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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B91cd3DOHL4

Main idea:

Space exploration has a positive effect and it would be very useful. Spreading out into space will have an even greater effect. It will completely change the future of the human race and maybe determine whether we have any future at all.

Arguments/facts:

It would unite us to face a common challenge.

Going into space won’t be cheap, but it would take only a small proportion of world resources.

Robotic missions are much cheaper and may provide more scientific information but they don’t catch the public imagination in the same way, and they don’t spread the human race into space, which I am arguing should be our long-term strategy.

Dialogue:

This video was made by a very important scientist and physicist called Stephen Hawkings. This scientist, although has paralysis, is able to share his knowledge with us. It is a curious video, because it explains a lot about space exploration and what it can lead to. It explains why it matters and also many key pieces of information about how it works.

Summary:

In the same way that President Kennedy's Moon aim did in the 1960s, a goal of a base on the Moon by 2020 and a manned landing on Mars by 2025 would re-ignite the space program and give it a sense of purpose. A surge in interest in space would help improve science's reputation in general. There are major repercussions from the poor regard that people have for science and scientists. Even as science and technology increasingly rule our culture, fewer and fewer young people are choosing to pursue careers in the field. My daughter Lucy and I have written a children's book as a little step toward fixing this.

APA:

(2016 July 14) Why exploring space matters,Hawking Stephen,TEDxLondon

Retrieved from: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B91cd3DOHL4

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Why exploring space matters | Stephen Hawking | TEDxLondon

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Main idea:

Humans have long been attracted by space exploration and space science. We have come a long way in the last few decades in understanding the universe and our place in it.

Arguments/facts:

From the first manned mission to the moon in 1969 to the ongoing efforts to send humans to Mars, space travel and exploration have opened up new frontiers and possibilities for humanity.

Our many launches into space have created debris, including abandoned rocket stages, old satellites, and other discarded equipment.

This debris poses a significant risk to future space exploration, as it can collide with, and damage, functioning satellites or even endanger astronauts on space missions.

Dialogue:

I believe that this piece of information is quite relevant to our project because of the important and key arguments it contains. It is important for this project to let people know how space exploration works and the consequences it has. It is an interesting article and it gives information about how space exploration has evolved, how humans have been attracted to space and also it talks about how it revolutionised humanity.

Summary:

Space exploration and the study of outer space have fascinated humans for centuries. From the first manned mission to the moon in 1969 to the ongoing efforts to send humans to Mars, space travel and exploration have opened up new frontiers and possibilities for humanity.These satellites serve a wide range of purposes that have revolutionised the way we live, including communication, weather forecasting, surveillance, and environmental monitoring. Our many launches into space have created debris, including abandoned rocket stages, old satellites, and other discarded equipment.

APA:

Mathieu Edouard and Roser Max (n.d) Our World in Data, Space exploration and satellites

Retrieved from:

https://ourworldindata.org/space-exploration-satellites

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Space exploration and the study of outer space have fascinated humans for centuries. In recent decades, we have made significant advancements in our understanding of the universe and our place within it. From the first manned mission to the moon in 1969 to the ongoing efforts to send humans to Mars, space travel and exploration have opened up new frontiers and possibilities for humanity.

In addition to manned missions, we have also sent satellites into orbit around the Earth. These satellites serve a wide range of purposes that have revolutionized the way we live, including communication, weather forecasting, surveillance, and environmental monitoring.

But, as our presence in space has increased, so has the issue of pollution. Our many launches into space have created debris, including abandoned rocket stages, old satellites, and other discarded equipment. This debris poses a significant risk to future space exploration, as it can collide with, and damage, functioning satellites or even endanger astronauts on space missions. This is an ongoing challenge that will require continued research and innovation to solve.

On this page, you can find data and visualizations on space exploration and travel, satellites, and space pollution.

Interactive charts on Space Exploration and Satellites

Cite this work

Our articles and data visualizations rely on work from many different people and organizations. When citing this topic page, please also cite the underlying data sources. This topic page can be cited as:

Edouard Mathieu and Max Roser (2022) - "Space Exploration and Satellites". Published online at OurWorldInData.org. Retrieved from: 'https://ourworldindata.org/space-exploration-satellites' [Online Resource]

BibTeX citation

@article{owidspaceexplorationsatellites, author = {Edouard Mathieu and Max Roser}, title = {Space Exploration and Satellites}, journal = {Our World in Data}, year = {2022}, note = {https://ourworldindata.org/space-exploration-satellites} }

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Space exploration and the study of outer space have fascinated humans for centuries. In recent decades, we have made significant advancements in our understanding of the universe and our place within it. From the first manned mission to the moon in 1969 to the ongoing efforts to send humans to Mars, space travel and exploration have opened up new frontiers and possibilities for humanity.

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Main idea:
Airbus has been exploring space for decades now to learn more about the universe.

Arguments/facts:
-Airbus has been in several missions
-NASA wants to land astronauts on the moon, and they have asked Airbus to build a "mission-critical element"
-Airbus continues on exploring space, and being envolved in several different projects

Dialogue:

If Airbus is so famous, then why does nobody talk about them?
There isn't that much talk about NASA on the news, since I didn't really know that they wanted to send people back to the moon.

Summary:

Airbus has been helping bigger companies in many different mission, such as the first European Mars exploration. They have apparently become so famoous that NASA has for the first time asked for a NON-Us company to help them in their exploration.
Right now Airbus is halping in many different projects for the future, such as developing and building ESA's JUICE.

APA:
(n.a.), 2023, AIRBUS, Space Exploration. Retrieved on 2023, January 30 from:
https://www.airbus.com/en/products-services/space/exploration

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For decades, Airbus Defence and Space has been at the very heart of space exploration, developing the technology that allows mankind to send spacecraft to planets, moons and comets both close to the sun and millions of kilometres away - allowing us to learn more about the universe we live in and helping to make it truly our home.

Missions that began in our clean rooms

Airbus clean rooms served as a starting point for several missions, including: Mars Express, the first European Mars exploration mission - for which Airbus Defence and Space designed and built the satellite; and Gaia, designed and built by Airbus for the European Space Agency (ESA) to conduct a census of a billion stars and other astronomical phenomena in our galaxy to help scientists understand stellar evolution and star formation, providing insights into the Milky Way origin.

Defence and Space engineers also designed and built the spacecraft and instruments for LISA Pathfinder, the technology demonstrator mission aiming to prove key elements of Einstein's theory of general relativity. BepiColombo is Europe's first mission to Mercury, for which Airbus is responsible for the systems design and building three of the four elements: the Mercury Planetary Orbiter, Mercury Transfer Module and Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter Sunshield and Interface Structure.

Under its Artemis programme, NASA is planning to once again land astronauts on the . And for the first time ever, NASA has entrusted a non-US company to build a mission-critical element for an American Human Spaceflight Mission: When the new Orion spacecraft sets course for the Earth's satellite, it relies on Airbus technology for essential functions - from the supply of air and water to the propulsion, power and thermal control - all provided by the Orion European Service Module (ESM), developed by Airbus under an ESA contract.

Future missions under development

Airbus continues active work on several space exploration projects, such as: developing and building ESA's JUICE (JUpiter ICy moons Explorer) spacecraft; leading the teams designing and building the Solar Orbiter that will research how the Sun creates the heliosphere. For the ExoMars mission - a joint project by the European and Russian space agencies (ESA and Roscosmos) to examine the geological environment and search for life on Mars - Airbus Defence and Space is developing the rover (a robotic vehicle).

To support highly precise mission preparations, Airbus developed image simulation software SurRender for all development phases - from preliminary sizing and feasibility studies to validation and testing. The software is especially useful for the development and testing of vision-based navigation techniques.

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For decades, Airbus Defence and Space has been at the very heart of space exploration, developing the technology that allows mankind to send spacecraft to planets, moons and comets both close to the sun and millions of kilometres away - allowing us to learn more about the universe we live in and helping to make it truly our home.

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Main idea:
In this article there is mainly discussed the history of space exploration, how it advanced and what is space exploration, which is what we will be focusing on. This article introduces us a little about what space exploration is.
Space exploration, is the investigation of space, focusing on the universe beyond Earth.

Arguments:

- Space exploration has advanced a lot since it started and we have mastered and learned many things. But the Universe is still full of mysteries.

- Why explore space?
- To extend knowledge about Earth, the solar system, and the universe beyond. Artificial satellites have given us so much new information about Earth.
- Communications satellites multiply international communications channels and make possible the intercontinental transmission of television.

-History
- Space exploration began on October 4, 1957, when the Soviet Union launched the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, into orbit around Earth.
- April 12, 1961, Soviet cosmonaut Yury Gagarin became the first human to travel in space.
- July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong became the first person to set foot on the Moon.

Dialogue:
I feel like this article is really interesting, especially how rockets are launched since I did not it know before.

"Most of the rockets used in space exploration are multistage, or step, rockets, in which one rocket is placed atop another. Successive stages are discarded as they exhaust their propellants. This process increases the efficiency of the vehicle because, as each empty stage falls away, the mass that must be accelerated by the remaining stages is reduced."

Summary:
Space exploration is basically the exploration of space, space exploration gave us many knowledge which we could not have learned if it weren't for it. It is a really interesting topic.

APA:
Space exploration. (n.d.). Britannica Kids. https://kids.britannica.com/students/article/space-exploration/277156

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Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.

Motivations for space activity
Although the possibility of exploring space has long excited people in many walks of life, for most of the latter 20th century and into the early 21st century, only national governments could afford the very high costs of launching people and machines into space. This reality meant that space exploration had to serve very broad interests, and it indeed has done so in a variety of ways. Government space programs have increased knowledge, served as indicators of national prestige and power, enhanced national security and military strength, and provided significant benefits to the general public. In areas where the private sector could profit from activities in space, most notably the use of satellites as telecommunication relays, commercial space activity has flourished without government funding. In the early 21st century, entrepreneurs believed that there were several other areas of commercial potential in space, most notably privately funded space travel.

In the years after World War II, governments assumed a leading role in the support of research that increased fundamental knowledge about nature, a role that earlier had been played by universities, private foundations, and other nongovernmental supporters. This change came for two reasons. First, the need for complex equipment to carry out many scientific experiments and for the large teams of researchers to use that equipment led to costs that only governments could afford. Second, governments were willing to take on this responsibility because of the belief that fundamental research would produce new knowledge essential to the health, the security, and the quality of life of their citizens. Thus, when scientists sought government support for early space experiments, it was forthcoming. Since the start of space efforts in the United States, the Soviet Union, and Europe, national governments have given high priority to the support of science done in and from space. From modest beginnings, space science has expanded under government support to include multibillion-dollar exploratory missions in the solar system. Examples of such efforts include the development of the Curiosity Mars rover, the Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn and its moons, and the development of major space-based astronomical observatories such as the Hubble Space Telescope.

Even before the first satellite was launched, U.S. leaders recognized that the ability to observe military activities around the world from space would be an asset to national security. Following on the success of its photoreconnaissance satellites, which began operation in 1960, the United States built increasingly complex observation and electronic-intercept intelligence satellites. The Soviet Union also quickly developed an array of intelligence satellites, and later a few other countries instituted their own satellite observation programs. Intelligence-gathering satellites have been used to verify arms-control agreements, provide warnings of military threats, and identify targets during military operations, among other uses.

In addition to providing security benefits, satellites offered military forces the potential for improved communications, weather observation, navigation, timing, and position location. This led to significant government funding for military space programs in the United States and the Soviet Union. Although the advantages and disadvantages of stationing force-delivery weapons in space have been debated, as of the early 21st century, such weapons had not been deployed, nor had space-based antisatellite systems-that is, systems that can attack or interfere with orbiting satellites. The stationing of weapons of mass destruction in orbit or on celestial bodies is prohibited by international law.

Governments realized early on that the ability to observe Earth from space could provide significant benefits to the general public apart from security and military uses. The first application to be pursued was the development of satellites for assisting in weather forecasting. A second application involved remote observation of land and sea surfaces to gather imagery and other data of value in crop forecasting, resource management, environmental monitoring, and other applications. The U.S., the Soviet Union, Europe, and China also developed their own satellite-based global positioning systems, originally for military purposes, that could pinpoint a user's exact location, help in navigating from one point to another, and provide very precise time signals. These satellites quickly found numerous civilian uses in such areas as personal navigation, surveying and cartography, geology, air-traffic control, and the operation of information-transfer networks. They illustrate a reality that has remained constant for a half century-as space capabilities are developed, they often can be used for both military and civilian purposes.

Most space activities have been pursued because they serve some utilitarian purpose, whether increasing knowledge, adding to national power, or making a profit. Nevertheless, there remains a powerful underlying sense that it is important for humans to explore space for its own sake, "to see what is there." Although the only voyages that humans have made away from the near vicinity of Earth-the Apollo flights to the Moon-were motivated by Cold War competition, there have been recurrent calls for humans to return to the Moon, travel to Mars, and visit other locations in the solar system and beyond. Until humans resume such journeys of exploration, robotic spacecraft will continue to serve in their stead to explore the solar system and probe the mysteries of the universe.

Major milestones
The first artificial Earth satellite, Sputnik 1, was launched by the Soviet Union on October 4, 1957. The first human to go into space, Yuri Gagarin, was launched, again by the Soviet Union, for a one-orbit journey around Earth on April 12, 1961. Within 10 years of that first human flight, American astronauts walked on the surface of the Moon. Apollo 11 crew members Neil Armstrong and Edwin ("Buzz") Aldrin made the first lunar landing on July 20, 1969. A total of 12 Americans on six separate Apollo missions set foot on the Moon between July 1969 and December 1972. Since then, no humans have left Earth orbit, but more than 500 men and women have spent as many as 438 consecutive days in space. Starting in the early 1970s, a series of Soviet (Russian from December 1991) space stations, the U.S. Skylab station, and numerous space shuttle flights provided Earth-orbiting bases for varying periods of human occupancy and activity. From November 2, 2000, when its first crew took up residence, to its completion in 2011, the International Space Station (ISS) served as a base for humans living and working in space on a permanent basis. It will continue to be used in this way until at least 2024.

Since 1957 Earth-orbiting satellites and robotic spacecraft journeying away from Earth have gathered valuable data about the Sun, Earth, other bodies in the solar system, and the universe beyond. Robotic spacecraft have landed on the Moon, Venus, Mars, Titan, a comet, and four asteroids, have visited all the major planets, and have flown by Kuiper belt objects and by the nuclei of comets, including Halley's Comet, traveling in the inner solar system. Scientists have used space-derived data to deepen human understanding of the origin and evolution of galaxies, stars, planets, and other cosmological phenomena.

Orbiting satellites also have provided, and continue to provide, important services to the everyday life of many people on Earth. Meteorologic satellites deliver information on short- and long-term weather patterns and their underlying causes. Other Earth-observation satellites remotely sense land and ocean areas, gathering data that improve management of Earth's resources and that help in understanding global climate change. Telecommunications satellites allow essentially instantaneous transfer of voice, images, and data on a global basis. Satellites operated by the United States, Russia, China, Japan, India, and Europe give precision navigation, positioning, and timing information that has become essential to many terrestrial users. Earth-observation satellites have also become extremely useful to the military authorities of several countries as complements to their land, sea, and air forces and have provided important security-related information to national leaders.

As the many benefits of space activity have become evident, other countries have joined the Soviet Union and the United States in developing their own space programs. They include a number of western European countries operating both individually and, after 1975, cooperatively through the European Space Agency, as well as China, Japan, Canada, India, Israel, Iran, North Korea, South Korea, and Brazil. By the second decade of the 21st century, more than 50 countries had space agencies or other government bodies carrying out space activities.

Prelude to spaceflight
Precursors in fiction and fact
Since ancient times, people around the world have studied the heavens and used their observations and explanations of astronomical phenomena for both religious and practical purposes. Some dreamed of leaving Earth to explore other worlds. For example, the French satirist Cyrano de Bergerac in the 17th century wrote Histoire comique des états et empires de la lune (1656) and Histoire comique des états et empires du soleil (1662; together in English as A Voyage to the Moon: With Some Account of the Solar World, 1754), describing fictional journeys to the Moon and the Sun. Two centuries later the French author Jules Verne and the English novelist and historian H.G. Wells infused their stories with descriptions of outer space and of spaceflight that were consistent with the best understanding of the time. Verne's De la Terre à la Lune (1865; From the Earth to the Moon) and Wells's The War of the Worlds (1898) and The First Men in the Moon (1901) used sound scientific principles to describe space travel and encounters with alien beings.

In order to translate these fictional images of space travel into reality, it was necessary to devise some practical means of countering the influence of Earth's gravity. By the beginning of the 20th century, the centuries-old technology of rockets had advanced to the point at which it was reasonable to consider their use to accelerate objects to a velocity sufficient to enter orbit around Earth and even to escape Earth's gravity and travel away from the planet.

Tsiolkovsky

Goddard
In the United States, Robert Hutchings Goddard became interested in space exploration after reading works such as The War of the Worlds. Even as a young man, he dedicated himself to working on spaceflight. In his 1904 high-school graduation speech, he stated that "it is difficult to say what is impossible, for the dream of yesterday is the hope of today and the reality of tomorrow." Goddard received his first two patents for rocket technology in 1914, and, with funding from the Smithsonian Institution, he published a theoretical treatise, A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitudes, in 1919. Goddard's claim that rockets could be used to send objects as far as the Moon was widely ridiculed in the public press, including The New York Times (which published a retraction on July 17, 1969, the day after the launch of the first crewed mission to the Moon). Thereafter, the already shy Goddard conducted much of his work in secret, preferring to patent rather than publish his results. This approach limited his influence on the development of American rocketry, although early rocket developers in Germany took notice of his work.

In the 1920s, as a professor of physics at Clark University in Worcester, Massachusetts, Goddard began to experiment with liquid-fueled rockets. His first rocket, launched in Auburn, Massachusetts, on March 16, 1926, rose 12.5 metres (41 feet) and traveled 56 metres (184 feet) from its launching place. The noisy character of his experiments made it difficult for Goddard to continue work in Massachusetts. With support from aviator Charles A. Lindbergh and financial assistance from the philanthropic Daniel Guggenheim Fund for the Promotion of Aeronautics, he moved to Roswell, New Mexico, where from 1930 to 1941 he built engines and launched rockets of increasing complexity.

Oberth
The third widely recognized pioneer of rocketry, Hermann Oberth, was by birth a Romanian but by nationality a German. Reading Verne's From the Earth to the Moon as a youth inspired him to study the requirements for interplanetary travel. Oberth's 1922 doctoral dissertation on rocket-powered flight was rejected by the University of Heidelberg for being too speculative, but it became the basis for his classic 1923 book Die Rakete zu den Planetenräumen ("The Rocket into Interplanetary Space"). The work explained the mathematical theory of rocketry, applied the theory to rocket design, and discussed the possibility of constructing space stations and of traveling to other planets.

In 1929 Oberth published a second influential book, Wege zur Raumschiffahrt ( Ways to Spaceflight). His works led to the creation of a number of rocket clubs in Germany as enthusiasts tried to turn Oberth's ideas into practical devices. The most important of these groups historically was the Verein für Raumschiffahrt (VfR; "Society for Spaceship Travel"), which had as a member the young Wernher von Braun. Although Oberth's work was crucial in stimulating the development of rocketry in Germany, he himself had only a limited role in that development. Alone among the rocket pioneers, Oberth lived to see his ideas become reality: he was Braun's guest at the July 16, 1969, launch of Apollo 11.

Other space pioneers
Although Tsiolkovsky, Goddard, and Oberth are recognized as the most influential of the first-generation space pioneers, others made contributions in the early decades of the 20th century. For example, the Frenchman Robert Esnault-Pelterie began work on the theoretical aspects of spaceflight as early as 1907 and subsequently published several major books on the topic. He, like Tsiolkovsky in the Soviet Union and Oberth in Germany, was an effective publicist regarding the potential of space exploration. In Austria, Eugen Sänger worked on rocket engines and in the late 1920s proposed developing a "rocket plane" that could reach a speed exceeding 10,000 km (more than 6,000 miles) per hour and an altitude of more than 65 km (40 miles). Interested in Sänger's work, Nazi Germany in 1936 invited him to continue his investigations in that country.

