Battle for Ideas 2009 - Space Events

The annual Battle of Ideas has two space events this year:

• Friday 23 October - Space: From Infinite Ideas to Recurring Nightmares - 8 pm, Royal Observatory, Greenwich. More details here.

• Sunday 1 November - A Space Age Future: SciFi clips and Discussion - 1.15 pm, Royal College of Art, London. More details here.

Team Kingston at IAC2009

The 2009 International Astronautical Congress is taking place in Korea and Team Kingston is in attendance. On the left is James Arkwright who has just graduated from the MEng in Aerospace Engineering and Astronautics. On Monday afternoon James represented the UK in the intenational student paper competition talking about the hybrid rocket motor that he designed and built as his individual project. We'll find out later in the week if he has won a medal.

On the right is third year astro student Tejal Thakore who has been here since last week taking part in the Space Generation Congress and in connection with her role as co-ordinator of the Space Generation Advisory Council's 'Move an Asteroid' competition.

Cosmic Science and Cosmic Disco

Shoreditch Monday 19 October

Subject: Cosmos
Guests: Cosmologist Marcus Chown and DJ Piers Martin
Assignment: Bring a question you've always wanted to ask about the Universe
Tickets: £10 (includes nibbles, a glass of wine and a mix CD)

Organised by super/collider, this event has New Scientist cosmology consultant Marcus Chown talking about some of the ideas and theories he has described in his books. DJ Piers Martin will also present a brief history of Cosmic Disco and play classics from the depths of the musical Universe.

More info and tickets here.

Can the United Kingdom be the Vanguard of a New Space Age?

Can the United Kingdom be the Vanguard of a New Space Age?

Thursday 19th November 2009
Alan Bond, Managing Director
Reaction Engines Ltd

This free lecture will take place at No.4 Hamilton Place, London. Commencing at 18:00 hrs, refreshments will be served from 17:30 hrs. RSVP conference@aerosociety.com.

The current ‘Space Age’ arguably began in the immediate postwar ‘40s when V2s began to carry instruments above the atmosphere to determine Earth’s environment at high altitudes. A decade later orbital spaceflight began and yet another decade or so led to the first human presence on the moon. Since then there has been a more or less permanent, if small, human population in orbit around our planet.

Our knowledge of the Solar System is now incomparably great compared to 50 years ago. All of this has been possible because of the technology of the expendable rocket having its origins with those first V2s. But now we want to do so much more. We need to extend the utility of space for the human race and we want to get people onto the surface of other worlds to see what they are about. The faithful expendable rocket, which has served us so well, is simply not up to the job. New technology is needed; cheaper, more reliable and more frequent. The UK is well placed to lead this new Space Age technologically; it just needs some visionary leadership.

Alan Bond began his career with Rolls-Royce (Derby) in 1963. He worked on the Spey gas turbine for the Phantom and RZ2 rocket engine for Blue Streak as well as the RZ20 Liquid O2/H2 rocket engine for the ELDO launcher upper stage. Alan moved to BAC (Stevenage) in 1972 working on classified weapon propulsion. He moved to UKAEA (Culham) in 1976 working on nuclear fusion and later advanced space propulsion.

Alan has been Managing Director of Reaction Engines from 1989 to present, working on spaceplane propulsion. He was also a consultant to the HOTOL project 1983-1989. His career has embraced chemical, electric and nuclear rocket propulsion, gas turbine and high speed air breathing propulsion, and nuclear fusion power generation. Alan’s interests include astronomy and astrophysics.

LCROSS Impacts the Moon Today

The Lunar CRater Observing and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) mission is hoping to find if there is ice at the poles of the Moon. To do this, the Centaur upperstage of its Atlas V launch vehicle will be impacted into a crater to throw up a debris plume which will be evaluated by the LCROSS spacecraft when it flies through it four minutes later before impacting the Moon itself throwing up a second plume. The NASA feed is here and the SLOOH Space Camera feed is here.

