Mediaboss Marketing

Space station astronauts will soon be able to enter virtual reality to help stay mentally healthy away from their home planet.

An HTC Vive Focus 3 virtual reality (VR) headset will fly to the International Space Station (ISS) on a SpaceX cargo ship launching no earlier than Thursday (Nov. 9), health care platform company XRHealth announced on Nov. 2. You can watch SpaceX's Dragon cargo ship launch live here at Space.com, via NASA Television.

Once hooked up for space experiments, the headset will "treat astronauts for mental health conditions" associated with living in space for long periods of time, which can include feelings of isolation, stress and confinement. European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Andreas Mogensen has pledged to test the headset during his half-year mission, which includes commanding the ISS.

Related: Best VR headsets 2023: Explore the cosmos and blast aliens from the safety of your home

ISS astronauts live in what are considered isolated, confined environments (ICE); simply put, these are zones where people work in operational circumstances in small teams far away from assistance. Examples include research bases in the Arctic and Antarctic, submarines and of course, spacecraft, leading to decades of studies on how best to help personnel in these circumstances, according to a 2021 study in Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews.

Based on their peer-reviewed survey of the field, the authors of that 2021 study noted that teams already properly screened and selected for an ICE mission will have the best outcomes with "leadership, coping and interpersonal skills training during and after long-duration missions." The study was co-authored by the University of Southern California's Lawrence Palinkas and the University of British Columbia's Peter Suedfeld, two oft-cited authors in the field of ICE who also have done many space studies.

NASA and other space agencies already include numerous tools to help crews with mental health readiness. Astronauts train in ICE environments on the ground that include caves, wilderness excursions and underwater habitats. While in space, astronauts speak with a psychologist at least once every two weeks, according to the Canadian Space Agency. They also have scheduled rest times, regular calls with family and friends and encouragement to pursue hobbies in orbit.

While far from the first headset to fly in space, the new HTC Vive will include a simulator mode "specially developed and adapted to work with the microgravity environment," officials wrote in the statement.

Past VR headsets had a tendency to induce motion sickness due to "multiple challenges around tracking and orientation (such as) jittering, rolling and drifting of the content," as headsets usually use gravity to align the view, according to XRHealth's Nov. 2 statement. The participating companies which include XRHealth, Nord-Space Aps and HTC Vive made unspecified changes to this headset to make it work better on the ISS.

Mogensen and other experiment participants will do "in-flight testing sessions comprised of VR video viewing and questionnaires", NASA officials stated of the experiment. The astronauts will do so with an app from ESA called EveryWear, which has been adapted from a previous version that measured food intake.

The results will also be adapted for the general public to aid in stress management , especially for conditions including anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder and attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

Related: Deep space missions will test astronauts' mental health. Could AI companions help?

"Astronauts are essentially isolated during their missions for months and years at a time, and are confined to small spaces with limited contact with friends and family," Per Lundahl Thomsen, chief technology officer at Nord-Space Aps, said in the Nov. 2 statement.

"Creating a virtual platform that addresses their mental health needs while in isolation is imperative for them to maintain a healthy lifestyle when they return," Thomsen added. "We partnered with companies that provide the most advanced technologies that could be adapted for space to provide the most beneficial experience for our astronauts."

Many other VR headsets have flown to the ISS, according to NASA materials. Some of the many applications have included controlling robots, helping with maintenance tasks and training, performing experiments to see how astronaut bodies adapt to space and filming immersive reality videos to share the ISS experience publicly.

If you're looking for a VR headset for your own residence, check out our best VR headset guide. We have tested the major headset platforms for different types of gamers and to suit a range of budgets. Whether you want high resolution, a wireless experience or a budget-friendly option, the guide will cover you.

Hybrid VR and AR in a portable, but expensive package.