Early rocket development
Germany

United States

Soviet Union
In the U.S.S.R. the government took an interest in rockets as early as 1921 with the founding of a military facility devoted to rocket research. Over the next decade that centre was expanded and renamed the Gas Dynamics Laboratory. There in the early 1930s, Valentin Glushko carried out pioneering work on rocket engines. Meanwhile, other rocket enthusiasts in the Soviet Union organized into societies that by 1931 had consolidated into an organization known as GIRD (the abbreviation in Russian for "Group for the Study of Reactive Motion"), with branches in Moscow and Leningrad. Emerging as leaders of the Moscow branch were the aeronautical engineer Sergei Korolev, who had become interested in spaceflight at a young age, and the early space visionary Fridrikh Tsander. Korolyov and a colleague, Mikhail Tikhonravov, on August 17, 1933, launched the first Soviet liquid-fueled rocket. Later that year the Moscow and Leningrad branches of GIRD were combined with the Gas Dynamics Laboratory to form the military-controlled Rocket Propulsion Research Institute (RNII), which five years later became Scientific-Research Institute 3 (NII-3). In its early years the organization did not work directly on space technology, but ultimately it played a central role in Soviet rocket development.

Korolyov was arrested in 1937 as part of the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin's great purges of intellectuals and was sent to a Siberian prison. After Stalin recognized the imprudence of removing the best technical people from the Soviet war effort, Korolyov was transferred to a prison-based design bureau, where he spent most of World War II working on weapons, although not on large rockets. By the end of the war, Stalin had become interested in ballistic missiles, and he sent a team, which included Korolyov, on visits to Germany to investigate the V-2 program. A number of German engineers were relocated to the Soviet Union in the aftermath of the war, but they did not play a central role in postwar Soviet rocket development; most returned to Germany in the early 1950s.

Preparing for spaceflight
Between 1946 and 1951, the U.S. Army conducted test firings of captured German V-2 rockets at White Sands, New Mexico. These sounding-rocket flights reached high altitudes (120-200 km [75-125 miles]) before falling back to Earth. Although the primary purpose of the tests was to advance rocket technology, the army invited American scientists interested in high-altitude research to put experiments aboard the V-2s. An Upper Atmosphere Research Panel, chaired by the physicist James Van Allen, was formed to coordinate the scientific use of these rocket launchings. The panel had a central role in the early years of American space science, which focused on experiments on solar and stellar ultraviolet radiation, the aurora, and the nature of the upper atmosphere. As the supply of V-2s dwindled, other U.S.-built sounding rockets such as the WAC Corporal, Aerobee, and Viking were put into use. In other countries, particularly the Soviet Union, rocket-based upper-atmosphere research also took place after World War II.

In the early 1950s scientists began planning a coordinated international investigation of Earth, to be called the International Geophysical Year (IGY), that would be held in 1957-58 under the auspices of the International Council of Scientific Unions. By this time, progress in rocket development had advanced such that orbiting of an artificial Earth satellite by 1957 seemed feasible. At the urging of American scientists, IGY planners in 1954 called for scientifically instrumented satellites to be launched as part of IGY activities. Soon thereafter, the governments of the Soviet Union and the United States each announced plans to do so.

In the years following World War II, the United States and the U.S.S.R. became political and military competitors in what soon was being called the Cold War. Because the Soviet Union was a closed society, U.S. leaders gave high priority to developing technology that could help gather intelligence on military preparations within the Soviet borders. As orbiting satellites neared realization, the idea of equipping such satellites with cameras and flying them over Soviet territory became more attractive to U.S. planners, and the U.S. Air Force began work on a reconnaissance satellite project. Still unresolved, however, was the question of whether it would violate national sovereignty to fly over a country's territory in orbit, above most of the atmosphere. One reason the U.S. government had committed itself to the IGY satellite program was that it wanted to establish the principle that outer space was not subject to claims of territorial sovereignty and thus that an orbiting satellite could pass freely over any point on Earth. Such overflights were essential if reconnaissance satellites were to have intelligence value.

As scientific and military planners contemplated initial space projects and engineers worked on developing the needed launch vehicles, the idea that humans would soon begin the exploration of space entered popular imagination. In Europe since the 1930s, the British Interplanetary Society had been actively promoting the idea that human space travel was soon to happen. American movies such as The Day the Earth Stood Still (1951), Destination Moon (1950), and When Worlds Collide (1951) contained vivid images of such journeys. Reports were widespread of sightings of unidentified flying objects (UFOs), which were thought by some to be spacecraft from alien worlds.

Authors such as Isaac Asimov, Robert A. Heinlein, and Arthur C. Clarke both discussed the reality of space technology in popular writings and constructed believable science-fiction stories based on its use. A central figure in popularization efforts within the United States was Wernher von Braun. A charismatic spokesman for the idea of space travel, Braun, in a series of talks, books, magazine articles, and television appearances during the 1950s, reached millions of people with his ideas for establishing orbiting space stations and human travel to the Moon and Mars. The efforts of Braun and other popularizers helped create a receptive climate for initial government proposals to undertake space activities and, particularly, to put humans in space.

From Sputnik to Apollo
The first satellites
Although Soviet plans to orbit a satellite during the IGY had been discussed extensively in technical circles, the October 4, 1957, launch of Sputnik 1 came as a surprise, and even a shock, to most people. Prior to the launch, skepticism had been widespread about the U.S.S.R.'s technical capabilities to develop both a sophisticated scientific satellite and a rocket powerful enough to put it into orbit. Under Korolyov's direction, however, the Soviet Union had been building an intercontinental ballistic missile ( ICBM), with engines designed by Glushko, that was capable of delivering a heavy nuclear warhead to American targets. That ICBM, called the R-7 or Semyorka ("Number 7"), was first successfully tested on August 21, 1957, which cleared the way for its use to launch a satellite. Fearing that development of the elaborate scientific satellite intended as the Soviet IGY contribution would keep the U.S.S.R. from being the first into space, Korolyov and his associates, particularly Tikhonravov, designed a much simpler 83.6-kg (184.3-pound) sphere carrying only two radio transmitters and four antennas. After the success of the R-7 in August, that satellite was rushed into production and became Sputnik 1. A second, larger satellite carrying scientific instruments and the dog Laika, the first living creature in orbit, was launched November 3. The even larger, instrumented spacecraft originally intended to be the first Soviet satellite went into orbit in May 1958 as Sputnik 3. (For additional information on Korolyov's contribution to the Soviet space program, see Energia.)

After President Eisenhower, in May 1955, had committed the United States to an IGY satellite, the army, navy, and air force competed for the assignment. (No civilian organization existed that was capable of developing the launch vehicle needed.) The mission was assigned to the Naval Research Laboratory rather than to the army's Redstone Arsenal, where Braun worked, so that the work would not interfere with Redstone's higher-priority development of ballistic missiles. The navy project, called Vanguard, would use a new launch vehicle based on modified Viking and Aerobee sounding rockets to orbit a small scientific satellite. Vanguard made slow progress over the subsequent two years, but, after Sputnik's success, the White House pressed to have the satellite launched as quickly as possible. On December 6, 1957, the Vanguard rocket rose only slightly off its launch pad before exploding and sending the satellite not into orbit but onto a Florida beach.

Braun and his army superiors had not agreed with the decision to assign the satellite mission to the navy. After the launches of the first two Sputniks, they secured permission to attempt their own satellite launch. In anticipation of such a situation, they had kept in touch with JPL and Van Allen and so were able to prepare a satellite quickly. On January 31, 1958, Braun's Jupiter-C launch vehicle, a modified Redstone ballistic missile, carried into orbit Explorer 1, the first U.S. satellite. Designed at JPL, Explorer 1 carried Van Allen's experiment to measure cosmic rays. The results from this experiment and similar ones aboard other U.S. and Soviet satellites launched that same year revealed that Earth is surrounded by two zones of radiation, now known as the Van Allen radiation belts, comprising energetic particles trapped by Earth's magnetic field.

Initial satellite launches were scientific in character, but U.S. government interest in reconnaissance satellites persisted. In February 1958, President Eisenhower authorized the development, under conditions of great secrecy, of such a spacecraft. The project, which came to be called Corona, would take pictures over the Soviet Union and return them to Earth by dropping the exposed film in a capsule that would be snatched out of the air as it parachuted back from space. After 12 failures, the first successful Corona mission took place on August 18, 1960; the returned film contained images of many previously unknown Soviet airfields and missile sites.

Development of space organizations
United States
Eisenhower also decided to create a separate organization to manage the secret reconnaissance satellite program. This effort resulted in the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO), jointly directed by the Department of Defense and the Central Intelligence Agency. The very existence of this organization was kept secret until 1992. The NRO operated the initial Corona program until 1972. It continued to manage the development of successor photointelligence satellite systems of increasing technological sophistication and also developed radar-surveillance and electronic-signals-collection satellites. All were operated under conditions of the highest secrecy.

After it received its mandate to send Americans to the Moon, NASA grew into a large organization. From its headquarters in Washington, D.C., it operated 10 field centres established throughout the United States to carry out research and technology development and to manage the various universities and industrial contractors involved in the U.S. civilian space program. At the peak of the Apollo program, NASA had 34,000 employees; by the second decade of the 21st century, this labour force had shrunk to just over 17,000, but NASA remained by far the largest space agency in the world.

The air force had no separate organization for space until 1982, when the U.S. Air Force Space Command was created to manage its military space operations, which involved the use of satellites for meteorology, communication, navigation, and early warning of missile attack. The other U.S. military services soon created similar organizations to administer their smaller space activities. In 1985 these organizations were brought under a unified U.S. Space Command, dominated by the air force, which was responsible for 85 percent of military space activities. Research and development efforts related to military space programs were managed by various government laboratories and carried out primarily by American industry.

Soviet Union
In contrast to the United States, the Soviet Union had no separate publicly acknowledged civilian space agency. For 35 years after Sputnik, various design bureaus-state-controlled organizations that actually conceived and developed aircraft and space systems-had great influence within the Soviet system. (For information on the history of specific Soviet aerospace design bureaus, see Energia, MiG, Sukhoy, and Tupolev.) Rivalry between those bureaus and their heads, who were known as chief designers, was a constant reality and posed an obstacle to a coherent Soviet space program. Space policy decisions were made by the Politburo of the Central Committee of the Communist Party as well as the Soviet government's Council of Ministers. After 1965 the government's Ministry of General Machine Building was assigned responsibility for managing all Soviet space and missile programs; the Ministry of Defense was also quite influential in shaping space efforts. A separate military branch, the Strategic Missile Forces, was in charge of space launchers and strategic missiles. Various institutes of the Soviet Academy of Sciences, particularly the Institute for Space Research (IKI), proposed and managed scientific missions.

Only after the dissolution of the U.S.S.R. did Russia create a civilian organization for space activities. Formed in February 1992, the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roskosmos) has acted as a central focus for the country's space policy and programs. Although it began as a small organization that dealt with international contacts and the setting of space policies, it quickly took on increasing responsibility for the management of nonmilitary space activities.

Europe
In 1961, within four years of the launch of the first U.S. and Soviet satellites, the government of France created the French Space Agency (CNES), which grew to become the largest national organization of its kind in Europe. Gradually other European countries formed government or government-sponsored organizations for space, among them the German Aerospace Center (DLR), the U.K. Space Agency, and the Italian Space Agency (ASI). Still others included space as part of their science or technology ministries.

In 1964 a European Space Research Organisation (ESRO), created at the initiative of European scientists to pool government resources in support of space science, began operations. Ten western European countries and Australia joined the organization. In the same year, a parallel European Launcher Development Organisation (ELDO), which had seven European member states, was established to develop a space launch vehicle for Europe. Whereas ESRO was successful in mounting a series of science missions, many in collaboration with NASA, ELDO failed in attempts to design and launch a European rocket. In 1975 a new European Space Agency (ESA) was formed from ESRO and ELDO to carry out both of their tasks. As of 2020, ESA had 22 member states-Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom. Canada also participated in some ESA projects. With a budget that made it the world's second largest civilian space agency, ESA carried out a comprehensive program in space science, applications, and infrastructure development. In particular, the Ariane series of expendable launch vehicles was developed under ESA auspices, with France taking the leading role. These launchers proved to be extremely reliable, and they gave Europe independent access to space and a leading position in the commercial space launch industry.

Japan
In Japan the University of Tokyo created an Institute of Space and Astronautical Science (ISAS) in 1964. This small group undertook the development of scientific spacecraft and the vehicles needed to launch them, and it launched Japan's first satellite, Ōsumi, in 1970. In 1981 oversight of ISAS was transferred to the Japanese Ministry of Education. In 1969 the Japanese government founded a National Space Development Agency (NASDA), which subsequently undertook a comprehensive program of space technology and satellite development and built a large launch vehicle, called the H-II, for those satellites. In 2001 both ISAS and NASDA came under the control of the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology. In 2003 ISAS, NASDA, and the National Aerospace Laboratory were merged into a new organization, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).

China
China's space program evolved largely in secret, under the joint control of the Chinese military and the Commission on Science, Technology, and Industry for the National Defense. After the communist takeover of 1949, Qian Xuesen, who had worked at GALCIT in the 1940s and helped found JPL, returned to China, where he became the guiding figure in the development of Chinese missiles and launch vehicles, both originally derived from a Soviet ICBM. China developed a family of Chang Zheng (" Long March") boosters, which are used domestically and serve as competitors in the international commercial space launch market. Its space development has concentrated on applications such as communications satellites and Earth-observation satellites for civilian and military use. In 1993 an independent Chinese Aerospace Corporation, later known as the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, was established to oversee most Chinese space-equipment manufacturers, and the China National Space Administration was established to manage national space activities.

China initiated its own human spaceflight program in 1992. The spacecraft, called Shenzhou, that it developed for the effort was modeled on Russia's time-tested Soyuz design ( see below the section Soyuz), but it relied heavily on Chinese-developed technologies and manufacturing. Following four years of uncrewed spacecraft tests, China launched its first indigenous astronaut, air force pilot Yang Liwei, into orbit on October 15, 2003. In so doing, it became the third country-after the former Soviet Union and the United States-to achieve human spaceflight. China has followed its initial human space flight with the step-by-step development of capabilities such as space walking and operating a space laboratory ( Tiangong) that are required for human operations in low Earth orbit.

International participation
At the initiative of the United States, an International Telecommunications Satellite Consortium ( Intelsat) was founded in 1964 to develop and operate a global system of communications satellites. By 1969 the organization had established a system of satellites with global coverage; in the late 1980s it provided services to more than 200 countries and territories. Intelsat membership grew to 144 countries before a decision was made in 1999 to change the ownership of the organization from national governments to the private sector. A similar consortium, the International Maritime Satellite Organization (Inmarsat), was established as an intergovernmental organization in 1979 to supply maritime and other mobile communications services via satellite; it also was later transformed into a privately owned entity. In addition, a number of regional organizations have been created to operate communication and meteorologic satellites.

Involvement of industry
Building the systems and components needed to carry out both government and commercial space programs has required the participation of private industry, and a number of firms have grown to have substantial space involvement. Often these firms have also been major suppliers of aviation and defense products, a reflection of the common technological foundation for what has become known as the aerospace industry. Other private firms have specialized in providing space-based services in such areas as telecommunications and Earth observation.

The first human spaceflights
During the 1950s space planners in both the Soviet Union and the United States anticipated the launching of a human being into orbit as soon as the required launch vehicle and spacecraft could be developed and tested. Much of the initial thinking focused on some form of piloted space plane, which, after being launched atop a rocket, could maneuver in orbit and then return to Earth, gliding to a horizontal landing on a conventional runway.

NASA/Dryden Research Aircraft Movie Collection

In the United States the air force developed a rocket-powered experimental aircraft, the X-15, which, after being dropped from an in-flight B-52 bomber, could reach altitudes as high as 108 km (67 miles), the edge of outer space. Nevertheless, the X-15 could not achieve the velocity and altitude needed for orbital flight. That was the mission of Dyna-Soar, another air force project. Dyna-Soar was to be a piloted reusable delta-winged vehicle that would be launched into orbit by a modified Titan ICBM and could carry out either bombing or reconnaissance missions over the Soviet Union or intercept a Soviet satellite in orbit. Although a full-scale vehicle was built and six people were chosen to train as Dyna-Soar crew, the project was canceled in 1963.

Rather than base their human spaceflight programs on space planes, the Soviet Union and the United States, in their desire to put people into space as quickly as possible, opted for a less technically demanding ballistic approach. A person would ride in a capsulelike spacecraft atop a rocket to achieve orbit. At the end of the flight, another rocket (called a retro-rocket) would slow down the spacecraft enough for it to fall back to Earth. To accomplish this feat, the spacecraft would have to survive the intense heat caused by reentering the atmosphere at a high speed and then carry its passenger safely back to Earth's surface.

Vostok
Soon after the success of the first Sputniks, Korolyov and his associate Tikhonravov began work on the design of an orbital spacecraft that could be used for two purposes. One was to conduct photoreconnaissance missions and then return the exposed film to Earth. The other was to serve as a vehicle for the first human spaceflight missions, in which a human being would replace the reconnaissance camera. The spacecraft was called Vostok when it was used to carry a human into space. Vostok had two sections-a spherical capsule in which the person would ride and a conical module that contained the instruments needed for its flight. The spacecraft was large for the time, weighing 4.73 metric tons. The crew capsule was completely covered by a thermal coating to protect it during reentry. Vostok was designed so that the human aboard need not touch any control from launch to touchdown; he would be essentially just a passenger. Nor would he land with the spacecraft. Rather, he would be ejected from it at an altitude of 7 km (4.3 miles) and parachute to dry land while the spacecraft landed nearby with its own parachutes.

After a series of five test flights carrying dogs and human dummies, the first person, by that time designated as a cosmonaut, lifted into space in Vostok 1 atop a modified R-7 rocket on April 12, 1961, from the Soviet launch site at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The passenger, Yuri Gagarin, was a 27-year-old Russian test pilot. After firing of the retro-rocket 78 minutes into the mission, the crew capsule separated from the instrument module-although not without problems-and Gagarin parachuted to a soft landing 108 minutes after his launch. He had reported during the mission "I feel fine" and showed no ill effects from his one-orbit trip around the globe.

There were five additional one-person Vostok missions. In August 1961, Gherman Titov at age 25 (still the youngest person ever to fly in space) completed 17 orbits of Earth in Vostok 2. He became ill with space sickness (the equivalent of motion sickness on Earth) during the flight, an incident that caused a one-year delay in Vostok flights while Soviet physicians investigated the possibility that humans could not survive for extended times in the space environment. In August 1962, two Vostoks, 3 and 4, were orbited at the same time and came within 6.5 km (4 miles) of one another. This dual mission was repeated in June 1963; aboard the Vostok 6 spacecraft was Valentina Tereshkova, the first woman to fly in space.

Mercury
John H. Glenn, Jr., became the first American astronaut to orbit Earth in his three-orbit mission on February 20, 1962. His Mercury spacecraft was launched by a modified air force Atlas ICBM. Three more one-man Mercury orbital flights, carrying astronauts M. Scott Carpenter, Walter M. Schirra, Jr., and L. Gordon Cooper, Jr., were conducted, the last being a 22-orbit mission in May 1963.

Gemini and Voskhod
In 1961 Pres. John F. Kennedy announced that the United States would send people to the Moon "before this decade is out." In order to test many of the techniques that would be needed to carry out a lunar mission, particularly rendezvousing and docking two objects in space, the United States in late 1961 decided to develop a two-person spacecraft called Gemini. The Gemini spacecraft was much more complex than the rudimentary Mercury capsule and, at 3.81 metric tons, was twice as heavy. Another converted air force ICBM, a Titan II, was used to launch the Gemini spacecraft.

The first crewed Gemini mission lifted into space in March 1965; nine more missions followed, the last in November 1966. On the second mission, in June 1965, Edward H. White II became the first American astronaut to operate outside a spacecraft. His 20-minute space walk-also known as extravehicular activity (EVA)-was without incident. Although problems developed on many of the Gemini flights, the program demonstrated that people could live and work in space for as long as 14 days, more than the time needed for a round trip to the Moon. It also showed that astronauts could carry out a rendezvous in space and could make useful observations of Earth, both visually and photographically.

