NASA, US Department of Commerce Expand Minority Business Efforts

NASA, US Department of Commerce Expand Minority Business Efforts

NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy speaks with Under Secretary of Commerce for Minority Business Development, Donald Cravins, Jr., Tuesday, Oct. 17, 2023, at the Mary W. Jackson NASA Headquarters building in Washington.
NASA/Aubrey Gemignani

NASA and the U.S. Department of Commerce Minority Business Development Agency (MBDA) signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) on Dec. 28, 2023, to help connect minority businesses to NASA acquisition and development opportunities. Outreach efforts will focus on engaging both minority and other underserved businesses.

With a term of three years, the MOU enables the continuous efforts of both agencies’ longstanding partnership to foster, promote, and develop the nation’s minority business enterprises in the aerospace industry, and highlights the Biden-Harris Administration’s economic investments in the sector. NASA and MBDA have a history of collaboration; this further solidifies a partnership to work towards mitigating barriers to equity.

“At NASA, we explore for the benefit of all humanity, and as we venture deeper into the cosmos, we are dedicated to developing partnerships that bring diverse perspectives and talent to the forefront,” said NASA Deputy Administrator Pam Melroy. “Creating equitable and inclusive opportunities allows everyone to experience the strategic and economic advantages of exploring space.”

Under the terms of the agreement, the agencies will work together to highlight subject-matter experts within the federal government and private sector who can support initiatives to help minority business enterprises seeking NASA acquisition opportunities. The Minority Development Business Agency will use its network of business centers and programs to promote these opportunities with NASA.

“The Minority Business Development Agency is collaborating with NASA to ensure minority and other underserved businesses have the opportunities to help humanity explore worlds beyond our own,” said Donald Cravins, Jr., Under Secretary of Commerce for Minority Business Development. “Through this collaboration, MBDA will work closely with NASA to identify aerospace industry initiatives, support outreach efforts, and foster federal partnership opportunities for the businesses we serve. As opportunities in the aerospace industry continue to expand to new frontiers, MBDA is committed to helping guide federal investments with equity and intention.”

Through this effort, NASA and MBDA aim to boost equitable participation of minority businesses in aerospace technology and scientific discovery by identifying and addressing barriers and policy gaps.

Learn more about NASA’s Office of Small Business Programs at:

https://www.nasa.gov/osbp/

-end-

Amber Jacobson / Roxana Bardan
Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1600
amber.c.jacobson@nasa.gov / roxana.bardan@nasa.gov

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Roxana Bardan

New Study Updates NASA on Space-Based Solar Power

New Study Updates NASA on Space-Based Solar Power

3 min read

Preparations for Next Moonwalk Simulations Underway (and Underwater)

New Set of Solar Fireworks
The sun emitted a significant solar flare, peaking at 2:14 p.m. EDT on Oct. 20, 2012 NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) captured this image of an M9-class flare on Oct 20, 2012 at 2:14 p.m. EDT.

Space-based solar power offers tantalizing possibilities for sustainable energy – in the future, orbital collection systems could harvest energy in space, and beam it wirelessly back to Earth. These systems could serve remote locations across the planet to supplement the terrestrial power transmission infrastructure required today.

Countries around the world are investing in space-based solar power research and development, and international organizations are focused on reducing carbon emissions to net-zero by 2050. NASA is considering how best to support space-based solar power development. “Space-Based Solar Power,” a new report from the NASA’s Office of Technology, Policy, and Strategy (OTPS) aims to provide NASA with the information it needs to determine how it can support the development of this field of research.

“This analysis compares the lifecycle cost of two conceptual space-based solar power systems versus their potential for net emissions reductions,” said Charity Weeden, who leads NASA OTPS. “By considering scenarios like these, OTPS helps NASA understand the technological, policy, and economic implications that would need to be addressed.”

The OTPS report considered the conditions under which space-based solar power would be a competitive option to achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions when compared to other sustainable solutions. The report also considered what role NASA could play in the development of space-based solar power systems.

Creating a space-based solar power system would require addressing several significant capability gaps. Researchers would need to find ways to assemble and maintain large systems in orbit, enable those systems to operate autonomously, and develop efficient power-beaming to bring the harvested energy to Earth. These systems may need to operate in geostationary orbit, higher than the low-Earth orbit paths used by many of today’s satellites, which would carry additional challenges.

