Japanese space probe goes into orbit around Venus

[Aepsilons]

Japan’s space agency said Wednesday its Akatsuki probe had successfully entered into orbit around Venus after an initial attempt at reaching the second planet from the sun failed five years ago.

The success marks the first time a Japanese space probe has entered into the orbit of another planet, according to Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).

“The probe is functioning properly,” Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) project manager Masato Nakamura said during a press conference.

“We’ll conduct an initial observation for three months… We’ll then shift to full observation in April,” he said.

Akatsuki, meaning dawn, blasted off in 2010 on a 25.2 billion yen ($205 million at current exchange rates) mission to observe the toxic atmosphere and super-hot volcanic surface of Venus.

But the box-shaped probe failed to enter the planet’s gravitational pull and shot past it, forcing JAXA technicians to make the second attempt.

The successful Venus orbit came a week after another Japanese space probe, Hayabusa 2, passed by Earth to harness the planet’s gravitational pull to propel it toward a far away asteroid in its quest to study the origin of the solar system.

The explorer conducted an “Earth swing-by” and came as close as 3,090 kilometers above the planet’s surface, before switching its orbit to continue towards the tiny Ryugu asteroid.

Hayabusa 2 was launched a year ago on a six-year mission to bring back mineral samples from the asteroid.

It is expected to reach Ryugu, named after a mythical castle in a Japanese folk tale, in mid-2018.

If all goes well, soil samples will be returned to Earth in late 2020.

Analysing the extra-terrestrial materials could help shed light on the birth of the solar system 4.6 billion years ago and offer clues about what gave rise to life on Earth, scientists have said.


Japanese space probe goes into orbit around Venus ‹ Japan Today: Japan News and Discussion

 

[Aepsilons]

Nihon

 

[Kyusuibu Honbu]

Congrats Japan

Too bad space achievements from Japan do not gain media attention

 

[Aepsilons]

Congrats Japan

Too bad space achievements from Japan do not gain media attention

Better that way. We prefer to do it silently.

 

[BDforever]

Japan’s space agency said Wednesday its Akatsuki probe had successfully entered into orbit around Venus after an initial attempt at reaching the second planet from the sun failed five years ago.

The success marks the first time a Japanese space probe has entered into the orbit of another planet, according to Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).

“The probe is functioning properly,” Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) project manager Masato Nakamura said during a press conference.

“We’ll conduct an initial observation for three months… We’ll then shift to full observation in April,” he said.

Akatsuki, meaning dawn, blasted off in 2010 on a 25.2 billion yen ($205 million at current exchange rates) mission to observe the toxic atmosphere and super-hot volcanic surface of Venus.

But the box-shaped probe failed to enter the planet’s gravitational pull and shot past it, forcing JAXA technicians to make the second attempt.

The successful Venus orbit came a week after another Japanese space probe, Hayabusa 2, passed by Earth to harness the planet’s gravitational pull to propel it toward a far away asteroid in its quest to study the origin of the solar system.

The explorer conducted an “Earth swing-by” and came as close as 3,090 kilometers above the planet’s surface, before switching its orbit to continue towards the tiny Ryugu asteroid.

Hayabusa 2 was launched a year ago on a six-year mission to bring back mineral samples from the asteroid.

It is expected to reach Ryugu, named after a mythical castle in a Japanese folk tale, in mid-2018.

If all goes well, soil samples will be returned to Earth in late 2020.

Analysing the extra-terrestrial materials could help shed light on the birth of the solar system 4.6 billion years ago and offer clues about what gave rise to life on Earth, scientists have said.


Japanese space probe goes into orbit around Venus ‹ Japan Today: Japan News and Discussion

when we will be able to do such thing Congratz to Japanese ppl

Congrats Japan

Too bad space achievements from Japan do not gain media attention

because all accepted that it is bread and butter thing for Japanese ppl lol

 

[Shotgunner51]

Nihon

Congrats! By the way that 宇宙航空研究開発機構 pic is amazing, but I still prefer 機動戦士ガンダム more ...

 

[Cyberian]

Congratulations Japan.

We now have two Asian countries at same time successfully orbiting their spacecrafts at two separate planets - other being India at Planet Mareekh.

