China Space Military：Recon, Satcom, Navi, ASAT/BMD, Orbital Vehicle, SLV, etc.

[samsara]

The final frontier: China plans to build manned space station in 2019

RT - Published time: 28 Apr, 2017 16:20

Long March-7 rocket carrying Tianzhou-1 cargo spacecraft lifts off from the launching pad, China, April 20, 2017. © China Daily / Reuters​

China will reportedly begin building a permanent manned space station in 2019, a move likely to increase Western fears over the country’s space capabilities.

The Chinese space agency successfully refueled its Tianzhou-1 cargo spacecraft in orbit on April 20. The vessel, which can reportedly carry six tons (metric) of goods, two tons of fuel and fly unmanned for three months, also docked with the Tiangong-2 space laboratory two days later.

READ MORE: China’s cargo spacecraft docks with orbital laboratory for 1st time

“This again announces the ambition and aspiration of the great rejuvenation of the Chinese people, and our resolute confidence in becoming a major space power,” the space station project's supervisor Wang Zhaoyao told a news briefing in Beijing on Thursday.

“After completing experimental stage spaceflight missions, we will enter the development and construction phase. According to our plans we will carry out the assembly and construction of China's manned space station between 2019 and 2022."

The US has previously expressed fears over China’s technological advancements.

https://twitter.com/x/status/852367239994982400

In October, Robert Walker and Peter Navarro, advisers to Donald Trump, then-candidate for the US presidency, said a lack of investment in space security means the US is falling behind China.

Writing in Space News, the pair said: “America’s space program is suffering from significant under-investment ... Meanwhile, China and Russia continue to move briskly forward with military-focused space initiatives. Indeed, each continues to develop weapons explicitly designed, as the Pentagon has noted, to ‘deny, degrade, deceive, disrupt, or destroy’ America’s eyes and ears in space.”

China was also excluded from the International Space Station over US objections to its space program’s perceived links to the country’s military.

China, meanwhile, maintains it has “peaceful motives” for space exploration.

https://twitter.com/x/status/656254779656540160

The success of the Tianzhou-1 mission follows an announcement that both Chinese and European space agencies are planning to construct a joint base on the moon.

Pal Hvistendahl, a spokesman for the European Space Agency (ESA), told Bloomberg: “The Chinese have a very ambitious moon program already in place. Space has changed since the space race of the ’60s. We recognize that to explore space for peaceful purposes, we do need international cooperation.”

Groundwork for the ‘Moon Village’ mission will begin in November when China plans to send a lunar probe to the moon to retrieve rock and soil samples, according to state media. The Chang’e-5 mission will be China’s first ever attempt at sample retrieval in space.

 

[samsara]

3 cargo vehicles to serve nation's space program

By Zhao Lei | China Daily | Updated: 2017-04-29 06:16

China will produce two additional types of cargo spacecraft with different functions to service its future manned space station, according to a space program manager.

That will make a total of three, including Tianzhou 1, which is now in space, Yang Baohua, deputy general manager of China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp, said at a news conference on Friday in Beijing.

That spaceship's cargo cabin is hermetically sealed because one of the spacecraft's tasks is to test in-orbit resupply technology, including the transportation of astronauts' necessities that require isolation from space.

"We will design two variants of Tianzhou 1," Yang said. The first variant will have a cargo area that is hermetically sealed like the Tianzhou 1 as well as a cargo area that is partly open to space to allow for more storage, he said.

The first variant will be used to transport astronauts' supplies and small spare parts needed at the space station.

The second variant will be open and will carry cargo that does not need protection from space conditions. It will haul large parts as well as any spacecraft to be launched from the station, he said.

In the case of all three types of spacecraft, the propulsion cabin will remain hermetically sealed like that of Tianzhou 1, Yang said. None of the craft will be designed to be reusable.

Tianzhou 1, China's first cargo spacecraft, has completed the country's first in-orbit refueling test with the Tiangong II space laboratory, the China Manned Space Agency said on Thursday. The success of the five-day test made China the third nation in the world to have in-orbit refueling technology after Russia and the United States, it noted.

