered how these data help inform policy and decision-makers, the public in general, as well as those taking direct action.

NASA Chief Scientist and Senior Climate Advisor Kate Calvin spoke next, giving an overview of the range of relevant observations contributed by one of the premier space agencies. Solar activity, greenhouse gas concentrations, the state of the ozone layer, sea ice and land ice distributions, sea level rise, global surface temperatures, and air pollution are all monitored by NASA satellites, and the data are disseminated widely to potential stakeholders.

Anny Cazenave from the Laboratoire d’Études en Géophysique et Océanographie Spatiales (LEGOS) explained how three decades of satellite measurements of sea-level changes contribute to coastal impact assessment. She discussed how space-based observations of sea level rise and the accelerating loss of land ice in Greenland and Antarctica provide key information needed to improve predictions of the future effects of rising waters on coastal populations.

Edward Blanchard from the University of Washington, Seattle, followed by reviewing the way sea-ice loss, as observed from space, contributes to climate forecasting. Arctic sea-ice extent has been monitored by satellites for about 50 years, documenting the dramatic rate at which loss is occurring; having such an extensive, long-term data record helps improve predictions of future sea-ice

‘‘Arctic sea-ice extent has been monitored by satellites for about 50 years’’

‘‘the COSPAR-sponsored session on Space-Observation Contributions Supporting Climate Action covered many aspects of our space-based ... observations, and drew the connections between these measurements and their application to policy and decision-making.’’

changes as well as strengthening assessments of the impacts these changes will have on other elements of the Earth System. The third focused talk was given by Angelica Tarpanelli of the Italian National Research Council. She concentrated on space-based monitoring of African river flow, the results of which are used to inform water management over the continent. In situ measurements are sparse in Africa, and radar altimetry as well as optical mapping by remote sensing instruments provide a broadly sampled complement to surface-based gauges in constraining the models used for resource forecasting and to help determine water management policy.

C.K. Shum from Ohio State University spoke next, describing the increasingly capable suite of space-based instruments studying the land surface for potential hazards. The impressive list includes satellite gravimetry, altimetry, global navigation system (GNSS) bistatic altimetry, synthetic aperture radar (SAR), Interferometric SAR (InSAR), and commercial, high-spatiotemporal-resolution multispectral imagery. These data, individually and especially in combination, are used to identify everything from groundwater reservoir depletion to even very subtle surface movement that can presage hazards such as landslides and larger earthquake events.

Wildfires are of increasing concern to populations in many parts of the world, and Nancy French of Michigan Tech University highlighted the range of satellite measurements that allow for better fire prediction as well as monitoring of smoke transport for downwind air quality forecasting and climate impact assessment. Everything from vegetation health and fuel loading, to “fire weather,” mainly related to near-surface temperature, relative humidity, wind speed and precipitation, to fire location, smoke plume injection height and source strength, as well as downwind dispersion are all observed from space and are used in fire and smoke modeling.

The final presentation, given by Aneesh Subramanian of the University of Colorado, Boulder, discussed a future mission that would add to our space-based Earth observation capabilities by quantifying the turbulent air-sea fluxes of heat and moisture at relatively high (~25 km) spatial resolution. The role of these fluxes in mediating severe storms, as well as longer-term climate phenomena such as droughts and floods, has become increasingly clear through the combination of satellite observations and advanced modeling. The proposed, space-based passive microwave instrument would provide flux measurements at a global scale, with greater sensitivity, and at higher spatial resolution, than current instruments offer.

In summary, the COSPAR-sponsored session on Space-Observation Contributions Supporting Climate Action covered many aspects of our space-based cryosphere, ocean, land, and atmosphere observations, and drew the connections between these measurements and their application to policy and decision-making. An underlying theme, especially relevant to the core values of COSPAR, is that these data tend to be acquired globally. As such, they typically apply to conditions in underserved nations as much as they do to areas that are otherwise well-monitored. The additional step required in many cases is capacity building, to develop regional expertise at actually using the satellite data, so the necessary analysis can be performed by those most closely affected by and interested in the results. Capacity building is another core value of COSPAR.

A slide from Kate Calvin’s presentation “How NASA missions and research inform climate decisions”

Anny Cazenave spoke on “Sea-level Rise from Global to Local Scale”

Nancy French covers “Spacecraft Monitoring of Woodland Fire, Smoke Transport and Applications to Fire Management and Air Quality”

“Earth Observation Monitoring of African rivers in a Climate Change Context” was covered by

Angela Tarpanelli

Pascale Ehrenfreund, COSPAR President, with Kate Calvin, NASA Chief Scientist, at the opening of the UN-COSPAR Symposium.

Edward Blanchard-Wigglesworth’s presentation was on “The Influence of Multi-Decadal Sea-ice Loss on Climate Forecasting”

Enriching Scientific Discovery through Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Accessibility IDEA for Today and Tomorrow

COSPAR’s IDEA initiative was first introduced at a Special Session Workshop during the July 2022 Scientific Assembly in Athens, Greece. We began a dialogue that has now extended to the global scientific community to ask: “Why is IDEA significant to COSPAR” and, more importantly, “Why now?”

‘‘The IDEA Task Group was officially launched after the 2022 Athens Assembly. ’’

The 2019-23 COSPAR Strategic Plan defined the organization’s key diversity principle as “promoting diversity and gender equality in all of its activities”. The IDEA initiative currently goes beyond that initial principle to establish a renewed policy for diversity and inclusion, to actively promote diversity and equity in all activities, and to identify meaningful roles for all researchers across COSPAR programs. The IDEA initiative is envisioned to encompass the broadest and most forward-looking definition of inclusion, diversity, equity and accessibility. Moreover, its implementation will drive growth and instill relevance for COSPAR global constituents as well as for new members across all areas of scientific inquiry.

In the 2019-23 Strategic Plan, COSPAR leaders recognized that universities, around the globe, are overflowing with brilliant students who are dedicated to making a difference in the world. They look to solve challenges in areas such as Earth remote sensing, space weather, planetary exploration, climate change, planetary protection, advanced spacecraft and instrument development, and the scientific exploration of the Moon and Mars. COSPAR believes we have the opportunity to lead or partner with others to create and sustain a workforce environment that is welcoming to the extraordinary talent entering the marketplace. This is the crux of the issue - contributing to the growth of the workplace that embraces Inclusion, Diversity, Equity and Accessibility: IDEA. Through IDEA, COSPAR can be a global leader in creating such an environment.

The IDEA Task Group (IITG) was officially launched after the 2022 Athens Assembly. The Group now has 30 individual members, including graduate students and career professionals, representing 13 countries. An IDEA panel focused on females in the STEM workforce will be presented at the Scientific Symposium in Singapore on 19 April. We are now looking ahead to organize an IDEA Workshop at the 2024 Scientific Assembly in Busan, South Korea.

The IITG is pleased to be collaborating with the Panel on Capacity Building, and we are participating in planned Capacity Building Workshops (CBW) throughout 2023. In January this year as part of the CBW on Data Analysis for Planetary Sciences in Antofagasta, Chile, members of the IITG organized a roundtable discussion panel intended to focus on prevailing diversity and accessibility challenges in the region.

[Mary Snitch, IDEA Coordination Officer (ICO) - IDEA Coordination Officer (ICO)]

As shown on the graph, the overall rating of the roundtable was favorable, but we received significant feedback on how we can improve the session to add significant value for the students. The students were very interested in learning about the IDEA initiative, but expected a more interactive exchange between the panellists and the audience. The students arrived with specific concerns they were experiencing--lack of inclusion and accessibility based on gender, colour, LGBTQ – and they expected to be actively engaged in the roundtable exchange.

In planning for an IDEA session at the next CBW on International Reference Ionosphere: Improved Real-Time Ionospheric Predictions with Data from Spaceborne Sensors and GNSS on 8-9 May, in Daejeon, South Korea, the IITG will strive to organize an interactive roundtable led in-person by someone from the region or someone who has spent time with the group over the course of the workshop. The IITG may also consider having the student audience lead the IDEA session from their perspectives with IITG aligning discussion within IDEA framework. All said, the IITG panellists appreciated joining the students in Chile via Zoom and are eager to engage in the CBW in May.

‘‘the IITG panellists... are eager to engage in the CBW in May.’’

The goal of IDEA is quite simple: to develop a strong and effective culture of diversity and inclusion encompassing the entire COSPAR enterprise. With IDEA principles integrated into all aspects of COSPAR – events, governance, member recognition – the organization will become a global voice for the public good.

If you are interested in learning more or contributing to the work of the IDEA Initiative, I would like to hear from you.

See more on the IDEA Initiative on the COSPAR website: https://cosparhq.cnes.fr/ scientific-structure/task-groups/idea-inclusion-diversity-equity-and-accessibility-initiative-task-group/

The inclusion of a "round table" on Inclusiveness, Diversity, Equity and Accessibility (IDEA) was a good idea.

30 responses

‘‘we received significant feedback on how we can improve the session’’

COSPAR Community

In this section, we include profiles of COSPAR personalities, principally officers, and other articles relevant to persons active in COSPAR’s affairs.

Hajime YANO—Chair, Commission-B: Space Studies of the Earth-Moon System, Planets, and Small Bodies of the Solar System.

“ He has also been appointed as the first SC-B liaison to the newly created COSPAR Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility (IDEA) Initiative Task Group (IITG).”

Prof. Hajime Yano is a space scientist, university professor, and professional project manager (PMP) at the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS), Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). As an expert in cosmic dust studies and impact physics, his research extends to the interdisciplinary combination of exploratory, observational, experimental, analytical, and theoretical works of small bodies and ocean worlds of the Solar System, as well as planetary protection, planetary defense, and space debris. He has published more than 250 refereed papers as the first author or a co-author and contributed as the principal investigator or a co-investigator of about 20 space exploration and experiment projects from Japan, Europe, and the United States. These missions include LDEF, EuReCa, HST, SFU, Nozomi, Stardust, Hayabusa 1~2, Leonid-MAC, SSSAT, IKAROS, Tanpopo 1~4, BepiColombo, SpaceSkin, EQUULEUS, DESTINY+, Comet Interceptor, and Gateway.  Through these projects, his teams have accomplished a number of pioneering works that led to major scientific discoveries and “game-changing” strategies in solar system exploration.

Hajime Yano first majored in physics at the International Christian University in Japan and in astronomy at the University of California at Berkeley in the USA and then obtained a PhD in space sciences at the University of Kent at Canterbury (UKC) in the UK in 1995. He conducted his own research and contri-

buted to space missions as a JSPS postgraduate fellow at ISAS in 1995-1998 and as an NRC research associate at NASA Johnson Space Center (JSC) in 1998-1999. Since 1999, he has rejoined ISAS as an academic faculty. Back in 1994, he received a travel grant to attend his first COSPAR assembly in Hamburg, Germany. Since then, he has participated in all the COSPAR assemblies as a contributed speaker, a solicited speaker, a session chair, a scientific organizing committee member, the deputy organizer, and the main science organizer in the last 28 years. In 2010-2014, he supported Dr. Maria Teresa Capria of INAF, the Chair of the SC-B Sub-Commission-B1 on Small Bodies (SC-B1) as Vice-Chair. He was elected as the SC-B1 Chair in 2014-2021. He also became the first Asian Vice-Chair of the Panel of Planetary Protection in 20142018, while he was responsible for the planetary protection activities of JAXA’s Hayabusa2 and Procyon missions. In 2021, he was elected as one of the three Vice-Chairs of the SC-B with Prof. Bernard Foing of ESA and Dr. Rosaly Lopes of JPL, under the leadership of Dr. Capria. He has also been appointed as the first SC-B liaison to the newly created COSPAR Inclusion, Diversity, Equity, and Accessibility (IDEA) Initiative Task Group (IITG). After the unfortunate loss of Dr. Capria in the spring of 2022, Hajime Yano was elected as the new SC-B Chair in Athens and he has become the first Asian to lead the commission in the last three decades.

In the space shuttle era, Prof. Yano established post-flight analysis procedures of micrometeoroid and orbital debris impact signatures

on retrieved spacecraft surfaces. Microscopic analyses of several hundred impacts per spacecraft such as LDEF, EuReCa, HST, and SFU revealed their origins and formed a fundamental database for dust environment modeling in near-Earth space. In 19982002, his team became the world’s first to use high-definition video imagery for astronomical research via airborne observation onboard the Leonid MAC mission, which yielded both the faintest influx and organic and volatile spectroscopy of the Leonid meteor storm. He also developed and operated a number of new instruments for cosmic dust detection and collection. The detectors include the Nozomi-MDC impact plasma detector, the BepiColombo-MDM and Gateway ERSA/LVDM acoustic sensors, and the PVDF detectors onboard SSSAT, IKAROS, and EQUULEUS. As all are involved in hypervelocity to low-velocity impact calibration experiments and simulations, Hajime has developed stable shotgun techniques for microparticle impacts with two-stage light gas guns at UKC, JSC, and ISAS and single shot technique with a vacuum laser abrasion accelerator at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). The ALADDIN PVDF sensors onboard the world’s first interplanetary solar sail IKAROS deployed a 0.54 m2 detection area of dust impacts, which yielded the finest structure of the zodiacal dust between the Earth and Venus.

Also noted is a projectile-impact sampling system his team had developed for almost any unknown surface conditions of an airless solid body (Yano et al., Science, 2006). Hayabusa-1&2 missions employed the system and resulted in the world’s first asteroid sample return from 25143 Itokawa in 2010 and the second of its kind from 162173 Ryugu in 2020. Upon touch-and-go samplings on Itokawa, Hajime and his colleagues discovered evidence of granular migration on such a small body, which created a new research field of “microgravity geology” (Miyamoto,

Yano, et al., Science, 2006).

He also attempted intact capture of micrometeoroids by foil stuck, silica aerogels, and carbon nanotubes deployed on LDEF, EuReCa, Stardust, and most recently Tanpopo-1&2 in 2015-2020, which were Japan’s first astrobiology space experiment series that he served as the project manager. He is now advancing these experiences for future mission concepts like a sample return from sub-surface ocean plumes and planetary rings as well as impact ejecta from interstellar objects.

As an educator, Hajime Yano has given a number of lectures for planetary science, astronautical engineering, and project management in universities worldwide. He has supervised dozens of Master’s and PhD students and hosted international student interns in solar system science at ISAS. In addition to COSPAR, Hajime has organized numerous international scientific meetings in IAA, IAU, and ISTS and served as a referee and an editorial member for a number of international peer-reviewed journals. Currently, he is the IAA Academician and the secretary of its Space Physical Science Commission. In Japan, he has been a member of the COSPAR Sub-Committee in the Science Council of Japan since 2017 and now serves as its secretary. He has received a number of domestic and international awards as a team or individual, including SAF-Prix International d’Astronautique (Hayabusa2), IAA-Laurels (Hayabusa and IKAROS), NASA-Group Achievement Award (Hayabusa), NASA Ames-Honor Award (Leonid-MAC), and ISTS-Jaya Jayant Award (individual). In 2003, the IAU named the main belt carbonaceous (B/Cb) asteroid 1995 WF2 “8906 Yano”.

Hajime and his colleagues discovered evidence of granular migration on such a small body, which created a new research field of “microgravity geology”

Awards

PSW Vice-Chair Awarded Julius Bartels Medal

The 2023 Julius Bartels Medal is awarded to Hermann Opgenoorth, a member of the UmU space group, for his exceptional contributions to substorms and space weather research, and his strong leadership in international collaboration. The medal is given by EGU at their meeting later this spring.

He has been Professor Emeritus in the Physics Department at University of Umeå in Sweden since 2019 and has worked in many different capacities throughout his long career, including Head of the Solar Terrestrial Physics research programme at the Swedish Institute for Space Physics in Uppsala, Head of the Solar System Missions Division of ESA, and Discipline Scientist at the International Space Science Institute.

Hermann Opgenoorth is Vice-Chair of the COSPAR Panel on Space Weather (PSW) and has been an active Associate since 2002. He is also the COSPAR PSW Liaison to the United Nations.

CBW Fellowship Chair Awarded Jocelyn Bell Burnell Inspiration Medal

Congratulations to Mariano Méndez, Chair of the COSPAR Capacity Building Fellowship Programme and Alumni for being awarded the 2023 Jocelyn Bell Burnell Inspiration Medal by the European Astronomical Society for his work over decades to set up a programme of education in space science in developing countries.

This includes his work in the COSPAR Capacity Building Workshops. Professor Méndez has carried out this programme on a voluntary basis, while maintaining a highly productive scientific career.

