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Sunday, January 16, 2022

China has built an artificial moon that simulates low-gravity conditions on Earth

China has built an artificial Moon that simulates low gravity conditions, the first of its kind. The facility is expected to play an important role in China's future Moon missions.

China has built a research facility that simulates the low-gravity environment on the moon – and it was inspired by experiments using magnets to levitate a frog.

` The facility could provide valuable research for China’s lunar exploration activities, according to scientists involved in the project. Located in the eastern city of Xuzhou, in Jiangsu province, the simulator is expected to be officially launched in the coming months.

` Lead scientist Li Ruilin, from the China University of Mining and Technology, said it was the “first of its kind in the world” and would take lunar simulation to a whole new level.

` Do you have questions about the biggest topics and trends from around the world? Get the answers with SCMP Knowledge, our new platform of curated content with explainers, FAQs, analyses and infographics brought to you by our award-winning team.

` The simulator can make gravity “disappear”, Li said in an interview on Tuesday. While low gravity can be achieved in an aircraft or a drop tower, it is momentary. Li said in the simulator that effect can “last as long as you want”.

` At its heart is a vacuum chamber that houses a mini “moon” measuring 60cm (about 2 feet) in diameter. The artificial lunar landscape is made up of rocks and dust that are as light as those on the moon – where gravity is about one-sixth as powerful as the gravity on Earth – partly because they are supported by a magnetic field.

` When the field is strong enough it can magnetise and levitate things – from a living frog to a chestnut – against the gravitational force.

` “Some experiments such as an impact test need just a few seconds [in the simulator],” said Li, from the university’s state key laboratory for geomechanics and deep underground engineering. “But others such as creep testing can take several days.”

A vacuum chamber at the heart of the simulator houses an artificial moon measuring 60cm (about 2 feet) in diameter. Photo: Li Ruilin, China University of Mining and Technology

` Li said the idea came from Russian-born physicist Andre Geim’s experiments to levitate a frog with a magnet – for which he won an Ig Nobel Prize, celebrating science that “first makes people laugh, and then think”, in 2000. Geim, from the University of Manchester in England, also won a Nobel Prize in Physics in 2010 for his work on graphene.

` Responding to an approach by the South China Morning Post, Geim said he was pleased that his “purely education experiments on diamagnetic levitation led to applications in space exploration”.

` “Magnetic levitation is certainly not the same as antigravity, but there is a variety of situations where mimicking microgravity by magnetic fields could be invaluable to expect the unexpected in space research.”

` China is seeking to take the lead in a new international space race with the United States. That includes its lunar exploration programme – named after the mythical moon goddess Chang’e – whose recent missions include landing a rover on the far side of the moon in 2019, and in 2020 bringing rock samples back to Earth for the first time in 44 years.

` Next, China wants to land astronauts on the moon by 2030, and to set up a joint lunar research base with Russia. Chinese space authorities said last month that construction of the research station could start as soon as 2027 – years ahead of schedule – amid concerns over US-led moves to set the rules for future lunar activities. Nasa also plans to send astronauts back to the moon by 2024 under its Artemis programme.

` The Xuzhou facility is expected to play a key role in China’s future lunar missions, including building infrastructure on the moon, Li said.

` It will allow scientists to test equipment – and potentially prevent costly miscalculations – in a simulation of the extreme lunar environment, where rocks and dust can behave in a completely different way than they do on Earth. There is no atmosphere on the moon, the temperature can change quickly and dramatically, and in low gravity, soil particles are more loosely bound to each other.

` The Chang’e 5 mission returned with rock samples in December 2020, but there were not as many as planned because the drill hit unexpected resistance. Previous missions by the Soviet Union and US have had similar issues.

` Experiments conducted on a smaller prototype simulator suggested drill resistance on the moon could be much higher than predicted by theoretical models, according to a paper by the Xuzhou team published in the Journal of China University of Mining and Technology last week.

