Space Technology Lectures

On December 9 JCC held lectures on Japanese advanced space technologies in Science Center, taking advantage of APRSAF (Asia-Pacific Regional Space Agency Forum), which took place in Singapore.

Prof. Kubota talked about "Hayabusa Project", in which he navigated the space craft "Hayabusa" (meaning a falcon) to an asteroid "Itokawa", 30 billion km far from the Earth. He explained that the navigation was extremely difficult as if he was shooting an arrow from Singapore aiming at a mosquito in Bogota, Columbia, the other side of the Earth. He used a special device called optical sensor to keep the space craft on the track. After Hayabusa reached Itokawa, its chemical engine went dead and he lost sight of the space craft for one month. He finally found it but Hayabusa could use only an ion engine. It took 5 years, 3 years more than planned, to come back to the Earth. In a sense it was a miracle that Hayabusa could bring back some materials from the surface of Itokawa, which retain the original form of the Solar system.

Dr. Sobue talked about utilization of satellite technologies for environmental, disaster relief purposes. He monitored the floods in Thailand by satellite system and helped the Thai Government to give warnings to flood affected regions. He also explained how useful it was to collect information by various kinds of satellite systems and to analyze environmental situation on the Earth.

Approximately 130 participants were excited and asked numerous questions. I even wondered that Dr. Sobue might not be able to catch a plane.