Tianzhou 1, the country's largest and heaviest spacecraft, was launched at the Wenchang Space Launch Center in Hainan province on April 20. Tiangong II has been in space since mid-September and carried two Chinese astronauts from mid-October to mid-November. It is now unmanned.

The agency said that after the first test, the two spacecraft would stay connected as they orbit Earth for about two months. After the two months, the cargo spacecraft will undock and dock again with the space lab. It will then undock again and start a three-month independent flight before a third docking.

The cargo craft will inject fuel into Tiangong II during the second and third dockings. After the third docking, Tianzhou 1 will depart from Tiangong II and will be directed by ground control to fall back to Earth.

In the future, the Tianzhou-series cargo spacecraft will be tasked with bringing supplies of fuel, spare parts and other necessities to China's planned manned space station, which will start construction around 2019 and is expected to enter service by about 2022.

An artist’s rendering of the Tiangong 3 space station (Adrian Mann)​

The space station will consist of three parts－a core module attached to two space labs, each weighing about 20 tons－and will operate for at least 10 years, according to the manned space agency.

Zhao Guangheng, chief designer of scientific applications at the manned space agency, said on Thursday that the space station will conduct 30 research and experimental projects in eight major fields including life science, biology, and material science.

 

[JSCh]

Chinese media reported CZ-5 Y2 start its journey from Tianjin port to WSLC, Hainan aboard Yuan Wang-22. CZ-5 Y2 is to launch Sijian-18 in June.

View attachment 392590
​

News video in mandarin --> http://tv.cntv.cn/video/C11299/0e3039da58e0424fb2567d4b6de4e0ed

Chinese media report that CZ-5 Y2 has just arrived at port near WSLC, Hainan this morning.

 

[samsara]

China plans to build 60-ton space station

https://twitter.com/x/status/858256556479176704

 

[cirr]

Project TengYun

 

[Shotgunner51]

China plans to launch six to eight BeiDou-3 satellites later this year as part of a plan for the 35 satellites to provide worldwide navigation services latest by 2020. Calender:

April: Tianzhou-1; Shijian 13; (done)
June: Shijian-18; HXMT (upcoming with CZ-5 HSLV)
July: Beidou-3M1, Beidou-3M2
August: Zangheng-1 (CSES)
September: Beidou-3M3; Beidou-3M4; Zhongxing-6C; Gaofen-5
October: Four 'Tianyi' satellites; Beidou-3M5, Beidou-3M6,
November: Chang’e-5
December: Beidou-3M7, Beidou-3M8; GaoJing-3, Gaojing-4; Beidou-2G8;​

Sources
http://usa.chinadaily.com.cn/opinion/2017-04/27/content_29103491.htm
http://www.chinatopix.com/articles/...ocket-long-march-5-y2-arrives-launch-site.htm
http://gbtimes.com/china/heres-what-china-has-planned-its-space-program-2017

 

[cirr]

Shijian-18(DFH-5 testbed)

 

[JSCh]

Asteroids promise payoffs for humanity
By Zhao Lei | China Daily | Updated: 2017-05-09 07:32

Forum explores mining them, or taking a ride into deep space

Chinese scientists will look at ways to harvest resources on asteroids and how to use these so-called minor planets as bases for interstellar journeys, according to a senior space expert.

Ye Peijian, a leading specialist in deep-space exploration at the China Academy of Space Technology, told an asteroid exploration forum in Beijing on Monday that more than 900 asteroids fly past Earth each year and many of them have rich resources of precious metals such as platinum, rhodium and iridium.

"In the near future, we will study ways to send robots or astronauts to mine suitable asteroids and transport the resources back to Earth. In the long term, we will consider using resources from asteroids to build facilities in space or to provide materials to support interstellar travel," he said.

"In addition, some asteroids can be used as bases for interstellar exploration. We can land an unmanned probe on it, and the probe will travel with the asteroid to deep space. When it reaches a certain point, we will activate the probe, which will leave the asteroid to execute its scientific mission," Ye said. "This will tremendously reduce the amount of fuel a probe needs to carry and extend its life span as well as its flight range."