Astrobiology Rap

A rap video by Jon Chase about astrobiology - The search for life in space, particularly on other worlds called exoplanets. You can see Jon at "Life the Universe and... Physics" in Brick Lane on the evening of Monday 19 October. It's free!

Kingston alum talks at BIS - Wednesday 7 October

On Wednesday 7 October, Kingston space alumnus and lecturer Dave Wade will be talking at the British Interplanetary Society (BIS) in Vauxhall (just 25 mins by train from Kingston). Dave now works in the City of London for the Atrium Space Insurance Consortium and, with David Todd of Ascend Worldwide Ltd, will be talking about the space insurance market, the hidden hazards for space insurers, what insurance cover space insurers provide and they assess the risks associated with satellites and launch vehicles. The talk starts at 7.00 pm.

If you are not a BIS member, then the ticket will be £5 - you can book here.

Alternatively, why not join the BIS (I joined in my first year at university and have been a member ever since). If you are a student, the membership is £18 per year. Join here!

SGAC releases Youth Space Vison for the Next Decade

In light of its ten year anniversary, SGAC has produced "The Youth Space Vision for the Next Decade: Looking Back to Look Forward" report. This document is a youth vision of the political development of the "spacescape" in the next decade. This vision includes a description of the roles the youth and the Space Generation Advisory Council would like to play. Ideas were developed from the Space Generation Advisory Council's Ten Year Anniversary Conference that reviewed the past ten years and assessed the coming decade.

Space Propulsion Talk at KGS

As part of World Space Week I'll be giving a talk called ‘The Only Way is Up! – Space Propulsion Systems Past, Present and Future' at Kingston Grammar School at 7.30 pm on Monday 5 October. The talk will describe the history of space travel, both in fantasy and in fact, and explain the basics of rocket propulsion before exploring current and proposed forms of rocket, e.g. chemical, electric and nuclear, as well ideas for space propulsion that do not use rockets (e.g. solar sails and tethers). The talk is to help the school raise money for its science labs.

Tickets are £8 adults and £4 concessions and are available from Debbie Heaney at the School - dheaney@kgs.org.uk

UKEDS Conference 2009

It's the start of another academic year, so the 2009 UKSEDS conference can't be far off. This year it is going to take place at the University of Surrey in Guildford, which means that it will be easy to get to. I heard yesterday that it has been decided that this year the conference will be one day instead of the usual two days and that it will take place on Saturday 7 November. The conference website has all the relevant information, so check it out.

Ulysses - Hail and Fairwell

Yesterday (June 30), the Ulysses mission finally ended today when ground controllers sent commands to shut down the spacecraft's communications. The event marks the conclusion of one of the longest and most successful space missions ever conducted (and also the very first mission that your author ever worked on, back in 1983 when it was known as the International Solar Polar Mission).

From launch in 1990 the 18-year, 8-month mission has returned a wealth of scientific data on the space environment above and below the poles of the Sun (each orbit taking aound six years). The spacecraft and its suite of nine instruments had to be highly sensitive yet robust enough to withstand some of the most extreme conditions in the Solar System, including a close fly-by of the giant planet Jupiter.

The end of the mission had been predicted for July 2008, at which time the satellite's depleted radioisotope power supply was expected to fall below the minimum required to keep fuel lines from freezing. However, mission controllers determined they could keep this from happening by firing the thrusters briefly every few hours. The final decision to end the mission was taken because the unavailability of ground station time to communicate with Ulysses in the future.

Send Your Name to Mars with NASA's MSL

NASA invites you to submit your name to be included on a microchip that will be sent to Mars as part of NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) mission, scheduled to launch in 2011. MSL is a rover that will assess whether Mars ever was, or still is, an environment able to support microbial life. The Send Your Name to Mars Web page enables anyone to take part in the mission by sending his or her name to the Red Planet.

Buzz Aldrin and Snoop Dogg's "Rocket Experience"

Apollo 11 astronaut Buzz Aldrin has produced a hip-hop song, "Rocket Experience" along with rappers Snoop Dogg and Talib Kweli! If you like it, you can buy it on iTunes (a portion of the proceeds will go to ShareSpace Foundation, to further benefit and support the work of the National Space Society, the Planetary Society and the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation).

