Over the last few decades, both the aeronautics and space disciplines have greatly influenced advances in controls, sensors, data fusion and navigation. Many of those achievements that made the word "aerospace" synonymous with "high-tech" were enabled by innovations in guidance, navigation and control. Europe has seen a strong trans-national consolidation process in aerospace over the last few decades. Most of the visible products, like commercial aircraft, fighters, helicopters, satellites, launchers or missiles, are not made by a single country - they are the fruits of cooperation. No European country by itself hosts a specialized guidance, navigation and controls community large enough to cover the whole spectrum of disciplines. However, on a European scale, mutual exchange of ideas, concepts and solutions is enriching for all. The 1st CEAS Specialist Conference on Guidance, Navigation and Control is an attempt to bring this community together. This book is a selection of papers presented at the conference. All submitted papers have gone through a formal review process in compliance with good journal practices. The best papers have been recommended by the reviewers to be published in this book.

Incredible discoveries from the fringes of the universe to the inner workings of our minds all from nothing

It turns out that almost nothing is as curious or as enlightening as, well, nothing. What is nothingness? Where can it be found? The writers of the world's top-selling science magazine investigate from the big bang, dark energy, and the void to superconductors, vestigial organs, hypnosis, and the placebo effect and discover that understanding nothing may be the key to understanding everything: What came before the big bang, and will our universe end?How might cooling matter down almost to absolute zero help solve our energy crisis?How can someone suffer from a false diagnosis as though it were true?Does nothingness even exist? Recent experiments suggest that squeezing a perfect vacuum somehow creates light.Why is it unfair to accuse sloths animals who do nothing of being lazy? And more Contributors Paul Davies, Jo Marchant, and Ian Stewart, along with two former editors of Nature and 16 other leading writers and scientists, marshal up-to-the-minute research to make one of the most perplexing realms in science dazzlingly clear. Prepare to be amazed at how much more there is to nothing than you ever realized."

The range of solar sailing is very vast; it is a fully in-space means of propulsion that should allow us to accomplish various mission classes that are literally impossible using rocket propulsion, no matter if nuclear or electric. Fast and very fast solar sailings are special classes of sailcraft missions, initially developed only in the first half of the 1990s and still evolving, especially after the latest advances in nanotechnology. This book describes how to plan, compute and optimize the trajectories of sailcraft with speeds considerably higher than 100 km/s; such sailcraft would be able to explore the outer heliosphere, the near interstellar medium and the solar gravitational lens (550-800 astronomical units) in times significantly shorter than the span of an average career (~ 35 years), just to cite a few examples. The scientific interest in this type of exploration is huge.

Magnetized plasmas in the universe exhibit complex dynamical behavior over a huge range of scales. The fundamental mechanisms of energy transport, redistribution and conversion occur at multiple scales. The driving mechanisms often include energy accumulation, free-energy-excited relaxation processes, dissipation and self-organization. The plasma processes associated with energy conversion, transport and self-organization, such as magnetic reconnection, instabilities, linear and nonlinear waves, wave-particle interactions, dynamo processes, turbulence, heating, diffusion and convection represent fundamental physical effects. They demonstrate similar dynamical behavior in near-Earth space, on the Sun, in the heliosphere and in astrophysical environments. 'Multi-scale Dynamical Processes in Space and Astrophysical Plasmas' presents the proceedings of the International Astrophysics Forum Alpbach 2011. The contributions discuss the latest advances in the exploration of dynamical behavior in space plasmas environments, including comprehensive approaches to theoretical, experimental and numerical aspects. The book will appeal to researchers and students in the fields of physics, space and astrophysics, solar physics, geophysics and planetary science.

This book is a collection of articles covering the six lecture courses given at the CISM School on this topic in 2008. It features contributions by established international experts and offers a coherent and comprehensive overview of the state-of-the art research in the field, thus addressing both postgraduate students and researchers in aerospace, mechanical and civil engineering.

Some might think that the 27 thousand tons of material launched by earthlings into outer space is nothing more than floating piles of debris. However, when looking at these artifacts through the eyes of historians and anthropologists, instead of celestial pollution, they are seen as links to human history and heritage.