This is quite amazing.

 

[mike2000 is back]

Congrats Japan

Too bad space achievements from Japan do not gain media attention

Japan is already an established power and an ultra developed country, its still the most developed an advanced country in Asia by quite a margin even today.
You should know that an established power/developed country doesn't need to prove itself anymore, meanwhile a developing country coming from far behind needs to prove itself a lot, reason any little news from a developing country garners more attention worldwide than when a developed country does the same(or even more). For example India's mars mission attracted world's attention, meanwhile Japan has accomplished dozens(if not hundreds) of far more challenging space projects than India can ever do this coming decade, but Japan doesn't attract too much attention for the reason i mentioned above. Plus don't forget that Japan still has the most powerful operational rocket launcher in Asia.

Anyway Congrats to Japan for this mission. It's not easy to send a probe to another planet far away from our solar system i think only a few countries U.S/E.U, Russia and recently India with its mars mission have ever succeeded in doing that(even less so to Venus).
However, I'm shocked to see Japan has already launch a mission to return samples on an Asteroid, i never knew that. WOW......That will be quite an achievement since its a VERY VERY challenging/complex to land on an asteroid let alone return samples to earth from it. I think only European Space Agency has so far succeeded in landing on an asteroid, but we didn't return any sample though. Looking forward to see if Japan can do better.
Does Japan have deep space capabilities then Nihonji? Since to be able to send a probe successfully this far to another planet out of our solar system requires deep space capabilities.
Great going @Nihonjin1051

 

[Pangu]

Everyone wants to visit Mars, the god of war, but it's good to see Japan visit Venus, the goddess of love. Make love not war yah?

 

[Aepsilons]

Everyone wants to visit Mars, the god of war, but it's good to see Japan visit Venus, the goddess of love. Make love not war yah?

Ha...! Why...yes!



--------------


JAXA probe has made contact with the great plant VENUS:

 

[F-22Raptor]

Congrats

 

[Aepsilons]

Make love not war yah?

Make love and a bit more love lah!

 

[xunzi]

Congrats Japan

Too bad space achievements from Japan do not gain media attention

The Soviet sent a probe to Venus 50 years ago. Let me remind you that. This is nothing new. This is not a new territory. Sending a probe is easy. In fact, any country with rocket that send satellite to space can do that. Though, sending and landing a probe on the planet or better yet, a manned mission in space take a different technological know-how territory because of precise navigation and reentry back to earth needs advance re-entry rocket.. That's why nobody cares about sending probe to another planet. It is a one way street. Easy cake. Even a private space company can do that.

 

[Aepsilons]

I think this is quite pertinent to the topic of galactic exploration by JAXA and the raw, unlimited power from space. The new horizon is in the Heavens. JAXA, like NASA, will pave the way.


-------------


JAXA Looks to Space for Energy Production


SSPS Ground Station (JAXA)



SNA (Tsukuba) – The loss of public faith in nuclear energy since the March 11, 2011, triple disaster has once again put the Japanese nation on the hunt for new solutions to its vast energy needs. Many voices have called for the dramatic expansion of renewable energy systems such as solar, wind, and hydro as the medium- to long-term answer to reduce the contemporary dependency on nuclear, as well as on CO2-producing forms of energy like oil and gas.

Here at the Tsukuba Space Center of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), they are working on a project that one can easily imagine to be a late 21st century or early 22nd century answer to human energy needs – it is a Space Solar Power System, or SSPS.

The origins of the SSPS concept go back to 1968 and the United States. The first such idea was proposed by the NASA-affiliated scientist and aerospace engineer Dr. Peter Glaser, and during the 1970s some preliminary work was done. However, shortly after Ronald Reagan was elected US President in 1980, NASA’s development of an SSPS was defunded as “a high-risk venture” and an unnecessary government expense.

Later, JAXA picked up the threads and today Japan is the world leader in developing this technology.