Kingston student space competition hat trick!

I am very pleased to announce that for the third year in a row a Kingston Astro student has been selected to represent the UK at the International Astronautical Congress in the undergraduate paper competition. Final year MEng Astro student James Arkwright has been selected to present a paper based on his final year project, ‘Development of a Desktop Hybrid Rocket Motor for Classroom Demonstration’, supervised by Barnaby Osborne, at IAC2009 in Daejeon, Korea in October. Congratulations to both of them!

James (shown here at the Big EARS rocketry week-end) is the fifth Kingston student to be selected in the last six years and follows on from Victoria Reid (2008), Alison Gibbings (2007 – Silver Medal Winner), Flis Holland (2005) and Peter Rickmers (2004 – Gold Medal Winner).

OasISS mission to launch tomorrow

ESA astronaut Frank De Winne launches to the International Space Station tomorrow (Wednesday) to start his six-month OasISS mission. The launch of the Soyuz TMA-15 spacecraft from Baikonur will take place tomorrow at 1334 BST and you can watch it live here.

ESA announces six new astronauts,... and one is British!

From the ESA press release...

ESA today presented the six individuals who will become Europe's new astronauts. The new recruits will join the European Astronaut Corps and start their training to prepare for future missions to the International Space Station, and beyond.

The new astronauts are:

1. Samantha Cristoforetti, Italian

2. Alexander Gerst, German

3. Andreas Mogensen, Danish

4. Luca Parmitano, Italian

5. Timothy Peake, British

6. Thomas Pesquet, French

They were selected following a Europe-wide recruitment process that started last year. Following thorough psychological, medical and professional screening that started with 8413 valid applications, they are the first new recruits to join the European Astronaut Corps since 1992 under this second-ever astronaut selection carried out by ESA. The choice of six was made taking into account flight opportunities planned not only under ESA programmes and activities but also those planned in the frame of a Memorandum of Understanding between the Italian Space Agency (ASI) and NASA. This (deleted all) was done in agreement with the Italian authorities and in accordance with the ESA Council decision in 2002 to create a single corps of astronauts in Europe. 

New European Astronauts to be announced on 20 May

The European Space Agency (ESA) will be announcing its new astronauts at ESA HEadquarters in Paris on Wednesday 20 May at press confererence starting at 1315 CEST (1215 BST).

The selection process started in 2008 with 8413 valid applications and following a very demanding selection process, ESA is now ready to introduce the latest members of the European Astronaut Corps who will conduct future missions to the International Space Station, and one day to the Moon and beyond.

Since, currently, the UK does not participate in human spaceflight or contribute financially to ESA's programmes in this area, it is virtually certain that none of the new astronauts will be British. However, given that the UK is currently reappraising its position on human spaceflight, some space commentators believe that a British reserve astronaut may be announced in June.

Rocket Club @ Big Ears

Today saw the first major outing of Rocket Club - to the East Anglian Rocket Society (EARS) annual week-end launch event, Big Ears. Twenty-five rocketeers made the trek to near Cambridge in search of fun, launch opportunities and, ideally, UKRA High Power Rocketry Certification. Although, the weather was fine and sunny, the wind was quite strong for most of the day which, unfortunately, limited the types of rockets that could be launched. Nevertheless, seven Rocket Club members obtained their Level 1 Certification and everyone had a good time. Over the next few weeks we will be working to find more launch opportunities so that the remaining members can launch their rockets and seek certification as well.

Ed Roberston - Satellite

For all the space couples out there (you know who you are!), here's a special song by Ed Robertson of the Barenaked Ladies.

Orphans of Apollo - UK Premiere 22 May

super/collider is holding the UK premiere of Orphans of Apollo in London on Friday 22 May. The title of the film refers to those people who grew up during the glory days of the Apollo era and expected to see space exploration continue at the same rate, but who were sadly disappointed.