And prior to the point of bringing space-based solar power systems online, launch and manufacturing costs would need to be addressed – moving all that mass into orbit would require many sustained missions to carry infrastructure into space.

The OTPS report considered the potential of a space-based solar power system that could begin operating in 2050. Based on that timeline, the report found that space-based solar power would be more expensive than terrestrial sustainable alternatives, although those costs could fall if current capability gaps can be addressed. The report shows that emissions from space-based solar power could be similar to those from terrestrial alternative power sources but it noted that this issue requires more detailed assessments.

NASA is already developing technologies for its current mission portfolio that will indirectly benefit space-based solar power, the report found. These include projects focusing on the development of autonomous systems, wireless power beaming, and in-space servicing, assembly, and manufacturing.

NASA frequently reevaluates how it approaches issues that could affect the agency’s missions. The report noted that further analysis of space-based solar power could be warranted – including evaluations of the technology for potential lunar applications – as the technology progresses and capability gaps are addressed.

The report and other OTPS documents advising NASA on technology, policy, and strategy issues are available on the office’s webpage.

SpaceBased Solar Power (PDF)

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Jan 11, 2024

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Bill Keeter

NASA Selects Crew for Next Simulated Mars Mission

NASA Selects Crew for Next Simulated Mars Mission

NASA selected a crew of four for the agency’s next Human Exploration Research Analog mission, a simulated mission to Mars. From left are Abhishek Bhagat, Susan Hilbig, Kamak Ebadi, and Ariana Lutsic.  
Credit: HERA C7 Crew   

NASA selected a crew of four volunteers to participate in a simulated journey to Mars inside a habitat at the agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston. 

Abhishek Bhagat, Kamak Ebadi, Susan Hilbig, and Ariana Lutsic will enter the ground-based HERA (Human Exploration Research Analog) facility on Friday, Jan. 26, to live and work like astronauts for 45 days during the simulated mission to the Red Planet. Crew members will exit the facility on March 11, after they “return” to Earth. Two additional volunteers are available as backup crew members.

Without leaving Earth, HERA allows scientists to study how crew members adapt to the isolation, confinement, and work conditions astronauts will experience during future spaceflight missions. Crew members will conduct science, operational, and maintenance tasks while facing communication delays with the outside world lasting up to five minutes as they “approach” Mars.

The new crew will participate in 18 human health studies throughout the simulated mission. The experiments will assess the psychological, physiological, and behavioral responses of crew members millions of miles away from their home planet. Ten studies are new to HERA, including seven led by scientists outside the United States. These international studies are collaborations with the United Arab Emirates’ Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre and ESA (European Space Agency).

The upcoming mission marks the first of four simulated missions to Mars that researchers will carry out using HERA in 2024. Each mission will include a different crew of four astronaut-like research volunteers. The final mission is slated to end Dec. 16.

Primary Crew

Abhishek Bhagat

Abhishek Bhagat headshotAbhishek Bhagat is a research electrical engineer for the U.S. Army Engineering Research and Development Center’s Cold Region Research and Engineering Lab. 

Bhagat holds a bachelor’s degree in engineering from Nagpur University in India, a master’s degree in electrical engineering from California State University in Northridge, and a master’s degree in computer science from the University of North America in Fairfax, Virginia. He is currently pursuing a master’s degree in space systems from the Florida Institute of Technology in Melbourne. 

Bhagat began working as a consultant at Samsung Telecom America, which paved the way for subsequent consulting roles with Qualcomm and Sprint. He then served in the U.S. Army. When he transitioned out of active duty, he became an electronics engineer for the Federal Aviation Administration. 

Bhagat received the Army Commendation Medal and remains an Army reservist. In his spare time, he enjoys hiking, climbing mountains, and riding motorcycles.

Kamak Ebadi

Kamak Ebadi is a robotics technologist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Southern California. He is a member of the spaceflight operations team responsible for managing NASA’s Perseverance Rover on Mars. Ebadi also supports NASA’s Artemis program and Mars Sample Return mission through work that helped develop orbital maps and navigation algorithms for the guided descent and precision landing of autonomous spacecraft on the Moon and Mars. 
 
