NASA has included critical payloads in a flight test that simulated lunar gravity to prepare them for the Moon and other space exploration missions.
During the test, Blue Origin’s New Shepard reusable rocket was launched in Texas to replicate the Moon’s gravity during a suborbital flight, NASA said Tuesday. The experiments include technologies and instruments, which experienced around two minutes of lunar gravity forces without going to the Moon.
The New Shepard capsule used its reaction control system to spin up to 11 revolutions per minute and simulate one-sixth of Earth’s gravity.
Preparing Tech for Lunar Explorations
The flight test was provided with sufficient support to expand the available vehicle capabilities and ensure technologies are ready for lunar exploration, according to Danielle McCulloch, program executive at NASA’s Flight Opportunities program. She added that the experiment was designed to achieve a test environment that is similar to a mission’s operating environment.
Greg Peters, acting program manager for Flight Opportunities, noted that an extended period of simulated lunar gravity is a critical test regime for NASA. “It’s crucial to reducing risk for innovations that might one day go to the lunar surface,” he explained.
Among the payloads tested in Blue Origin flight is the Lunar-g Combustion Investigation, which seeks to understand material flammability on the Moon. Such knowledge is an important component of astronaut safety on the Moon and would inform the design of potential combustion devices there.
Related Articles
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence has appointed Tidal “Ty” McCoy II, most recently a principal at Nexfed, as intelligence community chief financial officer. McCoy announced his appointment at ODNI in a LinkedIn post published Tuesday. Hear experts discuss the latest tech advancements, trends and opportunities facing the IC at the Potomac Officers Club’s 2025 Intel Summit on Oct. 2. Reserve your spot now! Who Is Tidal McCoy? In 2022, McCoy joined strategy consulting firm Nextfed as a vice president. At Nexfed, he led the firm’s intelligence and acquisition strategy practice and played a key role in mergers
The National Science Foundation has launched an initiative to invest up to $100 million in a national network of artificial intelligence-enabled programmable cloud laboratories as part of efforts to advance automated science and engineering and drive discoveries and innovation. NSF said Tuesday the Directorate for Technology, Innovation and Partnerships, or TIP, will lead the NSF Test Bed: Toward a Network of Programmable Cloud Laboratories, or NSF PCL Test Bed. “The idea of a national network of programmable cloud laboratories builds on NSF’s longstanding legacy of transformative investments — such as NSFNET decades ago — that paved the way for the modern
Sens. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H.; Maggie Hassan, D-N.H.; Susan Collins, R-Maine; and Angus King, I-Maine have proposed legislation that would spare the Navy’s four public shipyards from workforce reductions. Called the Protecting Public Naval Shipyards Act, the bipartisan bill tells the Department of Defense to exempt certain positions at public shipyards from hiring freezes and layoffs to ensure that nuclear-powered submarine maintenance and overhaul are uninterrupted. “This bipartisan bill will ensure that important naval operations continue without disruption by exempting public shipyard employees from the chaotic mass firings, workforce reductions, and hiring freezes directed by the Trump Administration,” said Hassan. Top