The Large High Altitude Air Shower Observatory (LHAASO), one of China's key national science and technology infrastructure facilities, has accurately measured the brightness over 3.5 orders of magnitude of the standard candle in high-energy astronomy, thus calibrating a new standard for ultra-high-energy (UHE) gamma-ray sources. The standard candle is the famous Crab Nebula, which evolved from the "guest star" recorded by the imperial astronomers of China's Song Dynasty.

LHAASO has also discovered a photon with an energy of 1.1 PeV (1 PeV = one quadrillion electronvolts), indicating the presence of an extremely powerful electron accelerator—about one-tenth the size of the solar system—located in the core region of the Crab Nebula. The accelerator can energize electrons to a level 20,000 times greater than what CERN's Large Electron-Positron Collider (LEP) can ever achieve, thus approaching the absolute theoretical limit posed by classical electrodynamics and ideal magnetohydrodynamics.

When NASA's Ingenuity Mars Helicopter hovered above the Red Planet April 19 on its maiden voyage, the moment was hailed as the first instance of powered, controlled flight on another planet. Figuring out how to fly on Mars, where the air is thin but gravity is about a third of that on Earth, took years of work. Along with the challenge of developing a craft that was up to the task, the mission needed software to make the unprecedented flights possible.

From ESA's Materials and Electrical Components Laboratory—one of a suite of labs based at the ESTEC technical center in Noordwijk, the Netherlands—a view from an intricate test campaign for the next generation of European weather satellites.

The near infrared detector assembly of the Flexible Combined Instrument (FCI) imager aboard the Meteosat Third Generation—Imaging (MTG—I) satellite was found to be susceptible to unwanted "stray light" from the sun.

A solution was proposed to reduce this vulnerability: a very thin metal mask would be glued atop the assembly, with carefully designed slits that would allow light to penetrate only in the desired areas, minimizing the entry of stray light.

But the feasibility of this solution needed to be tested, in order to demonstrate if the alloy cover would remain securely in place as incoming direct sunlight heats it up repeatedly during moments of sun intrusion.

Accordingly, a new feature was added to the Electrostatic Discharge (ESD) facility, part of the Materials and Electrical Components Lab. Originally designed as a vacuum chamber to expose samples to mono-energetic electrons down to cryogenic temperature, the ESD was upgraded to host an optical rack to hold a light source to simulate sunlight exposure onto the sample.

The European Robotic Arm (ERA) will be launched to the International Space Station together with the Russian Multipurpose Laboratory Module, called 'Nauka'. ERA is the first robot able to 'walk' around the Russian segment of the Space Station. It has the ability to anchor itself to the Station and move back and forward by itself, hand-over-hand between fixed base-points. This 11-metre intelligent space robot will serve as main manipulator on the Russian part of the Space Station, assisting the astronauts during spacewalks. The robot arm can help install, deploy and replace elements in outer space

ERA is 100% made-in-Europe. A consortium of European companies led by Airbus Defence and Space Netherlands designed and assembled it for ESA. The robotic arm is largely funded by the Dutch government.

The long-delayed Russian module for the International Space Station is set to be finally launched this month, but the date has been pushed back several days, the head of the country's space corporation said Thursday.

Roscosmos director Dmitry Rogozin said on Twitter that the Nauka (Science) module is now scheduled to be launched from the Russian launch facility in Baikonur, Kazakhstan on July 21. The following two days could serve as reserve dates for the launch.

Russian space officials had earlier said that the launch previously set for July 15 was postponed because of the need to fix some unspecified flaws.

The launch of Nauka, also called Multipurpose Laboratory Module, has been repeatedly delayed because of technical problems.

It was initially scheduled to go up in 2007. In 2013, experts found contamination in its fuel system, resulting in a long and costly replacement. Other Nauka systems also underwent modernization or repairs.

The 20-metric-ton module is set to be put to orbit by a Proton-M booster rocket. It's intended to provide Russian astronauts onboard the space outpost with their own room and capacity for lab research.