` According to Li, the moon simulator could also be used to test whether new technology such as 3D printing could be used to build structures on the lunar surface. It could help assess whether a permanent human settlement could be built there, including issues like how well the surface traps heat, he said.

` “Some experiments conducted in the simulated environment can also give us some important clues, such as where to look for water trapped under the surface,” he said.

` Simulating the harsh lunar environment on Earth was no easy task – the magnetic force needed is so strong that it could tear apart components like superconducting wires. Add to that the many metallic components needed for the vacuum chamber which do not function properly near a powerful magnet.

` Li said the team came up with a number of technical innovations to get around these challenges, including simulating lunar dust that could float more easily in the magnetic field, and replacing steel with aluminium in some of the key components.

` He said the Chinese facility would be open to researchers from around the world.

` And that includes UK-based physicist Geim. “We definitely welcome Professor Geim to come and share more great ideas with us,” Li said.

`

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Wednesday, July 15, 2020

US versus China – in outer space


New frontier: A November 2019 file photo presented on Monday showing China’s Mars lander's hovering, obstacle avoidance and deceleration capabilities being tested at a facility in Huailai, Hebei province. China is scheduled to launch its Mars rover and an orbiter around July 23 in a mission named Tianwen, or ‘Questions for Heaven’. – AP

IF you have been too preoccupied with all the awful stuff happening on Earth, you might have missed something that is shaping up. Up, as in up in space.

I did and it was only recently I caught up somewhat with the New Space Race. That was when I stumbled across the January graduation ceremony of the first class of 13 astronaut candidates comprising seven men and six women under the Artemis programme.

This is the long-awaited successor to the 1960s and 1970s Apollo missions by the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Nasa). Artemis – goddess of the moon and twin sister of Apollo – is Nasa’s plan to finally return to Earth’s closest celestial body.

The first man to land on the moon was, of course, Neil Armstrong on July 20,1969, and that historic occasion marked the winner of the first space race between the United States and Russia (or USSR as it was then called).

I still remember the excitement of watching RTM’s delayed telecast of the very grainy footage of the Apollo 11 moon landing. I was all of 10 years old.

The subsequent Apollo missions were very much part of my teenage years, but with the exception of the near disaster of Apollo 13, none of them came close to the global excitement over Apollo 11’s achievement.

That feat will be exactly 51 years old come Monday. Since Dec 14,1972, when Apollo 17 landed, no humans have visited the Moon.

While the six Moon missions did deliver much scientific data and 382kg of lunar soil samples, the race to the moon was essentially a politically-motivated contest to prove American technological prowess over Russian and once achieved, the enormously expensive one-upmanship (total cost was US$20bil) was over.

Nasa went on to do other great stuff like Skylab, the space shuttle and the International Space Station (ISS), which is still going strong after 20 years.

Without a doubt, for the last 50 years, the United States has held dominance in space exploration. But its pole position is now being challenged in the new space race.

This time it’s between the US and – no surprise – China, which also has its eye on the moon and beyond.

When China sent its first yuhangyuan (meaning “space navigator”) into orbit in the early 2000s, the West chuckled. They wondered what they would do during the flight and a think tank analyst guessed they would do some “physical exercises” and “space medicine-type things”.

No one is laughing now. In January last year, China landed its Chang’e 4 lunar lander on the far side of the moon, the first ever by any nation. (Chang’e is the Chinese moon goddess.)

From there, the Jade Rabbit 2 rover was able to transmit data back to Earth via a satellite that had been previously deployed around the moon for this purpose.

With that successful landing, China proved it has become a force to be reckoned with, which was President Xi Jinping’s declared intention in 2016 – to make China a “space giant” with the Moon as the vital centrepiece.

On May 5, China successfully launched its Long March-5B rocket, which is designed to ultimately transport astronauts into space. That was quickly followed by back-to-back launches of Earth-imaging satellites.

