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GS Paper: GS3-17.Awareness in the fields of IT, Space, Computers, Robotics, Nano-technology, Bio-technology and issues relating to Intellectual Property Rights.

  • ISRO pushing Venus Mission ‘Shukrayaan’ to 2031

    venus

    ISRO said that it is yet to receive approval from the Indian government for the Venus mission and that the mission could as a result be postponed to 2031.

    Shukrayaan I: Venus Orbiter Mission

    • Shukrayaan-I is a planned orbiter to Venus by the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) to study the surface and atmosphere of Venus.
    • The idea was born in 2012; five years later, ISRO commenced preliminary studies after the Department of Space received a 23% hike in the 2017-2018 budget.
    • The orbiter, depending on its final configuration, would have a science payload capability of approximately 100 kilograms (220 lb) with 500 W available power.
    • The launch will involve GSLV Mark II.

    Expected launch

    • ISRO had originally hoped to launch Shukrayaan I in mid-2023 but cited the pandemic when it pushed the date to December 2024.
    • Optimal launch windows from Earth to Venus occur once around every 19 months.
    • This is why ISRO has ‘backup’ launch dates in 2026 and 2028 should it miss the 2024 opportunity.
    • But even more optimal windows, which further reduce the amount of fuel required at liftoff, come around every eight years.

    Other missions to Venus

    • The US and the European space agencies have Venus missions planned for 2031 — referring to VERITAS and EnVision, respectively.

     

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  • James Webb Telescope discovers its first Earth-sized Exoplanet

    exoplanet

    NASA has announced that the James Webb Space Telescope has discovered its first new exoplanet LHS 475 b.

    LHS 475 b

    • The exoplanet LHS 475 b is roughly the same size as Earth.
    • Located just 41 light-years away, the planet orbits very close to a red dwarf star and completes a full orbit in just two days.

    Red Dwarf Stars

    • As mentioned before, the newly discovered exoplanet orbits around a red dwarf star.
    • Such types of stars are the most common and smallest in the universe.
    • As they don’t radiate much light, it’s very tough to detect them with the naked eye from Earth.
    • However, as red dwarfs are dimmer than other stars, it is easier to find exoplanets that surround them.
    • Therefore, red dwarfs are a popular target for planet hunting.

    What are Exoplanets?

    • Exoplanets are planets that orbit other stars and are beyond our solar system.
    • According to NASA, to date, more than 5,000 exoplanets have been discovered.
    • Scientists believe that there are more planets than stars as each star has at least one planet orbiting it.
    • Exoplanets come in a host of different sizes. They can be gas giants bigger than Jupiter or as small and rocky as Earth.
    • They are also known to have different kinds of temperatures — boiling hot to freezing cold.

    Significance of exoplanets study

    • Studying exoplanets not only broadens our understanding of other solar systems but also helps us piece together information about our own planetary system and origin.
    • However, the most compelling reason to learn about them is to find extraterrestrial life.
    • Researchers emphasize on determining if exoplanets are solid or gaseous or even has water vapour in the atmosphere.
    • This helps scientists determine if a discovered world is habitable or not.
    • Another important element of the study is finding out the distance between an exoplanet and its host star.

    Do you know?

    If an exoplanet is too close to the star, it might be too hot to sustain liquid water. If it’s too far, it might only have frozen water. When such a planet is at a distance that enables it to have liquid water, it is said to be in the “Goldilocks zone”.

     

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  • 1st-ever 3D map of Local Bubble’s magnetic fields

    bubble

    Researchers have generated a 3D magnetic map of the giant cosmic cavity called Local Bubble that surrounds the solar system could reveal the universe’s secrets, including questions about the origins of stars.

    What is the Local Bubble?

    • The Local Bubble is a 1,000-light-year-wide cavity or a super-bubble.
    • It is a relative cavity in the interstellar medium (ISM) of the Orion Arm in the Milky Way.
    • Local Bubble is thought to have originated from supernovae roughly 14 million years ago. Supernova is a cosmic explosion occurring when stars meet their end.
    • Space is full of these super-bubbles that trigger the formation of new stars and planets and influence the overall shapes of galaxies.

    How are they formed?

