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Copernical Team
Surrey Satellite opens new Australian office
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UK built Prometheus 2 imaging and monitoring cubesats on track for UK launch
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Albedo raises $48M to capture the highest resolution satellite imagery
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DART sets sights on asteroid target
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Spiralling stars provide a window into the early Universe
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Astronomers have been bemused to find young stars spiralling into the centre of a massive cluster of stars in the Small Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way. The outer arm of the spiral in this huge, oddly shaped stellar nursery – called NGC 346 – may be feeding star formation in a river-like motion of gas and stars. This is an efficient way to fuel star birth, researchers say.
The Small Magellanic Cloud has a simpler chemical composition than the Milky Way, making it similar to the galaxies found in the younger Universe, when heavier elements were more scarce.
Open Day 2022
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Open Day 2022
How space helps connect everyone everywhere
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![Connected car](https://www.esa.int/var/esa/storage/images/esa_multimedia/images/2022/09/connected_car/24435343-1-eng-GB/Connected_car_card_full.jpg)
Staying in touch with each another always, no matter whereabouts on Earth, is crucial for everything from driverless cars to remote healthcare, electronically enabled commerce, tele-education and remote working.
Europe’s tallest ever communications satellite launched
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The fourth Spacebus Neo satellite to benefit from ESA’s Neosat programme has launched into space on board the second Ariane 5 launch mission of 2022.
What's next for Artemis I after 2nd scrub?
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![The Artemis I unmanned lunar rocket sits on the launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on August 25, 2022. Credit: NASA What’s next for Artemis I after 2nd scrub?](https://scx1.b-cdn.net/csz/news/800a/2022/whats-next-for-artemis.jpg)
What went wrong with Artemis I was on the launch pad at Kennedy Space Center, so that's where NASA has decided to try and fix it.
On Tuesday, mission managers announced they would hold off rolling back to the Vehicle Assembly Building the 5.75 million-pound, 322-foot-tall combination of the Space Launch System rocket, Orion capsule and mobile launcher.
Instead, they will stay at Launch Pad 39-B to work on the source of the Saturday's scrub, which was the second scrub of NASA's attempt to send the uncrewed Artemis I on a multiweek mission to the moon. It's the first step in its eventual plans to return humans, including the first woman, to the lunar surface for the first time since 1972.
Pregnancy in space: Studying stem cells in zero gravity may determine whether it's safe
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![Weightlessness affects how our cells develop and divide. Credit: MarcelClemens/Shutterstock Pregnancy in space: studying stem cells in zero gravity may determine whether it’s safe](https://scx1.b-cdn.net/csz/news/800a/2022/pregnancy-in-space-stu.jpg)
Space is a hostile, extreme environment. It's only a matter of time before ordinary people are exposed to this environment, either by engaging in space tourism or by joining self-sustaining colonies far away from Earth.
To this end, there needs to be a much better understanding of how the environmental dangers of space will affect the biology of our cells, tissues, organs, and cognition. Crucially for future space colonies, we need to know whether we can easily reproduce in environments other than those found on Earth.
The effects of radiation on our cells, producing DNA damage, are well documented. What's less clear is how lower levels of gravity, what scientists call microgravity, will affect the mechanisms and rhythms taking place within our cells.
Scientists are only just beginning to investigate how activity in our cells might be affected by exposure to microgravity. Crucially, experiments on embryonic stem cells, and models of how embryos develop in their first few weeks in space, will help us determine whether it's possible for humans to produce offspring in the extraplanetary colonies of the future.