Chinese spaceclaft rands on moon

[spaminator]

A Chinese lunar probe returns to Earth with the world’s first samples from the far side of the moon
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Huizhong Wu
Published Jun 25, 2024 • 2 minute read

China-Moon-Probe
This China National Space Administration (CNSA) handout image released by Xinhua News Agency, shows the lander-ascender combination of Chang'e-6 probe taken by a mini rover after it landed on the moon surface, June 4, 2024. China's Chang'e 6 probe returned on Earth on Tuesday with rock and soil samples from the little-explored far side of the moon in a global first. The probe landed in northern China on Tuesday afternoon in the Inner Mongolian region. Photo by CNSA /Xinhua via AP, File
BANGKOK (AP) — China’s Chang’e 6 probe returned on Earth with rock and soil samples from the little-explored far side of the moon in a global first.


The probe landed in the Inner Mongolian region in northern China on Tuesday afternoon.

“I now declare that the Chang’e 6 Lunar Exploration Mission achieved complete success,” Zhang Kejian, Director of the China National Space Administration, said in a televised news conference after the landing.

Chinese scientists anticipate the returned samples will include 2.5 million-year-old volcanic rock and other material that scientists hope will answer questions about geographic differences on the moon’s two sides.

The near side is what is seen from Earth, and the far side faces outer space. The far side is also known to have mountains and impact craters, contrasting with the relatively flat expanses visible on the near side.


The probe had landed in the moon’s South Pole-Aitken Basin, an impact crater created more than 4 billion years ago. The samples scientists are expecting will likely come from different layers of the basin, which will bear traces of the different geological events across its long chronology, such as when the moon was younger and had an active inside that could produce volcanic rock.

While past U.S. and Soviet missions have collected samples from the moon’s near side, the Chinese mission was the first that has collected samples from the far side.

“This is a global first in the sense that it’s the first time anyone has been able to take off from the far side of the moon and bring back samples,” said Richard de Grijs, a professor of astrophysics at Macquarie University in Australia.


The moon program is part of a growing rivalry with the U.S. _ still the leader in space exploration — and others, including Japan and India. China has put its own space station in orbit and regularly sends crews there.

China’s leader Xi Jinping sent a message of congratulations to the Chang’e team, saying that it was a “landmark achievement in our country’s efforts at becoming a space and technological power.”

The probe left earth on May 3, and its journey lasted 53 days. The probe has drilled into the core and scooped rocks from the surface.

The samples “are expected to answer one of the most fundamental scientific questions in lunar science research: what geologic activity is responsible for the differences between the two sides?” said Zongyu Yue, a geologist at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, in a statement issued in the Innovation Monday, a journal published in partnership with the Chinese Academy of Sciences.


China in recent years has launched multiple successful missions to the moon, collecting samples from the moon’s near side with the Chang’e 5 probe previously.

They are also hoping that the probe will return with material that bear traces of meteorite strikes from the moon’s past. That material could shed light on the solar system’s early days. There’s a theory that the moon acted as a vaccum cleaner of sorts, attracting all the meteorites and debris in the system’s earlier era so that they didn’t hit Earth, said de Grijs, who is also executive director at the International Space Science Institute — Beijing.

China has said it plans to share the samples with international scientists, although it did not say exactly in which countries.

A Chinese lunar probe returns to Earth with the world’s first samples from the far side of the moon

The probe landed in the Inner Mongolian region in northern China on Tuesday afternoon.

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

China reportedly developing Death Star-like weapon to blast satellites from space
Author of the articleostmedia News
Published Nov 10, 2024 • 2 minute read

So much for a galaxy far, far away.


Chinese scientists have reportedly been developing a Death Star-esque space weapon that would use electromagnetic pulses to knock enemy satellites out of the sky, according to the Daily Mail.

While it won’t be powerful enough to reduce Earth to space dust — like the fictional planet Alderaan in the original Star Wars movie — the scientists have been able to combine multiple pulses of microwave radiation into a single powerful beam, the Daily Mail reported, citing the South China Morning Post.

“The weapon has now completed experimental trials for potential military applications thanks to breakthroughs in ‘ultrahigh-time precision synchronization,'” the Daily Mail reported. “This could be used for ‘achieving multiple goals such as teaching and training, new technology verification and military exercises,'” experts say.

