Greenbelt MD (SPX) Jun 29, 2022
On the heels of a successful launch on June 26, NASA is set to launch two more sounding rockets from northern Australia during the first half of July. These missions will help astronomers understand how starlight influences a planet's atmosphere, possibly making or breaking its ability to support life as we know it. The two missions will look at Alpha Centauri A and B - two Sun-like stars

Bern, Switzerland (SPX) Jun 29, 2022
Liquid water is an important prerequisite for life to develop on a planet. As researchers from the University of Bern, the University of Zurich and the National Centre of Competence in Research (NCCR) PlanetS report in a new study, liquid water could also exist for billions of years on planets that are very different from Earth. This calls our currently Earth-centred idea of potentially habitabl

Pasadena CA (JPL) Jun 29, 2022
NASA scientists hope to solve a fundamental mystery about Mars' atmosphere, and you can help. They've organized a project called Cloudspotting on Mars that invites the public to identify Martian clouds using the citizen science platform Zooniverse. The information may help researchers figure out why the planet's atmosphere is just 1% as dense as Earth's even though ample evidence suggests the pl

Washington DC (SPX) Jun 29, 2022
The violent event that likely preceded our Solar System's formation holds the solution to a longstanding meteorite mystery, says new work from Carnegie's Alan Boss published in The Astrophysical Journal. The raw material from which our Solar System was constructed was dispersed when the shock wave from an exploding supernova injected material into a cloud of dust and gas, causing it to col

Chelyabinsk, Russia (SPX) Jun 29, 2022
The largest meteorite observed so far this century entered the Earth's atmosphere above Chelyabinsk in the Southern Urals, Russia on February 15, 2013. Unusually, dust from the surface of this meteorite survived its fall and is being extensively studied. This dust includes some unusually shaped microcrystals of carbon. A study of the morphology and simulations of the formation of these cry

Pasadena CA (JPL) Jun 29, 2022
After a successful drilling of Avanavero, the team is ready to dig even deeper into our investigation of this new drill target. Tosol's plan includes an important part of this process: our initial analysis of the drilled sample with the CheMin instrument. In addition, the team planned three full hours of remote science activities at this new drill site, including a ChemCam LIBS observation

Long Beach CA (SPX) Jun 29, 2022
Virgin Orbit (Nasdaq: VORB) alongside the Brazilian Space Agency has announced Virgin Orbit has been formally granted an operator's license to allow LauncherOne launch operations in Brazil. The license is granted to Virgin Orbit Brasil Ltda. (VOBRA), a newly formed and wholly owned Brazilian subsidiary dedicated to bringing the LauncherOne air-launch rocket system to the Alcantara Launch C

Washington DC (SPX) Jun 29, 2022
NASA's CubeSat designed to test a unique lunar orbit is safely in space and on the first leg of its journey to the Moon. The spacecraft is heading toward an orbit intended in the future for Gateway, a lunar space station built by the agency and its commercial and international partners that will support NASA's Artemis program, including astronaut missions. The Cislunar Autonomous Positioni

Beijing, China (SPX) Jun 29, 2022
The space station is a bridgehead for human space exploration missions. During its construction, operation, and maintenance, there are a variety of tasks that need to be performed. However, the space environment has harsh conditions such as microgravity, high vacuum, strong radiation, and large temperature differences, which seriously threaten the health and life safety of astronauts. Sinc

Washington DC (SPX) Jun 29, 2022
NASA has analyzed the data from the wet dress rehearsal conducted Monday, June 20, and determined the testing campaign is complete. The agency will roll Space Launch System (SLS) and Orion back to the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) at Kennedy next week to prepare the rocket and spacecraft for launch. "During the wet dress rehearsal activities, we have incrementally added to our knowledg