The latest two selections in the Discovery program of low-cost missions:

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...1224080741.htm

I'm particularly excited about the selection of Kepler, which is the first program with the capability of finding Earth-sized planets around other stars.

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Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

I've been pleasantly surprised to discover these missions are both still on track to be launched.


http://dawn.jpl.nasa.gov/

http://www.nasa.gov/centers/ames/res...se-kepler.html


I'd never heard of the Dawn mission before, but its scheduled to launch June 17th next year. Very exciting news, particularly as to me at least its very new news

I've followed the development of the Dawn mission for several years. There is speculation that Ceres is more planet-like than asteroid-like and this should prove that. This means that it has a core, mantel, and crust. There is speculation that it has significant ice deposits and possible a thin atmosphere as well. Vesta, being significantly smaller, probably is more asteroid-like (similar to Eros and Itokawa). The really cool thing about this mission, though, is that it will fly out to one of the asteroids first, orbit it for detailed study, then power up its engines again and fly to the other for another detailed orbital study. I hope they do Ceres last, and then at teh end of the mission do a NEAR-like landing on the surface. That would be cool.

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...and we'll be saying a big hello to all intelligent life forms everywhere; and to everyone else out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together, guys...

Dawn will do Vesta first, then Ceres, as this Universe Today story explains.

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Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

Why exactly were you surprised?

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Fiction has to be plausible. Reality is under no such constraint.

As you said, Ceres is very planet-like. That means that it's gravity is also much stronger than on an average asteroid. So soft landing isn't possible.

I'd like to see Dawn leaving the orbit around Ceres and going to study yet another asteroid. But let's hope it first completes its primary mission successfully.

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Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.
-- Richard Feynman

They weren't cancelled?

Well, Kepler's launch was postponed due to budged cuts.

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Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.
-- Richard Feynman

Only because of the lack of press that these missions receive. The obsession with Mars is fine, but the general public out there (which in relation to space exploration I've been a member of for the past couple of years mainly due to time constraints), is simply not aware of the other worthwhile and interesting missions being carried out by NASA and various other space agencies.

I had heard about these missions a few years ago and was definitely excited about them, but not having kept-up-to-date with their progression, its always pleasing to find that they're still on track, particularly in light of all the bad press NASA often puts up with.

Basically, to the general public NASA is the ISS/Shuttles & Mars. ISS/Shuttles = Massive waste of money (not to mention extremely dangerous), and Mars = Search for life. I don't think there's much else on the NASA radar for the great majority of people, and that is most definitely reflected in NASA's coverage in the mainstream media.

Unmanned missions only get press when they're announced, when they're about to launch, when they start their mission, or when they find something stupendous (or when they screw up badly).

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Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

Why so long to Vesta? 5 years? Are they really that much farther away than Mars? We can get to Mars in less than a year. I realize Vesta is at a greater distance and would take longer, but over 4 years longer?

CJSF

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Two years ago moved from my town
I was looking up past the city lights
But the city lights got in my way

See the constellation ride across the sky
No cigar, no lady on his arm
Just a guy made of dots and lines

-from "See The Constellation"
by They Might Be Giants

because mission uses ion drive, so verrrrrrry weak thrust but for a VERY long time... in the end getting BOTH Ceres and Vesta, all but impossible with chemical rockets. Drawback is that you have a fairly leisurely pace across Solar System, think that SMART-1 took nearly a year to enter orbit around the Moon using ion drive

mauro

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Ion Drive - same force as a piece of paper falling, but per second, to add together to quite a great amount of speed in space.

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"A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right." -- Thomas Paine

Being intelligent is not a felony. But most societies evaluate it as at least a misdemeanor. -- Heinlein

Creationists make it sound as though a "theory" is something you dreamt up after being drunk all night. -- Isaac Asimov

Oh, OK. I hadn't realized they were going to use ion drive... that's what I get for skimming the web pages that fast!



CJSF

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Two years ago moved from my town
I was looking up past the city lights
But the city lights got in my way

See the constellation ride across the sky
No cigar, no lady on his arm
Just a guy made of dots and lines

-from "See The Constellation"
by They Might Be Giants

Also we need to slip into orbit. If we wanted to get something there in a short time frame we could, but it would blow right past it. For this we have to slip in behind it and get caught in its gravity.

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...and we'll be saying a big hello to all intelligent life forms everywhere; and to everyone else out there, the secret is to bang the rocks together, guys...

In other words they get press if they make NEWs (hopefully at least).

Sure I would love to hear about Opportunity and Spirit's every move on the evening news but it is really not justified for a general audience. For us fans it is exciting, but for most it is just another rock. For a general news, the rovers might get featured for the mention as a story of wild success against the odds. But otherwise unless something really major comes along it will not get covered in the context of general news. If I was in charge of the evening newscast I don't think that the unmanned missions would get that much more coverage than they do now. (Though I would not discriminate against a probe because it was not made in the U.S. thus proving that I could never hold down that job.) The science section of the paper will do a bit better, but even it does not cover the rovers that much anymore. But then again, with the web we can look up the specialized stuff we like to lean about...

In the end, after a while repeated success ceases to be news. Maybe we should wish that the rovers don't make the general news other than the rare milestone (anniversaries, etc) pieces. Because if they don't make the general news it means that the rovers are still at work.

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Yeah, which leads, unfortunately, to a rather interesting phenoma.

Number of aircraft that take off and land without problem: 10,000. For every 10,000 of those planecraft that take off: 1 has a problem. For every 1 that has a problem: .1 crash.

Yet what do people focus on? The crashes.

Same with NASA's endeavors. We focus on the mistakes, not the successes, and thus, people get a bad idea about A) Space travel, and B) NASA.

As if the Conspiracy Theorists really need more help.

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"A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right." -- Thomas Paine

Being intelligent is not a felony. But most societies evaluate it as at least a misdemeanor. -- Heinlein

Creationists make it sound as though a "theory" is something you dreamt up after being drunk all night. -- Isaac Asimov

Some interesting language here:

Asteroid threat after all? http://www.space.com/news/051103_asteroid_apophis.html

Fireballs: http://www.space.com/scienceastronom...fireballs.html

Don't count on the Air Farce:
http://www.spacewar.com/news/abm-05zi.html

DAMN!

Space.com: NASA Dawn Asteroid Mission Told To ‘Stand Down’

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Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.
-- Richard Feynman

I tell ya, corporations are the way to go. They don't suffer government budget cuts.

(There would be other things to contend with, but still.)

__________________
"A long habit of not thinking a thing wrong gives it a superficial appearance of being right." -- Thomas Paine

Being intelligent is not a felony. But most societies evaluate it as at least a misdemeanor. -- Heinlein

Creationists make it sound as though a "theory" is something you dreamt up after being drunk all night. -- Isaac Asimov