Long before humans reached orbit, insects had already proven they could handle spaceflight. Fruit flies travelled aboard a V-2 rocket in 1947, becoming the first animals to reach space and survive the journey. Since then, countless creepy crawlies have followed, from bumblebees and houseflies to ants and stick insects, helping scientists understand how living organisms cope with the extreme environment beyond Earth's atmosphere.
Space News & Blog Articles
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When Black Holes Merge
October and November 2024 proved to be particularly productive for gravitational wave astronomy. Within the two months, the LIGO-Virgo-KAGRA collaboration detected two black hole mergers with such unusual properties that they're changing our understanding of how they form and evolve. Both events feature rapidly spinning black holes in unequal mass pairs, properties that point toward a violent history of previous collisions rather than a quiet stellar origin.
Could this film become the 1st western movie to send a filmmaker into space?
An Italian producer has announced plans for the first western film to launch a filmmaker into low-Earth orbit to shoot key scenes.
Never Mind Rogue Planets. Their Rogue Moons Could Support Life
At a young age, we're told how the Sun warms the Earth and makes life possible. That idea sticks with most of us for life. But when we want to understand things more thoroughly and we dig more deeply, we learn that Earth its own heat sources that help it maintian habitability: remnant heat and radioactive decay. Other rocky worlds can have these sources, too.
Astronomy Heaven: Sky & Telescope Tours Chile
Sky & Telescope's Chile tour offered magnificent views of the southern sky, professional observatories, and one of the world’s most remarkable deserts.
'Shockingly large' amount of sensitive satellite communications are unencrypted and vulnerable to interception, researchers find
A mind-boggling lack of encryption allowed researchers to eavesdrop on satellite links and intercept vast quantities of private communications, including those by government and military officials.
Darth Vader returns in the new 'Star Wars' novel 'Master of Evil', and we've got a sneak peek (exclusive)
Author Adam Christopher takes us to Mustafar and beyond in the chilling new sci-fi story "Star Wars: Master of Evil."
China breaks its single-year launch record with weekend flurry
Four Chinese rockets launched over the weekend, taking the nation's total for 2025 to a record-breaking 72 orbital missions.
Florida annual launch record broken with late-night Starlink flight
A long-exposure shot of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket blasting off from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on Nov. 10, 2025. Image: John Pisani / Spaceflight Now
Update Nov. 10, 11:30 p.m. EST (04130UTC): SpaceX confirms deployment of the 29 Starlink satellites.
Scientists 3D printed muscle tissue in microgravity. The goal is to make human organs from scratch
Scientists just 3D printed human muscle tissue in microgravity conditions. The ultimate goal is to make organs in space.
James Webb Space Telescope
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is the premier space science observatory designed to solve the mysteries of our solar system, look beyond to distant worlds around other stars, and probe the enigmatic structures and origins of our universe. As the successor to the Hubble Space Telescope, JWST is an international collaboration led by NASA with its partners, the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Canadian Space Agency (CSA).
New 'exosuit' with artificial muscles could help astronauts explore the moon and Mars
A new "exosuit" was put through its paces with analog astronauts in Australia. The research team would love to try the suit out on the International Space Station, too.
Private Chinese rocket fails during launch, 3 satellites lost
Galactic Energy's Ceres-1 rocket suffered a failure of its upper stage during a launch on Sunday (Nov. 9), leading to the loss of all three payloads on board.
Northern lights may be visible in 21 US states tonight
Auroras may be visible from Alaska to Indiana as two incoming coronal mass ejections could spark geomagnetic storm conditions overnight.
Planets may make their own water as they form — could that mean more habitable worlds in the universe?
New lab experiments suggest that water may not be a rare visitor delivered by chance but rather a fundamental ingredient woven into the process of planetary birth.
ESA's sun spacecraft captures 1st close-up of our star's magnetic engine in motion
"Solar Orbiter can now provide this missing piece of the puzzle."
Can you still do good astrophotography on a 14 year old DSLR?
I took my Canon EOS Rebel T3i and headed to the fields to see whether the 14-year-old camera could grab great photos of the night sky.
The Taurid meteor shower could put on its best show this week — keep your eyes peeled for fireballs
There is still time to look out for Taurid meteors lighting up November nights.
Lego City Modular Galactic Spaceship review
The perfect playset for kids wanting to jet off into space, the Lego City Modular Galactic Spaceship is a fun, detailed build.
Aurora alert! Sun fires off 2 colossal X flares as multiple CMEs race toward Earth
Geomagnetic storm conditions are possible Nov. 10 through Nov. 12.
Volcano belches ash over Chile | Space photo of the day for Nov. 10, 2025
The European Space Agency's Copernicus Sentinel-2 satellite mission captured a plume of ash over the Planchón-Peteroa volcanic complex.
