Kepler Mission |
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Kepler Mission |
 Apr 8 2009, 04:39 AM
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#136
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 Member  Group: Members Posts: 131 Joined: 31-May 08 From: San Carlos, California, USA Member No.: 4168  |
http://kepler.nasa.gov/about/news.html
2009 April 7 RELEASE: The dust cover on NASA's Kepler spacecraft is scheduled to be ejected tonight, no earlier than 6:30 p.m. Pacific Time, with a backup opportunity tomorrow evening. |
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Apr 8 2009, 05:07 AM
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#137
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1018 Joined: 29-November 05 From: Seattle, WA, USA Member No.: 590 |
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Apr 8 2009, 05:13 AM
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#138
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 Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1281 Joined: 18-December 04 From: San Diego, CA Member No.: 124 |
Success!
QUOTE News release: 2009-065 April 7, 2009 Dust Cover Jettisoned From NASA's Kepler Telescope Engineers have successfully ejected the dust cover from NASA's Kepler telescope, a spaceborne mission soon to begin searching for worlds like Earth. "The cover released and flew away exactly as we designed it to do," said Kepler Project Manager James Fanson of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "This is a critical step toward answering a question that has come down to us across 100 generations of human history -- are there other planets like Earth, or are we alone in the galaxy?" -------------------- Lyford Rome
"Zis is not nuts, zis is super-nuts!" Mathematician Richard Courant on viewing an Orion test |
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Apr 8 2009, 08:44 AM
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#139
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 Special Cookie Group: Members Posts: 2168 Joined: 6-April 05 From: Sintra | Portugal Member No.: 228 |
Bring us those brave new worlds Kepler!
-------------------- "Ride, boldly ride," The shade replied, "If you seek for Eldorado!"
Edgar Alan Poe |
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Apr 8 2009, 05:31 PM
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#140
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Forum Contributor Group: Members Posts: 1372 Joined: 8-February 04 From: North East Florida, USA. Member No.: 11 |
Anyone know how thick the "wire" was and was there back up circuits to power it and burn it through ?
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Apr 8 2009, 11:50 PM
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#141
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 Member Group: Members Posts: 813 Joined: 29-December 05 From: NE Oh, USA Member No.: 627 |
KEPLER is close to starting its science mission... I tremble with anticipation... eta sub E of the Drake equation is about to be quantified...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drake_equation We stand where Galileo did 400 years ago. What will we know in four years? GLORIOUS! Craig |
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Apr 9 2009, 02:46 AM
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#142
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Member Group: Members Posts: 202 Joined: 9-September 08 Member No.: 4334 |
According to this Planetary Society blog entry about the dust cover ejection, Kepler is more than 3 million kilometers from Earth already. Wow...
(Hopefully that's far enough away from city lights...  )
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Apr 16 2009, 05:01 PM
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#143
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Special Cookie Group: Members Posts: 2168 Joined: 6-April 05 From: Sintra | Portugal Member No.: 228 |
-------------------- "Ride, boldly ride," The shade replied, "If you seek for Eldorado!"
Edgar Alan Poe |
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Apr 17 2009, 03:43 PM
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#144
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Forum Contributor Group: Members Posts: 1372 Joined: 8-February 04 From: North East Florida, USA. Member No.: 11 |
QUOTE (ustrax @ Apr 16 2009, 05:01 PM)  And proberbly several earth like planets. |
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Apr 17 2009, 03:55 PM
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#145
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 1276 Joined: 25-November 04 Member No.: 114 |
A reconfirmation of TrES-2 would be nice first bit of news.
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Apr 17 2009, 06:47 PM
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#146
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Rover Driver Group: Members Posts: 1015 Joined: 4-March 04 Member No.: 47 |
Well, there's a transit every few days, so the Kepler scientists might have already seen it!
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Apr 17 2009, 10:13 PM
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#147
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 Senior Member Group: Admin Posts: 3108 Joined: 21-December 05 From: Canberra, Australia Member No.: 615 |
Just for your amusement...
Seems as if Kepler has already made an astounding discovery according to this report.   Telescope finds 100,000 possible Earth-like stars So, it's already found them. The stars are 'Earth-like' (so not very bright then). To top that, according to the article... like Kepler, Ball Aerospace & Technologies is being controlled on a day-to-day basis by students at the University of Colorado. A lovely job of taking probably what was a longer article or press release and then editing it so it makes no sense at all. |
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Apr 18 2009, 04:24 AM
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#148
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Member Group: Members Posts: 131 Joined: 31-May 08 From: San Carlos, California, USA Member No.: 4168 |
FULL INLINE QUOTE REMOVED - ADMIN
Plenty of fail in that article. I have to wonder what the editors were busy with when that column hit their inbox for approval. There may well be 100 Denver-based BLOGS with better and more accurate Kepler content. I love the internet. |
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Apr 21 2009, 04:31 AM
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#149
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Junior Member Group: Members Posts: 72 Joined: 20-April 05 Member No.: 272 |
QUOTE (Decepticon @ Apr 17 2009, 10:55 AM) A reconfirmation of TrES-2 would be nice first bit of news. So, any predictions as to when that will be? At 2.5 days between transits, a solid confirmation will take between 5 and 7.5 days of observations, plus whatever wait time there is till the next scheduled download, and however long it takes to eke out the light curves from the data. Before the middle of May, perchance? |
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Apr 21 2009, 06:41 PM
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#150
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Member Group: Members Posts: 131 Joined: 31-May 08 From: San Carlos, California, USA Member No.: 4168 |
QUOTE (tacitus @ Apr 20 2009, 08:31 PM) So, any predictions as to when that will be? I would guess mid-May at the latest. Probably earlier. I think the team will probably use TrES for calibration. During the science phase, the team will have monthly downlinks. During the calibration phase, I'd expect the downlinks to be scheduled as needed. |
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