He said that Chinese scientists and engineers must develop a number of technologies and special equipment to fulfill an asteroid expedition, including a large-thrust electric propulsion system, long-endurance power technology, a satellite-based navigation system and sampling devices.

Ye told China Daily in March that China plans to conduct at least one asteroid exploration mission between 2020 and 2025. He said the detailed schedule and the target asteroid have yet to be determined.

In a white paper on China's space activities published in December, the China National Space Administration said that from 2017 to 2021, it would undertake a feasibility study and research on key technology for the exploration of Jupiter and asteroids. These deep-space expeditions will be used to help explore the origin and evolution of the solar system as well as the possibility of extraterrestrial life, the administration said.

Xu Weibiao, a researcher at the Chinese Academy of Sciences' Key Laboratory of Planetary Sciences, said at Monday's forum that asteroid expeditions will help researchers understand the physical and chemical traits of asteroids, which could lead to preventing collisions with Earth.

"So far, humans have discovered a total of 157 potentially hazardous objects in space with a diameter of at least 1,000 meters. Each is capable of destroying all civilization on Earth if it were to hit our mother planet. Therefore, we must study asteroids so we can work out how to break the dangerous ones or change their routes," Xu said.

He also said research on asteroids will help expand human knowledge of the solar system and the origin of life.

Pang Zhihao, a researcher of human space activity at the China Academy of Space Technology, said expeditions to asteroids will be technologically challenging for several reasons. For example, a typical asteroid is usually small, its gravity is weak and each asteroid has its own orbit. Such factors make it difficult for a probe to intercept a target asteroid and land on it.

To date, only the United States, the European Space Agency and Japan have carried out asteroid exploration missions.

 

[TaiShang]

Two teams face plants, worms, year of inner space
By Zhao Lei | China Daily | Updated: 2017-05-11

China started a yearlong experiment on Wednesday using an airtight advanced life-support system to house eight volunteers as a way to help with the nation's goal of long-term manned deep-space exploration, the project's operator said.

The Lunar Palace 365 experiment was launched at the Lunar Palace 1 bioregenerative life-support laboratory in Beihang University in Beijing.

The eight volunteers, all postgraduate students at the university, are divided into two teams of four and will undertake the experiment in three shifts - one team entered the lab on Wednesday morning and will stay for 60 days before the second team takes over. They will live in the lab for 200 days before the first team will complete the remaining 105 days, the university said.

Lunar Palace 1 is capable of providing a habitable environment similar to Earth's biosphere and can support four people. It was designed to test and verify technologies to be used on space missions of extended duration in deep space, and with multiple crews.

The 500-cubic-meter lab is sealed from the outside. It consists of three cabins with a total area of 160 square meters - one for volunteers to live in and control the facility and the other two to simulate cultivating plants on the moon, the university said.

During the experiment, volunteers will not leave the lab during their shifts unless they encounter emergencies.

They will plant several kinds of grains, such as wheat and corn, as well as many types of vegetables, such as carrots, tomatoes, mushrooms and cucumbers.

The harvest will be part of their food. They also will experiment with growing mealworms to consume as a source of protein.

Liu Hui, one of the volunteers and a doctoral student in biomedicine at Beihang University, said before entering the lab on Wednesday that their main tasks are to grow plants, to observe inner biology within the lab, to record their own metabolism and to test the equipment.

She noted that in the lab they can use a computer, make phone calls or conduct video chats with their families and do physical exercise with the proper equipment.

Professor Liu Hong, director of the Research Center of Space Life Science and Life Support Technology, who heads the project, said astronauts would carry all their necessities with them in short- or medium-length space journeys, such as China's Shenzhou manned missions that last at most one month.

For space stations, cargo spaceships would be used to transport supplies. However, longer-lasting missions in the future, such as constructing a lunar station or manned expeditions to Mars, will require the station or spacecraft itself to be self-sustaining, which mean they must carry physical and chemical instruments that can generate the necessities of life.