Space: The New Frontier for Archeologists

Handbook of Space Engineering, Archaeology and Heritage, published this month by CRC Press Taylor and Francis Group, brings together 43 anthropologists, historians, physicists, and engineers, a scientific team as culturally diverse as the crew of any science fiction cruiser. They offer a range of novel historical and technological perspectives on humankind s experience in space. This ambitious work presents an informative, thought-provoking, and educational text that discusses the evolution of space engineering, spacecraft reliability and forensics, field techniques, and mission planning, as well as space programs for the future. The book is edited by a pair of scientists from different sides of the campus: Ann Garrison Darrin, aerospace engineer and NASA veteran and Beth Laura O Leary, anthropologist and member of the World Archaeological Congress Space Heritage Task Force.

The handbook delves into the evolution of space archaeology and heritage, including the emerging fields of Archaeoastronomy, Ethnoastronomy, and Cultural Astronomy. It also covers space basics and the history of the space age from Sputnik to modern day satellites. It discusses the cultural landscape of space, including orbital artifacts in space, as well as objects left on planetary surfaces and includes a look at the culture of Apollo as a catalog of manned exploration of the moon. It also considers the application of forensic investigation to the solving of cold case mysteries including failed Mars mission landing sites and lost spacecraft, and even investigates the archaeology of the putative Roswell UFO crash site and appraises material culture in science fiction.

The goals of the 10th International Space Conference on "Protection of Materials and Structures from Space Environment" ICPMSE-10J, since its inception in 1992, have been to facilitate exchanges between members of the various engineering and science disciplines involved in the development of space materials, including aspects of LEO, GEO and Deep Space environments, ground-based qualification, and in-flight experiments and lessons learned from operational vehicles that are closely interrelated to disciplines of the atmospheric sciences, solar-terrestrial interactions and space life sciences. The knowledge of environmental conditions on and around the Moon, Mars, Venus and the low Earth orbit as well as other possible candidates for landing such as asteroids have become an important issue, and protecting both hardware and human life from the effects of space environments has taken on a new meaning in light of the increased interest in space travel and colonization of other planets. And while many material experiments have been carried out on the ground and in open space in the last 50 years (LDEF, MEEP, SARE, MISSE, AOP, DSPSE, ESEM, EURECA, HST, MDIM, MIS, MPID, MPAC and SEED), many questions regarding the environmental impact of space on materials remain either poorly understood or unanswered. The coming generations of scientists will have to continue this work and tackle new challenges, continuing to build the level of confidence humans will need to continue the colonization of space. It is hoped that the proceedings of the ICPMSE-10J presented in this book will constitute a small contribution to doing so.

Over the last fifteen years, space-based exploration of the solar system has increased dramatically, with more and more sophisticated orbiters and landers being sent to Mars. This intense period, rich in unprecedented scientific results, has led to immense progress in our perception of Mars and of its evolution over geological time. In parallel, advances in numerical simulations and laboratory experiments also shed new light on the geochemical evolution of the planet Mars. The ISSI-Europlanet Workshop entitled "Quantifying the Martian Geochemical Reservoirs" was held in Bern in April 2011 with the objective to create a diverse interdisciplinary forum composed of scientists directly involved in space-based exploration of the Martian surface, meteoriticists studying SNC meteorites, and planetary and/or Earth scientists simulating, numerically or experimentally, the physical and chemical processes occurring on or within Mars. The chapters of this book provide an overview of current knowledge of the past and present Martian geochemical reservoirs, from the accretionary history to the secondary alteration processes at the surface. In addition to the detailed description of data from Mars and the methods used to obtain them, the contributions also emphasize comparison with features on Earth, providing a perspective on the extent to which our knowledge of terrestrial systems influences interpretation of data from Mars. Areas that would benefit from future work and measurements are also identified, providing a view of the short-term and long-term future of the study of Mars. This collection of chapters constitutes a timely perspective on current knowledge and thinking concerning the geochemical evolution of Mars, providing context and a valuable reference point for even more exciting future discoveries. It is aimed at graduate students and researchers active in geochemistry and space science. Previously published in Space Science Reviews, Vol. 174/1-4, 2013.