See https://eas.unige.ch/inspiration_medal.jsp

Research Highlight

Ongoing Efforts of the International DART Investigation Team to Understand Humanity’s First Asteroid Deflection Mission

[Nancy L. Chabot, Andrew S. Rivkin, Andrew F. Cheng Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, USA]

‘‘One of DART’s primary requirements was for DART’s kinetic impact to cause at least a 73 s orbital period change for Dimorphos’’

On 26 September 2022, NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft successfully collided with the asteroid Dimorphos [1], making history as humanity’s first demonstration of asteroid deflection. Shared live via a NASA broadcast, over a million concurrent viewers around the world watched as the DART spacecraft streamed images to Earth up to the final second before its impact with Dimorphos (Fig. 1). Autonomously targeting a small asteroid with limited prior knowledge at high speed was a key accomplishment for the DART mission and one of the mission’s primary requirements [2]

While the inflight operations of the DART spacecraft ended on 26 September 2022, other aspects of the DART project and its planetary defence mission were just beginning. Additional primary mission requirements remained to be completed by the DART project, and the international DART Investigation Team got quickly to work to begin to address them.

Measuring the Amount of Deflection

A key aspect of the DART mission concept was to change the orbital period of Dimorphos around Didymos by an amount that could be clearly measured using Earth-based telescopes (Fig. 2). The Didymos-Dimorphos double asteroid system and DART’s impact date during fall of 2022 were chosen for these reasons. Telescopes had measured the orbital period of Dimorphos very precisely prior to DART’s impact [3–5], and on 26 September 2022, the Didymos asteroid system was 11 million km from Earth, allowing the telescopes to get high-quality data at the time of DART’s impact. Didymos remained well

positioned for Earth-based observations for many months afterwards, enabling an extended period of measurements. One of DART’s primary requirements was for DART’s kinetic impact to cause at least a 73 s orbital period change for Dimorphos, which was judged to be the minimum that could be confidently detected by the telescopic observations with a 10% accuracy during the observing period [2].

During a NASA press conference on 11 October 2022, the DART team announced the initial result that the binary orbit period of Dimorphos had been reduced by 32 minutes with an uncertainty of ±2 minutes, greatly surpassing this primary requirement. Both photometric observations by ground-based optical telescopes and planetary radar observations contributed to determining the post-impact binary orbital period of Dimorphos. Additional observations in October 2022 refined the orbital period change to be –33.0 ±1.0 (3’) minutes [6]. Telescopic observations have continued beyond this initial dataset and will continue through March 2023. These measurements are refining the accuracy of the period change measurement and contributing to understanding the dynamical effects to the Didymos-Dimorphos system by DART’s impact event.

Determining the Momentum Transfer Enhancement Factor

DART was the first full-scale demonstration of the kinetic impactor technique for asteroid deflection, and a strong motivation for the full-scale test was to learn how an actual asteroid of the relevant size would react to DART’s collision. At 150 meters in diameter, Dimorphos is the size for which a kinetic impactor has been considered as a possible mitigation

‘‘significantly more momentum was transferred to Dimorphos from the escaping impact ejecta than was incident with the DART spacecraft’’

technique. Hence a DART primary requirement was for the team to determine ß, the momentum transfer enhancement factor, a measure of how much the asteroid was deflected relative to the momentum brought in by the DART spacecraft during its collision.

Using the sizes and shapes of Didymos and Dimorphos determined from DART’s approach imaging (Fig. 3) to estimate the mass of Dimorphos [2] and the orbital period change determined from telescopic observations [6], an initial assessment of ß yielded a range of values from 2.4 to 4.9 [7]. The large range in ß values is due to the uncertainty in the bulk density of Dimorphos, as the mass of Dimorphos was not measured by the DART mission. If Dimorphos is assumed to have the same density as Didymos of 2,400 kg/m3, then the resulting ß value is 3.6 [7]. These ß values are within the range of pre-impact predictions [8] and indicate that significantly more momentum was transferred to Dimorphos from the escaping impact ejecta than was incident with the DART spacecraft. This is an exciting and promising result for planetary defence, indicating that a kinetic impactor technique may be an efficient method to protect Earth from asteroid impacts in the future.

The DART Investigation Team is continuing in its analysis efforts to further refine and understand the ß value produced by DART’s kinetic impact. In particular, including more detailed modelling and analysis of the ejecta produced by the impact as observed by space-based [9] and ground-based telescopes as well as by the Light Italian CubeSat for Imaging of Asteroids (LICIACube), contributed by the Italian Space Agency (Agenzia Spaziale Italiana, ASI) [10], can provide further insight into the ß value, as can simulations of DART’s kinetic impact event. Such analyses are ongoing within the DART Investigation Team.

Understanding DART’s Test to Inform Future Planetary Defence Efforts

As stated in the mission’s name, DART was just a test. Neither Dimorphos nor Didymos poses any hazard to Earth either before or after DART’s collision. Rather, this double asteroid system served as

the ideal target for humanity’s first planetary defence test mission. The DART Investigation Team has been working to not just measure what DART’s impact did to Dimorphos but, more importantly, to fully understand the results so they can be used to inform future planetary defence efforts. The DART Investigation Team is actively working on a range of activities to accomplish this broad primary requirement.

Numerous ground-based and space-based facilities have been engaged in the team’s observing campaign (Fig. 4). Telescopic facilities on all seven continents have made measurements of the post-impact Didymos system in support of the DART project, as have the Hubble Space Telescope, JWST, and Lucy projects. Along with determining the orbital period change of Dimorphos, telescopic observations have been characterizing the properties of the Didymos system, and observations of the ejecta evolution produced by DART’s impact are currently ongoing (Fig. 5). Analysis of the many months of telescopic data is yielding insights into the properties of the ejecta and its evolution, with initial estimates placing the total mass of ejecta at more than a million kg.

Images obtained by ASI’s LICIACube CubeSat capture in spectacular detail the ejecta resulting from DART’s kinetic impact into Dimorphos (Fig. 6). LICIACube was carried by DART until 15 days prior to DART’s impact, at which time it was deployed and operated independently to witness DART’s impact. LICIACube made its closest flyby of Dimorphos about 3 minutes after DART’s impact at a distance of roughly 58 km, acquiring images of Dimorphos and the evolving ejecta both before and after its closest approach. Analysis of the LICIACube images is ongoing, and the images are being used to study the surfaces of both asteroids as well as the characteristics of the ejecta and its complex morphology.

IAdditionally, work is in progress to understand the geology and surface characteristics of the impact site. Studies to model the ejecta formation and evolution, DART’s kinetic impact event, and the dynamics of the Didymos system are also underway.

‘‘Telescopic facilities on all seven continents have made measurements of the post-impact Didymos system’’

All of these current efforts will contribute to a full understanding of DART’s first demonstration of asteroid deflection to inform future planetary defence applications.

International Collaboration for an International Issue

The DART Investigation Team includes roughly 300 scientists from over 100 different institutions that represent 28 different countries, supporting international cooperation for the international issue of planetary defence. The DART Investigation Team will continue their work through the end of NASA’s DART project in September 2023. DART’s pioneering planetary defence mission is followed by ESA’s Hera mission [11] (Fig. 7), and the DART and Hera teams have worked closely throughout the development of the two missions. Planned for launch in 2024, Hera will rendezvous with the Didymos system in late 2026 and conduct a robust remote sensing campaign in 2027, including determining the mass of Dimorphos as a crucial measurement to better understand the ß value from DART’s kinetic impact. The combined efforts of the DART and Hera missions will provide fundamental insight into understanding the kinetic impactor technique as a potential method of asteroid deflection, taking the first steps to develop a capability to potentially prevent an asteroid impact with the Earth in the future, if such a need should arise.

Acknowledgments:

Johns Hopkins APL built and operated the DART spacecraft and manages the DART mission for NASA’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office as a project of the agency’s Planetary Missions Program Office. This work was supported by the DART mission, NASA Contract 80MSFC20D0004, and by the Italian Space Agency (ASI) within the LICIACube project (ASI-INAF agreement AC n. 2019-31-HH.0).

References:

1. Daly, R. T. et al. (2023) Nature, in press.

2. Rivkin, A. S. et al. (2021) Planet. Sci. J. 2 173, doi: 10.3847/PSJ/ac063e.

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6. Thomas, C. A. et al. (2023) Nature, in press.

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Fig. 1

Fig. 2

Fig. 1. The last complete image of asteroid moonlet Dimorphos, taken by the DART spacecraft. The image shows a patch of the asteroid that is 100 feet (31 meters) across, and Dimorphos’ north is toward the top of the image. (Image credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL).

Fig 2. Illustration of the effect of DART’s impact on the orbit of Dimorphos. (Image credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL).

Fig. 3. Views of the asteroids 150-meter Dimorphos (left) and 760-meter Didymos (right), oriented with their rotational north poles toward the top of the image and with each asteroid and their distance to each other to scale; this product was produced by compiling two images taken by DART. (Image credit : NASA/Johns Hopkins APL).

Fig. 4. Over three dozen telescopic facilities in space and around the globe observed the Didymos asteroid system in support of DART’s global observation campaign after impact. Numerical figures in parentheses next to telescope names indicate the telescope size. (Image credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL/Nancy Chabot/Mike Halstad).

Fig. 5. An image of the Didymos system constructed from several images taken on 30 November 2022 by astronomers at Magdalena Ridge Observatory in New Mexico, USA. This image is roughly 32,000 km across the field of view at the distance of Didymos. (Image credit: Magdalena Ridge Observatory/NM Tech).

Fig. 6. LICIACube acquired this image just before its closest approach to Dimorphos, at 156 seconds after DART’s kinetic impact, capturing the ejecta coming off of Dimorphos after DART’s impact. (Image credit: ASI/NASA).

Fig. 7. Infographic showing the combined efforts of the DART and Hera missions to advance planetary defence. (Image credit: ESA).

Fig. 8. Illustration of NASA’s DART spacecraft and the Italian Space Agency’s (ASI) LICIACube, with images of the asteroids Dimorphos and Didymos obtained by the DART spacecraft. (Image credit: NASA/ Johns Hopkins APL/Joshua Diaz)

Fig. 3.

Fig. 4.

Fig. 5.

Fig.

Fig.

Fig. 6

About the Authors

Nancy L. Chabot is a planetary scientist at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, USA.

She is the Coordination Lead on NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) mission. In addition to her work with DART, she is the Deputy PI for the Mars-moon Exploration with GAmma rays and NEutrons (MEGANE) instrument on the JAXA Martian Moons eXploration (MMX) mission, and an Interdisciplinary Scientist on the joint ESA-JAXA BepiColombo mission. Previously on NASA’s MESSENGER mission, she served as the Instrument Scientist for the Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS) and the Chair of the Geology Discipline Group. Her scientific research focuses on understanding the formation and evolution of rocky planetary bodies in our Solar System. She is a fellow and current President of the Meteoritical Society, and asteroid 6899 Nancychabot is named in her honour.

Andrew F. Cheng is Chief Scientist for Space Science at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), and he is co-lead investigator for the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART).

He previously served as Deputy Chief Scientist for Space Science in NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, he was the Project Scientist for the NEAR mission, and he served as Orbital LIDAR scientist on the Joint Science Team for the Japanese Hayabusa mission to asteroid Itokawa. He also was a scientist on the Galileo mission, a co-investigator on the Cassini mission, and the principal investigator for the Long Range Reconnaissance Imager (LORRI) on the New Horizons mission.

He joined APL in 1983, and founded the Planetary Exploration Group there in 2004. Andrew earned a BS in Physics at Princeton University and a PhD in Physics at Columbia University.

Andrew S. Rivkin is a Planetary Astronomer at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory and Investigation Lead for the Double Asteroid Redirection Test.

His research centers on near-infrared spectroscopy and spectrophotometry of asteroids. In addition to observa tional work, he has been active in the broader Near-Earth Object community, serving as a team member on seve ral efforts to understand and report Earth impact hazards and how to mitigate them. Rivkin has also contributed to works considering the ethics of asteroid mining and studying what needs to be learned before humans could be sent to explore asteroids. Asteroid 13743 was named Rivkin in recognition of his work.

News in Brief

Satellite ’Archaeology’ Provides Record of 1970’s Sea Ice Development

(from ESA release, March 2023)

Existing sea ice climate data records, albeit some of the longest available, only go back as far as 1979. However, using ’satellite archaeology’, a team of scientists from DTU working as part of the ESA CCI Sea Ice project harvested data from one of the earliest prototype satellite sensor datas to reveal how sea ice formed in the early 1970s. The team achieved this by reprocessing observations from the Electrically Scanning Microwave Radiometer (ESMR) onboard the Nimbus-5 satellite, which launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California in December 1972.

EMSR was a prototype that marked the start of microwave observations from space. Using data from this legacy mission, the research team was able to derive improved estimates of global sea ice concentrations and extent for the period 1972-1977, which predate sea ice climate data records derived from modern satellite radiometers which only start from 1979.

In contrast to modern multi-frequency radiometers, ESMR only measured brightness temperatures at a single channel and polarization (19 GHz horizontal polarization). Nevertheless, it proved the feasibility of microwave radiometry from space with unprecedented coverage and mapped features such

as the Weddell Sea Polynya, which had not been mapped before. Even though the single-channel ESMR was a prototype, it has the common heritage with modern sensors. This made it possible for the DTU scientists to reprocess EMSR’s primordial brightness temperature using today’s state-of-the-art processing algorithms to derive improved estimates of global sea ice concentrations and extent. The Nimbus-5 ESMR Sea Ice Concentration (v.1.0) can be accessed and downloaded from the CCI Open Data Portal and is the latest addition to the ESA Climate Change Initiative sea ice datasets, which provides an interesting reference to the 1970s, since current sea ice climate data records go back to 1979. The dataset contains sea ice concentrations and associated uncertainties at a 25-km grid resolution.

Polar sea ice is both an indicator and a driver of global climate. It affects ocean circulation, weather, and regional climate and has decreased significantly since the records began. Reflecting its importance, sea ice is considered to be one of 55 Essential Climate Variables recognised among science and policy communities that are used to characterise Earth’s climate.

‘‘Polar sea ice is both an indicator and a driver of global climate.’’

Seeds Undergo Space Radiation for Enhanced Food Security

(from IAEA Department of Nuclear Sciences and Applications release, January 2023)

Seeds launched into space in November last year, have now been positioned inside and outside the International Space Station to be exposed to the full range of cosmic radiation and the extreme temperatures of space. This astrobotany investigation, an undertaking of the IAEA and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) through their Joint FAO/IAEA Centre of Nuclear Techniques in Food and Agriculture, aims to explore the effects of cosmic radiation on seeds as part of ongoing research into strengthening crop varieties to withstand the effects of climate change and increase global food security. The aim is to determine whether the harsh conditions of space, such as extremes of temperature and cosmic radiation, will lead to evolutionary changes in the seeds, and in turn, whether those changes could help plants become more resilient in the face of increasingly difficult growing conditions on Earth.

Arabidopsis and sorghum seeds were launched into space from NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility on 7 November 2022 as part of the cargo load of the CRS2 NG-18 mission to the ISS. On 13 December, half the seeds were moved to the ISS Nanoracks external platform. The other half have been kept inside the ISS for comparison, exposed mainly to microgravity and to some levels of radiation.

“Innovative research and development is urgently needed by the smallholder food producers most vulnerable to climate change,” said FAO Deputy Director-General Maria Helena Semedo. “The increasingly harsh growing conditions threaten food production, a situation we hope space science will contribute to change by promoting the development of resilient, nutritious crop varieties in abundance.”

Spontaneous mutations arising from exposure to different conditions in the environment are the bases of evolution in all organisms, and the IAEA and FAO, through the Joint FAO/IAEA Centre, have a long history of supporting countries in finding new crop varieties with desirable traits through radiationinduced mutagenesis techniques, improving food and nutrition security and farmers’ income.

The Joint FAO/IAEA Centre, based in Vienna, Austria, has been speeding up plant breeding research using radiation to develop new agricultural crop varieties for almost 60 years. In the history of plant agriculture, natural selection or evolution breeding, also called mutation breeding, have been the drivers of crop domestication and plant breeding. They are responsible for the genetic adaptation of plants to their changing environments and lead to the improvement of crops. So far, over 3 400 new varieties of more than 210 plant species have been developed using radiation-induced genetic variation and mutation breeding — including numerous food crops, ornamentals and trees used by farmers in 70 countries.

When the seeds return from space, currently expected in April 2023, they will be germinated and grown in the IAEA greenhouses and laboratories in Seibersdorf, managed by the Joint FAO/IAEA Centre, and examined for DNA structural variations and biological effects.  These analyses will help understand whether cosmic radiation and space conditions have a uniquely valuable effect for crop improvement and could potentially benefit people on Earth.

See https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/news/seedsundergo-radiation-in-space-to-explore-biology-andgenetics-for-enhanced-food-security

‘‘The increasingly harsh growing conditions threaten food production’’

The impact of satellite trails on Hubble Space Telescope observations

(from Nature Astronomy, March 2023)

Arecent paper published in Nature Astronomy reports that recent launch of low Earth orbit satellite constellations is creating a growing threat for astronomical observations with ground-based telescopes that has alarmed the astronomical community.