“While the exact details of the weapon remain highly classified, Chinese academic journals suggest that microwave weapons like this are being developed for use in space.”

To wrap your head around the concept, think of the Death Star laser beam used to destroy Alderaan in A New Hope and vapourize rebel spaceships in Return of the Jedi. Seven electromagnetic pulses would merge into a single beam — but only if they all hit the exact same target within 170 trillionths of a second, according to the Daily Mail.



The feat was thought to be nearly impossible, the Daily Mail reported, because the technology exceeds the preciseness of atomic clocks on advanced GPS satellites. The atomic clock aboard China’s Tiangong space station, for example, is so precise that it is expected to only miss one second every few billion years, according to the Daily Mail.

“However, Chinese scientists say they have now been able to overcome these challenges by connecting each of the vehicles with fibreoptic cables,” they added, which would make the beam powerful enough to overwhelm satellites.


The revelation comes as militaries around the globe continue to tinker with direct energy weapon technology, which forgoes projectiles and explosives for powerful blasts of electromagnetic radiation.

The U.K. has been developing a Dragonfire laser weapon, the Daily Mail said, which can reportedly blast a drone out of the air and is accurate enough to hit a British one-pound coin from almost a kilometre away.

The U.S. air force’s Tactical High-Power Operational Responder (THOR) can also use “wide bursts of energy” to take out multiple drones.

No need for The Force, we guess.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/1431324544581652480

Chinese scientists build 'real life DEATH STAR': Here's how it works

Chinese scientists claim to have created a 'real-life Death Star' capable of devastating enemy satellites in orbit.

dailymail.co.uk

China reportedly developing Death Star-like weapon to blast satellites from space

While it won't be powerful enough to reduce Earth to space dust, scientists have been able to combine microwaves into a powerful beam.

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

The far side of the moon once had erupting volcanoes too
Lunar soil was brought back by China's Chang'e-6

Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Adithi Ramakrishnan
Published Nov 15, 2024 • 1 minute read

This China National Space Administration (CNSA) handout image released by Xinhua News Agency, shows the lander-ascender combination of Chang'e-6 probe taken by a mini rover after it landed on the moon surface, June 4, 2024.
This China National Space Administration (CNSA) handout image released by Xinhua News Agency, shows the lander-ascender combination of Chang'e-6 probe taken by a mini rover after it landed on the moon surface, June 4, 2024. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEW YORK — Volcanoes were erupting on the mysterious far side of the moon billions of years ago just like on the side that we can see, new research confirms.


Researchers analyzed lunar soil brought back by China’s Chang’e-6, the first spacecraft to return with a haul of rocks and dirt from the little-explored far side.

Two separate teams found fragments of volcanic rock that were about 2.8 billion years old. One piece was even more ancient, dating back to 4.2 billion years.

“To obtain a sample from this area is really important because it’s an area that otherwise we have no data for,” said Christopher Hamilton, a planetary volcano expert at the University of Arizona who was not involved with the research.

Scientists know there were active volcanoes on the near side, the part of the moon seen from Earth, dating back to a similar time frame. Previous studies, including data from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, suggested the far side might also have a volcanic past. The first samples from that region facing away from Earth confirm an active history.


The results were published Friday in the journals Nature and Science.

China has launched several spacecraft to the moon. In 2020, the Chang’e-5 spacecraft returned moon rocks from the near side, the first since those collected by NASA’s Apollo astronauts and Soviet Union spacecraft in the 1970s. The Chang’e-4 spacecraft became the first to visit the moon’s far side in 2019.

The moon’s far side is pockmarked by craters and has fewer of the near side’s flat, dark plains carved by lava flows. Why the two halves are so different remains a mystery, said study co-author Qiu-Li Li from the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

Li said the new findings reveal over 1 billion years of volcanic eruptions on the lunar far side. Future research will determine how the activity lasted so long.

The far side of the moon once had erupting volcanoes too

Lunar soil was brought by China's Chang'e-6, the first spacecraft to return with a haul of rocks and dirt from the little-explored far side.

torontosun.com