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Space Science and the
Engines of Change
Keith Mason
CEO
UK Science & Technology
Facilities Council
Astronomy as a change engine
• Human kind is instinctively curious about the world
and their place in it
• Astronomy, the oldest science, is accessible to all
– Discoveries change people’s perceptions of their place in the
Universe and their relationship to each other
– Generally a ‘non-threatening’ science
– Astronomy as ‘entertainment’!
• Astronomy Inspires!
– People who are inspired can achieve things otherwise
beyond them!
• Drives technological capability
– Wider benefit to society
• Drivers not dissimilar to ‘exploration’!
Way forward
• Best way to look forward is to
extrapolate from the past
• So how far have we come in the last 50
years?
• What are the plans for the immediate
future?
• Where might that lead?
Astronomy in 1957
• Confined to ‘visible’ wavelengths and radio
– Largest telescope 200in (5m) at Mt Palomar
– Photographic plates rule!
– Radio astronomy in its infancy – 250 ft fully-steerable Lovell
telescope just completed
• Debate between ‘big bang’ and ‘steady state’
cosmology
• Origin of lunar craters – volcanic or impact?
• Speculation about life on Mars, oceans on Venus
Take care with ‘experts’
“Space Travel is bunk”
Sir Harold Spencer Jones, British Astronomer
Royal, 1957,
2 weeks before launch of Sputnik 1
Lesson: History has a way of overturning even the most
cherished paradigms!
1957-2007: some highlights
• Travel to the Moon and initial exploration of major planets,
comets, asteroids
• Understanding the Sun and its effect on the Earth’s environment
• Detection of extra-solar planets
• Discovery of super compact stars
– importance of gravitational accretion as a source of energy
• Discovery of quasars
– prodigious energy understood as due to accretion onto
supermassive black hole at the centre of galaxies
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Seeing the birth of black holes
Mapping evolutionary history of stars & galaxies
Cosmic microwave background  ‘Big Bang’ cosmology
Measuring the geometry of the Universe
Discovery of ‘Dark Energy’
WMAP (CMB)
Integral (-ray)
Spitzer (IR)
Swift (GRB)
1990
Chandra(X-ray)
Newton (X-ray)
1980
COBE (CMB)
HST
IRAS (IR)
1970
IUE (ultraviolet)
Einstein(X-ray)
Skylab (Solar)
Uhuru (X-ray)
Orbiting Solar
Observatory
1960
2000
Landing on Titan
Hubble constant (precise)
Gamma-ray bursts extragalactic
Dark Energy
Voyager Neptune flyby
Giotto flyby of Comet Halley
Voyager Uranus flyby
Voyager Saturn flyby
Viking landers on Mars
Hot gas in galaxy clusters
Voyager Jupiter flyby
Black Hole in Cyg X-1
Apollo 11
X-ray binary stars / first landing on Venus
Microwave background / first Mars flyby
Pulsars
Quasars / extra-solar X-ray sources
Lunar far-side photographed
Earth’s radiation belts
Astronomy 2007
• Discoveries in past 50 years fuelled by
– access to space,
– development of electronics and detector systems,
– computers.
• Subject transformed compared to 1957
• No let up in the pace of discovery
• Even if rate of discovery lessens, still likely
that subject will take many twists and turns
before 2057!
• So what is to come?
Future plans
• Consider ESA’s space science programme
• Organised in decadal plans
– Horizon 2000, Horizon 2000+, Cosmic Visions 2015-2025
• Illustrative - Other nations have similar plans, and
many missions likely to be realised by international
collaboration to make them affordable
• So what are the prospects for the next few years?
ESA Science
The Herschel Mission
THE MISSION:
ESA’s Herschel Space Observatory has the largest
mirror ever built for a space telescope. At 3.5-metres in
diameter the mirror will collect long-wavelength radiation
from some of the coldest and most distant objects in the
Universe. In addition, Herschel will be the only space
observatory to cover a spectral range from the far
infrared to sub-millimetre. Located at L2 (lagrangian
point).
OBJECTIVES:
- Study the formation of galaxies in the early universe
and their subsequent evolution
- Investigate the creation of stars and their interaction
with the interstellar medium
- Observe the chemical composition of the atmospheres
and surfaces of comets, planets and satellites
- Examine the molecular chemistry of the universe
2008
James Webb Space Telescope
(NASA, ESA, Canadian Space Agency)
• Infrared optimised successor
to Hubble Space Telescope
• Mirror diameter 6.5m. Will be
located at L2 (operating
temperature < 50K)
• Themes:
– The End of the Dark Ages:
First light and re-ionisation
– Assembly of Galaxies
– Birth of stars & protoplanetary
systems
– Planetary Systems & the
origin of life
2013
The Planck Mission
THE MISSION:
Planck will help provide answers to one of the most
important set of questions asked in modern science how did the Universe begin, how did it evolve to the
state we observe today, and how will it continue to
evolve in the future? Planck's objective is to analyse,
with the highest accuracy ever achieved, the
remnants of the radiation that filled the Universe
immediately after the Big Bang, which we observe
today as the Cosmic Microwave Background.
