News

With conference season in full swing and SpaceRef Co-founder and Senior Editor Marc Boucher in Prague covering the 61st International Astronautical Congress (IAC2010) all this week, it’s time to take a quick look at some of the other space focused events, conferences and conventions coming up over the next little while.

Zombie satellite refuses to die; threatens Anik F3! Meanwhile, back on Earth, the Constellation program also refuses to die and continues to swallow whole the brains, money and other assets rightly belonging to others in the US space program but not Canadian government favorite Macdonald Detwiller (MDA) which just keeps going and going. All that and more, this week in space for Canada.

MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates Ltd. (MDA) was awarded a $6 million (CAD) contract today by the Canadian Space Agency (CSA) to develop a terrestrial prototype of a science rover for Mars exploration. The Mars Exploration Science Rover (MESR) prototype is part of the CSA Exploration Surface Mobility (ESM) program.

With more than a half-dozen posters available for delegates to view, Gordon Zhou – a young researcher at the University of British Columbia’s department of civil engineering – said in-situ resource utilization (ISRU) is the one theme that unites the posters he wrote with Austin Mardon, at the Antarctic Institute of Canada.

The Canadian Space Agency (CSA) has spent the past three years putting “considerable emphasis” on lunar exploration technologies, according to the paper Advanced technology Development for Space Exploration at the Canadian Space Agency being presented at the Lunar Exploration Analysis Group this week.

The Canadian Space Society announced the Call for Papers for the upcoming Canadian Space Summit. The summit is an annual conference that brings together all elements of the Canadian space industry. The annual meeting is being held between November 19th through the 21st at the Lord Elgin Hotel in Ottawa. In addition to displays, booths, and activities, the centerpiece of the Summit are two days …

The next Canadian Space Commerce Association meeting is Thursday, September 16, 2010 from 7:30 to 9:00 pm at the law office of Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP, 199 Bay Street, Suite 2800, Commerce Court West, Toronto, ON M5L 1A9 (a map to the office can be found at: http://www.blakes.com/english/toronto.html).

Just in time for its annual Canadian Space Summit the Canadian Space Society has added software Industry heavyweight Analytical Graphics, Inc (AGI) as a major corporate sponsor to the ranks of its contributors. AGI provides software for timely and cost-effective development of advanced space, defense and intelligence applications.

The concept of mining on the moon is “embryonic”, notes Dale Boucher, a researcher from the Northern Centre for Advanced Technology (NORCAT), but with the right economic argument there will be companies interested in getting involved. Boucher co-authored the paper Assessing the Resource Potential of the Moon: The Case for a Decadal-Scale Robotic Lunar Exploration Program presented at this weeks Lunar Exploration Analysis Group meeting.