Copernical Team
Euclid spacecraft prepares to probe universe's dark mysteries
For now, Europe's Euclid spacecraft sits quietly in a sterilized room in the south of France, its golden trim gleaming under the fluorescent light.
But in a few months the space telescope will blast off on history's first mission to search for two of the universe's greatest mysteries: dark matter and dark energy.
Though together they make up 95 percent of the universe, almost nothing is known about either—a glaring hole in scientific understanding that Euclid project manager Giuseppe Racca dubbed a "cosmic embarrassment".
Aiming to shed light on these dark secrets, the European Space Agency's mission will chart a 3D map of the universe encompassing two billion galaxies across more than a third of the sky.
Eyes on Hera: Asteroid mission's cameras ready
MAVEN status update
NASA's MAVEN spacecraft entered safe mode on Feb. 16 after encountering an issue with its Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU), which measures the spacecraft rate of rotation for use in determining its pointing. The IMU had been powered up in preparation for a minor maneuver targeted to reduce eclipse durations in 2027.
On Feb.17, MAVEN exited safe mode and is currently operating in all stellar mode, a mode that does not rely on IMU measurements such that the IMU can be powered off to conserve its lifetime. The maneuver will be waived as the team evaluates the path forward. Relay activities and nominal science operations are scheduled to resume on Feb. 23.
MAVEN launched in November 2013 and entered Mars' orbit in September 2014. The mission's goal is to explore the planet's upper atmosphere, ionosphere, and interactions with the Sun and solar wind to explore the loss of the Martian atmosphere to space. Understanding atmospheric loss gives scientists insight into the history of Mars' atmosphere and climate, liquid water, and planetary habitability.
Provided by NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center
ESA invites you to satnav summer school in Sweden
This year’s ESA/JRC International Summer School on Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS) will take place in July in Kiruna, Sweden.
Luxembourg taps into SES's O3b mPOWER for defense and disaster recovery
Luxembourg has selected SES's O3b mPOWER system to serve as the resilient satcom infrastructure for defense, security, and disaster recovery in the country and beyond. The MEO Global Services program, valued at 195 million euro over 10 years, will enable the acquisition and operation of O3b mPOWER services, pending approval by the Luxembourg parliament. The effects of Aurora Borealis on energy grids with the addition of renewables
As the world transitions toward more renewable energy resources and deals with the consequences of a changing climate, the resiliency of energy infrastructure is becoming ever more urgent. University of Oklahoma researcher Paul Moses, Ph.D., has received a Faculty Early CAREER Development award from the National Science Foundation to better understand how chaotic grid disturbances from events li Colossal sky map shows over one billion glowing galaxies
The largest two-dimensional map of the sky ever made has grown even larger with the tenth data release from the DESI Legacy Imaging Surveys - a monumental six-year survey covering nearly half the sky. This new data release adds increased sky and wavelength coverage to the already completed surveys made with data from NSF's NOIRLab telescopes at Kitt Peak National Observatory in Arizona and Cerro Squishy outer shell may be resurfacing Venus
Earth and Venus are rocky planets of about the same size and rock chemistry, so they should be losing their internal heat to space at about the same rate. How Earth loses its heat is well known, but Venus' heat flow mechanism has been a mystery. A study that uses three-decade-old data from NASA's Magellan mission has taken a new look at how Venus cools and found that thin regions of the planet's Ryugu Asteroid sample reveals organic-rich composition, first analysis shows
Asteroid Ryugu has a rich complement of organic molecules, according to a NASA and international team's initial analysis of a sample from the asteroid's surface delivered to Earth by Japan's Hayabusa2 spacecraft. The discovery adds support to the idea that organic material from space contributed to the inventory of chemical components necessary for life.
Organic molecules are the building Galactic Energy to launch rockets from the sea
Galactic Energy, a private space company based in Beijing, plans to make its first sea-based launch this summer, which could be the first by a private Chinese firm if successful. According to Xia Dongkun, a vice-president at Galactic Energy, the company has scheduled the launch of one of its Ceres 1 rockets in the Yellow Sea