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This Week at NASA…

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October 7 is the launch date for SpaceX’s
Dragon spacecraft on the first commercial

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resupply mission to the International Space
Station.

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This will be the first of 12 contracted flights
by SpaceX to resupply the space station under

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the Commercial Resupply Services contract
and will restore an American capability to

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transport cargo to and from the orbiting laboratory.

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Dragon will be sent aloft from Cape Canaveral
Air Force Station in Florida by SpaceX’s

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Falcon 9 rocket.

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A back up launch opportunity is available
on Oct. 8.

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Hello, my name is Sanjeev Gupta and I am a
long term planner for the Mars Curiosity rover.

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This is your Curiosity rover update.

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We’ve now been on Mars for almost 2 months
and we have been witnessing the amazing new

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vistas of the never-before-seen Gale landscape
taken with our wonderful cameras.

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However, much of the science team have had
their eyes and the rover's eyes FIRMLY focused

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on the ground.

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Looking at the ground, the team have made
an interesting discovery.

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On the drive from the Bradbury landing site
to our current location we have been analyzing

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3 interesting outcrops that are called Goulburn,
Link, and Hottah.

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If we look at the Hottah outcrop, we can see
a distinct layer that has been tilted and

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eroded and this allows us to look at a cross-section
through the layer.

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When we looked at the layer with our high-resolution
Mastcam camera we found that it was comprised

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of sand grains and small pebbles that had
become cemented to form a hard layer.

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Here you can see a pebble that is 3 cm in
diameter so smaller than a ping pong ball.

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This suggests that this layer is an ancient
gravel deposit.

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The surprising thing is that when we looked
at the pebbles closely, we discovered that

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many of them were quite well rounded.

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This is very different to the many angular
clasts that litter the surface.

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Here, you can see a rounded pebble from a
riverbed on Earth.

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On Earth rounded pebbles are a common tell
tale sign of rocks that have been transported

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by water, for example in a river or stream.

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As water flows over a riverbed, if the flow
strength is great enough, the pebbles are

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lifted up into the flow or rolled along the
riverbed and they become pounded or battered

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against each other and this causes them to
become rounded through time.

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The size of the pebbles tells us that these
rocks could not have been transported by wind

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action so it seems clear that they must have
been transported by water.

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So how did this pebble deposit get to be here?

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If we look more broadly in Gale Crater, we
can see that there is a prominent feature

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that geologists call an alluvial fan.

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Alluvial fans are cone-shaped deposits of
gravel and sand that accumulate where streams

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exit mountains.

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In Gale crater, there is a 10 km long fan
formed at the mouth of 30 m deep canyon that

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is derived from the crater rim.

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On the fan itself we can see evidence for
multiple channels suggesting that the streambed

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direction changed through time.

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When we look at the location of the Curiosity
landing site with respect to the alluvial

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fan we can see that the rover landed downstream
of the fan.

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The rounded pebbles likely represent long
distance transport down the alluvial fan.

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So this is really exciting news for the science
team because this is the first time we’re

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seeing gravel transported by water on the
surface of Mars.

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This has been another exhilarating week for
Curiosity on Mars and for the scientists here

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in Pasadena.

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This has been your Curiosity rover report.

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Check back for more updates.

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The next crew slated to live aboard the International
Space Station continues to ready itself for

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the mission.

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Expedition 33/34 Soyuz Commander Oleg Novitskiy
of the Russian Federal Space Agency, NASA

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Flight Engineer Kevin Ford and Russian Flight
Engineer Evgeny Tarelkin took a break from

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training to field questions from the news
media at the Gargarin Cosmonaut Training Center

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in Star City, Russia.

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They also participated in traditional ceremonies
in Moscow’s Red Square.

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The trio will ride a Soyuz spacecraft to the
ISS in mid-October, where they’ll join Expedition

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33 Commander Suni Williams of NASA, Flight
Engineer Aki Hoshide of the Japan Aerospace

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Exploration Agency and Russian Flight Engineer
Yuri Malenchenko.

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Space shuttle Endeavour is back on the ground
following its removal from NASA 905, the Shuttle

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Carrier Aircraft that transported Endeavour
from Kennedy Space Center to Los Angeles International

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Airport (LAX).

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Following its “demating” from the modified
747, Endeavour was moved into a United Airlines

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hangar, where it will be prepped for its two-day
journey through the streets of Inglewood and

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Los Angeles to its new home at the California
Science Center.

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Endeavour, the youngest of NASA’s five space
shuttles, was rolled out of the Palmdale,

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California Assembly plant in April 1991, and
flew the first of its 25 missions the next

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year.

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Astronomers compiled 10 years worth of photographs
taken by NASA's Hubble Space Telescope to

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make the Extreme Deep Field or XDF, the deepest
image ever taken of our universe.

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It builds on the work done in the 2003 timeframe
when the Ultra Deep Field image revealed distant

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galaxies that offer clues into the earliest
times of the universe.