Observations affected by artificial satellites can become unusable for scientific research, wasting a growing fraction of the research budget on costly infrastructures and mitigation efforts. The paper outlines the first measurements, of artificial satellite contamination on observations from a low Earth orbit made with the Hubble Space Telescope.

With the help of volunteers on a citizen science project (www.asteroidhunter.org) and a deep learning algorithm, the archive of Hubble

Space Telescope images taken between 2002 and 2021 was scanned. The authors found that a fraction of 2.7% of the individual exposures with a typical exposure time of 11 minutes are crossed by satellites and that the fraction of satellite trails in the images increases with time. This fraction depends on the size of the field of view, exposure time, filter used and pointing.

With the growing number of artificial satellites currently planned, the fraction of Hubble Space Telescope images crossed by satellites will increase in the next decade and will need further close study and monitoring.

See https://www.nature.com/articles/s41550023-01903-3

Science Tourism Becoming More Attractive in Portugal

(from Austrian Academy of Sciences, February 2023)

In Portugal, the country with the highest vaccination rate in the EU, trust in science is high. It was not always like this. In 2005, according to a Eurobarometer survey, interest in science and technology in Portugal was relatively low compared to other EU countries. As current results from the Science Barometer of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (OeAW) show, Portugal did surprisingly well in the latest Eurobarometer survey from 2021.

What led to this and what is so special about science communication in Portugal ? The following is taken from an interview of Rosalia Vargas, President of the national science communication agency “Ciência Viva” during a visit to the OeAW.

Rosalia Vargas: In 1996, our Minister of Science and Technology, Professor José Mariano Gago, launched Ciência Viva and invited me to run this program. The idea was to work closely with the scientific community and the schools to embed science in society.

Vargas: Our science centers are museums with a modern approach. They are very interactive, open and updated, looking at research beyond tomorrow. And these science centers were created in partnership with scientific institutions, universities, polytechnic institutions and local authorities. We opened science centers all over the county. They are successful because they are close to the people and installed in buildings relevant for the local community, such as a former mining facility, a church, a monastery, a factory, even an old prison. All science centers are different from each other – a good reason to visit each and every one of them. We created a science tourism program to promote visits to all the science centers. The program includes a common entry card, supported by an app and a guide. Besides visiting the science centers, the visitor can choose from a wide variety of science tourism activities offered by more than 100 partnerships with other entities, and special rates on more than 100 restaurants and hotels.

‘‘School is the best place to work with the new generation to nourish their curiosity, especially about science’’

The most important question was: how to bring science closer to people ? One of the answers: We need to start with the children. School is the best place to work with the new generation to nourish their curiosity, especially about science and we know that, for many, this is the only way to have direct contact with science, before leaving school. We started by launching a call for proposals to the schools - with one particularity: it was required that in these projects the teachers worked together with scientists. The purpose was to build partnerships between schools and academia. Partnerships are very important because no one knows enough to do everything alone. So, working together is needed, particularly in science, where it is essential to share knowledge and expertise even on an international scale. At the heart of Ciência Viva are science centers throughout the country with a low access threshold.

Is this a way to reach people who otherwise feel little addressed by science ?

In the most recent Eurobarometer survey from the previous year, which, among other things, asked about attitudes to research and scientific knowledge, Portugal consistently ranked at the top.

Has Ciência Viva also changed the way people talk about science ?

Vargas: For many years Portugal was at the bottom of the Eurobarometer results in Europe. Then the Eurobarometer from 2021 showed a remarkable change. Why ? Because we started 26 years ago and we didn’t stop. It takes a generation to change, it is not a quick thing to do. But now the Portuguese are confident in science and in the scientists. And they say that they want to know more about science and technology - and they want to know more from the scientists.

‘‘the Portuguese are confident in science and in the scientists’’

https://www.oeaw.ac.at/en/news/portugal-sciencetourism-is-becoming-increasingly-attractive

NASA STAR Program Launches Careers in Space Biology Worldwide

Are you a biologist with dreams of understanding the effects of spaceflight on your model system? Have you been imagining watching a rocket launch, knowing that your own experiment is on its way to orbit? If that is the case, your interests are not uncommon, and your research might benefit from joining the NASA STAR program. The program is organized by Dr. Lisa Carnell from NASA Headquarters together with Dr. Egle Cekanaviciute and Dr. Marianne Sowa from NASA Ames Research Center, and has been held annually since 2020.

STAR, which stands for Spaceflight Technology, Applications and Research, is a virtual, international training program for postdoctoral scholars, senior researchers and principal investigators in academia, industry and government institutions. The applications to STAR open between March and May every year on the NASA NSPIRES website, and the course itself is taught to 25 competitively selected participants between September and February for two hours weekly, which depending on the time zone might fall anywhere between 2 am and 11 pm. To date, the STAR participants have included citizens from 12 countries, ranging in expertise from microbiology to plant biology to engineering to bioinformatics.

The third STAR cohort will be finishing their training at the end of February 2023. They have been learning about the biological responses to microgravity and deep space radiation, as well as vertebrate, invertebrate, plant and microbial model systems used for spaceflight. The training in fundamental space biology has been supplemented by statistics, systems biology and -omics approaches. In addition, STAR emphasizes the practical aspects of designing and flying a payload, by inviting speakers to focus on the engineering and logistics aspects of ISS payloads, small satellites and less well known platforms for studying spaceflight stressors such as scientific

balloons and parabolic flights. Representatives from key flight integrator companies define the process of moving the experiments from the bench to a spacecraft, and program officers discuss funding opportunities. At the time of graduation, the participants are ready to propose and successfully complete their first flight experiment.

However, STAR is not over when participants receive their diplomas at the time of graduation. One of the goals of the program is building a robust community of space biologists by encouraging collaborations. Multiple STAR alumni have worked together to submit grant proposals and design educational opportunities both within and outside the US.

A few recently funded NASA Space Biology proposals by STAR alumni as principal investigators include a flight payload of human megakaryocytes to the ISS (Dr. Hansjorg Schwerz, University of Montana, STAR-1), and a study on the impact of radiation on maternal and fetal skeletal physiology (Dr. Heather Allaway, Lousiana State University, STAR-2) as well as a computational genomics investigation on transposons using publicly available NASA data (Dr. Caralina Marin de Evsikova, Bay Pines Foundation, Inc., STAR-2) Some of the STAR alumni have collaborated with NASA investigators on their proposals, while others have joined NASA Centers, including the Marshall Space Flight Center (Dr. Chelsi Cassilly, STAR-1) and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (Dr. Siddharth Pandey, STAR-2).

As a part of a major NASA incentive to democratize access to space biology samples and data, the STAR participants have a dedicated session to learning about the Open Science Data Repository administered by NASA Ames Research Center, and are invited to join

the Analysis Working Groups, which connect an international community of investigators collaborating on re-analyzing publicly available space ‘omics and other data. Multiple STAR researchers have served on the resulting publications, with other investigations still ongoing.

In addition to the STAR program, NASA has recently begun a complementary training program in space radiation, called SHINE (Space Health Impacts for the NASA Experience),

which takes place virtually between February – August, allowing the participants to join both STAR and SHINE courses. A similar studentfocused program has been considered for the future as well.

All interested STAR participants and speakers may check out the program website, read a recent NASA publication about the program, or contact Dr. Egle Cekanaviciute, STAR Course Director, at egle.cekanaviciute@nasa.gov

Space Snapshots

NASA Space Mission Takes Stock of Carbon Dioxide Emissions by Countries

(from a NASA release, March 2023)

This map shows mean (average) net emissions and removals of carbon dioxide from 2015 to 2020 using estimates informed by NASA’s OCO-2 satellite measurements. Countries where more carbon dioxide was removed than emitted appear as green depressions, while countries with higher emissions are tan or red and appear to pop off the page. [Image credit: NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio]

A NASA Earth-observing satellite has helped researchers track carbon dioxide emissions for more than 100 countries around the world. The pilot project offers a powerful new look at the carbon dioxide being emitted in these countries and how

much of it is removed from the atmosphere by forests and other carbon-absorbing “sinks” within their borders.

The findings demonstrate how space-based tools can support insights on Earth as nations work to achieve climate goals.

See https://climate.nasa.gov/news/3251/nasaspace-mission-takes-stock-of-carbon-dioxideemissions-by-countries/

First Observational Evidence Linking Black Holes to Dark Energy

(University of Hawaii news release, 15 February 2023)

A team of researchers led by scientists at the University of Hawai’i at Mānoa has uncovered the first evidence of “cosmological coupling”—a newly predicted phenomenon in Einstein’s theory of gravity, possible only when black holes are placed inside an evolving universe. The team has published two papers, one in The Astrophysical Journal and another in The Astrophysical Journal Letters, that studied supermassive black holes at the hearts of ancient and dormant galaxies. The first paper found that these black holes gain mass over billions of years in a way that can’t easily be explained by standard galaxy and black hole processes, such as mergers or accretion of gas.

The second finds that the growth in mass of these black holes matches predictions for black holes that not only cosmologically couple, but also enclose vacuum energy—material that results from squeezing matter as much as possible without breaking Einstein’s equations, thus avoiding a singularity. With singularities absent, the paper then shows that the combined vacuum energy of black holes produced in the deaths of the universe’s first stars agrees with the measured quantity of dark energy in our universe. “We’re really saying two things at once: that there’s evidence the typical black hole solutions don’t work for you on a long, long timescale, and we have the first proposed astrophysical source for dark energy,” said Duncan Farrah, lead author of both papers.

Artist’s impression of a supermassive black hole . Cosmological coupling allows black holes to grow in mass without consuming gas or stars. [Image credit: University of Hawaii]

Webb Telescope Reveals Intricate Networks of Gas and Dust in Nearby Galaxies

(NASA release, 16 February 2023)

New imagery from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is giving scientists their first look at high resolution into the fine structure of nearby galaxies and how that’s impacted by the formation of young stars.

NGC 1433 is a barred spiral galaxy with a particularly bright core surrounded by double star forming rings.

For the first time, in Webb’s infrared images, scientists can see cavernous bubbles of gas where forming stars have released energy into their surrounding environment. In the image of NGC 1433, blue, green, and red were assigned to Webb’s MIRI data at 7.7, 10 and 11.3, and 21 microns.

See https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2023/nasa-s-webb-reveals-intricate-networks-of-gas-anddust-in-nearby-galaxies]

[Image credits: NASA, ESA, CSA, and J. Lee (NOIRLab). Image processing: A. Pagan (STScI)]

Japan’s ALOS-2 Observations of Earthquakes in South-eastern Turkey

(JAXA release, 2 March 2023)

After the major earthquakes in February in south-eastern Turkey and Syria, in response to requests from the “Sentinel Asia” and the “International Disasters Charter”, JAXA conducted emergency observation by the Synthetic Aperture Radar “PALSAR-2” onboard “DAICHI-2” (ALOS-2) and provided data to relevant organisations.

The image shows a differential interferometric image using observation data of 6 April 2022 (before the earthquake) and 8 February 2023 (after the earthquake). The blue to pink to yellow change in the image indicates that the ground surface has moved away from the satellite (westward or subsiding), while the blue to yellow to pink change indicates that the ground surface has moved closer to the satellite (eastward or uplifting).

Based on the result, extremely large crustal deformation was detected near the two epicenter areas (red stars) where the earthquake occurred, as well as local crustal deformation caused by afterquakes.

See https://earth.jaxa.jp/en/ earthview/2023/02/14/7381/ index.html

(Image credit: JAXA)

Meetings

Meetings of Interest to COSPAR

[Meetings organized or sponsored by COSPAR are shown in bold face.]

17-21 April 2023

Singapore

5th COSPAR Symposium: Space Science with Small Satellites

https://www.cospar2023.org/

8-19 May 2023

Daejeon, South Korea

COSPAR Capacity Building Workshop: International Reference Ionosphere: Improved Real-Time Ionospheric Predictions with Data from Spaceborne Sensors and GNSS

http://swpc.kasi.re.kr/

10-12 May 2023

Turin, Italy

Int. Conf. on Space Exploration

https://academieairespace.com/space-exploration/ presentation /

1-2 June 2023

University of Lusaka, Zambia

1st Astroscience Exploration Network (ASEN): “Pioneering the dissemination of astroscience in sub-Saharan Africa”

https://norcel.net

11-20 July 2023

Berlin, Germany

IUGG Berlin 2023

www.iugg2023berlin.org

14 – 20 August 2023

Fortaleza, Brazil

Space Week Nordeste 2023: Space Science and Technologies for the Benefit of Nature and Society

www.spaceweeknordeste.com.br

19-26 August 2023

Sapporo, Japan

URSI GASS 2023

www.ursi.org/event.php?id=425

16-20 October 2023

Ahmedabad, India

GHRSST24 Meeting

https://www.ghrsst.org/ghrsst-news/24th-international-science-team-meeting-ahmedabad-indiaghrsst-xxiv-ghrsst24/

23-27 October 2023

Kigali, Rwanda

WCRP Open Science Conf. 2023

www.wcrp-climate.org/wcrp-osc23

4-7 December 2023

Texas, USA and virtual 2nd Int.Orbital Debris Conf. (IOC) II

https://www.hou.usra.edu/meetings/orbitaldebris2023/

13-21 July 2024

Busan, South Korea

45th COSPAR Scientific Assembly

www.cospar2024.org

1-9 August 2026

Florence, Italy

46th COSPAR Scientific Assembly

E-mail: cospar@cosparhq.cnes.fr

Meeting Announcements

ASEN: its educational programme across African sub-Saharan

In-person conference on 1 - 2 June 2023, University of Lusaka, Zambia

How can we, collectively, make available astrosciences across Africa? NoRCEL has been active on the continent since 2015, steadily delivering inspirational talks and workshops. The international team at NoRCEL in collaboration with local scientists, that is our Astroscience Exploration Network (ASEN) team members, are exploring the possible ways forward to enable extending awareness and education in astroscience in sub-Saharan Africa. Our first event will be an in-person conference entitled: “Pioneering the dissemination of astroscience in sub-Saharan Africa” at the University of Lusaka, Zambia (thanks largely to Fred Nambala) on 1-2 June 2023.

A Call for Abstract Submission

We call upon the global astroscience community, including and especially those in Africa to support our efforts and attend this event. Attendance at the event is urged because we will be brain-storming ideas about the way forward with astroscience in Africa. You can forward an abstract (maximum 500 words) on any topic related to astrophysics, astrochemistry, astrobiology, geoscience, atmospheric sciences, planet formation etc., for consideration for an oral presentation at ASEN2023. Please visit https://norcel.net and contact Sohan Jheeta, at sohan@sohanjheeta.com. Please help make this particular conference a success: we need you: Africa needs you.

Meeting Report

Report on the COSPAR Capacity Building Workshop "Planetary Sciences Data Analysis"

[Carlos

Antofagasta, Chile, 16-27 January 2023

Gabriel, Chair of COSPAR Panel on Capacity Building]

The workshop took place at the Universidad Católica del Norte (UCN) in Antofagasta, the core of the Atacama Desert, from 16 to 27 January 2023. Organised mainly by COSPAR together with UCN, the University of Chile (Santiago de Chile) and the Uruguayan University of the Republic, it was supported by international organisations, such as the space agencies NASA and ESA and the European Southern Observatory (ESO). It was also sponsored by local organisations such as the Meteorological Society, the Centre for Astrophysics and Related Technologies (CATA), the Millennium Institute of Astrophysics and the Geological Society of Chile. The company L3Harris contributed by offering free IDL licenses for the students for 6 weeks.

The workshop was proposed and organised locally by Prof. Millarca Valenzuela from UCN, Prof. Gonzalo Tancred from the Universidad República del Uruguay who scientifically directed it, and Prof. Patricio Rojo (Universidad de Chile).

The aim of the workshop was to develop interesting scientific projects guided by experts from missions such as Hayabusa 2, Mars Express, JUNO, New Horizons and DART. This involved learning various analysis tools such as Spice, Small Body mapping Tool and programmes dedicated to the specific analysis of data from the different missions. Representatives from NASA’s Planetary Data System, JAXA’s Science Data Archive and ESA’s Planetary Science Archive assisted in the extraction and management of data from the various databases.

Details of the workshop can be found on the Capacity Building Programme pages (https://cosparhq.cnes.fr/Meetings/Workshops.html) and on the local website (http:// cospar.das.uchile.cl/).

