Orbiting Rainbow Project Experiment updates

Three NASA NIAC talks

0 to 30 minutes – Marco Pavone, Stanford University – Spacecraft/Rover Hybrids for the Exploration of Small Solar System Bodies

31 -60 minutes – Thomas Prettyman, Planetary Science Institute – Deep mapping of small solar system bodies with galactic cosmic ray secondary particle showers

Focus on the third talk

61+ minutes – Marco Quadrelli, NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory – Orbiting Rainbows Phase II

An orbiting rainbow is an artificial cloud in space engineered to reflect electromagnetic energy and perform useful functions.

Lasers hit and trap the tenuous cloud periodically to image distant objects. It is not on continuously because that would fry the cloud material.

Algorithms will be used to pull the clear image from the noise in the system.

Need to bring down the wave front error.

Nextbigfuture looked at this work before that this laser cloud imaging could effectively create massive space telescope.

Assuming 10 million grains per aerosol patch, a grain density of 2500 kg/m3, 3 patches of diameter 1 meter, difficulty level 2, cloud thickness 1 micron.

SOURCES – RIT, NASA, NIAC