OBJECTIVES:
- Mapping of Cosmic Microwave Background
anisotropies with improved sensitivity and angular
resolution
- Determination of Hubble constant
- Testing inflationary models of the early universe
- Measuring amplitude of structures in Cosmic
Microwave Background
2008
GAIA: Galactic Archaeology
•
Apparent shift of star position wrt
background viewed from opposite
sides of Earth’s orbit
– Parallax
– Measure of distance
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GAIA precision 20arcsec
– Measure distances at Galactic
centre to 20%
– ~1 billion stars!
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Also measure velocity in 3D
Brightness, luminosity and
chemical composition
Create a 3-D structural map of the
Galaxy!
Earth Orbit about Sun
2011
GAIA Objectives
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Trace formation history of Milky
Way through galaxy mergers
Find planets around stars out to
50 pc (10,000-50,000 planets)
Search for brown dwarf stars
Detect 10,000+ asteroids
(including NEOs), comets etc in
Solar System
Detect 105 supernovae in
distant galaxies
Discover 5 x 105 quasars
Test General Relativity
Gravitational Wave Astronomy
• General relativity
predicts that
gravitational waves
propagate at the speed
of light
• Ripples from distant
binary stars should be
detectable as minute
distortions in the
separations of two
appropriately spaced
test masses
• New field of astronomy!
The LISA Mission
THE MISSION:
LISA is an ESA-NASA mission involving three spacecraft
flying approximately 5 million kilometres apart in an
equilateral triangle formation. Together, they act as a
Michelson interferometer to measure the distortion of
space caused by passing gravitational waves. Lasers in
each spacecraft will be used to measure minute changes
in the separation distances of free-floating masses within
each spacecraft.
OBJECTIVES:
To be the first spacecraft to detect gravitational waves
Measure the properties of binary star systems in the
Galaxy and beyond
Test General Relativity under extreme conditions
Search for gravitational signature of the Big Bang
2017
LISA Concept
• LISA will consist of three
spacecraft arranged in a
triangle with sides 5m km
• Separation will be measured
by interferometry of laser
beams shining between the
three spacecraft
• Change in separation due to
gravitational waves tiny –
typically 10-10 m from a
Galactic binary
• Reference point (test mass)
must be shielded from
external buffeting by, for
example, the solar wind
The LISA Pathfinder Mission
THE MISSION:
LISA Pathfinder will pave the way for the LISA mission by
testing in flight the very concept of the gravitational wave
detection: it will put two test masses in a near-perfect
gravitational free-fall and control and measure their
motion with unprecedented accuracy. This is achieved
through state-of-the-art technology comprising the
inertial sensors, the laser metrology system, the dragfree control system and an ultra-precise micro-propulsion
system.
OBJECTIVES:
LISA Pathfinder is to demonstrate the key technologies
to be used in the future LISA mission.
2009
Solar Storms
• Images from the X-ray
Telescope on the
Japan/UK/US Hinode
satellite (launch Nov 2006)
show turbulent solar
atmosphere
• Coronal mass ejections can
result in dangerous radiation
levels for humans and
instrumentation
– Particularly if outside the
protection of the Earth’s
magnetic field (e.g. Moon)
Solar Orbiter Sentinels
• Need to understand and
predict these outbursts, and
how they propagate out from
the Sun
• Require data from much
closer to the Sun
• Combination of ESA Solar
Orbiter and NASA Sentinels
to probe to 0.2 AU (i.e. inside
the orbit of Mercury)
• Very hostile environment!
2015
The BepiColombo Mission
THE MISSION:
BepiColombo will set off in 2013 on a journey lasting
approximately 6 years. When it arrives at Mercury in
August 2019, it will endure temperatures as high as 350
°C and gather data during its 1 year nominal mission
from September 2019 until September 2020, with a
possible 1-year extension to September 2021.
OBJECTIVES:
- Origin and evolution of a planet close to the parent star
- Mercury as a planet: form, interior, structure, geology,
composition and craters
- Mercury's vestigial atmosphere (exosphere):
composition and dynamics
- Mercury's magnetized envelope (magnetosphere):
structure and dynamics
- Origin of Mercury's magnetic field
- Test of Einstein's theory of general relativity
2013
The EXOMARS Mission
• First mission in Aurora
programme
• Launch in 2013
• To explore Mars in three
dimensions to understand
habitability, life potential and
hazards to future exploration
• High mobility
• Drill for sub-surface sampling to
2m depth
• Suite of Exobiology instruments
2013
Rosetta Mars Encounter
Distant Travellers
Rosetta
• Rosetta (ESA)
– Launch 2004
– Encounter with Comet 67
P/Churyumov- Gerasimenko
2014
• New Horizons (NASA)
– Launch 2006
– Encounter with
Pluto/Charon 2015
Io/Europa
New Horizons
New Horizons
So what about the future?
• 50 years is a long time in the current rapidly
developing field of space science/astronomy
• Progress and direction will certainly be
hijacked by ‘unknown unknowns’!
– As it should be since that’s what makes it exciting!!
