NavList:

Space navigation is about to take a major leap forward with the launch and deployment of the multi-purpose NICER/SEXTNAT aboard ISS.

Here is an extract from NASA and some references of how pulsars will be tested for navigation timing and orientation. Aboard some of the Mars rovers, are similar devices along with star field imagers and local vertical sensors.

While there are Mars GPS proposals (MIT is bidding), the NICER/SEXTANT project may superseed GPS-like approaches.

NICER/SEXTANT

The Neutron-star Interior Composition Explorer (NICER), which NASA recently selected as its next Explorer Mission of Opportunity, will gather scientific data revealing the physics of the densest matter allowed in nature, and—from the same platform—will demonstrate a groundbreaking navigation technology that could revolutionize the agency’s ability to travel to the far reaches of the solar system and beyond.

The multi-purpose mission, also known as NICER/SEXTANT (Station Explorer for X-ray Timing and Navigation Technology), consists of 56 X-ray telescopes in a compact bundle, their associated silicon detectors, and a number of other advanced technologies.

The X-ray instrument is roughly the size of a typical college dormitory refrigerator and will be deployed on the International Space Station (ISS) in 2017 as an external attached payload on one of the ISS ExPRESS Logistics Carriers.

“NICER/SEXTANT will establish the viability of spacecraft navigation using neutron stars, while the same instrument gives scientists an important new tool with which to better understand these stars that can serve as navigation beacons.”


https://phys.org/news/2015-05-nasa-multi-purpose-nicersextant-mission-track.html

https://www.nasa.gov/nicer

Ed Popko