The contributions to the 151st IAU Colloquium cover different fields of recent research, observational as well as theoretical, on solar and stellar flares ranging from radio up to gamma-ray wavelengths. A special chapter is devoted to all-sky monitoring and, finally, the excerpts of a round-table discussion present the reader with an interesting outlook on future developments. This book is therefore a unique source for those who want to get a complete picture of this fascinating part of modern astrophysics.

The book is the first thorough overview of the first important steps to develop a worldwide virtual observatory so that, in the future, it could be easier to "dial-up" a part of the sky than wait many months to access a telescope. The articles in this book present details on the status of the first efforts to develop a standardized framework for the virtual observatory, including steps towards completion and deployment of technical infrastructure, uptake by data providers worldwide, and utilization by the scientific community.

This monograph collects and critically reviews the main results obtained by the scientific community in gyroscope technologies research field. It describes architectures, design techniques and fabrication technology of angular rate sensors proposed in literature. MEMS, MOEMS, optical and mechanical technologies are discussed together with achievable performance. The book also consideres future research trends aimed to cover special applications. The book is intended for researchers and Ph.D. students interested in modelling, design and fabrication of gyros. The book may be a useful education support in some university courses focused on gyro technologies.

During the last decade, a rapid growth of knowledge in the field of re-entry and planetary entry has resulted in many significant advances useful to the student, engineer and scientist. The purpose of offering this course is to make available to them these recent significant advances in physics and technology. Accordingly, this course is organized into five parts: Part 1, Entry Dynamics, Thermodynamics, Physics and Radiation; Part 2, Entry Abla tion and Heat Transfer; Part 3, Entry Experimentation; Part 4, Entry Concepts and Technology; and Part 5, Advanced Entry Programs. It is written in such a way so that it may easily be adopted by other universities as a textbook for a two semesters senior or graduate course on the sub ject. In addition to the undersigned who served as the course instructor and wrote Chapters, 1, 2, 3 and 4, guest lecturers included: Prof. FRANKLIN K. MOORE who wrote Chapter 5 "Entry Radiative Transfer," Prof. SHIH-I PAI who wrote Chapter 6 "Entry Radiation-Magnetogasdy namics," Dr. CARL GAZLEY, J r. who wrote Chapter 7 "Entry Deaccelera [ion and Mass Change of an Ablating Body," Dr. SINCLAIRE M. SCALA who wrote Chapter 8 "Entry Heat Transfer and Material Response," Mr.

This book collects together a selection of the best papers presented at the Third International Bioastronomy Symposium held in 1990. The subject is bioastronomy, the search for life in the universe, andthe book is devided according to the five main stages of life as recognized by this new branch of science: cosmic organic, prebiotic, primitive biological, and advanced. Thereader will find here the most recent results obtained by top specialists from all over the world on hot topics such as the formation and discovery of planets, organic chemistry in meteorites and comets, prebiotic chemistry in the atmosphere of Titan, the search for primitive life in the permafrost of Mars, and, SETI itself, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence. Complemented by live discussions each presentation forms a review of the state-of-the-art treatment of a particular area and also looks toward those developments in bioastronomywhich will surely be realized in the next few years.

"Fault Detection and Isolation: Multi-Vehicle Unmanned System" deals with the design and development of fault detection and isolation algorithms for unmanned vehicles such as spacecraft, aerial drones and other related vehicles. Addressing fault detection and isolation is a key step towards designing autonomous, fault-tolerant cooperative control of networks of unmanned systems. This book proposes a solution based on a geometric approach, and presents new theoretical findings for fault detection and isolation in Markovian jump systems. Also discussed are the effects of large environmental disturbances, as well as communication channels, on unmanned systems. The book proposes novel solutions to difficulties like robustness issues, as well as communication channel anomalies. "Fault Detection and Isolation: Multi-Vehicle Unmanned System" is an ideal book for researchers and engineers working in the fields of fault detection, as well as networks of unmanned vehicles.

