The shuttle did some extraordinary work in low-orbit experiments, the International Space Station, moving cargo.
And Richard Branson is planning to take tourists on jaunts into low-orbit space via Virgin Galactic.
There's also the ORS-1, a low-orbit reconnaissance satellite that takes just 90 minutes to circle the globe.
But unlike Iridium's 66 low-orbit birds, Astrolink will cover the earth with only four high-orbit geostationary fliers.
McCaw also has intellectual property rights to a system that connects low-orbit satellite systems like Iridium with midaltitude projects like ICO.
Fearful that one network of low-orbit birds is as bad as another, investors had lopped 30% off Globalstar's stock value by early August before shares rebounded a bit.
Others, including Pirate Party co-chairman Gregory Engels, seem to prefer the idea of a low-Earth-orbit satellite that would be harder to launch but easier to keep airborne than a slowly-deflating balloon.
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Geosynchronous satellites are so distant that their images aren't sharp, while low-earth orbit satellites, which fly as low as 100 miles, can feed information only when they pass over an area of interest.
Most see a greater role for the private sector in launching astronauts to low-Earth orbit.
The other study would look at new low-Earth orbit applications for an ATV-derived vehicle.
No longer will it own the vehicles it uses to go to low-Earth orbit.
This meant relying on unproven and complex technology and launching dozens of satellites into low-earth orbit.
The rocket was attempting to carry a 19.5kg satellite to a low-Earth orbit of 450km.
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The Long March 5 will be capable of putting more than 20 tonnes in a low-Earth orbit.
But it remains to be seen how useful an acoustic sensor placed in a low-Earth orbit might be.
They were most concerned with low-Earth orbit (that is, below 2, 000km in altitude).
Reed warns that if space junk is not removed it could mean that low-earth orbit might eventually become unusable.
For the most part, though, their proposals call for activating nuclear reactors only after the vehicles have reached low-Earth orbit.
Thagard, the former NASA astronaut, said he was exposed to 120 millisieverts during his 115 days in low-Earth orbit aboard Mir.
Its most striking feature is to delegate the humdrum task of ferrying people and equipment to low-Earth orbit to the private sector.
But even if NASA does not venture beyond low-Earth orbit, others might.
Nasa astronaut Stan Love knows first-hand the difficulties with technology that his colleagues have experienced on the International Space Station in low-Earth orbit.
Virgina-based Iridium is almost halfway through a multi-year plan to replace its low-earth orbit network of communication satellites with a powerful new generation.
"We need to get NASA out of the business of getting crew" to low-earth orbit, she told The Wall Street Journal at the time.
Nasa's new Space Launch System (SLS) is a multi-billion-dollar venture to take humans beyond the International Space Station (ISS) and the confines of low-Earth orbit.
Beyond low-Earth orbit, astronauts are bombarded with harmful cosmic rays, which can boost the risk of certain diseases such as cancer and neurological damage.
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It should be noted also that the 2017 maiden test flight will use a "lite" variant, one capable of lifting about 70 tonnes to low-Earth orbit.
But until the commercial astronaut taxis are ready to go, the nation will be dependent on Russian Soyuz spacecraft to launch its crews to low-Earth orbit.
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However, he said in due course this revised vessel would also serve as the "technological foundation" for much more capable vehicles to take astronauts beyond low-Earth orbit.
The Space Launch System, or SLS for short, is NASA's go-to rocket to carry NASA's planned Orion capsule and possibly other future payloads beyond low-Earth orbit.
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