Uchuu Kyoudai

I just read a reddit IAMA session with the actual NASA chief technologist Mason Peck. Its a great reading and i suggest everyone to give it a look. 

I'd like to point out a specific answer. Do you remember that in this manga they send two different rockets, one for materials and one for flesh and bones, in order to make the moon base, and then they shield it with regolith to avoid cosmic radiation contamination? Well, apaprently there could be  a smarter way to do it:

http://it.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/1epdv7/i_am_mason_peck_nasas_chief_technologist_ask_me/ca2g427

I would have tried to make the sponge hydrophobic, perhaps coating it in some oil of some sort. Not sure exactly how well that would work, though.

Oil and mud is a very bad combo since clay and certain loams are notorious for bonding with one another.  It's a good idea if it's a sand desert (silica based) though.  Anything "temporary" would be useless consider the revolutions the wheel have to go thru (distance to goal divide by the circumference of the expanded sponge wheel) would eat thru the coating unless it's some hi-tech polymer or the likes (primarily half-life based instead of exposure based).

The sealant is a good idea for "on-the-spot" solution, if they had more time, I would've recommended a new set of wheels with a disposable ~5mm outer layer that "peels" off when there's too much moisture build up (the stuff they use when your bath ceiling is crumbling and you can't have tile on the top to prevent steam build up, when it peels a few years down the road, you just have to scrap off the old stuff and reapply it).  It'd only shrink the diamater of the wheels by 1 cm in the end when everything peels off.  The "rim" of the wheel would be the sponge, but with thin slits cut into it to jam some coconut husk into to promote a water wick effect toward the center of the wheels and minor reduction of weight.  The center of the wheel would have an evaporation point (etched thin gold plate/leaf sheet painted black at regular intervals with a chemical that produce moderate amount of heat when in contact with water). But it's completely against the spirit of the "Space Development - Abridged" though, since it's single use and it target a specific obstacle (water) that isn't normally a concern in space.

Great, now I want a T-shirt that says Uchunchu.

I would have tried to make the sponge hydrophobic, perhaps coating it in some oil of some sort. Not sure exactly how well that would work, though.

I think I had that exact same lego astronaut as a kid.

Bad luck is bad...

Well another trouble coming!!!!

Awww damn, everybody.... I freaking love you. That is all. ;m;

I seriously doubt any teacher in America would say something like that. It's just not part of the American culture.

You haven't met enough teachers in America then, there are those that steals from their student while they weren't looking, those that tells them that they won't amount to anything and will just be burden to society, those that teach them that science is a lie if it isn't from "the book", those that sexually preys their students, something like this isn't all that uncommon at all especially in certain parts of the US. 

Then on the other spectrum, you've teachers that pay out of their own pockets to make sure certain smart underprivileged kids gets into university, those that volunteers their time at the risk of losing their job just so kids don't drop out (thanks to bush's ill conceived no-one-left-behind policy), guidance counselors that DID lose their job when they fought against the system to get brilliant but troubled kids into programs that they would otherwise not be qualified for.

Teachers are humans, and humans are capable of during a wide spectrum of things both good and bad.  I'd like to know which "American culture" you are referring to, cause there isn't a unifying one at all aside from the fabled "american dream". 

@redlar - have you ever been to a school in a small town or rural area? It's really not that unrealistic at all.

Awesome updates this week btw. Thank you, iMangaScans!

I seriously doubt any teacher in America would say something like that. It's just not part of the American culture.

Oath Sign

;_;

ah crap, can feel tears trying to escape from my eye holes

Now that's what I call a manly brofist.

@v1989: No, Sharon's husband was a Japanese astronomer.

Welcome to the October Sky chapter of Uchuu Kyodai. it seems like all astronaut stories have a part like this, where characters are born in a poor small town and struggle to get people to believe their dreams are achievable.

Wait a minute... Rick was a name of Sharon's husband, wasn't it?

God I really really love this manga.

Come on Mutta, Pico and Vince were just trying to drink, and you knocked them into a flashback. Personally I can't stand when I'm at the bar, and look around, and suddenly I'm in a different place in the time-space continuum. It's extremely disorienting.

"What a gentleman-like speed violation."

Mutta's reaction just made my day.