One particular group of ambitious Americans led by Walt Anderson decided that if they wanted a bold future they would have to make it happen themselves. Back in the 1990s, that's what they tried to do, setting up MirCorp, 'renting' the Mir space station from Russia while endeavouring to commercialise it and get approval the export an electrodynamic space tether for the USA to reboost the station....

There is a minimum donation of £5, with all proceeds going towards the International Space University scholarship fund. It is essential to RSVP by email to the to the film's director Michael Potter, who will be doing a Q&A with after the screening.

Time: 7 pm for a 7:30 pm start
Venue: Private screening room at The Soho Hotel, 4 Richmond Mews (off Dean Street), London W1D 3DH
Map: click here

Q&A with ESA astronaut Frank De Winne on YouTube

This is your opportunity to get your questions about space answered European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Frank De Winne. All you have to do is record your question using a webcam, video camera or mobile phone, and post it on ESA’s YouTube channel. Each week, De Winne will post his responses to selected questions on the site from either his training post in Moscow or directly from space.

De Winne is currently in training ahead of his six-month mission to the International Space Station (ISS). He will travel to the ISS together with Russian cosmonaut Roman Romanenko and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Robert Thirsk where he will be its first European commander. Launch from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan is scheduled for 27 May.

Record and upload your questions to ESA’s YouTube channel as a 'Video Response' to De Winne's video message.

Call for 2010 'Fly your thesis' propsals

The time has come for the next call for the ESA 'Fly your thesis' competition proposals.  'Fly your thesis' is an ESA run competition for Masters/PhD students to propose a microgravity experiment that could be run in the upcoming microgravity parabolic flight campaign.  The winning teams and their experiments will end up on board an A300 specially fitted out to fly in a large parabolic flightpath.  During the parabola the aircraft, the occupants and all of the experiments on board are placed into free fall and experience weightlessness.  This lasts for about 25seconds and is repeated 30 times a day.  A typical flight campaign will go for 3 days, giving 90 parabolas of microgravity.
Last year a team of four of our final year MEng Astro stu

dents entered the competition.  They did very well, making it all the way to the final selection committee.  Unfortunately they were not selected to fly.  This year we want to get all the way!

If you would like to submit a proposal for this competition then come see either me or Dr Welchwith your ideas!

Racing to the Moon - Monday 11 May

If you are looking for a break from exams next month or need a bit of inspiration, how about this?

"Four decades after the first Moon landings, the original space-racers have been joined by China, India, South Korea, even Nigeria. Why do we still need manned missions? Does space exploration need countries to cooperate, or does it benefit from the oxygen of international conflict and mistrust? Join a lively debate on colonizing the Moon between scientists, historians and commentators. This is the first of two King's Place summer events organized by the weekly science journal Nature."

See here for more info.

Future Flying

There are many more aircraft than spacecraft in this, but I couldn't resist the lastest offering from WebUrbanist. Tear yourself away from the end-of-term blues for a few minutes and indulge in some Futuristic Flying: Brilliant Prototype & Concept Airplanes.

Where are they now? - Daniel Martins

Not all our alumni end working in the space sector - some pursue other dreams. Daniel Martins graduated in 2003 after doing an industrial placement with EADS Astrium (who also supplied his final year project) and a group project looking at the thermal protection for an inflatable re-entry capsule for ESA's Young Engineer's Satellite -2 project (which eventually flew in 2007). After graduation, Daniel's dream of flying became stronger than his dream of engineering and he returned to Portugal to learn to fly. After a period as a flight instructor he obtained his type rating with TAP and later moved to Macau where he is a pilot for Air Macau flying A319/320/321s.

Summer Internship At NASA Ames

If you have excellent computer skills then this might be the job for you - help NASA put scientific papers on the map of Mars. NASA Ames, are working with Google, Inc., and the SAO/NASA Astrophysics Data System to get scientific papers geo-located on Mars. They need a summer intern to help with the following:

• create an initial seed of test data
• develop the supervised parsing strategies for extracting geospatial data from scientific plain text
• develop the information architecture for doing all of this
• create the presentation of the geographic data for Google Mars 3D

See here for more information.

