Aerospace and Defense Review : News

When weighed against NASA's annual budget of USD 150 million, the observation effort is a relatively small part of the agency under its planetary defense program. However, the program holds a much higher profile as it attempts to search for any asteroids that might pose an impact risk to the Earth NASA's small yet high profile planetary defense program has overcome disruptions caused by the coronavirus pandemic to continue searching for potentially hazardous near-Earth objects. The Near Earth Objects (NEO) Observations Program is designed to support a variety of primarily ground-based efforts to discover, track, and characterize NEOs. However, these efforts were slowed down for a time by the pandemic, which forced the temporary closure of laboratories in the U.S. and other countries. [vendor_logo_first]“We did see a number of observatories that had to close, either on their own or because their host organizations or host observatory sites had to close,” said Kelly Fast, manager of the NEO Observations Program. "The program hit an extreme point in terms of the number of observatories closed in late March, but since then, some observatories have found ways to resume at least partial operations with new COVID-19 safety protocols. That's included the Catalina Sky Survey in Arizona as well as telescopes at Mauna Kea Observatory in Hawaii." The closures, however, did not significantly affect the number of new NEOs discovered. According to Kelly, this was a concern, but the statistics at the Minor Planet Center, what's being received there, and between what's coming in from the NASA efforts and around the world is being closely watched. She added that over 2,400 NEOs were discovered by various search efforts in 2019. Through early June of this year, 1,222 had been found. When weighed against NASA's annual budget of USD 150 million, the observation effort is a relatively small part of the agency under its planetary defense program. However, the program holds a much higher profile as it attempts to search for any asteroids that might pose an impact risk to the Earth. Public opinion surveys have often ranked that program as a higher priority among the general public than some of NASA's far more considerable exploration efforts. The program’s budget also funds NASA’s first dedicated planetary defense mission, the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), scheduled for launch in July 2021, on board a Falcon 9. See Also: Top Aerospace Tech Solution Companies ...Read more

The global scare of the ongoing coronavirus epidemic seems to have a limited yet growing impact on the space industry as some companies and organizations are rethinking about organizing events The global scare of the ongoing coronavirus epidemic seems to have a limited yet growing impact on the space industry as some companies and organizations are rethinking about organizing events. Following a speech at the Next-Generation Suborbital Researchers Conference, NASA Administration Jim Bridenstine stated that the agency was taking a day by day approach to address the disease, and the responses may vary from one field to another based on the location of the outbreaks. "We're taking it at this point day by day. We have ten centers across the nation, and every single one of them, as this continues to develop, is going to be affected differently," Bridenstine said. According to Bridenstine, NASA is following a tiered approach in handling with the coronavirus, starting with guidance and direction from government officials, tailoring that as needed for various centers. "More than everything, we need people to understand that we care about them individually and that there’s a lot of guidance out there as far as what needs to be done to minimize the risk of infection," he said. The agency's employees have been told to restrict their international travel only to what is necessary, although it has not put any restrictions on domestic travel. NASA hasn't announced any other restrictions on upcoming meetings or other activities. Meanwhile, the European Space Agency has enforced certain restrictions for the use of its centers. Anyone who has traveled from areas with significant coronavirus outbreaks including China, Japan, South Korea, Singapore, Japan, Iran, and northern Italy need to have been out of certain regions of the agency for at least two weeks before they can enter an ESA facility. Currently, the agency's leaders are assessing whether upcoming meetings to be organized by the ESA should take place. "As soon as the virus reached Europe, we defined clear measures for ESA to minimize its spread," Jan Woerner, director general of ESA, stated in a blog post. “Due to the necessity for us to continue operating satellites, there are some limits to what we can do. Each and every one of us, though, must act responsibly to help counteract the coronavirus.” See Also :-  Top Healthcare Solution Companies   ...Read more

™ " title="Pioneer Metal Finishing announces launch of Surface Engineering Academy ™ " style="float:left;margin-right: 10px;" /> GREEN BAY, Wis. - Pioneer Metal Finishing, LLC ("Pioneer"), is pleased to announce the launch of Surface Engineering Academy ("SEA"), anExpert-Level resource for Surface Engineering and Modification advancement.   Kevin Stevick, CEO of Pioneer, "We are very excited to launch Surface Engineering Academy as part of our ongoing efforts to help our customers optimize the performance of their products. Given the complexity, breadth and development of surface modification options, our goal is to create a technically focused venue that helps to drive continuous improvement in this important category.  Pioneer is thrilled to support this new and important resource.”   Surface Engineering Academy’s focus on surface engineering and modification stems from the goal of furthering the development and application of optimized product surfaces.  While not a new category, the use of legacy technologies, such as anodizing, plating, adhesives and coatings, continues an important evolution to meet the needs of users.  This, coupled with further utilization of Thin Film Deposition and new surface modification technologies, has significantly expanded the options for solving tribological, adhesive application and corrosion protection challenges, among others.   Scott Kettler, COO of Pioneer, "SEA, at its core, is designed by our operations and product development teams.  It offers a peer-to-peer, technologist-to-technologist platform to further surface technology development, increase operational efficiencies and share insights& industry best-practices.  The surface modification space offers great potential for improving the performance of mission-critical products.  We are excited to be a part of these important development efforts.”    The academy’s centralized platform offers expert-level surface engineering and operational resources in a variety of media formats.  With a focus on technology development and optimization, SEA provides users with access to webinars, expert panel sessions, white papers, how-to handbooks, technical articles and technology development resources. ...Read more