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The XDF, is a small patch of the sky that
reveals about 5000 galaxies but is only a

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fraction of the entire universe.

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It gives us a glimpse of galaxies about 450
million years after the Big Bang.

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The Goddard Space Flight Center recently took
delivery of the first two of 18 beryllium

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primary mirror segments for NASA’s James
Webb Space Telescope.

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Ball Aerospace in Boulder, Colorado, shipped
the two mirrors in custom containers.

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The remaining 16 mirrors will likewise make
their way from Boulder to Goddard over the

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next 12 months and will be integrated into
the telescope in 2015.

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The Webb, NASA’s next Great Observatory,
is on track for launch in October 2018.

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This artist’s illustration, based in part
on data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory,

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indicates that our Milky Way Galaxy is surrounded
by an enormous halo of hot gas.

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Extending hundreds of thousands of light years,
this hot-gas halo has a mass comparable to

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that of all the stars in the Milky Way, and
a temperature much hotter than previously

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believed.

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The illustration shows the halo in blue, along
with the Milky Way and two neighboring galaxies,

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the Small and Large Magellanic Clouds.

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“And welcome to the Kennedy Space Center’s
50th Anniversary Gala.”

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The Kennedy Space Center and the National
Space Club Florida Committee marked KSC’s

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fiftieth anniversary with a gala in the Visitor
Complex’s Apollo/Saturn V Center.

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With “Celebrating the Past and Preparing
for the Future” as their theme, some 650

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current and former NASA employees, dignitaries
and guests noted Kennedy’s achievements

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of the last five decades while discussing
the center’s next chapter as a hub of commercial

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spaceflight.

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“The Kennedy Space Center is synonymous
with humankind’s greatest achievements in

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exploration of the Universe.

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Kennedy and its adjacent Cape Canaveral sites
were the launch pads for Alan Shepard’s

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first flight, John Glenn’s first orbit of
Earth and Neil Armstrong’s first small step.”

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“Throughout those 50 years there’s been
on common theme, and that’s an insatiable

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desire to explore, to send humans and robotic
spacecraft beyond the confines of our home

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planet.”

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More than 1,700 people got an inside peek
at the programs and projects at Marshall Space

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Flight Center during its Innovation & Technology
Day.

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The event included a technology expo with
more than 70 booths of interactive displays,

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exhibits and demonstrations showcasing the
latest trends and initiatives in the areas

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of information technology, engineering, science
programs and projects.

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Innovation & Technology Day was hosted by
Marshall’s Chief Information Officer and

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the Office of Strategic Analysis & Communications.

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The moon took center stage for stargazers
around the world during International Observe

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the Moon Night.

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Ames was one of the NASA Centers hosting events.

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Astronomers with NASA's Lunar Science Institute
held discussions and presentations while amateur

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astronomers and astronomy clubs set up telescopes
for public viewing.

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The moon appeared as “half-full” in what
is known as a “first quarter” moon, which

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is ideal for viewing.

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Sputnik 1, the first artificial Earth satellite
was launched into an elliptical low Earth

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orbit by the Soviet Union fifty-five years
ago on October 4, 1957.

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The surprise launch precipitated the American
Sputnik crisis, began the Space Age and triggered

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the Space Race, a part of the larger Cold
War.

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Sputnik was also scientifically valuable.

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The density of the upper atmosphere could
be deduced from its drag on the orbit, and

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its radio signals, monitored by amateur radio
operators worldwide, gave information about

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the ionosphere.

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After about 37 million miles and 3 months
in orbit Sputnik 1 fell back to Earth and

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burned up in the atmosphere on January 4,
1958.

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“Liftoff the clock has started.”

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Fifty years ago on October 3, 1962 NASA Astronaut
Wally Schirra orbited the Earth six times

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in the Sigma 7 spacecraft.

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The Mercury-Atlas 8 (MA-8) mission was the
fifth United States manned space mission.

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The nine-hour flight focused mainly on technical
evaluation and was the longest U.S. manned

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orbital flight to date in the Space Race.

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The flight confirmed the Mercury spacecraft's
durability ahead of Gordon Cooper’s one-day

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Mercury-Atlas 9 mission the next year.

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Langley Research Center Director Lesa Roe
accepted a “Bridge Builder” award on behalf

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of NASA during the Virginia Hispanic Chamber
of Commerce’s annual Hispanic Gala.

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The award recognizes Langley’s efforts to
improve the connection between the Hispanic

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community and the community at large and its
contributions to inspire Hispanic youth via

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STEM educational outreach efforts in Virginia
and throughout the country.

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Also presented with a Bridge Builder award
was Secretary of Labor, Hilda Solis, who is

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the first Hispanic woman to serve as a United
States Cabinet member.

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“No matter where you come from, no matter
what zip code, no matter what side of the

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aisle or even railroad – what side of the
tracks you were born on.

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There are great possibilities in this country.”

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And that’s This Week @NASA.

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