Holiday on Mars this summer!

I missed this earlier in the month, but Expedia ran an April Fool's Day ad campaign for holidays on Mars. So, if you fancy dust-surfing, a Mars historical tour or climbing Olympus Mons (the biggest mountain the solar system), follow the link :).

Go Barnaby!

I'm very pleased to report that, recognising his research in precision optics, Barnaby has been awarded a Business Fellowhip Scheme award with the National Physical Laboratory for the development of Mirrorlite - a carbon fibre reinforced polymer telescope mirror. No wonder he looks happy!

UKSEDS 2009 Student Space Conference

A date for your diary. This year's annual UKSEDS conference will take place on the weekend of 7/8 November at the University of Surrey in Guildford. This location will make going to the conference much easier and cheaper than usual - except for the times when it's been at Kingston (2002 and 2005, for those who are interested). More details will be announced in due course (probably after the summer).

Space Development; Theory and Practice Workshop - Russia

For the last ten years, the Youth Space Centre of Bauman Moscow State Technical University runs this workshop, which gives an opportunity to discuss the results of the past year in space, see and touch real space hardware and meet people working on the front line of space science and technology. This year, the workshop is running July 4-10 in Korolev with an optional trip to Baikonur in Khazakstan. UK participation is organised through UKSEDS. See here for more information.

Be an Integral Astronomer - ESA Competition

To mark the International Year of Astronomy, ESA has launched a competition for students. Participants will use data taken by the Integral space observatory to investigate objects in one of the most active regions of our galaxy.

See the competition pages for details of what the competition entails, prizes and how to enter. The deadline is 14 August 2009. Good luck!

Rocket Club - Flight Readiness Review

As launch day approaches, it's time to assess the flight readiness of the rockets that club members have been building. Only those rockets passing the review can be considered for launch. If you didn't get your rocket inspected yesterday, you will need to make arrangements to do so in the next ten days. Like Nick's Fantom 438 (see left), rockets don't need to have been painted yet, but they do need to be fully and correctly assembled and have a working recovery system.

Where Are They Now? - Dave Wade

Dave graduated with a first class honours degree from Kingston in 1991. After graduation he went to Cranfield University and gained an MSc in Astronautics and Space Systems, before working for small satellite company Space Innovations Limited for several years. In 1994 he returned to Kingston, this time to work as a lecturer in Astronautics. In 2000 he left Kingston again, this time for a highly-sucessful career as a space underwriter. You can see more about his work here.

Entering the Workforce and Strengthening the Global Community

From IAF: Calling on students and young professionals -- you are the future of the global space program! As such, it is time to share your vision, ambitions and challenges as current and prospective members of the 21st century space workforce with space leaders in government, industry and academia at the International Astronautical Congress in Daejeon, South Korea, 12-16 October 2009!

Looking for an incredible opportunity to address the international space community? For the first time, the International Astronautical Federation (IAF) is organizing a plenary event to hear perspectives from 21-33 year olds on 12 October 2009 in Daejeon, South Korea, at the International Astronautical Congress (IAC) (www.iafastro.org). Highlight how you are impacting the space world right now, share your vision and aspirations for future space endeavors, and underscore your desired role in them. Plenary event participants will deliver a ten minute presentation, engage in a panel discussion, and interact with the audience. You don’t want to miss this!

This sounds amazing! What do I need to do to participate?

ROUND ONE: 12 Seconds of Fame

By April 24, 2009, create a 12 second video telling us why you should be chosen to address the IAC and post it on http://12seconds.tv/. Then complete the application here. The IAF will select a subset of candidates from these entries and notify all entrants by May 6, 2009.

ROUND TWO: Just YouTube it!

If selected, create and post a three minute video on http://www.youtube.com by May 20, 2009. From your video, we should get a snapshot of your ten minute plenary presentation (think of it as a verbal abstract!). Send an email to youthplenary@iafastro.org with the link to your video.

IAF will select the finalists from these entries based on their creativity, efficacy of messages and relevance to the plenary topics. All entrants will be notified of IAF’s decision on their applications by June 3, 2009.

