Cozy Dark emerging technology began work in 2010 as a skunkworks-style engineering firm and is registered with CCR and NSPIRES.
Our early engineering & design efforts have focused on orbital debris solutions and electrodynamic tether technology.
Zach Urbina founded Cozy Dark with the cooperation of technical, research, and academic colleagues in the Southern California AeroAstro community.
We also have a growing library of space science talks featuring Apollo astronaut Buzz Aldrin, astrophysicist Sean Carroll and more.
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8 posts tagged astronauts
Designing the Interplanetary Web |
Reliable Internet access on the Moon, near Mars or for astronauts on a space station? How about controlling a planetary rover from a spacecraft in deep space? These are just some of the pioneering technologies that ESA is working on for future exploration missions.
What do observation or navigation satellites orbiting Earth have in common with astronauts sending images in real time from the International Space Station? They all need to send data back home. And the complexity of sharing information across space is set to grow.
In the future, rovers on Mars or inhabited bases on the Moon will be supported by orbiting satellite fleets providing data relay and navigation services. Astronauts will fly to asteroids, hundreds of millions of kilometres from Earth, and they’ll need to link up with other astronauts, control centres and sophisticated systems on their vessels.
All of these activities will need to be interconnected, networked and managed. continue reading
NASA astronaut Megan McArthur prepares to descend into the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft scheduled for launch on 30 April from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Megan was taking part in a crew equipment test.
![Orbiting Through a Geomagnetic Storm |
Glowing green and red, shimmering hypnotically across the night sky, the aurora borealis is a wonder to behold. Longtime sky watchers say it is the greatest show on Earth. [video]
It might be the greatest show in Earth orbit, too. High above our planet, astronauts onboard the International Space Station (ISS) have been enjoying an up-close view of auroras outside their windows as the ISS flys through geomagnetic storms.
“We can actually fly into the auroras,” says eye-witness Don Pettit, a Flight Engineer for ISS Expedition 30. “It’s like being shrunk down and put inside of a neon sign.”
Auroras are caused by solar activity. Gusts of solar wind and coronal mass ejections strike Earth’s magnetic field, rattling our planet’s protective shell of magnetism. This causes charged particles to rain down over the poles, lighting up the atmosphere where they hit. The physics is akin to what happens in the picture tube of a color TV.
Incoming particles are guided by Earth’s magnetic field to a pair of doughnut-shaped regions called “auroral ovals.” There’s one around the North Pole and one around the South. Sometimes, when solar activity is high, the ovals expand, and the space station orbits right through them. continue reading](http://24.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m12224DgdP1qb7n75o1_500.jpg)
Orbiting Through a Geomagnetic Storm |
Glowing green and red, shimmering hypnotically across the night sky, the aurora borealis is a wonder to behold. Longtime sky watchers say it is the greatest show on Earth. [video]
It might be the greatest show in Earth orbit, too. High above our planet, astronauts onboard the International Space Station (ISS) have been enjoying an up-close view of auroras outside their windows as the ISS flys through geomagnetic storms.
“We can actually fly into the auroras,” says eye-witness Don Pettit, a Flight Engineer for ISS Expedition 30. “It’s like being shrunk down and put inside of a neon sign.”
Auroras are caused by solar activity. Gusts of solar wind and coronal mass ejections strike Earth’s magnetic field, rattling our planet’s protective shell of magnetism. This causes charged particles to rain down over the poles, lighting up the atmosphere where they hit. The physics is akin to what happens in the picture tube of a color TV.
Incoming particles are guided by Earth’s magnetic field to a pair of doughnut-shaped regions called “auroral ovals.” There’s one around the North Pole and one around the South. Sometimes, when solar activity is high, the ovals expand, and the space station orbits right through them. continue reading
X-Rays Illuminate the Interior of the Moon |
Unlike Earth, our Moon has no active volcanoes, and the traces of its past volcanic activity date from billions of years ago. This is surprising because recent Moonquake data suggest that there is plenty of liquid magma deep within the Moon and part of the rocks residing there are thought to be molten. Scientists have now identified a likely reason for this peaceful surface life: the hot, molten rock in the Moon’s deep interior could be so dense that it is simply too heavy to rise to the surface like a bubble in water. For their experiments, the scientists produced microscopic copies of moon rock collected by the Apollo missions and melted them at the extremely high pressures and temperatures found inside the Moon. They then measured their densities with powerful X-ray beams. continue reading
Moon-Walk Mineral Discovered in Western Australia |
The last mineral thought to have been unique to the Moon has been discovered in the remote Pilbara region of Western Australia. It was identified by researchers at The University of Western Australia’s Centre for Microscopy, Characterisation and Analysis (CMCA).
Tranquillityite, named after the Sea of Tranquillity* where the Apollo 11 moon-walkers landed in July 1969, was tentatively identified by Professor Birger Rasmussen from Curtin University while studying a polished slice of earthly rock in a scanning electron microscope.
When lunar rocks were first analysed in the 1970s after having been brought to Earth by US astronauts Neil Armstrong, Edwin ‘Buzz’ Aldrin and Michael Collins, scientists identified three minerals — armalcolite (after Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins), pyroxferroite and tranquillityite — that they believed were unique to the Moon.
Armalcolite and pyroxferroite were later found on Earth, but when the CMCA’s Dr Janet Muhling and Assistant Professor Alexandra Suvorova and their colleagues from Curtin University, published a recent paper in the journal Geology, they showed for the first time that tranquillityite occurred also on Earth. continue reading
Dreams, Dragons, and Space Debris |
The astronauts on the International Space Station talked to reporters today about their mission so far, and what’s ahead. André Kuipers is on the left, Dan Burbank in the middle, and Don Pettit on the right.
Buzz Aldrin presents his Mars mission plan @ USC | 13 December 2011
Last night legendary astronaut Buzz Aldrin laid out his Mars mission plans amid current NASA politics. USC professor Madhu Thangavelu is seen and heard from, briefly, near the end.
// // “We are a group of professionals,” said Alan Poindexter, a NASA commander, during a visit to Tokyo, when asked about the consequences if astronauts boldly went where no others have been. “We treat each other with respect and we have a great working relationship. Personal relationships are not … an issue,” said a serious-faced Mr Poindexter. “We don’t have them and we won’t.” read moreInternational Space Station sex ban
Commanders do not allow sexual intercourse on the International Space Station, it has been disclosed.
