Author Topic: ESA - LISA Pathfinder updates  (Read 48916 times)

Offline jebbo

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Offline bolun

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Re: ESA/NASA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #41 on: 06/07/2016 02:42 pm »
LISA Pathfinder Exceeds Expectations
http://www.esa.int/Our_Activities/Space_Science/LISA_Pathfinder_exceeds_expectations

Image credit: Spacecraft: ESA/ATG medialab; data: ESA/LISA Pathfinder Collaboration

Offline bolun

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Re: ESA/NASA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #42 on: 06/07/2016 02:43 pm »

Offline Star One

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Re: ESA/NASA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #43 on: 06/07/2016 05:16 pm »
Lisa Pathfinder’s success boosts likelihood of future gravity-wave observatory

Quote
The 22-nation European Space Agency has said a laser-interferometry mission featuring three spacecraft millions of kilometers apart and linked by lasers is their preferred next selection for Large-class mission.

But while Lisa Pathfinder’s ability to eliminate most surrounding noise, including that caused by gas molecules, during its nearly three months of operations argues heavily in favor of a full-blown Lisa mission, other technologies need to be proven before the full observatory is given go-ahead approval.

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Asked whether a national 2034 date could not be moved forward by five years, to 2029, Favata said the technologies challenges remaining are probably too formidable to make the earlier date.

Favata said ESA will spend the next three or four years examining how close they are to reaching the technology readiness level for the Lisa mission components. Once a go-ahead is decided, a 10-year development effort would begin.

Quote
Favata said ESA expects NASA will also be a partner on the full Lisa observatory for 2034. Details are yet to be finalized. ESA’s Large-class missions are budgeted at aroun 900 million euros, plus whatever contributions are made by national European laboratories and national space agencies in Europe.

http://spacenews.com/lisa-pathfinders-success-boosts-likelihood-of-future-gravity-wave-observatory/

Offline catdlr

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Re: ESA/NASA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #44 on: 06/07/2016 08:55 pm »
LISA Pathfinder’s Stunning Success

NASA Goddard

Published on Jun 7, 2016
LISA Pathfinder, a mission led by the European Space Agency (ESA) with contributions from NASA, has successfully tested a key technology needed to build a space-based observatory for detecting gravitational waves. These tiny ripples in the fabric of space, predicted by Albert Einstein a century ago, were first seen last year by the ground-based Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory (LIGO).

Seismic, thermal, and other noise sources limit LIGO to higher-frequency gravitational waves around 100 cycles per second (hertz). But finding signals from more exotic events, such as mergers of supermassive black holes in colliding galaxies, requires the ability to see frequencies at 1 hertz or less, a sensitivity level only possible from space.

A space-based observatory would work by tracking test masses that move only under the influence of gravity. Each spacecraft would gently fly around its test masses without disturbing them, a process called drag-free flight. The primary goal of ESA's LISA Pathfinder mission is to test current technology by flying around an identical pair of 1.8-inch (46 millimeter) cubes made of a gold-platinum alloy, a material chosen for its high density and insensitivity to magnetic fields.

Scientists say the results are nothing short of astonishing. Non-gravitational forces on the cubes were reduced to levels far below the project's original requirements and approach the level of control needed for a full-scale observatory.

The test masses are housed in an experiment called the LISA Technology Package (LTP), which was built by a consortium of European national space agencies and ESA. The LTP uses a high-resolution laser interferometer to determine the positions of the test masses and relays the information to the spacecraft's Drag-Free and Attitude Control System, which then applies minute bursts from microthrusters. In this way, the spacecraft flies in formation with the cubes and isolates them from external forces. The results show that LISA Pathfinder reduced non-gravitational forces on the test masses to a level about 10,000 times smaller than drag-free control technologies used on previous science missions.

LISA Pathfinder also carries a NASA experiment called the ST-7 Disturbance Reduction System which is expected to begin science operations in early July.

LISA Pathfinder was launched on Dec. 3, 2015, and began orbiting a point called Earth-sun L1, roughly 930,000 miles (1.5 million kilometers) from Earth in the sun's direction, in late January 2016. LISA stands for Laser Interferometer Space Antenna, a space-based gravitational wave observatory concept that has been studied in great detail by both NASA and ESA. The LISA Pathfinder mission is an ESA-led effort to demonstrate technologies for a future gravitational wave observatory in space. NASA Goddard astrophysicist Ira Thorpe, a member of the team, discusses the mission and its spectacular results so far.

