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Northrop Grumman team recognized by NASA for successful control center relocation by Matt Jorgenson for NGC News Huntsville AL (SPX) Dec 25, 2020
Designed and built by Northrop Grumman, the Chandra X-ray Observatory is part of NASA's fleet of "Great Observatories," allowing scientists from around the world to explore very hot regions of exploded stars, clusters of galaxies and matter around black holes. In an elliptical orbit over 85,000 miles from the Earth, Chandra's X-ray images of some of the most extreme phenomena are leading to discoveries that are furthering our understanding of the structure and evolution of the universe. For more than 20 years, the science and data driven mission was operated from the Chandra Operations Control Center (OCC) near the campus of Harvard University, home of the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard and Smithsonian, and the Chandra X-Ray Center. From early 2017 through July 2019, the Chandra OCC relocation team - comprised of Northrop Grumman, NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, Smithsonian Institution and other industry partners - worked together to bring a new control center online in a new location. The team successfully executed the challenging and extensive control center relocation, adhering to a strict schedule while maintaining the observatory operational safety and science data delivery, to its new location in Burlington, Massachusetts, 20 miles from Cambridge. NASA recognized the team in September 2020 with a NASA Agency-level Honor Award for outstanding site selection, design, development, test and verification of a new Chandra Operations Control Center (OCC). "Northrop Grumman has a deep heritage of supporting science and discovery through the Chandra X-Ray Observatory," said John Daegele, vice president and general manager, strategic space systems, Northrop Grumman. "The success and recognition of this collaborative effort is a testament to our established and trusted partnership with NASA and across the Chandra team." Launched July 23, 1999, the Chandra X-ray Observatory collects data about the life cycle of stars and the role of supermassive black holes in the formation of galaxies. Chandra is managed by NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center for the Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C. Northrop Grumman is the prime contractor and led an industry team in the design, development and building of the telescope. In July 2020, the observatory surpassed 21 years on orbit, or more than four times its five-year design life. During that time, Northrop Grumman has performed Chandra flight operations and provided systems engineering expertise, enabling its customers to meet and exceed their mission needs.
Silence please! Why radio astronomers need things quiet in the middle of a WA desert Canberra, Australia (The Conversation) Dec 23, 2020 A remote outback station about 800km north of Perth in Western Australia is one of the best places in the world to operate telescopes that listen for radio signals from space. It's the site of CSIRO's Murchison Radio-astronomy Observatory (MRO) and is home to three telescopes (and soon a fourth when half of the Square Kilometre Array, the world's largest radio telescope, is built there). But it's important these telescopes don't pick up any other radio signals generated here on Earth that co ... read more
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