Participants

A total of 37 candidates were selected out of a total of 101 candidates. The selected students were all, with one exception, from Latin American countries (11 from Chile, 9 from Brazil, 6 from Argentina, 3 from Uruguay, 3 from Mexico and 1 each from Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Ja-

pan). These workshops are defined as regional, for several reasons, including financial ones. A good candidate from a different region has to bear the costs of his or her participation. A couple of the originally chosen students had withdrawn their participation a few weeks before the event, but were easily replaced by other candidates. The limitation to 37 students was mainly due to financial reasons, the somewhat low local funding together with inflation especially related to flight costs forced us to be very conservative from the beginning.

The geographical distribution of the students showed a strong regional diversification. The gender distribution showed a 57/43% female/male student ratio, which is quite typical considering the workshops previously organised in this region.

Lecturers

For most of the speakers/supervisors this was their first participation in a COSPAR Capacity Building Workshop (CBW), most of them were sent by the space missions we have consulted. Juno, a NASA space probe orbiting Jupiter, sent 4 mission specialists: Scott Bolton, Jack Connerney, Steven Levin and Frederic Allegrini; New Horizons, NASA’s mission to the Pluto system and beyond sent Simon Porter, a postdoctoral researcher. Another postdoctoral researcher, Terik Dalik, represented the DART mission, Double Asteroid Redirection Test, a planetary defence mission that successfully collided in September 2022 with the small asteroid Dimorphos, changing its orbit. Another specialist on small solar system bodies, James «Gerbs» Bauer, spoke mainly on the PSA and PDS planetary data science systems. JAXA’s Hayabusa 1 and 2 missions were represented by Sergi Sugita. Lucie Riu, ESA research fellow, was the Mars Express specialist and a very active project supervisor. The team of supervisors was completed by Javier Suarez from Jacobs University Bremen (Germany), another Mars Express specialist. All of them participated for the first time in a COSPAR CBW. However, the scientific

"The aim of the workshop was to develop interesting scientific projects guided by experts from missions such as Hayabusa 2, Mars Express, JUNO, New Horizons and DART"

From left to right

1. Telescopes from UCN

2. Sunset

3. The four Very Large Telescopes at Paranal

4. Searching for meteorites

5. Participants and lecturers on the last day of the Capacity Building Workshop

leadership was in the hands of a Uruguayan professor with COSPAR CBW experience who had led previous planetary science workshops in Montevideo, Uruguay, in 2007 and Guaratinguetá, Brazil, in 2015. Several presentations on future planetary missions from both ESA and NASA were made online (a first for COSPAR CBW).

The Programme

The school was structured with approximately 43% of the time devoted to science lessons, 13% to lessons on data analysis software and 43% to the projects that the students had to carry out (a bit misleading because the students usually work long hours, especially in the second week). As in the past, most of the teachers also acted as project supervisors.

For the first time all the presentations could be followed online via Zoom, and we also used it to record them. Together with all the material used, the files of the presentations, including those made by the students at the end of the workshop, are available on this Google drive.

The projects

The students defined their projects together with the supervisors, and decided at that point to work individually or in small groups. A division was made to assign supervisors according to the chosen topics. The number of supervisors was perhaps too small on this occasion, with only four supervisors present in the second week (L. Riu, T. Daly, S. Porter and J. Suárez), although on-line help was also available.

Unlike other astronomy workshops held in the last 10 years, in which practically all students worked on their projects using their own laptops, in this case we had few students, six in total (17%) using the desktop computers provided. The desktops we had at our disposal (40, a very large number) were equipped with Windows as their operating system. Although it was possible to install most of the software to be used on them, this took some time and some students were not used to using Windows.

The inclusion of IDEA

This workshop presented novelties not only with respect to the introduction of online classes (in the post-COVID19 era this is truly accessible) but also introduced a segment dedicated to discussion on inclusion, diversity, equity and accessibility (IDEA), in line with COSPAR’s decision to incorporate in its strategic plan a call to action to define a roadmap to achieve this across the organisation.

An obvious communication problem between the local organisers, scientists and the IDEA team led to a lack of clarity on whether the 90 minutes should be a round table

including students, or a panel discussion, or something in between. The result was interesting presentations by the four women on the panel and only at the end were students invited to comment. This format was totally outside the expectations of the students, who evidently, according to the comments obtained in the final evaluation, considered IDEA in general as a very valuable element, but expected a discussion on the problems they face in their respective countries, both professionally and socially, and not what was done.

Inclusion of IDEA

The experience, although negative in important aspects, can tell us a lot about what to change and improve for future events. We hope to include aspects of IDEA in all training workshops we organise.

The excursion

The excursion was undoubtedly one of the highlights of the stay. We went to visit ESO’s Paranal site with the impressive Very Large Telescopes (VLT), about 130 km from Antofagasta. A large bus and a minivan took us all to combine this visit with a field trip to learn how to search for meteorites in the desert.

In the total area we scanned for meteorites we would expect an average of 1.5 meteorites. One candidate was found, which has been left at UCN for analysis.

After these visits we headed to the Mano del Desierto, halfway back to the city of Antofagasta, a much visited monument (to experience a combination of art and strong desert wind!) to finally reach a plain at an altitude of 1,700 m near El Cobre, which is a formidable platform for observing perhaps the best sky on Earth.

There were several telescopes with solar filters brought by UCN staff for pre-sunset observations. As night fell and, in the darkness, we enjoyed an exceptional seafood catering complemented by pisco sour and good Chilean wines. Fruit juices were also available. We enjoyed a sensational night, under a sky with a new moon (they had also prepared it, evidently) in which we observed planets, constellations, a milky way that seemed to fall on us, we clearly saw clusters of stars and the Magellanic clouds. We were back at the hotel at 23:30 with the impression that it had been a truly unforgettable experience.

General evaluation

As anticipated in several points, we have prepared and distributed among the students an evaluation sheet to obtain feedback on the different aspects of the workshop, obtaining so far 33 evaluation sheets answered (> 80 %). In ge-

neral terms, the results do not differ much from those obtained in previous workshops in Latin America. As always, with regard to local elements (place, food) opinions differ partly, as is to be expected due to the very different conditions.

A notable difference from previous evaluations is the level of satisfaction with financial support, which is much lower than in the past. The general increase in workshop-related costs, especially flight costs, has forced us to reduce the percentage of subsidised travel expenses. In the past, this percentage ranged from 70% to 80% of the price of an economy ticket. This time we have been forced to reduce it to an average of 55%. This, together with the rising cost of flights in general, and the economic situation in a large number of Latin American countries with very weak currencies, has led to a low level of student satisfaction (and also to an increase in students’ efforts to cover these costs themselves. It should be clarified, however, that we did not have any refusal of the invitation to participate for financial reasons). There is a high level of satisfaction with the workshop in general, also with the teachers and supervisors. The hard work done by the latter in helping with data reduction and analysis is especially rewarded with more than 90% agreement (of which almost 70% is «strong»). We have however noticed, that in the midst of this general satisfaction, there is a noticeable minority who express negatively about the aid received. Two written comments clarify this situation: the group that chose to work with Juno data as a project felt abandoned during the second week, as all members of that project had to return to the USA for an important project meeting.

A large majority of participants believe they will be able to use planetary science data in their future research, demonstrating a high level of confidence, and almost two-thirds

believe they will be able to do so without much additional help (Figs. 15)

Almost unanimously, the students feel that they have benefited significantly from their attendance at the workshop (see figure 16). This very high level of satisfaction does not differ much from previous workshops, which is always very comforting for us, organisers, teachers and supervisors. That this is not just a product of participants trying to please us is shown by the fact that they give critical opinions regarding some other aspects of the workshop, such as the financial support for travel, or the comments received regarding the two hours devoted to inclusion in IDEA, both discussed earlier in this report. The importance of this issue for Latin American students is reflected on the one hand in the high level of agreement with it, but also in the large number of written comments (with 25 being the most commented point of the evaluation). The fact that they are mostly negative about its implementation should not discourage us, but rather reinforce and motivate us to do better.

I would like to thank first of all Prof. Gonzalo Tancredi, the scientific leader and inspiration for this workshop, who together with Prof. Millarca Valenzuela, Prof. Patricio Rojo and the entire local organising committee made the event possible. For the work and dedication also to all the speakers. Thanks also on behalf of COSPAR to the institutions that have contributed substantially to it : Universidad Católica del Norte, Universidad de Chile, Universidad de la República del Uruguay, NASA, ESA, the local sponsors Centro de Astrofísica y Tecnológica Afines, Instituto Milenio de Astrofiísica, Sociedad Meteorológica and Sociedad Geológica de Chile, as well as the European Southern Observatory ESO and the company L3Harris, and the missions Juno, New Horizons, DART, Hayabusa I and II, Mars Express and Bepi Colombo.

I have learned enough to do this without much extra help.

32 responses

32 responses

I have benefitted significantly from attending the workshop.

33 responses

The Future - I will be able to use planetary science data in my future research.

Capacity Building Workshop in Spatial Oceanography: Summary Report

Rabat, Morocco, 12-16 September 2022

For several decades space observation techniques have enabled considerable progress in the analysis and monitoring of oceans. The measurement of hydrography (maritime topography) and its temporal evolution, wave measurements, surface temperature and biological indicators are all information that can now be obtained instantly. All the data collected by meteorological and oceanic observation satellites provide a better description and understanding of oceanic phenomena and contribute significantly to the management of marine risks and resources.

These large amounts of data from Earth observation as well as the simulation and modelling tools available at international and national levels open up an unprecedented avenue for applied research activities whose orientations remain dependent on good knowledge and understanding of the Earth’s environment by national researchers of these data, methods and models used as well as their application to the national context.

Thus, within the framework of the work and activities of the National Committee of Coordination in the fields of Hydrography, Oceanography and Marine Mapping (CNCHOC), the CRTS organized a training workshop for national researchers on the theme of space oceanography and its applications to marine and coastal areas. Two webinars were also organized on the sidelines of the workshop to broaden the audience and benefit more researchers from Moroccan and African universities.

Objectives

This workshop was organized in partnership with COSPAR. It enabled :

- a platform to be developed for exchange between national scientists involved in marine and coastal areas;

- knowledge to be shared on the associated use of space-based remote sensing and in situ data;

- understanding the tools for extracting marine and coastal parameters from satellite images;

- understanding the physical models used for ocean forecasting, integrating satellite images;

- the appropriation of computer tools for visualization, processing, modelling and simulation;

- new data processing methods to be used, such as AI and Deep Learning

Opening Ceremony

The opening ceremony was chaired by Mr. Driss El Hadani, Director of the CRTS in the presence of Mr. Jean Claude Worms, Executive Director of COSPAR and Mr. Gad LEVY, President of PORSEC. Mr. Driss El Hadani insisted in his speech on the importance of the theme of space oceanography at national and regional level and particularly its anchoring in the activities of the National Committee in the fields of Hydrography, Oceanography and Marine Cartography (CNCHOC). He also emphasized the major role of national capacity building of researchers in this field, and the role of international cooperation in technology transfer and training.

Mr. Jean Claude Worms presented the role and the international activities of capacity building within COSPAR while welcoming this second initiative in Morocco, following the one organized in 2005 at CRTS. He also expressed the idea of again supporting a training session in space oceanography in Morocco, extended to the African continent.

Dr. Gad Levy presented PORSEC, an international association in the field of oceanography and was pleased with this first training course in the African continent involving five PORSEC experts.

Presenters

The speakers were scientists and experts specialized in the exploitation of satellite images dedicated to marine and coastal areas, as well as in the design of oceanographic analysis and forecasting systems from seven national and international institutions :

Dr. Abderrahmane Atillah, Centre Royal de Télédétection Spatiale, Morocco.

Dr. Gad Levy, NorthWest Research Associates (NWRA), USA

Dr. Stefano Vignudelli, Consiglio Nazionale delle Ricerche, Italy

Dr. Cara Wilson, NOAA, National Marine Fisheries Service, USA

Dr. Nimit Kumar, Indian National Centre for Ocean Information Services, INCOIS, India

Dr. David Doxaran, Laboratoire d’océanographie de Villefranche, France

Dr. Andrew Geiss, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, USA.

This workshop was intended for CNCHOC members. The 16 participants were researchers involved in various fields related to the theme of the training, including :

- Physical and operational oceanography

- Automatic detection of ships from satellite radar images using artificial intelligence techniques,

- Bathymetry and classification of the seabed,

- Monitoring the evolution of the coastline,

- Offshore renewable energies,

- Morpho-sedimentary dynamics of coastlines,

Workshop Program

The training workshop was organized in the form of lectures and practical exercises in face-to-face and distance learning formats, structured in five modules :

1- Introduction to space oceanography:

Main space missions for ocean observation; main parameters, products and applications.

2- Operational Oceanography : Modeling - Assimilation - Forecasting

Data assimilation methods; Machine Learning methods; integration of methods into existing global and regional ocean physical analysis and forecasting systems; applications of forecasting methods.

3- Applications to marine resources

Fundamentals and applications of Ocean Colour; exploitation of several databases and services: ERDDAP (NOAA server), NASA Oceancolor portal, INCOIS LAS ...; use of different software : BRAT Toolbox and BEAM for the extraction and production of marine parameters.

4- Applications for marine and coastal hazards

Principle of Radar altimetry; exploitation of several databases and services : SARVATORE GPOD and EarthConsole® Altimetry Virtual Lab from ESA; data processing using Matlab.

5- Applications for coastal ecosystems

Turbidity of coastal waters from satellite observations; methods for estimating biochemical products : turbidity, concentration of suspended solids, organic matter, etc.; use of ACOLITE, SeaDAs, SNAP tools for extraction and production of coastal parameters.

Webinars

A series of two webinars for national and African researchers on the topic of the contribution of space technologies in marine and coastal areas were organized on the sidelines of the workshop according to the program below :

-Applications for marine and coastal risks, with Dr Stefano Vignudelli from National Research Council, Italy.

-Applications for Coastal ecosystems, with Dr. David Doxaran from Laboratoire d’Océanographie de Villefranche, France

162 people registered for these webinars, mostly from Moroccan universities, as well as research institutions

in some African countries, including the Democratic Republic of Congo, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Gambia, Togo, and Tunisia. All participants received the presentation materials.

Opportunities for collaboration

1- proposal to organize the biannual PORSEC conference for 2024 in Morocco. During the same period, a training activity for researchers in the field of space oceanography. Contact : Dr Gad Levy.

2- COSPAR : proposal to organize jointly with COSPAR a Regional Training Workshop in space oceanography for African researchers. Contact : Jean-Claude Worms.

3- Possibilities of collaboration with the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), one of the national laboratories of the US Department of Energy, Richland, Washington, on : clouds and aerosols, atmospheric convection, climate modelling, and the Atmospheric Radiation Measure-ments (ARM) program. Contact : Dr. Andrew Geiss.

4. Opportunities for collaboration in NOAA/NESDIS (National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service) projects, particularly on capacity building aspects. Contact : Dr. Cara Wilson.

5- Possibility of collaboration in the framework of the FULLBRIGHT and POGO/SCOR (Partnership for Observation of the Global Ocean and Scientific Committee on Oceanic Research (SCOR)) for scholarships and provision of experts. Contacts : Dr. Gad Levy and Dr. Cara Wilson.

6- Potential collaboration with INCOIS for technology transfer and training in oceanography.

Evaluation

- The training was very well perceived by the participants, who were able to understand the fundamentals of space oceanography and its applications, to practise on open source tools and access to databases and services on an international scale. Other topics of specific interest for future training were mentioned :

- Processing, extraction and analysis of Earth observation data

- Machine Learning

- Radar data processing and marine and coastal applications

- Bathymetry

The participants of this Capacity Building Workshop Hard at work extracting data

XIII Latin American Conference on Space Geophysics (COLAGE): Short summary

São José dos Campos, Brazil, 27 November - 3 December 2022

[Dr. Clezio Marco De Nardin, President of the XIII COLAGE]

This traditional conference, which has the objective of congregating students and researchers from Latin America, had 211 participants from 16 countries, including attendees from the USA, Europe, Africa and Asia. The meeting focused on debating five big scientific themes: (1) Space Weather; (2) Ionosphere and upper atmosphere; (3) Solar physics, heliosphere and cosmic rays; (4) Solar wind, magnetosphere and geomagnetism and (5) Space plasma physics and nonlinear processes in space geophysics.

A total of h188 papers were presented during the meeting, including 74 orals and 112 posters. Two plenary talks were presented, the first one “Electrojet Zeeman Imaging Explorer (EZIE) Mission : Science, Data Products, And Opportunities” was presented by Dr. Rafael Mesquita from Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory, USA, and the second one “Catalyzing Academic and Private Partnerships in the Use of Big Data for Space Exploration and Human Benefit” was given by Madhulika Guhathakurta from NASA, USA. A panel about the “Latinxs in Space Geophysics: Discussing Gender Bias in ALAGE/COLAGE” was presented and discussed as well. The main results presented during the meeting are going to be published in a Special Issue of the Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics, which is also open to receive contributions from anywhere in the world.