"Therefore, such experiments will check whether our bioregenerative life-support system can work well and explore how astronauts can resolve possible psychological problems in a sealed environment for a long time," Liu Hong said, adding the experiment's data and findings also will be useful in manned deep-sea exploration programs.

The professor noted that Lunar Palace 365 is the world's first experiment to examine the recyclable applications of animals and microbes in the space environment.

The Lunar Palace 1 housed a three-person, 105-day airtight experiment in 2014.

The first group of four volunteers (at left) greet people through the window of the airtight laboratory in Beihang University in Beijing on Wednesday. In photo at right, Xu Huibin (center), president of the university, waves back to the graduate students taking part in the life-support experiment.Kong Xiangming / For China Daily.

 

[Pyr0test]

Looks like a step up version of the MARS500 experiment that was conducted between China, Russia and EU

 

[Place Of Space]

Dear if I lived in the small space for one year, i have to bring several interesting books.

 

[JSCh]

A cabin on the moon? China hones the lunar lifestyle
Source: Xinhua| 2017-05-10 23:37:10|Editor: ZD

Four volunteers take the oath in front of the Lunar Palace 1, a facility for conducting bio-regenerative life-support systems experiments key to setting up a lunar base, in Beijing University for Aeronautics and Astronautics (BUAA) in Beijing, capital of China, May 10, 2017. A ceremony was held in the BUAA on Wednesday as 8 volunteers start a 365-day experiment in two groups in the Lunar Palace 1. (Xinhua/Ju Huanzong)

BEIJING, May 10 (Xinhua) -- While it remains unclear exactly how long China's first lunar explorers will spend on the surface, the country is already planning for longer stays.

Eight Chinese volunteers will live in "Yuegong-1," a simulated space "cabin" in Beijing for the next year, strengthening China's knowledge and technical know-how, and helping the country's scientists understand exactly what will be required for humans to remain on the moon in the medium and long terms.

The volunteers, all civilians and elite postgraduate students from Beihang University, are divided into two groups. The first four stepped into Yuegong-1 on Wednesday. The two men and two women will stay in the cabin for 60 days, then be replaced by the second group, also two men and two women, who will stay there for 200 days. After that, the first group will return for the remaining 105 days.

The experiment, code-named "Yuegong-365," is Beihang's second attempt to see how the Bioregenerative Life Support System (BLSS) works in a moon-like environment. A successful 105-day trial was conducted in 2014.

The BLSS is a system where animals, plants and microorganisms co-exist. Water and food can be recycled in the system, creating an earth-like environment.

"The BLSS is absolutely crucial to probes to the moon and to Mars," said Liu Zhiheng of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. "The latest test is vital to the future of China's moon and Mars missions and must be relied upon to guarantee the safety and health of our astronauts."

Liu Hong, chief designer of "Yuegong-1," said that the purpose of the new program is to test the stability of the BLSS when astronauts with different metabolic rates take turns to live in the cabin and when they face sudden situations such as blackouts.

"Yuegong-1" consists of a major living space and two plant cabins: "greenhouses." The major cabin covers 42 square meters the size of a very small urban apartment while each of the plant cabins is 3.5 meters high and 50 to 60 square meters in area. The major cabin hosts four bed cubicles, a common room, a washroom, a waste-treatment room and an animal-raising room. The system allows four "astronauts" to conduct research while their basic needs are met.

 

[samsara]

‘718 days in space’: Secretive US X-37B plane said to break record as it lands in Florida

Published time: 8 May, 2017 04:52
Edited time: 8 May, 2017 13:04

© defense.gov

The US Air Force’s X-37B space plane has returned to Earth from its secret mission in orbit which is said to have lasted a record-breaking 718 days.

The unmanned, reusable space plane landed at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida after almost two years of circling our planet as part of a secret test mission.