As plans in the United States for multiple-astronaut missions became known, the Soviet Union worked to maintain its lead in the space race by modifying the Vostok spacecraft so that it could carry as many as three persons. Korolyov could accomplish this only by having the crew fly without wearing spacesuits. The redesigned spacecraft was known as Voskhod. There were two Voskhod missions, one with three people aboard in October 1964 and another with a two-man crew in March 1965. On the second mission, cosmonaut Aleksey Leonov became the first human to leave an orbiting spacecraft, less than three months before White. His 12-minute EVA was full of problems, and his reentry of the Voskhod spacecraft was particularly difficult.

Soyuz
Korolyov and his associates began work in 1962 on a second-generation spacecraft, to be called Soyuz. It was to be a much more complex vehicle than Vostok, holding as many as three people in an orbital crew compartment, with a separate module for crew reentry and a third section containing spacecraft equipment and rocket engines for in-orbit and reentry maneuvers. Soyuz was to be capable not only of flights in Earth orbit but also, in modified versions, of flights around the Moon and even as part of a lunar landing mission.

The first launch of Soyuz, with a single cosmonaut, Vladimir Komarov, aboard, took place on April 23, 1967. Once the spacecraft reached orbit, it suffered a number of problems, which prompted ground controllers to bring Komarov back to Earth as soon as possible. After reentry, however, the spacecraft's main parachute did not fully deploy, and the Soyuz hit the ground at high speed. Komarov became the first person to perish during a spaceflight, and the accident dealt a major blow to Soviet hopes of orbiting or landing on the Moon before the United States.

After the problems with the Soyuz design were diagnosed and remedied, various models of the spacecraft served as the means of access to space for the Soviet, and then Russian, program of human spaceflight for more than 50 years. Versions of Soyuz have been used both to transport crews to and from the International Space Station and to serve as the crew rescue vehicle-the lifeboat-for the ISS.

The race to the Moon
The American commitment
In the immediate aftermath of Gagarin's orbital flight, President Kennedy was advised by NASA and by his vice president, Lyndon B. Johnson, of Braun's belief that the Soviet Union, using Korolyov's existing R-7 launcher, could well succeed in sending a multiperson spacecraft into Earth orbit and perhaps even around the Moon before the United States. The first competition that the United States had a good chance of winning would be that of a crewed lunar landing, because it would require each country to develop a new, more-powerful rocket. On those technical grounds and because a lunar landing would be a very visible demonstration of American strength, Kennedy announced on May 25, 1961, that the United States would commit itself to a lunar landing before 1970. At that time, only one American human spaceflight, Shepard's 15-minute suborbital journey, had been made.

In response to Kennedy's decision, the United States carried out a warlike, but peaceful, mobilization of financial and human resources. NASA's budget was increased almost 500 percent in three years, and at its peak the lunar landing program involved more than 34,000 NASA employees and 375,000 employees of industrial and university contractors.

The Soviet response
While committing the United States to winning the Moon race, President Kennedy also made several attempts in the early 1960s to convince the Soviet leadership that a cooperative lunar landing program between their two countries would be a better alternative. No positive reply from the Soviet Union was forthcoming, however. In fact, between 1961 and 1963, there was still vigorous debate within the Soviet Union over the wisdom of undertaking a lunar program, and no final decision had been made on the question.

Meanwhile, the separate design bureaus headed by Korolyov and his rival Vladimir Chelomey competed fiercely for a lunar mission assignment, either a flight around the Moon or an actual landing. Finally, in August 1964, Korolyov received the lunar landing assignment, and soon afterward Chelomey was given responsibility for planning a circumlunar flight to be carried out before the 50th anniversary of the Bolshevik Revolution, which would take place in October 1967. In 1965 Soviet leaders decided to combine the efforts of the two rivals for the circumlunar mission, using a version of Korolyov's Soyuz spacecraft and a new rocket, the UR-500 (also called the Proton), designed by Chelomey.

The rocket that Korolyov designed for the lunar landing effort was called the N1. Like the Saturn V, it was huge, standing 112.8 metres (370.1 feet) tall and having a planned takeoff thrust of 44,500 kilonewtons (10 million pounds). Instead of a few large rocket engines in its first stage, however, the N1 had 30 smaller engines. These were developed by Nikolay Kuznetsov, an aircraft-engine chief designer who had little experience with rocket engines, rather than the more capable Glushko. Korolyov and Valentin Glushko, already personal adversaries for many years, had disagreed on the proper fuel for the N1, and they finally decided that they could no longer work together. Consequently, Korolyov turned to Kuznetsov, who chose the small-engine approach.

Indecision, inefficiencies, inadequate budgets, and personal and organizational rivalries in the Soviet system thus posed major obstacles to success in the race to the Moon. To these was added the unexpected death of Korolyov, age 59, during surgery on January 14, 1966. This was a serious setback to the Soviet space program. Korolyov had been a charismatic leader and organizer. His successor, Vasily Mishin, attempted to maintain the program's momentum, but he was not the effective manager or politically sophisticated operator that Korolyov had been.

Interim developments
In the United States, Apollo moved forward as a high-priority program; after the assassination of President Kennedy in November 1963, it became seen as a memorial to the fallen young president. A major setback occurred on January 27, 1967, when astronauts Grissom, White, and Roger Chaffee were killed after their Apollo 1 Command Module caught fire during a ground test. The first crewed Apollo mission, designated Apollo 7 and intended to test the redesigned Command Module, was launched into Earth orbit on October 11, 1968. The launcher used was a Saturn IB, a less-powerful rocket than the Saturn V needed to reach the Moon. The mission's success cleared the way for a bold step-the first launch of a crew atop a Saturn V to the lunar vicinity. On December 21, 1968, the Apollo 8 Command and Service Modules were put on a trajectory that sent them into orbit around the Moon on Christmas Eve, December 24. The three astronauts- Frank Borman, James A. Lovell, Jr., and William A. Anders -sent back close-up images of the lunar surface, read from the biblical book of Genesis, and brought back vivid colour photographs of a blue planet Earth rising over the desolate lunar landscape. By the end of the mission, it was clear that the first lunar landing was only months away.

One reason for conducting the Apollo 8 mission was to allow NASA to test most of the systems needed for a lunar landing attempt while waiting to carry out a crewed trial in Earth orbit of the Lunar Module, whose development was behind schedule. Another was the concern that the Soviet Union would beat the United States in sending people to the lunar vicinity. A circumlunar mission indeed had been part of Soviet plans, but the Soyuz 1 accident had made the October 1967 deadline infeasible. During 1968 a number of test flights of a circumlunar mission were made, using the Proton launcher and a version of the Soyuz spacecraft designated Zond. In September Zond 5 carried a biological payload, including two tortoises, around the Moon and safely back to Earth, but two months later the Zond 6 spacecraft depressurized and then crashed on landing, ending any hope for a quick follow-on launch with a human crew. Plans to send cosmonauts around the Moon in a Zond spacecraft were postponed indefinitely in March 1969, but two more scientifically successful uncrewed circumlunar missions, Zond 7 and Zond 8, were carried out in 1969 and 1970, respectively.

The Soviet lunar landing program went forward rather fitfully after 1964. The missions were intended to employ the N1 launch vehicle and another variation of the Soyuz spacecraft, designated L3, that included a lunar landing module designed for one cosmonaut. Although an L3 spacecraft was constructed and three cosmonauts trained for its use, the N1 rocket was never successfully launched. After four failed attempts between 1969 and 1972-including a spectacular launch pad explosion in July 1969-the N1 program was finally canceled in May 1974, and Soviet hopes for human missions to the Moon thus ended.

The Apollo lunar landings and Apollo-Soyuz
In contrast to the Soviet lunar landing efforts, during 1969 all went well for the Apollo program. In March the Apollo 9 crew successfully tested the Lunar Module in Earth orbit, and in May the Apollo 10 crew carried out a full dress rehearsal for the landing, coming within 15,200 metres (50,000 feet) of the lunar surface. On July 16, 1969, astronauts Armstrong, Aldrin, and Michael Collins set off on the Apollo 11 mission, the first lunar landing attempt. While Collins remained in lunar orbit in the Command Module, Armstrong piloted the Lunar Module, nicknamed Eagle, away from boulders on the lunar surface and to a successful landing on a flat lava plain called the Sea of Tranquillity at 4:18 pm U.S. Eastern Daylight Time on July 20. He reported to mission control, "Houston, Tranquillity Base here. The Eagle has landed." Six and a half hours later, Armstrong, soon followed by Aldrin, left the Lunar Module and took the first human step on the surface of another celestial body. As he did so, he noted, "That's one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind." (In the excitement of the moment, Armstrong apparently skipped the "a" in the statement he had prepared.) Concluding 2.5 hours of activity on the lunar surface, the two men returned to the Lunar Module with 21.7 kg (47.8 pounds) of lunar samples. Twelve hours later, they blasted off the Moon in the Lunar Module's ascent stage and rejoined Collins in the Command Module. The crew returned to Earth on July 24, splashing down in the Pacific Ocean, where they were greeted by U.S. Pres. Richard Nixon.

The successful Apollo 12 mission followed in November 1969. The Apollo 13 mission, launched in April 1970, experienced an explosion of the oxygen tank in its Service Module on the outbound trip to the Moon. The crew survived this accident only through the improvised use of the Lunar Module as living quarters in order to preserve the remaining capabilities of the Command Module for reentering Earth's atmosphere after they had returned from their circumlunar journey. Four more Apollo missions followed. On each of the final three, the crew had a small cartlike rover that allowed them to travel several kilometres from their landing site. The final mission, Apollo 17, which was conducted in December 1972, included geologist Harrison Schmitt, the only trained scientist to set foot on the Moon.

The United States had won the race to the Moon, but that race had been motivated primarily by political considerations. No equally compelling reason to continue to travel to the Moon or to send humans to Mars was put forth in the following years. Proposals by U.S. presidents in 1989 and 2004 to restart human exploration beyond Earth orbit received insufficient political support to be implemented. No human has traveled beyond near-Earth orbit since Apollo 17 in December 1972. U.S. plans have called for a return to the Moon in the 2020s.

An Apollo spacecraft was used for the last time in 1975. Three years earlier, as a sign of improved U.S.-Soviet relations, the two countries had agreed to carry out a joint mission in which an Apollo spacecraft carrying three astronauts would dock in orbit with a Soyuz vehicle having two cosmonauts aboard. The Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, which took place in July 1975, featured a "handshake in space" between Apollo commander Thomas P. Stafford and Soyuz commander Aleksey Leonov.

Orbiting space platforms
Space stations
By 1969, even though the U.S.S.R. was still moving forward with its lunar landing program, it had begun to shift its emphasis in human spaceflight to the development of Earth-orbiting stations in which cosmonaut crews could carry out extended observations and experiments on missions that lasted weeks or months rather than a few days. The first Soviet space station, called Salyut 1, was launched April 19, 1971. The first crew to occupy the station- Georgy Dobrovolsky, Viktor Patsayev, and Vladislav Volkov -spent 23 days aboard carrying out scientific studies but perished when their Soyuz spacecraft depressurized during reentry.

With similar objectives for a long-term crewed platform in space, the United States converted the third stage of a Saturn V rocket into an orbital workshop for solar and biomedical studies. This first U.S. space station, called Skylab, was launched May 14, 1973. Over a period of eight and a half months, three three-person crews using Apollo spacecraft for transport spent time aboard Skylab, with the final crew staying for 84 days. Skylab was abandoned in February 1974 and reentered Earth's atmosphere in July 1979, with some portions of the station surviving reentry and landing in Australia.

Because of budgetary cuts, the United States did not launch a planned second Skylab. In contrast, the Soviet Union orbited and successfully occupied five more Salyut stations in a program that continued through the mid-1980s. Two of these stations had a military reconnaissance mission, but the others were devoted to scientific studies, particularly biomedical research. The Soviet Union also launched guest cosmonauts from allied countries for short stays aboard Salyut 6 and 7.

These early stations were a reflection of a long-held belief among space visionaries, dating back to Tsiolkovsky at the start of the 20th century, that living and working in space, first in Earth orbit and then on the Moon, Mars, and other locations, were an important part of the human future. It also was thought that increasingly complex orbital outposts would be the first steps in a long-term process of space development and colonization. The early focus of the United States and the U.S.S.R. on sending people to the Moon for political reasons deviated from this vision, which has since returned to dominate space thinking.

The Soviet Union followed its Salyut station series with the February 1986 launch of the core element of the modular Mir space station. Additional modules carrying scientific equipment and expanding the living space were attached to Mir in subsequent years. In 1994-95 Valery Polyakov, a medical doctor, spent 438 continuous days aboard the station. More than 100 different people from 12 countries visited Mir, including seven American astronauts in the 1995-98 period. The station, which was initially scheduled to operate for only five years, supported human habitation until mid-2000 (continuously between 1989 and 1999), although it experienced a number of accidents and other serious problems. In March 2001 it made a controlled atmospheric reentry, with the surviving pieces falling into the Pacific Ocean.

The United States did not follow up on Skylab until 1984, when Pres. Ronald Reagan approved a space station program and invited U.S. allies to participate. By 1988, 11 countries-Canada, Japan, and 9 countries from Europe-had decided to join what was known as Space Station Freedom. Progress in developing the station was slow, however, and in 1993 newly elected Pres. Bill Clinton ordered a sweeping redesign of the program. The United States and its existing partners invited Russia, which had inherited most of the Soviet Union's space efforts after the U.S.S.R.'s collapse in 1991, to participate in the multinational program, renamed the International Space Station (ISS). Three additional countries joined during the 1990s and thereby made the 16-country project the largest-ever cooperative technological undertaking. The first two elements of the ISS were launched and connected in space in late 1998. Between 2000 and 2011, U.S., European, Japanese, and Russian modules were added to the ISS, along with Canadian robotic equipment and U.S.-provided trusses, solar panels, and associated hardware. An initial three-person crew began its stay aboard the ISS in November 2000, and the station has been continuously occupied since then. When ISS assembly was completed in 2011, the program's focus shifted to scientific and technological utilization of the orbiting laboratory, which is planned to remain in service until at least 2024.

International space endurance records
International space endurance records

A list of human endurance records in space is provided in the table.

Summary of space stations launched since 1971
Space stations (1971 onward)

A summary of space stations launched since 1971 is provided in the table.

The space shuttle

Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.

After the success of the Apollo 11 mission, NASA proposed an ambitious plan for a series of large space stations to be developed during the 1970s and a new reusable space transportation system to send people and supplies to those stations, lunar bases, and crewed missions to Mars in the 1980s. This plan was quickly rejected, as there was no interest in an ambitious and expensive post-Apollo space program among the political leadership or the general public. In 1972 NASA received presidential approval to develop a partially reusable transport vehicle called a space shuttle. This vehicle was intended to carry people and as much as 29,500 kg (65,000 pounds) of cargo into low Earth orbit at low cost. On the basis of those expectations, the United States planned to use the shuttle as its sole launch vehicle once it entered operation and to operate a shuttle fleet with a launch rate as high as 60 per year. In the absence of a space station, plans also called for having the shuttle serve double duty as a space platform to conduct in-orbit research for periods as long as two weeks. To that end, Europe pledged to contribute a pressurized laboratory, known as Spacelab, that would be carried in the shuttle's payload bay.

The space shuttle design had three major components. A reusable winged orbiter carried crew and cargo and glided to a landing on a runway at the end of its mission. A large external tank carried the liquid-oxygen and liquid-hydrogen propellants for the orbiter's three powerful engines. The tank was used only during the first eight minutes of flight; once the fuel was exhausted, the tank was discarded and burned up on reentry. Two solid-fuel rockets assisted in accelerating the vehicle during the first two minutes of flight; they were then detached and parachuted into the ocean, where they were recovered for future use. A fleet of four operational orbiters, named Columbia, Challenger, Atlantis, and Discovery, was built in order to allow multiple shuttle flights each year. Facilities in Florida originally constructed for the Apollo program were remodeled for shuttle use, and construction on a facility at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California for launching the shuttle into north-south polar orbits was begun.

After several years of technical and budgetary delays to the program, the first space shuttle flight took place on April 12, 1981; aboard were astronauts John W. Young, a veteran of the Gemini and Apollo programs, and Robert Laurel Crippen. With additional shuttle flights, it became evident that projections of the vehicle's operational costs and performance had been extremely optimistic. Major refurbishment was required between each launch; the highest flight rate achieved was in 1985, when the shuttle was launched nine times. Each launch cost hundreds of millions of dollars, rather than the tens of millions that had been promised in 1972. Although the space shuttle was a remarkable technological achievement as a first-generation reusable launch vehicle, the plans to use it as the only launcher for American payloads proved to be a major policy mistake, and the cost of its operation acted as a barrier to undertaking other ambitious space efforts.

The optimism surrounding the space shuttle program was publicly shattered on January 28, 1986, when the Challenger orbiter was destroyed in a catastrophic explosion 73 seconds after liftoff. Its seven-person crew perished; among them was schoolteacher Christa McAuliffe, on board as the first teacher in space. The launch had taken place in unusually cold weather, and a sealing ring within a segment joint of one of the solid rocket boosters failed. The solid rocket broke loose and hit the external tank, rupturing it. The flame from the leaking booster ignited the shuttle's fuel, causing the explosion.

After the accident, the shuttle fleet was grounded until September 1988. A replacement orbiter, Endeavour, was built, but, upon the resumption of flights, the shuttle fleet was operated with much greater assurances for the safety of its crew. This limited the flight rate to six to eight missions per year; the 100th shuttle flight was not achieved until October 2000.

Both before and after the Challenger accident, the space shuttle demonstrated impressive capabilities in space operations, including the repair and redeployment of damaged satellites-most striking being the in-orbit repair of the Hubble Space Telescope in 1993. Four more missions to upgrade Hubble were carried out between 1997 and 2009. Beginning in 1998, the space shuttle was used to carry components of the ISS into orbit, along with the crews to assemble those components. It also was used to ferry people and supplies to and from the space station, the role for which it was first conceived. There were a total of 37 shuttle missions associated with assembling and outfitting the ISS.

The shuttle program suffered its second fatal disaster on February 1, 2003, when the orbiter Columbia broke up over Texas at an altitude of about 60 km (40 miles) as it was returning from an orbital mission. All seven crew members died, including Ilan Ramon, the first Israeli astronaut to go into space. The shuttle fleet was once again grounded during the ensuing investigation into the cause of the accident, and flights to keep the ISS in operation were conducted by Russian spacecraft.

As part of the rethinking of U.S. space plans in the wake of the Columbia accident, it was decided to retire the space shuttle from service once assembly of the ISS had been completed. This decision was announced by Pres. George W. Bush in January 2004. The final space shuttle flight took place in July 2011, and the remaining three orbiters were then retired to museums around the United States.

Between 1981 and 2011, space shuttles flew 135 missions, traveled 872,906,379 km (542,398,878 miles), and launched 355 different people (306 men and 49 women) from 16 countries into orbit. Including repeat fliers, a total of 852 people went into space on the shuttle, with two of them, U.S. astronauts Jerry Ross and Franklin Chang-Díaz, each making seven separate trips to orbit.

In the 1980s the Soviet Union also developed a space shuttle, called Buran, and a very powerful rocket, called Energia, to launch it and other heavy payloads. Energia was launched only twice, once in 1987 with a military payload and once the next year carrying Buran on a successful uncrewed test flight into orbit and back. Use of the two vehicles was abandoned as the Soviet Union faced increasing economic problems.

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Risks and benefits
Human spaceflight is both risky and expensive. From the crash landing of the first crewed Soyuz spacecraft in 1967 to the breakup of the shuttle orbiter Columbia in 2003, 18 people died during spaceflights. Providing the systems to support people while in orbit adds significant additional costs to a space mission, and ensuring that the launch, flight, and reentry are carried out as safely as possible also requires highly reliable and thus costly equipment, including both spacecraft and launchers.