Born in Tehran, Iran, Ebadi relocated to the United States in 2010, driven by his lifelong aspiration to join NASA. He earned his doctorate in robotics from Santa Clara University in California. He was awarded a doctoral fellowship from JPL in 2017 and helped develop a fleet of autonomous robots to explore uncharted subterranean environments. 
 
Ebadi completed postdoctoral research jointly at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena and JPL. He developed algorithms that control in-space docking and manipulation of uncooperative space objects, such as defunct satellites and asteroids. 
 
In his spare time, Ebadi participates as a board member for a non-profit organization committed to disrupting the cycle of poverty through education. He advocates for STEM education and engages as a space and science communicator across various social media platforms. He enjoys spending quality time with his family, playing the guitar, participating in sports, maintaining a strict fitness routine, and learning to pilot private aircraft.

Susan Hilbig

Susan Hilbig headshotSusan Hilbig, from Durham, North Carolina, is a physician assistant with a focus on aerospace medicine and human performance in isolated, confined environments. She completed her academic training at North Carolina’s Duke University, where she double majored in biology and Earth and ocean science prior to earning a master’s degree in physician assistant studies from Duke University’s School of Medicine.

Hilbig’s passion for exploration led her to pursue research at remote field sites as an undergraduate, taking her across the world for various projects. Most notably, she traveled to the village of Tsinjoarivo, Madagascar, where she collected data on wild populations of the only lemur known to hibernate. Prior to graduate school, Hilbig worked as a clinical research coordinator in neuroscience with a focus on non-invasive brain stimulation. She subsequently worked as a physician assistant in Duke University’s emergency department.

Hilbig has experience with simulated extreme environments in hyperbaric chambers at Duke University’s Dive Medicine Center. As an avid cyclist, Hilbig has spent years leading weeklong cycling tours in Europe, with a regional focus on the Balkans and Northern Italy. Hilbig is a triathlete and general outdoor enthusiast who enjoys hiking, swimming, and scuba diving.

Ariana Lutsic

Ariana Lutsic headshotAriana Lutsic is a scientist and engineer at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, specializing in research support for biological payloads on the International Space Station. Over the past seven years, she has held various roles at Kennedy, focusing on plants, animals, and hardware design.

Prior to her work at Kennedy, Lutsic volunteered with conservation and rehabilitation programs at the Sea Turtle Healing Center at the Brevard Zoo. She also served as a kayak guide for bioluminescent tours in the Indian River Lagoon in Florida.

Lutsic obtained her bachelor’s degree in communications from the University of Maryland Global Campus while living in Japan, and earned a master’s degree in space systems from the Florida Institute of Technology. She is currently pursuing another master’s degree at the Florida Institute of Technology, with emphases on marine biology and astrobiology. In her spare time, she enjoys volunteering with STEM programs, coaching youth soccer, and going to the beach with her family.

Back-Up Crew

Gregory Contreras

Gregory Contreras headshotLieutenant Commander Gregory “GM” Contreras is a planner and budget programming analyst for the U.S. Navy’s Integration and Programming Division. He is a native of Pleasant Hill, Calif.

During his 20 years in the Navy, Contreras worked as a surface warfare officer aboard the USS Chafee in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. He also served as a space systems engineer and technical representative at the U.S. Department of Defense’s National Reconnaissance Office and as an engineering, technical, and logistics adviser on behalf of the United States for the Royal Saudi Navy. 

Contreras earned bachelor’s degrees in naval science and in mechanical engineering in 2007 from the University of Idaho in Moscow. In 2013, he completed a master’s degree in astronautical engineering from the Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, Calif. His master’s thesis focused on space controls and robotics. He also earned a second master’s degree in engineering administration from Virginia Tech in Fairfax in 2017.

Contreras and his wife have three daughters — Lucia, Alexandra, and Claire — and a cat named Mimi. His passions include playing with his daughters, diving, surfing, and taking long breaks in nature with the family recreational vehicle.

Carli Domenico

Carli Domenico headshotCarli Domenico is a neuroscientist from San Antonio, Texas. She received her doctorate at Baylor College of Medicine, where she studied neural circuits in animal models from pigeons to rats for research that specialized in learning and memory. She has presented her work through talks at conferences, universities, and workshops, and has published in several journals.

