After Several Months, My SECOND “#1 NEW RELEASE”, Is Finally Available In Print! I Was Almost In

Spent yesterday afternoon talking about “NASA In The 60s” to kids at a Gwinnett Parks Summer Camp. I love being a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador!!! #stemeducation #nasa #solarsystemambassador #nasasolarsystemambassador #gwinnetcountyparks https://www.instagram.com/p/CfHbeldO82N/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

Mars 09/06/2020 - Celestron 127slt mak - My first decent Mars image. I’ve got a long way to go. Like many dads before me have said, “practice, practice, practice”. #space #backyardastronomy #mars #celestrontelescope #celestron127slt https://www.instagram.com/p/CEzXHdvD4Gd/?igshid=vu3voayh5ooz

A re-edit of one of my favorite images from a previous visit to the U.S. Space and Rocket Center in Huntsville, Alabama. #spaceshuttle @rocketcenterusa @nasa #nasa #usspaceandrocketcenter #space #marshallspaceflightcenter #huntsvilleal (at U.S. Space & Rocket Center) https://www.instagram.com/p/B_9DbjPHTj4/?igshid=ihu7m7gkszlw

The Space Shuttle The Space Shuttle program, officially called the Space Transportation System (STS), was the United States government's manned launch vehicle program from 1981 to 2011. The four reusable orbiters were launched vertically, like conventional rockets, and then landed horizontally on a runway. The program became politically untenable after Challenger in 1986 and Columbia in 2003 were lost. The Space Shuttle was the first reusable spacecraft in history. It was designed to be launched vertically, then land horizontally on a runway. The Space Shuttle program was a major part of the United States' space exploration efforts. It began with the development of a space shuttle proposal in 1972, which was approved for production as part of an inter-agency program between NASA and the Department of Defense. The first test flight occurred in 1981 and its first operational flight was STS-5, which launched on November 11, 1982. After a series of delays due to both technical issues and external events like the 1986 Challenger Disaster and 2003 Columbia Accident, it flew on 135 missions from 1981 until its decommissioning in 2011; its final launch being STS-135 by Atlantis on July 8th 2010. In 2011, the United States' Space Shuttle was retired from service after 30 years of service. In the current era of spaceflight, the United States is planning for its next crewed spacecraft Orion and its primary launch vehicle SLS; their first flight is set for 2022 with no crew members onboard followed by a crewed flight in 2023. Orion has been under development since 2004. It was originally planned to be launched atop an Atlas V rocket but has since switched over to being launched by a new SLS rocket under development by NASA as part of its Space Launch System program. The first mission using this new vehicle will be Exploration Mission 1 (EM-1) which will send astronauts on a lunar flyby mission before returning them safely back home again via parachute landing system similar to what occurred during the Apollo era. #explorepage #sts #spaceshuttle #nasa #columbia #challenger #discovery #atlantis #endeavour #kennedyspacecenter #stemeducation https://www.instagram.com/p/CfwYMqPuUMc/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

Looking forward to the launch of Mars Rover, Perseverance! #nasa #nasasocial @nasajpl @nasa #mars #perseverance #space #planets https://www.instagram.com/p/CC_PU75HnCu/?igshid=1e9tvyopix5kz

Working with the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, I captured and processed the “Pillars of Creation” in the Eagle Nebula. It doesn’t quiet compare to the Hubble Space Telescope’s capture, but I’m proud of it. https://www.instagram.com/p/CDvPyrWDz-m/?igshid=1uyp3ajel3e1i

Having a little fun inspired by those old school READ posters. #astronomy #backyardastronomy #space https://www.instagram.com/p/CDVPhCdHp_Y/?igshid=1wubxh6imrtxd

The kids at the Lilburn Activities Building learned about the Space Shuttle and NASA's James Webb Space Telescope today!!! They got to see what a Space Shuttle cockpit looked like when it was in orbit. The kids examined a piece of a space flown shuttle tire, and acted out the duties of shuttle crew members. To top it off, the kids took home Space Shuttle gliders, along with shuttle and JWST coloring pages! Special thanks to former astronaut, Terry Virts, for recording my introduction! The kids loved hearing your insights! #explorepage #space #stemeducation #spaceshuttle #JamesWebbSpaceTelescope #solarsystemambassador (at Lilburn, Georgia) https://www.instagram.com/p/Cf9Xg3AujqY/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