    • Super-bubbles are comparable to holes in Swiss cheese. Supernova explosions blow holes in the cheese. New stars form around these holes.
    • However, mechanisms powering the formation and expansion of the Local Bubble are not well-understood.
    • Further, there is little information on how magnetic fields likely impact the bubble and local star formation.
    • Max Planck has provided information on the magnetic alignment of cosmic dust. This alignment can indicate the orientation of the magnetic field acting on the dust particles.

     

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  • Antimicrobial resistance (AMR): The silent health catastrophe

    microbial

    Context

    • Antimicrobial resistance (AMR), often also called antibiotic resistance, is a global health challenge and a looming public health crisis. The WHO has declared it as one of the top 10 health threats facing humanity.

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    What is antimicrobial resistance (AMR)?

    • AMR is the ability of a microorganism (like bacteria, viruses, and some parasites) to stop and survive exposure to an antimicrobial (such as antibiotics, antivirals and antimalarials) from working against it. As a result, standard treatments become ineffective, infections persist and may spread to others.

    How AMR occurs?

    • Improper use of antimicrobials: Antimicrobials, chemicals or molecules that kill harmful bugs, are the backbone of modern medicine. Improperly used antimicrobials create selective pressure on bugs.
    • Resilient bugs survive the exposure to antimicrobials: The bugs most vulnerable to the drugs die quickly, while the most resilient ones survive, replicate and become superbugs. AMR occurs when superbugs develop and antimicrobials stop working.
    • For example: Microorganisms (bugs) are everywhere with some being helpful like the yoghurt-making lactobacillus and some being harmful like the typhoid-causing salmonella.

    What are superbugs?

    • Microorganisms that become resistant to most antimicrobials are often referred to as superbugs.
    • Superbugs makes medical procedures such as organ transplantation, cancer chemotherapy, and other major surgeries very risky.

    microbial

    Interesting fact

    • Research has shown that the use of certain types of antimicrobials in animal feed can lead to the development of antimicrobial-resistant bacteria in food-producing animals.
    • These resistant bacteria can then be transmitted to humans through the food supply, leading to the spread of AMR.

    microbial

    Prescription to reduce and potentially reverse AMR

    • The first prescription is prevention: Disease prevention and wellness are key to public health and thus preventing infections whenever and wherever possible is equivalent to averting resistance. We need to spearhead sanitation drives, ensure a clean water supply and support hospital-driven infection-control programmes.
    • Judicious prescription of antimicrobials: Reducing AMR also requires prescribing antimicrobials judiciously and only when they are absolutely needed.
    • Effective coordination and management: There is also a need for more cohesion within management strategies. Coordination across the animal industry and environmental sectors to prevent the unnecessary use of antibiotics in farms these nurtures drug-resistant organisms in our food supply is necessary.
    • Robust surveillance systems to detect resistant pathogens of all kinds: Other prescription closely connected with prevention is the development of robust surveillance systems that allow us to detect resistant pathogens of all kinds in the environment and hospitals that would eventually allow containment.
    • Heavy investment in research and development: There is an urgent need for a strong pipeline of new antibiotics; an essential component in restoring the balance and ensuring that we have new tools in the fight against AMR. Bringing a new antibiotic from basic research through clinical trials takes more than a decade and requires upward of $1 billion. So there is need to invest heavily in research and development through both government and private funding.
    • New financial incentives to make it profitable keeping in mind the social value: Profits on these drugs are negligible. Hence, there is need to formulate new types of financial incentives to measure return on investment and measure profitability by the social value of the antibiotic, breaking the conventional link between sales and profits.
    • Bringing in the collective moral vision: Last but not least, we need to bring a collective moral vision to AMR and start thinking of antibiotic/antimicrobial drugs as limited resources that should be available to all.

    microbial

    Conclusion

    • Although seemingly distant and abstract, AMR is in the air and potentially catastrophic for those burdened by it. The success of modern medicine, women’s health, infectious diseases, surgery and cancer would be at increased risk for lack of working antimicrobials. The cost of AMR to the economy is significant and it is critical to develop policies and implement them through a holistic One Health approach.

    Mains question

    Q. What is Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR)? Given that AMR is an impending health disaster, discuss what measures can be taken to reduce AMR?