In pursuit of impactful science communication, Domenico serves as director of academic and professional programming for the Intercollegiate Psychedelics Network. Domenico has also taught courses and programs in STEM for students in middle school, high school, and college.

Domenico received a Bachelor of Science with honors from Texas A&M University, College Station. She interned at Johnson, investigating astronaut cognition and sleep for long-duration spaceflight. Her thesis research included an independent study investigating inflammation and chronic pain in humans.

She recently received her certification as a yoga instructor. In her free time, she teaches at her community’s aging center, where she volunteers by leading activities and delivering meals. Domenico lives in Cleveland with her husband, golden retriever, and two cats. She enjoys live music, hiking, yoga, cooking, and soccer. 

____

NASA’s Human Research Program, or HRP, pursues the best methods and technologies to support safe, productive human space travel. Through science conducted in laboratories, ground-based analogs, and the International Space Station, HRP scrutinizes how spaceflight affects human bodies and behaviors. Such research drives HRP’s quest to innovate ways that keep astronauts healthy and mission-ready as space travel expands to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.

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Nathan Cranford

This US-Indian Satellite Will Monitor Earth’s Changing Frozen Regions

This US-Indian Satellite Will Monitor Earth’s Changing Frozen Regions

NISAR will study changes to ice sheets, glaciers, and sea ice in fine detail, as climate change warms the air and ocean.

NISAR, the soon-to-launch radar satellite from NASA and the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), will measure some key Earth vital signs, from the health of wetlands to ground deformation by volcanoes to the dynamics of land and sea ice.

This last capability will help researchers decipher how small-scale processes can cause monumental changes in the ice sheets covering Antarctica and Greenland, as well as on mountain glaciers and sea ice around the world.

Short for NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar, NISAR will provide the most comprehensive picture to date of motion and deformation of frozen surfaces in Earth’s ice- and snow-covered environments, collectively known as the cryosphere.

“Our planet has the thermostat set on high, and Earth’s ice is responding by speeding up its motion and melting faster,” said Alex Gardner, a glaciologist at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California. “We need to better understand the processes at play, and NISAR will provide measurements to do that.”

NASA and the Indian Space Research Organisation have teamed up to create NISAR, a new satellite mission that will track the changing Earth in fine detail. Learn how NISAR will use radar to deepen our understanding of deforestation, shrinking glaciers, natural hazards, and other global vital signs. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

Set to be launched in 2024 by ISRO from southern India, NISAR will observe nearly all the planet’s land and ice surfaces twice every 12 days. The satellite’s unique insights into Earth’s cryosphere will come from the combined use of two radars: an L-band system with a 10-inch (25-centimeter) wavelength and an S-band system with a 4-inch (10-centimeter) wavelength.

L-band can see through snow, helping scientists better track the motion of ice underneath, while S-band is more sensitive to snow moisture, which indicates melting. Both signals penetrate clouds and darkness, enabling observations during monthslong polar winter nights.

‘Time-Lapse Movie’ of Ice Sheets

NISAR’s orientation in orbit will enable it to collect data from Antarctica’s far interior, close to the South Pole – unlike other large imaging radar satellites, which have more extensively covered the Arctic.

Antarctica’s ice sheets hold the planet’s largest reservoir of frozen fresh water, and the rate at which it may lose ice represents the greatest uncertainty in sea level rise projections. NISAR’s increased coverage will be crucial for studying the motion of ice flowing down from central Antarctica’s high elevations toward the sea.

The measurements will also enable scientists to closely study what happens where ice and ocean meet. For example, when parts of an ice sheet sit on ground that is below sea level, saltwater can seep under the ice and increase melting and instability. Both Antarctica and Greenland also have ice shelves – masses of ice that extend from land and float on the ocean – that are thinning and crumbling as icebergs break off. Ice shelves help keep glacial ice on the land from slipping into the ocean. If they are diminished, glaciers can flow and calve faster.

Pictured in this artist’s concept, NISAR will use two radar systems to monitor change in nearly all of Earth’s land and ice surfaces. The satellite marks the first time the U.S. and Indian space agencies have cooperated on hardware development for an Earth-observing mission.
NASA/JPL-Caltech

Ice losses on both Antarctica and Greenland have accelerated since the 1990s, and there’s uncertainty about how quickly each will continue to recede. NISAR will improve our horizontal and vertical views of these changes.

