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By NASA
NASA astronaut Andre Douglas poses for a portrait at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston.Credits: NASA/Josh Valcarcel NASA has selected astronaut Andre Douglas as its backup crew member for the agency’s Artemis II test flight, the first crewed mission under NASA’s Artemis campaign.
Douglas will train alongside NASA astronauts Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, and Christina Koch, and Canadian Space Agency (CSA) astronaut Jeremy Hansen.
In the event a NASA astronaut is unable to take part in the flight, Douglas would join the Artemis II crew.
“Andre’s educational background and extensive operational experience in his various jobs prior to joining NASA are clear evidence of his readiness to support this mission,” said Joe Acaba, chief astronaut at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. “He excelled in his astronaut candidate training and technical assignments, and we are confident he will continue to do so as NASA’s backup crew member for Artemis II.”
The CSA announced Jenni Gibbons as its backup crew member in November 2023. Gibbons would step into the mission to represent Canada should Hansen not be available.
“Canada’s seat on the historic Artemis II flight is a direct result of our contribution of Canadarm3 to the lunar Gateway. Jenni Gibbons’ assignment as backup is of utmost importance for our country,” said CSA President Lisa Campbell. “Since being recruited, Jenni has distinguished herself repeatedly through her work with NASA and the CSA. She is also a tremendous role model for Canada’s future scientists, engineers, and explorers.”
The selection of Douglas and Gibbons as backup crew members for Artemis II is independent of the selection of crew members for Artemis III. NASA has not yet selected crew members for Artemis flights beyond Artemis II. All active NASA astronauts are eligible for assignment to any human spaceflight mission.
The approximately 10-day Artemis II test flight will launch on the agency’s powerful SLS (Space Launch System) rocket, prove the Orion spacecraft’s life-support systems, and validate the capabilities and techniques needed for humans to live and work in deep space.
More on Artemis II backup crew
Douglas graduated from NASA’s astronaut candidate training program in March 2024. He is a Virginia native and earned a bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from the U.S. Coast Guard Academy in New London, Connecticut, as well as four post-graduate degrees from various institutions, including a doctorate in Systems Engineering from George Washington University in Washington. Douglas served in the U.S. Coast Guard as a naval architect, salvage engineer, damage control assistant, and officer of the deck. He also worked as a staff member at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland, working on maritime robotics, planetary defense, and space exploration missions for NASA. Douglas participated in the Joint EVA and Human Surface Mobility Test Team 5, working with a specialized group that develops, integrates, and executes human-in-the-loop tests, analog missions, and Moonwalks. Most recently, Douglas worked with teams on the development of the lunar terrain vehicle, pressurized rover, lunar Gateway and lunar spacesuit.
Gibbons was recruited as a CSA astronaut in 2017 and completed her basic training in 2020. Since then, Gibbons has continued to serve Canada’s space program and has worked in different positions, including Mission Control as a capsule communicator (CAPCOM) during spacewalks, and commercial spacecraft and daily International Space Station operations. Gibbons holds an honors bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from McGill University in Montreal. While at McGill, she conducted research on flame propagation in microgravity in collaboration with CSA and Canada’s National Research Council Flight Research Laboratory in Ontario. She holds a doctorate in engineering from Jesus College at the University of Cambridge, England.
Under NASA’s Artemis campaign, the agency is establishing the foundation for long-term scientific exploration at the Moon, land the first woman, first person of color, and its first international partner astronaut on the lunar surface, and prepare for human expeditions to Mars for the benefit of all.
Learn more about NASA’s Artemis campaign at:
https://www.nasa.gov/artemis
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Last Updated Jul 03, 2024 LocationNASA Headquarters Related Terms
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By NASA
6 Min Read First of Its Kind Detection Made in Striking New Webb Image
The Serpens Nebula from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope. Alignment of bipolar jets confirms star formation theories
For the first time, a phenomenon astronomers have long hoped to directly image has been captured by NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope’s Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam). In this stunning image of the Serpens Nebula, the discovery lies in the northern area (seen at the upper left) of this young, nearby star-forming region.
Astronomers found an intriguing group of protostellar outflows, formed when jets of gas spewing from newborn stars collide with nearby gas and dust at high speeds. Typically these objects have varied orientations within one region. Here, however, they are slanted in the same direction, to the same degree, like sleet pouring down during a storm.