Platforms: Android or PC VR

Price: $1099 / 1299

Resolution: 1920x1920 per eye

Field of view: Up to 110 degrees

Refresh rate: 90 Hz

Controllers: Included controllers

Lightweight, goggle-like design

Mixed reality thats almost affordable

Still pricey

Lacking killer apps

Round up of today's best deals

View post:

A VR headset that could help astronaut mental health is launching to ... - Space.com

Former SpaceX engineers raise 7.5m to build Sift, the software stack for building next generation machines

Gollapudi, who led several SpaceX Dragon missions, and Spiegel, who led multiple teams supporting high-profile projects across the board at the space industry giant, came together upon recognizing the dangerous room for human error of current telemetry tools. From satellites to submersibles, small miscalculations can equate to costly disasters.

Keenly observing this problem, along with recognizing that transportation systems are racing toward autonomy, Gollapudi and Spiegel observed how many companies were running into preventable failures due to a lack of transparency into their machine performance. Machine performance data has remained confusing and ambivalent throughout hardware development, manufacturing and operations for even the most seasoned engineers. Knowing this was a solvable problem, Gollapudi and Spiegel developed Sift's proprietary, end-to-end telemetry stack to serve as a digital backbone to the physical world.

Advanced hardware plays a critical role in mission success across industries from transportation, to energy, to space and defense, and beyond. As the earth's orbit fills with satellites, transportation systems race toward autonomy, and energy scientists reimagine our climate future many processes are required to create and run the complex machines shaping our collective future.

Designed for the rigors of space, Sift's end-to-end stack allows forward-thinking engineering teams to scale their data infrastructure, easily review data, and automate operations as the company's name implies, engineers can now siftthrough their data to invent new machines and scale easily. Similar to the sieve prospectors once used when panning for gold, Sift's stack allows engineers to easily locate and interpret the data they're searching for without complication.

The Sift stack is already used by innovative operating teams in aerospace, aviation, defense, energy and transportation. Regarding Sift, Ben Stabler, co-founder of the autonomous train company Parallel Systems, says, "Our engineering team uses Sift daily to understand test data from our vehicles and iterate on our designs. Sift helps us build a safer, more flexible freight transportation system."

"We saw so many of our friends leaving SpaceX to build the machines of tomorrow, but they were struggling with the tools available today," said Gollapudi. "We're very excited to equip our community of hardware innovators with the tools they need to build the future."

Sift is backed by leading hardware investor, Riot Ventures, and enterprise SaaS expert Fika Ventures, also investors inFirst Resonance,Datum, andDuro.

With offices in Los Angeles, Gollapudi and Spiegel have assembled a team who worked on mission critical tools at SpaceX before augmenting it with experts from tech sector giants like Google, Palantir, Uber, Amazon, Bird and LeoLabs. Each founder independently forged groundbreaking advances while leading critical missions at SpaceX, and they plan to replicate that formula for success within Sift and their clients.

About the Founders:Karthik Gollapudi is a second generation software developer with deep roots in the SpaceX community. As a former Dragon engineer, he led mission-over-mission operations, including simulation, test, and certification. He achieved several advancements in human spaceflight, including joint simulations with NASA, before founding his telemetry-based start-up, Sift, in 2023.

Austin Spiegelis a seasoned software engineer who started his career at SpaceX, where he was a lead responsible for the telemetry system for Starlink's satellite constellation and innovative manufacturing systems. From building groundbreaking applications to managing diverse engineering teams, his contributions spanned multiple divisions, culminating in the foundation of his telemetry-focused start-up, Sift, in 2023.

SOURCE Sift

Read the original post:

Former SpaceX engineers raise 7.5m to build Sift, the software stack ... - PR Newswire

SpaceX logo and Elon Musk photo are seen in this illustration taken, December 19, 2022. REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/Illustration Acquire Licensing Rights

MEXICO CITY, Nov 6 (Reuters) - Starlink, the satellite internet service of billionaire Elon Musk's rocket manufacturer SpaceX, has won a tender from Mexico's state energy firm to provide services through December 2026, according to documents seen by Reuters on Monday.

The contract is valued between 887.5 million pesos ($51 million) and 1.8 billion pesos ($101 million), according to the decision from Mexico's Comision Federal de Electricidad (CFE).

Starlink's bid beat out those of two other companies because it "offered the best conditions in terms of price," the document said.

