Copernical Team
Maine company successfully launches prototype rocket
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A Maine company that's developing a rocket to propel small satellites into space passed its first major test on Sunday.
Brunswick-based bluShift Aerospace launched a 20-foot (6-meter) prototype rocket, hitting an altitude of a little more than 4,000 feet (1,219 meters) in a first run designed to test the rocket's propulsion and control systems.
It carried a science project by Falmouth High School students that will measure flight metrics such as barometric pressure, a special alloy that's being tested by a New Hampshire company—and a Dutch dessert called stroopwafel, in an homage to its Amsterdam-based parent company.
Opportunities for industry to renew Europe’s Spaceport
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ESA invites European space and non-space companies to get involved in the modernisation of facilities at Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana. A total budget of €140 million has been allocated to finance this work over the 2020–24 period.
Waldrop leads $75M NASA mission to investigate Earth's atmosphere
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University of Illinois Electrical and Computer Engineering Assistant Professor Lara Waldrop has been selected by NASA to lead the development of a $75 million satellite that ultimately may help protect technology like satellite electronics, radio communication, electric power distribution, and even air travel from the dangers of solar storms.
Waldrop's Solar Terrestrial Probes (STP) Scienc Test paves way for new planetary radar
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The National Science Foundation's Green Bank Observatory (GBO) and National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO), and Raytheon Intelligence and Space conducted a test in November to prove that a new radio telescope system can capture high-resolution images in near-Earth space.
GBO's Green Bank Telescope (GBT) in West Virginia - the world's largest fully steerable radio telescope - was outfit NASA's Imaging X-Ray Polarimetry Explorer prepares for environmental testing
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Despite COVID-19-related hurdles, NASA's newest X-ray astronomy mission is a step closer to launch. Engineers recently completed integration of the agency's Imaging X-Ray Polarimetry Explorer, or IXPE, at Ball Aerospace in Boulder, Colorado. Now, Ball will put the fully assembled observatory through a series of tests that simulate the harsh conditions the small spacecraft will encounter on its r EDMO Distributors signs distribution agreement with AvMap Satellite Navigation
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EDMO Distributors, a global leader in the distribution of avionics and installation supplies, has signed a distribution agreement with AvMap Satellite Navigation.
The AvMap company has built a solid reputation as a value-oriented navigation system, with the first units fielded in 1994. The EKP V is a stand-alone moving map display that can be carried on or panel mounted. Customers can add MDA extends satellite operations capability through contract award by the Canadian Space Agency
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MDA will provide spacecraft health monitoring and control, operational analysis, basic system maintenance, data order handling, image quality control and data processing and archiving for the RADARSAT Constellation Mission (RCM), SCISAT and NEOSSat from the CSA's Multi-Mission Control Centre in Longueuil, Quebec.
MDA has partnered with two leading Canadian space firms - Calian Advanced T
Earth will soon forever lose its 'second moon', astronomers say
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NASA has confirmed that the enigmatic object, 2020 SO, is the remains of a Centaur rocket booster from the mid 20th century Space Age, adding that the orbiting space junk can be classified as a mini-moon to our planet.
Near-Earth orbiting object 2020 SO, informally dubbed by astronomers "the planet's second moon", is expected to pass at a relatively close distance to our planet on 2 Februa Ball Aerospace completes integration of NASA's IXPE Observatory
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Ball Aerospace recently completed the spacecraft and payload assembly integration of NASA's Imaging X-Ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) space-based astrophysics observatory at its Boulder, Colo. facility. Ball will now begin environmental testing of the integrated observatory, which includes all instruments and the spacecraft bus.
Scheduled to launch later this year, once on orbit, IXPE will Could game theory help discover intelligent alien life
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New research from The University of Manchester suggests using a strategy linked to cooperative game playing known as 'game theory' in order to maximise the potential of finding intelligent alien life.
If advanced alien civilisations exist in our galaxy and are trying to communicate with us, what's the best way to find them? This is the grand challenge for astronomers engaged in the Search 