Image: Serpens Nebula (NIRCam)
In this image of the Serpens Nebula from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope, astronomers found a grouping of aligned protostellar outflows within one small region (the top left corner). Serpens is a reflection nebula, which means it’s a cloud of gas and dust that does not create its own light, but instead shines by reflecting the light from stars close to or within the nebula. The discovery of these aligned objects, made possible due to Webb’s exquisite spatial resolution and sensitivity in near-infrared wavelengths, is providing information into the fundamentals of how stars are born.
“Astronomers have long assumed that as clouds collapse to form stars, the stars will tend to spin in the same direction,” said principal investigator Klaus Pontoppidan, of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California. “However, this has not been seen so directly before. These aligned, elongated structures are a historical record of the fundamental way that stars are born.”
So just how does the alignment of the stellar jets relate to the rotation of the star? As an interstellar gas cloud crashes in on itself to form a star, it spins more rapidly. The only way for the gas to continue moving inward is for some of the spin (known as angular momentum) to be removed. A disk of material forms around the young star to transport material down, like a whirlpool around a drain. The swirling magnetic fields in the inner disk launch some of the material into twin jets that shoot outward in opposite directions, perpendicular to the disk of material.
In the Webb image, these jets are signified by bright clumpy streaks that appear red, which are shockwaves from the jet hitting surrounding gas and dust. Here, the red color represents the presence of molecular hydrogen and carbon monoxide.
“This area of the Serpens Nebula – Serpens North – only comes into clear view with Webb,” said lead author Joel Green of the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore. “We’re now able to catch these extremely young stars and their outflows, some of which previously appeared as just blobs or were completely invisible in optical wavelengths because of the thick dust surrounding them.”
Astronomers say there are a few forces that potentially can shift the direction of the outflows during this period of a young star’s life. One way is when binary stars spin around each other and wobble in orientation, twisting the direction of the outflows over time.
Stars of the Serpens
The Serpens Nebula, located 1,300 light-years from Earth, is only one or two million years old, which is very young in cosmic terms. It’s also home to a particularly dense cluster of newly forming stars (~100,000 years old), seen at the center of this image. Some of these stars will eventually grow to the mass of our Sun.
“Webb is a young stellar object-finding machine,” Green said. “In this field, we pick up sign posts of every single young star, down to the lowest mass stars.”
“It’s a very complete picture we’re seeing now,” added Pontoppidan.
So, throughout the region in this image, filaments and wisps of different hues represent reflected starlight from still-forming protostars within the cloud. In some areas, there is dust in front of that reflection, which appears here with an orange, diffuse shade.
This region has been home to other coincidental discoveries, including the flapping “Bat Shadow,” which earned its name when 2020 data from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope revealed a star’s planet-forming disk to flap, or shift. This feature is visible at the center of the Webb image.
Future Studies
The new image, and serendipitous discovery of the aligned objects, is actually just the first step in this scientific program. The team will now use Webb’s NIRSpec (Near-Infrared Spectrograph) to investigate the chemical make-up of the cloud.
The astronomers are interested in determining how volatile chemicals survive star and planet formation. Volatiles are compounds that sublimate, or transition from a solid directly to a gas, at a relatively low temperature – including water and carbon monoxide. They’ll then compare their findings to amounts found in protoplanetary disks of similar-type stars.
“At the most basic form, we are all made of matter that came from these volatiles. The majority of water here on Earth originated when the Sun was an infant protostar billions of years ago,” Pontoppidan said. “Looking at the abundance of these critical compounds in protostars just before their protoplanetary disks have formed could help us understand how unique the circumstances were when our own solar system formed.”
These observations were taken as part of General Observer program 1611. The team’s initial results have been accepted in the Astrophysical Journal.
The James Webb Space Telescope is the world’s premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and CSA (Canadian Space Agency).
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Science Paper: The science paper by J. Green et al., PDF (7.93 MB)
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Laura Betz – laura.e.betz@nasa.gov, Rob Gutro – rob.gutro@nasa.gov
NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.
Hanna Braun hbraun@stsci.edu Christine Pulliam – cpulliam@stsci.edu
Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md.
