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Albedo raised $35 million to build and launch its first high-resolution Earth-imagery satellite. The company announced a Series A-1 round Tuesday led by Standard Investments. The funding round will allow Albedo to accelerate work on its very low Earth orbit (VLEO) constellation, capable of producing optical images with a resolution of 10 centimeters and thermal imagery at a resolution of two meters. Albedo expects to launch its first satellite in 2025. [SpaceNews]
French launch vehicle startup Latitude has raised $30 million. The company announced its Series B round Monday from a group of European investors, including the French government's Deeptech 2030 fund. Latitude is working on Zephyr, a small launch vehicle capable of putting up to 100 kilograms into low Earth orbit, with a first launch in 2025. The company says the funding will support production and testing of the vehicle and the creation of an assembly line for later vehicles. Latitude plans to double the vehicle's payload capacity as soon as 2028. [SpaceNews]
Aldoria, a French space situational awareness (SSA) startup, has raised $10.9 million. The company announced its Series A round Tuesday involving several French and European investors. Aldoria, previously known as Share My Space, operates a network of optical telescopes to track space objects. The company will use the funding to expand that network and enhance its ability to process data from that network and other sources. [SpaceNews]
A new report calls for greater use of artificial intelligence to analyze satellite data. The report, released last week by the World Economic Forum and Deloitte, found a burgeoning demand for data related to climate and sustainability, precision agriculture and ESG reporting requirements. That data is available in many cases from existing Earth observation satellites, but the report found that advances an AI may enable new applications involving such data to make it accessible to a wider range of customers. An Earth observation market panel at the recent WEF forum concluded that there has to be continued dialogue between data suppliers, users and financiers, as these groups may not typically talk to one another. [SpaceNews]
The Japanese space agency JAXA hopes that sunlight can revive its SLIM lunar lander in the coming days. Flight controllers had to turn off SLIM hours after its landing Friday to conserve battery power because its solar panels were not generating electricity. A changing sun angle could enable those panels to produce power, officials said. JAXA is planning a press conference Thursday to provide an update on the mission, including whether SLIM achieved its goal of a landing with a precision of 100 meters or better. [SpaceNews]
The two companies with NASA contracts to develop crewed Artemis lunar landers are also working on cargo versions. NASA said it recently activated options on Human Landing System contracts with Blue Origin and SpaceX to direct them to start initial design of cargo versions of their landers, capable of placing 12 to 15 metric tons of cargo on the lunar surface. The work, taking the designs up to a preliminary design review, will be backed by the existing contracts and not require additional funding. NASA says it does not expect to require the cargo landers until the Artemis 7 mission, no sooner than the early 2030s. [SpaceNews]
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A Chinese commercial rocket launched five satellites Monday night. The Lijian-1, or Kinetica-1, solid-fuel rocket lifted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center at 11:03 p.m. Eastern. The rocket successfully placed five Taijing remote sensing satellites into orbit. [Xinhua]
India is planning to privatize production of its largest launch vehicle. The Indian space agency ISRO and its commercial arm, NewSpace India Ltd. (NSIL), have started the process to set up a public private partnership to produce the LVM3 rocket, also known as the GSLV Mark 3. The LVM3 is capable of placing up to eight tons into low Earth orbit and four tons into geostationary transfer orbit. ISRO and NSIL have previously adopted similar approaches to hand over production of the smaller SSLV and PSLV rockets to the private sector. [IANS]
NASA has finally opened the canister containing samples returned from an asteroid. Technicians in an astromaterials lab at the Johnson Space Center removed the final two fasteners on the lid of the OSIRIS-REx canister after developing special tools to remove the stuck fasteners. That allowed them to open the lid of the canister nearly four months after it returned to Earth with samples from the asteroid Bennu. Scientists are now working to remove the asteroid material inside, weigh it and hand it over to other researchers for analysis. [NASA]
Astronomers discovered a tiny asteroid Saturday hours before it burned up in the atmosphere. The asteroid, 2024 BX1, was spotted Saturday by Hungarian astronomer Krisztián Sárneczky. The images showed that the asteroid, about one meter across, would enter the Earth's atmosphere later that night over Germany. Observers there, including in and around Berlin, spotted a bright meteor at the predicted time. [Space.com]
Salads may not be as healthy for you in space as once thought. NASA has worked to grow lettuce and other vegetables in space to provide future long-duration missions with fresh food. However, a study found that lettuce grown in microgravity may be more susceptible to Salmonella infections that could sicken astronauts who eat the lettuce. That's a particular concern in a confined habitat like the International Space Station, where disease-causing microbes can thrive. [Univ. of Delaware]
A scientist who discovered key evidence supporting the Big Bang model of the universe has died. Arno A. Penzias was working at Bell Labs in the early 1960s when he and fellow physicist Robert Wilson noticed a persistent hum from a radio dish. After ruling out terrestrial sources of interference, including bird droppings inside the antenna, they concluded that they had detected a cosmic microwave background signal, a signature of the Big Bang predicted by astronomers. Penzias and Wilson shared part of the 1978 Nobel Prize in physics for the discovery. Penzias was 90. [New York Times]
| | Play to Your Strengths
"You have different approaches to solving problems. The Chinese will say, 'OK, what can we copy?' The Americans say, 'Where can we innovate?' And the Europeans say, 'OK, what can we regulate?' Let's be honest, it's a distinctive capability that we have."
– Thomas Dermine, the Belgian government's State Secretary for Science Policy, Recovery Program and Strategic Investments, during a panel discussion about a proposed E.U. space law at the European Space Conference on Tuesday. | | | |
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