Promontory UT (SPX) Jan 22, 2021
Northrop Grumman has conducted a validation ground test of an extended length 63-inch-diameter Graphite Epoxy Motor (GEM 63XL) in Promontory. This variation of the company's GEM 63 strap-on booster was developed in partnership with United Launch Alliance (ULA) to provide additional lift capability to the Vulcan Centaur rocket. "This new motor optimizes our best-in-class technologies and le

Washington DC (SPX) Jan 22, 2021
This composite image shows a hot spot in Jupiter's atmosphere. In the image on the left, taken on Sept. 16, 2020 by the Gemini North Telescope, the hot spot appears bright in the infrared at a wavelength of 5 microns. The inset image on the right was taken by the JunoCam visible-light imager aboard NASA's Juno spacecraft, also on Sept. 16, during Juno's 29th close pass by Jupiter. Here, th

Nanjing (XNA) Jan 22, 2021
China's first solar probe, Advanced Space-based Solar Observatory (ASO-S), is scheduled to be launched into space in the first half of 2022, marking the country's first-ever mission to "touch" the sun. The satellite will operate in a sun-synchronous orbit 720 km above Earth to keep a close tab on the sun 24 hours a day. Measuring about 1,000 kg in total mass, the satellite is expected to o

Brussels, Belgium (SPX) Jan 22, 2021
This week the European Commission has awarded two contracts for 12 Satellites (6 satellites each) for a total of EUR euro 1.47 billion, to ThalesAleniaSpace (Italy) and Airbus Defence and Space (Germany) following an open competition. With this, the Commission is initiating the launch of the 2nd Generation of Galileo, the European satellite positioning system. The aim is to keep Galileo a

Melbourne, Australia (SPX) Jan 20, 2021
A group of international scientists, including an Australian astrophysicist, has used knowhow from gravitational wave astronomy (used to find black holes in space) to study ancient marine fossils as a predictor of climate change. The research, published in the journal Climate of the Past, is a unique collaboration between palaeontologists, astrophysicists and mathematicians - to improve th

Aboard Yuanwang-5 (Xinhua) Jan 22, 2021
China's space tracking ship Yuanwang-5 completed its mission in the Pacific Ocean to monitor and ensure the launch of the Tiantong 1-03 satellite on Wednesday. China successfully launched the mobile telecommunication satellite at 12:25 a.m. (Beijing Time) on Wednesday. The satellite entered its planned orbit. As the only maritime monitoring site for the launch, Yuanwang-5 was respons

For the first time ever, a telecommunications satellite has used an iodine propellant to change its orbit around Earth.

The small but potentially disruptive innovation could help to clear the skies of space junk, by enabling tiny satellites to self-destruct cheaply and easily at the end of their missions, by steering themselves into the atmosphere where they would burn up.

Image: Sardinia, the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, is featured in this false-colour image captured by the Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission.

WASHINGTON — Google announced Jan. 21 it is shutting down Loon, a venture to provide wireless connectivity by balloon that has been seen as both complementary to and competitive with satellite networks.

In a blog post, Astro Teller, head of X, the advanced projects or “moonshot factory” division of Google parent company Alphabet, announced that Loon will wind down operations in the next several months.

WASHINGTON — A recent NASA mission successfully demonstrated the performance of a non-toxic “green” propellant, creating opportunities for its use in a wide range of future spacecraft.

NASA flew the Green Propellant Infusion Mission (GPIM) spacecraft as one of the payloads on the Space Test Program 2 mission that launched on a SpaceX Falcon Heavy in June 2019.