It might have faced a setback when its Kuaizhou-11 rocket carrying low-orbit remote sensing satellites failed to launch on July 10, but that won’t derail China’s plans to launch 60 spacecraft in over 40 launches this year.

What’s more, China plans to have its own space station in operation by the end of 2022. While Nasa partners with several other national space agencies on the International Space Station and welcomes newbie astronauts from many countries, including Malaysia, no yuhangyuan has been allowed on board.

China’s space station will orbit the moon to give it what is known as cislunar domination. Cislunar refers to the space between the earth and the moon and the moon’s orbit. If China succeeds, it will have the space equivalent of the Silk Road, because once cislunar is secured, it can develop a sustainable presence on the moon for in-space manufacturing, mineral extraction, and space-based solar power (SBSP) technology. From that, it can leap into deep space exploration and stage manned missions to Mars.

Nasa’s Artemis programme too has big plans for a permanent station orbiting the moon called the Gateway that would be instrumental to its ambition to send its first manned mission to Mars.

To do that, President Donald Trump proposed a US$4.7bil (RM20bil) budget submission for Nasa for 2021 so that Artemis can ensure “the next man and the first woman on the moon will be American astronauts (by 2024) – using this as a launching pad to ensure America is the first nation to plant its flag on Mars” by 2033.

But the Democrat-controlled Congress isn’t playing ball and wants to push the return-to-moon target date to 2028 because they don’t want it to be a Trump triumph.

This is the rare Trump initiative I actually like and how that will pan out, like his re-election, remains to be seen. But the space race is definitely on. There are other serious players, namely India and the newest – and I must say surprising – contender, the United Arab Emirates (UAE).

Russia, while maintaining a presence with its participation in the ISS, is by all accounts no longer a serious contender as its space agency Roscosmos is beset with corruption and mismanagement.

In 2014, India’s Space Research Organisation beat China in putting out a satellite in orbit around Mars, becoming the fourth national space agency to reach Mars. In the pipeline is the launch of its first crewed orbital space craft named Gaganyaan by 2022.

Today the UAE will launch its first mission to Mars: A spacecraft called Hope that will orbit the Red Planet to study its atmosphere and weather.

Undoubtedly, there are great bragging rights for a nation that has the means to undertake space exploration, truly the final frontier.

To be fair, the US has been very magnanimous in freely sharing Nasa’s inventions and innovations with the rest of the world. These include baby formula, scratch resistant lenses, artificial limbs, camera phones, athletic shoes, wireless headsets, water purification systems, the computer mouse and freeze-dried food. Just check out inventions we use every day that were actually created for space exploration on usatoday.com or bit.ly/spacethings.

I do wonder whether China will be as magnanimous?

YouTuber and former Nasa Jet Propulsion Laboratory engineer Mark Rober aptly sums up what he considers the five best reasons for space exploration in his video, “Is Nasa a waste of money?”

The one that seems the most far-fetched yet most compelling is finding habitable planets that humans can live on to prevent humanity’s extinction. Earth could be destroyed by a meteor strike or by our own human doing, a possibility which has become more real with the Covid-19 pandemic and worsening climate change.

But space exploration is no longer the sole domain of governments. Increasingly, private sector entities like Elon Musk’s SpaceX and Roger Zhang Changwu’s LandSpace have become important players and collaborators.

Still, instead of Artemis versus Chang’e, I wish the US and China can resolve their differences and work together on their space ambitions for the good of humankind instead of turning space into the latest battleground for economic and military supremacy.

I had a glimpse of the future of space exploration in 1995. That was when I visited the Johnson Space Center in Houston and saw the prototype design for the ISS.

That was in my lifetime, as was the 1969 moon landing. I may live long enough to see the first woman to walk on the Moon but perhaps not the Mars manned mission.

That saddens me but it also thrills me to know that it will happen. Bon voyage, astronauts and yuhangyuan!

The views expressed here are entirely the writer’s own.

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