We have now discovered 30 039 near-Earth asteroids in the Solar System – rocky bodies orbiting the Sun on a path that brings them close to Earth’s orbit. The majority of these were discovered in the last decade, showing how our ability to detect potentially risky asteroids is rapidly improving.

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A new image from the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope reveals a remarkable cosmic sight: at least 17 concentric dust rings emanating from a pair of stars. Located just over 5000 light-years from Earth, the duo is collectively known as Wolf-Rayet 140. Each ring was created when the two stars came close together and their stellar winds (streams of gas they blow into space) met, compressing the gas and forming dust. The stars’ orbits bring them together about once every eight years; like the rings of a tree’s trunk, the dust loops mark the passage of time.

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The ESA-led Solar Orbiter mission arrives at its next close approach to the Sun on 12 October 2022 at 19:12 UTC (21:12 CEST). This sequence of images shows the progress of the ESA/NASA spacecraft as it heads inwards on its voyage of discovery. The sequence begins on 20 September and finishes on 10 October.

The sequence was taken by the Extreme Ultraviolet Imager (EUI) using the Full Sun Imager (FSI) telescope, and shows the Sun at a wavelength of 17 nanometers. This wavelength is emitted by gas in the Sun’s atmosphere with a temperature of around one million

The kinetic impact of NASA’s DART spacecraft with the Dimorphos asteroid around its larger Didymos parent body has succeeded in shifting its orbit, meaning humankind’s first planetary defence test has been successful. Observations are continuing of the debris plume caused by the collision for as long as possible, as the asteroid system gradually recedes from Earth.

Mexico City (AFP) Oct 10, 2022
Mexican President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador on Monday denied that a space cooperation agreement signed with Russia last year would help Moscow spy on North America. The pact was inked before Russia's invasion of Ukraine and "now a scandal is being made because there's talk that Mexico is allowing Russian satellites to be used to spy on Mexican and North American airspace," Lopez Obrador to

Certain estimates of Antarctica’s total contribution to sea-level rise may be over, or even underestimated, after researchers detected a previously unknown source of ice loss variability. In a new paper published in The Cryosphere, researchers using Copernicus Sentinel-1 data, found that glaciers feeding the George VI Ice Shelf speed up by approximately 15% during the Antarctic summer. This is the first time that such seasonal cycles have been detected on land ice flowing into ice shelves in Antarctica.

The ESA Council at Ministerial level, CM22, is a time for critical decisions. In November 2022, ESA’s Member States, Associate States and Cooperating States will come together to strengthen Europe’s space sector and ensure it continues to serve European citizens.

Washington (AFP) Oct 11, 2022
NASA on Tuesday celebrated exceeding expectations during a mission to deflect a distant asteroid, in a sci-fi like test of humanity's ability to stop an incoming cosmic object from devastating life on Earth. The fridge-sized Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) impactor deliberately smashed into the moonlet asteroid Dimorphos on September 26, pushing it into a smaller, faster orbit around

Tokyo (AFP) Oct 12, 2022
Japan's space agency said it sent a self-destruct order to its Epsilon rocket after a failed launch on Wednesday because of a problem that meant the craft could not safely fly. The unmanned rocket, on its sixth mission, was taking satellites into orbit to demonstrate "innovative" technologies. "The rocket can't continue a safe flight, because of the danger it would create if it falls on