SPACE EXPLORATION COS 8 Identify technological advances and other benefits of space exploration. Listing highlights of space exploration, including satellites, manned moon missions, the unmanned Mars mission, and an inhabited space station Identifying Alabama’s contribution to the space industry

What is NASA, and What does it do?

NASA's mission is to pioneer the future in space exploration, scientific discovery, and aeronautics research.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower established the National Aeronautics & Space Administration in 1958.

President John F. Kennedy focused NASA and the nation on sending astronauts to the moon by the end of the 1960s.

The world’s first weather satellite, a polar-orbiting satellite, was launched from Cape Canaveral, Fla. on April 1, 1960. Named "TIROS" for Television Infrared Observation Satellite, it demonstrated the advantage of mapping the Earth’s cloud cover from satellite altitudes. http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov/topstory/20000330tiros_anniversary.html

On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first of 12 men to walk on the moon. http://spaceplace.nasa.gov/en/educators/images/moon/AldrinFlag.jpg

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/kennedy/shuttleoperations/orbiters/orbiterscol.html After Apollo, NASA focused on developing America's ready access to space: the space shuttle. First launched in 1981, the Space Shuttle has had 112 successful flights, though two crews have been lost.

In 1997, Mars Pathfinder became the first in a fleet of spacecraft that will explore Mars in the next decade, as we try to determine if life ever existed there. http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/missions/images/br_pathfinder.jpg

April 1, 2000, marks the anniversary of the launch of the world’s first weather satellite. http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov/topstory/20000330tiros_anniversary.html The images above show the stark contrast between the first image beamed down from TIROS-1 on April 1, 1960 and the full-color full-Earth images that GOES-8 produces every three hours. 

http://www.nasa.gov/missions/solarsystem/explore_main_old.html NASA's new spaceship is the key to making the Vision for Space Exploration a reality. The Vision, announced by President Bush in January 2004, will extend humanity's presence across the solar system, starting with a return to the moon by the end of the next decade, followed by journeys to Mars and beyond.

On May 5, 1994, President Bill Clinton decided to merge America's military and civil polar-orbiting operational meteorological satellite systems into a single, national system that could satisfy both civil and national security requirements for space-based environmental data. This system will be called the National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS).

Artists concept of NPOESS satellite The first converged satellite is expected to be available for launch in the latter half of the decade, approximately 2008. Artists concept of NPOESS satellite http://www.ipo.noaa.gov/

http://www.hoax-slayer.com/images/mars.jpg Mars is extremely far away. Missions to Mars must be launched in two year increments when Mars is the closest to the Earth. It usually takes from 6-12 months to travel to Mars. There are two main ways of getting to Mars.

http://library.thinkquest.org/11967/images/quickest.gif The first is to go directly, leaving Earth when the planets are closest to each other. The only problem with this approach is that it requires a huge amount of energy and money.

http://library.thinkquest.org/11967/images/minenergy.gif The second way results in a low cost mission that would use the least amount of energy, yet it would take a much longer time. For this mission, the crew would leave Earth and travel to Mars in the same manner as the quickest trip to Mars, but the crew would then stay on the surface for more than an Earth year which could be dangerous.

http://www.esa.int/esaHS/ESAH7O0VMOC_iss_0.html Our permanently inhabited Space Station in low Earth orbit is a cooperative program between Europe, the United States, Russia, Canada, and Japan.

http://www.uah.edu/ASGC/ The Alabama Space Grant Consortium includes seven universities, all with space - related research activities. NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center is also a member of the consortium. The consortium is housed in Huntsville, home to NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, making available NASA's technology to all Alabama institutions of higher education.

http://www.naida.com/site_pages/is_aerospace_defense.cfm More than 200 Aerospace and Defense companies are located in North Alabama. The Alabama Aerospace Industry Association links aerospace companies together across the state to collaborate and solve common problems.

Marshall Space Flight Center serves as NASA’s center for propulsion research including developing a new space launch vehicle for planned trips to the Moon and eventually Mars. http://www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall/images/content/100231main_a7-25-005_m.jpg

http://apod.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap010525.html NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center is located on Redstone Arsenal and is the birthplace of the nation’s space program and the Saturn V Rocket.

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall/images/content/100224main_9302295.jpg Engineers and scientists at the Marshall Space Flight Center use state-of-the-art equipment and facilities to accomplish our goal of leading the world in space transportation and microgravity research.

A pool of talented, highly educated, dedicated employees is at the heart of the Marshall Space Flight Center and is what makes it a world-class institution. http://www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall/images/content/100225main_9302295_m.jpg

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/marshall/images/content/100228main_9305956_m.jpg Here, an optics technician at the Marshall Center is framed by apparatus for testing a prototype nickel-plated mirror fabricated at Marshall and intended for studying emissions of x-ray energy from distant astronomical objects.