During the meeting, traditional awards from the

Latin American Association of Space Geophysics (ALAGE) were delivered. The awarded researchers were : Dr. Sergio Dasso from UBA (Mario Acuña Award for his contribution as distinguished researcher in Argentina); Dr. Elizaveta Antonova from Lomonosov Moscow State University (Ruth Gall Award for her contribution collaborating with research groups in Chile) and Juan S. Hincapie Tarquino from UNAl; Carlos Castillo Rivera from UDEC; Diego Prado Barroso from INPE; Hadassa Raquel Peixoto Jácome from INPE; Ana Luiza Piragibe Freira from UnB (Roberto Manzano Award for the best paper presented by students in each scientific session of the COLAGE).

Using resources from the sponsors including COSPAR, it was possible to support 35 participants, including students and young scientists. Depending on the solicitations, registration fees, airfares and/ or accommodation were fully or partially paid. The meeting ended after the General Assembly of ALAGE, which elected the new directory board, the national representative from the Latin American countries and chose Monterrey, Mexico, as the host for the XIV COLAGE from 8 to 13 April 2024. Finally, the LOC of XIII COLAGE expressed their gratitude to the sponsors, who helped to make this meeting a success. We hope to see you in Mexico in 2024 during the XIV COLAGE, when we will have the opportunity to discuss science and see, in person, a total solar eclipse.

Double Anniversary of Astronomy in Bern

25-26 November 2022

The Astronomical Institute of the University of Bern (AIUB), Switzerland, celebrated a double anniversary on 25-26 November 2022: 200 years for the «Alte Sternwarte Bern (Uraniae)» (old observatory) and 100 years for the AIUB.

Today, the AIUB has a leading role at international level in fundamental astronomy, in satellite geodesy and in space debris detection and monitoring. This international profile is based on a long tradition of work in celestial mechanics, astrometry and geodesy in Bern. In 1822 the observatory Uraniae was built at the same place as the building of exact sciences hosting the Astronomical Institute today. The position of the observatory’s meridian circle defined the origin of the Swiss Federal Surveying (Dufour map).

In 1922 the Muesmatt Observatory was built and inaugurated on 25 November 1922 as the Astronomical Institute of the University of Bern. The Uraniae became famous due to Rudolf Wolf’s discovery of the 11-year sunspot cycle and due to Georg Sidler’s establishment of the tradition of celestial mechan-

ics, in particular of orbit determination, in Bern. The director of the Muesmatt Observatory and founder of the AIUB, Sigmund Mauderli, established international relations with many famous astronomers thanks to his membership of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) and as member of the Governing Board of the Astronomische Gesellschaft (AG). His successor, Max Schürer, built the Zimmerwald Observatory, which was used by Paul Wild mainly for the supernova search program originally inspired by Fritz Zwicky at Caltech and for optical observations of artificial Earth satellites. Later on, the Zimmerwald observatory became one of the first satellite laser ranging (SLR) stations. In recent years, the observatory was enlarged by several domes to become the largest observatory worldwide dedicated to the optical observation of space debris.

The centennial jubilee of the institute and the bicentennial jubilee of the old observatory motivated the two-day celebration end of November 2022 in Bern with a ceremonial act, a scientific symposium and activities and presentations for a broad audience. In addition, a “Festschrift” on the history of astronomy and geodesy in Bern has been published.

‘‘the Zimmerwald observatory became one of the first satellite laser ranging (SLR) stations.’’

[Heike Peter, Chair of COSPAR Panel on Satellite Dynamics, Adrian Jäggi, Andreas Verdun and Gerhard Beutler, Astronomical Institute of the University of Bern (AIUB), Switzerland]

(On the left) The Swiss Optical Ground Station and Geodynamics Observatory Zimmerwald in 2018. (On the right) Daguerrotype of the Uraniae taken in 1845. This is one of the oldest photographs of an astronomical observatory ever taken.

‘‘The position of the observatory’s meridian circle defined the origin of the Swiss Federal Surveying (Dufour map).’’

The scientific symposium, which was attended by about 200 guests and participants, included presentations by Claude Nicollier, former Swiss astronaut and professor at EPFL (École Polytechnique Federal Lausanne), Tim Flohrer, head of the Space Debris Office at ESA, and Markus Rothacher, president of the Swiss Geodetic Commission and professor at ETHZ (Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich).

The presentations and video recordings are available at: https://www.aiub.unibe.ch/about_us/news__ events/double_anniversary/index_eng.html

Highly precise orbit determination and space debris detection

The AIUB has an international reputation in satellite geodesy. The well-known Bernese GNSS Software is a pillar of its work enabling applications to high–precision orbit determination of artificial Earth orbiting objects. The software is today used by almost 800 institutions worldwide for research and, by federal or national agencies, for the establishment of first-order networks. The applications are manifold, comprising, e.g., the estimation of time-variable gravity fields based on GRACE/GRACE-FO data, which is highly relevant for climatological research. For decades AIUB has been heavily involved in many international collaborations and projects, most of them under the umbrella of the International Association of Geodesy (IAG). The institute also has a leading role in the field of the optical observation of space

debris. The Swiss Optical Ground Station and Geodynamics Observatory in Zimmerwald (near Bern) is the world’s largest observatory in terms of the number of telescopes for the optical detection of space debris. Characterisation and cataloguing of space debris are important activities at AIUB, as well. The Zimmerwald observatory is also one of the most productive sites worldwide for satellite laser ranging thanks to its highly automated mode of operation.

AIUB and COSPAR

The Astronomical Institute has a long history of collaborating with COSPAR. Prof. em. Gerhard Beutler was deeply involved in the Commission for coordination of Space Techniques for geodesy and Geodynamics (CSTG), a joint commission of the IAG, the IAU, and COSPAR (now sub-commission B2 of COSPAR). He also served as chair of CSTG’s Technical Panel on Satellite Dynamics (PSD). Dr. Heike Peter has served as vice-chair of the Panel, as well, and Prof. Adrian Jäggi is currently its vice-chair. Prof. Thomas Schildknecht has been serving as vice-chair and subsequently as chair of the Panel on Potentially Environmentally Detrimental Activities in Space (PEDAS).

‘‘The institute also has a leading role in the field of the optical observation of space debris.’’

Handover of the “Festschrift” by the Director of the AIUB Adrian Jäggi, left, to the former Swiss astronaut Claude Nicollier, right, after his talk on Sustainability in near-Earth Space.

COSPAR Alumni Corner

In this occasional column, we bring you news from our Alumni, early career scientists who have taken part in a COSPAR Capacity Building Workshop or even in the COSPAR Fellowship Program.

COSPAR Fellowship Programme: Personal Experience

Getting the COSPAR fellowship is one of the best things to happen during my PhD. The idea of the project seeded during the COSPAR Capacity Building Workshop 2019, organized in IISER Mohali, India. Later on, I started working on the AstroSat observation of accretion-powered millisecond pulsar SAX J1748.9-2021 with Dr. Aru Beri and Dr. Andrea Sanna. With the announcement to PCB travel Fellowship, I applied for a fellowship to visit Dr. Andrea Sanna to learn more about the timing analysis techniques. In November 2019, I received the result and got the grant partially funded by COSPAR and ISRO.

With coordination with Dr. Sanna, I planned to visit the University of Cagliari, Italy in February 2020. Dr. Sanna also arranged for local accommodation at the University Guest House. The visit was of three weeks duration and a very fruitful one. I learned about timing analysis, met other distinguished researchers of the University of Cagliari and made future collaborations. We published our results from SAX J1748.9-2021 in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society (MNRAS) (Sharma et al. 2020).

Next, we extended our project to other accretionpowered pulsars and results from the same were submitted to MNRAS for publication (Sharma et al. 2022). The paper is currently in the review process and we hope to get it published in the coming months.

This research visit has helped me a lot and in my thesis work which was submitted to University of Delhi, India. It opened new doors for further collaborations and gave me further courage to extend the project ideas. Fortunately (or unfortunately), my research visit was just completed before the Covid outbreak. After returning to India everything was on hold and the whole country was under lockdown. My thesis work got delayed due to it but I was able to complete it by September 2020. That was a difficult time but we came through it.

Apart from the research work, I roamed around and explored the city of Cagliari, on the beautiful island of Sardinia. I explored their culture, festivals and delicious Italian food. I also visited Rome at the end of my visit before heading back to India. Overall it was a wonderful experience from my first international trip.

Last but not least, I would like to acknowledge and thank the Committee on Space Research (COSPAR) and Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) for all the support they provided. I would like to thank Dr. Andrea Sanna and the University of Cagliari for their hospitality during the research visit. I would like to thank Prof. Mariano Mendez for his help and support during the application process. I would also like to thank Dr. Aru Beri and Prof. Anjan Dutta for their help and support.

Dr. Rahul Sharma, Post-Doctoral Fellow, Raman Research Institute, India

In this issue we are delighted to hear from Dr Rahul Sharma and his experience with COSPAR.

COSPAR Extended Abstracts

COSPAR publishes scientific papers in both Advances in Space Research (ASR) and Life Sciences in Space Research (LSSR). In this regular section we invite the author or authors of one or more recent papers that have been particularly significant in terms of scientific impact to write extended abstracts that summarise these papers.

Here we have invited Ralph Lorenz to summarise his paper on “Planetary landings with hazard avoidance: A review”, which appeared in Advances in Space Research, 2023, 71, 1 (doi: 10.1016/j.asr.2022.11.024), followed by Xu Cao who sums up their paper on “Drug Discovery for Space Radiation Using iPSCs and Clinical Trials in Dish”, published in Life Sciences in Space Research, 2022, 35, 140-149 (doi: 10.1016/j.lssr.2022.05.006). Richard Harrison, General Editor SRT

Planetary Landings with Hazard Avoidance: A Review

[Ralph Lorenz, Space Exploration Sector, Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, MD, USA]

Sometimes the future sends us to the past. The NASA Dragonfly New Frontiers mission to Titan, featuring a radioisotope-powered octocopter to fly autonomously on Saturn’s moon Titan in the mid-2030s to explore its diverse, organic-rich surface, is widely considered to be exciting, innovative, and perhaps even futuristic, although arguably it largely is ‘merely’ an application of existing technologies (Turtle and Lorenz, 2021; Lorenz, 2022).

Whereas the long series of mostly successful, and mostly unguided, Mars landers in the past three decades have been able to simply adopt previous de-

signs and specifications, or at least overall assumptions, the fact that Dragonfly confronts landing on a new planetary body, probably dozens of times, has forced some consideration whether these assumptions should apply.

In particular, there is a convention that risks due to interaction of spacecraft with terrain (e.g. hitting rocks – see figure 1) should be only of the order of a few per cent, to be commensurate with other risks such as launch failure (see, for example, Lorenz, 2019). Since an unguided vehicle samples the terrain randomly, it follows that the fraction of the

Figure 1. The Apollo 12 Lunar Module demonstrated precision navigation at the moon and is seen at left at a safe site just beyond the rim of a crater in which the unguided Surveyor 3 lander had arrived less than three years before. Note that a relatively large number of rocks are nearby on the inner wall of the crater. (Image credit: Zoomed section of NASA image AS12-48-7091)

delivery ellipse occupied by mission-ending hazardous areas should only one or two per cent: this can be highly restrictive especially where the delivery ellipse is large. But this simple metric is not appropriate on some target worlds (including Titan) data do not exist to measure hazards at the lander scale, nor where hazards can be detected in-situ and avoided at scales much smaller than the delivery errors.

As part of a series of Dragonfly-related papers documenting aspects of environment interaction, specification and development testing, I wanted to summarize the experience with such ‘smart’ landings, starting of course with the Apollo missions where the sense and avoid function was performed by the vision of a human pilot. Famously, Apollo 11 commander Neil Armstrong observed that the Lunar Module “Eagle” was approaching a field of rocks adjacent to a crater, and shifted the landing aimpoint to touch down further downrange. The area coverage of hazards, as mapped prior to the mission, in the Tranquillitatis landing site was about 10%, much higher than the goal for unguided missions. And once Apollo 12 demonstrated precise landing capability, later missions accepted even 3040% terrain risks.

It was for me, having an interest in space exploration history, fascinating to delve into the details of the Apollo site certification process, and then to contrast this with the landings in the last decade on the Moon, Mars and small bodies that have been effected with automatic systems performing the hazard avoidance functions. A variety of approaches exist, e.g. in the case of the Mars 2020 rover Perseverance, the system did not sense hazards directly, but rather performed terrain-relative navigation to guide itself to safe spots in a pre-determined hazard map developed on Earth from previous orbital data.

It was striking too, in researching the paper, to note the similarities and differences between NASA missions and those of other agencies – the automatic lunar landing of the Chinese Chang’E-3 mission, for example.

The choice of landing site is usually the result of dynamic tension between science value and engineering safety, since the most hazard-free sites are usually the least interesting (Lorenz, 2019), and the capability of automatic systems to negotiate hazards greatly widens the range of possible sites. While the moment of landing is an engineering triumph, and an occasion of high drama for the public, it is usually just the beginning of the scientific journey beyond.

Other Resources

https://www.nasa.gov/image-feature/goddard/2019/lro-camera-simulates-view-from-lunarmodule

Scott Manley analysis of the Chang’e-4 landing

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unEbg_dt3DM Chang’e-5 Landing set to music

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VS9zr6MrCiM

References

Lorenz, R. 2019 Calculating Risk and Payoff in Planetary Exploration and Life Detection Missions, Advances in Space Research, 64, 944-956, https://doi. org/10.1016/j.asr.2019.05.026

Lorenz, R. D. 2022. Planetary Exploration with Ingenuity and Dragonfly: Rotary-Wing Flight on Mars and Titan, American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, ISBN 978-1-62410-636-1, 194pp, June 2022

Turtle, E. P. and R. D. Lorenz, 2021. The Dragonfly Mission to Titan: Technological Development and Science Converge to Enable New Exploration, The Bridge, Vol. 51 No.3, pp.59-66

About the Author

Ralph Lorenz is a planetary scientist at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab, Laurel, MD, USA, specializing in the interaction of vehicles and instruments with planetary surfaces and atmospheres. He is associated with NASA’s InSight and Perseverance missions at Mars, the Japanese Venus climate orbiter Akatsuki and the DAVINCI Venus probe Discovery mission presently in development. He worked for ESA on the design of the Huygens probe to Titan, planned Cassini’s radar observations, and is the Mission Architect for the Dragonfly New Frontiers mission. He has over 300 refereed journal publications and has authored ten books, including “Space Systems Failures” and “Titan Unveiled”. He received the 2022 Fred Whipple Award from the American Geophysical Union.

Drug Discovery for Space Radiation Using iPSCs and Clinical Trials

in Dish

[Xu Cao (Stanford Cardiovascular Inst., Stanford University School of Medicine, CA, USA and Dept. of Medicine, Division of Cardiology, Stanford University School of Medicine, CA, USA) , Michael M. Weil (Dept. of Environmental and Radiological Health Sciences, Colorado State University, CO, USA), Joseph C. Wu (Stanford Cardiovascular Inst., Stanford University School of Medicine, CA, USA / Dept. of Medicine, Division of Cardiology, Stanford University School of Medicine, CA, USA / Dept. of Radiology, Stanford University School of Medicine, CA, USA)]

Introduction

Space radiation exposure presents a significant challenge for astronauts during long-duration missions. The risks include increased cancer risk, cardiovascular dysfunction, central nervous system impairment, and other health problems, which are primarily due to high-energy, high charge (HZE) ions that can easily penetrate spacecraft shielding (Chancellor et al., 2014). Understanding the health effects of HZE ions is an important goal of space radiobiology as they create dense ionization tracks in living tissue known as high-linear energy transfer (LET). Health risks of space radiation remain poorly understood, with most insight based on studies of the effects of ground-based space radiation analogs and limited flight research. Drugs that can protect astronauts from both rare high-dose solar particle event (SPE) radiation and constant lowdose galactic cosmic rays (GCRs) are urgently needed. To understand the effects of space radiation on human health, it is important to study individual susceptibility and radio-sensitivity of different tissue types, which can be challenging to achieve through existing animal models. The advent of human induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs) and their use in preclinical drug development, known as «clinical trials in dish» (CTD), offers a new opportunity to study radiation biology and develop radioprotective countermeasures for extended space travel (Figure 1)

Human iPSCs as ideal cell source for CTD

The cost of developing a new FDA-approved drug is high, with 80% of the cost being spent on clinical trials and FDA approvals (DiMasi et al., 2016). CTD provides a tool to test candidate drugs on patient-specific cells before moving to clinical trials and can be valuable for assessing individual susceptibility to radiation exposure and designing personalized medicine. CTD requires high-quality patient-specific cell types, which has become more feasible with iPSCs. Human iPSCs have the ability to provide an unlimited source of autologous cells for cellular therapies, generate human genetic disease models using genome edi-

ting techniques, provide patient-specific cells for drug screening, and predict individual disease risks and drug responses, making them a valuable tool for drug development (Sayed et al., 2016). More than 80% of drugs fail in clinical trials due to toxicity or lack of efficacy, highlighting the need for more efficient systems to better predict patients’ drug responses. Immortalized cell lines and animal models have limited success due to poor relevance to human physiology and pathophysiology. Progress in developing well-validated and standardized protocols for generating various cell types from iPSCs is expected to lead to the increased use of iPSCs derived cells and engineered tissues in preclinical drug development. Patient-specific iPSCs, which carry the same genetic information as donors, can be used to evaluate personalized countermeasures and reduce the cost and improve the efficiency of clinical trials by categorizing patients as drug responders and non-responders (Inoue et al., 2014). Additionally, the use of expression quantitative trait locus (eQTL) analysis can identify drug response-related genes and single nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) as biomarkers to predict individual risks and responses (Rong et al., 2021).

