Space Solutions to Terrestrial Problems
Most people intuitively assume and fundamentally believe that terrestrial problems must have terrestrial solutions. This is likely due to a lack of understanding about our interconnectedness and interdependence with the rest of the cosmos. As a terrestrially evolved organism, it is in our genes to adapt to our immediate environment as we have over millions of years. Only recently have we begun to become aware of how celestial events affect our lives. We now know that such events have been critically important to the evolution of life on Earth. Impacts of comets and asteroids most likely provided a young Earth [...]
CRES – Chemically Rigidized Expandable Structures
CRES Expertise accumulated through the Contraves Space work M.C. Bernasconi Consultants Dr. Marco C. Bernasconi Overview Dr. Marco C. Bernasconi, in particular because of his long involvement with the developments at Contraves Space, possesses of a unique expertise in the field of inflatable, chemically-rigidized expandable structures for space applications (called herein CRES, for short). For historical reasons, work at Contraves centered on microwave antenna reflectors, as exemplified by the realization of the first “inflatable” offset reflector; however, work has been done in all classes of flexible-wall expandable structures (a superset of CRES — see diagram below) with the exception of [...]
Ethical Considerations in Astronautical Endeavours
Introductory Remarks Marco C. Bernasconi The OURS Foundation, Switzerland Paper IAA-95-IAA.8.1.01 presented at the XLVI International Congress of Astronautics, in Oslo (Norway),October 1995 Introduction Ethics is not a scientific discipline, but part of philosophy, and the philosophers even after three thousand years of inquiry have not managed to develop a method for ascertaining which of their many statements are – if not true – at least truly relevant for this Universe. Therefore, turning to ethics to obtain a guide for future-oriented action, one just opens the floodgates for a profusion of arguments and counter-arguments, and for being submerged by a [...]
Considering the Universe
Contribution by Dr. Marco C. Bernasconi The progress of the astronomical sciences has constantly opened new horizons to the humanity’s culture, not only by the discovery of new celestial objects, but mainly by showing the real dimensions of the Universe. In recent times, astronautical techniques have contributed substantially to the cosmic research effort, to the point that science has been advanced as the primary reason for spaceflight. In reality, although astronautics and astronomy have a common origin in the human drive to explore and to penetrate the mysteries of the heavens, this is not the case. The scientific research aimed [...]
Inflatable Technologies for Sculpture in Earth Orbit
A number of artists have made proposals for creating monumental artworks to be placed in Earth orbit which could be seen with unaided vision by those on Earth. While there has been a variety of technologies suggested most of the proposals have utilized some form of inflatable space technology. Echo 2 The idea of using inflatable structures goes back to the first Echo satellites launched by the US in the 60's - although a number of inflatable concepts for space applications pre-dated these satellites. These were passive communication satellites and carried no other payload. However, they were significant because, in [...]
Most people intuitively assume and fundamentally believe that terrestrial problems must have terrestrial solutions. This is likely due to a lack of understanding about our interconnectedness and interdependence with the [...]
CRES Expertise accumulated through the Contraves Space work M.C. Bernasconi Consultants Dr. Marco C. Bernasconi Overview Dr. Marco C. Bernasconi, in particular because of his long involvement with the developments [...]
Introductory Remarks Marco C. Bernasconi The OURS Foundation, Switzerland Paper IAA-95-IAA.8.1.01 presented at the XLVI International Congress of Astronautics, in Oslo (Norway),October 1995 Introduction Ethics is not a scientific discipline, [...]
Contribution by Dr. Marco C. Bernasconi The progress of the astronomical sciences has constantly opened new horizons to the humanity’s culture, not only by the discovery of new celestial objects, [...]
A number of artists have made proposals for creating monumental artworks to be placed in Earth orbit which could be seen with unaided vision by those on Earth. While there [...]