Crews wearing protective suits for hazardous operations met the mini-shuttle as it touched down Sunday morning.

https://twitter.com/x/status/861210390918770690

The touchdown marks the first landing at the space center’s Shuttle Landing Facility since the Atlantis made the final flight of NASA’s 30-year space shuttle program in July 2011.

https://twitter.com/x/status/861223103346741250

The completed mission, known as OTV-4 (Orbital Test Vehicle-4), marks the fourth in the X-37B programme but is the first to have landed at the Florida space center. Three previous landings occurred at Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

“This mission once again set an on-orbit endurance record and marks the vehicle's first landing in the state of Florida,” said Lieutenant Colonel Ron Fehlen, X-37B program manager.

“We are incredibly pleased with the performance of the space vehicle and are excited about the data gathered to support the scientific and space communities.”

https://twitter.com/x/status/861255043563098112

While most of the X-37B's payloads and activities are classified, the Air Force has insisted that the mini space shuttle is simply testing technologies in orbit.

It outlines the programme’s primary objectives as twofold. Firstly, it wants to test reusable spacecraft technologies for America’s future in space, and secondly, to carry out experiments which can be returned to, and examined, on Earth.

“Technologies being tested in the program include advanced guidance, navigation and control, thermal protection systems, avionics, high temperature structures and seals, conformal reusable insulation, lightweight electromechanical flight systems, advanced propulsion systems, advanced materials and autonomous orbital flight, reentry and landing.”

The X-37B, which is 29 feet long and has a wingspan of just over 14 feet across, launches vertically and comes back to Earth horizontally for a runway landing.

The OTV-4 has spent the longest period in space, substantially surpassing the first vehicle of the mission launched in 2010, which spent 224 days in orbit.

However it has failed to come close to the overall longest spaceflight mission. NASA's twin Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 probes are still sending data home, nearly 40 years after their 1977 launches, according to Space.com.

The fifth X-37B mission is scheduled to launch from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, later in 2017.

https://www.rt.com/usa/387531-space-plane-x37b-landing/

-----------------

This top secret space plane gonna bring arm race in space to a new level.

• ASAT? Satellite killer?
• Nuclear weapon delivery from space??
• What will be the responses from both Russia and China to this new strategic, devastating space weapon?

 

[samsara]

SUPER SECRET X-37B NEARS ONE YEAR IN ORBIT DOING ???

By Matt Williams - Universe Today - 2016-05-13

For years now, the program to develop the X-37B spacecraft has been shrouded in secrecy. Originally intended as part of a NASA project to develop a reusable unmanned spacecraft, this Boeing-designed spaceplane was taken over by the Department of Defense in 2004. And while it has been successfully tested on multiple occasions, there remain some unanswered questions as to its intended purpose and what has been taking place during these flights.

This, predictably, has lead to all kinds of rumors and speculation, with some suggesting that it could be a spy plane while others think that it is intended to deliver space-based weapons. Its latest mission which was dubbed OTV-4 (Orbital Test Vehicle-4) has been especially clandestine. And after nearly a year in orbit, it remains unclear what the X37B has been doing up there all this time.

The mission began atop a Atlas V rocket which launched from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on May 20th, 2015. As the second flight of the second X-37B vehicle, the stated purpose of mission was to test a Hall-effect thruster (HET) a special type of ion thruster that NASA hopes to use on future satellites. The mission had the additional purposes of testing various materials in space for NASA, as well as experimental propulsion system developed by the US Air Force.

Sounds straightforward enough, doesnt it? But here is where the clandestine nature of things kicks in. Originally, the mission was expected to last about 200 days. But as of the penning of this article, the vehicle is going on 365 days in orbit, and no one is quite sure why or what it is doing up there. While the duration of OTV missions have been secret in the past, as well as the location of their landings, this prolonged stay in orbit is leading to more conjecture about the X-37Bs true purpose.