From the start of human spaceflight efforts, some have argued that the benefits of sending humans into space do not justify either the risks or the costs. They contend that robotic missions can produce equal or even greater scientific results with lower expenditures and that human presence in space has no other valid justification. Those who support human spaceflight cite the still unmatched ability of human intelligence, flexibility, and reliability in carrying out certain experiments in orbit, in repairing and maintaining robotic spacecraft and automated instruments in space, and in acting as explorers in initial journeys to other places in the solar system. They also argue that astronauts serve as excellent role models for younger people and act as vicarious representatives of the many who would like to fly in space themselves. In addition is the long-held view that eventually some humans will leave Earth to establish permanent outposts and larger settlements on the Moon, Mars, or other locations.

Selecting people for spaceflights
Most of the individuals who have gone into space are highly trained astronauts and cosmonauts, the two designations having originated in the United States and the Soviet Union, respectively. (Both taikonaut and yuhangyuan have sometimes been used to describe the astronauts in China's crewed space program.) Those governments interested in sending some of their citizens into space select candidates from many applicants on the basis of their backgrounds and physical and psychological characteristics. The candidates undergo rigorous training before being chosen for an initial spaceflight and then prepare in detail for each mission assigned. Training centres with specialized facilities exist in the United States, at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas; in Russia, at the Yuri Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Centre (commonly called Star City), outside Moscow; in Germany, at ESA's European Astronaut Centre in Cologne; in Japan, at JAXA's Tsukuba Space Center, near Tokyo; and in China, at Space City, near Beijing.

Astronauts and cosmonauts who undertook multiple spaceflights traditionally fell into one of two categories. The first consisted of pilots, often with military backgrounds, who had extensive experience in flying high-performance aircraft. They were responsible for piloting space vehicles such as the space shuttle and Soyuz. The other category included scientists and engineers who are not necessarily pilots. They had primary responsibility for carrying out the scientific and engineering activities scheduled for a particular mission. They were known in the U.S. space program as mission specialists and in the Russian space program as flight engineers. With the development of long-duration space stations such as Mir and the ISS, the distinction between pilot and nonpilot astronauts and cosmonauts has become less clear, because all members of a space station crew carry out station operations and experiments.

A third category of individuals who have gone into space was called variously payload specialists or guest cosmonauts. These individuals include scientists and engineers who accompany their experiments into orbit; individuals selected to go into space for political reasons, such as members of the U.S. Congress or persons from countries allied with the Soviet Union or the United States; and a few nontechnical people-for example, the rare journalist or teacher or the private individual willing to pay substantial amounts of money for a spaceflight. These people are intensively trained for their particular flight but usually go into space only once. The first orbital spaceflight with a crew of private individuals, one of whom had chartered the spacecraft, Inspiration4, launched in 2021. At some future time, the costs and risks of human spaceflight may become low enough to accommodate a booming business of space tourism, in which many people would be able to experience spaceflight. Until then, access to orbit will be restricted to a comparatively small number of people. However, several firms have planned for paying customers brief suborbital flights that would provide a few minutes of weightlessness and dramatic views of Earth as they are launched on a trajectory carrying them just below 100 km (62 miles) in altitude, the generally recognized border between airspace and outer space.

Biomedical, psychological, and sociological aspects
Human beings have evolved to live in the environment of Earth's surface. The space environment-with its very low level of gravity, lack of atmosphere, wide temperature variations, and often high levels of ionizing radiation from the Sun, from particles trapped in the Van Allen radiation belts, and from cosmic rays-is an unnatural place for humans. An understanding of the effects on the human body of spaceflight, particularly long-duration flights away from Earth to destinations such as Mars, is incomplete.

Many of those going into space experience space sickness ( see motion sickness), which may cause vomiting, nausea, and stomach discomfort, among other symptoms. The condition is thought to arise from a contradiction experienced in the brain between external information coming from the eyes and internal information coming from the balance organs in the inner ear, which are normally stimulated continually by gravity. Space sickness usually disappears within two or three days as the brain adapts to the space environment, although symptoms may reappear temporarily when the space traveler returns to Earth's gravity.

The virtual absence of gravity causes loss of tissue mass in the calf and thigh muscles, which are used on Earth's surface to counter the effect of gravity. Muscles that are less involved with gravity, such as those used to bend the legs or arms, are less affected. Some loss of muscle mass in the heart has been observed in astronauts on long-duration missions. In the absence of gravity, blood that normally pools in the body's lower extremities initially shifts to the upper regions. As a result, the face appears puffy, the person experiences sinus congestion and headaches, and blood production decreases as the body attempts to compensate. In addition, in the space environment, some weight-bearing bones in the body atrophy.

Although the changes in muscle, bone, and blood production do not pose problems for astronauts in space, they do so on their return to Earth. For example, in normal gravity, a person with decreased bone mass runs a greater risk of breaking a bone during normal strenuous activity. Countermeasures, particularly various forms of exercise while in space, have been developed to prevent these effects from causing health problems later on Earth. Even so, people recovering from long-duration flights require varying amounts of time to readjust to Earth conditions. Light-headedness usually disappears within one or two days; lack of balance and symptoms of motion sickness, in three to five days; anemia, in one to two weeks; muscle atrophy, in three to five weeks; and bone atrophy, in one to three years or more.

Except for the Apollo trips to the Moon, all human spaceflights have taken place in near-Earth orbit. In this location, Earth's magnetic field shields humans from potentially dangerous exposure to ionizing radiation from recurrent major disturbances on the Sun and interplanetary cosmic rays. The Apollo missions, which were all less than two weeks long, were timed to avoid exposure to anticipated high levels of solar radiation. If, however, humans were sent on journeys to Mars or other destinations that would take months or even years, such measures would be inadequate. Exposure to high levels of solar radiation or cosmic rays could cause potentially fatal tumours and other health problems ( see radiation injury). Space engineers will need to devise adequate radiation shielding for interplanetary crewed spacecraft and will require accurate predictions of radiation damage to the body to ensure that risks remain within acceptable limits. Biomedical advances are also necessary to develop methods for the early detection and mitigation of radiation damage. Nevertheless, the effects of radiation may remain a major obstacle to long human voyages in space.

In addition to the biomedical issues associated with human spaceflight are a number of psychological and sociological issues, particularly for long-duration missions aboard a space station or to distant destinations. To be in space is to be in an extreme and isolated environment. Mission planners will have to consider issues relating to crew size and composition-particularly if the crews are mixtures of men and women and come from several nations with different cultures-if interpersonal conflicts are to be avoided and effective teamwork achieved.

Solar and space physics
The first scientific discovery made with instruments orbiting in space was the existence of the Van Allen radiation belts, discovered by Explorer 1 in 1958. Subsequent space missions investigated Earth's magnetosphere, the surrounding region of space in which the planet's magnetic field exerts a controlling effect ( see Earth: The magnetic field and magnetosphere). Of particular and ongoing interest has been the interaction of the flux of charged particles emitted by the Sun, called the solar wind, with the magnetosphere. Early space science investigations showed, for example, that luminous atmospheric displays known as auroras are the result of this interaction, and scientists came to understand that the magnetosphere is an extremely complex phenomenon.

The focus of inquiry in space physics was later extended to understanding the characteristics of the Sun, both as an average star and as the primary source of energy for the rest of the solar system, and to exploring space between the Sun and Earth and other planets ( see interplanetary medium). The magnetospheres of other planets, particularly Jupiter with its strong magnetic field, also came under study. Scientists sought a better understanding of the internal dynamics and overall behaviour of the Sun, the underlying causes of variations in solar activity, and the way in which those variations propagate through space and ultimately affect Earth's magnetosphere and upper atmosphere. The concept of space weather was advanced to describe the changing conditions in the Sun-Earth region of the solar system. Variations in space weather can cause geomagnetic storms that interfere with the operation of satellites and even systems on the ground such as power grids.

To carry out the investigations required for addressing these scientific questions, the United States, Europe, the Soviet Union, and Japan developed a variety of space missions, often in a coordinated fashion. In the United States, early studies of the Sun were undertaken by a series of Orbiting Solar Observatory satellites (launched 1962-75) and the astronaut crews of the Skylab space station in 1973-74, using that facility's Apollo Telescope Mount. These were followed by the Solar Maximum Mission satellite (launched 1980). ESA developed the Ulysses mission (1990) to explore the Sun's polar regions. Solar-terrestrial interactions were the focus of many of the Explorer series of spacecraft (1958-75) and the Orbiting Geophysical Observatory satellites (1964-69).

In the 1980s NASA, ESA, and Japan's Institute of Space and Astronautical Science undertook a cooperative venture to develop a comprehensive series of space missions, named the International Solar-Terrestrial Physics Program, that would be aimed at full investigation of the Sun-Earth connection. This program was responsible for the U.S. Wind (1994) and Polar (1996) spacecraft, the European Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO; 1995) and Cluster (2000) missions, and the Japanese Geotail satellite (1992).

Among many other missions, NASA has launched a number of satellites, including Thermosphere, Ionosphere, Mesosphere Energetics and Dynamics (TIMED, 2001); the Japanese-U.S.-U.K. collaboration Hinode (2006); and Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO, 2006), part of its Solar Terrestrial Probes program. The Solar Dynamics Observatory (2010); the twin Van Allen Probes (2012); and the Parker Solar Probe (2018), which made the closest flybys of the Sun, were part of another NASA program called Living with a Star. A two-satellite European/Chinese mission called Double Star (2003-04) studied the impact of the Sun on Earth's environment.

Solar system exploration
From the start of space activity, scientists recognized that spacecraft could gather scientifically valuable data about the various planets, moons, and smaller bodies in the solar system. Both the United States and the U.S.S.R. attempted to send robotic missions to the Moon in the late 1950s. The first four U.S. Pioneer spacecraft, Pioneer 0-3, launched in 1958, were not successful in returning data about the Moon. The fifth mission, Pioneer 4 (1959), was the first U.S. spacecraft to escape Earth's gravitational pull; it flew by the Moon at twice the planned distance but returned some useful data. Three Soviet missions, Luna 1-3, explored the vicinity of the Moon in 1959, confirming that it had no appreciable magnetic field and sending back the first-ever images of its far side. Luna 1 was the first spacecraft to fly past the Moon, beating Pioneer 4 by two months. Luna 2, in making a hard landing on the lunar surface, was the first spacecraft to strike another celestial object. Later, in the 1960s and early 1970s, Luna and Lunokhod spacecraft soft-landed on the Moon, and some gathered soil samples and returned them to Earth.

In the 1960s the United States became the first country to send a spacecraft to the vicinity of other planets; Mariner 2 flew by Venus in December 1962, and Mariner 4 flew past Mars in July 1965. Among significant accomplishments of planetary missions in succeeding decades were the U.S. Viking landings on Mars in 1976 and the Soviet Venera explorations of the atmosphere and surface of Venus from the mid-1960s to the mid-1980s. In the years since, the United States has continued an active program of solar system exploration, as did the Soviet Union until its dissolution in 1991. Japan launched missions to the Moon, Mars, Halley's Comet, and Venus and returned samples from the asteroids Itokawa and Ryugu. Europe's first independent solar system mission, Giotto, also flew by Halley. After the turn of the 21st century, it sent missions to the Moon, Venus, and Mars and an orbiter-lander, Rosetta-Philae, to a comet. India and China sent the Chandrayaan-1 (2008) and two Chang'e (2007, 2010) missions, respectively, to orbit the Moon. China's Chang'e 3 mission landed a small rover, Yutu, on the Moon in 2013, and Chang'e 4 made the first landing on the far side of the Moon in 2019. India's Mars Orbiter Mission entered orbit around that planet in 2014. China placed the Tianwen-1 lander and the Zhurong rover on Mars in 2021, and that same year Hope, an orbiter from the United Arab Emirates, entered Mars orbit. NASA's Dawn mission (2007) orbited the large asteroid Vesta from 2011 to 2012 and entered orbit around the dwarf planet Ceres in 2015.

Early on, scientists planned to conduct solar system exploration in three stages: initial reconnaissance from spacecraft flying by a planet, comet, or asteroid; detailed surveillance from a spacecraft orbiting the object; and on-site research after landing on the object or, in the case of a giant gas planet, by sending a probe into its atmosphere. All three of those stages have been carried out for the Moon, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, a comet, and several asteroids. Several Soviet and U.S. robotic spacecraft have landed on Venus and the Moon, and the United States has landed spacecraft on the surface of Mars. A long-term detailed surveillance of Jupiter and its moons began in 1995 when the U.S. Galileo spacecraft took up orbit around the planet, at the same time releasing a probe into the turbulent Jovian atmosphere. In 2001 the U.S. Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) spacecraft landed on the asteroid Eros and transmitted information from its surface for more than two weeks.

Among the rocky inner planets, only Mercury was for some time relatively neglected. In the first half century of space exploration, Mercury was visited just once; the U.S. Mariner 10 probe made three flybys of the planet in 1974-75. In 2004 the U.S. Messenger spacecraft was launched to Mercury for a series of flybys beginning in 2008 and entered orbit around the planet in 2011. A joint European-Japanese probe, BepiColombo, was launched toward Mercury in 2018 and is scheduled to enter orbit there in 2025.

As of 2020, the exploration of the two outer giant gas planets- Uranus and Neptune-remained at the first stage. In a series of U.S. missions launched in the 1970s, Pioneer 10 flew by Jupiter, whereas Pioneer 11 and Voyager 1 and 2 flew by both Jupiter and Saturn. Voyager 2 then went on to travel past Uranus and Neptune. On August 25, 2012, Voyager 1 became the first space probe to enter interstellar space when it crossed the heliopause, the outer limit of the Sun's magnetic field and solar wind. The Voyagers were expected to still be returning data through 2020. The U.S. Cassini spacecraft, launched in 1997, began a long-term surveillance mission in the Saturnian system in 2004; the following year its European-built Huygens probe descended to the surface of Titan, Saturn's largest moon. In 2017 the Cassini mission ended when it burned up in Saturn's atmosphere. In 2011 the United States launched the Juno mission, which studied the origin and evolution of Jupiter after it arrived at the giant planet in 2016. Thus, every significant body in the solar system, even the dwarf planet Pluto and its largest moon, Charon, has been visited at least once by a spacecraft. (The U.S. New Horizons spacecraft, launched in 2006, flew by Pluto and Charon in 2015 and by a much smaller Kuiper belt object, Arrokoth, in 2019.)

These exploratory missions sought information on the origin and evolution of the solar system and on the various objects that it comprises, including chemical composition; surface topography; data on magnetic fields, atmospheres, and volcanic activity; and, particularly for Mars, evidence of water in the present or past and perhaps even of extraterrestrial life in some form.

What has been learned to date confirms that Earth and the rest of the solar system formed at about the same time from the same cloud of gas and dust surrounding the Sun. The four outer giant gas planets are roughly similar in size and chemical composition, but each has a set of moons that differ widely in their characteristics, and in some ways they and their satellites resemble miniature solar systems. The four rocky inner planets had a common origin but followed very different evolutionary paths and today have very different surfaces, atmospheres, and internal activity. Ongoing comparative study of the evolution of Venus, Mars, and Earth could provide important insights into Earth's future and its continued ability to support life.

There are indications that water may be present in the outer solar system. The Galileo mission provided images and other data related to Jupiter's moon Europa that suggest the presence of a liquid water ocean beneath its icy crust. Future missions are needed to confirm the existence of this ocean and search for evidence of organic or biological processes in it. The Cassini-Huygens mission confirmed the presence of lakes of liquid methane on Saturn's moon Titan and suggested the likely existence of liquid water underneath the surface of another moon, Enceladus.

Exploring the universe
Until the dawn of spaceflight, astronomers were limited in their ability to observe objects beyond the solar system to those portions of the electromagnetic spectrum that can penetrate Earth's atmosphere. These portions include the visible region, parts of the ultraviolet region, and most of the radio-frequency region. The ability to place instruments on a spacecraft operating above the atmosphere ( see satellite observatory) opened the possibility of observing the universe in all regions of the spectrum. Even operating in the visible region, a space-based observatory could avoid the problems caused by atmospheric turbulence and airglow.

Beginning in the 1960s, a number of countries launched satellites to explore cosmic phenomena in the gamma-ray, X-ray, ultraviolet, visible, and infrared regions. More recently, space-based radio astronomy has been pursued. In the last decades of the 20th century, the United States embarked on the development of a series of long-duration orbital facilities collectively called the Great Observatories. They include the Hubble Space Telescope, launched in 1990 for observations in the visible and ultraviolet regions; the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory, launched in 1991; the Chandra X-Ray Observatory, launched in 1999; and the Spitzer Space Telescope, launched in 2003. Europe and Japan have also been active in space-based astronomy and astrophysics. Europe's Herschel infrared observatory, launched in 2009, studied the origin and evolution of stars and galaxies. A telescope aboard Japan's Akari spacecraft, launched in 2006, also observed the universe in the infrared spectrum.

The results of these space investigations have made major contributions to an understanding of the origin, evolution, and likely future of the universe, galaxies, stars, and planetary systems. For example, the U.S. Cosmic Background Explorer (COBE) satellite, launched in 1989, mapped the microwave background radiation left over from the early universe, providing strong support for the theory that the universe was created in a primordial explosion, known as the big bang. Precision measurements of this cosmic microwave background by the American Wilkinson Microwave Anisotropy Probe (WMAP, 2001) and the European Planck spacecraft (2009) enabled astronomers to determine the age, size, and shape of the universe. The U.S. satellite Kepler (2009) discovered thousands of planetary candidates of startling diversity orbiting distant suns. The European satellites Hipparcos (1989) and Gaia (2013) precisely mapped the position of more than a billion stars. The striking images of cosmic objects obtained by the Hubble Space Telescope not only added significantly to scientific knowledge but also shaped the public's perception of the cosmos, perhaps as significantly as did the astronomer Galileo 's observations of the Moon and Jupiter nearly four centuries earlier. Working as complements to ground-based observatories of increasing sensitivity, space-based observatories helped create a revolution in modern astronomy.

Microgravity research
A spacecraft orbiting Earth is essentially in a continuous state of free fall. All objects associated with the spacecraft, including any crew and other contents, are accelerating-i.e., falling freely-at the same rate in Earth's gravitational field ( see Earth: Basic planetary data). As a result, these objects do not "feel" the presence of Earth's gravity but instead experience a state of weightlessness, or zero gravity. True zero gravity, however, is experienced only at the centre of mass of a freely falling object. With increasing distance from the centre of mass, the influence of gravity increases in both directions perpendicular to the object's flight path. These constant but tiny accelerations make necessary the use of the term microgravity to describe the space environment. (It is possible to create a similar absence of gravity's effects only briefly on Earth or in an aircraft.) Human activity or the operation of equipment in a spacecraft causes vibrations that impart additional accelerations and so raise gravity levels, which can make it difficult to carry out highly sensitive experiments under sufficiently low microgravity conditions. Although spacecraft designers cannot totally eliminate gravitational effects, they hope to reduce them in some parts of the International Space Station to one microgravity-one-millionth of Earth's gravity-by isolating those areas from vibrations and other disturbances as much as possible.

The opportunity to carry out experiments in the absence of gravity has interested scientists from the beginning of activities in orbit. In addition to concern about the effects of the weightlessness on humans sent into space ( see above Biomedical, psychological, and sociological aspects), scientists are interested in its effects on the reproductive and developmental cycles of plants and animals other than humans. The overall goal is to use space-based research to add to the general understanding of a wide range of biological processes.

The microgravity environment also offers unique conditions for experiments designed to explore the behaviour of materials. Among the areas of inquiry are biotechnology, combustion science, fluid physics, fundamental physics, and materials science. Experiments in the microgravity environment on various materials, including metals, alloys, electronic and photonic materials, composites, colloids, glasses and ceramics, and polymers, have resulted in a greater understanding of the role of gravity in similar laboratory and manufacturing processes on Earth. The microgravity environment offers the potential for producing biological materials, including highly ordered protein crystals for crystallographic analysis and even materials resembling human tissues, that are difficult or impossible to make on Earth. Although microgravity research is still largely at the basic level, scientists and engineers hope that additional work-another major focus for the ISS-will lead to practical knowledge of great usefulness to manufacturing processes on Earth.

