Space Tourism, Space Transport and Space Exploration News

February 28, 2013

First-ever space tourist plans mission to Mars
Washington (AFP) Feb 27, 2013
The world's first space tourist, US multimillionaire Dennis Tito, unveiled plans Wednesday to send a manned mission to Mars and back, targeting a launch date less than five years away. The two space travelers wouldn't land on the Red Planet - or even enter its orbit - just fly through the vicinity and back, a trajectory Tito said would take 501 days, thanks to a rare planetary alignment. The US space agency has aimed for the 2030s in its vague projections of a manned mission to Mars, and is fo ... read more

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Stanford scientist closes in on a mystery that impedes space exploration New research by Stanford aeronautics and astronautics Assistant Professor Sigrid Close suggests she's on track to solve a mystery that has long bedeviled space exploration: Why do satellites fail? ... more		'Faulty Ukrainian Parts' Blamed for Zenit Launch Failure The crash of a Russian Zenit-3SL rocket earlier this month was caused by defective components manufactured in Ukraine, Ivan Kharchenko, first deputy head of the Russian government's military-industr ... more		Meteorite's Powerful Blast Due to Space Collisions The powerful blast of a meteorite above the Urals city of Chelyabinsk was probably caused by its previous "space collisions" with other celestial bodies, said Professor Erik Galimov of the Vernadsky ... more
				Black hole found spinning near the relativistic limit The best evidence yet that some supermassive black holes (SMBH) rotate at extremely high rates has been found by an international team of astronomers. Made using the recently launched NuStar space t ... more		Asteroid impact mission targets Didymos ESA's proposed Asteroid Impact and Deflection Assessment mission now has a target: asteroid Didymos. The recent Russian meteor and, on the same day, our planet's close encounter with an even larger ... more

CubeSats, SmallSats and MicroSats

Lab Instruments Inside Curiosity Eat Mars Rock Powder Two compact laboratories inside NASA's Mars rover Curiosity have ingested portions of the first sample of rock powder ever collected from the interior of a rock on Mars. Curiosity science team memb ... more		Detecting Life on Planets that Orbit White Dwarf Stars A white dwarf is a dead star that slowly cools down until it fades into oblivion. Yet it has been predicted that habitable planets can orbit a white dwarf. If we can somehow detect these planets, wo ... more		India signs $7 bn deal for 97 domestically made fighter jets France doubles down on threat to build future fighter jet alone US approves $1.2 bn missile sale to Germany		The light-lift member of Arianespace's launcher family is readied for its second mission The Spaceport's ZLV launch site in French Guiana is busy with activity as the second Vega undergoes its assembly for a mission scheduled in April. Build-up of the smallest member in Arianespace's la ... more
				NASA Creates Space Technology Mission Directorate As part of the Obama Administration's recognition of the critical role that space technology and innovation will play in enabling both future space missions and bettering life here on Earth, NASA Ad ... more		Mercury may have harbored an ancient magma ocean By analyzing Mercury's rocky surface, scientists have been able to partially reconstruct the planet's history over billions of years. Now, drawing upon the chemical composition of rock features on t ... more

Solar systems for home and business installations

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And it's 3... 2... 1... blastoff! Discover the thrill of a real-life rocket launch.

Visit The Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex

Tempur-Pedic Mattress Comparison & Memory Foam Mattress Review

Future Evidence for Extraterrestrial Life Might Come from Dying Stars Even dying stars could host planets with life - and if such life exists, we might be able to detect it within the next decade. This encouraging result comes from a new theoretical study of Earth-lik ... more		'Vulcan' wins Pluto moon name vote In a voting campaign to pick names for two of Pluto's smallest moons one clear winner is "Vulcan," proposed by U.S. actor William Shatner of "Star Trek" fame. ... more		Simulations of Exoplanet Formation May Help Inform Search for Extraterrestrial Life Ancient hot springs reveal how microbes thrived before Earth gained oxygen Framework proposed to study planetary scale impact of life		Choreographed to Perfection Not all world-class choreographers design for principal dancers of the American Ballet Theater or the Marinsky Ballet, both known for extreme perfectionism; some, who are actually engineers, work wi ... more
				ATK Launch Abort Motor For First Orion Test Vehicle ATK has delivered a launch abort motor to Kennedy Space Center, Fla., for Exploration Flight Test (EFT-1) of NASA's Orion Multi-Purpose Crew Vehicle, scheduled to fly next year. The test fligh ... more		Record Number of Students Control ISS Camera Ever wonder what it's like to control a camera on the International Space Station? More than 30,000 students found out in late January as part of the Earth Knowledge Acquired by Middle school studen ... more

'Faulty Ukrainian Parts' Blamed for Zenit Launch Failure

SpaceX 2 Launch Set for March 1

NASA Releases Glory Taurus XL Launch Failure Report Summary

Lab Instruments Inside Curiosity Eat Mars Rock Powder

First-ever space tourist plans mission to Mars

Mars rover ingests rock powder for tests

Water On The Moon: It's Been There All Along

Building a lunar base with 3D printing

US, Europe team up for moon fly-by

'Vulcan' wins Pluto moon name vote

Public to vote on names for Pluto moons

The PI's Perspective: The Seven-Year Itch

	Mars rover ingests rock powder for tests NASA scientists say two compact laboratories inside the Mars rover Curiosity have ingested the first rock powder ever collected from inside a martian rock. ... more		NASA Partner Orbital Tests Rocket, Newest US Launch Pad NASA commercial partner Orbital Sciences of Dulles, Va., successfully conducted an engine test of its Antares rocket Friday, February 22, at the nation's newest launch pad. The company fired d ... more		SpaceX 2 Launch Set for March 1 NASA and its international partners are targeting Friday, March 1, as the launch date for the next cargo resupply flight to the International Space Station by Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) ... more		NASA Releases Glory Taurus XL Launch Failure Report Summary NASA has released a summary report on findings from a panel that investigated the unsuccessful 2011 launch of the agency's Glory spacecraft. The satellite, designed to improve our understandin ... more

Uranium enrichment: Why Iran refuses to step back

Redwire to Deliver Solar Array Wings for Axiom Station's First Module

Germany's Merz rejects claims he is slowing green shift

Opportunity Is On A Rock Hunt		Big Nickel Rock Target Ahead		Japan robot suit gets global safety certificate		Brown researchers build robotic bat wing		Educator Teams Fly On NASA Sofia Airborne Observatory
India rocket launches asteroid-spotting satellite		India's 102nd space mission lifts off successfully		Asteroid impact mission targets Didymos		Apophis Risk Assessment Updated		Discovering the birth of an asteroid trail

Potential benefits of inertial fusion energy justify continued R and D

Journey to the Limits of Spacetime

Lessons from cockroaches could inform robotics

Brain prostheses create a sense of touch

Cassini Still Going Strong Investigating Saturn's Moons

Simplified brain lets the iCub robot learn language

Countdown begins for Indo-French satellite launch

Start Me Up!

Supersonic skydiver's records confirmed

NASA Awards Final Space Launch System Advanced Booster Contract

Previewing the next steps on the path to a magnetic fusion power plant

ISS plays host to innovative infectious disease research

Kepler helps astronomers find tiny exo planet

Water On The Moon: It's Been There All Along

NASA Seeks Big Ideas for Small In-Space Propulsion Systems

Kennedy Engineers Designing Plant Habitat For ISS

NASA's Kepler Mission Discovers Tiny Planet System

The quest for a better bionic hand

NASA briefly loses contact with space station

NASA Rover Confirms First Drilled Mars Rock Sample

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