Obviously, putting a solar power station up in space is a much more costly proposition than building a more conventional mega-solar plant on the ground, but, as JAXA Associate Senior Engineer Tatsuhito Fujita tells the SNA, there are key advantages as well: “The biggest merit of the SSPS is that in space, as opposed to on land, it can continue to operate even during the nighttime hours. So even when it is dark across the land, it can gather the solar energy and beam it down to earth. Also, solar power on land is at the mercy of weather conditions, like clouds and rain. It can’t produce much energy under bad weather conditions. When the SSPS beams down its energy, cloud cover has no effect, so weather is not a factor. Overall, this means the SSPS can generate a lot more energy. So while it certainly costs more money to send a solar power station into space as opposed to building one on land, once it is up there and producing energy, it is much more efficient, powerful, and stable. That’s its great merit.”

One of the key challenges, of course, is transmitting the solar energy collected in space to businesses and homes down on earth. From the beginning of the SSPS concept, two major possibilities have been explored; the first is through microwaves and the second through lasers. Obviously, these microwaves or beams cannot be so intense as to threaten birds or airplanes that happen to cross their paths, but apparently the technology is already more or less in place that would allow the construction of special energy-collection stations on earth to safely gather the energy sent down from the solar power satellites.

Japan is now moving from the basic study phases of the SSPS to demonstration tests, and in the 2020s, probably in partnership with other countries, is likely to launch a serious effort to build and to put such a system into operation. JAXA’s current goal is to have the first SSPS up and running sometime in the 2030s and generating energy equivalent to about one nuclear power plant.

From that point, if the technology is found to meet the promise that its designers expect of it, not even the sky will be the limit.

However, I'm shocked to see Japan has already launch a mission to return samples on an Asteroid, i never knew that. WOW......That will be quite an achievement since its a VE
RY VERY challenging/complex to land on an asteroid let alone return samples to earth from it. I think only European Space Agency has so far succeeded in landing on an asteroid, but we didn't return any sample though. Looking forward to see if Japan can do better.
Does Japan have deep space capabilities then Nihonji? Since to be able to send a probe successfully this far to another planet out of our solar system requires deep space capabilities.

Not only that, my friend, we have launched a space exploratory probe to a meteor cluster , successcully collected data , and retrieved data for JAXA's analysis. We have already launched a 2nd strike to do more specific analysis on a new meteor cluster through Hayabusa 2.

THAT is JAPANESE ENGINEERING. Pin Point Precision. Even in Space, Not many can boast that. But we Japanese can.

Japan is already an established power and an ultra developed country, its still the most developed an advanced country in Asia by quite a margin even today.
You should know that an established power/developed country doesn't need to prove itself anymore, meanwhile a developing country coming from far behind needs to prove itself a lot, reason any little news from a developing country garners more attention worldwide than when a developed country does the same(or even more). For example India's mars mission attracted world's attention, meanwhile Japan has accomplished dozens(if not hundreds) of far more challenging space projects than India can ever do this coming decade, but Japan doesn't attract too much attention for the reason i mentioned above. Plus don't forget that Japan still has the most powerful operational rocket launcher in Asia.

Anyway Congrats to Japan for this mission. It's not easy to send a probe to another planet far away from our solar system i think only a few countries U.S/E.U, Russia and recently India with its mars mission have ever succeeded in doing that(even less so to Venus).
However, I'm shocked to see Japan has already launch a mission to return samples on an Asteroid, i never knew that. WOW......That will be quite an achievement since its a VERY VERY challenging/complex to land on an asteroid let alone return samples to earth from it. I think only European Space Agency has so far succeeded in landing on an asteroid, but we didn't return any sample though. Looking forward to see if Japan can do better.
Does Japan have deep space capabilities then Nihonji? Since to be able to send a probe successfully this far to another planet out of our solar system requires deep space capabilities.
Great going @Nihonjin1051 View attachment 278497

@mike2000 is back , think about it this way, if we can launch an inter-galactic strike with pin point accuracy at a meteor cluster with 100% precision. Imagine the potential for Japanese intercontinental ballistics, well, if we so decided to do it. LOL. The latter is just so ...terra...

I suppose with the blessings of the Great Omnipotent and Divine Sun Goddess the Omikami Amaterasu, Japan can accomplish anything.

I deign to say...Divine Right...

 

[ArsalanKhan21]

Venus is very hot, high pressure and with Sulphuric Acid dense atmosphere.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terraforming_of_Venus