London, UK (SPX) May 21, 2024
AAC Clyde Space has secured its first order for its 16U EPIC satellite, set for delivery and commissioning by June 2026. The contract is valued at EUR 2.3 M (approx. SEK 27.0 M). The satellite will be part of the ESA OPS-SAT VOLT mission and will host multiple payloads. The mission, led by Craft Prospect Ltd. (CPL), is under ESA's ARTES Scylight programme. It aims to test and evaluat

Los Angeles CA (SPX) May 21, 2024
Cislunar space, extending from the Earth to just beyond the moon's orbit, is poised for increased activity in the next decade. NASA's Artemis missions and international participation in the cislunar space race highlight the need for improved tracking and prediction of objects such as asteroids and satellites to avoid collisions with spacecraft. The current space domain awareness (SDA) infr

Los Angeles CA (SPX) May 21, 2024
NASA has awarded contracts to four companies to provide spacecraft and related services, including the acquisition of spacecraft components and equipment, for NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. The contracts are indefinite-delivery/indefinite-quantity base contracts with a firm-fixed-price structure, totaling $6 billion. These contracts may support other NASA center

Los Angeles CA (SPX) May 21, 2024
As part of NASA's efforts to expand commercial resupply in low Earth orbit, Sierra Space's uncrewed spaceplane arrived at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida ahead of its first flight to the International Space Station. The Dream Chaser spaceplane, named Tenacity, arrived at Kennedy on May 18 inside a climate-controlled transportation container from NASA's Neil Armstrong Test Facility i

Sydney, Australia (SPX) May 21, 2024
China has developed a mid-latitude high-frequency radar network in the northern regions to enhance the quality of detection data for global space weather forecasts and warnings. The initial scientific results from the network were presented at the Super Dual Auroral Radar Network (SuperDARN) international workshop in Beijing. Constructed by the National Space Science Center (NSSC) un

Los Angeles CA (SPX) May 21, 2024
A surprisingly low amount of methane and a super-sized core have been discovered within the planet WASP-107 b. Data from the James Webb Space Telescope provide the first measurements of an exoplanet's core mass, likely informing future studies of planetary atmospheres and interiors, important in the search for habitable worlds beyond our solar system. "Looking into the interior of a

Los Angeles CA (SPX) May 21, 2024
Astrobotic has been selected by NASA's Mars Exploration Program for two studies of commercial services aimed at supporting cost-effective, frequent missions to Mars. The studies will explore commercial payload delivery and surface imaging services to enable future scientific missions to the Red Planet. The two studies will focus on large payload delivery and hosting services, and Mars surf

Los Angeles CA (SPX) May 21, 2024
Space Systems Command (SSC) awarded Starfish Space a $37.5 million Strategic Funding Increase (STRATFI) contract to develop, launch, and operate an Otter satellite vehicle for a docking mission to provide two years of augmented maneuver for National Security Space assets. In collaboration with the Air Force Research Laboratory's (AFRL) SpaceWERX Program, Starfish Space, Space Safari, and S

Los Angeles CA (SPX) May 21, 2024
Scientists with NASA's New Horizons mission are pursuing new research goals and making unique astrophysical and heliospheric observations with the suite of instruments onboard the New Horizons spacecraft. This project takes advantage of the spacecraft's position in the distant Kuiper Belt, avoiding viewing obscurations closer to Earth. Launched in 2006, New Horizons aimed to understand the

Berlin, Germany (SPX) May 20, 2024
Physicists from Darmstadt propose a new method to measure the time it takes for particles to tunnel, challenging previous experiments that suggested particles could move faster than the speed of light. This phenomenon, known as quantum tunneling, allows particles to pass through barriers even if they don't have enough energy to go over them. This effect has practical applications, such as in fla