Space radiation effects: lessons learned from conventional cell models

In vitro and ex vivo studies in human cells and tissues are necessary for extrapolating risks of radiation injuries from animal models to humans and understanding inter-individual heterogeneity in radiation responses. Despite lacking genetic diversity and physiologically relevant environment, primary cell types like blood, endothelial cells, and fibroblasts provide a cost-effective platform for understanding human responses to radiation and screening candidate countermeasures, although low-LET radiation (e.g., x-rays and gamma rays) used in most studies compromise their translational value to space radiation.

Delineating radiation effects and developing countermeasures with CTD

Primary and immortalized cell lines are suitable for in vitro and ex vivo radiation assays at the initial stage of drug development but lack the genetic diversity of patient populations and the physiological complexity of tissues. Cells and engineered tissues derived from iPSCs are promising platforms for preclinical drug development that can reduce time and cost. The ability of iPSCs to differentiate into desired lineages allows the study of radiation effects on various cell types from diverse patients, which could be used for developing individualized radiation countermeasures. However, most studies using iPSC models have primarily concentrated on simulating human exposure to radiation rather than conducting drug screening or discovery. More work is needed to translate iPSC radiation models into high-throughput drug screening assays and to study genetic contributions to radiation-induced damage.

Moving toward 3D tissue engineering

The translation of preclinical studies using CTD into clinical applications depends on the development of iPSC-derived models with radiation-related phenotypes that can replicate cell-cell interactions and 3D environments in human tissues/organs, which can be achieved with recent advances in co-culture systems, 3D tissue engineering, organoids, and microphysiological systems (MPS) (Cho et al., 2021; Kim et al., 2022; Thomas et al., 2021). Although there are a limited number of radiation studies published using engineered human tissues derived from iPSCs, more studies have been published using 3D tissue models made from human primary or immortalized cells. Recent advancements of radiation studies using tissue engineering and their potential applications in space radiation countermeasure discovery are summarized in this section (Figure 2).

Conclusions

CTD provides a unique opportunity to discover space radiation countermeasures based on human systems, since iPSCs can be obtained from different individuals with diverse genetic backgrounds to predict individual drug responses within a large population. CTD allows for the study of radiation responses of human cells in 2D and 3D models, with 2D models being ideal for cost-effective assays at the initial stage of drug discovery and 3D models better resembling the in vivo physiological environment in a lower throughput secondary screens. The application of CTD in radiation drug discovery is still in its early stages. However, a number of studies have been conducted to understand human-specific radiation injuries and test specific drug candidates using various human primary cell

types or iPSC-derivatives, providing evidence of the great value of human in vitro cell models for space radiation drug discovery (Figure 2). Last but not least, efforts are needed to simulate simultaneous exposure to microgravity and radiation using random positioning or clinostat within a radiation environment, potentially using 2D/3D cell models adapted for CTD. The ultimate goal is the development of countermeasures for the effects induced by simultaneous exposure to both factors.

Acknowledgment

This work was supported by National Institutes of Health (NIH) R01 HL123968, R01 HL146690, UH3 TR002588, and P01 HL141084 (JCW), and The Translational Research Institute for Space Health (TRISH) NNX16AO69A (MMW).

References

Chancellor, J., Scott, G., Sutton, J., 2014. Space Radiation: The Number One Risk to Astronaut Health beyond Low Earth Orbit. Life 4, 491–510. https://doi. org/10.3390/life4030491

Cho, S., Lee, C., Skylar-Scott, M.A., Heilshorn, S.C., Wu, J.C., 2021. Reconstructing the heart using iPSCs: Engineering strategies and applications. J Mol Cell Cardiol 157, 56–65. https://doi.org/10.1016/j. yjmcc.2021.04.006

DiMasi, J.A., Grabowski, H.G., Hansen, R.W., 2016. Innovation in the pharmaceutical industry: New estimates of R&D costs. J Health Econ 47, 20–33. https:// doi.org/10.1016/j.jhealeco.2016.01.012

Inoue, H., Nagata, N., Kurokawa, H., Yamanaka, S., 2014. iPS cells: a game changer for future medicine. Embo J 33, 409–17. https://doi.org/10.1002/embj.201387098 Kim, H., Kamm, R.D., Vunjak-Novakovic, G., Wu, J.C., 2022. Progress in multicellular human cardiac organoids for clinical applications. Cell Stem Cell 29, 503–514. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.stem.2022.03.012

Rong, Y., Dong, S.-S., Hu, W.-X., Guo, Y., Chen, Y.-X., Chen, J.-B., Zhu, D.-L., Chen, H., Yang, T.-L., 2021. DDRS: Detection of drug response SNPs specifically in patients receiving drug treatment. Comput Struct Biotechnology J 19, 3650–3657. https://doi.org/10.1016/j. csbj.2021.06.026

Sayed, N., Liu, C., Wu, J.C., 2016. Translation of Human-Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells: From Clinical Trial in a Dish to Precision Medicine. J Am Coll Cardiol 67, 2161–76. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jacc.2016.01.083

Thomas, D., Kim, H., Lopez, N., Wu, J.C., 2021. Fabrication of 3D Cardiac Microtissue Arrays using Human iPSC-Derived Cardiomyocytes, Cardiac Fibroblasts, and Endothelial Cells. J Vis Exp Jove. https://doi. org/10.3791/61879

Figure 1. Schematic overview of the application of Clinical Trials in Dish (CTD) in space radiation countermeasure discovery.

Created with BioRender.com

Figure 2. Radiation countermeasures that have been tested with human in vitro cell models and shown protective effects.

Created with BioRender.com

Life Sciences in Space Research Update &

Top Reviewers for 2022

[Tom Hei, Life Sciences in Space Research Editor-in-Chief]

Do you know the top five most cited papers published in Life Sciences in Space Research as of 2021 ?

Do you know the top five most downloaded manuscripts published in Life Sciences in Space Research from ScienceDirect ?

Life Sciences in Space Research Honours

Top Reviewers for 2022

One of the most important aspects in maintaining journal quality is a timely and rigorous peer review system. In this regard, we are proud that our turn-around time from submission to rendering a first decision was only 6.8 weeks in 2022. In this regard, we owe our expert reviewers a big Thank You.

We would like to specifically thank the following individuals who have been recognized by the Journal and Elsevier as LSSR Top Reviewers of 2022. To qualify as a Top Reviewer, each individual must review a minimum of 2 manuscripts with a turn-around time of ten days or less :

Dr. Lawrence Heilbronn, Professor, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN, USA.

Dr. Ning-ang Liu, Associate Professor, School of Radiation Medicine and Protection, Soochow University, Suzhou, China.

Dr. Masayuki Naitou, National Institutes for Quantum and Radiological Science and Technology, Chiba, Japan.

Dr. Livio Narici, Professor, University of Rome Tor Vergata, Rome, Italy.

Dr. Kerry O’Banion, Professor of Neuroscience, University of Rochester Medical Center, NY. USA.

Dr. Christopher Porada, Professor of Regenerative Medicine, Wake Forest University, Winston Salem, NC. USA.

Dr. Bernard Rabin, Professor of Psychology, University of Maryland- Baltimore County, USA.

Dr. Tony Slaba, NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton, VA, USA.

Dr. Jian Zhang, Professor, Guizhou University of Traditional Chinese Medicine, Guiyang, Guizhou, China.

Advances in Space Research (ASR)

Special Issue Calls for Papers

Papers are invited for special issues of ASR for the topics listed below.

Details on the topics included for each issue are available at the following COSPAR website: https://cosparhq.cnes.fr/publications/advances-in-space-research-asr/

• Synergistic Use of Remote Sensing Data and In-Situ Investigations to Reveal the Hidden Secrets of the Moon: deadline extended to 30 April 2023

• Information Theory and Machine Learning for Geospace Research: deadline 31 May 2023

• Global Navigation Satellite Systems: Recent Scientific Advances: deadline extended to 30 June 2023

• Advanced Methods for Geodesy, Metrology, Navigation and Fundamental Physics: deadline extended to 31 July 2023

A list of recently published Special Issues can be found at https://cosparhq.cnes.fr/news/advances-inspace-research-special-issues/

This list is updated regularly at https://www.sciencedirect.com/journal/advances-in-space-research/special-issues

Advances in Space Research

Top Reviewers for 2022

[Pascal Willis, Advances in Space Research Editor-in-Chief]

Advances in Space Research (ASR), as with any established scientific journal, insists on a rigorous peer-review process to maintain the integrity and quality of its published papers. An essential part of this process is the reviewer, spending his or her valuable time using unique expertise to evaluate the scientific quality of a manuscript and help the Editor make a fair and timely decision.

To further highlight the vital importance of reviewers to the quality ASR publications, the Editors have selected their 10 top reviewers for the year 2022, taking into account criteria such as the number and the quality of the referee reports performed during this year. By publishing the names and short biographies of these selected reviewers in this issue of Space Research Today, we would like to acknowledge their valuable efforts. Their names will also be acknowledged on the journal homepage of ASR (https://www. journals.elsevier.com/advances-in-space-research/reviewers/thank-you-reviewers-aisr).

We also feel deeply obliged to all ASR reviewers who have contributed this past year who are not mentioned here, and we sincerely thank all of them for bringing the journal up to its current scientific standard.

Pascal Willis, ASR Editor-in-Chief

Adriaan Klinkenberg, ASR Publisher (Elsevier)

Elisa Maria Alessi works as a researcher at the Institute for Applied Mathematics and Information Technologies of the National Research Council in Italy. She graduated in physics from the University of Padova in Italy and obtained the PhD in Applied Mathematics from the University of Barcelona in Spain, funded by a Marie Curie fellowship.

Her research focuses on the application of dynamical systems theory on orbital mechanics problems, with special emphasis on the role of natural perturbations on the design of disposal strategies for satellites orbiting the Earth, and on the exploitation of the third-body effect for the design of interplanetary trajectories.

Aigen Li is Curators’ Distinguished Professor at the University of Missouri.

He studied astrophysics in Beijing Normal University, Beijing Astronomical Observatory, and Leiden University of the Netherlands, where he received BS, MS and PhD degrees, respectively in 1992, 1994 and 1998. Prior to joining the faculty of the University of Missouri, USA as an assistant professor in 2004 and promotion to associate/full professor in 2008/2011, he was first a postdoctoral scholar at Princeton University (1999-2002), and then a Theoretical Astrophysics Prize Fellow at the University of Arizona (2002-2004), USA. He is an expert on cosmic dust, with interests spanning comets, interstellar medium, planet-forming disks, evolved stars, galaxies and active galactic nuclei.

Zishen Li has worked full time in the Aerospace Information Research institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences (AIR/CAS) as an assistant professor/associate professor and then full professor from 2020.

He was responsible for forming the BDS/GNSS precise positioning and Atmosphere remote sensing research group in 2013 and in 2021 establishing the department of Integrated application of Navigation and Remote Sensing of which he is the director. His research interests include the BDS/GNSS precise and trusted positioning, navigation for autonomous driving, and the monitoring of ionospheric space weather etc.

He has published more than 60 peer-reviewed papers with about 2800 citations and lodged 12 national patents, and is the recipient of numerous pres tigious research awards from organizations both internal and external, such as the Chinese National Science and Technology Progress Award, Beijing Natural Science Award of China, and Australia Endeavor Research Fellowship.

In addition, Zishen Li is also the chair of real-time ionosphere monitoring and modeling of IAG 4.3, and the member of ionosphere workgroup of Interna tional GNSS services.

Kavutarapu Venkatesh is a faculty in the Space and Atmospheric Sciences division of the Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad, India.

He did his MSc in 2008, and PhD in 2013 from the Andhra University, India. Later he worked as a Post-Doctoral Fellow at Universidade do Vale do Praiba (UNIVAP), Brazil during 2013 to 2018 and at the National Atmospheric Research Laboratory (NARL), India during 2018-2021. His major research interests include Low latitude ionosphere-thermosphere dynamics, topside ionospheric modelling and space weather effects. He has 48 research publications in peer reviewed international journals to his credit. He served as a guest editor for three special issues in Advances in Space Research. He is the Co-convener of the WG-II of the International Association of Geo-magnetism & Aeronomy (IAGA). He is a recipient of the URSI Young Scientist Award (2015), INSPIRE fellowship from the Department of Science and Technology, Govt. of India (2011-2013) and two gold medals from the Andhra University, India (2008).

Patricia Melin is a Professor of Computer Science in the Graduate Division, Tijuana Institute of Technology, Tijuana, Mexico, since 1998.

In addition, she is serving as Director of Graduate Studies in Computer Science and is head of the research group on Hybrid Neural Intelligent Systems (2000-present). She holds a DSc in computer science from the Polish Academy of Sciences. She has also been advisor of more than 100 graduate students in computer science at the PhD and masters levels. She has published nearly 1000 publications in indexed journals, book chapters, and conference proceedings, as well as nearly chapters, and conference proceedings, as well as nearly 50 books, and as consequence of this she has achieved more than 20800 citations with an h index of 80 in Google Scholar, and h index of 69 in Scopus. In addition, she has been awarded the Highly Cited Researcher recognition in the area of computer science in 2017 and 2018 by Clarivate Analytics-Web of Science because she is in the top 1% cited author in this area.

She has also been awarded with the IFSA 2021 Award on Outstanding Applications of Fuzzy Technology for the contribution of Development and Application of Fuzzy Models in Medical Diagnosis and the NAFIPS 2022 K. S. Fu Award for contributions to the Pattern Recognition, Fuzzy Control, Neuro-Fuzzy and Genetic-Fuzzy hybrid approaches.

Yuichi Otsuka received his PhD degree in engineering from Kyoto University, Japan in 1999.

He is currently working as an Associate Professor at the Institute for Space-Earth Environmental Research, Nagoya University in Japan. He is a member of the Society of Geomagnetism and Earth, Planetary and Space Sciences (SGEPSS) in Japan, and the American Geophysical Union (AGU).

His research interests include ionospheric dynamics using Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS), radar, and airglow observation techniques. His research is aimed at better understanding the Earth’s upper atmosphere with an emphasis on the ionosphere at equatorial region and mid latitudes.

Especially, he is interested in atmospheric waves propagating from below to the ionosphere and thermosphere. By analyzing the GNSS data, recently, he studies ionospheric disturbances and irregularities, such as traveling ionospheric disturbance and equatorial plasma bubbles.

Michael Pezzopane has been working since 2001 as a geophysicist at the Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia, Upper Atmosphere Physics and Radiopropagation Unit, Rome, Italy.

He got his Master Science in physics at “Sapienza” University of Rome, Italy, and his PhD in geophysics at the “Alma Mater Studiorum” University of Bologna, Italy.

His main research interests focus on: ionospheric physics, radio wave propagation in the ionosphere, atmospheric gravity waves, autoscaling of vertical ionospheric soundings, electron density irregularities at low and high latitudes, E sporadic layer, topside modelling and three dimensional electron density modelling of the ionosphere.

He is author and coauthor of more than 120 papers published in journals indexed in ISI-WEB of Science, of which for most of them he is the first or second author. He is coauthor of the algorithm Autoscala, able to automatically scale ionospheric characteristics from an ionogram.

He has recently developed a nowcasting version of the IRI model for the European region and conceived an improvement of the topside representation made by the NeQuick model.

In 2013 he received the first prize for the best communication in Geophysics presented at the XCIX National Congress of the Italian Physical Society, held in Trieste. He is coauthor of the patent number 1325371 titled “Digital Ionosonde”.

He was and he is involved in several national and international projects, sometimes with leading roles. He taught ionospheric physics at the department of physics of “Sapienza” University of Rome for several academic years. He is coordinator of the division “Aeronomic Phenomena” of IAGA-Italia, co-chair of IAGA WGII-E: “Ionospheric irregularities, Fields and Waves”, and member of the International Reference Ionosphere Working Group.

