Учебное пособие Астрономия. Космическая техника и технологии Алматы, 2012 удк 802. 0 52 629. 7 (0758) ббк 81. Англ. 923
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Quiz: NASA Turns Fifty 1) This type of spin stabilized spacecraft made successful explorations of the Sun, Earth's Moon, Jupiter, Saturn and Venus. a) Mercury VII b) Pioneer c) Saturn V d) Jupiter C 2) Previous to the creation of NASA, Explorer I was launched into orbit by the United States. Who was responsible for the project? a) CIA b) U.S. Air Force c) U.S. Army Ballistic Missile Agency d) University of Iowa 3) The Viking missions to Mars were to involve orbiters and landers that took how long to reach their destination? a) three years b) ten to eleven months c) six to eight weeks d) they never functionally arrived 4) For all of the splash that Skylab made, how long was it manned by NASA? a) Skylab was unmanned b) eighty four days c) twenty four weeks d) three years 5) The space probe 'Galileo' was launched from the cargo bay of Space Shuttle Atlantis in 1989, traveled approximately 2.8 billion miles, and crashed into what, ending its mission? a) Jupiter b) the Indian ocean c) an asteroid d) Mars 6) Everyone is familiar with Apollo 11's Neil Armstrong, who was the first to set foot on the moon. Others will recall the transmission of the ill fated Apollo 13, "Houston, we have a problem". How many Apollo flights actually made safe lunar landings? a) 3 b) 17 c) 11 d) 6 7) If you have "the Right Stuff", you can spot the astronaut who was NOT one of the "Mercury Seven" astronauts. a) Slayton b) Cooper c) Young d) Schirra 8) What was the name of the Space Mission that bridged the gap between John Glenn's flight and the Apollo space mission? a) Gemini b) Titan c) Friendship d) Mercury 9) Perhaps the most noted Space Shuttle mission was the Challenger tragedy of January 28, 1986. Had the tragedy not occurred, what was the mission for the Challenger STS-51L? a) launch and retrieve the Spartan satellite b) Teacher in Space experiments c) study Haley's Comet d) all are correct 10) By the time the Space Shuttle Atlantis docked for the first time with Russia's MIR Space Station in 1995, the two vehicles were directly above what famous geographical feature? a) Mt. Rushmore b) The White House c) Lake Baikal d) Chernobyl Speaking Work in pairs and discuss projects of NASA: a) Project Mercury b) Project Gemini c) Project Apollo d) Apollo Eleven e) Apollo Seventeen f) Apollo-Soyuz Test Project g) The space shuttle program h) Mariner spacecraft i) Voyagers j) The Galileo k) Mariner spacecraft l) Mars exploration m) Moon exploration Text 10B Aerospace engineering Aerospace engineering is the branch of engineering behind the design, construction and science of aircraft and spacecraft. It is broken into two major and overlapping branches: aeronautical engineering and astronautical engineering. The former deals with craft that stay within Earth's atmosphere, and the latter deals with craft that operates outside of Earth's atmosphere. While aeronautical engineering was the original term, the broader "aerospace" has superseded it in usage, as flight technology advanced to include craft operating in outer space. Aerospace engineering, particularly the astronautics branch, is often informally called rocket science. Flight vehicles undergo severe conditions such as differences in atmospheric pressure, and temperature, with structural loads applied upon vehicle components. Consequently, they are usually the products of various technological and engineering disciplines including aerodynamics, propulsion, avionics, materials science, structural analysis and manufacturing. These technologies are collectively known as aerospace engineering. Because of the complexity of the field, aerospace engineering is conducted by a team of engineers, each specializing in their own branches of science. The development and manufacturing of a modern flight vehicle is an extremely complex process and demands careful balance and compromise between abilities, design, available technology and costs. Aerospace engineers design, test, and supervise the manufacture of aircraft, spacecraft, and missiles. Aerospace engineers develop new technologies for use in aviation, defense systems, and space exploration. Answer the questions: 1) What doesterm “Aerospace engineering” mean? 2) What does aeronautical engineering study? 3) What does astronautical engineering deal with? 4) What conditions do flight vehicles undergo? 5) What technologies are collectively known as aerospace engineering? 6) What do the development and manufacturing of a modern flight vehicle demand? 7) What are Aerospace engineers responsible for? Unit 11 Technologies in Space Text 11A Life on Mars? The position of Mars in the Solar System makes it a good candidate for the investigation of life outside of the Earth. It is the fourth of the four inner terrestrial planets from the Sun, the Earth being the third, and the fact that it is relatively close to Earth suggests that there could be some similarities between the two. Such similarities would be encouraging to scientists looking for life on Mars, but in order to determine whether the conditions on Mars allow for the chemical evolution of life to take place it is logical to look back to a time and a place where we know that life did appear - the Earth 4,000 million years ago - and to compare these conditions with current conditions on Mars. Mars is a rocky planet with a core radius of 1,700 km, less than half that of the Earth. The atmosphere is 95.32% carbon dioxide, but it is thin, with a mass 60 times smaller than the atmosphere on Earth. The thin atmosphere lessens the greenhouse effect on the planet as there are fewer carbon dioxide molecules to absorb the solar radiation which explains why the average surface temperature