Observing Earth
Satellites, space stations, and space shuttle missions have provided a new perspective for scientists to collect data about Earth itself. In addition to practical applications ( see below Space applications), Earth observation from space has made significant contributions to fundamental knowledge. An early and continuing example is the use of satellites to make various geodetic measurements, which has allowed precise determinations of Earth's shape, internal structure, and rotational motion and the tidal and other periodic motions of the oceans. Fields as diverse as archaeology, seismology, and oceanography likewise have benefited from observations and measurements made from orbit.

Scientists have begun to use observations from space as part of comprehensive efforts in fields such as oceanography and ecology to understand and model the causes, processes, and effects of global climate change, including the influence of human activities. The goal is to obtain comprehensive sets of data over meaningful time spans about key physical, chemical, and biological processes that are shaping the planet's future. This is a coordinated international effort, in which the United States, Europe, Japan, and other countries are providing satellites to obtain the needed observations.

Meteorology
Meteorologists initially thought that satellites would be used primarily to observe cloud patterns and thus provide warnings of impending storms. They did not expect space observations to be central to improved weather forecasting overall. Nevertheless, as the technology of space-based instrumentation became more sophisticated, satellites were called upon to provide three-dimensional profiles of additional variables in the atmosphere, including temperature, moisture content, and wind speed. These data have become critical to modern weather forecasting.

Meteorological satellites are placed in one of two different kinds of orbit. Satellites in geostationary orbit provide continuous images of cloud patterns over large areas of Earth's surface. From changes in those patterns, meteorologists can deduce wind speeds and locate developing storms. Satellites in lower orbits aligned in a north-south direction, called polar orbits, can obtain more detailed data about changing atmospheric conditions. They also provide repetitive global coverage as Earth rotates beneath their orbit. In the United States, military and civilian agencies each have developed independent polar-orbiting meteorological satellite systems; China, Europe, and Russia also have deployed their own polar-orbiting satellites. The United States, Europe, Russia, China, India, and Japan have orbited geostationary meteorological satellites.

Although the research and development activity needed to produce meteorological satellites has been carried out by various space agencies, control over satellite operation usually has been handed over to organizations with general responsibility for weather forecasting. In the United States the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) operates geostationary and polar-orbiting satellites for short- and long-term forecasting; the Department of Defense (DOD) also has developed similar satellites for military use. In Europe an intergovernmental organization called Eumetsat was created in 1986 to operate Europe's meteorological satellites and provide their observations to national weather services. Agencies around the world cooperate in the exchange of data from their satellites. Meteorological satellites are an excellent example of both the ability of space systems to provide extremely valuable benefits to humanity and the need for international cooperation to maximize those benefits.

Positioning, navigation, and timing
In 1957 scientists tracking the first satellite, Sputnik 1, found that they could plot the satellite's orbit very precisely by analyzing the Doppler shift ( see Doppler effect) in the frequency of its transmitted signal with respect to a fixed location on Earth. They understood that if this process could be reversed-i.e., if the orbits of several satellites were precisely known-it would be possible to identify one's location on Earth by using information from those satellites.

This realization, coupled with the need to establish the position of submarines carrying ballistic missiles, led the United States and the Soviet Union each to develop satellite-based navigation systems in the 1960s and early '70s. Those systems, however, did not provide highly accurate information and were unwieldy to use. The two countries then developed second-generation products-the U.S. Navstar Global Positioning System (GPS) and the Soviet Global Navigation Satellite System (GLONASS)-that did much to solve the problems of their predecessors. The original purpose of the systems was the support of military activities, and they have continued to operate under military control while serving a wide variety of civilian uses.

GPS requires a minimum of 24 satellites, with four satellites distributed in each of six orbits. Deployment of the full complement of satellites was completed in 1994 and included provision for continual replenishment and updating and the maintenance of several spare satellites in orbit. Each satellite carries four atomic clocks accurate to one nanosecond. Because the satellites' orbits are maintained very precisely by ground controllers and the time signals from each satellite are highly accurate, users with a GPS receiver can determine their distance from each of a minimum of four satellites and, from this information, pinpoint their exact location in three dimensions with an accuracy of approximately 3 metres (10 feet) horizontally and 5 metres (16 feet) vertically.

GLONASS, which became operational in 1995, functions on the same general principles as GPS. The fully deployed system consists of 24 satellites distributed in three orbits. Because of Russia's economic difficulties, however, GLONASS for some years was not well maintained, and replacement satellite deployment was slow. However, with improved economic conditions, the Russian government gave high priority to achieving and maintaining a fully operational GLONASS system.

Notwithstanding the military origin of GPS and GLONASS, civilian users have proliferated. They range from wilderness campers, farmers, golfers, and recreational sailors to surveyors, car-rental firms, bus and truck fleets, and the world's airlines. The timing information from GPS satellites is also used by the Internet and other computer networks to manage the flow of information. Users have found ways to increase the accuracy of position location to a few centimetres by combining GPS signals with ground-based enhancements or with GLONASS signals, and affordable GPS receivers make the system widely accessible.

The United States regards GPS as a global utility to be offered free of charge to all users and has stated its intent to maintain and upgrade the system into the indefinite future. Concern has been expressed, however, that important worldwide civilian activities such as air traffic control should not depend on a system controlled by one country's military forces. In response, Europe began in the late 1990s to develop its own navigation satellite system, called Galileo, to be operated under civilian control. Galileo became operational in 2016. In the early 21st century China began to develop its own global navigation system, called Beidou ("Compass"). Initially consisting of three satellites in geostationary orbit over China, Beidou began operation in 2000. A full global version of Beidou was completed in 2020. Japan and India developed systems for regional use, the Quasi-Zenith Satellite System (QZSS) and Navigation with Indian Constellation (NavIC), respectively, which both became operational in 2018.

Military and national security uses of space
Those countries and organizations with armed forces deployed abroad were quick to recognize the great usefulness of space-based systems in military operations. The United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, China, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), and, to a lesser degree, other European countries have deployed increasingly sophisticated space systems-including satellites for communications, meteorology, and positioning and navigation-that are dedicated to military uses. In addition, the United States and Russia have developed satellites to provide early warning of hostile missile launches. Many of these satellites have been designed to meet unique military requirements, such as the ability to operate in a wartime environment, when an opponent may try to interfere with their functioning.

To date, military space systems have served primarily to enhance the effectiveness of ground-, air-, and sea-based military forces. Commanders rely on satellites to communicate with troops on the front lines, and, in extreme circumstances, national authorities could use them to issue the commands to launch nuclear weapons. Meteorological satellites assist in planning air strikes, and positioning satellites are used to guide weapons to their targets with high accuracy.

Despite the substantial military use of space, no country has deployed a space system capable of attacking a satellite in orbit or of delivering a weapon to a target on Earth. Nevertheless, as more countries acquire military space capabilities and as regional and local conflicts persist around the world, it is not clear whether space will continue to be treated as a weapons-free sanctuary.

In addition to recognizing the value of space systems in warfare, national leaders in the United States and the Soviet Union realized early on that the ability to gather information about surface-based activities such as weapons development and deployment and troop movements would assist them in planning their own national security activities. As a result, both countries deployed a variety of space systems for collecting intelligence. They include reconnaissance satellites that provide high-resolution images of Earth's surface in close to real time for use in identifying threatening activities, planning military operations, and monitoring arms-control agreements. Other satellites collect electronic signals such as telephone, radio, and Internet messages and other emissions, which can be used to determine the type of activities that are taking place in a particular location. Most national-security space activity is carried out in a highly secret manner. As the value to national security of such satellite systems has become evident, other countries, such as France, Germany, Italy, China, India, Japan, and Israel, have developed similar capabilities, and still others have begun planning their own systems.

Satellite telecommunications
Although some early space experiments explored the use of large orbiting satellites as passive reflectors of signals from point to point on Earth, most work in the late 1950s and early '60s focused on the technology by which a signal sent from the ground would be received by satellite, electronically processed, and relayed to another ground station. American Telephone and Telegraph, recognizing the commercial potential of satellite communications, in 1962 paid NASA to launch its first Telstar satellite. Because that satellite, which operated in a fairly low orbit, was in range of any one receiving antenna for only a few minutes, a large network of such satellites would have been necessary for an operational system. Engineers from the American firm Hughes Aircraft, led by Harold Rosen, developed a design for a satellite that would operate in geostationary orbit. Aided by research support from NASA, the first successful geostationary satellite, Syncom 2, was launched in 1963; it demonstrated the feasibility of the Hughes concept prior to commercial use.

The United States also took the lead in creating the organizational framework for communications satellites. Establishment of the Communications Satellite Corporation ( Comsat) was authorized in 1962 to operate American communications satellites, and two years later an international agency, the International Telecommunications Satellite Organization ( Intelsat), was formed at the proposal of the United States to develop a global network. Comsat, the original manager of Intelsat, decided to base the Intelsat network on geostationary satellites. The first commercial communications satellite, Intelsat 1, also known as Early Bird, was launched in 1965. Intelsat completed its initial global network with the stationing of a satellite over the Indian Ocean in mid-1969, in time to televise the first Moon landing around the world.

The original use of communications satellites was to relay voice, video, and data from one relatively large antenna to a second, distant one, from which the communication then would be distributed over terrestrial networks. This point-to-point application introduced international communications to many new areas of the world, and in the 1970s it also was employed domestically within a number of countries, especially the United States. As undersea fibre-optic cables improved in carrying capacity and signal quality, they became economically and technologically competitive with communications satellites, and the latter responded with comparable technological advances that allowed these space-based systems to meet the challenge. A number of companies in the United States and Europe manufacture communications satellites and vie for customers on a global basis. Other firms operate these satellites, often producing significant profits.

Other space-based communications applications have appeared, the most prominent being the broadcast of signals, primarily television programming, directly to small antennas serving individual households. A similar use is the broadcast of audio programming to small antennas in locations ranging from rural villages in the developing world to individual automobiles in the United States. International private satellite networks emerged as rivals to the originally government-owned Intelsat, which after 2001 was transformed into a private-sector organization.

Yet another service that has been devised for satellites is communication with and between mobile users. In 1979 the International Maritime Satellite Organization (Inmarsat) was formed to relay messages to ships at sea. Beginning in the late 1990s, with the growth of personal mobile communications such as cellular telephone services, several attempts were made to establish satellite-based systems for this purpose. Typically employing constellations of many satellites in low Earth orbit, they experienced difficulty competing with ground-based cellular systems. This led these companies to concentrate on specialized applications, such as offering communications services in remote areas where there are no ground-based competitors.

In the late 2010s constellations arose that would supply Internet service via satellite to the entire world. The first such launches happened in 2019 with the first 6 in the 1,980-satellite OneWeb constellation and the first 60 in SpaceX's almost 12,000-satellite Starlink constellation. Amazon has planned its own constellation, Project Kuiper, which would have 3,236 satellites. These megaconstellations would increase the number of satellites in low Earth orbit by a factor of 10, which has raised concerns among regulators about a corresponding increase in space debris and among astronomers about satellite tracks interfering in telescope images.

The first commercial space application was satellite communications, and it has remained the most successful one. One estimate of revenues associated with the industry for the year 2017 included $15.5 billion from satellite manufacturing, $119.8 billion from selling the associated ground systems, $128.7 billion from the users of satellite communication systems, and $4.6 billion for launching the satellites, for a total of $268.6 billion. As of 2020 there were more than 400 commercial geostationary communications satellites around the world, operated by about 60 different owners.

Remote sensing
Remote sensing is a term applied to the use of satellites to observe various characteristics of Earth's land and water surfaces in order to obtain information valuable in mapping, mineral exploration, land-use planning, resource management, and other activities. Remote sensing is carried out from orbit with multispectral sensors; i.e., observations are made in several discrete regions of the electromagnetic spectrum that include visible light and usually other wavelengths. From multispectral imagery, analysts are able to derive information on such varied areas of interest as crop condition and type, pollution patterns, and sea conditions.

Because many applications of remote sensing have a public-good character, a commercial remote-sensing industry has been slow to develop. In addition, the secrecy surrounding intelligence-gathering satellites during the Cold War era set stringent limits on the capabilities that could be offered on a commercial basis. Since then, however, very high resolution images (about 0.5 metre [1.5 feet]) have been gathered by several commercial systems. The United States launched the first remote-sensing satellite, NASA's Landsat 1 (originally called Earth Resources Technology Satellite), in 1972. The goals of the Landsat program, which by 2020 had included seven successful satellites, were to demonstrate the value of multispectral observation and to prepare the system for transfer to private operators. Despite two decades of attempts at such a transfer, Landsat has remained a U.S. government program. In 1986 France launched the first of its SPOT remote-sensing satellites and created a marketing organization, Spot Image, to promote use of its imagery. Six subsequent SPOT satellites have been launched. Both Landsat's and SPOT's multispectral images offered a moderate ground resolution of 10-30 metres (about 33-100 feet). Japan and India also launched multispectral remote-sensing satellites.

Since the 1990s, with the end of the Cold War, some of the technology used in reconnaissance satellites has been declassified. In addition, technological developments in India and several countries in Europe enabled those countries to develop both optical and radar Earth-observation satellites with high ground resolution and to market imagery on a commercial basis. Among major customers for high-resolution imagery are governments that lack their own reconnaissance satellites; the U.S. government has also purchased significant amounts of such imagery from U.S. commercial firms rather than obtaining it from government-operated satellites. The global availability of imagery previously available only to the leaders of a few countries is troubling to some observers, who express concern that it could lead to increased military threats. Others suggest that this widespread availability will contribute to a more stable world.

Commercial space transportation
The prosperity of the communications satellite business was accompanied by a willingness of the private sector to pay substantial sums for the launch of its satellites. Initially, most commercial communications satellites went into space on U.S.-government-operated vehicles. When the space shuttle was declared operational in 1982, it became the sole American launch vehicle providing such services. After the 1986 Challenger accident, however, the shuttle was prohibited from launching commercial payloads. This created an opportunity for the U.S. private sector to employ existing expendable launch vehicles such as the Delta, Atlas, and Titan as commercial launchers. In the 1990s, an American commercial space transportation industry emerged. Whereas the Titan was not a commercial success, the other two vehicles found a few commercial customers. However, the business was not profitable, and American firms no longer compete for commercial launch contracts, with the exception of Space Exploration Technologies ( SpaceX), which has marketed launch services using its Falcon 9 booster to customers around the world.

Europe followed a different path to commercial space transport. After deciding in the early 1970s to develop the Ariane launcher, it created under French leadership a marketing organization called Arianespace to seek commercial launch contracts for the vehicle. In the mid-1980s both the U.S.S.R. and China initiated efforts to attract commercial customers for their launch vehicles. As the industry developed in the 1990s, American companies initiated joint ventures with Russia and Ukraine to market those countries' launchers; in the 2000s these companies ended their involvement in marketing Russian launchers. China continued to market its Long March series of launch vehicles for commercial use, and other countries, such as India and Japan, hoped to market their indigenous launchers on a commercial basis. The main competition for launching large communications satellites to geosynchronous orbit, the most lucrative commercial opportunity, was between companies in Russia, China, and Europe.

However, in the 2010s, SpaceX's partially reusable Falcon 9 rocket came to dominate the commercial launch industry with its low prices. The Russian space agency Roscosmos discontinued flights of its Proton launch vehicle because of price competition, and the American company United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Lockheed Martin and Boeing, which used the Delta IV and Atlas V rockets, lost its monopoly on U.S. military launches when the air force awarded a contract to SpaceX. In 2018, out of 41 commercial launches, the Falcon 9 did 16.

In 2008 in the United States, NASA contracted on a commercial basis for the transportation of cargo to the International Space Station (ISS) rather than manage such launches itself. In 2010 this approach was extended to transporting astronauts to the space station. The first demonstration of commercial cargo delivery to the ISS took place in May 2012, with the flight of a SpaceX Dragon capsule; operational cargo flights began later that year. Commercial missions carrying crew to orbit began in 2020.

In 2017 the revenues of the commercial space transportation industry were estimated to be $5.5 billion. Analysts forecast an average of 42 commercial launches per year in the ensuing decade.

New commercial applications
Space advocates have identified a number of possible opportunities for the future commercial use of space. For their economic feasibility, many depend on lowering the cost of transportation to space, an objective that to date has eluded both governments and private entrepreneurs. Access to low Earth orbit has typically cost tens of thousands of dollars per kilogram of payload-a significant barrier to further space development. However, one company, SpaceX, lowered this cost by a factor of 10 with its Falcon 9 rocket and promises to reduce it still further with its planned Falcon Heavy.

The ISS originally was expected to be the scene of significant commercially funded research and other activity as its laboratories began to operate. This was projected to include both industry-funded microgravity research in ISS laboratories and less-conventional undertakings such as hosting fare-paying passengers, filming movies on the facility, and allowing commercial endorsements of goods used aboard the station. Commercial success for the ISS was predicted to lead to the development of new, privately financed facilities in low Earth orbit, including research, manufacturing, and residential outposts, and perhaps to privately financed transportation systems for access to those facilities. Because of delays in completing the station-particularly after the grounding of the shuttle fleet following the Columbia accident in 2003-such commercial demand for access to the station did not emerge. However, with the ISS planned to operate until at least 2024, it is possible that the private sector may use the ISS more if early research results demonstrate the facility's benefits.

Another potential commercial application is the transport of fare-paying passengers into space, known as space tourism. Various surveys have suggested a willingness among many in the general public to spend considerable sums for the opportunity to experience space travel. Although a very limited number of wealthy individuals have purchased trips into Earth orbit to visit the ISS at a very high price, large-scale development of the space tourism market will not be possible until less-expensive, highly reliable transportation systems to orbit have been developed.

One variant of space tourism is to take fare-paying passengers to the edge of space-generally set at 100 km (62 miles) altitude-for brief suborbital flights that offer a few minutes of weightlessness and a broad view of Earth. In 2004, in response to a prize competition initiated in the late 1990s, a privately funded spacecraft, named SpaceShipOne, became the first of its kind to carry human beings (in this case, test pilots) on such flights. This achievement could herald the beginning of a commercial suborbital travel business. Even so, the speed reached by SpaceShipOne was just over three times the speed of sound, roughly one-seventh of the speed required for entering a practical low-Earth orbit. Frequent commercial flights into orbit appear to be some years in the future.

However, several companies, such as Virgin Galactic with its SpaceShipTwo, hope to begin commercial suborbital flights. In addition to carrying space tourists, such flights could provide opportunities for research and technology development. One 2012 estimate suggested that there could be daily suborbital flights within 10 years of the first commercial suborbital flight.

As an alternative to existing sources of energy, suggestions have been made for space-based systems that capture large amounts of solar energy and transmit it in the form of microwaves or laser beams to Earth. Achieving this objective would require the deployment of a number of large structures in space and the development of an environmentally acceptable form of energy transmission to create a cost-effective competitor to Earth-based energy-supply systems.

Resources available on the Moon and other bodies of the solar system, particularly asteroids, represent additional potential objectives for commercial development. For example, over billions of years the solar wind has deposited large amounts of the isotope helium-3 in the soil of the lunar surface. Scientists and engineers have suggested that helium-3 could be extracted and transported to Earth, where it is rare, for use in nuclear fusion reactors. In addition, there is evidence to suggest that the Moon's polar regions contain ice, which could supply a crewed lunar outpost with drinking water, breathable oxygen, and hydrogen for spacecraft fuel. Significant quantities of potentially valuable resources such as water, carbon, nitrogen, and rare metals may also exist on some asteroids, and space mining of those resources has been proposed.

Contunico © ZDF Enterprises GmbH, Mainz; Thumbnail © dottedhippo-iStock/Getty Images

John M. Logsdon

Crewed spaceflights, 2020-
Crewed spaceflights during the 2020s are listed chronologically in the table.

mission

country

crew

date

notes

Ivan Vagner

Christopher Cassidy

Robert Behnken

Sergei Kud-Sverchkov

Kathleen Rubins

Victor Glover

Noguchi Soichi

Shannon Walker

Pyotr Dubrov

Mark Vande Hei

Katherine McArthur

Hoshide Akihiko

Thomas Pesquet

Liu Boming

Tang Hongbo

Sian Proctor

Hayley Arceneaux

Christopher Sembroski

Klim Shipenko

Yulia Peresild

Wang Yaping

Ye Guangfu

Crew-3/ISS

U.S.

