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Another Mars robot is settling in for a long, long sleep. With dust caking its solar panels, InSight has been losing the ability to recharge for months — in the spring, it was operating at just one-tenth of its landing power. Now, the thick layers of dust might have doomed InSight for good. NASA announced […]
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The portable power bank first came on the scene in 2001, and since then, on-the-go charging has been a possibility for most mobile device users. Now, a new space company wants to bring the concept of mobile charging to the moon — not for cell phones, of course, but for rovers and landers. Toronto-based Stells, […]
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The demise of a spacecraft is usually something rather poignant. But two weeks ago, NASA celebrated one’s destruction. On September 26, NASA executed the final stage of the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART), in which a spacecraft intentionally crashed into the asteroid Dimorphos to investigate whether such an impact could deflect an Earth-bound stellar object. […]
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The booming satellite industry has been a boon for Morpheus Space, which produces a modular, electric propulsion system for small satellites. Morpheus has raised a $28 million Series A, with which it intends to build a factory in Dresden, Germany, where it’s based, and to increase headcount. That will allow the company to ramp up […]
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Chalk one up for the American broomsticks. Northrop Grumman has announced that it will partner with startup Firefly Aerospace to build an all-American version of its workhorse Antares rocket, which currently flies with Russian-built RD-181 engines. Due to the continuing war in Ukraine, Russia halted all sales of its rocket engines to the United States […]
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South Korea is headed for the moon. Last night, the country launched its first-ever lunar mission — in fact, its first-ever mission beyond low Earth orbit. Formerly called the Korea Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter (KPLO), the mission, managed by the Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI), is now named Danuri, a play on the Korean words for […]
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With a $24 billion budget and dozens of active, high-profile missions, it’s not surprising that NASA is the most visible of the dozens of government space agencies in the world. But China’s space program is a rapidly developing superpower that, whether it’s due to political tensions or the government’s careful control of information, doesn’t often […]
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Update: The launch was delayed due to a slight problem with propellant temperature, but Virgin Orbit has confirmed it will make its next attempt tonight (July 1st) no earlier than 10:20 PM PDT. Update 2: Launch is good and payloads are in orbit! We’re sorry in advance for getting Paula Abdul stuck in your head […]
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If this year’s Lunabotics competition is any indication, there’s a bright future ahead for the surface of the moon — and below it. The NASA-hosted challenge recently saw 39 teams of university students building lunar mining robots, which were tasked with digging up rocks in simulated regolith (the material making up the lunar surface) at […]
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NASA has announced the formation of a study team dedicated to UFOs — or unidentified aerial phenomena (UAPs), as they’ve been rebranded to shed some of their tin-foil-hat stigma. But don’t expect some sort of “X-Files” team seeking to prove the existence of extraterrestrials. Starting this fall, the study will have researchers identify what UAP […]
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