of Mars is minus 60 degrees C. It is not surprising, then, that there is no liquid water on Mars. There are reasons to suspect similarities between the conditions on Mars now and the conditions on Earth 4,000 million years ago. The young sun emitted 20–30% less solar radiation than it does today, which would have greatly affected the Earth's temperature. This suggests that, like Mars today, the Earth would probably have been very cold at the surface, possibly even cold enough to cause ocean waters to freeze. Unlike Mars, however, the atmosphere of nitrogen and carbon dioxide was very thick on Earth 4,000 million years ago, meaning that there were more carbon dioxide molecules to absorb the solar radiation. This would have played an important role in increasing the Earth’s temperature. In addition to the thick atmosphere, the interior of the Earth, being much hotter 4,000 million years ago, would have provided more heat to the Earth radiating out from within. This could have allowed for liquid water to exist on Earth underneath a layer of ice. This idea is an attractive one because the liquid water could have supported organic molecules and the layer of ice would have provided some protection from harmful UV radiation. Earth 4,000 million years ago, then, was a much more hospitable environment for life to develop than Mars today. Although we have very set ideas about what is needed for chemical evolution to take place, if we found evidence of life on planets without these conditions we would have to re-think our ideas. The Viking landing mission to Mars in 1976 came close to this when three experiments designed to test for the presence of microbial organisms appeared to exhibit positive results on a planet with no liquid water. These positive results are generally thought to be caused by chemical reactions rather than life, because it was not thought possible for life to exist in such varied conditions. However, discoveries of organisms in extreme conditions on Earth have forced us to reconsider this view. Nevertheless, as there was no evidence of organic matter whatsoever on Mars from the Viking mission, the likelihood of anything alive existing on Mars today appears remote. There are, however, reasons to suspect that conditions on Mars in the past were more favourable for chemical evolution. Although there is no liquid water on Mars today, observations by the Mars Global Surveyor and Mars Odyssey suggest that markings on the Martian surface indicate the presence of a great deal of liquid water on Mars in the past. Scientists believe that Mars had a thick atmosphere 3,800 million years ago, and was therefore much warmer than today. This means it would be more likely to hold liquid water on its surface as the warmer temperatures would prevent water from freezing and the thick atmosphere would generate a greater atmospheric pressure to prevent all liquid water at the surface from vaporizing. In conclusion, although conditions on Earth 4,000 million years ago were harsh, the key requirement for chemical evolution, liquid water, was present. This is not the case on Mars today. Organic material was also nowhere to be found on Mars, so it is fair to assume that it is very unlikely that chemical evolution is occurring on Mars today. We cannot, however, rule out the possibility until we have explored the planet much further. The indication that 3,800 million years ago Mars had a much more Earth-like climate suggests that the key to finding life on Mars lies in the planet's past rather than its present, and that this is a subject we should definitely investigate further. Answer the questions: 1) According to the text, is it likely that there is life on Mars now? How about in the past? 2) Why do scientists observing Mars take an interest in Earth 4,000 million years ago? 3) Why is a thick atmosphere so important for life to develop? 4) Is there anything in the text that you found surprising? 5 ) How much of the information in the text did you already know? 6 ) Do you know anyone who knows enough about Mars to have written this text? 7 ) What level of education do you need to produce a text like this? 8)Do you think there is life on Mars now? 9) Do you think there ever was life there? 10) Does it make you feel excited to think that there might have been life on Mars? 11) Have you ever seen Mars through a telescope? 12) How long do you think it will be before humans travel to other planets? 13) Do you think humans will ever leave the Earth and find homes on other planets? 14) Do you think there is other intelligent life out there somewhere? 15) If someone were to visit Earth from another planet, what would they find most strange about us humans? 16) Do you find space particularly interesting? Why/why not? 17) Do you enjoy science fiction books or movies? If so, which do you prefer and why? 18) When it comes to space, do you think that truth is stranger than fiction? True or false? a) Scientists are interested in investigating the possibility of life on Mars because its distance from the Sun is relatively similar to that of the Earth. b) The more carbon dioxide there is in the atmosphere, the more the sun can warm the surface of a planet. c) The sun is not as strong now as it was 4,000 million years ago. d) The thick atmosphere was by far the most important reason why the Earth was not too cold to support life 4,000 million years ago. e) The temperature of the surface of the Earth depends entirely on the heat that comes from the sun. f) Scientists are too stubborn to change their ideas about how life can originate on a planet. g) The Viking Mission proved conclusively that life exists on Mars. h) Since the Viking mission, scientists have become slightly less skeptical about the validity of some of its findings. i) The presence of liquid water on Mars in the past may