Plenary participants will be responsible for finding a sponsor or sponsors for their travel to and accommodations at the IAC. Candidates may also apply to the IAF Youth Grants Programme (see blog entry below).

IAC 2009 Youth Grants Programme

The International Astronautical Federation (IAF) has begun a new programme to provide grants that enable students and young space professionals to participate in IAF activities, in particular the International Astronautical Congress.

The first step in this initiative involves the selection of up to ten young people whose participation in the 2009 International Astronautical Congress in Daejeon, Republic of Korea from 12 to 16 October(IAC) will be supported by the IAF.

The IAC 2009 Youth Grants Programme is open to individuals between the ages of 21 and 33 on 1 January 2009. Candidates may apply regardless of their home country or current residence. While all applications will be considered the IAF through this programme seeks to encourage applications from candidates in nations with emerging space capabilities and interests who would otherwise not be able to attend an International Astronautical Congress. The deadline for applications is 1 June 2009.

New Frontiers Questionnaire

In order to help prepare the future of space transportation up to 2030 and beyond, ESA and the French space agency CNES are holding a seminar in May 2009 co-organized by the 3AF (the French Association for Aeronautics and Astronautics) and the futurologist group Prospective 2100.

In order to stimulate discussion on advanced space exploration, ESA's Advanced Concept Team (ACT) have produced two on-line questionnaires aimed at young adults interested in space. With the input from these, they will assess the different opinions and try to establish the vision of the younger generation. The first questionnaire is aimed at non-experts, while second questionnaire is for those who are interested in the technical and scientific details. The most interesting points will be used as a basis for further discussion, managed with a mailing list.

Arthur Success!

I'm very pleased and gratified to say that on Saturday night I was awarded the 2009 Sir Arthur Clarke Award for Achievement in Space Education. Here you can see me with the award (modelled on the black monolith from the film 2001: A Space Odyssey by Sir Arthur and director Stanely Kubrick) and alumni of the International Space University who were present at the awards dinner (including Kingston alumnus Abdul Ismail). There's more info here.

Year 2 Astro Visit to Astrium

Today, the Year 2 Astro class (and a handful of Year 3s) visited the EADS Astrium facility in Stevenage, which is responsible for the structure and subsystem design and build for all Eurostar communications satellites and is prime contractor for science missions such as Beagle 2 Mars lander, Rosetta and Lisa Pathfinder and Earth observation satellites such as Aeolus.

After a welcome from Alistair Scott, we were given an introduction to the company by Nick Gregory (who graduated from the MEng Astro last year) and then presentations on Cubesats by Ronan Wall, Mission Systems by Nic Leveque, Future Missions by Elie Allouis (the latter two also Kingston alumni) and Propulsion Systems by Bob Baldwin. Thank you to all of these. After lunch we were taken on a tour of the site where we saw a wide variety of spacecrtaft being built and also Bridget, Astrium prototype Mars Rover. Unfortunately, we couldn't take photographs inside the site :(

International Space Station Visible over UK

With the Space Shuttle Discovery installing a final set of solar panels on the International Space Station (ISS) at the moment (making it the brightest object in the night sky, after the Moon) and the fine weather we are having, the scope for seeing the ISS is very good at the moment.

In general, low-Earth orbiting satellites are visible for about an hour or so after sunlight and before dawn, when it is dark on the ground but the satellites are still illuminated by the Sun. The inclination of the ISS orbit is such that at the latitude of the UK the station will usually be seen in the south and will and be visible for only a few minutes. To get predictions, go to this NASA website or register (free) at Heavens Above for even more accuracy.

Enjoy!