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  • Superconductivity in Mercury

    mercury

    This newscard is an excerpt from the original article published in TH.

    What is a superconductor?

    • A superconductor is defined as a substance that offers no resistance to the electric current when it becomes colder than a critical temperature.
    • Some of the popular examples of superconductors are aluminium, magnesium diboride, niobium, copper oxide, yttrium barium and iron pnictides.

    How mercury becomes superconductor?

    • In 1911, Dutch physicist Heike Kamerlingh Onnes discovered superconductivity in mercury.
    • He found that at a very low temperature, called the threshold temperature, solid mercury offers no resistance to the flow of electric current.

    How is mercury capable of achieving superconductivity?

    Ans. Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer (BCS) theory

    • Scientists classified mercury as a conventional superconductor because its superconductivity could be explained by the concepts of Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer (BCS) theory.
    • While scientists have used the BCS theory to explain superconductivity in various materials, they have never fully understood how it operates in mercury — the oldest superconductor.
    • The researchers used state-of-the-art theoretical and computational approaches and found that all physical properties relevant for conventional superconductivity are anomalous in some respect in mercury.

    How BCS explains it?

    • In BCS superconductors, vibrational energy released by the grid of atoms encourages electrons to pair up, forming so-called Cooper pairs.
    • These Copper pairs can move like water in a stream, facing no resistance to their flow, below a threshold temperature.
    • By including certain factors that physicists had previously side-lined, the group’s calculations led to a clearer picture of how superconductivity emerges in mercury.
    • For example, when the researchers accounted for the relationship between an electron’s spin and momentum, they could explain why mercury has such a low threshold temperature (around –270°C).

    Coulomb repulsion and Mercury

    • Similarly, the group found that one electron in each pair in mercury occupied a higher energy level than the other.
    • This detail reportedly lowered the Coulomb repulsion (like charges repel) between them and nurtured superconductivity.
    • Thus, the group has explained how mercury becomes a superconductor below its threshold temperature.
    • Their methods and findings suggest that we could have missed similar anomalous effects in other materials, leading to previously undiscovered ones that can be exploited for new and better real-world applications.

     

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  • Underwater combat drones: Indian Navy’s readiness

    combat

    Context

    • India is on a drive to induct unmanned combat systems into the military. Months after the Indian Army announced the induction of swarm drones into its mechanized forces, the Navy chief, Admiral R Hari Kumar, reiterated the importance of autonomous systems in creating a future-proof Indian Navy (IN).

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    combat

    Indian Navy’s expanding surveillance and reasons for doing so

    • The IN, indeed, has been on a mission to expand surveillance in India’s near-seas: Two years after it leased MQ-9B Sea Guardian drones from the US, the navy, in July 2022, released an unclassified version of its unmanned roadmap for the induction of remote autonomous platforms including undersea vehicles.
    • Maritime deterrence in the Eastern Indian Ocean: A key driver for the enterprise is underwater domain awareness, deemed an increasingly vital component of maritime deterrence in the Eastern Indian Ocean.
    • Chinas undersea presence in the Indian ocean: In the aftermath of the conflict in Ladakh in June 2020, there is a growing sense among Indian experts and military planners that China’s undersea presence in the Indian Ocean is on the cusp of crossing a critical threshold.
    • Recent reports of sighting of Chinese drones in the waters of Indonesia: Recent reports of the sighting of Chinese drones in the waters off Indonesian islands suggest the Peoples Liberation Army Navy has been studying the operating environment of the Indian Ocean.
    • China already deployed vessels around Andaman in the name of research: Already, there has been a rise in the deployment of Chinese research and survey vessels in the waters around India’s Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
    • Recognizing the threat, Indian Navy sought acquire to own AUV: Ever more alive to the dangers posed by foreign undersea presence in Indian waters, the IN sought to acquire its own autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) with twin surveillance and strike capabilities.