Introduces the reader to engineering magnetohydrodynamics applications and presents a comprehensive guide of how to approach different problems found in this multidisciplinary field. An introduction to engineering magnetohydrodynamics, this brief focuses heavily on the design of thermo-magnetic systems for liquid metals, with emphasis on the design of electromagnetic annular linear induction pumps for space nuclear reactors. Alloy systems that are liquid at room temperature have a high degree of thermal conductivity far superior to ordinary non-metallic liquids. This results in their use for specific heat conducting and dissipation applications. For example, liquid metal-cooled reactors are typically very compact and can be used in space propulsion systems and in fission reactors for planetary exploration. Computer aided engineering (CAE), computational physics and mathematical methods are introduced, as well as manufacturing and testing procedures. An overview on space nuclear systems is also included. This brief is an invaluable tool for design engineers and applied physicists as well as to graduate students in nuclear and mechanical engineering or in applied physics.

This SpringerBrief details the MESSENGER Mission, the findings of which present challenges to widely held conventional views and remaining mysteries surrounding the planet. The work answers the question of why Mercury is so dense, and the implications from geochemical data on its planetary formation. It summarizes imaging and compositional data from the terrestrial planet surface processes and explains the geologic history of Mercury. It also discusses the lack of southern hemisphere coverage. Our understanding of the planet Mercury has been in a transitional phase over the decades since Mariner 10. The influx of new data from the NASA MESSENGER Mission since it was inserted into the orbit of Mercury in March of 2011 has greatly accelerated that shift. The combined compositional data of relatively high volatiles (S, K), relatively low refractories (Al, Ca), and low crustal iron, combined with an active, partially molten iron rich core, has major implications for Mercury and Solar System formation. From a scientist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, this presents a comprehensive overview of the discoveries from the ten-year MESSENGER mission.

This two-part book is devoted to classic fundamentals and current practices and perspectives of modern plasma astrophysics. This second part discusses the physics of magnetic reconnection and flares of electromagnetic origin in space plasmas in the solar system, single and double stars, relativistic objects, accretion disks and their coronae. More than 25% of the text is updated from the first edition, included the additions of new figures, equations and entire sections on topics such as topological triggers for solar flares and the magnetospheric physics problem. This book is aimed at professional researchers in astrophysics, but it will also be useful to graduate students in space sciences, geophysics, applied physics and mathematics, especially those seeking a unified view of plasma physics and fluid mechanics.

In Robotic Exploration of the Solar System, Paolo Ulivi and David Harland provide a comprehensive account of the design and management of deep-space missions, the spacecraft involved - some flown, others not - their instruments, and their scientific results. This fourth volume in the series covers the period 2004 to the present day and features: coverage of the Rosetta and Curiosity missions up to the end of 2013 coverage of Mars missions since 2005, including the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter, Phoenix and Fobos-Grunt, plus a description of plans for future robotic exploration of the Red Planet coverage of all planetary missions launched between 2004 and 2013, including the Deep Impact cometary mission, the MESSENGER Mercury orbiter, the New Horizons Pluto flyby and the Juno Jupiter orbiter the first complete description of the Chinese Chang'e 2 asteroid flyby mission ever published extensive coverage of future missions, including the European BepiColombo Mercury orbiter and international plans to revisit the most interesting moons of Jupiter and Saturn.

Young addresses the impressive expansion across existing and developing commercial space business markets, with multiple private companies competing in the payload launch services sector. The author pinpoints the new markets, technologies, and players in the industry, as well as highlighting the overall reasons why it is important for us to develop space. NASA now relies on commercial partners to supply cargo and crew spacecraft and services to and from the International Space Station. The sizes of satellites are diminishing and their capabilities expanding, while costs to orbit are decreasing. Suborbital space tourism holds the potential of new industries and jobs. Commercial space exploration of the Moon and the planets also holds promise. All this activity is a catalyst for anyone interested in joining the developing space industry, from students and researchers to engineers and entrepreneurs. As more and more satellites and rockets are launched and the business of space is expanding at a significant pace, it is increasingly important for scientists and engineers of many disciplines to understand how the business evolved and where it is continuing to develop. The growing field is fully explored in this concise overview to the players in this changing landscape.

The field of ultraviolet astronomy offers unequalled scientific promise yet has not been blessed with a multitude of space missions (as has been the case for other spectral domains). This book contains a distillation of the community's views on the topic and the desires for future observational facilities. As such, it provides the most up-to-date information on the topic of ultraviolet astronomy from a very broad point of view, presenting a compilation of lectures given at a specialist meeting and combining theoretical arguments with observational reports and detailed instrumental information.