“NISAR will give us a consistent time-lapse movie of that motion, so we can understand how and why it’s changing and better predict how it will change into the future,” said Ian Joughin, a glaciologist at the University of Washington in Seattle and the NISAR cryosphere lead.

Mountain Glaciers, Water Supply, and Flooding

The satellite will also track changes in Earth’s mountain glaciers. Their melting has contributed about a third of the sea level rise seen since the 1960s, and climate-driven changes to freezing and thawing patterns can affect the water supplies of downstream populations.

In the Himalayas, NISAR’s all-weather capability will help researchers monitor how much water is stored in glacial lakes, which is essential to assessing the risk of catastrophic floods.

“The beauty and the difficulty of the Himalayas are the clouds,” said Sushil Kumar Singh, a glaciologist at the ISRO Space Applications Centre in Ahmedabad, India. “With NISAR we will be able to get a more continuous and complete data set that would not be possible with instruments that use visible light.”

Sea Ice Dynamics Near Both Poles

NISAR will also capture the movement and extent of sea ice in both hemispheres. Sea ice insulates the ocean from the air, reducing evaporation and heat loss to the atmosphere. It also reflects sunlight, keeping the planet cool through the albedo effect.

Arctic sea ice has been diminishing for decades as rising water and air temperatures have increased melting. With more of its surface exposed to sunlight, the Arctic Ocean gains and holds more heat in summer and takes longer to cool. This means less ice formation in winter and faster melting the next summer, said Ben Holt, a JPL sea-ice scientist.

With greater coverage of the Southern Ocean than any radar mission to date, NISAR will open new insights around Antarctica, where sea ice had mostly been more stable until the past few years. It reached a record low in 2023.

More About the Mission

NISAR is an equal collaboration between NASA and ISRO and marks the first time the two agencies have cooperated on hardware development for an Earth-observing mission. NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is managed for the agency by Caltech in Pasadena, California, leads the U.S. component of the project and is providing the mission’s L-band SAR. NASA is also providing the radar reflector antenna, the deployable boom, a high-rate communication subsystem for science data, GPS receivers, a solid-state recorder, and payload data subsystem. U R Rao Satellite Centre (URSC) in Bengaluru, which leads the ISRO component of the mission, is providing the spacecraft bus, the launch vehicle, and associated launch services and satellite mission operations. ISRO’s Space Applications Centre in Ahmedabad is providing the S-band SAR electronics.

To learn more about NISAR, visit:

https://nisar.jpl.nasa.gov/

News Media Contacts

Andrew Wang / Jane J. Lee
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.
626-379-6874 / 818-354-0307
andrew.wang@jpl.nasa.gov / jane.j.lee@jpl.nasa.gov

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Naomi Hartono

NASA’s Webb Discovers Dusty ‘Cat’s Tail’ in Beta Pictoris System

NASA’s Webb Discovers Dusty ‘Cat’s Tail’ in Beta Pictoris System

6 Min Read

NASA’s Webb Discovers Dusty ‘Cat’s Tail’ in Beta Pictoris System

Star system Beta Pictoris. A thin, elongated horizontal orange line appears at the center of the frame, extending almost to the edges. This is a debris disk seen edge-on. A thin blue-green disk is inclined about five degrees counterclockwise relative to the orange main disk. Cloudy, translucent gray material is most prominent near the orange main debris disk. Some of the gray material forms a curved feature in the upper right, resembling a cat’s tail. The central star, represented as a small white star icon, is blocked by an instrument known as a coronagraph, which forms a large black circle at center and two small disks pointing to the upper left and lower right. The background of space is black.

This image from Webb’s MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) shows the star system Beta Pictoris.

Credits:
NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, C. Stark and K. Lawson (NASA GSFC), J. Kammerer (ESO), and M. Perrin (STScI).

Beta Pictoris, a young planetary system located just 63 light-years away, continues to intrigue scientists even after decades of in-depth study. It possesses the first dust disk imaged around another star — a disk of debris produced by collisions between asteroids, comets, and planetesimals. Observations from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope revealed a second debris disk in this system, inclined with respect to the outer disk, which was seen first. Now, a team of astronomers using NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope to image the Beta Pictoris system (Beta Pic) has discovered a new, previously unseen structure.