Credit: NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center/Scott Wiessenger

This video is public domain and along with other supporting visualizations can be downloaded from the Scientific Visualization Studio at: http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/12264

If you liked this video, subscribe to the NASA Goddard YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/NASAExplorer




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Offline catdlr

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Re: ESA/NASA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #45 on: 06/07/2016 08:56 pm »
LISA Pathfinder results

European Space Agency, ESA

Published on Jun 7, 2016
Launched in December 2015, LISA Pathfinder travelled to its operational orbit, 1.5 million km from earth towards the Sun, where it started its scientific mission on 1 March.



Tony De La Rosa, ...I'm no Feline Dealer!! I move mountains.  but I'm better known for "I think it's highly sexual." Japanese to English Translation.

Offline Star One

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Re: ESA/NASA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #46 on: 06/07/2016 09:32 pm »
The first videos in the above two posts are both showing 400 error?

Offline catdlr

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Re: ESA/NASA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #47 on: 06/07/2016 10:04 pm »
The first videos in the above two posts are both showing 400 error?

I'm able to play the embedded and linked videos.  Might be YouTube cached server issues with your region?
Tony De La Rosa, ...I'm no Feline Dealer!! I move mountains.  but I'm better known for "I think it's highly sexual." Japanese to English Translation.

Offline russianhalo117

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Re: ESA/NASA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #48 on: 06/08/2016 12:49 am »
The first videos in the above two posts are both showing 400 error?
they work for me

Offline Star One

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Re: ESA/NASA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #49 on: 06/08/2016 05:54 am »
The first videos in the above two posts are both showing 400 error?
they work for me

They are both working now, odd.

Offline bolun

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Re: ESA/NASA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #50 on: 06/28/2016 09:00 am »
LISA pathfinder completes first operations phase

24 June 2016

On Saturday 25 June, the LISA Technology Package (LTP) – a European payload on ESA's LISA Pathfinder – completes its nominal operations phase, passing the baton to the Disturbance Reduction System, an additional experiment provided by NASA. This won't be the last time the European experiment is run – the recently approved mission extension will see the LTP back in action for seven months starting in November this year.

http://sci.esa.int/lisa-pathfinder/58006-lisa-pathfinder-completes-first-operations-phase/

Image credit:  ESA/LISA Pathfinder Collaboration

Offline bolun

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Re: ESA/NASA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #51 on: 07/17/2016 08:11 pm »
http://english.nssc.cas.cn/ns/headline/201605/t20160518_163197.html

The 12th China-ESA Space Science Bilateral Meeting Opens in Shanghai

Quote
... both parties introduced the respective gravitational wave detection plans and agreed that there is a cooperation possibility in this area.

Offline Sam Ho

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Re: LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #52 on: 08/16/2016 03:56 pm »
The National Academies published a midterm assessment of the New Worlds, New Horizons program.

http://www.nap.edu/23560

The assessment bemoans the gutting of gravitational wave funding after the cancellation of LISA, and recommends that the US provide support to bring eLISA back up to the capabilities LISA had.

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FINDING 4-9: The dissolution of the U.S. LISA project, and the attendant loss of science and technology funding, has severely impacted preparations for a space gravitational wave mission. If this situation persists, the options for significant U.S. participation in this revolutionary discovery area will be limited.

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RECOMMENDATION 4-4: NASA should restore support this decade for gravitational wave research that enables the U.S. community to be a strong technical and scientific partner in the European Space Agency (ESA)-led L3 mission, consistent with LISA’s high priority in the 2010 report New Worlds, New Horizons in Astronomy and Astrophysics (NWNH). One goal of U.S. participation should be the restoration of the full scientific capability of the mission as envisioned by NWNH.

