Paris, France (SPX) Sep 25, 2025
Framatome and ENEA, Italy's Agency for New Technologies, Energy and Sustainable Development, have signed a memorandum of understanding to jointly explore advanced technologies for lunar surface nuclear fission reactors. The agreement is intended to support future human settlements on the Moon with reliable, long-duration power systems. Nuclear fission is seen as a key enabler for lunar ope

Berlin, Germany (SPX) Sep 25, 2025
Interstellar objects such as 3I/ATLAS, when captured in the planet-forming discs of young stars, may serve as the building blocks of giant planets, offering a solution to a long-standing problem in planet formation theory. These wandering asteroid- and comet-like bodies are ejected from their home systems and drift through interstellar space, occasionally crossing into other star systems.

Paris, France (SPX) Sep 25, 2025
Scientists have produced the most detailed three-dimensional map yet of stellar nurseries within our galaxy, using data from the European Space Agency's Gaia mission. The new model reveals how massive young stars interact with interstellar clouds, transforming our understanding of star-forming environments. Studying stellar birthplaces has always been challenging, since thick gas and dust

Los Angeles CA (SPX) Sep 25, 2025
Scientists at NYU Abu Dhabi have built an artificial intelligence system capable of predicting solar wind speeds up to four days in advance with far greater accuracy than existing methods. Their findings are published in The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series. Solar wind, a constant stream of charged particles from the Sun, can intensify into powerful events that disrupt Earth's atmos

New Brunswick NJ (SPX) Sep 25, 2025
Astronomers have identified an extraordinary Einstein Cross containing a fifth image, pointing to the presence of a massive halo of dark matter. The finding, led by an international team including Rutgers researchers, is published in The Astrophysical Journal. An Einstein Cross typically forms when the gravity of foreground galaxies bends light from a background galaxy into four distinct i

Paris (AFP) Sept 19, 2025
With help from amateur astronomers, scientists tracked how an asteroid travelled from space, broke up in Earth's atmosphere and sent fiery fragments shooting to the ground, gathering new information about how these space rocks disintegrate. Asteroid 2023 CX1 briefly lit up the sky as it disintegrated over northwestern France at around 4:00 pm (1400 GMT) on February 13, 2023. Seven hours

Washington DC (UPI) Sep 24, 2025
Two rocket launches with satellites by Space X and United Launch Alliance are scheduled for Thursday morning from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Central Florida. SpaceX is scheduled to lift off at 4:36 EDT with a Falcon 9 rocket taking 28 Starlink satellites into low-Earth orbit from Launch Complex 40. There is a four-hour launch window. This is the 22nd flight scheduled for the

Washington DC (UPI) Sep 24, 2025
SpaceX launched a trio of spacecraft Wednesday morning, each meant to study the sun and space weather, and their affects on Earth. The Falcon 9 rocket launched from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida around 7:30 a.m. EDT. The primary payload on the flight was NASA's Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe, also known as IMAP, Space.com reported. This observatory pl

Greenbelt MD (SPX) Sep 25, 2025
A new NASA mission will capture images of Earth's invisible "halo," the faint light given off by our planet's outermost atmospheric layer, the exosphere, as it morphs and changes in response to the Sun. Understanding the physics of the exosphere is a key step toward forecasting dangerous conditions in near-Earth space, a requirement for protecting Artemis astronauts traveling through the region