    Analysis: The navy’s interest in armed underwater drones

    • Underwater vehicles never viewed as warfighting assets: Despite being widely used in underwater search and exploration, underwater vehicles have never quite been viewed as warfighting assets by India’s military establishment.
    • Never sought deploying underwater drones in combat roles: Notwithstanding the AUVs’ utility in tasks such as mine detection and ship survey, India’s naval planners have traditionally desisted from deploying undersea drones in a combat role.
    • Acknowledging war fighting capabilities and need of the hour: Indian analysts and decision-makers seem to be belatedly acknowledging the warfighting abilities of underwater autonomous platforms powered by artificial intelligence (AI).
    • Getting ready for the new era warfare: With the fourth industrial revolution (4IR) shaping a new era in warfare, Indian observers are beginning to recognise the likely impact of disruptive technologies on the maritime domain. AI powered by deep learning, data analytics, and cloud computing, many say, is poised to alter the maritime battlefront, potentially triggering a revolution in naval affairs in India.

    Challenges to harness the disruptive technologies in maritime combat

    • Ethical paradox: There is an ethical paradox that typifies artificially intelligent combat systems.
    • Imported AI tech algorithms cannot be under user control: Despite rendering warfare more deadly, AI compromises the control, safety, and accountability of weapon systems it also enhances the risk of shared liability between networked systems, particularly when weapon algorithms are sourced from abroad, and when the satellite and link systems that enable combat solutions are not under the control of the user.
    • Predisposition of data in AI can undermine the decision making: AI is characterised by a predisposition to certain kinds of data. Biases in the collection of data, in the set of instructions for data analysis, and in the selection of probabilistic outcomes muddle rational decision-making, undermining confidence in automated combat solutions.
    • The doctrinal paradox is equally troubling: There is no easy way of incorporating AI-fuelled warfighting approaches into doctrine, particularly when many technologies are in a nascent stage of development, and there is little clarity about how effective AI could be in combat.
    • Capacity limitation that restricts the development of AI: While technology absorption in the navy has matured in certain areas over a period of time, a large gap still exists in the development of critical technologies, which are system engineering, airborne and underwater sensors, weapon systems, and hi-tech components.

    The critics of AI in warfare

    • Technology without comprehensive testing is risky: That fielding nascent technologies without comprehensive testing puts both military personnel and civilians at risk.
    • Probabilistic assessment by computers not always provide optimal solution: A system of targeting human beings based on probabilistic assessments by computers that act merely on machine-learned experiences, is problematic because the computer neither has access to all relevant data to make an informed decision nor recognizes that it needs more information to come up with an optimal solution.
    • Shaping policy to account for AI is challenging: That is because military doctrine is premised on a traditional understanding of conflict. If war is a normative construct, then there are rules and codes to be followed, and ethical standards to be met.
    • AI could be inconsistent with the laws of war: What is more, AI seemingly automates weapon systems in ways that are inconsistent with the laws of war.

    combat

    Legality issues of underwater combat drones

    • Status by UNCLOS is not yet clear: It is not yet clear if unmanned maritime systems enjoy the status of ships under the UN convention of the laws of the sea; even if they do, it is unlikely that they can be classified as warships.

    Way ahead

    • Notwithstanding the announcement of multiple AI projects, the navy remains focused on using AI in noncombat activities such as training, logistics, inventory management, maritime domain awareness, and predictive maintenance.
    • India’s maritime managers recognize that the IN is still at a place on its evolutionary curve where incorporating AI in combat systems could prove risky. An incremental approach, many believe, is the best way forward.

    Conclusion

    • It is worth acknowledging that AI in warfare is not just a matter of combat effectiveness but also of warfighting ethics. AI-infused unmanned systems on the maritime battlefront pose a degree of danger, making it incumbent upon the military to deploy its assets in ways that are consistent with national and international law. India’s naval leadership would do well if it takes careful and calculated steps in developing AI-powered underwater systems.

  • AI generative models and the question of Ethics

    AI

    Context

    • 2022 had an unusual blue-ribbon winner for emerging digital artists; Jason Allen’s winning work Théâtre D’opéra Spatial was created with an AI Generative model called Midjourney.

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    What is Midjourney?

    • Midjourney is an AI based art generator that has been created to explore new mediums of thought.
    • It is an interactive bot, which uses machine learning (ML) to create images based on texts. This AI system utilises the concepts and tries to convert them into visual reality.
    • It is quite similar to other technologies such as DALL-E 2.

