Space and astronomy: what to expect in 2023

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In the space and astronomy sector, 2022 will be a difficult year to overcome.

NASA wowed us with cosmic scenes captured by the James Webb Space Telescope. The Dart mission deflected an asteroid into a new orbit. Artemis I set mankind on a course back to the moon. China has finished building a new space station in orbit. SpaceX launched and landed 61 rockets in 12 months. And the invasion of Ukraine endangered Russia’s position as a space power.

It’s a lot to overcome, but 2023 is sure to have some excitement on the launch pad, on the lunar surface, and in the sky.

new lunar landings

At least one lunar landing attempt is guaranteed for 2023. Japanese company Ispace launched its M1 mission on a SpaceX rocket in December. The spacecraft is following a slow and economical route to the moon and should arrive in April, when it will try to deploy a vehicle built by the United Arab Emirates and a robot made by the Japanese space agency, Jaxa, as well as other payloads.

There could be five more lunar landing attempts this year. NASA has contracted two private companies to transport payloads to the lunar surface. Both Houston-based Intuitive Machines and Pittsburgh-based Astrobotic Technology faced delays in 2022, but could make the trip in the coming months.

They may be accompanied by lunar missions from space programs of three governments. India’s Chandrayaan-3 mission was delayed last year, but could be ready by 2023. A Japanese mission, Smart Lander for Investigating Moon, or Slim, aims to test the country’s moon landing technologies. Finally, Russia’s Luna-25 mission has been postponed from September, but space agency Roscosmos may try this year.

new rockets

NASA lifted its massive Space Launch System off the ground for the first time in 2022, lighting up the Florida night with an incredible stream of flames as it carried the Artemis I mission toward the moon. That has drawn attention to SpaceX, which is building the next-generation Starship rocket, which is also key to NASA’s Artemis III manned moon landing attempt.

SpaceX released a major environmental overhaul that would allow it to launch an unmanned orbital test flight from south Texas if it met certain conditions. But the rocket was not ready in 2022. The company has not yet announced a test date this year, but regular ground tests of Starship equipment indicate that it is working on it.

Several more rockets will be able to fly for the first time in 2023. Most importantly, United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan Centaur will replace that company’s Atlas V, a core vehicle for American spaceflight for two decades. The Vulcan has the BE-4 engine built by Blue Origin, the rocket company founded by Jeff Bezos.

Several American private companies are expected to test new rockets in 2023, including Relativity and ABL. They could join foreign manufacturers including Mitsubishi Heavy Industries, which could test Japan’s H3 rocket in February, and Arianespace, which is working on a test flight of Europe’s Ariane 6 rocket.

new space telescopes

The Webb Telescope has wowed space enthusiasts and scientists alike with its views of the cosmos, but we will be able to gain new advantages from a variety of orbital observatories.

The most significant may be Xuntian, a Chinese mission that will be like a more sophisticated version of the Hubble Space Telescope. The spacecraft will survey the universe in optical and ultraviolet wavelengths while orbiting the Earth near China’s Tiangong space station. A Japanese-led mission, XRISM (pronounced “crism”), could launch early in the year. The mission will use X-ray spectroscopy to study clouds of plasma, which could help explain the composition of the universe. A European space telescope, the Euclid, could also be launched on a SpaceX rocket after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine caused the artifact to lose its place on a Russian Soyuz rocket. It will study the universe’s dark energy and dark matter.

A Total Eclipse and a Not So Total Eclipse

There will be two solar eclipses in 2023. A total eclipse on April 20 will be best seen in the Southern Hemisphere, and the moon will hide the sun only in remote parts of Australia and Indonesia. (Maybe not a bad time to be on a boat in parts of the Indian and Pacific oceans.)

But Americans could be in for a good show on October 14, when North America will be visited by an annular eclipse. Eclipses of this type are sometimes called “ring of fire” eclipses, because the moon is too far from Earth to fully block out the sun, but it creates a ring-like effect when it reaches totality. The eclipse’s trajectory crosses parts of Oregon, California, Nevada, Utah, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas, before dipping into Central and South America. Where the weather cooperates, it should be a big solar show and good preparation for the total eclipse on April 8, 2024, which will cross the United States from southwest to northeast.

New planetary missions

A new spacecraft will head out towards Jupiter this year, aiming to be the first to orbit another planet’s moon. The European Space Agency’s Jupiter Icy Moon Explorer, or Juice, will be launched from an Ariane 5 rocket on April 5 towards the Jovian system, arriving in 2031. Once it reaches the gas giant, it will move on to perform 35 three-way flybys. of the planet’s giant moons: Callisto, Europa and Ganymede, all of which may have underground oceans, it is believed. In 2034, Juice will begin orbiting Ganymede, the largest moon in the Solar System.

Closer to the sun will be Rocket Lab, a small launch company founded in New Zealand that intends to use its Electron rocket to send a mission to Venus. The company’s Photon satellite will attempt to deploy a small probe, built with researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, that will briefly study the planet’s toxic atmosphere. The mission was planned for May, but is expected to experience delays as the company prioritizes missions for other customers.

Translated by Luiz Roberto M. Gonçalves

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