The Complete Book of Spaceflight: From Apollo 1 to Zero Gravity

40 Artemis Project
ESA devised a four-step recovery strategy that should
allow ARTEMIS eventually to reach its correct geostationary
position and function as originally planned for at
least five years. The first two steps of this strategy involved
several firings of the satellite’s solid-propellant apogee
kick motor to raise the apogee (highest point of the orbit)
and then circularize the orbit at about 31,000 km, while
the second two involved an unforeseen use of the ion
engine for maneuvering into geostationary orbit.
Launch
Vehicle: Ariane 5
Date: July 12, 2001
Site: Kourou
Initial orbit
Intended: 858 × 35,853 km × 2°
Actual: 590 × 17,487 km × 2.9°
Artemis Project, the
A multi-industry program to establish a commercial lunar
base, led by the Lunar Resources Company of Houston.
It is supported by the Artemis Society, which publishes
Pleiades, a monthly newsletter, and Artemis, a bimonthly
commercial magazine.
artificial gravity
The simulation of the pull of gravity aboard a space station,
space colony, or manned spacecraft by the steady
rotation, at an appropriate angular speed, of all or part of
the vessel. Such a technique may be essential for longduration
missions to avoid adverse physiological (and possibly
psychological) reactions to weightlessness.
The idea of a rotating wheel-like space station goes back
as far as 1928 in the writings of Herman Noordung and
was developed further by Werhner von Braun. Its most
famous fictional representation is in the film 2001: A
Space Odyssey, which depicts spin-generated artificial gravity
aboard a spaceship bound for Jupiter. The O’Neill-type
space colony provides another classic illustration of this
technique.
However, there are several reasons why large-scale rotation
is unlikely to be used to simulate gravity in the near
ARTV Missions
future. In the case of a manned Mars spacecraft, for example,
the structure required would be prohibitively big, massive,
and costly in terms of energy to run (except possibly
in the case of an orbital cycler). A better approach for such
a mission, and one being explored, is to provide astronauts
with a small spinning bed on which they can lie for an
hour or so each day, head at the center and feet pointing
out, so that their bodies can be loaded in approximately
the same way they would be under Earth-normal gravity.
In the case of space stations, one of the objects is to
carry out experiments in zero-g,or, more precisely, microgravity.
In a rotating structure, the only gravity-free place
is along the axis of rotation. At right-angles to this axis,
the pull of simulated gravity varies as the square of the
tangential speed.
Another way to achieve Earth-normal gravity is not
by constant rotation, which produces the required force
through angular acceleration, but by steadily increasing
straight-line speed at just the right rate. This is the
method used in the hypothetical 1g spacecraft. 279
ARTV (Advanced Reentry Test Vehicle)
Early American suborbital reentry tests involving mice
named Mia, Mia II, and Wickie. (See table, “ARTV Missions.”)
Launch
Vehicle: Thor-Able
Site: Cape Canaveral
Aryabhata
India’s first satellite, named for the Indian mathematician
(c. A.D. 450). The Soviet Union assisted India in developing
Aryabhata, which carried out satellite technology tests
and made observations of the upper atmosphere.
Launch
Date: April 19, 1975
Vehicle: Cosmos-3M
Site: Kapustin Yar
Orbit: 398 × 409 km × 50.7°
Mass: 360 kg
Mission Launch Date Notes
ARTV 1 Apr. 24, 1958 Failed due to Thor turbopump problem; Mouse Mia not recovered
ARTV 2 Jul. 10, 1958 Mouse Mia II reached 1,600 km altitude, flew 9,600 km range, but reentry vehicle not
recovered
ARTV 3 Jul. 23, 1958 Mouse Wickie not recovered; nosecone lost