Tag: JAXA

JAXA, Sony CSL to Conduct In-Orbit Demonstrations of Long-Distance Laser Communication Using ISS Kibo Module

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Figure 1: SOLISS system flight model (Credit: JAXA/Sony CSL)

TOKYO (JAXA PR) — The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA, President: Hiroshi Yamakawa) and Sony Computer Science Laboratories, Inc. (Sony CSL, President and CEO: Hiroaki Kitano) have announced their plans to conduct in-orbit demonstrations of the long-distance laser communication system, which they have jointly developed with the aim of establishing a real-time, mass-data communication system for future inter-satellite communications and communications with ground stations.

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Hayabusa2’s MASCOT Lander Confirms What Scientists Have Long Suspected at Asteroid Ryugu

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Close-up of the rock examined by MASCOT. The yellow arrow shows the direction of the incident light, and the dotted line separates the observed stone from the background. The red arrow shows the part of the rock where the radiometer MARA measured the surface temperature, the dotted line here shows a ledge. The scale in the center of the image shows the dimensions at this distance from the camera. The image was acquired by the DLR camera MASCAM on MASCOT. (Credit: MASCOT/DLR/JAXA)

COLOGNE, Germany (DLR) PR) — Ryugu and other asteroids of the common ‘C-class’ consist of more porous material than was previously thought. Small fragments of their material are therefore too fragile to survive entry into the atmosphere in the event of a collision with Earth.

This has revealed the long-suspected cause of the deficit of this meteorite type in finds on Earth. Researchers at the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR) have come to this conclusion in a scientific paper published in the journal Nature Astronomy.

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Images From Hayabusa2’s Second Landing on Asteroid Ryugu

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Asteroid Ryugu with north polar boulder (Credit: JAXA, University of Tokyo, Kochi University, Rikkyo University, Nagoya University, Chiba Institute of Technology, Meiji University, University of Aizu and AIST)

TOKYO (JAXA PR) — Today (July 11), the Hayabusa2 spacecraft performed a second touchdown on the surface of asteroid Ryugu. The touchdown occurred at 10:06 JST at the on board time and was successful.

From the data sent from Hayabusa2, it has been confirmed that the touchdown sequence, including the discharge of a projectile for sampling, was completed successfully. Hayabusa2 is functioning normally, and thus the second touchdown ended with success.

Below we show images taken before and after the touchdown. As this is a quick bulletin, more detailed information will be given in the future.

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JAXA, CNES to Cooperate on Hayabusa2 Sample Analysis, Martian Moons Mission

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Asteroid Ryugu with north polar boulder (Credit: JAXA, University of Tokyo, Kochi University, Rikkyo University, Nagoya University, Chiba Institute of Technology, Meiji University, University of Aizu and AIST)

TOKYO (JAXA PR) — The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency [JAXA] has agreed to cooperate with Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES) on the study-phase activities in JAXA’s Martian Moons eXploration (MMX) mission and analysis of Hayabusa2-returned samples.

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Hayabusa2 Team Mulls Second Touchdown on Asteroid Ryugu

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Figure 1: Image taken on June 13, 2019 during the operation PPTD-TM1B. This is a composite of 28 images taken at 7 second intervals starting from 10:58 JST (upper left) to 11:01 (lower right) using the Optical Navigation Camera – Telescopic (ONC-T). The image altitude is about 52m at the start and 108m at the end. The white point in the upper-left center is the target marker. You can see that detailed images have been acquired continuously from the target marker to the edge of the artificial crater, located in the lower-right of the image. (Image credit: JAXA, Chiba Institute of Technology, University of Tokyo, Kochi University, Rikkyo University, Nagoya University, Meiji University, University of Aizu, AIST)

TOKYO (JAXA PR) — Our first touchdown took place this year on February 22. Then as a new challenge for the Hayabusa2 Project, we succeeded in creating an artificial crater using the Small Carry-on Impactor (SCI) on April 5.

The last big operation left at asteroid Ryugu is the collection of subsurface material exposed with the creation of the artificial crater. In order to collect this material, we need a second touchdown for which the project has been steadily preparing. At this point, it has not yet been decided whether or not to go ahead with a second touchdown, but here we will introduce our preparations in the “Approach to the second touchdown”.

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KiboCUBE: Team from the Republic of Moldova Selected for Fourth Round

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TUMnanoSAT (Credit; JAXA)

TOKYO (JAXA PR) — The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) and the United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA) have been cooperating under the KiboCUBE programme launched in 2015 to provide opportunities to deploy CubeSats from the Japanese Experiment Module “Kibo” of the International Space Station (ISS).

JAXA and OOSA have selected a team from the National Center of Space Technologies of the Technical University of Moldova for the fourth round of KiboCUBE, which called for applications from October 1, 2018 to February 28, 2019. (Reference 1).