Raja Chari

November 11, 2021-May 5, 2022

Expeditions 66 and 67 crew

Thomas Marshburn

Matthias Maurer

Kayla Barron

Maezawa Yusaku

Hirano Yozo

Denis Matveyev

Sergei Korsakov

Larry Connor

Mark Pathy

Eytan Stibbe

Robert Hines

Samantha Cristoforetti

Jessica Watkins

Liu Yang

Cai Xuzhe

John M. Logsdon

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Motivations for space activity Although the possibility of exploring space has long excited people in many walks of life, for most of the latter 20th century and into the early 21st century, only national governments could afford the very high costs of launching people and machines into space.

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Main idea:
In this article it is discussed how space exploration affects your life. Your home and city.

Arguments:
- Many things in your house, can be provided thanks to space exploration. For example:
- Without space exploration, you would not have many important things such as: Air purifiers, rechargable batteries, led light bulbs, liquid metals, light bulb-cancellation, digital cameras, speakers and wireless headphones.
- And without space exploration, you would not have any of these objects in the kitchen: Coffee maker, water purification, portable cordless vacum.

Dialogue:
Example on how detailed the explanations are, these is from the wireless headphones: "Wireless headset

Improved by the technology that carried Neil Armstrong’s words from the moon to Mission Control, more compact and comfortable headsets were developed for airline pilots in the 1960s and '70s. Today those advancements continue to evolve in all forms of communications and telephone equipment. Mobile headsets provide greater efficiency and flexibility for everyone from professionals conducting business to consumers playing video games."

Summary:
This article demonstrates how useful space exploration and how many objects we would not have if we did not do it.

APA:
Nasa Home & City. (n.d.). https://homeandcity.nasa.gov/

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Trace Space Back to You | Nasa Home & City

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How does space exploration affect your daily life Explore the NASA technologies you use everyday throughout your home and city!

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Main idea:
This article talks about the history of space exploration.

Arguments:
- In 1957, the Soviets launched the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, into space. Four years later, Yuri Gagarin became the first human to orbit Earth in Vostok 1.
- On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong stepped onto the moon.
- Mars is the main point of modern space exploration, and manned Mars exploration is a long-term goal of the United States. NASA has sent orbiters, landers, and rovers, increasing our knowledge about the planet.

Dialogue:
Quote about the landing of the moon: "“Landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to Earth within a decade” was a national goal set by President John F. Kennedy in 1961. On July 20, 1969, astronaut Neil Armstrong took “one giant leap for mankind” as he stepped onto the moon. "

Summary:
In this article we can see how space exploration has progressed a lot. From since it started until now. We started with launching a rocket until now, which we may are about to find out if there is water in Mars.

APA:
A Brief History of Space Exploration | The. (2022, December 29). Aerospace Corporation. https://aerospace.org/article/brief-history-space-exploration

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Humans have always looked up into the night sky and dreamed about space.

In the latter half of the 20th century, rockets were developed that were powerful enough to overcome the force of gravity to reach orbital velocities, paving the way for space exploration to become a reality.

In the 1930s and 1940s, Nazi Germany saw the possibilities of using long-distance rockets as weapons. Late in World War II, London was attacked by 200-mile-range V-2 missiles, which arched 60 miles high over the English Channel at more than 3,500 miles per hour. After World War II, the United States and the Soviet Union created their own missile programs.

On Oct. 4, 1957, the Soviets launched the first artificial satellite, Sputnik 1, into space. Four years later on April 12, 1961, Russian Lt. Yuri Gagarin became the first human to orbit Earth in Vostok 1. His flight lasted 108 minutes, and Gagarin reached an altitude of 327 kilometers (about 202 miles).

The first U.S. satellite, Explorer 1, went into orbit on Jan. 31, 1958. In 1961, Alan Shepard became the first American to fly into space. On Feb. 20, 1962, John Glenn's historic flight made him the first American to orbit Earth.

Landing On The Moon

Landing on the moon: Apollo 12 launches for second moon landing Nov. 14, 1969.

"Landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to Earth within a decade" was a national goal set by President John F. Kennedy in 1961. On July 20, 1969, astronaut Neil Armstrong took "one giant leap for mankind" as he stepped onto the Moon. Six Apollo missions were made to explore the Moon between 1969 and 1972.

During the 1960s, unmanned spacecraft photographed and probed the Moon before astronauts ever landed. By the early 1970s, orbiting communications and navigation satellites were in everyday use, and the Mariner spacecraft was orbiting and mapping the surface of Mars. By the end of the decade, the Voyager spacecraft had sent back detailed images of Jupiter and Saturn, their rings, and their moons.

Skylab, America's first space station, was a human-spaceflight highlight of the 1970s, as was the Apollo Soyuz Test Project, the world's first internationally crewed (American and Russian) space mission.

In the 1980s, satellite communications expanded to carry television programs, and people were able to pick up the satellite signals on their home dish antennas. Satellites discovered an ozone hole over Antarctica, pinpointed forest fires, and gave us photographs of the nuclear power plant disaster at Chernobyl in 1986. Astronomical satellites found new stars and gave us a new view of the center of our galaxy.

Space Shuttle

In April 1981, the launch of the space shuttle Columbia ushered in a period of reliance on the reusable shuttle for most civilian and military space missions. Twenty-four successful shuttle launches fulfilled many scientific and military requirements until Jan. 28,1986, when just 73 seconds after liftoff, the space shuttle Challenger exploded. The crew of seven was killed, including Christa McAuliffe, a teacher from New Hampshire who would have been the first civilian in space.

The Space Shuttle was the first reusable spacecraft to carry people into orbit; launch, recover, and repair satellites; conduct cutting-edge research; and help build the International Space Station.

The Columbia disaster was the second shuttle tragedy. On Feb. 1, 2003, the shuttle broke apart while reentering the Earth's atmosphere, killing all seven crew members. The disaster occurred over Texas, and only minutes before it was scheduled to land at the Kennedy Space Center. An investigation determined the catastrophe was caused by a piece of foam insulation that broke off the shuttle's propellant tank and damaged the edge of the shuttle's left wing. It was the second loss of a shuttle in 113 shuttle flights. After each of the disasters, space shuttle flight operations were suspended for more than two years.

Discovery was the first of the three active space shuttles to be retired, completing its final mission on March 9, 2011; Endeavour did so on June 1. The final shuttle mission was completed with the landing of Atlantis on July 21, 2011, closing the 30-year space shuttle program.

The Gulf War proved the value of satellites in modern conflicts. During this war, allied forces were able to use their control of the "high ground" of space to achieve a decisive advantage. Satellites were used to provide information on enemy troop formations and movements, early warning of enemy missile attacks, and precise navigation in the featureless desert terrain. The advantages of satellites allowed the coalition forces to quickly bring the war to a conclusion, saving many lives.

Space systems continue to become more and more integral to homeland defense, weather surveillance, communication, navigation, imaging, and remote sensing for chemicals, fires, and other disasters.

International Space Station

The International Space Station.

The International Space Station is a research laboratory in low Earth orbit. With many different partners contributing to its design and construction, this high-flying laboratory has become a symbol of cooperation in space exploration, with former competitors now working together.

The station has been continuously occupied since the arrival of Expedition 1 in November of 2000. The station is serviced by a variety of visiting spacecraft: the Russian Soyuz and Progress; the American Dragon and Cygnus; the Japanese H-II Transfer Vehicle; and formerly the Space Shuttle and the European Automated Transfer Vehicle. It has been visited by astronauts, cosmonauts, and space tourists from 17 different nations.

Space launch systems have been designed to reduce costs and improve dependability, safety, and reliability. Most U.S. military and scientific satellites are launched into orbit by a family of expendable launch vehicles designed for a variety of missions. Other nations have their own launch systems, and there is strong competition in the commercial launch market to develop the next generation of launch systems.

The Future Of Space Exploration

During Exploration Mission-1, Orion will venture thousands of miles beyond the Moon during an approximately three-week mission. (Image: NASA)

Modern space exploration is reaching areas once only dreamed about. Mars is focal point of modern space exploration, and manned Mars exploration is a long-term goal of the

United States. NASA is on a journey to Mars, with a goal of sending humans to the Red Planet in the 2030s.

NASA and its partners have sent orbiters, landers, and rovers, increasing our knowledge about the planet. The Curiosity Rover has gathered radiation data to protect astronauts, and the MARS 2020 Rover will study the availability of oxygen and other Martian resources.

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A Brief History of Space Exploration | The Aerospace Corporation

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The development of ballistic missiles, first used by Germany toward the end of World War II, paved the way for the launch vehicles that would fuel a space race between the Soviet Union and the United States. The space race was then followed by an era of space cooperation, highlighted by the International Space Station.

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Main idea:
We have 10 pros and 7 cons of space exploration

Arguments/facts:
- Good PROS like that space exploration can help with possible future problems
- CONS: Can be really expensive
- CONS: We are taking a huge risk

Dialogue:
It has really good PROS and CONS, that are hard to attack. Arguments are very general and also easy for everybody to understand.

Summary:
Exploring space can have several PROS and CONS, and some of them are:
PROS: It can give us many new resources. Can help with problems inside of Earth. It creates opportunities, since it is for everyone. It drives international cooperation.
CONS: We are taking huge risks, since we don't know what is out there, and we might not like what we find. We are also poluting a lot, wich is going to affect live on earth, meaning that if we aren't able to leave Earth, we will have polluted it for no reason.

APA: Gaile Branon, 2018 March 18, B, 17 Top Pros and Cons of Space Exploration:
https://brandongaille.com/17-top-pros-and-cons-of-space-exploration/

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In 2017, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA, celebrated the 40th anniversary of launching Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. These two, small spacecraft were designed to explore the outer regions of our solar system, visiting planets that had not been visited at the time. Today, they continue to voyage beyond the outer realms of our solar system to explore deep space.

The known universe is quite large and, as Carl Sagan once said, "The Earth is a very small stage in a cast cosmic arena."

Our nature is to explore. We still have regions of our planet that are mysteries to us, but those places are becoming rare and fleeting. It is for that reason we often think of space exploration as being the final frontier.

Exploring space has its benefits and its challenges. Here are the top pros and cons to think about and discuss.

List of the Top Pros of Space Exploration

1. Exploration provides us knowledge about the universe.

Exploring our solar system has provided us with valuable information. As we explore space, we can discover new mysteries about the universe that can be applied to science and technology at home. Our exploration efforts may help us to discover life outside of our planet one day. We have already discovered new planets, like Kepler 22b, that may support life in other solar systems. By taking the next step forward into space, we can begin to see what the rest of the universe has waiting for us.

2. It allows us to access new mineral resources.

Our ability to explore space has led to the innovation of satellite technologies. These satellites have allowed us to locate mineral deposit and fuel sources. They have helped us to communicate with one another more effectively. In the coming days, Elon Musk plans to launch a network of satellites that could broadcast internet access to the entire world. Space exploration allows us to find these resources on other planets, asteroids, and celestial bodies that benefit us here at home.

3. We can locate potential dangers ahead of time.

Most of the asteroids in our solar system are located between Mars and Jupiter. Comets are relegated to the fringes of the solar system. As they encounter the pull of gravity, however, their orbits can change. That means an asteroid or comet could find its way toward our planet one day. Efforts at space exploration make it possible to locate potentially dangerous asteroids and comets before they would impact the planet, giving us an opportunity to stop a potentially catastrophic chain of events.

4. It has increased our understanding of ourselves.

Space exploration has allowed us to view our planet from a different perspective. The "pale blue dot" view, for example, shows us that from a universal perspective, we are just one speck. All our hopes, dreams, and wars take place on this one speck. By seeing ourselves as the rest of the universe sees us, we can begin to set aside our differences and work toward a greater good. We are important, but we are not the center of the universe.

5. We understand how our planet operates better due to space exploration.

Our different perspective of the planet has allowed us to observe it in unique ways as well. We can see changes in the environment, for example, on a macro-scale instead of a micro-scale. Scientists have been able to study ozone depletion concerns, global warming concerns, and weather patterns thanks to space exploration. This information allows us to assess our current living conditions and make changes that can keep our planet healthier for generations to come.

6. It creates opportunities.

The drive to explore space has created numerous highly-skilled employment opportunities here on Earth. There are more than 18,000 people who are currently employed because of NASA. SpaceX has an estimated 7,000 employees and the company was founded in 2002. We often think of space exploration as the job responsibility of an astronaut, but it is much more than that. We need engineers, spacecraft designers, scientists, trainers, nutritionists, astronomers, and many more people involved in this effort and their jobs bring economic benefits to each community.

7. We define ourselves based on our need for adventure.

According to figures released in 2017, there have been a total of 18 cosmonaut and astronaut fatalities that have occurred during space flight. Another 13 fatalities have occurred during training missions for space flight or test flights of new vehicles. There have also been 28 fatalities recorded for personnel with job duties that were associated with space exploration. Why have so many people given their lives for this cause? Because we have a need to continue exploring. We must keep pushing boundaries to see what lies beyond. It is the basic definition of accomplishment.

8. It drives innovation.

The need to explore the universe has driven numerous industries toward innovative new products. We have camera phones, CAT scans, LEDs, athletic shoes, water purification systems, wireless headsets, memory foam, portable computers, and even scratch-resistant lenses because of the need to innovate for the harsh environments for space. Those innovations make life better for everyone, which allows us all to pursue our goals a little more efficiently.

9. We see ourselves as humans first.

Space exploration is one of the few tasks that we have on our planet today that drives international cooperation. We see many different cultures and nations coming together in pursuit of a common goal. This allows us to share resources, offer new perspectives, and lessen the costs of research because we are working together instead of duplicating each other's work. This level of cooperation can serve as a tool from which the world can take a lesson and emulate.

10. It is something that anyone can do.

With a telescope, anyone can begin to explore outer space. We have taken that concept to a new level with the Hubble Space Telescope, which has made over 1.3 million observations since its mission began in 1990. Scientists have published over 15,000 papers from the data it has collected since it became operational, making it one of the most successful and productive pieces of equipment humanity has ever built. We have learned more about the age of the universe, discovered new moons around Pluto, and understand more about planetary seasons outside of Earth because of the data it has collected.

List of the Top Cons of Space Exploration

1. Space exploration is a costly venture.

In 2016, the budget for NASA was $19.3 billion. Although that seems small when compared to the total U.S. budget of $3.95 trillion for that year, that figure does need to be put in perspective. According to figures released by the United Nations, it would only take $30 billion to end world hunger globally each year. If the money funneled to NASA were used to take care of Earth-based needs, the United States could eradicate about 60% of the world's hunger on its own with a simple shift of monetary resources.

2. It is a venture that will always have risks.

Humans cannot survive the conditions of space without protection. Even if humans land on Mars or another distant planet, protection against the existing conditions will be required. There are health issues to consider when the human body is exposed to gravity that is less than what is normal on Earth, including bone loss. We know that the radiation in space can be deadly. We have mitigated these risks by exploring through machines and satellites so far, but eventually, we'll need to send people out into space to see what is there.

3. We may not like what we find.

When the Voyagers were sent out into space in 1977, there were golden records placed on the spacecraft to communicate with other life about our own species. Carl Sagan compared the act to throwing a message in a bottle in the ocean. This information may reflect the hope of humanity about life in the universe in general, but these records also provide a map toward our own planet. It would be illogical to assume that every space-faring species is naturally peaceful. Some may wish to come to our planet and exploit our resources. In space, we may even find new microorganisms that are incredibly lethal.

4. It creates a huge amount of junk.

NASA is currently tracking more than 500,000 pieces of space junk that are orbiting our planet. These items will not go away unless we do something about it. From satellites that have ceased to operate to drops of coolant left behind by space vehicles, we have created a ring of debris around our planet that could be devastating to future space travelers. We also have the threat of falling space debris to consider. To deliver internet globally, SpaceX plans to send up 12,000 small satellites.

5. Nations could use space exploration to exploit one another.

There are currently 5 treaties which govern how countries operate in outer space. The goal was to make it so that no nation could claim territories in space that would give them an advantage over everyone else. That hasn't stopped countries from exploiting space to give themselves an advantage. Satellites can spy on other nations. They can monitor communications. As we push further into the cosmos, these issues will only increase. A treaty is a good first step, but it cannot be the only solution. We must come together as a planet, not as a group of nations, if we are going to explore the depths of the final frontier one day.

6. We could be harming our planet to explore others.

To reach the stars, we must consume fossil fuels. More than 3.8 million pounds of fuel and propellants was used for the space shuttle program in the United States. The cost for a single load of fuel for the SpaceX Dragon is estimated to be as high as $300,000 per launch. The first Apollo missions used over 500,000 gallons of fuel just to get out of the atmosphere. We have come a long way in our goals to reduce reliance on fossil fuels, but we must still burn them to go exploring in space. That means we are potentially harming our planet in our quest to go see new planets.

7. We could bring harm to other species.

We know how devastating human diseases have been to isolated pockets of humanity. When European colonists came to North America, smallpox killed up to 90% of the local population because they lacked immunity to the disease. It may be exciting to visit new worlds or even meet new species like ourselves, but we must take the disease risk seriously. They could infect us or we could infect them, bring harm to one another.

The top pros and cons of space exploration speak to the human spirit of exploration. They must also speak to the human spirit of common sense. We have a very big universe that offers numerous mysteries that likely defy anything in our current imagination. There is not a manifest destiny to control the stars. Instead, we must walk softly and leave no trace wherever possible to let the universe know we are ready to join its potentially extensive community.

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17 Top Pros and Cons of Space Exploration - BrandonGaille.com

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In 2017, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA, celebrated the 40th anniversary of launching Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. These two, small spacecraft were designed to explore the outer regions of our solar system, visiting planets that had not been visited at the time.

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Main idea:
We have 10 pros and 7 cons of space exploration

Arguments/facts:
- Good PROS like that space exploration can help with possible future problems
- CONS: Can be really expensive
- CONS: We are taking a huge risk

Dialogue:
It has really good PROS and CONS, that are hard to attack. Arguments are very general and also easy for everybody to understand.

Summary:
Exploring space can have several PROS and CONS, and some of them are:
PROS: It can give us many new resources. Can help with problems inside of the earth. It creates opportunities, since it is for everyone. It drives international cooperation.
CONS: We are taking huge risks, since we don't know what is out there, and we might not like what we find. We are also poluting a lot, wich is going to affect live on earth, meaning that if we aren't able to leave Earth, we will have polluted it for no reason.

APA: Gaile Branon, 2018 March 18, B, 17 Top Pros and Cons of Space Exploration :
https://brandongaille.com/17-top-pros-and-cons-of-space-exploration/

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In 2017, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA, celebrated the 40th anniversary of launching Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. These two, small spacecraft were designed to explore the outer regions of our solar system, visiting planets that had not been visited at the time. Today, they continue to voyage beyond the outer realms of our solar system to explore deep space.

The known universe is quite large and, as Carl Sagan once said, "The Earth is a very small stage in a cast cosmic arena."

Our nature is to explore. We still have regions of our planet that are mysteries to us, but those places are becoming rare and fleeting. It is for that reason we often think of space exploration as being the final frontier.

Exploring space has its benefits and its challenges. Here are the top pros and cons to think about and discuss.

List of the Top Pros of Space Exploration

1. Exploration provides us knowledge about the universe.

Exploring our solar system has provided us with valuable information. As we explore space, we can discover new mysteries about the universe that can be applied to science and technology at home. Our exploration efforts may help us to discover life outside of our planet one day. We have already discovered new planets, like Kepler 22b, that may support life in other solar systems. By taking the next step forward into space, we can begin to see what the rest of the universe has waiting for us.

2. It allows us to access new mineral resources.

Our ability to explore space has led to the innovation of satellite technologies. These satellites have allowed us to locate mineral deposit and fuel sources. They have helped us to communicate with one another more effectively. In the coming days, Elon Musk plans to launch a network of satellites that could broadcast internet access to the entire world. Space exploration allows us to find these resources on other planets, asteroids, and celestial bodies that benefit us here at home.

