NASA's Mars helicopter Ingenuity didn't check in with its handlers for nearly a week this spring, and communications could continue to be spotty for a while yet.
Space News & Blog Articles
Find a Horizon and Savor the Bending of Light
The full Strawberry Moon on June 3rd invites us to experience the refractive power of Earth's atmosphere.
NASA Panel Talks Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena
NASA has held its first public meeting with its panel investigating Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena. The panel will publish a full report in July.
North Korean launch attempt fails, days after South Korea’s successful space shot
North Korea’s Chollima 1 rocket takes off from the Sohae Satellite Launching Station on May 31, local time. Credit: Korean Central News Agency
An attempt to place a small North Korean military spy satellite into orbit May 30 failed a few minutes after liftoff, five days after South Korea successfully launched the country’s homegrown Nuri rocket with several technology demonstration and scientific research spacecraft.
Exactly How Massive is the Milky Way?
How do you weigh a galaxy? It’s an astronomical challenge, particularly if it’s the galaxy you call home. It turns out there are several ways to get a handle on the mass of the Milky Way, and a recent study summarizes these methods to present the best value.
The Expanse: A Telltale Series preview — Trust your gut before your head gets in the way
Telltale Games is reviving The Expanse with a prequel game series, and we’ve played the first episode.
Odd supergiant star Betelgeuse is brightening up. Is it about to go supernova?
One of the brightest stars in the night sky has been getting oddly brighter, prompting speculations that it might soon explode in a supernova. Can we really expect that celestial spectacle?
Zany new trailer for Fox's 'Stars on Mars' reality show counts us down to launch (video)
Fox released a new trailer for the wild new reality TV series "Stars on Mars" hosted by William Shatner that tosses contestants into a simulated Martian habitat.
Trial by sound
Image: Trial by sound
Watch live: ‘Ready for the Moon’ conference
Join us live to follow the ‘Ready for the Moon’ event, a high-level political conference on the challenges and ambitions for Europe's space sector. ESA Web TV will broadcast on its Channel Two the conference, including the media briefing on 2 June starting at 14:00 CEST (13:00 BST).
Saturn's moon Enceladus is blasting a plume of water 6,000 miles high. Could life be lurking under its icy shell?
The James Webb Space Telescope has found a 6,000 mile-long plume of water squirting into space from Saturn's tiny moon Enceladus, creating a massive watery cloud in the planet's orbit.
Hubble captures starry tentacles of faraway 'jellyfish galaxy' in stunning detail (photo)
NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has snapped a stunning image of a jellyfish galaxy, whose cosmic tentacles host massive amounts of star formation.
June: Solstice Nights & Summer Sights
June offers the shortest nights of the year for stargazers in the Northern Hemisphere. So count on our monthly Sky Tour podcast to help you get the most out your casual stargazing. It’s a fun and informative way to introduce yourself to the nighttime sky!
Accelerating the Green Transition
Earth observation has been essential in identifying and monitoring climate change. Satellite data form the baseline for effective European mitigation and adaptation strategies to support the Green Transition, the European Union to reach its goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2050, as well as its Green Deal.
Galileo Second Generation enters full development phase
The main procurements batch of Galileo Second Generation initiated last summer has been finalised, leaving the system ready for its In Orbit Validation development phase. Today, following the opening session of the European Navigation Conference (ENC), ESA Director of Navigation Javier Benedicto invited Thales Alenia Space (Italy), Airbus Defence and Space (Germany) and Thales Six GTS (France) to sign the respective contracts commencing System Engineering Support for the next generation of Europe’s navigation satellite system.
If You’re Going to Visit Venus, Why Not Include an Asteroid Flyby Too?
A recent study submitted to Acta Astronautica examines the prospect of designing a Venus mission flight plan that would involve visiting a nearby asteroid after performing a gravity assist maneuver at Venus but prior to final contact with the planet. The study was conducted by Vladislav Zubko, who is a researcher and PhD Candidate at the Space Research Institute of the Russian Academy of Science (RAS) and has experience studying potential flight plans to various planetary bodies throughout the solar system.
ESA is Testing How Iron Burns in Weightlessness
What happens when you burn iron in space? The European Space Agency is torching iron powder in microgravity, to find out. They aren’t doing it for the fun of it, but to understand something called “discrete burning.” It turns out that this process might enable more efficient iron-burning furnaces right here on Earth. It could eventually join other renewable energy sources as a way to combat the release of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere.
Here's How You Could Get Impossibly Large Galaxies in the Early Universe
One of the most interesting (and confounding) discoveries made by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is the existence of “impossibly large galaxies.” As noted in a previous article, these galaxies existed during the “Cosmic Dawn,” the period that coincided with the end of the “Cosmic Dark Age” (roughly 1 billion years after the Big Bang). This period is believed to hold the answers to many cosmological mysteries, not the least of which is what the earliest galaxies in the Universe looked like. But after Webb obtained images of these primordial galaxies, astronomers noticed something perplexing.
New technique could probe the heart of powerful solar storms
Neutral particles accelerated to incredible speeds could be used to investigate powerful solar storms, according to a new study.
UFO Panelists Say NASA Needs Better Data — and Help from AI
A panel of independent experts took a first-ever look at what NASA could bring to the study of UFO sightings — now known as unidentified anomalous phenomena, or UAPs — and said the space agency will have to up its game.
A New Launch Complex Opens Up in the Ocean
The commercial space sector (aka. NewSpace) is one of the fastest-growing industries of the 21st century. In the past twenty years, what was once considered an ambitious venture or far-off prospect has become a rapidly-accelerating reality. Today, companies are conducting launches using their own rockets and spacecraft, often from their own facilities, to send everything from satellites and cargo to astronauts (commercial and professional) into space. The growing number of launch providers has also led to a dramatic increase in demand for launch-related services.