For instance, if the X-37Bs primary purpose is to test reusable space technologies, then it would make sense to land it before long. In this case, the key aspects of the mission would come down to the Air Force testing their ability to deploy and retrieve the spacecraft, as well as its ability to deliver scientific packages to orbit. This is certainly in keeping with the US Air Forces fact sheet on the X-37B, which states that:

The primary objectives of the X-37B are twofold: reusable spacecraft technologies for Americas future in space and operating experiments which can be returned to, and examined, on Earth Technologies being tested in the program include advanced guidance, navigation and control; thermal protection systems; avionics; high-temperature structures and seals; conformal reusable insulation, lightweight electromechanical flight systems; and autonomous orbital flight, re-entry and landing.​

However, these aims seems incongruous with all the secrecy that surrounds the X-37B program, which is something one expects instead when dealing with the development of weapons systems. The long-terms stays in orbit also don't appear to be in keeping with this, as these would only prove useful if the intended spacecraft was meant to act as a satellite (i.e. remain in orbit for extended periods of time to collect information).

<PIC: Fourth flight of the X-37B Orbital Test Vehicle is set for blastoff on May 20, 2015 from Cape Canaveral, Florida. Credit: Boeing>

As a result, it has been widely speculated in the past few years that the true purpose of the X-37B is to act as a spy plane. As Tom Burghardt commented in his 2010 article, The Militarization of Outer Space: The Pentagon’s Space Warriors, the development of the X-37B is part of the US Air Forces stated intention of maintaining space superiority:

Now the Defense Department wants to up the stakes with new, destabilizing weapons systems that will transform low- and high-earth orbit into another “battlespace,” pouring billions into programs to achieve what Air Force Space Command (AFSPC) has long dreamed of: “space dominance”. Pentagon space warriors fully intend to field a robust anti-satellite (ASAT) capability that can disable, damage or destroy the satellites of other nations, all for defensive purposes, mind you.​

This was followed up in 2012 with allegations that the X-37B was spying on the Chinese Tiangong-1 space station module. These claims were naturally denied by the US Air Force, which indicated that the orbits conducted by the test flight did not allow for any opportunities to conduct surveillance. This was backed up by space journalist and analyst Jim Oberg, who said in an interview with the BBC, “They are in orbits which cross the equator about 90 degrees apart. They crisscross each others’ paths at thousands of meters per second. Any observation from one to the other is impossible.”

Others have gone on record as stating that there is nothing particularly telling or alarming about the OTV missions, and that they are likely just the result of the USAF wanting to attempting to test the full capabilities of this new spacecraft. As Joan Johnson-Freese, a professor of national security affairs at the U.S. Naval War College in Newport, Rhode Island, recently told Space.com:

While no more specifics have been offered about the X-37B by the Air Force since it began flying the orbital technology test bed in 2010, the overall mission seems clear: Lengthy missions allow time for seeing what such a vehicle has to offer in terms of capabilities. The military likes to have lots of arrows in its quiver.​

Nevertheless, the possibility that the X37B supports space-based espionage efforts remains a popular idea. For instance, Brian Weeden a former air force officer and current technical adviser to the Secure World Foundation has stated that he thinks the X-37B’s mission is to test reconnaissance and spy sensors, particularly how they hold up against radiation and other hazards of orbit.

The possibility of it being used to capture satellites is also an enduring one. In 2014, Alan Hulas of Guardian stated, The mystery of the plane centers around the purpose of an interior cavity, he wrote, about the size of a truck bed and much too cozy for a human to live in for 674 days, the duration of its latest mission. The main theories suggest that the plane carries sensors and spy equipment, satellites or even weaponry.

Whatever the true purpose, the reactions towards the X-37B and the levels of secrecy surrounding it are not atypical. Whenever the issue of militarizing space emerges, it triggers fears about the prospect of a space-weapons race. And since the Outer Space Treaty placed no bans on stationing conventional weapons in orbit, nor the stationing of spy satellites therein, there are no legal barriers to doing this.

Could the 21st century be a time where the US, Russia, China, and other major space players enter onto an arms race in space? Only time will tell. In the meantime, it might not be a bad idea to update the terms of the Outer Space Treaty and include some articles about secret spy spaceplanes!