Sir Arthur Clarke Award Nomination

I’m pleased to announce that I’ve just been told that I have been shortlisted for the 2009 Sir Arthur Clarke Award for Achievement in Space Education. Awarded annually since 2005, the ‘Arthurs’, are intended as a ‘space version of the Oscars’ to provide recognition and pay tribute to those who have worked for the advancement of space exploration. It goes without saying that I am very honoured to be shortlisted and hope that I can follow on from Alison Gibbing’s Arthur for Student Achievement in 2008. The Arthurs awards ceremony will be held on the evening of 4 April during the 2009 UK Space Conference at Charterhouse School. I’ll try not to be too tearful, whichever way it goes :)

The Future Through The Past, Today and Tomorrow

Those nice people at WebUrbanist have been looking at imaginings of the future from before the space age. Click your mouse button for 15 visions of retrofuturistic spaceflight and the dreams of what could be, then check out 15 cool space projects for today and tomorrow.

RAeS Lecture: Herschel & Planck - Europe launches the world’s largest telescope into space

On Thursday 30 April, the Royal Aeronautical Society will be presenting a free evening lecture by Dr David Southwood, the European Space Agency's Director of Science and Robotic Exploration. The subject of his talk will be the upcoming joint launch of the Herschel and Planck missions. Herschel is the largest space telescope ever to be built and a great European technical achievement. It will observe the universe in the far-infrared, a spectral region obscured from Earth by the atmosphere. The Planck spacecraft will observe the 'Cosmic Microwave Background' radiation with a sensitivity, angular resolution and frequency range never achieved before. Both satellites will operate at the gravitationally neutral L2 point 1.5 million kms from Earth. For more information, click here.

NASA's new online computer game

It seems that NASA will be releasing a computer game next year; Astronaut: Moon, Mars and Beyond.  It is a massively multiplayer online game, similar to world of warcraft, but in this case players get to drive lunar rovers, live in martian colonies, operate the shuttle and international space station.  The online life of your character will be based around the development of skills (robot arm operation, EVA training, etc) which is rewarded with access to more parts of the game and access to cooler stuff (exoskeleton suits).  Additionally characters are able to interact with and develop communities, and do things in these communities like run for mayor of Mars.

Check it out here.

European Space Camp 2009

European Space Camp is a summer camp for young people aged 17 to 21, interested in space and science with a background in Physics and Mathematics. It runs at Norway's Andøya Rocket Range (it is taught in English) and this year it will run 29 July - 9 August 2009

Participants spend a week doing technical experiments, involved in a rocket campaign, working as real rocket scientists, learning how to exploit knowledge they already possess, as well as broadening their understanding of applied science. Through the work in groups they have to use their creativity, and learn to co-operate. The programme includes group work with hands-on activities related to the rocket launch, lectures and social activities.

The Space Camp is FREE, though participants have to cover their own travel expenses. The Registration deadline is 15 April 2009.

For more details, see the website or email salome@spacecamp.no

United Kingdom Space Conference - Student Bursaries

There are a large, but not unlimited, number of student bursaries available to students wishing to attend the UK Space Conference (thanks to BNSC and Reaction Engines who provided the sponsorship).

UKSC can offer students two days at the conference, April 3rd and 4th, including accommodation and meals for £20. There is an extensive and varied programme of top speakers from the UK Space Industry, Astronomy and Space Science. There will also be a lively social scene with a fiercely competitive water rocket competition and a UKSEDS social on the evening of the third. The cost of attending the Social is £10.

This is a superb networking and career opportunity. There will be representatives from many of the largest UK Space Industry employers as well as leading academics and researchers. To apply contact Dave Wright at: brohp2@aol.com.

Rocket Club Masterclass Session

On the 4th of Feb, Rocket Club hosted Marcus from M.A.R.S. to give a masterclass session on high poower rockets and some advice on build techniques.  He brought a variety of examples with him, particularly useful to the unlucky members whose kits still have not arrived.

Astro Alum quoted in Daily Express

Astronautics alumna Victoria Lowe was quoted in an article in the Daily Express about steps being take to promote engineering in the UK. In it Victoria talks about her job at the European Space Agency and says, "I’d always been fascinated by the solar system and knew I wanted to be involved with space exploration in some way. I opted for the foundation engineering course at Kingston because it provided a thorough grounding in engineering, applied maths and physics. It really opened the door for me to pursue my space interests further and after that I was able to specialise in astronautics.”