elizabethtasker

elizabethtasker, 6 months ago to random

I’m at the station and the train conductors… are playing trains 😂🚇

elizabethtasker, 4 months ago to random

Here's today's press release for JAXA's SLIM lunar landing!

TL;DR:

Pinpoint site identification was crazily successful.

We were lowering into position, detecting boulders like a champ.

THEN ONE OF THE ENGINES DROPPED OFF.

(I kid you not)

(we don't know why yet)

(maybe space pirates)

But we still soft-landed on 1 engine.

(TAKE THAT SPACE PIRATES!)

but on our head.

Strangely, might not be a big deal once the Sun moves round to the other side of the spacecraft.

https://global.jaxa.jp/press/2024/01/20240125-1_e.html

elizabethtasker, 10 months ago to random

It's 6:30am, I'm in Singapore Airport and Mastodon, do I have a story for YOU.

It all began... with an asteroid grain. Again.

elizabethtasker, 4 months ago (edited 4 months ago) to random

Tomorrow. My good people. We land.

ON THE MOON 🌝

This is not a drill ⚒️

JAXA's Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) mission is going to attempt the first "pin point" landing, with an accuracy of less than 100m.

(This is compared with conventional landing techniques, were anywhere within about 10km is considered pretty snazzy.)

If successful, SLIM will also be Japan's first soft moon landing.

elizabethtasker, 3 months ago to random

I’m in a long line for the bag drop at the airport. A robotic cart joined the queue. It alternated between demanding people move in Japanese and English, and voicing the same demands at a variety of barriers.

People have done their best to acquiesce to its demands, but it’s now stationary and shouting in multiple languages.

elizabethtasker, 4 months ago to random

Now this is one fabulous ball mural! The tennis club creates a new mural out of old balls every month or so, but this one for the Year of the Dragon is my favourite one so far!

elizabethtasker, 5 months ago to random

It’s 10am. And the queues for Christmas Eve KFC chicken have begun. I am not partaking. Because for real, Japan, this is quite strange!

elizabethtasker, 3 months ago to random

In a PLOT TWIST, the JAXA lunar lander, SLIM, has survived the lunar night (which is bloody cold and was expected to irrevocably freeze all circuits).

SLIM is a technology demonstration, designed to test tech for touching down with pinpoint (<100m) accurate at a target site. The mission achieved this in spades, with estimated accuracy of ~3-4m, although tipped due to the loss of one of the main engines.

SLIM carries 1 science instrument, which it's used but... I guess will now use some more!

Tweet from the SLIM mission team account reading: Communication with #SLIM was terminated after a short time, as it was still lunar midday and the temperature of the communication equipment was very high. Preparations are being made to resume operations when instrument temperatures have sufficiently cooled. #GoodAfterMoon #JAXA

elizabethtasker, 10 months ago to random

analbumcover

No. Read that again. And then remember to use #CamelCase for hashtags.

elizabethtasker, 4 months ago to random

SLIM'S ALIVE!! The team reestablished communication with the spacecraft after the Sun inched round in the sky and hit the solar panels. Wild science'ing instantly began!

I don't think #SLIM has a long lunar surface program. It is primarily a technology demonstration to test the image matching navigation (100% success) and 2-step landing (busted due to the loss of one of the two main engines). So I think the multi-band camera will snap hundreds of images while the Sun is up, and then be done.

elizabethtasker, 4 months ago to random

AND HERE'S THE BLOCKBUSTER! 🎬 Brought to you by yesterday's JAXA SLIM press conference slides (now translated)!

We open by revealing the landing site location to 5 decimal places, and sounding apologetic that only 1dp was previously quoted.

Now, we can mark our Moon globes accurately. Thank god.

Then we move to some SWEET image matching, where SLIM's new tech snaps photos, identifies craters and matches these to maps to estimate location to unholy precision.

(Slides:)
https://www.isas.jaxa.jp/en/outreach/announcements/files/SLIM-pressconf-20240125.pdf

elizabethtasker, 11 months ago (edited 11 months ago) to random

And this, my good people, is what I was really doing in France last week (apart from counting aeroplanes at the Paris Air Show):

Smuggling... uh, couriering grains from asteroid Ryugu to Cité de l'espace in France. They will be on public display from this autumn!