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Last Updated Jun 20, 2024 Editor Stephen Sabia Contact Laura Betz laura.e.betz@nasa.gov Related Terms
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By NASA
From the left, NASA Kennedy Space Center’s, Maui Dalton, project manager, engineering; Katherine Zeringue, cultural resources manager; Janet Petro, NASA Kennedy Space Center director; and Ismael Otero, project manager, engineering, unveil a large bronze historical marker plaque at the location of NASA Kennedy’s original headquarters building on Tuesday, May 28, 2024. Approved in April 2023 as part of the State of Florida’s Historical Markers program in celebration of National Historic Preservation Month, the marker commemorates the early days of space exploration and is displayed permanently just west of the seven-story, 200,000 square foot Central Campus Headquarters Building, which replaced the old building in 2019.Photo credit:: NASA/Mike Chambers Current and former employees of NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida gathered recently to celebrate the installation of a Florida Historical Marker cast in bronze at the location of the spaceport’s old headquarters building.
The first of its kind inside the center’s secure area, the marker is the latest example of the center’s commitment to remembering its rich history as it continues to launch humanity’s future.
At the forefront of NASA Kennedy’s commitment to preservation is Katherine Zeringue, who serves as cultural resources manager, overseeing the center’s historic resources from buildings to historic districts to archaeological sites.
“Traditional approaches attempt to preserve things to a specific time period, including historic materials,” Zeringue said. “But that’s a challenge here because we still actively use our historic assets, which need to be modified to accommodate new missions and new spacecraft. Therefore, we rely on an adaptive reuse approach, in which the active use of a historic property helps to ensure its preservation.”
Many iconic structures are still in service at NASA Kennedy, like the Beach House where Apollo astronauts congregated with their families, the Vehicle Assembly Building where NASA rockets are still stacked, the Launch Control Center, and Launch Complex 39A. All told, 83 buildings, seven historic districts, and one National Historic Landmark are either listed or are eligible for listing on the National Register of Historic Places.
To conserve these resources, the spaceport follows a variety of federal laws, regulations, and executive orders, including the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966. This includes making a reasonable and good faith effort to identify any historic properties under its care and considering how its decisions affect historic properties.
“The Cultural Resources Management Program aims to balance historic preservation considerations with the agency’s mission and mandate to ensure reliable access to space for government and commercial payloads,” Zeringue said. “Finding that proper balance is challenging in the dynamic environment of our spaceport.”
Perhaps no other location embodies the center’s commitment to the past and the future more than Launch Complex 39A. Created in 1965, the launch complex was initially designed to support the Saturn V rocket, which powered the agency’s Apollo Program as it made numerous trips to the Moon. Outside of launching Skylab in 1973, the pad stood unused following Apollo’s end in 1972 until the agency’s Space Shuttle Program debuted in 1981. The transition from Apollo to space shuttle saw Launch Complex 39A transform from support of a single-use rocket to supporting the nation’s first reusable space launch and landing system.
By the time the program ended in 2011, 135 space shuttle launches had taken place within Kennedy’s boundary, 82 of which were at Launch Complex 39A. Many of those were among the program’s most notable, including the flights of astronauts Sally Ride, NASA’s first woman in space, and Guion Bluford, NASA’s first Black astronaut in space, as well as the first flight to the newly created International Space Station in 1998.
The launch complex began another transformation in 2014 when NASA signed a 20-year lease agreement with SpaceX as part of Kennedy’s transformation into a multi-user spaceport. SpaceX reconfigured Launch Complex 39A to support its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets, which today launch robotic science missions and other government and commercial payloads, as well as crew and cargo to the space station. Apollo-era infrastructure is incorporated in the SpaceX Crew Launch Tower.
“Launch Complex 39A exemplifies the balance between historic preservation and supporting the mission,” Zeringue noted. “Each chapter of the space program brings change, and those changes become additional chapters in the center’s historical legacy as we continue to build the future in space exploration.”
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By European Space Agency
ESA’s Hera asteroid mission and its two CubeSats interacted as if they were in space, within the foam pyramid-lined walls of the Agency’s Maxwell test chamber in the Netherlands. The trio communicated together, sharing data and ranging information at the same time as their Hera mothership received commands from its mission controllers at the European Space Operations Centre in Darmstadt, Germany.
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By European Space Agency
ESA is getting ready to show thousands of visitors how space improves life on Earth at its very first open day to be held in the UK.
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