Offline eeergo

Re: LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #53 on: 08/16/2016 05:46 pm »
The 3Cat-2 satellite orbited yesterday by China carries a demonstrator for the eLISA magnetometer (AMR):

https://nanosatlab.upc.edu/en/missions-and-projects/3cat-2
-DaviD-

Offline Star One

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Re: LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #54 on: 09/12/2016 06:26 am »
NASA moves to rejoin sped-up gravitational wave mission

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This week, at the 11th LISA symposium in Zürich, Switzerland, a NASA official said he was ready to rejoin the LISA mission, which the agency left in 2011. Meanwhile, ESA says it is trying to move the launch of the mission up several years from 2034. “This is a very important meeting,” says David Shoemaker, a gravitational wave physicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. “It feels like a turning point.”

http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/09/nasa-moves-rejoin-sped-gravitational-wave-mission

Offline baldusi

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Re: LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #55 on: 09/12/2016 05:03 pm »
NASA moves to rejoin sped-up gravitational wave mission

Quote
This week, at the 11th LISA symposium in Zürich, Switzerland, a NASA official said he was ready to rejoin the LISA mission, which the agency left in 2011. Meanwhile, ESA says it is trying to move the launch of the mission up several years from 2034. “This is a very important meeting,” says David Shoemaker, a gravitational wave physicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. “It feels like a turning point.”

http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/09/nasa-moves-rejoin-sped-gravitational-wave-mission
I truly hope this time NASA keeps its word support.

Offline Star One

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Re: LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #56 on: 09/12/2016 05:14 pm »
NASA moves to rejoin sped-up gravitational wave mission

Quote
This week, at the 11th LISA symposium in Zürich, Switzerland, a NASA official said he was ready to rejoin the LISA mission, which the agency left in 2011. Meanwhile, ESA says it is trying to move the launch of the mission up several years from 2034. “This is a very important meeting,” says David Shoemaker, a gravitational wave physicist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge. “It feels like a turning point.”

http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/09/nasa-moves-rejoin-sped-gravitational-wave-mission
I truly hope this time NASA keeps its word support.

Unfortunately it doesn't look like they are going to put the $1 billion promised previously, but at least it should be higher than the current $150 million.

Offline bolun

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Re: ESA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #57 on: 10/07/2016 01:36 pm »
The LISA Pathfinder science archive is online

07 October 2016

Today, ESA's LISA Pathfinder Science Archive opens its virtual gates to the world. It contains data collected by the satellite during the mission's first few months, covering the nominal operations phase of the LISA Technology Package (LTP) – the European payload on LISA Pathfinder.

- Link: LISA Pathfinder Legacy Archive

http://sci.esa.int/lisa-pathfinder/58410-the-lisa-pathfinder-science-archive-is-online/

Offline bolun

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Re: ESA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #58 on: 12/13/2016 08:01 pm »
http://sci.esa.int/lisa-pathfinder/58633-lisa-pathfinder-s-pioneering-mission-continues/

LISA Pathfinder's pioneering mission continues

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On 7 December, LISA Pathfinder started the extended phase of its mission, an additional six months during which scientists and engineers will push the experiment to its limits in preparation for ESA's future space observatory of gravitational waves.

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..., on 25 June, the first operations phase, using the LISA Technology Package (LTP), was completed. The LTP is a European payload consisting of the test masses, inertial sensors, and laser interferometer, and uses a series of cold-gas micronewton thrusters to move the satellite and keep it centred on the cubes, in response to external and internal forces battering them around.

Operations continued with NASA's Disturbance Reduction System (DRS), an additional experiment which receives measurement input from the inertial sensors of the LTP but employs its own micronewton thrusters based on colloidal technology.

Following completion of the DRS operations, the extended mission of LISA Pathfinder began on 7 December 2016, at 09:00 CET (08:00 UTC). It will last until 31 May 2017, making use of both the LTP and DRS payloads.

Offline Star One

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ESA - LISA Pathfinder updates
« Reply #59 on: 01/29/2017 07:27 pm »
Quote
Jeff Foust –  ‏@jeff_foust

Shoemaker: goal of LISA tech dev work is to enable earliest possible launch date: as soon as 2029, depending on budget. #apsapril

https://mobile.twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/825798201294807044

Quote
Jeff Foust –  ‏@jeff_foust

David Shoemaker, MIT: proposal to ESA for LISA assumes a 20% NASA contribution; max allowed by ESA. #apsapril

https://mobile.twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/825796636471275520

Quote
Jeff Foust –  ‏@jeff_foust

Paul McNamara, ESA: LISA Pathfinder end of mission planned for April with maneuver to drift spacecraft away from Earth-Sun L1. #apsapril

https://mobile.twitter.com/jeff_foust/status/825784992470929408
« Last Edit: 01/29/2017 07:31 pm by Star One »

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