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Damn - these are full time employment deals for folks. 25 years on one project! Question - they have a ton of shielding for solar radiation - can they not loca

Damn - these are full time employment deals for folks. 25 years on one project! Question - they have a ton of shielding for solar radiation - can they not locate this thing in a shadow area somewhere?

zardo 5y ago
Possibly, but they couldn't power it by attaching solar panels.
causality0 5y ago
Being in a shadow area would mean it would be in orbit of something, and at best it would be in shadow 50% of the time and still need the same amount of shielding for daylight operations. Being in orbit would also mean its position would be much less stable than it will be at the L2 point.
perihelions 5y ago
Related: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10462349 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10462349 ("NASA's last original Voyager engineer retires at 80")
perihelions 5y ago
There aren't any permanent shadows in space. Every orbit goes "around" eventually -- and there's no configuration where some combination of objects works to permanently shadow you. (A technical exception is a planetary solar L2 Lagrange point [0], *if* it would occur close enough to a planet to be totally eclipsed. But that doesn't happen (AFAIK) -- they're generally far enough away that although the planet is always in front of the sun, the planet's disk is much smaller than the solar disk. Like a partial eclipse). With cryogenic cooling, you have an even more difficult challenge: the light of a planet's infrared radiation emission is something you also have to shield. That's a major reason JWST (and similar cryogenic telescopes) go to solar L2: its sunshield doesn't only block out the sun -- it simultaneously blocks out the sun and the Earth. That's the unique advantage of the solar L2 point: the sun and Earth are always in the same direction. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagrange_point https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagrange_point
- bagels 5y ago
  Inside of certain polar craters can satisfy the shade question. Pretty limited utility for a telescope, doubly for solar powered ones.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
marcodiego 5y ago
Why not a landed observatory on the moon? During the day it could recharge batteries; during the night it could perform observations.
- bagels 5y ago
  Getting to l2 is a lot easier than landing a sensitive device on the moon. Also don't have to worry as much about energy emissions from the moon.

zardo 5y ago

Possibly, but they couldn't power it by attaching solar panels.

causality0 5y ago

Being in a shadow area would mean it would be in orbit of something, and at best it would be in shadow 50% of the time and still need the same amount of shielding for daylight operations. Being in orbit would also mean its position would be much less stable than it will be at the L2 point.

perihelions 5y ago

Related: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10462349 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10462349 ("NASA's last original Voyager engineer retires at 80")

perihelions 5y ago

There aren't any permanent shadows in space. Every orbit goes "around" eventually -- and there's no configuration where some combination of objects works to permanently shadow you. (A technical exception is a planetary solar L2 Lagrange point [0], *if* it would occur close enough to a planet to be totally eclipsed. But that doesn't happen (AFAIK) -- they're generally far enough away that although the planet is always in front of the sun, the planet's disk is much smaller than the solar disk. Like a partial eclipse). With cryogenic cooling, you have an even more difficult challenge: the light of a planet's infrared radiation emission is something you also have to shield. That's a major reason JWST (and similar cryogenic telescopes) go to solar L2: its sunshield doesn't only block out the sun -- it simultaneously blocks out the sun and the Earth. That's the unique advantage of the solar L2 point: the sun and Earth are always in the same direction. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagrange_point https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lagrange_point

bagels 5y ago
Inside of certain polar craters can satisfy the shade question. Pretty limited utility for a telescope, doubly for solar powered ones.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

marcodiego 5y ago

Why not a landed observatory on the moon? During the day it could recharge batteries; during the night it could perform observations.

bagels 5y ago
Getting to l2 is a lot easier than landing a sensitive device on the moon. Also don't have to worry as much about energy emissions from the moon.