The team, led by Isabel Rebollido of the Astrobiology Center in Spain, used Webb’s NIRCam (Near-Infrared Camera) and MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) to investigate the composition of Beta Pic’s previously detected main and secondary debris disks. The results exceeded their expectations, revealing a sharply inclined branch of dust, shaped like a cat’s tail, that extends from the southwest portion of the secondary debris disk.

Image: Star System Beta Pictoris

Star system Beta Pictoris. A thin, elongated horizontal orange line appears at the center of the frame, extending almost to the edges. This is a debris disk seen edge-on. A thin blue-green disk is inclined about five degrees counterclockwise relative to the orange main disk. Cloudy, translucent gray material is most prominent near the orange main debris disk. Some of the gray material forms a curved feature in the upper right, resembling a cat’s tail. The central star, represented as a small white star icon, is blocked by an instrument known as a coronagraph, which forms a large black circle at center and two small disks pointing to the upper left and lower right. The background of space is black.
This image from Webb’s MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) shows the star system Beta Pictoris. An edge-on disk of dusty debris generated by collisions between planetesimals (orange) dominates the view. A hotter, secondary disk (cyan) is inclined by about 5 degrees relative to the primary disk. The curved feature at upper right, which the science team nicknamed the “cat’s tail,” has never been seen before. A coronagraph (black circle and two small disks) has been used to block the light of the central star, whose location is marked with a white star shape. In this image light at 15.5 microns is colored cyan and 23 microns is orange (filters F1550C and F2300C, respectively).
NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, C. Stark and K. Lawson (NASA GSFC), J. Kammerer (ESO), and M. Perrin (STScI).

“Beta Pictoris is the debris disk that has it all: It has a really bright, close star that we can study very well, and a complex cirumstellar environment with a multi-component disk, exocomets, and two imaged exoplanets,” said Rebollido, lead author of the study. “While there have been previous observations from the ground in this wavelength range, they did not have the sensitivity and the spatial resolution that we now have with Webb, so they didn’t detect this feature.”

A Star’s Portrait Improved with Webb

Even with Webb or JWST, peering at Beta Pic in the right wavelength range — in this case, the mid-infrared — was crucial to detect the cat’s tail, as it only appeared in the MIRI data. Webb’s mid-infrared data also revealed differences in temperature between Beta Pic’s two disks, which likely is due to differences in composition.

“We didn’t expect Webb to reveal that there are two different types of material around Beta Pic, but MIRI clearly showed us that the material of the secondary disk and cat’s tail is hotter than the main disk,” said Christopher Stark, a co-author of the study at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. “The dust that forms that disk and tail must be very dark, so we don’t easily see it at visible wavelengths — but in the mid-infrared, it’s glowing.”

To explain the hotter temperature, the team deduced that the dust may be highly porous “organic refractory material,” similar to the matter found on the surfaces of comets and asteroids in our solar system. For example, a preliminary analysis of material sampled from asteroid Bennu by NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission found it to be very dark and carbon-rich, much like what MIRI detected at Beta Pic.

Image: Annotated Image

Star system Beta Pictoris with labels and graphic overlays. A thin, elongated horizontal orange line appears at the center of the frame, extending almost to the edges. This is a debris disk seen edge-on. A white line traces over the orange debris disk and is labeled “main disk plane.” A thin blue-green disk is inclined about five degrees counterclockwise relative to the orange main disk and is highlighted by a blue-green line labeled “extended secondary disk.” Cloudy, translucent gray material is most prominent near the orange main debris disk. Some of the gray material forms a curved feature in the upper right and is marked with a yellow line labeled “cat’s tail.” The central star, represented as a small white star icon, is blocked by an instrument known as a coronagraph, which forms a large black circle at center and two small disks pointing to the upper left and lower right. The background of space is black. In the lower right corner is a white bar labeled “100 A U.”
This image from Webb’s MIRI (Mid-Infrared Instrument) shows the star system Beta Pictoris. An edge-on disk of dusty debris generated by collisions between planetesimals (orange) dominates the view and is labeled “main disk plane.” While a secondary disk (cyan), inclined 5 degrees relative to the main disk, was already known, Webb showed its true extent at lower left. Webb also detected a never-before-seen feature labeled the cat’s tail. A coronagraph (black circle and two small disks) has been used to block the light of the central star. A scale bar shows that the disks of Beta Pic extend for hundreds of astronomical units (AU), where one AU is the average Earth-Sun distance. (In our solar system, Neptune orbits 30 AU from the sun.) In this image light at 15.5 microns is colored cyan and 23 microns is orange (filters F1550C and F2300C, respectively).
NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, C. Stark and K. Lawson (NASA GSFC), J. Kammerer (ESO), and M. Perrin (STScI).