    AI

    The journey of AI generative models so far

    • Midjourney generator: Midjourney is one of the rash of AI-generated Transformer or Generative or Large Language Models (LLMs) which have exploded onto our world in the last few years.
    • Earlier models: Models like BERT and Megatron (2019) were relatively small models, with up to 174 GB of dataset size, and passed under the collective public radar.
    • Composition skills of GPT3: GPT3, released by OpenAI with a 570 GB dataset and 175bn parameters was the first one to capture the public consciousness with some amazing writing and composition skills.
    • Models that creat images or videos based on texts: The real magic, however, started with Transformers which could create beautiful and realistic pieces of art with just a text prompt OpenAI’s DALL-E2, Google’s Imagen, the open-source Stable Diffusion and, obviously, Midjourney. Not to be left behind, Meta unleashed a transformer which could create videos from text prompts.
    • ChatGPT, a latest and more evolved, like real communication: Recently in late 2022 came the transformer to rule them all ChatGPT built on GPT3, but with capabilities to have real conversations with human beings.

    AI

    Are these models ethical?

    • Ethics is too complex a subject to address in one short article. There are three big ethical questions on these models that humanity will have to address in short order.
    1. Environmental: Most of the bad rap goes to crypto and blockchain, but the cloud and these AI models running on it take enormous amounts of energy. Training a large transformer model just once would have CO2 emissions equivalent to 125 roundtrips from New York to Beijing. This cloud is the hundreds of data centres that dot our planet, and they guzzle water and power at alarming rates.
    2. Bias; as it do not understand meaning and its implications: The other thorny ethical issue is that sheer size does not guarantee diversity. Timnit Gebru was with Google when she co-wrote a seminal research paper calling these LLMs ‘stochastic parrots’, because, like parrots, they just repeated a senseless litany of words without understanding their meaning and implications.
    3. Plagiarism, question of who owns the original content: The third prickly ethical issue, which also prompted the artist backlash to Allen’s award-winning work is that of plagiarism. If Stable Diffusion or DALL-E 2 did all the work of scouring the web and combining multiple images (a Pablo Picasso Mona Lisa, for example), who owns it. Currently, OpenAI has ownership of all images created with DALL-E, and their business model is to allow paid users to have rights to reproduce, paint, sell and merchandise images they create. This is a legal minefield the US Copyrights office recently refused to grant a copyright to a piece created by a generative AI called Creativity Machine, but South Africa and Australia have recently announced that AI can be considered an inventor.

    AI

    Do you know ChatGPT?

    • ChatGPT is a chatbot built on a large-scale transformer-based language model that is trained on a diverse dataset of text and is capable of generating human-like responses to prompts.
    • A conversation with ChatGPT is like talking to a computer, a smart one, which appears to have some semblance of human-like intelligence.

    What are the other concerns?

    • Besides the legal quagmire, there is a bigger fear: This kind of cheap, mass-produced art could put artists, photographers, and graphic designers out of their jobs.
    • Machine does not have human like sense: A machine is not necessarily creating art, it is crunching and manipulating data and it has no idea or sense of what and why it is doing so.
    • As it is cheap, corporate might consider using it at a large scale: But it can do so cheaply, and at scale. Corporate customers might seriously consider it for their creative, advertising, and other needs.

    Conclusion

    • Legal and political leaders across the world are sounding the alarm about the ethics of large generative models, and for good reason. As these models become increasingly powerful in the hands of Big Tech, with their unlimited budgets, brains and computing power, these issues of bias, environmental damage and plagiarism will become even more fraught. Such AI models should not be used to create chaos rather a harmonious existence.

    Mains question

    Q. Name some of the models of AI based art generators. Discuss the ethical concerns of such models.

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  • In news: Crypto Awareness Campaign

    crypto

    The Investor Education and Protection Fund (IEPF) will launch an outreach programme soon to create awareness of cryptocurrencies.

    What is Cryptocurrency?

    • A cryptocurrency is a digital asset stored on computerised databases.
    • These digital coins are recorded in digital ledgers using strong cryptography to keep them secure.
    • The ledgers are distributed globally, and each transaction made using cryptocurrencies are codified as blocks.
    • And multiple blocks linking each other forms a blockchain on the distributed ledger.
    • There are estimated to be more than 47 million cryptocurrency users around the world.
    • These cryptocurrencies are created through a process called mining.