3. We can locate potential dangers ahead of time.

Most of the asteroids in our solar system are located between Mars and Jupiter. Comets are relegated to the fringes of the solar system. As they encounter the pull of gravity, however, their orbits can change. That means an asteroid or comet could find its way toward our planet one day. Efforts at space exploration make it possible to locate potentially dangerous asteroids and comets before they would impact the planet, giving us an opportunity to stop a potentially catastrophic chain of events.

4. It has increased our understanding of ourselves.

Space exploration has allowed us to view our planet from a different perspective. The "pale blue dot" view, for example, shows us that from a universal perspective, we are just one speck. All our hopes, dreams, and wars take place on this one speck. By seeing ourselves as the rest of the universe sees us, we can begin to set aside our differences and work toward a greater good. We are important, but we are not the center of the universe.

5. We understand how our planet operates better due to space exploration.

Our different perspective of the planet has allowed us to observe it in unique ways as well. We can see changes in the environment, for example, on a macro-scale instead of a micro-scale. Scientists have been able to study ozone depletion concerns, global warming concerns, and weather patterns thanks to space exploration. This information allows us to assess our current living conditions and make changes that can keep our planet healthier for generations to come.

6. It creates opportunities.

The drive to explore space has created numerous highly-skilled employment opportunities here on Earth. There are more than 18,000 people who are currently employed because of NASA. SpaceX has an estimated 7,000 employees and the company was founded in 2002. We often think of space exploration as the job responsibility of an astronaut, but it is much more than that. We need engineers, spacecraft designers, scientists, trainers, nutritionists, astronomers, and many more people involved in this effort and their jobs bring economic benefits to each community.

7. We define ourselves based on our need for adventure.

According to figures released in 2017, there have been a total of 18 cosmonaut and astronaut fatalities that have occurred during space flight. Another 13 fatalities have occurred during training missions for space flight or test flights of new vehicles. There have also been 28 fatalities recorded for personnel with job duties that were associated with space exploration. Why have so many people given their lives for this cause? Because we have a need to continue exploring. We must keep pushing boundaries to see what lies beyond. It is the basic definition of accomplishment.

8. It drives innovation.

The need to explore the universe has driven numerous industries toward innovative new products. We have camera phones, CAT scans, LEDs, athletic shoes, water purification systems, wireless headsets, memory foam, portable computers, and even scratch-resistant lenses because of the need to innovate for the harsh environments for space. Those innovations make life better for everyone, which allows us all to pursue our goals a little more efficiently.

9. We see ourselves as humans first.

Space exploration is one of the few tasks that we have on our planet today that drives international cooperation. We see many different cultures and nations coming together in pursuit of a common goal. This allows us to share resources, offer new perspectives, and lessen the costs of research because we are working together instead of duplicating each other's work. This level of cooperation can serve as a tool from which the world can take a lesson and emulate.

10. It is something that anyone can do.

With a telescope, anyone can begin to explore outer space. We have taken that concept to a new level with the Hubble Space Telescope, which has made over 1.3 million observations since its mission began in 1990. Scientists have published over 15,000 papers from the data it has collected since it became operational, making it one of the most successful and productive pieces of equipment humanity has ever built. We have learned more about the age of the universe, discovered new moons around Pluto, and understand more about planetary seasons outside of Earth because of the data it has collected.

List of the Top Cons of Space Exploration

1. Space exploration is a costly venture.

In 2016, the budget for NASA was $19.3 billion. Although that seems small when compared to the total U.S. budget of $3.95 trillion for that year, that figure does need to be put in perspective. According to figures released by the United Nations, it would only take $30 billion to end world hunger globally each year. If the money funneled to NASA were used to take care of Earth-based needs, the United States could eradicate about 60% of the world's hunger on its own with a simple shift of monetary resources.

2. It is a venture that will always have risks.

Humans cannot survive the conditions of space without protection. Even if humans land on Mars or another distant planet, protection against the existing conditions will be required. There are health issues to consider when the human body is exposed to gravity that is less than what is normal on Earth, including bone loss. We know that the radiation in space can be deadly. We have mitigated these risks by exploring through machines and satellites so far, but eventually, we'll need to send people out into space to see what is there.

3. We may not like what we find.

When the Voyagers were sent out into space in 1977, there were golden records placed on the spacecraft to communicate with other life about our own species. Carl Sagan compared the act to throwing a message in a bottle in the ocean. This information may reflect the hope of humanity about life in the universe in general, but these records also provide a map toward our own planet. It would be illogical to assume that every space-faring species is naturally peaceful. Some may wish to come to our planet and exploit our resources. In space, we may even find new microorganisms that are incredibly lethal.

4. It creates a huge amount of junk.

NASA is currently tracking more than 500,000 pieces of space junk that are orbiting our planet. These items will not go away unless we do something about it. From satellites that have ceased to operate to drops of coolant left behind by space vehicles, we have created a ring of debris around our planet that could be devastating to future space travelers. We also have the threat of falling space debris to consider. To deliver internet globally, SpaceX plans to send up 12,000 small satellites.

5. Nations could use space exploration to exploit one another.

There are currently 5 treaties which govern how countries operate in outer space. The goal was to make it so that no nation could claim territories in space that would give them an advantage over everyone else. That hasn't stopped countries from exploiting space to give themselves an advantage. Satellites can spy on other nations. They can monitor communications. As we push further into the cosmos, these issues will only increase. A treaty is a good first step, but it cannot be the only solution. We must come together as a planet, not as a group of nations, if we are going to explore the depths of the final frontier one day.

6. We could be harming our planet to explore others.

To reach the stars, we must consume fossil fuels. More than 3.8 million pounds of fuel and propellants was used for the space shuttle program in the United States. The cost for a single load of fuel for the SpaceX Dragon is estimated to be as high as $300,000 per launch. The first Apollo missions used over 500,000 gallons of fuel just to get out of the atmosphere. We have come a long way in our goals to reduce reliance on fossil fuels, but we must still burn them to go exploring in space. That means we are potentially harming our planet in our quest to go see new planets.

7. We could bring harm to other species.

We know how devastating human diseases have been to isolated pockets of humanity. When European colonists came to North America, smallpox killed up to 90% of the local population because they lacked immunity to the disease. It may be exciting to visit new worlds or even meet new species like ourselves, but we must take the disease risk seriously. They could infect us or we could infect them, bring harm to one another.

The top pros and cons of space exploration speak to the human spirit of exploration. They must also speak to the human spirit of common sense. We have a very big universe that offers numerous mysteries that likely defy anything in our current imagination. There is not a manifest destiny to control the stars. Instead, we must walk softly and leave no trace wherever possible to let the universe know we are ready to join its potentially extensive community.

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.title
17 Top Pros and Cons of Space Exploration - BrandonGaille.com

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
In 2017, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, or NASA, celebrated the 40th anniversary of launching Voyager 1 and Voyager 2. These two, small spacecraft were designed to explore the outer regions of our solar system, visiting planets that had not been visited at the time.

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Main idea:
Space exploration has many benefits and there are many arguments in favor that are extremely useful.

Arguments:
- It does not waste that much money.
- Space exploration has provided us with many valuable scientific information.
- Space exploration does give us direct benefit. When the space technology has advanced enough, we will be able to leave this planet in large numbers and live in the stars. The human race is changing and expanding, and soon Earth will not be big enough for all of us.

Dialogue/Opinion:
In my opinion, the in favour arguments are much stronger and much more reasonable. I do not think we should stop with space exploration since it could solve many problems which we will have in the future.

Summary:
Space exploration is vital and has helped us understand a lot of things. It gives us benefit, since as I said in my 3rd point, when the space technology is advanced enough, we will be albe to leave this planet. This could solve a lot of our current problems such as, the environmental, population, resource and energy problems. It make take some time to have that advanced technology, hundreds our even thousands of years, but we cannot get this technology without experimenting it.

APA
Dave, D. (2020, July, 10) Space Exploration Is a Waste of Money. Retreived from https://debatewise.org/137-space-exploration-is-a-waste-of-money/#:~:text=against%20space%20exploration,space%20industry%20is%20taking%20over

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Billions of dollars are spent every year by the world's space agencies, but does this money bring us any benefit, or should we pull the plug and spend it elsewhere?

All the Yes points:

1. against space exploration

2. Space exploration gives us no direct benefit

3. The Earth itself is not fully explored yet

4. A commercial space industry is taking over

5. the new crisis on planet earth: finish your priorities before starting new ones

6. Money is better used to help human lives in their own country

7. NASA is very Hazardous

8. Yes, because

9. The resources and efforts focused on space exploration could better humanity.

10. space exploration is a waste of money

11. Could have been used for more impactful endeavors

All the No points:

1. Scientific knowledge has value beyond the measurements of cost

2. The cost isn't actually very high

3. It is in man's nature to explore his environment.

4. Many discoveries have been made as a result of Space Exploration

5. Its not a waste

6. Plastics Industry/Internet

7. NASA's Inventions and innovations that help the world

8. The Largest Benefits

9. Man's uncontainable curiosity

10. Safety of Colonization

against space exploration

Spends the time and money to develop these products for use in space, but usually there are many civilian applications for the same products. Production of these product leads to redevelopment, sales and distribution - all of which leads to more jobs; somebody has to build, sell, and repair.

One last point, we know that Russia and China have both put men in space and now even more countries are getting involved. Obviously we have seen the power of Google Maps (and that is only at the civilian level). Imagine now, that other powerful countries have satellites to spy on us and can position weapons directly above our country, dont you think it would be a good idea to be abloe to stave that off. If we decided to stop "wasting" money on space programs, we can say goodbye to many new developments that will be out of reach of garage scientist and we can expect to be overwhelmed with visitors in the skies above the US.

Did you know that to build a space elevator (a space-platform constructed with the intent of lifting substances into Earth's orbit) would only cost $40 billion with 100% contingency, and half that for the baseline construction cost? There are endless possibilities, ranging from solar energy farms to revolutionary and cheap intercontinental transportation. Imagine a solar farm, capable of harvesting the solar winds; this translates to an unlimited supply of energy for not just the United States, but the entire world! The human race is changing, and expanding. Soon, the Earth will simply not be big enough and we need to start considering our future as a species.

There are issues that do plague us as a race. There is poverty and injustice in the world. While these issues exist and should certainly not be ignored, the funds put forth to space exploration have a quantifiable impact and are no less of a priority. These problems will likely not be solved by the evolution of invention and space exploration alone, but as technology improves so will the lives of every man, woman, and child regardless of gender, skin color, or wealth. Space exploration needs focus and funding, it is representative of our future, and will secure it. Space exploration is arguably the single-most important investment we could possibly make.

Space exploration gives us no direct benefit

The Earth itself is not fully explored yet

A commercial space industry is taking over

the corporations will move in whenever they see opportunity for solid profit, but it is always science, and often government funded research, that finds those opportunities in the first place.
for example you mention satellites which are an integral part of the global communications industry, which in itself would not exist without first having the invention of telephone wires, radio waves, etc., all which have led up to space satellites.

as for the prospects of space tourism again that is simply a result of the fact that governments have funded space research for all these years and finally it is getting to a point where it's cheap enough and safe enough to send paying citizens up there.

corporations will not do anything that doesn't guarantee profit so will they investigate whether there is water on the moon? whether it is possible in the future to colonize it? no. it's too much of a risk so the government has to pay for it.

the new crisis on planet earth: finish your priorities before starting new ones

there are two major crisis going on at your home planet. global warming and the world wild economic crisis, both are severe. if the government doesn't handle the economic crisis with care we all will end up poor. how can we feed the poor,fend for our selves and take care of really expensive space travels?

space travel is a unwanted business for now. how many of you'll know that NASA lost count of there budget after the first billions of dollar after the first year? is this more important than caring for the needy? when so many people are dieing as we speak can we just neglect them and say "the money we just spend went for a good cause, and these few hundreds of people who died are nothing because if we don't find a another planet to escape the cultures of global warming we all will die" is that fair for them?i say no and what will you say?

Global warming is the second most severe issue the earth is going through. we have to take care of our planet before we go roaming other planets. if the great legendary tribes of yesterday were here to see all this they would not believe that long time ago there used to be pure air to breath e and man and animal lived side by side.now everything is destroyed. if we take care of this problem with with care we would be able to overcome this disaster.

what if the space shuttle launch and then fall?then what?the government is going to have to pay more money for that.plus they might get sued.our government is dumb for going along with this.

First priority is to teach people to help themselves so that they can help us when it is time to explore space, so let's prioritize. We would not have most of the problems of today if our parents taught us better than to steal and hurt others, so let's teach the next generation so that they can explore space when they are well grounded.

Our goal here is to create a balance, not to give up one option for another.

It's sickening to see all of these people going on and on about "saving the starving and impoverished". Well then sell your computer. Stop commenting on here, go dedicate your life to helping the "starving and needy". And how many tons of rice and grain do we need to keep dropping on these countries before they get their act together and FEED THEMSELVES. I know it sounds heartless, but it's their fault. I don't care if they don't have money. Man lived for thousands of years off of the land and many (dumb) animals still manage to pull it off. Why do we have to send some christian missionaries over to dig them a well? Why can't they dig their own well? Why can't they plant their own grain? Why can't they hunt their own game or raise their own livestock? Why can't they move OUT of the areas of drought? Why is it OUR problem? You feel guilty because you live better? We shouldn't help people that will not help themselves. And something is going to happen and we will ALL be dead or starving on this planet because we refused to move on and advance the survival of our species; all pissed away on supporting some people that would probably just as soon let us starve if we were the ones without food and they were the rich ones.

Most humanitarian organizations simply give poor countries money to fend for their sick and hungry when they can instead teach them how to plant crops that survive in their harsh conditions and educate people who are illiterate and turn them into doctors or farmers. When money is just thrown at their feet, what will happen if the money runs out? When they send people to give them prepared food and medication, what will happen when they leave?
Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and feed him for a lifetime.

Money is better used to help human lives in their own country

NASA is very Hazardous

Go and search space shuttle disasters on Google you will find tons of information on how NASA failed on some of its missions risking the lives of there astronauts. Nasa scientists have lost contact with the latest unmanned spacecraft sent to Mars, the $165m Mars Polar Lander.

In September, the $125m Mars Climate Orbiter mission also failed, after an embarrassing mix-up over metric and imperial measurements.

The history of failed missions to Mars stretches back 40 years, so are they a waste of taxpayers' money, which would be better spent on more earthly needs?

Is the cost of space adventure unjustified while poverty exists in many parts of the world?

Yes, because

The resources and efforts focused on space exploration could better humanity.

Its a waste

space exploration is a waste of money

Could have been used for more impactful endeavors

Scientific knowledge has value beyond the measurements of cost

The cost isn't actually very high

It is in man's nature to explore his environment.

Many discoveries have been made as a result of Space Exploration

Space

Its not a waste

Plastics Industry/Internet

NASA's Inventions and innovations that help the world

It's pretty simple. This is were research happens. Test, trying things out. See what works. What can be improved. Patents on new innovations to create a more sustainable and efficient world.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_spin-off.

The Largest Benefits

Space Exploration has given us many,many technologies that are essential.

Satellites were some of the first venturers into space and are another critical part of our society.

Weather Forecasting (Satellites. Very important for hurricanes and dangerous storm systems, have saved lives and help us prepare for the worst.)

Velcor and non-stick pans! (Mostly a joke, but hey, they work!) (General Technology.)

GPS (Very critical if your lost somewhere, has saved lives!) (Satellites.)

Long range television! (Satellites.)

Long Range Communication (Phones,Cellphones,etc.) (Satellites.)

Internet. (Satellites, and power lines of course.)

(Much much more.)

Now onto the somewhat psyhcological and green-wise part of why we need Space Exploration.

If we stopped warring with eachohter and wasting precious minerals that we have on this Earth -on- war, we would have a lot more resources to spend on more important things such as daily life, and hey, space exploration wouldnt mind some more attention either. If we spent our time looking for other planets, and other areas of expansion. We would be a much more healthy planet and society. Our Earth is also nearlly completely explored except for the oceans depths which are frankly impossible to get to the bottom too. The pressures are far far too powerful and some even say its more dangerous to trek to the bottom of our oceans then it is into space. Our bodies and steels cannot handle the intense pressure they have for more then a half hour. (The window of an exploratory sub cracked and the crew nearly died before they had to immediately go back up.)

Look at the casualties of war and the waste of resources and land. Oil spills are causing massive damage to the eco-system, the recent gulf spill has me worried that the entire balance might just be at stake. We have seen that solar powered cars can convert it to electricity and has just as much if not more power then gas cars. (Instant accelereation* and some have gone to 100 mph.)
* You have to rev your engine on a gas car to get gas into the engine before accelerating. With electricity the power is instant.

Solar Power is infinitely renewable (Until the sun dies.) and infinitely powerful, why waste money on oil rigs? Your going to get alot more money on solar power and less expenses with minor maintence.

There are so many more things I can name at this time, but here are just a few as I must go eat for now.

Man's uncontainable curiosity

Safety of Colonization

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Space Exploration Is a Waste of Money - DebateWise

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Billions of dollars are spent every year by the world's space agencies, but does this money bring us any benefit, or should we pull the plug and spend it elsewhere?

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Main idea:
Space exploration is a waste of money, we should be focusing on ourselves and our planet instead of wasting all these minds in space exploration.

Argument/Facts:
- Waste of money: All this money could be used in humanity, feeding all the poor, etc.
- It gives us no benefit
- Not even the earth is fully explored: We should be focusing on ourselves.

Dialogue/Opinion:
In my opinion, even though space exploration may give us good things but it is not worth it. All these money can be used for something else and we could focus on our planet instead on others. According to this article, we have not had any direct benefits on space exploration until now. So apart from wasting all this money, we are also wasting time. We could have discovered so many things from Earth if we were focusing on it instead of the space. For example, we have only discorvered 5% of the ocean. And NASA at first, studied the ocean, but at some point they stopped and started researching on the space. My guess is that they found something but do not want the people to know.

I know this arguments have a point but many of the arguments in this article are very repetitive and I think that the argumants in favor are stronger.

Summary:
In conclusion, space exploration does not give us any benefit, it wastes our time and our money. We should be worrying about our planet not about space. And until now we have not figured out anything. Only that in some hundreds of years there might be water in Mars. We should be looking for solutions in our own planet.

APA
Dave, D. (2020, July, 10) Space Exploration Is a Waste of Money. Retreived from https://debatewise.org/137-space-exploration-is-a-waste-of-money/#:~:text=against%20space%20exploration,space%20industry%20is%20taking%20over

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.readable_text
Billions of dollars are spent every year by the world's space agencies, but does this money bring us any benefit, or should we pull the plug and spend it elsewhere?

All the Yes points:

1. against space exploration

2. Space exploration gives us no direct benefit

3. The Earth itself is not fully explored yet

4. A commercial space industry is taking over

5. the new crisis on planet earth: finish your priorities before starting new ones

6. Money is better used to help human lives in their own country

7. NASA is very Hazardous

8. Yes, because

9. The resources and efforts focused on space exploration could better humanity.

10. space exploration is a waste of money

11. Could have been used for more impactful endeavors

All the No points:

1. Scientific knowledge has value beyond the measurements of cost

2. The cost isn't actually very high

3. It is in man's nature to explore his environment.

4. Many discoveries have been made as a result of Space Exploration

5. Its not a waste

6. Plastics Industry/Internet

7. NASA's Inventions and innovations that help the world

8. The Largest Benefits

9. Man's uncontainable curiosity

10. Safety of Colonization

against space exploration

Spends the time and money to develop these products for use in space, but usually there are many civilian applications for the same products. Production of these product leads to redevelopment, sales and distribution - all of which leads to more jobs; somebody has to build, sell, and repair.

One last point, we know that Russia and China have both put men in space and now even more countries are getting involved. Obviously we have seen the power of Google Maps (and that is only at the civilian level). Imagine now, that other powerful countries have satellites to spy on us and can position weapons directly above our country, dont you think it would be a good idea to be abloe to stave that off. If we decided to stop "wasting" money on space programs, we can say goodbye to many new developments that will be out of reach of garage scientist and we can expect to be overwhelmed with visitors in the skies above the US.

