The+History+Of+Astronomical+Exploration

The official start of space exploration begins with "The space race" between the Americans and the Communist soviets(present day Russia). This race began with the downfall of the Nazis, in which the Americans and Soviets had stolen all the Nazi research, V2 rockets, and more importantly, some of the brightest Nazi scientists! One of the more famous and most brightest of the nazis who collaborated with the Americans is the famous "Verner Von Braun" ( what goes up, must come down). The Soviets had jumped us by getting the fist satellite, dog(who came back safely, not to to get anyone worried) and one of the bigger accomplishments by the Soviets was to get the first man in space(Yuri Gargarin). The United states won by landing on the moon with Apollo 11. While the observation of objects in space, known as [|astronomy], predates reliable [|recorded history] , it was the development of large and relatively efficient [|rockets] during the early 20th century that allowed physical space exploration to become a reality. Common rationales for exploring space include advancing scientific research, uniting different nations, ensuring the future survival of humanity and developing military and strategic advantages against other countries. Various criticisms of space exploration are sometimes made. Space exploration has often been used as a proxy competition for geopolitical rivalries such as the [|Cold War]. The early era of space exploration was driven by a " [|Space Race] " between the [|Soviet Union] and the United States, the launch of the first man-made object to orbit the [|Earth], the USSR's [|Sputnik 1] , on 4 October 1957, and the first [|Moon] landing by the American [|Apollo 11] craft on 20 July 1969 are often taken as the boundaries for this initial period. The [|Soviet space program] achieved many of the first milestones, including the first living being in orbit in 1957, the first [|human spaceflight] ( [|Yuri Gagarin] aboard [|Vostok 1] ) in 1961, the first [|spacewalk] (by [|Aleksei Leonov] ) in 1965, the [|first automatic landing] on another celestial body in 1966, and the launch of the first [|space station] ( [|Salyut 1] ) in 1971. After the first 20 years of exploration, focus shifted from one-off flights to renewable hardware, such as the [|Space Shuttle program], and from competition to cooperation as with the [|International Space Station] (ISS). With the substantial completion of the ISS [|[2]] following [|STS-133] in March 2011, plans for space exploration by the USA remain in flux. [|Constellation], a Bush Administration program for a return to the Moon by 2020 [|[3]] was judged inadequately funded and unrealistic by [|an expert review panel] reporting in 2009. [|[4]] The Obama Administration proposed a revision of Constellation in 2010 to focus on the development of the capability for crewed missions beyond [|low earth orbit] (LEO), envisioning extending the operation of the [|ISS] beyond 2020, transferring the development of launch vehicles for human crews from NASA to the private sector, and developing technology to enable missions to beyond LEO, such as [|Earth/Moon L1], the Moon, [|Earth/Sun L2] , near-earth asteroids, and [|Phobos] or Mars orbit. [|[5]] As of March 2011, the US Senate and House of Representatives are still working towards a compromise NASA funding bill, which will probably terminate Constellation and fund development of a [|heavy lift launch vehicle] (HLLV). [|[6]] In the 2000s, the People's Republic of China initiated a [|successful manned spaceflight program], while the [|European Union] , Japan, and [|India] have also planned future manned space missions. China, Russia, Japan, and India have advocated manned missions to the Moon during the 21st century, while the European Union has advocated [|manned missions to both the Moon and Mars] during the 21st century. From the 1990s onwards, private interests began promoting [|space tourism] and then private space exploration of the Moon (see [|Google Lunar X Prize] ) The first steps of putting a man-made object into space were taken by German scientists during [|World War II] while testing the [|V2 rocket] which became the first human-made object in space on 3 October 1942 with the launching of V-4. After the war, the U.S. [|used German scientists] and their captured rockets in programs for both military and civilian research. The first scientific exploration from space was the cosmic radiation experiment launched by the U.S. on a V2 rocket on 10 May 1946. The first images of Earth taken from space followed the same year while the [|first animal experiment] saw fruit flies lifted into space in 1947, both also on modified V2s launched by Americans. Starting in 1947, the Soviets, also with the help of German teams, launched sub-orbital V2 rockets and their own variant, the [|R-1], including radiation and animal experiments on some flights. These [|suborbital] experiments only allowed a very short time in space which limited their usefulness. First flights       [|Sputnik 1], the first artificial [|satellite] orbited earth at 939 km (583 mi) to 215 km (134 mi) in 1957, and was soon followed by [|Sputnik 2]. See [|First satellite by country] (Replica Pictured)         Apollo CSM in lunar orbit          [|Apollo 17] astronaut [|Harrison Schmitt] standing next to a boulder at Taurus-Littrow. The first successful orbital launch was of the [|Soviet] unmanned [|//Sputnik 1// ("Satellite 1")] mission on 4 October 1957. The satellite weighed about 83 kg (184 pounds), and is believed to have orbited Earth at a height of about 250 km (160 mi). It had two radio transmitters (20 and 40 MHz), which emitted "beeps" that could be heard by radios around the globe. Analysis of the radio signals was used to gather information about the electron density of the ionosphere, while temperature and pressure data was encoded in the duration of radio beeps. The results indicated that the satellite was not punctured by a [|meteoroid]. Sputnik 1 was launched by an [|R-7] rocket. It burned up upon re-entry on 3 January 1958. This success led to an escalation of the American [|space program], which unsuccessfully attempted to launch [|a Vanguard satellite] into orbit two months later. On 31 January 1958, the U.S. successfully orbited [|Explorer 1] on a Juno rocket. In the meantime, the Soviet dog [|Laika] became the first animal in orbit on 3 November 1957. First human flights The first successful human spaceflight was // [|Vostok 1] // ("East 1"), carrying 27 year old Russian [|cosmonaut] [|Yuri Gagarin] on 12 April 1961. The spacecraft completed one orbit around the globe, lasting about 1 hour and 48 minutes. Gagarin's flight resonated around the world; it was a demonstration of the advanced [|Soviet space program] and it opened an entirely new era in space exploration: [|human spaceflight].