KiboCUBE contributes to the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), especially Goal 4 “Quality Education” and Goal 9 “Industry, Innovation, and Infrastructure,” and this programme aims to contribute to the enhancement of space related technology in developing countries. Last year, JAXA and OOSA have agreed to extend the KiboCUBE programme, and we are welcoming many applications for the current fifth round of KiboCUBE. (Reference 2).

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JAXA, AIST Paving Way for Fabricating Integrated Circuits in Space

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Fig. 1: Traditional Mega Fab and Minimal Fab (Credit: JAXA)

Highlights

  • Japan Aerospace eXploration Agency (JAXA) is aiming to produce integrated circuits (ICs) for space applications with a small-volume production system (Minimal Fab) (Figure 1). Using a practical SOI-CMOS with two-layer aluminum wiring process, Technology 2018, developed by National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) (Figure 2), JAXA has designed an IC which contains around 1000 transistors (4bit shift resistor and an I/O circuit) and manufactured a prototype chip (Figure 3) whose operations has been demonstrated successfully (Figure 4).
  • AIST has built a fully automatic Minimal Fab system, which enables a circuit designer to manufacture a semiconductor device on his own by operating a series of manufacturing equipment. Maneuvered by a JAXA circuit engineer, the new system has proven itself and produced the above ICs.
  • These prototyping and operational demonstration have opened the way to manufacturing electronic devices aboard spacecraft with a Minimal Fab process, which is expected to broaden the applications of the new process.

TOKYO (JAXA PR) — JAXA and AIST have been conducting a joint research project concerning the applications of a small-volume production system (Minimal Fab) (Figure 1) to aerospace research and development applications, and have demonstrated for the first time in the world that the new system can realize ICs intended for use in space.

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Sierra Nevada to Provide Hardware for Japanese HTV-X ISS Missions

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HTV-6 cargo ship approaches the International Space Station. (Credit: NASA)

SPARKS, Nev., May 31, 2019 (SNC PR) –Sierra Nevada Corporation (SNC), the global aerospace and national security contractor owned by SNC CEO Fatih Ozmen and Chairwoman and President Eren Ozmen, teamed with the Marubun Corporation of Tokyo, Japan and has been awarded a contract to supply critical hardware for Japan’s HTV-X cargo spacecraft.

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Hayabusa2 Program Wins Two Prestigious Awards

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The award for Hayabusa2. Project Manager Tsuda (far left) received the award. (Credit: Hayabusa2 Project)

TOKYO (JAXA PR) — The Hayabusa2 Project has received awards from the Aviation Week Network and the Japan Society for Aeronautical and Space Sciences.

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Ryugu’s Fast-spinning Past Shaped the Asteroid’s Western Hemisphere

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Figure 1: When viewed from a certain direction (90 degrees west), the angle of the equatorial ridge on Ryugu becomes very sharp. This feature is also discussed in the paper led by Sei’ichiro Watanabe. (Hirabayashi, M.+, 2019)

TOKYO (JAXA PR) — The Astrophysical Journal Letters is an academic journal for research results in astronomy and astrophysics published in the United States. Our paper on the shape of asteroid Ryugu was recently included in the journal (publication date: March 26, 2019) entitled:

Hirabayashi, M., and 28 colleagues, “The western bulge of 162173 Ryugu formed as a result of a rotationally driven deformation process,” The Astrophysical Journal Letters, 2019, 874, 1, doi:10.3847/2041-8213/ab0e8b .
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.3847/2041-8213/ab0e8b

In this article, we will highlight our main findings from this research.

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Earth vs. Asteroids: Humans Strike Back

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SCI impactor on way to Ryugu asteroid (Credit: JAXA/The University of Tokyo/Kochi University/Rikkyo University/Nagoya University/Chiba Institute of Technology/Meiji University/The University of Aizu/AIST)

PARIS (ESA PR) — Incoming asteroids have been scarring our home planet for billions of years. This month humankind left our own mark on an asteroid for the first time: Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft dropped a copper projectile at very high speed in an attempt to form a crater on asteroid Ryugu. A much bigger asteroid impact is planned for the coming decade, involving an international double-spacecraft mission.

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JAXA Confirms Creation of Artificial Crater on Asteroid Ryugu

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These images were captured by the Optical Navigation Camera – Telescopic onboard Hayabusa2. By comparing the two images, we have confirmed that an artificial crater was created in the area surrounded by dotted lines. The size and depth of the crater are now under analysis. (Credit: JAXA, The University of Tokyo, Kochi University, Rikkyo University, Nagoya University, Chiba Institute of Technology, Meiji University, The University of Aizu, AIST)

TOKYO (JAXA PR) — Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) separated the SCI (Small Carry-on Impactor), which had been onboard the asteroid explorer Hayabusa2, on April 5, 2019, for deployment to Ryugu, and then put the SCI into operation.

As a result of checking the images captured by the Optical Navigation Camera – Telescopic (ONC-T) onboard the asteroid explorer Hayabusa2, we have concluded that a crater was created by the SCI.

Hayabusa2 is operating normally.











Hayabusa2 Images Artificial Crater on Asteroid Ryugu

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