The contract would provide infrastructure for CFE's rollout of internet access throughout rural Mexico, according to a separate document seen by Reuters, a draft contract from CFE.

The draft contract shows the agreement beginning last month and running through to Dec. 31, 2026.

CFE and a legal representative for Starlink did not immediately respond to requests for comment about whether the contract had already begun or the situation of Starlink's other open tender offers.

($1 = 17.5164 Mexican pesos)

Reporting by Adriana Barrera in Mexico City Writing by Kylie Madry Editing by Matthew Lewis

Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.

Read the original:

Musk's Starlink wins bid to roll out Mexico's rural satellite internet ... - Reuters

Astronaut Jasmin Moghbeli is pictured tethered to the space station during a spacewalk to replace solar array hardware.

The Expedition 70 crew participated in standard post-spacewalk activities today including health checks, spacesuit work, and a team conference. Meanwhile, science remained on Thursdays schedule as the International Space Station residents studied future piloting techniques and space manufacturing.

NASA astronauts Jasmin Moghbeli and Loral OHara had their first post-spacewalk medical exams on Thursday. The duo spent a few moments measuring each others vital signs including temperature, blood pressure, and pulse. Afterward, the pair began cleaning up the Quest airlock and deactivating their spacesuits.

Moghbeli also downlinked imagery captured using spacewalk cameras on Wednesday. She then photographed the spacesuit gloves for inspection and analysis by mission controllers on the ground. OHara logged into a computer and participated in a cognitive assessment.

After lunchtime, the two astronauts joined Commander Andreas Mogensen and Flight Engineer Satoshi Furukawa for a conference with ground specialists and discussed the previous days spacewalk activities. Mogensen from ESA (European Space Agency) also spent an hour-and-a-half servicing the spacesuits the spacewalkers wore the day before. Satoshi from JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) joined the trio at the end of the day for eye scans using the Ultrasound 2 device.

The orbiting labs three cosmonauts spent Thursday focused on space research and lab maintenance in the orbital outposts Roscosmos segment. Cosmonaut Nikolai Chub split his day on a pair of different experiments. During the morning, he explored spacecraft and robotic piloting techniques crews may use on future planetary missions. He then spent the afternoon testing a 3D printer that could help crews become less dependent on supply missions launched from Earth. Cosmonauts Oleg Kononenko and Konstantin Borisov worked throughout the day maintaining a variety of life support and electronics hardware.

NASA and SpaceX now are targeting 8:28 p.m. EST, Nov. 9, for launch of the companys 29th commercial resupply services (CRS-29) mission to the International Space Station. The additional time allows for completion of final prelaunch closeout ahead of liftoff of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon cargo spacecraft from Launch Complex 39A at NASAs Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Prior to every Dragon mission, SpaceX conducts extensive prelaunch checkouts at every stage of refurbishment and final integration to ensure the spacecraft is ready to safely fly its next mission. During the initial propellant load in preparation for the CRS-29 mission, teams identified a leak of NTO (nitrogen tetroxide oxidizer) in a Draco thruster valve, which per standard procedure required a pause to the operation to troubleshoot. The team inspected the valve and respective data, and decided to replace the thruster.

SpaceX continues to keep NASA informed throughout the process and the joint team collectively decided to shift launch to account for the initial part replacement and subsequent system checkouts and data reviews.

With a Nov. 9 launch, the spacecraft will arrive at the space station about 5:20 a.m. Saturday, Nov. 11.

Learn more about station activities by following thespace station blog,@space_stationand@ISS_Researchon X, as well as theISS FacebookandISS Instagramaccounts.

Get weekly video highlights at:https://roundupreads.jsc.nasa.gov/videoupdate/

Get the latest from NASA delivered every week. Subscribe here:www.nasa.gov/subscribe

Visit link:

Health Checks and Science on Station, SpaceX Adjusts Launch Date - NASA Blogs

By Nathan Vardi

The billionaire investor has beaten the market by betting on Elon Musk. He lands on the MarketWatch 50 list and, in this interview, remains as bullish as ever.