He keeps international collaborations with foreign universities as for instance the UNIVAP of São José dos Campos, Brazil, the Frederick University of Nicosia, Cyprus, and the National University of Tucuman, Argentina.

Alessandro A. Quarta received his Ph.D. degree in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Pisa in 2005 and, currently, he is Professor of flight mechanics at the Department of Civil and Industrial Engineering of the University of Pisa.

His main research areas include spaceflight simulation, spacecraft mission analysis and design, low-thrust trajectory optimization, solar sail and E-sail dynamics and control.

Konstantin G. Ratovsky received his PhD in radio physics from the Institute of Solar-Terrestrial Physics of Siberia Branch of Russian Academy of Sciences (ISTP SB RAS) in 1999.

He works at the ISTP SB RAS as a head of laboratory. His scientific interests include ionosonde and incoherent scatter radar and data analysis, local empirical models of the ionosphere, ionospheric effects of geomagnetic storms and stra tospheric warming event, and studies of travelling ionospheric disturbances. Dr. Ratovsky is a member of the Working Group on the International Reference Ionosphere (IRI).

Zheng Hong (George) Zhu is a Professor and Tier 1 York Research Chair in Space Technology (20172022) in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at York University in Toronto, Canada.

He was the inaugural Academic Director of Research Commons (2019-2022) in the Office of Vice-President of Research and Innovation. He is also an Honorary Treasurer of the Canadian Society of Mechanical Engineering. Before he joined York University in 2006, he was a research associate at the University of Toronto (1993-1995) and then a senior stress/structural engineer at Curtiss-Wright Indal Technologies (1995-2006).

His research includes the dynamics and control of tethered spacecraft, autonomous space robotics, visual servo, CubeSat technology, and additive manufacturing in space. He has published over 350 papers in peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings. He is an elected Corresponding Member of the International Academy of Astronautics, College Member of the Royal Society of Canada, Fellow of the Canadian Academy of Canada, Fellow of the Engineering Institute of Canada, Fellow of the Canadian Society of Mechanical Engineering, Fellow of American Society of Mechanical Engineers, and Associate fellow of American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics.

Dr. Zhu is the recipient of 2021 York University President’s Research Excellence Award, 2021 Robert W. Angus Medal from Canadian Society for Mechanical Engineering, and the 2019 Engineering Medal – R&D from Professional Engineers Ontario.

Book Review

My Life in Space Exploration, by Gerhard Haerendel, Springer Nature Switzerland, Cham, 2022

[Karl-Heinz Glassmeier, IGeP, TU Braunschweig,

Germany]

uture needs Origin” is the title of an essay of the German philosopher Odo Marquard. This motto applies especially to such a young field of science as space exploration. Thus, Gerhard Haerendel’s autobiography is a most welcome contribution when discussing the future of our field and community. And Haerendel is indeed a most reliable source of information on the origin and evolution of our field. He is a German national and international pioneer in space exploration, in particular auroral physics, magnetospheric substorms and artificial comets. He was Director of the Max-Planck-Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics in Garching and a former President of COSPAR.

This book is written in a three-fold way. First, Haerendel provides us with some most interesting information about his personal and professional life. This is done with noble reserve. After World War II Germany was to be rebuilt, in many aspects. This opened a strong force for many young scientists in the post war times. Space exploration was a most suitable pathway to rejoin the international science community. Details about this we

can learn from Haerendel’s memories.

Second, Haerendel tells us about his mentors and teachers. It is interesting to see the names of co-students and collaborators (the 2nd edition should contain a list of those persons and institutions mentioned), from school days to his later professional life. It shows the mutually supporting and fruitful activity in what Diana Crane calls the “invisible college”. Readers can learn a lot about collaboration and friendly competition, about the inner workings of our scientific community. And younger colleagues can read in Haerendel’s book how they shape a lifelong professional career.

It is also most interesting to prepare a list of names of eminent contributors to the field not being mentioned. This elucidates school building in space exploration and science. Reading Haerendel’s stories about the large number of space projects he was involved in, is also kind of a launch pad for one’s known memories. Being a

‘‘Personal memories as presented by Gerhard Haerendel may trigger discussions’’

‘‘Looking back in another 60 years, space exploration will probably be viewed as a former disruptive technology’’

member of the space science community for more than 40 years, additions and different perspectives came to my mind immediately. And I am sure this will also happen to any other reader. Personal memories as presented by Gerhard Haerendel may trigger discussions, one way or the other. But if somebody takes a different view on aspects Haerendel tells us about, there is AGU’s collection “Perspectives of Earth and Space Scientists”. Or you can prepare your own book. Biographical research is a most rewarding attempt to look into a scientist’s lifeworld and to understand how we do science.

The third path Haerendel walks is science itself, of course. He discusses and details his most important and influential scientific contributions. For a non-physicist, these parts of the book might be inaccessible. But this is why I call the style of writing a three-fold way. You can skip these parts. It does not harm your interest in the other aspects of Haerendel’s story. But if you are more of an expert, you will enjoy these parts.

Haerendel also describes in some detail why and how he escaped the management danger, the danger of being lost in fulfilling merely management duties. But throughout the whole book you realize what he has been: a political explorer and scientist, impacting his community by a large number of project initiatives, some of them successful, others less. Space exploration is a risky field. Looking back in another 60 years, space exploration will probably be viewed as a former disruptive technology, to use a currently fashionable expression. But Gerhard Haerendel teaches us that there are no quantum leaps in our field, just mainly hard work on all social, scientific and technological fields. Continuous development is what space exploration characterizes, with many successes and inevitable failures.

Here is somebody who can tell us about the origin of the science in our field, somebody who knows about personal requirements. For the younger colleagues: keep on running. Haerendel’s past is your future. Read it yourself !

What Caught the Editor’s Eye

[Richard Harrison, Space Research Today General Editor]

One research paper that really caught my eye in the last six months was that of Wynne et al. on “Planetary caves: A Solar System view of processes and products” (Journal of Geophysical Research Planets, 127, doi: 10.1029/2022JE0007303). In many ways it feeds a basic human desire to explore, and, as a non-planetary scientist, I read with interest, bordering on excitement, that the authors were providing the first Solar System-wide compendium of speliogenic processes and products. The statement that 3,545 ‘subsurface access points’ (SAPs), i.e. caves to most of us, have been identified on 11 planetary bodies was a striking result, and that does not include the Earth. In addition, they discuss the potential for such features on four other bodies. They report on an impressive 1,062 SAPs for Mars, 2,147 for Titan, 221 for the Moon, with others on Ceres, Enceladus, Europa, Triton, Pluto and Charon. They show maps of the Moon and Mars, with the Moon showing a fairly even spread of SAPs and Mars showing a major cluster of SAPs in the western hemisphere. As the authors note, with future missions, we will certainly find many more SAPs, and we can look forward to the robotic, even human exploration of caves, particularly on the Moon and Mars.

Nature Astronomy (2022, doi: 10.1038/s41550-022-01841-6) published a paper by Noguchi et al. entitled ‘A dehydrated space-weathered skin cloaking the hydrated interior of Ryugu’. As with the previous paragraph, I have to say that as a solar physicist, these topics are way out of my area of expertise, but, as a lifelong back-garden astronomer, they fascinate me. Ryugu is a near-Earth asteroid (number 162173). It is a C-type asteroid, which means that it is composed of materials largely unchanged since the formation of the Solar System. As Noguchi et al. report, the JAXA Hayabusa2 spacecraft brought back samples for Ryugu for analysis in the laboratory. As they point out, with no protective atmosphere, exposed surfaces in space gradually undergo an alteration in composition, structure and optical properties through space weathering. Here was a chance to investigate this. They report on processes that the surface grains from Ryugu experienced, in particular, surface dehydration, but stress that this is not a bulk loss of water from the asteroid.

‘‘with no protective atmosphere, exposed surfaces in space gradually undergo an alteration in composition, structure and optical properties through space weathering’’

On a completely different topic, as someone from the UK, of course I was interested in the planned first launch of a spacecraft from British soil, in January of this year. The launch was due to take place from the new horizontal launch facility at the airport near Newquay in Cornwall, on the southwest coast of England. The payload of a number of cubesats was to be carried aboard a rocket carried under a Virgin Orbit Boeing 747; the rocket, called LauncherOne, was to be dropped by the carrier 747, subsequently igniting and travelling to orbit. The carrier aircraft flight and the first stage flight of LaucherOne were perfect, but problems late in the rocket flight meant that the spacecraft failed to reach orbit. So, whilst it was in fact the first launch into space from European soil, orbit was not achieved. The Virgin Orbit press release can be seen here.

Letter to the Editor

[John Rummel, Friday Harbor Partners LLC, USA]

Since I received the August issue of Space Research Today (SRT), I have come to the conclusion that I need to send you, for publication, some comments and clarifications in response to the editorial “Message” published by Len Fisk at the end of his mandate (SRT 214, August 2022).

While it is natural and usually beneficial for the outgoing COSPAR President to write his or her remembrances of their time in office, it is not normal nor helpful for the President to include remembrances with personal interpretations of professional events, involving many scientists, in a manner that results in the introduction of inaccuracies. Yet that is what ex-President Fisk has done, in the arena of planetary protection, in your August issue. I am concerned that SRT readers who are not versed in the history of COSPAR’s planetary protection activities, or their current status, will be confused by a comparison of what the ex-President wrote versus what the facts actually are.

After the first nine paragraphs of his Message which focus on other issues, Len turns to the subject of planetary protection. There he spins a personal interpretation of events that are documented otherwise, and that have been witnessed by a large group of individuals — hence his views can be easily challenged. His view needs to be countered in order to provide to your publication the respect it deserves and the objectivity that science requires. As a result I am requesting that you publish the following corrections in SRT.

Below find the quotations from Len’s Message in italics, and my corrections in normal type.

Paragraph 10 reads:

“In the beginning, the United States dominated planetary exploration, and the PPP (Panel on Planetary Protection), which was chaired by the Planetary Protection Officer (PPO) of NASA, very responsibly set reasonable requirements for planetary protection.”

This sounds nice, but the history is entirely different

(and to some, the quote may suggest that the PPP then went on to set unreasonable requirements). More to the point, the quote suggests a direct relationship between the size of NASA’s planetary exploration program and the NASA PPO being the Chair of the PPP. It is important to note that that was not the case. Independently of which organization may have “dominated” exploration efforts, Planetary Protection rules must be the same for all. COSPAR, as an independent body is not dominated by NASA or the USA, and had no PPP until March 1999, when the COSPAR Bureau approved the resolution to form one. That resolution was forwarded by SC F at the 1998 Nagoya Assembly. I supported it whole heartedly, together with other scientists, because it was clear that some space agencies were not fully aware of the scattered resolutions that then comprised the COSPAR planetary protection policy. When the PPP resolution was approved by the Bureau, I was named Panel Chair with François Raulin from France (nobody’s PPO, and the Chair of SC F) as Vice Chair. We were appointed because of our track record in the field and because we were initial supporters of the resolution to form the Panel.

‘‘I am concerned that SRT readers who are not versed in the history of COSPAR’s planetary protection activities, or their current status, will be confused’’

Our first step in the business of the Panel was not to “very responsibly set reasonable requirements,” for that was unnecessary. A set of reasonable requirements, previously approved by the Bureau and Council, already existed. Rather, the PPP’s task was to locate and incorporate into a single COSPAR Planetary Protection Policy the existing COSPAR resolutions and policies that were already found (but hard to find) in the COSPAR files.

Also in paragraph 10:

“As ESA emerged as a significant participant in planetary exploration, its PPO joined the NASA PPO in dominating the PPP by rotating between the chair or vice-chair positions, and since Panels in COSPAR

generally have a loose structure, with no formal membership, the chairs and vice chairs determined the COSPAR Planetary Protection (PP) Policy.” First of all, recall that ESA was already engaged in planetary exploration well before 1999 (Giotto, Cassini/Huygens, and the ongoing preparation of Rosetta, MEX, and VEX). However, the position of PPO at ESA was created much later. Yes, in the timeframe of the PPP formation I was NASA PPO (for the second time, from late 1997 to late 2006, only), although at the invitation of successive COSPAR Presidents I stayed as Chair of the Panel until 2014. During that term I was fortunate to have François Raulin as Vice Chair from 1999 to 2008, when Gerhard Kminek, who had eventually been appointed by ESA as PPO, became Vice Chair. Gerhard took on the Chair’s role in 2014, but there was no “rotating” involved. It was a simple job-succession, and I was no longer working for NASA when it took place.

Len’s statement that “the chairs and vice chairs determined the COSPAR Planetary Protection PP Policy” is not only false, but should be seen as very offensive to the members of the PPP who were, and are, senior, independent, and qualified experts in the field.

During the period 1999 to 2014, the Panel produced eight different workshop or colloquium reports, and involved over 110 participants (scientists, engineers, etc.) in Panel business meetings and other Panel activities. This was a large community that one or two individuals could not manipulate, as suggested by Len.

That is a key point. I am surprised that a two-term President, as Len was, should not be aware of how COSPAR usually functions. The PPP’s initial work was constrained by the the existing (but hard to find) work of COSPAR, dating from 1964—and without approval by the Bureau and Council, NO changes were made to the COSPAR Policy during the period from 1999 until 2014. Thus, the extant COSPAR Policy was first assembled by the PPP for the Warsaw Assembly (2000), and after an April 2002 joint

workshop with the IAU, and a further joint Assembly session with the International Institute for Space Law, the first complete COSPAR Policy since 1969 was approved by the COSPAR Bureau and Council at the World Space Congress (Houston) in 2002. (See COSPAR PP Policy 2002; COSPAR Information Bulletin 156, 67-74, 2003).

Thereafter, all new changes to the PP Policy until 2014 (when I stepped down as Chair) were approved by the Panel, within open business meetings at each biannual Assembly, and then by the COSPAR Bureau and Council. Panel participants were not somehow there to be swayed by rogue PPOs for their own purposes! We had good representation of all points of view in the Panel meetings and in papers delivered in the various PPP Assembly sessions, as documented in the Assembly events, papers, and other reports produced by the Panel. In order to ensure that the COSPAR Policy conformed to the latest findings, proposed changes to the Policy were based on new science and technology. These were generally introduced into the COSPAR Policy process as a result of studies performed by the US Space Studies Board (of which Len was Chair from 2003-2008), at COSPAR workshops, and under the sponsorship of the European Science Foundation. There were also inputs from the NASA Planetary Protection Advisory Committee and the ESA Planetary Protection Working Group, both of which had international membership.

These activities, rather than the wishes of the PPP Chair or Vice Chair, were what determined changes to the COSPAR Policy after the Panel was formed.

Paragraph 11:

“Almost immediately upon becoming President, and to my surprise since when I was NASA Associate Administrator, the NASA PPO reported to me and all was well, I was besieged by complaints about planetary protection.”

This statement is, to say the least, humorous. Indeed, Len appointed me as NASA PPO (for the first

time) when he joined NASA as Associated Administrator for Space Science and Applications in 1987, and as he says, all was well. He should remember that !

Shortly after my NASA appointment (1990), I asked the Space Studies Board to look at planetary protection requirements for Mars landers, and the recommendations of their 1992 report were much easier to implement than those for the Viking landers. The new recommendations were brought into COSPAR’s (tough to find) policy through SC F in 1994, so, the engineers were comparatively happy, as were the other mission operators. Who, then, besieged Len in 2014 ? Given the span of possibilities, it would be appropriate for him to name the specific organizations that besieged him, at least.

Some of that, I witnessed. For example, at the Iguazu Falls Symposium in 2015 it was apparent that the Jet Propulsion Laboratory had decided to work to remove some planetary protection requirements in a way more adversarial than had previously been the case. At the Symposium, I discussed those issues with Len, who shouldn’t have been surprised, given his then-membership on the JPL Advisory Council (as he still appears to be). Clearly, JPL has some of the most difficult roles in flying planetary science missions in a planetary-protection-compliant manner, so lobbying the COSPAR President on the issue might be classified as due-diligence, from their perspective. That the COSPAR President was also a member of the JPL Advisory Council during that period would seem to be something more broadly known.

Paragraph 11 (cont.):

“Of more importance, there was a legitimate structural issue. The PPOs were both making and enforcing the COSPAR PP Policy. While this does not imply that they did it poorly, nonetheless it is simply poor governance.”

It should not have to be noted that COSPAR does not enforce its PP Policy at all, not even in the sense of a university professor first teaching a class and then giving an exam to her/his students. This statement is simply a non sequitur regarding the power of the PPOs, etc.

