12 December 2018
Chang'e 4 decelerated and entered the lunar orbit at 16:45 h Beijing Time (8:45 h UTC) on 12 December, completing a vital step on its way to make the first-ever soft landing on the far side of the Moon, the China National Space Administration (CNSA) announced. After flying about 110 hours from Earth, an engine on the probe was ignited when it was 129 km above the surface of the Moon, in line with instructions sent from a control center in Beijing at 16:39 h, and then the probe slowed and entered an elliptical lunar orbit with the perilune at about 100 km at 16:45 h Beijing Time, said CNSA.
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related:
Chang’e-4 Successfully Enters Lunar Orbit - Next stop: the Lunar Farside

 

 

12 December 2018
Hundreds of leading scientists and technologists from the UK and Chinese space research and industry are discussing how to deepen the collaboration and pave the way for future innovation at the 13th UK-China workshop on space science and technology in Ningbo City, east China's Zhejiang Province, from 11 to 13 December.
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12 December 2018
Eric Berger writes on the webportal arsTECHNICA: "China has an increasingly ambitious space program, which it views as critical to establishing itself as a global superpower. China has both military ambitions in space (where some of its technologies rival the United States'), as well as a desire for international prestige by doing new and interesting things in space. Sure, NASA has done a lot of amazing things, but it has not done a mission like the one China is attempting. This is one reason why an unprecedented, soft landing on the far side of the Moon is a big deal for the country."
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10 December 2018
Algae can withstand temperatures up to 60 degrees centigrade, and ultraviolet radiation and drought, said Liu Yongding, a researcher at the Wuhan-based Institute of Hydrobiology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, who has studied algae for over 40 years. Liu has an ambitious goal: letting algae pioneer human migration to Mars. Since 1987, his team has studied algae to support astronauts' long stay in space. They have carried out experiments on six of China's returnable satellites, and biological experiments on the Shenzhou spacecraft. They have worked with German scientists to research the life support system on the Shenzhou-8 spacecraft. They will also carry out experiments on China's future space station.
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