{"id":238542,"date":"2015-12-15T19:00:00","date_gmt":"2015-12-15T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/?guid=a4926b93f75fad9029da50fa79764468"},"modified":"2015-12-15T19:00:00","modified_gmt":"2015-12-15T23:00:00","slug":"orbit-facility","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/?p=238542","title":{"rendered":"ORBIT facility"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.esa.int\/var\/esa\/storage\/images\/esa_multimedia\/videos\/2015\/12\/orbit_facility\/15739918-1-eng-GB\/ORBIT_facility_small.jpg\" width=\"170\" height=\"96\" align=\"left\" hspace=\"8\" \/><\/p>\n<p>\nA new simulation system allows researchers to investigate the complexities of contact dynamics in weightlessness \u2013 such as this robotic arm reaching out to touch a free-floating platform. Simulating true microgravity is impossible but it can be mimicked on a frictionless basis in two dimensions.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nKnown as the Orbital Robotics Bench for Integrated Technology (ORBIT) facility, it relies on a trio of air-bearing platforms scooting across the flattest surface by far in ESA\u2019s ESTEC technical centre in the Netherlands \u2013 a 4.8 x 9 m epoxy floor smoothed to within 0.8 mm.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nThis space-age \u2018air hockey table\u2019 was first tested last month, The centrepiece of ESA\u2019s new Orbital Robotics and Guidance Navigation and Control Laboratory, it will serve proposals for missions aimed at microgravity or low-gravity environments.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.esa.int\/var\/esa\/storage\/images\/esa_multimedia\/videos\/2015\/12\/orbit_facility\/15739918-1-eng-GB\/ORBIT_facility_small.jpg\" width=\"170\" height=\"96\" align=\"left\" hspace=\"8\"><\/p>\n<p>\nA new simulation system allows researchers to investigate the complexities of contact dynamics in weightlessness &ndash; such as this robotic arm reaching out to touch a free-floating platform. Simulating true microgravity is impossible but it can be mimicked on a frictionless basis in two dimensions.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nKnown as the Orbital Robotics Bench for Integrated Technology (ORBIT) facility, it relies on a trio of air-bearing platforms scooting across the flattest surface by far in ESA&rsquo;s ESTEC technical centre in the Netherlands &ndash; a 4.8 x 9 m epoxy floor smoothed to within 0.8 mm.\n<\/p>\n<p>\nThis space-age &lsquo;air hockey table&rsquo; was first tested last month, The centrepiece of ESA&rsquo;s new Orbital Robotics and Guidance Navigation and Control Laboratory, it will serve proposals for missions aimed at microgravity or low-gravity environments.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":615444,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-238542","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-multimedia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238542","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=238542"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238542\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":238543,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/238542\/revisions\/238543"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/615444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=238542"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=238542"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/spaceweekly.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=238542"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}