The U.S. first launched a person into space within a month of [|Vostok 1] with [|Alan Shepard] 's suborbital flight in [|Mercury-Redstone 3]. Orbital flight was achieved by the United States when [|John Glenn] 's [|Mercury-Atlas 6] orbited the Earth on 20 February 1962. [|Valentina Tereshkova], the first woman in space, orbited the Earth 48 times aboard [|Vostok 6] on 16 June 1963. China first launched a person into space 42 years after the launch of Vostok 1, on 15 October 2003, with the flight of [|Yang Liwei] aboard the [|Shenzhou 5] (Spaceboat 5) spacecraft. First planetary explorations The first artificial object to reach another celestial body was [|Luna 2] in 1959. [|[7]] The first automatic landing on another celestial body was performed by [|Luna 9] [|[8]] in 1966. [|Luna 10] became the first artificial satellite of another celestial body. [|[9]] The first manned landing on another celestial body was performed by [|Apollo 11] in its lunar landing on 20 July 1969. The first successful interplanetary flyby was the 1962 [|Mariner 2] flyby of [|Venus] (closest approach 34,773 kilometers). Flybys for the other planets were first achieved in 1965 for [|Mars] by [|Mariner 4], 1973 for [|Jupiter] by [|Pioneer 10] , 1974 for [|Mercury] by [|Mariner 10] , 1979 for [|Saturn] by [|Pioneer 11] , 1986 for [|Uranus] by [|Voyager 2] , and 1989 for [|Neptune] by Voyager 2. The first interplanetary surface mission to return at least limited surface data from another planet was the 1970 landing of [|Venera 7] on Venus which returned data to earth for 23 minutes. In 1971 the [|Mars 3] mission achieved the first soft landing on Mars returning data for almost 20 seconds. Later much longer duration surface missions were achieved, including over 6 years of Mars surface operation by [|Viking 1] from 1975 to 1982 and over 2 hours of transmission from the surface of Venus by [|Venera 13] in 1982, the longest ever Soviet planetary surface mission. Key people in early space exploration The dream of stepping into the outer reaches of the Earth's atmosphere was driven by the fiction of [|Jules Verne] [|[10]] [|[11]] [|[12]] and [|H.G.Wells], [|[13]] and rocket technology was developed to try to realise this vision. The German [|V2] was the first rocket to travel into space, overcoming the problems of thrust and material failure. During the final days of World War II this technology was obtained by both the Americans and Soviets as were its designers. The initial driving force for further development of the technology was a weapons race for intercontinental ballistic missiles ( [|ICBMs] ) to be used as long-range carriers for fast [|nuclear weapon] delivery, but in 1961 when [|USSR] launched the first man into space, the U.S. declared itself to be in a " [|Space Race] " with Russia.