And of course it is hard to separate an accusation of “poor governance” from a suggestion that something was done poorly! But that suggestion has no place here, given that at least until COSPAR-2018 the PP Policy was not ‘made’ by the PPOs, nor by the non-PPO Panel Officers. It was made by the COSPAR Bureau and Council.

Paragraph 11 (redux):

“Thus a great deal of time was spent during my first four years as President restructuring the PPP into its current form...”

It is all well and good to note improvements in the structure and functioning of the PPP, demonstrating, among other things, an improved appreciation by Len of the United Nations’ interest in planetary protection. Both I and Gerhard Kminek had asked Len for reform of the Panel structure when he became COSPAR President. And I appreciate that Len notes, here, that the new Panel has been “ably led by Athena Coustenis as Chair and Niklas Hedman as Vice Chair from the UN.” They are first-rate! I do not, however, understand why, in this moment of largesse, Len would fail to acknowledge Gerhard Kminek’s contribution both to the restructuring of the Panel, or his service (by invitation) as the new Vice Chair (Planetary Protection). Why not thank him for his willingness to step down as PPP Chair to enable the structural change to occur when it did ?

Paragraph 14:

“In fact, the companies used their influence to get legislation proposed in the US Congress that would delegate to the Secretary of Commerce the responsibility of certifying that a commercial space mission satisfied the planetary protection requirements of the Outer Space Treaty, and the legislation specifically said that the COSPAR PP Policy did not apply.”

This is a curious sidetrack, given the context. Whereas NASA, itself, is not responsible for compliance with the OST (US compliance is the provenance of the Department of State), from time-to-time one part or the other of the US government has tried to fill the regulatory gap left by the dearth of comprehensive OST-enabling legislation by the US government as a whole. It is therefore predictable, but not of great concern, when there is a Bill passed by one

part of the US Congress (the House, in this case) that states, for example, that “Guidelines promulgated by the Committee on Space Research may not be considered international obligations of the United States.” The Bill in question (HR 2809) was not that much of a concern, as it was never passed into law, but on the plus side it did specify a process whereby the US would identify an appropriate source of guidelines to be followed to prevent harmful contamination. The failure of such a Bill to become US Law does suggest that the US needs to put forward a comprehensive regime for OST compliance, but has little effect on COSPAR’s Policy until that happens.

Paragraph 14 (cont.):

“Compliance with the COSPAR PP Policy is obviously voluntary and should the nation with the largest effort in planetary exploration decide not to comply, or in effect, make up its own policy, there is the potential for a major diplomatic incident, and COSPAR’s relevance would have been seriously diminished.”

Enforcing a voluntary policy is easier if the principles of the policy are shared. COSPAR provides for this shared perspective. Whereas in paragraph 11 Len states as a concern that “a growing number of nations...did not appreciate the dominance of NASA and ESA” in planetary protection, history suggests that most nations will accept jointly agreed principles if they need to do that in order to fly cooperative missions. It may not matter who sets out those principles for agreement, but COSPAR has the history and expertise to do this, and so we have done it as a service to space science and exploration. One role of the COSPAR President could well be to mediate between specific nations that show difficulties in implementing a specific COSPAR policy and tailor those along with the principles behind the COSPAR policy. In this retelling, there was no documented request by Len to the PPP to address the US and other government difficulties. Why not ?

Paragraph

14 (cont.):

“In fairness to the companies that want to use the Moon or Mars, the COSPAR PP Policy was never intended to take their interest into account...not even human exploration was seriously considered and cer-

tainly not commercial use...”

At this point, in fairness, I would suggest that Len go back and read the COSPAR PP Policy, as I am concerned that somebody new to the field might otherwise be misled. For example, the Appendix section “Principles and Guidelines for the Human Exploration of Mars” is, indeed, a serious consideration of human exploration and the use of the planet Mars. The use of the Moon has been the subject of previous consideration as a body that may be an important place for both scientific exploration AND use. Consideration of these led to COSPAR’s relatively recent update of its policy regarding lunar missions.

It is clear that Len does not know about or appreciate the work currently being done regarding human missions under the COSPAR PPP umbrella and jointly with NASA (with contributions from ESA, DLR, CSA, IBMP, JAXA, and CNES). The Panel has (from 2016) conducted a workshop series on planetary protection for human missions to Mars that has included world-class bioscientists, mission planners and engineers, as well as commercial concerns such as Space-X, Lockheed-Martin, and Boeing.

‘‘It may not matter who sets out those principles for agreement, but COSPAR has the history and expertise to do this’’

Thus, it is completely incorrect that COSPAR has not paid attention to the interests of companies in these areas. Such an argument from ignorance is not a convincing one, and does not belong in a message that claims some authority and improvement in this vital area for COSPAR.

In the above sections, I have tried to be objective in correcting a number of Len’s statements that are either incorrect or that might cause embarrassment to the COSPAR scientific community. Not all of Len’s statements are of equal weight, of course, and some have been left unaddressed, but most of the statements that I have dealt with here need to be corrected to set the record straight.

Submissions to Space Research Today

Anyone is welcome, indeed encouraged, to submit an article or news item to Space Research Today. As we are the main information bulletin of COSPAR, we are particularly focused on issues and news related to COSPAR business, to space research news and events, including meetings, around the world. In the spirit of a bulletin publication, we aim to be as flexible as possible in the submission procedures. Submission should be made in English, by e-mail to any member of the Editorial Team (see contact details given earlier).

Submissions may be made in (i) e-mail text, with attached image files if required, and (ii) As Word files with embedded images (colour is encouraged). Other formats can be considered; please contact the editorial team with your request. If you are submitting an article, please include ‘about the author’ information, i.e. a paragraph about yourself with an image.

The nominal deadlines are 1 February for the April issue, 1 June for the August issue, and 1 October for the December issue, but material can be submitted at any time. The editors will always be pleased to receive the following types of inputs or submissions, among others:

Research Highlight articles: These are generally substantial, current review articles that can be expected to be of interest to the general space community, extending from two pages to over five pages, with figures and images (again, colour encouraged). These could be reports on space missions, scientific reports, articles on space strategy or history.

In Brief articles: short research or news announcements up to three pages, with images as appropriate.

COSPAR News and COSPAR People: articles related to COSPAR business, reporting on particular activities, meetings or events.

Snapshots: striking space research related images (e.g. a spacecraft launch, a planetary encounter image, a large solar flare, or a historical image, particularly related to COSPAR) for which we require the image and a single paragraph caption, plus the image credit.

In Memoriam submissions: Articles extending to a few pages, including an image, about a significant figure in the COSPAR community.

Letters to the Editor: Up to two or three pages on any subject relevant to COSPAR and space research in general. These can cover news, opinions on strategy, or scientific results.

Meeting announcements: meeting reports and book reviews all welcome.

Articles are not refereed, but the decision to publish is the responsibility of the General Editor and his editorial team.

LAUNCHES AT A GLANCE: Satellite & Space Probe Launches

30 June - 30 December 2022

We note that the full list of Spacecraft Launches is maintained at the COSPAR website Https://Cosparhq.cnes.fr/Launchlist/

Here we provide a selective summary of the launches that occurred between the end of June to the end of December 2022.

This period saw 1269 craft launched into space. This included spacecraft from 24 countries and the EU. The countries included Angola, Bhutan, China, Finland, France, Great Britain, India, Iran, Israel, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Luxembourg, Moldova, New Zealand, Norway, Russia, Singapore, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Uganda, USA, Zimbabwe.

The figures are dominated by the USA Falcon 9 Starlink launches from both the Kennedy Space Centre and Vandenberg AFB on July 7, 11, 17, 22 and 24, August 10, 12, 19, 28 and 31, September 5, 11, 19 and 24, October 5, 20 and 28, and December 17 and 28.

Significant numbers of spacecraft were also launched by China, in particular the Jilin-1 high resolution and infrared imaging multi-spacecraft launches on August 10, November 16 and December 9, by Great Britain, with OneWeb multiple launches on October 22 and December 8, and by a variety of Russian launches.

The only crewed launch in the period was on October 5 when the Crew Dragon 5 spacecraft was launched to the ISS. Among the countries listed above, there are some notable countries that have emerging interests in spacecraft exploitation, such as Moldova, with the launch its first satellite, TUM-

nanSAT, listed as a student nano-satellite from the Technical University of Moldova, launched from the ISS on August 12, and Zimbabwe, with its first spacecraft, ZIMSAT, also launched from the ISS on December 5.

In all, over 20 different launchers were used in the period, ranging from the USA Falcon 9, Atlas V, Delta 4H and Electron launchers, to the Russian Soyuz 2, the Chinese Long March 11 and Ceres-1 rockets to the Indian PSLV-CA and GSLV Mk III launchers.

The European Ariane 5 and Vega C launchers were also used, as well as the South Korean Nuri vehicle. In addition, the Chinese Jielong-3 launches were notable because of their sea-platform launches and the LauncherOne rockets, because of their horizontal launches carried by a Boeing 747 from the Mojave Desert.

Of the larger payloads, the European Meteosat 13 launch using an Ariane 5 ECA on December 13 and the NOAA 21 weather spacecraft launch using an Atlas V on the 10th of November, are notable. Finally, the launch aboard the new Space Launch System rocket on 16 November, took the unmanned Orion capsule of the Artemis-1 mission to a lunar retrograde orbit, returning to Earth 24 days later.

COSPAR – Committee on Space Research

Furthering research, exploration, and the peaceful use of outer space through international cooperation

COSPAR was established by the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU), now the International Science Council (ISC), in October 1958 to continue the cooperative programmes of rocket and satellite research successfully undertaken during the International Geophysical Year of 1957-1958. The ICSU resolution creating COSPAR stated that its primary purpose was to “provide the world scientific community with the means whereby it may exploit the possibilities of satellites and space probes of all kinds for scientific purposes, and exchange the resulting data on a cooperative basis”. Accordingly, COSPAR is an interdisciplinary scientific organization concerned with the promotion and progress, on an international scale, of all kinds of scientific research carried out with space vehicles, rockets and balloons. COSPAR’s objectives are carried out by the international community of scientists working through ISC and its adhering National Academies and International Scientific Unions. Operating under the rules of ISC, COSPAR considers all questions solely from the scientific viewpoint and takes no account of political considerations.

Composition of COSPAR

COSPAR Members are National Scientific Institutions, as defined by ISC, actively engaged in space research and International Scientific Unions federated in ISC which desire membership. The COSPAR Bureau manages the activities of the Committee on a day-to-day basis for the Council – COSPAR’s principal body – which comprises COSPAR’s President, one official representative of each Member National Scientific Institution and International Scientific Union, the Chairs of COSPAR Scientific Commissions, and the Finance Committee Chair.

COSPAR also recognizes as Associates individual scientists taking part in its activities and, as Associated Supporters, public or private organizations or individuals wishing to support COSPAR’s activities. Current members in this category are Airbus Defence and Space SAS, Center of Applied Space Technology and Microgravity (ZARM), Germany; China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology (CALT), China; China Academy of Space Technology (CAST), China; Groupement des Industries Françaises Aéronautiques et Spatiales (GIFAS), France; the International Space Science Institute (ISSI), Switzerland.

COSPAR also has an Industry Partner programme to encourage strategic engagement with relevant industries who wish to be involved in the activities of COSPAR and support its mission. The current Industry Partner is Lockheed Martin Corporation, USA.

COSPAR Bureau (2022-2026)

President: P. Ehrenfreund (Netherlands/USA)

Vice Presidents: C. Cesarsky (France), P. Ubertini (Italy)

Other Members: V. Angelopoulos (USA), M. Fujimoto (Japan), M. Grande (UK), P. Rettberg (Germany), I. Stanislawska (Poland), C. Wang (China)

COSPAR Finance Committee (2022-2026)

Chair: I. Cairns (Australia)

Members: C. Mandrini (Argentina), J.-P. St Maurice (Canada)

COSPAR Publications Committee

Chair: P. Ubertini (Italy)

Ex Officio: P. Ehrenfreund (Netherlands/USA), J.-C. Worms (France), R.A. Harrison (UK), T. Hei (USA), M. Shea (USA), P. Willis (France)

Other Members: A. Bazzano (Italy), M. Klimenko (Russia), G. Reitz (Germany), M. Story (USA), P. Visser (Netherlands)

Space Research Today Editorial Officers

General Editor: R.A. Harrison, Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Harwell, Oxfordshire OX11 0QX, UK. Tel: +44 1235 44 6884, E-mail: richard.harrison@stfc.ac.uk

Executive Editor: L. Fergus Swan (leigh.fergus@cosparhq.cnes.fr)

Associate Editors: J.-C. Worms (France; cospar@cosparhq.cnes.fr), D. Altamirano (UK; d.altamirano@soton.ac.uk), Y. Kasai (Japan; ykasai@nict.go.jp), E.C. Laiakis (USA; ecl28@georgetown.edu), H. Peter (Germany; heike.peter@positim.com)

COSPAR Secretariat

Executive Director: J.-C. Worms

Associate Director: A. Janofsky

Administrative Coordinator: L. Fergus Swan

Accountant: A. Stepniak

COSPAR Secretariat, c/o CNES, 2 place Maurice Quentin

75039 Paris Cedex 01, France

Tel : +33 (0) 1 44 76 74 41, +33 (0)4 67 54 87 77

E-mail: cospar@cosparhq.cnes.fr, Web: https://cosparhq.cnes.fr

CHAIRS AND VICE-CHAIRS OF COSPAR’S MAIN SCIENTIFIC COMMISSIONS AND PANELS

SC A on Space Studies of the Earth’s Surface, Meteorology and Climate: R. Kahn (USA; Chair), J. Benveniste (ESA/ESRIN)

SC B on Space Studies of the Earth-Moon System, Planets, and Small Bodies of the Solar System: H. Yano (Japan; Chair), B. Foing (Netherlands), R. Lopes (USA)

SC C on Space Studies of the Upper Atmospheres of the Earth and Planets, including Reference Atmospheres: A. Yau (Canada, Chair), P.R. Fagundes (Brazil), D. Pallamraju (India), E. Yigit (USA)

SC D on Space Plasmas in the Solar System, including Planetary Magnetospheres: N. Vilmer (France, Chair), A. Gil-Swiderska (Poland), J. Zhang (USA)

SC E on Research in Astrophysics from Space: T. Belloni (Italy; Chair), E. Churazov (Germany), B. Schmieder (France), W. Yu (China)

SC F on Life Sciences as Related to Space: T.K. Hei (USA; Chair), G. Baiocco (Italy), J. Kiss (Germany), P. Rettberg (Germany), Y. Sun (China)

SC G on Materials Sciences in Space: M. Avila (Germany; Chair), K. Brinkert (UK), J. Porter (Spain), A. Romero-Calvo (USA)

SC H on Fundamental Physics in Space: M. Rodrigues (France; Chair), O. Bertolami (Portugal), S. Hermenn (Germany), P. McNamara (ESA/ESTEC),

Technical Panel on Satellite Dynamics (PSD): H. Peter (Germany; Chair), A. Jäggi (Switzerland), S. Jin (China), F. Topputo (Italy)

Panel on Technical Problems Related to Scientific Ballooning (PSB): M. Abrahamsson (Sweden; Chair), V. Dubourg (France), H. Fuke (Japan), E. Udinski (USA)

Panel on Potentially Environmentally Detrimental Activities in Space (PEDAS): C. Frueh (USA), C. Pardini (Italy)

Panel on Radiation Belt Environment Modelling (PRBEM): Y. Miyoshi (Japan, Chair), A. Brunet (France), Y. Shprits (Germany), Y. Zheng (USA)

Panel on Space Weather (PSW): M. Kuznetsova (USA; Chair), J.E.R. Costa (Brazil), S. Gadimova (UNOOSA), N. Gopalswamy (USA), H. Opgenoorth (Sweden)

Panel on Planetary Protection (PPP): A. Coustenis (France; Chair), P. Doran (USA), N. Hedman (UNOOSA)

Panel on Capacity Building (PCB): J.C. Gabriel (Spain; Chair), D. Altamirano (UK), D. Bilitza (USA), M. C. Damas (USA), D. Perrone (Italy), R. Smith (USA), Z. Su (Netherlands), M. Tshisaphungo (S. Africa)

Panel on Education (PE): R. Doran (Portugal; Chair), M.C. Damas (USA), S. Benitez Herrera (Spain), G. Rojas (Portugal)

Panel on Exploration (PEX): TBD, B. Foing (Netherlands), C. McKay (USA), F. Westall (France)

Panel on Interstellar Research (PIR): R. McNutt (USA; Chair), R. Wimmer-Schweingruber (Germany)

Panel on Innovative Solutions (PoIS): E.H. Smith (USA, Chair), G. Danos (Cyprus), I. Kitiashvili (USA)

Panel on Social Sciences and Humanities (PSSH): I. Sourbès-Verger (France; Chair), N. Hedman (Austria)

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