Copernical Team
Low-orbit, crewed equatorial space control stations
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Many think the idea of a military crewed space station is new. It is not. The Russian Almaz ("Diamond") was a highly secret Soviet military space station program that began in the early 1960s. In fact, three crewed military reconnaissance stations were launched between 1973 and 1976.
These were referred to as Salyut 2, Salyut 3 and Salyut 5. To camouflage their real mission the three stati Citizen scientists help create 3D map of local stellar neighborhood
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Is our solar system located in a typical Milky Way neighborhood? Scientists have gotten closer to answering this question, thanks to the NASA-funded Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 project, a "citizen science" collaboration between professional scientists and members of the public.
Scientists tapped into the worldwide network of 150,000 volunteers using Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 to find new exam Blue Origin launches capsule to space with astronaut perks
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Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin company launched a new capsule into space Thursday to test all the astronaut perks before people strap in.
Thursday's flight with a dummy named Mannequin Skywalker lasted 10 minutes and reached 66 miles (106 kilometers) above West Texas. Both the New Shepard rocket and the capsule landed successfully.
It was the 14th flight to the fringes of space for a New Shepard rocket. The first was in 2015.
"The success of this flight puts us one really big step closer to flying astronauts," launch commentator Ariane Cornell said from company headquarters in Kent, Washington.
RIP: Mars digger bites the dust after 2 years on red planet
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NASA declared the Mars digger dead Thursday after failing to burrow deep into the red planet to take its temperature.
Scientists in Germany spent two years trying to get their heat probe, dubbed the mole, to drill into the Martian crust.
Director General's annual press conference
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Video:
01:36:00
A replay of our start-of-year press conference with ESA Director General Jan Wörner, future Director General Josef Aschbacher and other ESA Directors, held online on Thursday, 14 January 2021.
They looked ahead at Europe's space activities in 2021 and answered questions from media. Highlights in 2021 include two ESA astronauts flying to the International Space Station, the new James Webb Space Telescope being launched from the European Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, and the launch of NASA’s first Artemis mission, in a programme that will take humans to the Moon powered by ESA’s European Service Module.
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Shining a new light on dark energy
Citizen scientists contribute to 3-D map of cosmic neighborhood
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Scientists tapped into the worldwide network of volunteers using Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 to map dozens of new brown dwarfs, or balls gas not heavy enough to be stars.
Is our solar system located in a typical Milky Way neighborhood? Scientists have gotten closer to answering this question, thanks to the NASA-funded Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 project, a citizen science collaboration between professional scientists and members of the public.
Scientists tapped into the worldwide network of 150,000 volunteers using Backyard Worlds: Planet 9 to find new examples of brown dwarfs. These objects are balls of gas that are not heavy enough to be stars, since they can't power themselves through nuclear fusion the way stars do. And while "brown" is in the name, they would appear magenta or orange-red if a person could see them close up.
NASA's Juno mission expands into the future
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NASA has authorized a mission extension for its Juno spacecraft exploring Jupiter. The agency's most distant planetary orbiter will now continue its investigation of the solar system's largest planet through September 2025, or until the spacecraft's end of life. This expansion tasks Juno with becoming an explorer of the full Jovian system—Jupiter and its rings and moons—with multiple rendezvous planned for three of Jupiter's most intriguing Galilean moons: Ganymede, Europa, and Io.
"Since its first orbit in 2016, Juno has delivered one revelation after another about the inner workings of this massive gas giant," said principal investigator Scott Bolton of the Southwest Research Institute in San Antonio.
NASA's SDO spots first lunar transit of 2021
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On Jan. 13, 2021, NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, or SDO, experienced its first lunar transit of the year when the moon crossed its view of the sun. The transit lasted about 30 minutes, between 12:56 and 1:25 a.m. ET. During this time, the moon happened to cover two of the spacecraft's fine-guidance sensors, causing its view of the sun to jitter slightly. SDO recovered a steady view shortly after the transit.
SDO sees lunar transits regularly. Due to its inclined circular orbit 23,000 miles above Earth, the moon passes between SDO and the sun between two and five times each year.
SDO captured these images in a wavelength of extreme ultraviolet light. This kind of light is invisible to human eyes, and colorized here in red.
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Mars 2020 Perseverance rover to capture sounds from the red planet
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When the Mars Perseverance rover lands on the red planet on Feb. 18, 2021, it will not only collect stunning images and rock samples; the data it returns may also include some recorded sounds from Mars.
The rover carries a pair of microphones, which—if all goes as planned—will provide interesting and historic audio of the arrival and landing at Mars, along with sounds of the rover at work and of wind and other ambient noise.
The way many things sound on Earth would be slightly different on the red planet.