Posts by kmcaleer
Berkeley News: When is an aurora not an aurora?
Phenomena called “Steve” and “picket fence” are masquerading as auroras, graduate student argues. Claire Gasque, a University of California, Berkeley, graduate student in physics, has now proposed a physical explanation for these phenomena that is totally different from the processes responsible for the well-known auroras. She has teamed up with researchers at the campus’s Space Sciences Laboratory (SSL) to propose that NASA launch a rocket into the heart of the aurora to find out if she’s correct.
Read MoreMemorial spaceflight for Mike Lampton
Celestis is a company that conducts memorial spaceflights, launching spacecraft to, and returning from, space in order to honor and remember lives dedicated to exploration, adventure and humanity’s presence among the stars. It’s a fitting journey for SSL’s Mike Lampton: scientist, astronaut, inventor, entrepreneur, and beloved husband and father. Mike passed away in June after…
Read MoreNASA will launch a Mars mission on Blue Origin’s first New Glenn rocket
NASA is aware of the risk of launching a real science mission on the first flight of a new rocket. But this mission, known by the acronym ESCAPADE, is relatively low cost. The Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers mission has a budget of approximately $79 million, significantly less than any mission NASA has sent to Mars in recent history.
Read MoreSSL will have a booth at AGU
For the first time, SSL will have its own booth at the Fall American Geophysical Union (AGU) Meeting, from Monday, December 11, through Thursday, December 14, at the Moscone Center. AGU is expected to have more than 25,000 attendees from over one hundred countries and the theme is Wide Open Science. SSL scientists will be…
Read MoreBusiness Wire: Rocket Lab Integrating Twin Spacecraft for Mission to Mars for NASA
LONG BEACH, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–Rocket Lab USA, Inc. (Nasdaq: RKLB) (“Rocket Lab” or “the Company”), a global leader in launch services and space systems, today announced that the two spacecraft the Company is building for NASA’s Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers (ESCAPADE) mission have entered the system integration phase in preparation for a planned…
Read MoreNASA’s OSIRIS-REx to bring samples of asteroid Bennu to Earth: What to know
NASA is receiving its first long-awaited sample from an asteroid. OSIRIS-REx visited and collected samples from 101955 Bennu, a carbonaceous near-Earth asteroid. The sample’s return yesterday concludes a seven-year mission, and the contents will be studied by scientists worldwide. SSL research scientist Zack Gainsforth, interviewed by Al Jazeera English for this video, compares the magnitude…
Read MoreEnduroSat Partners with SSL/UCB and NASA to Launch PADRE Mission to Study the Sun
EnduroSat, the Space Sciences Laboratory at UC Berkeley, and NASA have partnered to launch the PADRE mission, a CubeSat that will study the Sun in hard X-rays. The mission is scheduled to launch in 2025 and will help scientists to better understand solar activity, solar flares, and space weather.The PADRE science instruments will be hosted…
Read MoreSSL Mourns the Passing of Dr. Michael Logan Lampton (1941-2023) – Join us for a celebration of life 8/26/23
Michael Logan Lampton, University of California Berkeley scientist, astronaut, inventor, entrepreneur, and beloved husband and father, passed away surrounded by loved ones on June 9, 2023 in Oakland, CA at the age of 82 years old. He is survived by his wife, Susan Lea, and daughter Jennifer Lea (Nathan) Lampton.
Join us for a celebration of life August 26th, 2023 3pm.
Read MoreBale unfazed by “internet apocalypse”
In an article on June 28th, the Washington Post tried to allay recent concerns—hyped on social media—about the impact of future solar storms. A typical scary narrative foretells “magnetic fields unleashed by a solar superstorm rip through Earth’s magnetosphere, sending currents surging through human infrastructure…We look up from our phones and computers to catch a…
Read MoreNew SSL Undergraduate Engagement Group and Recent Activities/Achievements
“The University’s fundamental missions are teaching, research and public service” (source: UCOP). Although SSL excels at research, and through those discoveries, public service to a large degree, SSL’s role in and greater potential for contributing to the mission of teaching has been somewhat underappreciated on campus and beyond. But over the last year or so,…
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