    Investor Education and Protection Fund (IEPF)

    • The Investor Education and Protection Fund (IEPF) is managed by the IEPF Authority, which was set up in 2016 under the provisions of Section 125 of the Companies Act, 2013.
    • The Authority is entrusted with promoting awareness among investors, makes refunds of shares, unclaimed dividends, matured deposits and debentures and so on to rightful claimants.
    • As for investment education, the idea is to reach out to household investors, housewives and professionals alike in rural and urban areas and teach them the basics.
    • Focus areas include primary and secondary capital markets, various saving instruments, the instruments for investment, making investors aware of dubious Ponzi and chit fund schemes and existing grievance redressal mechanisms, among other things.
    • Until the end of October, it had conducted more than 65,000 awareness programmes covering 30 lakh citizens.

    Why is there a concern about cryptocurrency?

    • RBI caution: The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has recommended framing legislation on the sector. It is of the view that cryptocurrencies should be prohibited.
    • Fiscal stability at stake: The crypto dilemma stems from concerns about the unregulated currency having a destabilising effect on the monetary and fiscal stability of a country.
    • Involved in unlawful activities: Further, crypto exchanges in India are being investigated for their alleged involvement in unlawful practices such as drug trafficking, money laundering, violating foreign exchange legislation and evasion of GST.
    • High volatility: Cryptocurrency investing can be a complex and risky endeavour as the category is extremely volatile and works round the clock.

    Will an outreach programme help?

    • Regulation is must: Apart from the outreach programme, there has to be a regulatory mechanism for the crypto sector.
    • Messaging has to be right: If the government takes a heavy-handed approach and starts saying things like virtual currency is not legal in India that will not be entirely true.

    Present regulation in India

    • RBI has banned banks and other regulated entities from supporting crypto transactions.
    • The Government has confirmed that expenditure incurred in mining cryptocurrency is considered capital expenditure and not a cost of acquisition.
    • Cryptocurrency and Regulation of Official Digital Currency Bill, 2021 was introduced by the Centre.

    Way forward

    • Crypto assets are borderless and therefore, any legislation (for regulation or for banning) would require international collaboration to prevent regulatory arbitrage.
    • The collaboration must entail an evaluation of risks and benefits and the evolution of common taxonomy and standards.

     

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  • What is Social Stock Exchange (SSE)?

    social

    The National Stock Exchange of India (NSE India) received an in-principle approval from the Securities Exchange Board of India (SEBI) to set-up Social Stock Exchange (SSE) as a separate segment.

    What is Social Stock Exchange (SSE)?

    • SSE is a novel idea in India, and a stock exchange of this kind is intended to benefit the private and non-profit sectors by directing more capital to them.
    • During her Budget speech for the fiscal year 2019–20, Finance Minister first proposed the concept of SSE.
    • The Securities Contracts (Regulation) Act, 1956 was then invoked by the government, which subsequently published a gazette notification announcing a new security as “zero coupon zero principal”.
    • The SSE will function as a distinct division of the current stock exchanges under the new regulations.

    Who can list on SSE?

    • The SSE will be a distinct division of the current stock exchanges under the new regulations.
    • Not-for-profit organisations (NPOs) and for-profit social enterprises with social intent and impact as their primary goal will be eligible to participate in the SSE.
    • Additionally, such an intent should be shown by its emphasis on social goals that are appropriate for under-served or less privileged populations or areas.
    • The social enterprises will have to engage in a social activity out of 16 broad activities listed by the regulator.

    The eligible activities include-

    1. Eradicating hunger poverty, malnutrition and inequality
    2. Promoting healthcare, supporting education, employability and livelihoods
    3. Gender equality empowerment of women and LGBTQIA communities
    4. Supporting incubators of social enterprise

    Who are not eligible?

    • Corporate foundations, political or religious organisations or activities, professional or trade associations, infrastructure companies, and housing companies, with the exception of affordable housing, will not be eligible to be identified as social enterprises.
    • According to SEBI’s framework, minimum issue size of ₹1 crore and a minimum application size for subscription of ₹2 lakh are currently required for SSE.