When Ron Baron was starting an investment business, he got some advice from Steve Wynn. The casino magnate told Baron to name his investment company after himself as a way to show clients and customers that he promised to stand behind it. Some four decades later, Baron Capital has made its most important investment in Elon Musk, Inc.

Baron invested $570 million in Tesla (TSLA), mostly between 2014 and 2016, which was about 2% of his assets under management at the time. Today, after selling some shares, Tesla represents about 10.9% of Baron Capital's $41 billion under management, and the winning position has helped Baron's main mutual fund become the only mutual fund to beat the Nasdaq COMP over the last 5, 10 and 15 years, according to a recent Bloomberg analysis, during which time it returned 17% annualized.

"You get rich by being long-term and by being focused, by owning a small amount of companies," Baron said in an interview.

Baron epitomizes a bullish buy-and-hold investing style that has worked in the current environment, where a few big tech stocks, like Apple (AAPL), Microsoft (MSFT) and Alphabet (GOOGL), have accounted for a disproportionate share of the stock market's gains. Baron runs a concentrated portfolio and owns one of the best performing big tech companies, Tesla, and has benefitted from the electric-car maker's remarkable stock-market run. As a result, he lands on The MarketWatch 50 list of the most influential people in markets.

Musk himself may have just thrown cold water on Tesla's long-anticipated cybertruck and expressed concern about the ability of consumers to buy his expensive cars in the face of high interest rates. But Baron says Tesla's stock will keep rising over time and its market capitalization can grow from its current $630 billion to as much as $4 trillion in 10 years.

"In the case of Tesla, we are convinced that people cannot do what they're doing and that, ultimately, it's not just going to be a car company and it's not just going to be a battery company," said Baron. "All the other car companies, which 50 years ago, elected to become much more profitable and outsource supplies and compute to other people. We're going to be like Intel was inside of computers. This is going to be Tesla inside of cars. All the cars are going to be using Tesla autonomous driving. No one else can possibly compete."

But Baron is even more bullish on Space Exploration Technologies Corp., better known as SpaceX. The world's busiest rocket-launching company and its large satellite-Internet subsidiary remain private, but Baron said he expects SpaceX will go public and list on a stock exchange within the next three years.

Baron invested about $700 million in SpaceX several years ago and a recent secondary share sale in the private market implied a nearly $150 billion valuation recently for the entire company.

"We think that by 2030 it likely will be worth somewhere around $500 or $600 billion," Baron said. "And then in the 2030s, that's when I expect to make another 10 times our money. So we can make over the next 15 or 20 years, we can make 30 to 50 times our money in SpaceX."

Baron added, "I think SpaceX has a chance to be even bigger than Tesla in the 2030s."

Baron called SpaceX's satellite-Internet business as "Internet for the planet" and said that it will be much lower cost in many places than what any competitor could hope to provide.

"In the case of SpaceX, what they're going to be doing there, the innovation that other people can't possibly do, is the fact that they are able to launch rockets and re-use them over and over and over again," said Baron. "So as a result of that, it costs other people to get to space $100 million, $200 million. It costs us a fraction of that amount ... Basically, we can get our satellites to space for a very low cost."

What is the risk of betting so big on one man? Baron said the risk was greater when Tesla and SpaceX were smaller companies with fewer people, a period when he thinks the two companies were even more dependent on Musk. But now, Baron said, those companies are teeming with excellent engineers and talented professionals. He added that 3.5 million people applied for jobs at Tesla and SpaceX last year.

"It's harder to get a job at Tesla and SpaceX than to get into Harvard," said Baron. "He has the most brilliant people working there, and that isn't going to change."

At the same time, Baron said, Musk is a unique and irreplaceable force.

"I'm betting he's going to stay alive for at least 5 or 10 years," said Baron. "I think that's a good bet."

-Nathan Vardi

This content was created by MarketWatch, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. MarketWatch is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

11-04-23 1316ET

The rest is here:

Ron Baron says Tesla's valuation can hit $4 trillion, but 'SpaceX has ... - Morningstar