Alternate link

-----------------

The Militarization of Outer Space: The Pentagon’s “Space Warriors” | By Tom Burghardt
http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-militarization-of-outer-space-the-pentagon-s-space-warriors/19074

 

[onebyone]

China plans ambitious space mission to hunt and ‘capture’ asteroids by 2020

Ultimate aim is to land on orbiting space rocks and exploit their mineral wealth, top space scientists say


PUBLISHED : Thursday, 11 May, 2017, 9:01pm
UPDATED : Thursday, 11 May, 2017, 9:09pm

Stephen Chen

A senior government space scientist said China was considering mounting a mission to “capture” an asteroid and try to fire it into the moon’s orbit within a decade, state media reported.

The ultimate aim would be to mine the asteroid for metal and minerals, or use it as the base for a space station.

Ye Peijian, chief commander and designer of China’s lunar exploration programme, said at a meeting of space authorities in Beijing this week that the nation’s first batch of asteroid exploration spacecraft would probably be launched in about 2020, according to state media reports.

NASA says space mining can solve climate change, food security and other Earthly issues

Asteroids roam throughout our solar system, ranging in size from a metre to hundreds of kilometres across. Some cross close to Earth’s orbit, sometimes dangerously so.

Many near-Earth asteroids contain a high concentrations of precious metals, Ye told the Science and Technology Daily, a newspaper run by China’s Ministry of Science and Technology.

He estimated some of the asteroids might justify the enormous cost and risk of space exploration as their economic value could amount to trillions of US dollars.



Nasa announced a plan earlier this year to send two spacecraft to asteroids in 2021 and 2023.

The later mission will explore the asteroid 16 Psyche, which is 210km wide and probably a remnant from the core of an ancient planet no longer in existence.

The Chinese programme, however, is much more ambitious.

The plan is to capture an asteroid by landing and anchor a spacecraft on its surface, fire up multiple rocket boosters and project it into the orbit of the moon.

An asteroid like a 10-storey building just missed Earth by only half the distance to the Moon. We barely saw it coming

The excavation of mineral ores and its transportation to Earth would be carried out by robotic machinery, Ye was quoted as saying.

Ye estimated it could take a further four decades before China had the technology and infrastructure in place to mine the asteroid.

No details were given of which asteroid Chinese space scientists may be targeting.

China is also interested in using an asteroid as the base for a permanent space station, the report said. Ye was quoted by the newspaper as saying that the Chinese government was mulling this separate proposal to build a self-sustainable base on an asteroid.

The natural spin of an asteroid could generate a certain amount of centrifugal force that could be transformed into gravity, which was good for the mobility and general health of astronauts, he said.

A team of space scientists from the California Institute of Technology came up with a similar proposal in 2013 and submitted it to the White House under the former Obama administration.

China re-activated an air-tight research facility in Beijing on Wednesday and began a new experiment with artificial ecological system to pave the way for the design and construction of human settlement on the moon.

Four young men and women volunteers entered Lunar Palace 1 – a self-contained laboratory in Beihang University with a bio-regenerative life support system built four years ago – to join a year-long mission to evaluate the system’s performance after new upgrades, in particular its reliability and flexibility to cope with various accidents.

Chinese space technology still lags decades behind the US, but the Chinese government has poured enormous resources into the development of its space programme, including developing an orbiting space station. Analysts say the clear aim is to challenge US supremacy in space.

The first landing of a probe on an asteroid was conducted in 2001 by the US spacecraft NEAR Shoemaker.

Chinese scientists study viability of manned radar station on the moon

The European spacecraft Rosetta put a fully-functioning landing probe on an asteroid in 2014, which sent back data for two days until its power supply ran out.

The Chinese lunar probe Chang’e-2 conducted a fly-by in 2012 over 4179 Toutatis, the largest asteroid known to pose a collision threat with Earth.

Huang Jiangchuan, the chief scientist at China’s deep space exploration programme, said at the same meeting attended by Ye on Monday that the nation’s asteroid mission would aim high for “landmark achievements”, state media reported.

But some space researchers have cautioned that the mission faced huge challenges, including developing technology to firmly anchor the probe to the surface of the asteroid.

http://www.scmp.com/news/china/poli...lans-ambitious-space-mission-hunt-and-capture