Robert Gilruth Other key people included:
 * ** [|Konstantin Tsiolkovsky], [|Robert Goddard] , [|Hermann Oberth] **, and ** [|Reinhold Tiling] ** laid the groundwork of rocketry in the early years of the 20th century.
 * ** [|Wernher von Braun] ** was the lead rocket engineer for [|Nazi] Germany's World War II [|V-2 rocket] project. In the last days of the war he led a caravan of workers in the German rocket program to the American lines, where they surrendered and were brought to the USA to work on U.S. rocket development (" [|Operation Paperclip] "). He acquired American citizenship and led the team that developed and launched [|Explorer 1], the first American satellite. Von Braun later led the team at [|NASA] 's [|Marshall Space Flight Center] which developed the [|Saturn V] moon rocket.
 * Initially the race for space was often led by ** [|Sergei Korolyov] **, whose legacy includes both the [|R7] and [|Soyuz] —which remain in service to this day. Korolev was the mastermind behind the first satellite, first man (and first woman) in orbit and first spacewalk. Until his death his identity was a closely guarded state secret; not even his mother knew that he was responsible for creating the Russian space program.
 * ** [|Kerim Kerimov] ** was one of the founders of the [|Soviet space program] and was one of the lead architects behind the first [|human spaceflight] ( [|Vostok 1] ) alongside Sergey Korolyov. After Korolyov's death in 1966, Kerimov became the lead scientist of the Soviet space program and was responsible for the launch of the first [|space stations] from 1971 to 1991, including the [|Salyut] and [|Mir] series, and their precursors in 1967, the [|Cosmos 186] and [|Cosmos 188] . [|[14]] [|[15]]
 * ** [|Valentin Glushko] ** held the role of Chief Engine Designer for USSR. Glushko designed many of the engines used on the early Soviet rockets, but was constantly at odds with Korolyov.
 * ** [|Vasily Mishin] ** was Chief Designer working under Sergey Korolyov and one of first Soviets to inspect the captured German V2 design. Following the death of Sergei Korolev, Mishin was held responsible for the Soviet failure to be first country to place a man on the moon.
 * ** [|Bob Gilruth] ** was the [|NASA] head of the Space Task Force and director of 25 manned space flights. Gilruth was the person who suggested to [|John F. Kennedy] that the Americans take the bold step of reaching the Moon in an attempt to reclaim space superiority from the Soviets.
 * ** [|Christopher C. Kraft, Jr.] ** was NASA's first [|flight director], who oversaw development of [|Mission Control] and associated technologies and procedures.
 * ** [|Maxime Faget] ** was the designer of the [|Mercury] capsule; he played a key role in designing the [|Gemini] and [|Apollo] spacecraft, and contributed to the design of the [|Space Shuttle].

[ [|edit] ] Targets of exploration
Image of the Sun from 7 June 1992 showing some sunspots

[ [|edit] ] The Sun
While the [|Sun] will probably not be physically explored in the close future, one of the reasons for going into space includes knowing more about the Sun. Once above the atmosphere in particular and the Earth's magnetic field, this gives access to the Solar wind and infrared and ultraviolet radiations that cannot reach the surface of the Earth. The Sun generates most [|space weather], which can affect power generation and transmission systems on Earth and interfere with, and even damage, satellites and space probes.