Search

We review analytical formulae for low-thrust orbital transfers from a circular initial orbit to a circular target orbit and to escape, using constant thrust applied in the same direction as the velocity vector, or in the opposite direction. The formulae give approximations for the maneuver time, final mass fraction, and evolution of the semimajor axis. For comparison, the associated results for high-thrust Hohmann and Oberth transfers are summarized. A simple computer program employing the aforementioned relationships is a useful tool for analysis of planar planetary and interplanetary space missions. This implementation yields fast and reasonably accurate approximations to trajectory performance boundaries. Consequently, the approach can provide trajectory analysis for each spacecraft configuration during the conceptual space mission design phase. As an example, a mission from Low-Earth Orbit (LEO) to Jupiter’s moon Europa is analyzed.

This review surveys the origin and conceptual evolution of the space station. It opens with US President Ronald W. Reagan's announcement that one would be developed during the coming decade, continues with an assessment by the Space Science Board of the US National Academy of Sciences of requirements for and potential benefits of a space station, and offers NASA's rationale for its development, construction and utilization. The review examines early space station concepts, beginning with Edward Everell Hale's Brick Moonof 1869–1870 and going on to proposals by space pioneers Tsiolkovskii of Russia, Oberth of Germany, Noordung and von Pirquet of Austria, and others. Considerable attention is focused on designs put forward during the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s by individuals, by NASA investigators, and by industrial and other contractors. Langley's rotating hexagon, the space base configurations and other designs are reviewed, and strategies are considered for resolving the problem of integrating a multidisciplinary research program with varying and sometimes incompatible engineering and design requirements. The article describes the power tower and dual keel configurations of the 1980s. The interdisciplinary nature of the space station is evident throughout.

AbstractThis review surveys the origin and conceptual evolution of the space station. It opens with US President Ronald W. Reagan's announcement that one would be developed during the coming decade, continues with an assessment by the Space Science Board of the US National Academy of Sciences of requirements for and potential benefits of a space station, and offers NASA's rationale for its development, construction and utilization. The review examines early space station concepts, beginning with Edward Everell Hale's Brick Moonof 1869–1870 and going on to proposals by space pioneers Tsiolkovskii of Russia, Oberth of Germany, Noordung and von Pirquet of Austria, and others. Considerable attention is focused on designs put forward during the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s by individuals, by NASA investigators, and by industrial and other contractors. Langley's rotating hexagon, the space base configurations and other designs are reviewed, and strategies are considered for resolving the problem of integrating a multidisciplinary research program with varying and sometimes incompatible engineering and design requirements. The article describes the power tower and dual keel configurations of the 1980s. The interdisciplinary nature of the space station is evident throughout.

Recounts the ideas men have had through history for space stations, including some early ideas by thinkers such as Edward Hale, Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, Hermann Oberth and Wernher von Braun.

AIR FORCE AWARD FOR RESEARCH IN SPACE FLIGHT.— For research in the medical aspects of space flight, Hubertus Strughold, M.D., head, department of space medicine at the Air Force School of Aviation Medicine, Randolph Field, Texas, has been awarded the Hermann Oberth Medal of the German Rocket Society. The presentation was made in August at Innsbruck, Austria, where Dr. Strughold was attending the fifth annual congress of the International Astronautical Federation. The previous recipients of the medal have been engineers.An early specialist in aviation medicine and high-altitude physiology, Dr. Strughold was head of the Aeromedical Institute of Berlin before World War II. Since 1947 he has been a staff member of the U. S. Air Force school. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Muenster in 1922 and his M.D. from the University of Wurzburgh in 1923. He was a fellow of the Rockefeller Foundation in 1928-1929 doing

Teletherapy, a New Kind of QuackeryDr. Oberth Johann, a duly qualified medical man, caused a painful sensation not only in medical circles but also among the more intelligent lay public by whole page advertisements, which appeared in almost all the provincial daily papers. In his advertisements he offers to the public his newly invented therapeutic method teletherapy, the treating of the sick from any distance. He doesn't display the "secret" of his method but states that his success with it has surpassed his most audacious hopes and that with the "proper sitting in of the patient the undertaken treatment is a sure success," be the patient at ever so great a distance. He has simply to describe the symptoms of his ailments by filling a question blank, and the rest is done by teletherapy, provided the filled in blank is accompanied by 1.000 lei. "My patients heal as with