The Tail’s Puzzling Beginning Warrants Future Research

However, a major lingering question remains: What could explain the shape of the cat’s tail, a uniquely curved feature unlike what is seen in disks around other stars?

Rebollido and the team modeled various scenarios in an attempt to emulate the cat’s tail and unravel its origins. Though further research and testing is required, the team presents a strong hypothesis that the cat’s tail is the result of a dust production event that occurred a mere one hundred years ago.

“Something happens — like a collision — and a lot of dust is produced,” shared Marshall Perrin, a co-author of the study at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore, Maryland. “At first, the dust goes in the same orbital direction as its source, but then it also starts to spread out. The light from the star pushes the smallest, fluffiest dust particles away from the star faster, while the bigger grains do not move as much, creating a long tendril of dust.”

“The cat’s tail feature is highly unusual, and reproducing the curvature with a dynamical model was difficult,” explained Stark. “Our model requires dust that can be pushed out of the system extremely rapidly, which again suggests it’s made of organic refractory material.”

Animation: Cat’s Tail Creation

This is an animation portraying the creation of the cat’s tail, as hypothesized by a team of astronomers. The cat’s tail may be the result of a dust production event — like a collision — that occurred a mere one hundred years ago. This tendril of dust, which is seen in the southwest portion of Beta Pic’s secondary debris disk, is estimated to span 10 billion miles.
Credit: NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI, R. Crawford (STScI), C. Stark (NASA-GSFC), M. Perrin (STScI), and I. Rebollido (Astrobiology Center).

The team’s preferred model explains the sharp angle of the tail away from the disk as a simple optical illusion. Our perspective combined with the curved shape of the tail creates the observed angle of the tail, while in fact, the arc of material is only departing from the disk at a five-degree incline. Taking into consideration the tail’s brightness, the team estimates the amount of dust within the cat’s tail to be equivalent to a large main belt asteroid spread out across 10 billion miles.

A recent dust production event within Beta Pic’s debris disks could also explain a newly-seen asymmetric extension of the inclined inner disk, as shown in the MIRI data and seen only on the side opposite of the tail. Recent collisional dust production could also account for a feature previously spotted by the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array in 2014: a clump of carbon monoxide (CO) located near the cat’s tail. Since the star’s radiation should break down CO within roughly one hundred years, this still-present concentration of gas could be lingering evidence of the same event.

“Our research suggests that Beta Pic may be even more active and chaotic than we had previously thought,” said Stark. “JWST continues to surprise us, even when looking at the most well-studied objects. We have a completely new window into these planetary systems.”

These results were presented in a press conference at the 243rd meeting of the American Astronomical Society in New Orleans, Louisiana.

The observations were taken as part of Guaranteed Time Observation program 1411.

The James Webb Space Telescope is the world’s premier space science observatory. Webb is solving mysteries in our solar system, looking beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probing the mysterious structures and origins of our universe and our place in it. Webb is an international program led by NASA with its partners, ESA (European Space Agency) and the Canadian Space Agency

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Media Contacts

Laura Betzlaura.e.betz@nasa.gov, Rob Gutrorob.gutro@nasa.gov
NASA’s  Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Md.

Abigail Major amajor@stsci.edu, Christine Pulliamcpulliam@stsci.edu
Space Telescope Science Institute, Baltimore, Md.

Related Information

About protoplanetary disks

LIfe and Death of a Planetary System

More Webb News – https://science.nasa.gov/mission/webb/latestnews/

More Webb Images – https://science.nasa.gov/mission/webb/multimedia/images/

Webb Mission Page – https://science.nasa.gov/mission/webb/

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Steve Sabia