EPOXI Mission News Options

[stevesliva]

Looks like the Deep Impact list has been revived. Posting here for others to get back on board:

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EPOXI E-News #1 May 2008
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WELCOME BACK!

Did you know that the Deep Impact Flyby Spacecraft has a new assignment? The
EPOXI mission combines two exciting science investigations in an entirely
new mission that re-uses the Deep Impact spacecraft. The Extrasolar Planet
Observation and Characterization (EPOCh) investigation will observe stars
that have known transiting giant planets. The Deep Impact Extended
Investigation (DIXI) of comets observes comet 103P/Hartley 2 during a close
flyby in October 2010.

The education and public outreach team decided to get back in touch with our
Deep Impact friends and begin sending out newsletters again to keep you
informed of these two exciting investigations! During the two years since
our last newsletter for Deep Impact, the science team has stayed busy
continuing to do more analysis on the data collected in July 2005. The
science team also proposed and was awarded an extended mission teaming up
with a group from Goddard Space Flight Center.
EPOXI website: http://epoxi.umd.edu/
Mission Overview: http://epoxi.umd.edu/1mission/index.shtml
Press Releases: http://epoxi.umd.edu/7press/index.shtml
DI Results: http://deepimpact.umd.edu/results/

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MISSION STATUS

Dr. Deming, Principal Investigator (PI) for the EPOCh portion of the
mission, sends us the latest mission status report in which he tells us
about the current observing target GJ436. “This is an exciting time for
EPOCh, as we search for an exo-Earth orbiting a stellar neighbor of our
Sun!” reports Dr Deming. He also talks about the plans to observe a very
special planet in late May and early June.

Read his status report as well as past reports from other team members at
http://epoxi.umd.edu/1mission/status.shtml

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EPOCh TARGETS

The EPOCh component of the EPOXI mission will carefully study a small number
of stars in order to learn more about planets that we know are orbiting
those stars by watching the planets as they transit (cross in front of) the
star. EPOCh will also search for clues to other planets that might be
orbiting the same stars.

Read more about the EPOCh science targets to find out which stars are being
observed.
http://epoxi.umd.edu/2science/targets.shtml

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PLANET QUEST

Are we alone?
For centuries, human beings have pondered this question. Medieval scholars
speculated that other worlds must exist and that some would harbor other
forms of life. In our time, advances in science and technology have brought
us to the threshold of finding an answer to this timeless question.
The recent discovery of numerous planets around stars other than the sun
confirms that our solar system is not unique. Indeed, these "exoplanets"
appear to be common in our galactic neighborhood.
The EPOCh investigation is part of a larger family of missions studying
extrasolar planets. Learn more at the Jet Propulsion Lab Planet Quest Web site.
http://planetquest.jpl.nasa.gov/index.cfm

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OBSERVING CHALLENGE

The transits that will be studied for EPOCh are extremely difficult to
observe because the change in brightness is very small and requires high
precision photometry that can be accomplished with instruments on the Deep
Impact spacecraft. Observers on Earth can still take a look at the stars in
the night time sky. The selected stars are also pretty dim because we don’t
want them to saturate or over expose the spacecraft instruments but they are
bright enough to be visible in amateur telescopes if the sky conditions are
good and the skies are dark.

Like people, stars have multiple identifiers. EPOCh’s first target was a
star labeled as HAT-P-4 by the scientists observing it. They made their own
list of target stars so that was their shorthand name. But HAT-P-4 has
numerous other names which are more useful in identifying it in other databases.
HAT-P-4 = SAO 64638 = TYC 2569-1599-1 is a magnitude 11, G-class star
located in the constellation Boötes.
Chart: http://epoxi.umd.edu/2science/challenge.shtml

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SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION

Please forward this e-mail to others interested in NASA missions. New
subscribers may join the EPOXI Mission e-news mailing list on our website
at: http://epoxi.umd.edu/6outreach/newsletter.shtml

[ElkGroveDan]

- but make suggestions

I'd like to see the solar system at the start of stellar fusion.

[Astro0]

djellison said: Be kind, it's still in Beta

That it may be, but it's still light years ahead of anything else!

Good idea about suggestions, but maybe just not here....maybe here instead.

[Guest_cassioli_*]

Does anybody know of any webpage showing live minute-by-minute mission status, as sometimes happens for NASA missions?

[Hungry4info]

The closest thing I know of is either the Eyes on the Solar System or the Real-Time Simulation provided by dmuller.

[centsworth_II]

Does anybody know of any webpage showing live minute-by-minute mission status, as sometimes happens for NASA missions?

If it's eyewitness updates from the control center you're after, there's http://twitter.com/elakdawalla.

"I'm planning on being at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory incredibly early in my morning tomorrow, showing up around 6:00 a.m. my time (13:00 UTC). I'll be Tweeting events as they happen, and blogging as quickly as I can after the fact."

Also there is a deep impact Twitter page: Get short, timely messages from Deep Impact Flyby.

[Guest_cassioli_*]

damn, twitter does not work at office!

[Guest_cassioli_*]

I'd like to see a real-time mission status update like this old one:
http://spaceflightnow.com/cassini/status.html

[MahFL]

I installed the Eyes on the Solar System s/w at work .

Watches over shoulder for bosses........

[stewjack]

NASA TV should be covering it live.

9:30 (13:30 GMT) - 11:30 a.m. - Live Commentary and Coverage of the EPOXI Spacecraft Close-Up Encounter of Comet Hartley 2 – JPL (Public and Media Channels)
4 p.m. - EPOXI Encounter of Comet Hartley 2 Post Encounter News Briefing - JPL (Public Channel)

http://www.nasa.gov/multimedia/nasatv/index.html
http://www.neil-online.com/nasa/

Jack

[Guest_cassioli_*]

10 minutes to closest approach.

[Guest_Sunspot_*]

damn, twitter does not work at office!

Twitter isn't working right now anyway.

[MahFL]

When will the pictures be sent back ?

[elakdawalla]

They'll begin coming back 30 min after C/A, but high-res ones will not hit Earth until at least an hour after C/A.

[Guest_cassioli_*]

When will the pictures be sent back ?

Schedule says at 14:20 GMT high gain antenna will be pointed to Eatrh for image "uploading".

[elakdawalla]

Kevin Hussey is demoing EOTSS on NASA TV!

Meanwhile, I'm getting Fail Whale on Twitter. Argh.