Did you know that to build a space elevator (a space-platform constructed with the intent of lifting substances into Earth's orbit) would only cost $40 billion with 100% contingency, and half that for the baseline construction cost? There are endless possibilities, ranging from solar energy farms to revolutionary and cheap intercontinental transportation. Imagine a solar farm, capable of harvesting the solar winds; this translates to an unlimited supply of energy for not just the United States, but the entire world! The human race is changing, and expanding. Soon, the Earth will simply not be big enough and we need to start considering our future as a species.

There are issues that do plague us as a race. There is poverty and injustice in the world. While these issues exist and should certainly not be ignored, the funds put forth to space exploration have a quantifiable impact and are no less of a priority. These problems will likely not be solved by the evolution of invention and space exploration alone, but as technology improves so will the lives of every man, woman, and child regardless of gender, skin color, or wealth. Space exploration needs focus and funding, it is representative of our future, and will secure it. Space exploration is arguably the single-most important investment we could possibly make.

Space exploration gives us no direct benefit

The Earth itself is not fully explored yet

A commercial space industry is taking over

the corporations will move in whenever they see opportunity for solid profit, but it is always science, and often government funded research, that finds those opportunities in the first place.
for example you mention satellites which are an integral part of the global communications industry, which in itself would not exist without first having the invention of telephone wires, radio waves, etc., all which have led up to space satellites.

as for the prospects of space tourism again that is simply a result of the fact that governments have funded space research for all these years and finally it is getting to a point where it's cheap enough and safe enough to send paying citizens up there.

corporations will not do anything that doesn't guarantee profit so will they investigate whether there is water on the moon? whether it is possible in the future to colonize it? no. it's too much of a risk so the government has to pay for it.

the new crisis on planet earth: finish your priorities before starting new ones

there are two major crisis going on at your home planet. global warming and the world wild economic crisis, both are severe. if the government doesn't handle the economic crisis with care we all will end up poor. how can we feed the poor,fend for our selves and take care of really expensive space travels?

space travel is a unwanted business for now. how many of you'll know that NASA lost count of there budget after the first billions of dollar after the first year? is this more important than caring for the needy? when so many people are dieing as we speak can we just neglect them and say "the money we just spend went for a good cause, and these few hundreds of people who died are nothing because if we don't find a another planet to escape the cultures of global warming we all will die" is that fair for them?i say no and what will you say?

Global warming is the second most severe issue the earth is going through. we have to take care of our planet before we go roaming other planets. if the great legendary tribes of yesterday were here to see all this they would not believe that long time ago there used to be pure air to breath e and man and animal lived side by side.now everything is destroyed. if we take care of this problem with with care we would be able to overcome this disaster.

what if the space shuttle launch and then fall?then what?the government is going to have to pay more money for that.plus they might get sued.our government is dumb for going along with this.

First priority is to teach people to help themselves so that they can help us when it is time to explore space, so let's prioritize. We would not have most of the problems of today if our parents taught us better than to steal and hurt others, so let's teach the next generation so that they can explore space when they are well grounded.

Our goal here is to create a balance, not to give up one option for another.

It's sickening to see all of these people going on and on about "saving the starving and impoverished". Well then sell your computer. Stop commenting on here, go dedicate your life to helping the "starving and needy". And how many tons of rice and grain do we need to keep dropping on these countries before they get their act together and FEED THEMSELVES. I know it sounds heartless, but it's their fault. I don't care if they don't have money. Man lived for thousands of years off of the land and many (dumb) animals still manage to pull it off. Why do we have to send some christian missionaries over to dig them a well? Why can't they dig their own well? Why can't they plant their own grain? Why can't they hunt their own game or raise their own livestock? Why can't they move OUT of the areas of drought? Why is it OUR problem? You feel guilty because you live better? We shouldn't help people that will not help themselves. And something is going to happen and we will ALL be dead or starving on this planet because we refused to move on and advance the survival of our species; all pissed away on supporting some people that would probably just as soon let us starve if we were the ones without food and they were the rich ones.

Most humanitarian organizations simply give poor countries money to fend for their sick and hungry when they can instead teach them how to plant crops that survive in their harsh conditions and educate people who are illiterate and turn them into doctors or farmers. When money is just thrown at their feet, what will happen if the money runs out? When they send people to give them prepared food and medication, what will happen when they leave?
Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and feed him for a lifetime.

Money is better used to help human lives in their own country

NASA is very Hazardous

Go and search space shuttle disasters on Google you will find tons of information on how NASA failed on some of its missions risking the lives of there astronauts. Nasa scientists have lost contact with the latest unmanned spacecraft sent to Mars, the $165m Mars Polar Lander.

In September, the $125m Mars Climate Orbiter mission also failed, after an embarrassing mix-up over metric and imperial measurements.

The history of failed missions to Mars stretches back 40 years, so are they a waste of taxpayers' money, which would be better spent on more earthly needs?

Is the cost of space adventure unjustified while poverty exists in many parts of the world?

Yes, because

The resources and efforts focused on space exploration could better humanity.

Its a waste

space exploration is a waste of money

Could have been used for more impactful endeavors

Scientific knowledge has value beyond the measurements of cost

The cost isn't actually very high

It is in man's nature to explore his environment.

Many discoveries have been made as a result of Space Exploration

Space

Its not a waste

Plastics Industry/Internet

NASA's Inventions and innovations that help the world

It's pretty simple. This is were research happens. Test, trying things out. See what works. What can be improved. Patents on new innovations to create a more sustainable and efficient world.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NASA_spin-off.

The Largest Benefits

Space Exploration has given us many,many technologies that are essential.

Satellites were some of the first venturers into space and are another critical part of our society.

Weather Forecasting (Satellites. Very important for hurricanes and dangerous storm systems, have saved lives and help us prepare for the worst.)

Velcor and non-stick pans! (Mostly a joke, but hey, they work!) (General Technology.)

GPS (Very critical if your lost somewhere, has saved lives!) (Satellites.)

Long range television! (Satellites.)

Long Range Communication (Phones,Cellphones,etc.) (Satellites.)

Internet. (Satellites, and power lines of course.)

(Much much more.)

Now onto the somewhat psyhcological and green-wise part of why we need Space Exploration.

If we stopped warring with eachohter and wasting precious minerals that we have on this Earth -on- war, we would have a lot more resources to spend on more important things such as daily life, and hey, space exploration wouldnt mind some more attention either. If we spent our time looking for other planets, and other areas of expansion. We would be a much more healthy planet and society. Our Earth is also nearlly completely explored except for the oceans depths which are frankly impossible to get to the bottom too. The pressures are far far too powerful and some even say its more dangerous to trek to the bottom of our oceans then it is into space. Our bodies and steels cannot handle the intense pressure they have for more then a half hour. (The window of an exploratory sub cracked and the crew nearly died before they had to immediately go back up.)

Look at the casualties of war and the waste of resources and land. Oil spills are causing massive damage to the eco-system, the recent gulf spill has me worried that the entire balance might just be at stake. We have seen that solar powered cars can convert it to electricity and has just as much if not more power then gas cars. (Instant accelereation* and some have gone to 100 mph.)
* You have to rev your engine on a gas car to get gas into the engine before accelerating. With electricity the power is instant.

Solar Power is infinitely renewable (Until the sun dies.) and infinitely powerful, why waste money on oil rigs? Your going to get alot more money on solar power and less expenses with minor maintence.

There are so many more things I can name at this time, but here are just a few as I must go eat for now.

Man's uncontainable curiosity

Safety of Colonization

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Space Exploration Is a Waste of Money - DebateWise

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Billions of dollars are spent every year by the world's space agencies, but does this money bring us any benefit, or should we pull the plug and spend it elsewhere?

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Why exploring space matters | Stephen Hawking | TEDxLondon

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Main idea: In this article we have 17 Pros and Cons of space exploration. However, I am only going to talk about the CONS.

Arguments/facts:
-Space exploration is really expensive
-We are taking A LOT of risks, since we may not like what we find
-It can pollute a lot planet Earth

Dialogue:
I find the arguments quite good.
Important ot remember, that even if we explore space, it is important to still take care of Earth, so pollution isn't a good thing.
There are more PROS than CONS in this article

Summary:
Me should explore spance because:
We are taking a huge risk. It is bad for our planet is many ways, such as for example our economy, the environment, and it could potentually create some type of war between to different nations.

APA:
+Gaille Brandon, 2018 March 19, BRANDON GAILLE Small business and Marketing Advice, 17 Top Pros and Cons of Space Exploration
https://brandongaille.com/17-top-pros-and-cons-of-space-exploration/

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Main idea: There are 5 main reasons discussed in this article of why it is a good idea to explora space.

Arguments/facts:
-Space exploration could save our lifes
-Many precious material in outer space
-Medical researches could cure different diseases

Dialogue:
I think that "could potentially save the world" is a big pro
The arguments given are valid and are difficult to counter.

Summary:
There ar emany reason why we should have to explore space. According to this article, space exploration isn't a waste of money because it ca:
we are nearly 8 billion humans in our planet, and there is no certainty that the planet we are living in is going to last forever. Whith climate change and several other problems, space exploration and even colonization might be the way to go.

APA:
Whitwam Ryan, 2022 July 29, EXTREMETECH, 5 Reasons Space Exploration Is More Important Than Ever
https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/268062-5-reasons-space-exploration-is-more-important-than-ever#:~:text=Without%20space%20programs%2C%20we%20wouldn,t%20be%20done%20on%20Earth.

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This site may earn affiliate commissions from the links on this page. Terms of use.

Space may be the final frontier, but it's an expensive one to explore. There are ample problems with which to contend here on Earth, and that leads some people to wonder if space exploration is worth the hassle. At ExtremeTech, we believe the answer is unequivocally "yes." Here are five reasons why space exploration is vital to humanity.

New Technologies and Research

Humans did not evolve to go into space, but we go there anyway. That has led to the development of various technologies that feed back into the economy and improve our lives on Earth. Without space programs, we wouldn't have GPS, accurate weather prediction, solar cells, or the ultraviolet filters in sunglasses and cameras. There's also medical research happening in space right now that could cure diseases and prolong human lives, and these experiments can't be done on Earth. Space exploration could save your life.

Asteroids and Comets Don't Care About Us

Speaking of saving lives, space exploration could save all our lives. Our solar system has calmed down a lot since the early eons, but there are still uncountable big asteroids and comets out there that could smack into the planet and really ruin your day. It's happened several times in the past, each one causing a mass extinction. It's not a matter of if another large asteroid hits Earth, but when. A robust space program is the only hope we have of deflecting such an object.

Colonization Is the Ultimate Backup

There are currently more than 7 billion humans, which is a lot. However, we're all crammed together on this one planet. If something happened to Earth, our species could be wiped out. For example, the aforementioned asteroid impact. Colonizing other bodies in the solar system is a way to create a "backup" of humanity that will survive no matter what happens to Earth. Maybe future humans will be Martians who will never set foot on Earth.

Space Mining Could Save the World

As we develop new technologies on Earth, the strain on our natural resources continues to increase. The extraction of valuable minerals has led to a host of problems, including environmental damage and human exploitation, but there's a wealth of precious materials in space. Startups like Planetary Resources want to mine asteroids instead of Earth, which would mean an effectively unlimited supply of raw materials that are rare on Earth.

We Are Explorers

There are more practical reasons for space exploration, but one of the principle reasons we must continue is that we're explorers. That's why humans number in the billions - from our earliest upright steps, we've endeavored to learn more about the world around us, and this allowed us to build civilization. Exploring space is an opportunity not only to discover new worlds and build advanced technologies, but to work together toward a larger goal irrespective of nationality, race, or gender. If we stop exploring, we stop being human.

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5 Reasons Space Exploration Is More Important Than Ever - ExtremeTech

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This site may earn affiliate commissions from the links on this page. Terms of use. Space may be the final frontier, but it's an expensive one to explore. There are ample problems with which to contend here on Earth, and that leads some people to wonder if space exploration is worth the hassle.

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Main idea:
In this article several things are discussed, howeever it talks mostly about the history of space exploration and its history.

Arguments/facts:
-Humans have ever since the begginning looking at the stars
-Most significant milestones have been made by U.S or U.S.S.R
-The first person to be launched into space was Yuri Gagarin

Dialogue:
This article is really long, and it only talks about the history. It is really long, and it necessarily doesn't help with our topic.

Summary:

Humans have been looking at space since the beggining of time.Only until late 20th century, only really big and wealthy countries could afford it. After the WWII, big governements started to research a lot about nature for several reasons.The first satellite had been launched for the first time in 1957 by the soviet. The article starts to explain a lot of more other milestones, and started to explore more space.
When we look at a chart with the milestones, we see that in the beggining there is only U.S and the U.S.S.R.
Then the article starts to explain really detailled the history of space exploration. It talks about Tsiolkovsky Goddard, Oberth...
It explains everything from the early rocket development up until now. It also explains a little bit about the effects, space physics...

APA:
Logsdon John, 2023 January 4, Britannica, Space Exploration:
https://www.britannica.com/science/space-exploration/Early-rocket-development

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Motivations for space activity

Although the possibility of exploring space has long excited people in many walks of life, for most of the latter 20th century and into the early 21st century, only national governments could afford the very high costs of launching people and machines into space. This reality meant that space exploration had to serve very broad interests, and it indeed has done so in a variety of ways. Government space programs have increased knowledge, served as indicators of national prestige and power, enhanced national security and military strength, and provided significant benefits to the general public. In areas where the private sector could profit from activities in space, most notably the use of satellites as telecommunication relays, commercial space activity has flourished without government funding. In the early 21st century, entrepreneurs believed that there were several other areas of commercial potential in space, most notably privately funded space travel.

In the years after World War II, governments assumed a leading role in the support of research that increased fundamental knowledge about nature, a role that earlier had been played by universities, private foundations, and other nongovernmental supporters. This change came for two reasons. First, the need for complex equipment to carry out many scientific experiments and for the large teams of researchers to use that equipment led to costs that only governments could afford. Second, governments were willing to take on this responsibility because of the belief that fundamental research would produce new knowledge essential to the health, the security, and the quality of life of their citizens. Thus, when scientists sought government support for early space experiments, it was forthcoming. Since the start of space efforts in the United States, the Soviet Union, and Europe, national governments have given high priority to the support of science done in and from space. From modest beginnings, space science has expanded under government support to include multibillion-dollar exploratory missions in the solar system. Examples of such efforts include the development of the Curiosity Mars rover, the Cassini-Huygens mission to Saturn and its moons, and the development of major space-based astronomical observatories such as the Hubble Space Telescope.

Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev in 1957 used the fact that his country had been first to launch a satellite as evidence of the technological power of the Soviet Union and of the superiority of communism. He repeated these claims after Yuri Gagarin's orbital flight in 1961. Although U.S. Pres. Dwight D. Eisenhower had decided not to compete for prestige with the Soviet Union in a space race, his successor, John F. Kennedy, had a different view. On April 20, 1961, in the aftermath of the Gagarin flight, he asked his advisers to identify a "space program which promises dramatic results in which we could win." The response came in a May 8, 1961, memorandum recommending that the United States commit to sending people to the Moon, because "dramatic achievements in space...symbolize the technological power and organizing capacity of a nation" and because the ensuing prestige would be "part of the battle along the fluid front of the cold war." From 1961 until the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, competition between the United States and the Soviet Union was a major influence on the pace and content of their space programs. Other countries also viewed having a successful space program as an important indicator of national strength.

Even before the first satellite was launched, U.S. leaders recognized that the ability to observe military activities around the world from space would be an asset to national security. Following on the success of its photoreconnaissance satellites, which began operation in 1960, the United States built increasingly complex observation and electronic-intercept intelligence satellites. The Soviet Union also quickly developed an array of intelligence satellites, and later a few other countries instituted their own satellite observation programs. Intelligence-gathering satellites have been used to verify arms-control agreements, provide warnings of military threats, and identify targets during military operations, among other uses.

In addition to providing security benefits, satellites offered military forces the potential for improved communications, weather observation, navigation, timing, and position location. This led to significant government funding for military space programs in the United States and the Soviet Union. Although the advantages and disadvantages of stationing force-delivery weapons in space have been debated, as of the early 21st century, such weapons had not been deployed, nor had space-based antisatellite systems-that is, systems that can attack or interfere with orbiting satellites. The stationing of weapons of mass destruction in orbit or on celestial bodies is prohibited by international law.

Governments realized early on that the ability to observe Earth from space could provide significant benefits to the general public apart from security and military uses. The first application to be pursued was the development of satellites for assisting in weather forecasting. A second application involved remote observation of land and sea surfaces to gather imagery and other data of value in crop forecasting, resource management, environmental monitoring, and other applications. The U.S., the Soviet Union, Europe, and China also developed their own satellite-based global positioning systems, originally for military purposes, that could pinpoint a user's exact location, help in navigating from one point to another, and provide very precise time signals. These satellites quickly found numerous civilian uses in such areas as personal navigation, surveying and cartography, geology, air-traffic control, and the operation of information-transfer networks. They illustrate a reality that has remained constant for a half century-as space capabilities are developed, they often can be used for both military and civilian purposes.

Another space application that began under government sponsorship but quickly moved into the private sector is the relay of voice, video, and data via orbiting satellites. Satellite telecommunications has developed into a multibillion-dollar business and is the one clearly successful area of commercial space activity. A related, but economically much smaller, commercial space business is the provision of launches for private and government satellites. In 2004 a privately financed venture sent a piloted spacecraft, SpaceShipOne, to the lower edge of space for three brief suborbital flights. Although it was technically a much less challenging achievement than carrying humans into orbit, its success was seen as an important step toward opening up space to commercial travel and eventually to tourism. More than 15 years after SpaceShipOne reached space, several firms began to carry out such suborbital flights. Companies have arisen that also use satellite imagery to provide data for business about economic trends. Suggestions have been made that in the future other areas of space activity, including using resources found on the Moon and near-Earth asteroids and the capture of solar energy to provide electric power on Earth, could become successful businesses.

Most space activities have been pursued because they serve some utilitarian purpose, whether increasing knowledge, adding to national power, or making a profit. Nevertheless, there remains a powerful underlying sense that it is important for humans to explore space for its own sake, "to see what is there." Although the only voyages that humans have made away from the near vicinity of Earth-the Apollo flights to the Moon-were motivated by Cold War competition, there have been recurrent calls for humans to return to the Moon, travel to Mars, and visit other locations in the solar system and beyond. Until humans resume such journeys of exploration, robotic spacecraft will continue to serve in their stead to explore the solar system and probe the mysteries of the universe.

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Space exploration | History, Definition, & Facts

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Space exploration, investigation, by means of crewed and uncrewed spacecraft, of the reaches of the universe beyond Earth's atmosphere and the use of the information so gained to increase knowledge of the cosmos and benefit humanity. Learn more about space exploration in this article.

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Main idea:

Since 1957 people have been launching different types of artefacts to space including satellites, spaceships and even people. There was this “war” between the Soviet Union and the USA. This war is called The Cold War and there was a space race.

Arguments/facts:

This competition came to a head with the launch of Sputnik. Carried atop an R7 rocket, the Sputnik satellite was able to send out beeps from a radio transmitter.

Space exploration activities in the United States were consolidated into a new government agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).

The first space station in Earth orbit was the Soviet Salyut 1 station, which was launched in 1971.

Dialogue:

This might be useful for our presentation because it is very important to know where, when and how our topic started. It is interesting that the origin of Space Exploration was a competition or a kind of “war”.

Summary:

During the time that has passed since the launching of the first artificial satellite in 1957, astronauts have travelled to the moon, probes have explored the solar system, and instruments in space have discovered thousands of planets around other stars.

APA:

(n.a.), (n.d.) National Geographic, The History of Space Exploration

Retrieved from:

https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/history-space-exploration

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During the time that has passed since the launching of the first artificial satellite in 1957, astronauts have traveled to the moon, probes have explored the solar system, and instruments in space have discovered thousands of planets around other stars.