Do I look IMMENSELY HAPPY to be handing over that case in Toulouse? Let's talk about the behind the scenes adventure... 📦 🏃‍♀️

More 📷:
https://www.isas.jaxa.jp/gallery/feature/isas/isas_20230628_en.html

elizabethtasker, 8 months ago to random

LOOOOOOOK!! That asteroid grain I took to the UK (the one where I nearly couldn't board the plane due to having the wrong seat type reserved for the Hayabusa2 model)?

It's now on display at the London Science Museum!

I totally brought it there. Me! Yay!

https://blog.sciencemuseum.org.uk/4-6-billion-year-old-asteroid-sample-unveiled-at-the-science-museum/

elizabethtasker, 9 months ago to animals

An apex predator on this Sunday morning.

#NorahNeko #RescueCats #CatsOfMastodon

Same calico cat, now stretching out still on her back, looking very content.
Stretch over, the calico cat returns to lying on her bag with paws bent and relaxed!

elizabethtasker, 4 months ago to random

Lunar soft landing confirmed, maybe even with the “pinpoint” accuracy (will take a while to confirm, as expected) but something awry (solar panels not charging) and thus, everyone is peeved because they’re a bunch of perfectionists 😅

I have some SLIM swag! And I think the team are fabulous.

And. I need to sleep before the first train.

BBC news:
https://www.bbc.com/news/live/science-environment-68019846

elizabethtasker, 1 year ago to random

Lately on my mind has been... horseshoe orbits. ARE THEY 4 REALZ?

These come up all the time in planetary science and I know IN THEORY how they work: 2 objects share an orbit (e.g. moons, or a planet & asteroid) and from the perspective of one, the other appears to move in a horseshoe, approaching and then making a U-turn.

LOOKS TOTS UNLIKELY

So I made a #blender3d animation to prove this, by the camera observing the planetary system and then chasing the planet to view from that perspective.

An animation shows a rocky planet and a smaller asteroid orbiting a star very close to one another (basically sharing an orbit). Initially, the camera views the whole system, and you see the asteroid approach the planet a couple of times and the resulting gravitational tug causing the smaller asteroid to switch sides, moving from a slightly outer orbit to an inner one and vice-versa. Then the camera chases down the planet and "lands" so it orbits with the planet. From this perspective on the planet, the asteroid appears to move in a horseshoe pattern, approaching the planet, doing a U-turn, and moving away. The only thing that has changed is the camera angle: both the planet and asteroid are orbiting the star as before.

elizabethtasker, 3 months ago to random

While discussing a possible site for a telescope array in India:

“Without domes, won’t the monkeys make a complete mess of the mirrors?”

“No, the leopards with deal with the monkeys.”

Which led me to a different… yet distinctly related… question 🤔

elizabethtasker, 5 months ago to random

And--after the release of an extremely dull looking government document--it's official:

JAXA's Martian Moons eXploration (MMX) mission to visit Mars's moons, Phobos & Deimos, and collect a sample from Phobos, is scheduled for launch in FY2026 (bumped from 2024).

The delay is due to confirming the reliability of the new H3 rocket, which rud'ed on its 1st launch at the start of the year.

NO RUDS FOR MARS.

Could be a new t-shirt.

I updated our web with fresh new dates:
https://www.mmx.jaxa.jp/en/

elizabethtasker, 4 months ago to random

I have a foot…! …of the SLIM lunar lander. This is one of the 3D printed aluminium lattice spacecraft feet that was used for testing (described to me as “almost a flight model”!). The feet are designed to crumple to help SLIM withstand the impact of landing. While the Moon’s gravity is only 1/6 of that of the Earth, SLIM was expected to experience a load of up to 2 tons upon touchdown. It’s a bit prickly. Like a foot hedgehog.

elizabethtasker, 6 months ago (edited 6 months ago) to random

It would seem that Avi Loeb is on Santa's naughty list this year: the so-claimed interstellar meteorites from an extrasolar planet scooped up by Loeb's team from the sea floor actually have a composition consistent with ... coal ash.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2515-5172/ad03f9

elizabethtasker, 8 months ago to random

#JAXA have launched the #XRISM X-ray space telescope for studying the hottest gas in the Universe, and #SLIM: a "smart lander" for making a high-precision landing on the lunar surface (essential tech for future crewed missions).

It's 10 minutes into the flight and so far, everything seems to be going well.

English live feed 📺 : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ej4ZMp4a2xw

elizabethtasker, 10 months ago to random

Now this, my friends, is a front page.

elizabethtasker, 3 months ago to random

Friend, speaking about SLIM: It just woke up and was put straight back to work?

Me, speaking far less specifically: That’s academia.