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Robotic Asteroid Mining Spacecraft Wins a Grant From NASA

posted by janrinok on Saturday June 15 2019, @06:24PM   
from the we've-made-a-mess-here,-lets-go-to-space dept.

upstart writes:

Submitted via IRC for RandomFactor

Robotic asteroid mining spacecraft wins a grant from NASA - Universe Today

Back in April, NASA once again put out the call for proposals for the next generation of robotic explorers and missions. As part of the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) Program, this consisted of researchers, scientists, and entrepreneurs coming together to submit early studies of new concepts that could one-day help advance NASA's space exploration goals.

One concept that was selected for Phase III of development was a breakthrough mission and flight system called Mini Bee. This small, robotic mining craft was designed by the Trans Astronautica (TransAstra) Corporation to assist with deep-space missions. It is hoped that by leveraging this flight system architecture, the Mini-bee will enable the full-scale industrialization of space as well as human settlement.

The Mini-bee concept is essentially a technology-demonstrator for a family of flight system architectures known as Asteroid Provided In-situ Supplies (Apis). These systems range in size from the experimental Mini Bee (which weighs 250 kg or 550 lbs) to the larger Honey Bee and Queen Bee – which would be capable of capturing asteroids measuring 10 and 40 m (33 and 130 ft) in diameter, respectively.

The Mini Bee utilizes a series of innovative technologies, which includes optical mining method of resource harvesting (aka. laser mining), a spacecraft architecture that relies on sunlight to enable faster spacecraft, and an asteroid containment system similar to the one that was proposed for NASA's now-scrapped Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM).

Further Reading: NASA, TransAstra Corporation

Previous: https://www.universetoday.com/142543/saltwater-similar-to-the-earths-oceans-has-been-seen-on-europa-another-good-reason-why-we-really-need-to-visit-this-place

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Original Submission

• from concept to asteroid economy from concept to asteroid economy (Score: 2) by takyon on Saturday June 15 2019, @06:39PM (2 children)

  by takyon (881) <takyonNO@SPAMsoylentnews.org> on Saturday June 15 2019, @06:39PM (#856040) Journal

  It is hoped that by leveraging this flight system architecture, the Mini-bee will enable the full-scale industrialization of space as well as human settlement.

  Wow, no pressure.

  Don't forget this thing:

  https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2015/03/zaptec-plasma-lightning-pulses-could.html [nextbigfuture.com]
  https://www.nextbigfuture.com/2015/03/technical-details-on-zaptec-plasma.html [nextbigfuture.com]

  --
  [SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]

  • Re:from concept to asteroid economy Re:from concept to asteroid economy (Score: 4, Informative) by c0lo on Saturday June 15 2019, @10:43PM (1 child)

    by c0lo (156) on Saturday June 15 2019, @10:43PM (#856087) Journal

    Don't forget the energy source to make it economic.
    If mining of 1kg of whatever takes 5 years on top of the travel time, nobody is going to use them. Maybe except for Unobtainium - and good luck detecting from light-hour distances asteroids with unobtainium.

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    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford

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    • Re:from concept to asteroid economy (Score: 2) by Pslytely Psycho on Sunday June 16 2019, @06:03AM

      by Pslytely Psycho (1218) on Sunday June 16 2019, @06:03AM (#856180)

      Without a way to refine it in orbit, could it ever be economic?
      Would a pure (if such a thing can exist) Rhodium asteroid even bring in a profit?

      Probably best just to mine comets for ice to cool down the oceans.....Futurama style....

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqVyRa1iuMc [youtube.com]

      --
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      Parent