We are currently preparing for the annual COSPAR staff and officials meetings in March, when we meet to discuss new projects, do general housekeeping and, of course, firm up the scientific programme for forthcoming events, like COSPAR 2024 Assembly in Busan, among other matters.
In this issue of COSPAR News you'll get to meet another of our Interdisciplinary Lecturers for COSPAR 2024 (for which we have received a large number of abstracts, this promises to be a dynamic Assembly!) and also hear about a new initiative: the International Planetary Protection Week. Plus a good mix of COSPAR business, community snippets and a selection of news from the wider world of space.
Don't forget to let us know if there's something you'd like to see or read here, and if you enjoy this newsletter, please share it!
This image is an enlarged view of a lunar surface scan mosaic captured by the JapaneseSmart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM)-mounted Multi-Band Camera (MBC). Despite having to pôwer the spacecraft down after landing, due to the solar cells facing away from the sun, communication has been established, and both Lunar Excursion Vehicle-1 (LEV-1) and LEV-2 have been successfully deployed.
(Image credits: JAXA/Ritsumeikan University/The University of Aizu) Back to top
Please welcome Kanako Seki, one of our IDL speakers (there are three more). Her research subjects range fromsolar-planetary environment, planetary magnetosphere and ionosphere and aurora to elementary processes in space plasma, geospace environment and space weather. She is Professor at the Department of Earth and Planetary Science at The University of Tokyo. We can't wait to hear her lecture on Solar-planetary Environment and its Habitability: Insights from Atmospheric Escape Studies
Registration is now open for accompanying persons at the 45th COSPAR Scientific Assembly (COSPAR 2024), Busan, Korea, 13-21 July 2024. Don't come alone! Bring a friend, bring the family (registration for childcare is now open).
The deadline for applications for COSPAR Fellowships is 31 March 2024. The Fellowship is open to anyone who has participated in a COSPAR Capacity Building Workshop (CBW), and it provides for visits of 2-4 weeks duration for carrying out joint research at laboratories that collaborate with COSPAR,enabling paricipants to build on the skills acquired at the COSPAR CBW. Details on the website.
The new COSPAR Strategic Action Plan 2024-2028 is now available! One year in the making, covering all areas of the COSPAR community, this dynamic document provides clear guidance of the way forward for COSPAR for the next five years. Read it here.
The main goal of this I-HOW/COSPAR Capacity Building Workshop (CBW) is to facilitate the learning of High-resolution X-ray Spectroscopy for early-career scientists in Asia-Pacific countries. It will take place at Fudan University, Shanghai, China from 19-30 August 2024 and the application deadline is 22 March 2024.
...that COSPAR is co-sponsoring the XIV COLAGE and International Space Sciences School (ISSS) in Monterrey, Mexico, 8-12 April 2024?The aim of the school is promoting knowledge and training for undergraduate, master’s and doctoral candidates, from all over the world, in the area of Space Science. This coincides nicely with the total solar eciipse the day before, 7 April.
We're pleased to introduce Drs Gaines and Ibrahim, winners of the COSPAR Outstanding Paper Awards for Young Scientists, for their papers published in Life Sciences in Space Research in 2022! Their papers are free to read for 3 months here. The recipients of the award for papers published in Advances in Space Research can be found hereand access to their papers is also complimentary for 3 months, courtesy of Elsevier.
Congratulations to all!
COSPAR Scientific Commissions and Panels will be easier to identify in our communications now that they each have their own icon. Look out for them in future issues of COSPAR News, on the COSPAR website and read about them inthe next Space Research Today. And please give us your feedback!
The InternationalUnion of Pure & Applied Chemistry (IUPAC)'s Global Women's Breakfast, born from the international networking event “Women Sharing a Chemical Moment in Time” in 2011, goes from strength to strength. This year the theme was "Catalyzing Diversity in Science", encouraging chemists to connect, participate and to expand professional networks and learn from each other.
The UK Space Agency is setting up a new Planetary Protection Advisory Panel, chaired by Karen Olsson-Francis, member of the COSPAR Planetary Protection Panel, to support best practice for UK-licensed missions to the Moon and wider solar system.
News from Space Agencies
Australian Experiments Launched
Three Australian payloads were on board the MAPHEUS 14 sounding rocket which was launched in February from Esrange Space Center in Kiruna. They included an experiment designed and built by university students at RMIT to test a conceptual radiation shield for long term space missions, and two delivered by Adelaide-based start-up ResearchSat.
The first African Space Council of the African Space Agency has now been appointed. The Council is headed by Dr Tidiane Ouattara (Ivory Coast) with Mrs Thandikile Mbvundula (Malawi) as Vice-President. We look forward to further developments.
Astroscale Japan Inc. launched its commercial debris inspection demonstration satellite, Active Debris Removal by Astroscale-Japan (ADRAS-J) on 19 February. The ADRAS-J mission is the world’s first attempt to safely approach, characterize and survey the state of an existing piece of large debris through Rendezvous and Proximity Operations (RPO).
The largest black hole yet discoved (quasar J059-4351), has been identified, with a mass roughly17 billion times that of our Sun.It's the fastest-growing (and most luminous) object in the known universe, "eating" the equivalent of one sun a day and was first detected with a 2.3 m telescope at the ANU Siding Spring Observatory in NSW, Australia. The discovery was confirmed by the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope.
Artist’s impression showing the record-breaking quasar J059-4351 (Image credit: ESO/M. Kornmesser) Back to top
On the Radar
Scarred Star Spotted
Research by a team using the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope, led by theArmagh Observatory and Planetarium Astronomer, Stefano Bagnulo, has discovered the signature mark of white dwarfs that cannibalise their planetary systems. Their findings outline how a scar found imprinted on the surface of magnetic white dwarf WD0816-310 shows that the white dwarf had ingested planetary debris.
On the Radar
Farewell, ERS-2
Afteralmost 30 years in orbit, ESA’s ERS-2 re-entered Earth’s atmosphere at approximately 18:17 CET (17:17 UTC) on 21 February 2024. This is one of the final images of ERS-2 tumbling through the sky.
ISEE, Nagoya University is presently seeking an associate professor (tenured position) to work in both the Center for Integrated Data Science and the Division of Integrated Studies. Deadline for application: 31 March 2024. Full details here.
In March 2015 Jet Propulsion Lab's Dawn became the first spacecraft to orbit a dwarf planet, Ceres. Launched in 2007, it completed a 14-month mission survey of Vesta before leaving for Ceres in late 2012.
