NASA's trio of mini rovers will team up to explore the Moon
Thursday, 03 August 2023 12:33Working together without direct human input, three rovers each the size of a carry-on bag will map the lunar surface in 3D, using cameras and ground-penetrating radar. NASA is sending a trio of miniature rovers to the Moon to see how well they can cooperate with one another without direct input from mission controllers back on Earth. A teamwork-minded experiment to demonstrate new technolo
A new frontier for space in Australia with approval granted for a permanent commercial space launch facility in Koonibba
Thursday, 03 August 2023 12:33Southern Launch and the Koonibba Community Aboriginal Corporation will begin work on Australia's first permanent commercial sub-orbital space launch facility after planning consent was granted for the Koonibba Test Range. Southern Launch CEO Lloyd Damp says, 'The development of permanent, world-class facilities at the Koonibba Test Range will put Australia on the map as a space-faring nati
"Hoping for Frost" Sol 3906
Thursday, 03 August 2023 12:33Earth planning: Tuesday, August 1, 2023: Today we wrapped a single-sol plan for sol 3906. Our planning for this sol was primarily constrained by power. We had attempted to conduct a frost experiment over the weekend which failed, and so we are striving to save power to be able to attempt the experiment again on Wednesday's plan. The blog post for that weekend's plan gives an excellent descriptio
Russia to launch first lunar station in nearly 50 years
Thursday, 03 August 2023 12:33Russia's first lunar station in nearly 50 years, Luna-25, will fly to the Moon in the early morning of Aug 11, local media reported on Thursday. According to Russia's RIA Novosti, the launch date is set for Aug 11 when the Soyuz-2.1b rocket with the Fregat upper stage and the automatic station will lift off from the Vostochny Cosmodrome, located in the Amur Oblast, at 2:10 a.m. Moscow time
Galaxy 37 Horizons-4 performing well after launch
Thursday, 03 August 2023 12:33Maxar Technologies, provider of comprehensive space solutions and secure, precise, geospatial intelligence, has announced that the Galaxy 37/Horizons-4 satellite built for Intelsat is performing as expected after launch. The spacecraft was manufactured by Maxar in Palo Alto, California, and launched on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. Shortly aft
China launches Fengyun-3 satellite
Thursday, 03 August 2023 12:33China on Thursday launched a satellite into space from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Northwest China. The Fengyun-3 06 satellite was launched at 11:47 am (Beijing Time) by a Long March-4C carrier rocket and successfully entered the planned orbit. The launch marked the 481st flight mission of the Long March series carrier rockets. span class="BDL">Source: Xinhua News A
Dune patterns reveal environmental change on Earth and other planets
Thursday, 03 August 2023 12:33Dunes, the mounds of sand formed by the wind that vary from ripples on the beach to towering behemoths in the desert, are incarnations of surface processes, climate change, and the surrounding atmosphere. For decades, scientists have puzzled over why they form different patterns. Now, Stanford researchers have found a way to interpret the meaning of these patterns. Their results, published
Captain Kirk to the holodeck: Shatner beams in to remote meeting
Thursday, 03 August 2023 12:33More than half a century after he materialized on far-flung planets as Captain James T. Kirk of the Starship Enterprise, William Shatner has beamed into a distant land in a demonstration of hologram technology. The "Star Trek" actor was a guest speaker at an advertising conference in Sydney, Australia, where his lifelike image appeared in a box like a giant action figure - despite his being
Counting wildfires across the globe
Thursday, 03 August 2023 10:50In recent weeks, devastating wildfires have spread in Greece, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Algeria, Tunisia and Canada, causing human casualties as well as massive environmental and economic damage.
While wildfires are a natural part of many ecosystems, scientists have warned that they are becoming more frequent and more widespread. In response, an upgraded version of ESA’s World Fire Atlas is now available providing a detailed analysis of wildfires across the globe.
Northrop Grumman planning Cygnus upgrades
Thursday, 03 August 2023 10:49Northrop Grumman is planning upgrades to its Cygnus cargo vehicle, such as increased payload capacity, to support both the International Space Station and future commercial space stations.
Just add AI for smarter satnav... from rogue drone detection to safer driving
Thursday, 03 August 2023 07:54With our society producing more data than ever before, Artificial Intelligence, AI, is allowing us to gather, analyse and make use of it in novel ways, including in space programmes. Now AI is also being applied to satellite navigation by the engineering teams of ESA’s NAVISP programme, working with European industry and academia to invent the future of navigation. The result is a growing portfolio of prototype services, variously employed to improve space and Earth weather forecasting, enhance the performance of autonomous cars and boats, and help identify rogue drones in sensitive airspace.
Simulating Aeolus’s demise: a bird’s eye view
Thursday, 03 August 2023 07:30Aeolus’s mission is over, but weather forecasting is improved forever, and a new precedent has been set for safe satellite reentries. The trailblazing Earth Explorer returned through our atmosphere on 28 July, following the path it was guided on by ESA’s mission control over Earth’s most uninhabited regions, finally disintegrating over the Antarctic.
A week-long series of manoeuvres led to this point. They had never been performed before and pushed the satellite to its limits. Aeolus was never designed to fly at such low altitudes – its thrusters and fuel reserves were
Recycling parts for life on the Moon
Thursday, 03 August 2023 07:19Probing the origin and evolution of water-rich asteroids
Thursday, 03 August 2023 02:07More than half the work of the Emirates Mission to the Asteroid Belt is expected to be performed by UAE companies.
U.S. intelligence agency selects vendors for space debris tracking project
Wednesday, 02 August 2023 18:14The Intelligence Advanced Research Projects Activity selected four vendors to develop technologies and new approaches for tracking small debris objects in space.