    Minimum requirements for sustenance

    • NPO needs to be registered as a charitable trust and should be registered for at least three years, must have spent at least ₹50 lakh annually in the past financial year.
    • They should have received a funding of at least ₹10 lakh in the past financial year.

     

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  • Five space exploration missions to look out for in 2023

    2023 is set to be another busy year. Here are five of the most exciting missions to watch out for.

    (1) Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer

    space

    • In April, the European Space Agency (ESA) is set to launch the Jupiter Icy Moons Explorer (Juice), in what will be Europe’s first dedicated robotic mission to Jupiter.
    • Juice is due to reach the planet in July 2031 after performing an incredible flight path through the Solar System.
    • The mission will enter into orbit around Jupiter and perform numerous flybys of its large icy moons: Europa, Ganymede and Callisto.
    • After four years of moon flybys, Juice will then enter into orbit around Ganymede, the largest moon in the Solar System — becoming the first spacecraft ever to reach orbit around the moon of another planet.
    • The icy moons of Jupiter are interesting as they are all believed to host oceans of liquid water beneath their frozen surfaces.
    • Europa, in particular, is regarded as one of the most likely abodes in the Solar System for extra-terrestrial life.

    (2) SpaceX Starship

    space

    • Starship will be the largest spacecraft capable of carrying humans from Earth to destinations in space (the International Space Station is larger, but it was assembled in space).
    • It will be the most powerful launch vehicle ever to fly, capable of lifting 100 tonnes of cargo to low Earth orbit.
    • Starship is the collective name for a two-component system consisting of the Starship spacecraft (which carries the crew and cargo) and the Super Heavy rocket.
    • The rocket component will lift Starship to some 65km altitude before separating and returning to Earth in a controlled landing.
    • The upper Starship component will then use its own engines to push itself the rest of the way to orbit.

    (3) dearMoon Project

    space

    • The long-awaited dearMoon project, which will take members of the public on a six-day trip around the Moon and back, is due for launch on Starship and was originally planned for 2023.
    • It will be the first true deep space tourism launch.
    • This mission will mark a big change in the way we think about space, as previously only astronauts picked using incredibly stringent criteria have been able to go into deep space.
    • The success or failure of the dearMoon mission could affect whether deep space tourism becomes the next big thing, or it is relegated back to being a pipe-dream.

    (4) OSIRIS-REx returning Earth

    space

    • The Origins Spectral Interpretation Resource Identification Security — Regolith Explorer, mercifully more commonly known as OSIRIS-REx, is a NASA mission to near-Earth asteroid Bennu.
    • A key goal of this robotic mission was to acquire samples of Bennu and return them to Earth for analysis.
    • OSIRIS-REx is now fast returning to Earth with up to a kilogram of precious asteroid samples stored aboard.
    • If all goes well, the capsule will detach from the spacecraft, enter the Earth’s atmosphere and parachute to a soft landing in the deserts of Utah.
    • Asteroid sample return has only been achieved once before, by the Japanese Space Agency’s Hayabusa 2 mission in 2020.
    • Bennu is an approximately diamond-shaped world just half a kilometre in size, but has many interesting characteristics.
    • Some of the minerals detected within it have been altered by water, implying that Bennu’s ancient parent body possessed liquid water.
    • It also has an abundance of precious metals, including gold and platinum.
    • It is however classed as a potentially hazardous object with a (very) small possibility of Earth impact in the next century.

    (5) India’s private space launch

    • Skyroot Aerospace, which successfully launched its Vikram-S rocket in November 2022, is soon to become the first private Indian company to launch a satellite.
    • The rocket itself reached 90km in altitude, a distance that would need to be improved upon to get a constellation of satellites into orbit.
    • Skyroot’s first satellite launch is planned for 2023, with a goal of undercutting the cost of private space launch rivals by producing its 3D-printed rockets in a matter of days.
    • If successful, this could also provide a route for cheaper launches of scientific missions, enabling a faster rate of research.

    Conclusion

    • With many bold advances and launches due in 2023, we are entering a new phase akin to the “Golden era” of space launches in the 1960s and ’70s.