#01

The Russian research icebreaker Akademik Fedorov was frozen into the arctic ice last fall for a year long research mission studying the Arctic climate called MOSAiC. The plan was for crews to rotate through every 3-4 months but due to travel restrictions around the world, they seem to be stuck on the ice until around June. Many other research expeditions and fieldwork are also being canceled or rescheduled due to the pandemic. And in one of the more interesting side effects, the accuracy of weather forecasts could be diminished due to lack of air travel. It turns on that commercial flights actually collect a significant amount of data that is fed into weather models. 

#02

If you're stuck at home and not sure what to do with yourself, take these tips from scientists who have spent months in isolation ranging from antarctic research stations, space analog environments in Hawai'i, and of course, the space station itself. Among their advice: get a hobby ("In Antarctica, we spent months building a climbing wall. I improved my piano skills, learned how to build Roman armour out of plaster, how to speak French and Italian, and started writing a book"), get moving ("Yoga is a really good de-stressor"), and take it one thing at a time ("Try to appreciate the good things, compliment someone else, and remember that it will end").

#03

You can also use newfound free-time to make plans for cool things to do in the future. NOAA (the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) announced an fall 2020 expedition looking for useful industrial and medicinal drug compounds in an ancient submarine forest. There's a 60,000 year old cyprus forest buried in seafloor sediment off the coast of Alabama that is slowly being uncovered. The biologic potential of these ancient wooded structures is huge, "previous work by the research team on bacteria in shipworms has resulted in at least one antibiotic being under investigation as a drug to treat parasitic infections". And the team is going back to see what else can be learned from this unlikely source.

#04

Although many space missions around the world are on hold, work on NASA's next Mars rover Perseverance continues. A small plate was just installed on the back of the rover which shows a diagram of the Sun, Earth, and Mars, along with the words "explore as one" hidden in morse code. Along side this poetic diagram are the names of 11 million people microscopically etched into a chip. The rover will carry a helicopter to the surface of Mars, which recently completed a final spin test of it's rotors. It's critical to avoid delay at this point, because if Percy doesn't launch in July, it will be 18 months before the planets are once again favorably aligned.

As rovers continue to explore Mars, life found 300 feet below the ocean floor raises hopes that the red planet could still harbor  life somewhere under its surface. 

Elsewhere in the solar system, the European probe BepiColombo will swing by earth on April 10th for a gravity assist to put it on a circuitous trajectory through the inner solar system, eventually ending at Mercury. Its intuitive to think its more difficult to go away from the sun as towards it, but BepiColombo actually "takes more energy to enter orbit around Mercury than it would to get to Pluto" due to the immensity of the sun. Bepi-Colombo, launched in 2018, will require 1 flyby of earth, two of Venus, and 6 of Mercury before finally settling into orbit in 2025.

#05

NASA's recent call for astronauts has yielded 12,000 hopeful applicants for up to a dozen or so slots. This class will, "will help explore the moon and pave the way to Mars. They also could find themselves at the International Space Station, using new commercial capsules to get there."

Speaking of commercial capsules, if SpaceX gets their way, someday the company will launch 100 astronauts at a time on the massive Starship rocket. Interestingly, they just released a users manual for the mega-rocket, so now you can decide if the Starship will be right for your needs!

#06

Space telescopes like Hubble and James Webb tend to be learge and expensive. But a mission selected for development by NASA called SunRISE hopes to change that. SunRISE uses a constellation of six small CubeSats, each about the size of a toaster oven, to work together as a "vast, distributed radio telescope" and "collect radio images of low-frequency emissions caused by solar activity." The price tag you ask? $62.6 million. A fraction of the billions it takes to build a flagship class space telescope. (Also, I built hardware for a precursor mission to this one, so its great to see the technology get implemented elsewhere!)

#07

With all the doom and gloom in the world today, its nice to know there's still good new out there to be had. A new national park has opened in Afghanistan. The Bamyan Plateau Protected Area hosts rare species like the Persian leopard and ibex, will hopefully provide a tourism boost to the region, and critically, involved local inhabitants in developing the park for long term sustainability. The park is described as "a vast emptiness of gigantic and deep canyons, pristine rangeland, and rather intimidating dignified, old juniper trees." Sounds lovely!

A long-term effort to reforest abandoned coal mining land in Appalachia begins to take root. The effort is led by Patrick Angel who "is a gregarious, grizzled scientist who has made his career with the Office of Surface Mining Reclamation and Enforcement." After spending decades overseeing strip mining operations in the region, Angel is now responsible for "more than 187 million trees planted on about 275,000 acres of former mines, an area more than six times the size of the District of Columbia. This represents one of the most ambitious restoration efforts in one of the country’s most devastated places."

The Bookshelf

We know explorers most for their moments of glory, but many even have more success outside the public spotlight. The fourth person to walk on the moon, Alan Bean, is now a successful painter. Bill Anders, one of the first astronauts to orbit the moon on Apollo 8 and photographer of the iconic "Earthrise." went into business and eventually became the CEO of defense powerhouse General Dynamics. Bill Walsh, the first person to the bottom of the ocean, continued an illustrious navy career and considers his trip to the inky depths his 3rd greatest accomplishment. In No More Worlds to Conquer: Sixteen People Who Defined Their Time – And What They Did Next author Charles Wright Chronicles the lives of 16 people who were part of historical events focusing on what they did after they became famous. I appreciated the stories of not just the ones who continued with high octane careers, but also stories like that of the World Cup winning footballer who promptly became an undertaker. And if you're curious about Chuck Yeager, first man to break the sound barrier, yes, he does still fly F16's in his free time.

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This newsletter was produced as a private venture and not in the author's capacity as an employee of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory/California Institute of Technology or of Griffith Observatory. Any views and opinions expressed herein or on exploreandobserve.com are his own and not those of his employers.

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