Chinese Astronauts Dock With Orbiting Space Lab

A trio of Chinese astronauts has successfully docked with the Tiangong-1 space laboratory for what's expected to be a total of 15 days in orbit — the longest mission to date for China's burgeoning manned space program.

The published plan is for the three-person crew, including Wang Yaping, China's second female spacefarer, to practice docking maneuvers between their Shenzhou-10 capsule and theTiangong ("Heavenly Palace"). The crew will also conduct medical exams and "carry out youth-oriented science education activities during two space science lectures" from orbit, according to NASA. Wang is being billed as China's "first teacher in space" and is scheduled to broadcast a lecture on Earth physics.

The three astronauts aboard Shenzhou-10 are to be the last to visit Tiangong-1, which is running low on resources for future crews. It will be replaced by Tiangong-2, set for launch sometime in the next few years.

The Christian Science Monitor reports:

"China is ultimately hoping to build an international space station similar to Russia's Mir space station, a seven-module station. Russia dumped that station in 2001, joining the International Space Station project instead. ...

"Tiangong 1 will be converted into a miles-high warehouse used while the proposed space station is undergoing construction."

What is biopiracy?

The European parliament is debating a draft biopiracy law requiring industry to compensate indigenous people if it makes commercial use of local knowledge such as plant-based medicines. Under the law based on the international convention on access to biodiversity, the Nagoya protocol – the pharmaceuticals industry would need the written consent of local or indigenous people before exploring their region's genetic resources or making use of their traditional knowhow. Relevant authorities would have the power to sanction companies that fail to comply, protecting local interests from the predatory attitude of big European companies.

Biopiracy

 

Huge Earth-Passing Asteroid 'Entirely New Beast'

A big asteroid that flew past Earth last month belongs to a new category of space rock, scientists say.

This is an artist's drawing of asteroid 1998 QE2 as it approaches Earth.

ESA

Asteroid 1998 QE2 and its moon sailed within 3.6 million miles (5.8 million kilometers) of Earth on May 31, making their closest approach to our planet for at least the next two centuries. New radar images captured by the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico are revealing just how unique this binary asteroid is, researchers say.

“Asteroid QE2 is dark, red, and primitive — that is, it hasn’t been heated or melted as much as other asteroids," Arecibo's Ellen Howell said in a statement. "QE2 is nothing like any asteroid we've visited with a spacecraft, or plan to, or that we have meteorites from. It's an entirely new beast in the menagerie of asteroids near Earth." (Potentially Dangerous Asteroids (Images))

The 1,000-foot-wide (305 meters) Arecibo dish and NASA's 230-foot (70 m) Deep Space Network antenna in Goldstone, Calif., tracked 1998 QE2 as it approached Earth last month, then kept following the near-Earth asteroid as it receded into the depths of space.

The resulting radar images have helped researchers take 1998 QE2's measure. The dark, cratered main asteroid is 1.9 miles (3 km) wide, and it has a 2,500-foot (750 m) moon that orbits it once every 32 hours.

"QE2's moon is roughly one-quarter the size of the main asteroid," Patrick Taylor, also of Arecibo, said in a statement. "Similarly, our moon is also approximately one-fourth the size of our planet."

Studying the moon and its orbit should help scientists determine the mass of the main asteroid, which in turn will shed light on the object's composition, researchers said.

Asteroid 1998 QE2 was discovered in August 1998 by astronomers working with MIT's Lincoln Near Earth Asteroid Research program in New Mexico. The space rock completes one lap around the sun every 3.8 years.

There was never any danger of 1998 QE2 hitting Earth during last month's flyby, scientists say. If it had hit us, the damage would have been severe; researchers think that any asteroid bigger than 0.6 miles (1 km) is capable of inflicting damage on a global scale, primarily by altering the planet's climate.

1998 QE2 is one of roughly 10,000 near-Earth asteroids that have been spotted to date. The total population of close-flying space rocks is thought to exceed 1 million.

Arecibo's observing campaign of 1998 QE2 came to end on Thursday (June 13), observatory officials said.

For more, watch this video called '4 Biggest Asteroid Strikes Ever'. Really interesting. http://news.discovery.com/videos/4-biggest-asteroid-strikes-ever.htm

Fuente: Space.com