have caused the planet to have a thicker atmosphere. j) There used to be life on Mars. Find these words in the text, and try to work out the meaning from context. Do not use a dictionary. For each word, choose the most likely meaning, a or b. 1 emitted (paragraph three) a) gave off b) excluded 2 molecules (paragraph three) a) reflects b) very small units of a material or chemical 3 hospitable (paragraph three) a) unhealthy b) comfortable and suitable 4 microbial organisms (paragraph four) a) small living things b) chemicals 5 Martian (paragraph five) a) on, from or connected with Mars b) the name of a spacecraft 6 rule out (paragraph six) a) say for sure that it’s impossible b) say for sure that it’s true Text 11B The Apollo Hardware  James Webb, Administrator of NASA from 1961 to 1968, described the formidable task facing the space agency in 1961: The Apollo requirement was to take off from a point on the surface of the Earth that was traveling 1000 miles per hour as the Earth rotated, to go into orbit at 18,000 miles an hour, to speed up at the proper time to 25,000 miles an hour, to travel to a body in space 240,000 miles distant which was itself traveling 2000 miles per hour relative to the Earth, to go into orbit around this body, and to drop a specialized landing vehicle to its surface. There men were to make observations and measurements, collect specimens, leave instruments that would send back data on what we found, and then repeat much of the outward-bound process to get back home. The lunar-orbit mode of flying to the Moon was selected only after fierce debate within NASA. It was the simplest of the three methods being considered, both in terms of development and costs, but it was risky. There was no room for error or the crew could not get home. Once the mode of flight was selected, NASA engineers could proceed with building a launch vehicle and creating the basic components of the spacecraft--a habitable crew compartment, a baggage car of some type, and a service module containing propulsion and other expendable systems that could be jettisoned on the trip back. The Spacecraft Almost with the announcement of the lunar landing commitment in 1961, NASA technicians began a crash program to develop a reasonable configuration for the trip to lunar orbit and back. What they came up with was a spacecraft that contained a three-person command module capable of sustaining human life for two weeks or more in either Earth or lunar orbit; a service module holding oxygen, maneuvering rockets, fuel cells, life support, and other equipment that could be jettisoned upon reentry to Earth; rockets for slowing the spacecraft to prepare for reentry; and finally a launch escape system that was discarded upon achieving orbit. Work on the Apollo spacecraft began on November 28, 1961, when the prime contract for its development was left to North American Aviation. On January 27, 1967, tragedy struck. Three astronauts--"Gus" Grissom, Edward White, and Roger B. Chaffee--were in the command module training on the launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center. At 6:31 p.m., a fire broke out in the spacecraft. In a flash, flames engulfed the capsule and the astronauts died of asphyxiation. Shock gripped NASA and the nation during the days that followed. An investigation found that the accident could have been prevented. Changes to the spacecraft were quickly made, and within a little more than a year, it was ready for flight. By October 1968, Apollo 7 was ready to carry three astronauts into Earth orbit. There, they successfully tested the command/service module and helped restore confidence in the program by proving the space worthiness of the basic Apollo vehicle. The Launch Vehicle Boosting the Apollo vehicles to the Moon and returning them home safely was the job of the giant Saturn V. The Saturn family of rockets was developed by Wernher von Braun at the Marshall Space Flight Center. At 363 feet tall, the Saturn V was the first launch vehicle large enough that it had to be assembled away from the launch pad and transported there. The Saturn V had three stages. The first stage generated 7.5 million pounds of thrust from five massive engines. The extreme heat and shock of firing these engines required new alloys and construction techniques, among the most significant engineering accomplishments of the program. The thunderous sound of the first test of the first stage at Huntsville on April 16, 1965, brought home to many that the Kennedy goal was within grasp. As fuel burned off, making the vehicle weigh less, the second stage fired to deliver 1 million pounds of thrust. The third stage burned to send Apollo out of Earth orbit and on its way to the Moon.  On December 21, 1968, Apollo 8 took off with three astronauts aboard--Frank Borman, James A. Lovell, Jr., and William A. Anders--for a historic mission to orbit the Moon. So far Apollo had been all promise; now the delivery was about to begin. The Apollo 8 crew rode inside the command module, with no lunar lander attached. They were the first astronauts to be launched by the Saturn V, which had flown only twice before. The booster worked perfectly, as did the Service Propulsion System (SPS) engines that had been checked out on Apollo 7. As it traveled outward the crew focused a portable television camera on the Earth. For the first time humanity saw its home from afar--a tiny, lovely, and fragile "blue marble" hanging in the blackness of space. Apollo 8 entered lunar orbit on the morning of December 24, 1968. For the next 20 hours the astronauts circled the Moon. They took photographs and scouted future landing sites. They also photographed the first Earthrise as seen from the Moon. Apollo 8 proved the ability to navigate to and from the Moon, and gave a tremendous boost to the entire Apollo program. |