Nanodust and nanometer-sized structures are important components of many objects in space. Nanodust is observed in evolved stars, young stellar objects, protoplanetary disks, and dust debris disks. Within the solar system, nanodust is observed with in-situ experiments from spacecraft. Nanometer-sized substructures are found in the collected cometary and interplanetary dust particles and in meteorites. Understanding the growth and destruction of dust, its internal evolution, as well as the optical properties and the detection of nanoparticles is of fundamental importance for astrophysical research. This book provides a focused description of the current state of research and experimental results concerning nanodust in the solar system. It addresses three major questions: What is nanodust? How was it discovered in the solar system? And how do we interpret the observations? The book serves as a self-contained reference work for space researchers and provides solid information on nanodust in cosmic environments for researchers working in astrophysics or in other fields of physics.

For nearly sixty years, radio observations have provided a unique insight into the physics of the active and quiescent solar atmosphere. Thanks to the variety of emission mechanisms and to the large altitude range available to observations, fundamental plasma parameters have been measured from the low chromosphere to the upper corona and interplanetary medium. This book presents current research in solar radio astronomy and shows how well it fits in the exceptional scientific context brought by the current space solar observatories. It essentially contains contributed research and review papers presented during the 2010 Community of European Solar Radio Astronomers (CESRA) meeting, which took place in Belgium in June 2010. This book is aimed at graduate students and researchers working in solar physics and space science. Previously published in Solar Physics journal, Vol. 273/2, 2011.

STEM-Professional Women's Exclusion in the Canadian Space Industry: Anchor Points and Intersectionality at the Margins of Space showcases the 'how' of exclusion of STEM-professional women from management and executive positions. It examines the discourses and power-relations surrounding these STEM-professional women's identities, drawing on and reworking the concept of anchor points to investigate their relationship to structural, discursive, and socio-psychological processes. By utilizing the critical sensemaking (CSM) framework, the book provides an avenue to surface the ephemeral identities of STEM-professional women, and investigate their relationship with the meta-rules, rules, and social values of the Canadian space industry. It also considers the potential for social change across this industry by considering the responsibilities of cisgender men with respect to addressing and resisting the systemic discrimination of STEM-professional women in the industry. Specific sites for micro-political resistances that these STEM-professional women could enact are considered and suggested. This book will appeal to researchers and scholars focused on gender and diversity, intersectionality scholarship, and poststructuralist intersectional feminism.

Recent missions on board the International Space Station have revealed previously unreported physiological consequences of long duration space flight, particularly in eyesight, and in this Brief Dr. Seedhouse reviews the existing theories on what causes this degeneration and how long it will last. Notably, 60% of long-duration crews have reported subjective degradation in vision, a clear indication that further study is necessary before astronauts embark on even longer-term space missions. Decreased near-visual acuity was reported in 46% of ISS/Mir crewmembers, resulting in a change of up to 2 dioptres in their refractive correction. It is possible that ophthalmic changes have been present since the first days of spaceflight, but had been attributed to other causes; this approach to the issue as well as other hypotheses are all presented in full to give a broad foundation of the existing knowledge on the topic. The changes have occurred at various times during a mission with varying degrees of visual degradation. Some cases resolved on return to Earth, but several crewmembers have not regained pre-flight visual acuity, indicating the damage may be permanent. One explanation of the syndrome has been attributed to hyperopic shift due to aging, but onboard analysis techniques, including visual acuity assessments, retinal imagery, and ultrasound examination of the eye, has led to the acceptance of a wider syndrome. In addition to vision changes, studies have reported flattening of the globe, swelling of the optic disc (papilledema), choroidal folds in the retina, swelling of the optic nerve sheath, and visual field defects. It is widely hypothesized that this spectrum of symptoms may be explained by an elevation of intracranial pressure (ICP). Establishing the provenance of this medical problem, monitoring its occurrence and resolving the symptoms for future long term space missions is a key challenge for space medicine. With this book, readers have an entry point for understanding the full scope of the problem and its possible origins.