On this date, in 1968, Apollo 6 launched as an unmanned test flight. The mission was plagued with trouble, including engine problems that caused a severe pogo effect that could have shaken the rocket apart. Overall, the mission was a “successful failure” because it led to important changes in the F-1 engines. Due to the tragic assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, there was almost no press coverage of this launch. The Apollo 6 CM now sits at the Fernbank Science Center (not to be confused with the Fernbank Museum of Natural History) in Atlanta Georgia. #nasa #apollo #space #atlanta #georgia #solarsystemambassador https://www.instagram.com/p/CNQYFrwDI8Q/?igshid=1t7n3j398zbtm

Navigating Deep Space by Starlight

On August 6, 1967, astrophysicist Jocelyn Bell Burnell noticed a blip in her radio telescope data. And then another. Eventually, Bell Burnell figured out that these blips, or pulses, were not from people or machines.

The blips were constant. There was something in space that was pulsing in a regular pattern, and Bell Burnell figured out that it was a pulsar: a rapidly spinning neutron star emitting beams of light. Neutron stars are superdense objects created when a massive star dies. Not only are they dense, but neutron stars can also spin really fast! Every star we observe spins, and due to a property called angular momentum, as a collapsing star gets smaller and denser, it spins faster. It’s like how ice skaters spin faster as they bring their arms closer to their bodies and make the space that they take up smaller.

The pulses of light coming from these whirling stars are like the beacons spinning at the tops of lighthouses that help sailors safely approach the shore. As the pulsar spins, beams of radio waves (and other types of light) are swept out into the universe with each turn. The light appears and disappears from our view each time the star rotates.

After decades of studying pulsars, astronomers wondered—could they serve as cosmic beacons to help future space explorers navigate the universe? To see if it could work, scientists needed to do some testing!

First, it was important to gather more data. NASA’s NICER, or Neutron star Interior Composition Explorer, is a telescope that was installed aboard the International Space Station in 2017. Its goal is to find out things about neutron stars like their sizes and densities, using an array of 56 special X-ray concentrators and sensitive detectors to capture and measure pulsars’ light.

But how can we use these X-ray pulses as navigational tools? Enter SEXTANT, or Station Explorer for X-ray Timing and Navigation Technology. If NICER was your phone, SEXTANT would be like an app on it.  

During the first few years of NICER’s observations, SEXTANT created an on-board navigation system using NICER’s pulsar data. It worked by measuring the consistent timing between each pulsar’s pulses to map a set of cosmic beacons.

When calculating position or location, extremely accurate timekeeping is essential. We usually rely on atomic clocks, which use the predictable fluctuations of atoms to tick away the seconds. These atomic clocks can be located on the ground or in space, like the ones on GPS satellites. However, our GPS system only works on or close to Earth, and onboard atomic clocks can be expensive and heavy. Using pulsar observations instead could give us free and reliable “clocks” for navigation. During its experiment, SEXTANT was able to successfully determine the space station’s orbital position!

We can calculate distances using the time taken for a signal to travel between two objects to determine a spacecraft’s approximate location relative to those objects. However, we would need to observe more pulsars to pinpoint a more exact location of a spacecraft. As SEXTANT gathered signals from multiple pulsars, it could more accurately derive its position in space.

So, imagine you are an astronaut on a lengthy journey to the outer solar system. You could use the technology developed by SEXTANT to help plot your course. Since pulsars are reliable and consistent in their spins, you wouldn’t need Wi-Fi or cell service to figure out where you were in relation to your destination. The pulsar-based navigation data could even help you figure out your ETA!

None of these missions or experiments would be possible without Jocelyn Bell Burnell’s keen eye for an odd spot in her radio data decades ago, which set the stage for the idea to use spinning neutron stars as a celestial GPS. Her contribution to the field of astrophysics laid the groundwork for research benefitting the people of the future, who yearn to sail amongst the stars.  

Keep up with the latest NICER news by following NASA Universe on X and Facebook and check out the mission’s website. For more on space navigation, follow @NASASCaN on X or visit NASA’s Space Communications and Navigation website.  

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