• However many existing/planned missions and
facilities have a longevity measured in
decades
• So interesting to look at people’s current
aspirations as a guide to what might be done
in the next decades
Aspirations for the Future
(some ideas for ESA Cosmic Visions)
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Early Universe & Evolution
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2nd generation gravitational wave
observatory focussed on residual
radiation from the big bang –
Universe at <1s
High precision measurements of
cosmic microwave background
polarisation to test big bang models,
inflation
Large area, high spectral resolution
X-ray observatory for studying
earliest black holes and role in
galaxy formation
Dark Energy
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High sensitivity surveys for distant
supernovae, gravitational lensing –
distinguish Dark Energy models
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Planetary and Stellar Evolution
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Infrared Interferometer: highresolution spectroscopy at
0.01arcsec spatial resolution,
capable of resolving nearby
protoplanetary disks.
Survey of 100,000 stars for Earthlike and smaller planets, plus stellar
evolution studies.
Environments of Earth-like planets
Molecular hydrogen explorer
High-Energy Universe
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First large-area focussing -ray
telescope: Gamma-ray bursts,
supernovae, AGN, accretion disks,
Galactic centre
Aspirations for the Future (cont)
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Fundamental Physics
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Accurate measurement of G and
limits on change, equivalence
principle, link General Relativity and
Quantum Mechanics, search for
evidence of superstrings
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Planetary Exploration
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Magnetic Reconnection & Solar
Activity
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Measure processes in Earth’s
magnetosphere with fleet of 12
spacecraft at proton to electron
interaction scales.
Sample Solar wind environment
very close to Sun
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Lunar exploration & characterise
interior and cosmochemistry, sample
return.
Mars networks and sample return
Venus Entry Probe: long-term
balloon-bourne investigation plus
surface samples
Europa Exploration: characterise ice
thickness and surface/interior
characteristics leading to search for
life in liquid subsurface oceans
Asteroid sample return: 50-100g
from surface/subsurface regolith of
primitive body.
Example: Extra-Solar Planets
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Over 200 planets known around
other stars
Most discovered by dynamical
studies
– Wobble in parent caused by
unseen companion
– Favours massive planets close
to star (hot Jupiters)
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Can also be detected when they
transit in front of parent star
– Need high sensitivity to detect
tiny reduction in stellar light
– French-led CoRoT mission
launched in 2006
– NASA Kepler 2008
– Capable of detecting earth-like
rocky planets in habitable zone
Search for Life-bearing
planets
• Ultimate aim is to determine
whether Earth-like planets
harbour conditions for life
• Aim of Darwin/Terrestrial
Planet Finder missions
• Array of spacecraft working
together as one
– Use Nulling interferometer
or coronograph to block out
light from parent star
– Determine composition of
planet’s atmosphere
Possible Headlines from 2007-2057
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Scientists find birthplace of the first stars
Water found in Young Planetary System
Antimatter explorer prepares for launch
Astronomers find missing matter!
Astronomers find every galaxy in the Universe
Astronomers seek the first black holes
Scientists see the beginning of time
Einstein was wrong!
The road to unification finally revealed!
Spacecraft flies into the eye of a Solar hurricane
We are not alone!
When life began!
Doomed worlds
Scientists find biological activity on another Earth!
Earth’s evil twin shows us a glimpse of our future
Life, but not as we know it!
What do we need for a healthy future?
Smarter
Smaller, Faster, Cheaper used to be the
watchwords
With change, still makes sense, so long
as we also use Faster in the sense of
‘higher velocity’
Need to maintain momentum
• Tendency for greater challenges to drive more
complex missions
– Greater cost, more extended timescales, less risk
• Harder to inspire when time between and idea and
fruition measured in decades!
• Mitigation: reduce cost of access to space
– Encourage turnover, accept higher risk, encourage
innovative solutions
• Positive developments:
– Investment in infrastructure, for exploration
– Commercial launch companies driven by private investors
– Innovation & Low-cost platforms (e.g. SSTL)
Faster travel
• Current travel time to
outer planets, and even
Mercury, limits progress
• Voyager 1 currently at
100 AU after 30+ years
– ~0.5 lt days
• Need more efficient
propulsion to effectively
explore outer planets,
Kuiper belt and even
interstellar space
– E.g. ion drive as used
recently on SMART-1
More data
• Increasingly accustomed to a high data-rate
environment in science
• We have smart, capable instruments that can
tackle complex problems
• But, ability to get data back from instruments
in remote locations an increasing limitation
– E.g. Solar Orbiter, where telemetry rate does not
permit continuous use of high speed
measurements
• Need high bandwidth communications
infrastructure for entire solar system
– E.g. laser comms
Astronomy Access/Protection
Large infrastructure
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Favoured sites
– L2: deep space, cryogenic
– L1: solar
– Lunar far side: future large
infrastructure
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Need to protect environment
from the outset
– Particularly crucial in radio
regime
– Mobile phone in the Moon
would be one of the brightest
astronomical sources seen from
Earth!
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Solar
Deep Space
More robust & available
transportation infrastructure
– Maintenance & repair at L1, L2
from Lunar space ?
– Need efficient transport
End