Space Tourism, Space Transport and Space Exploration News

September 23, 2015

NASA Seeks Big Ideas from Students for Inflatable Heat Shield Technology
Washington DC (SPX) Sep 22, 2015
NASA is giving university and college students an opportunity to be part of the agency's journey to Mars with the Breakthrough, Innovative, and Game-changing (BIG) Idea Challenge. NASA's Game Changing Development Program (GCD), managed by the agency's Space Technology Mission Directorate in Washington, and the National Institute of Aerospace (NIA) are seeking innovative ideas for generating lift using inflatable spacecraft heat shields or hypersonic inflatable aerodynamic decelerator (HIAD) techno ... read more

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ExoMars 2016 targets March launch window A problem recently discovered in two sensors in the propulsion system of the entry, descent and landing demonstrator module has prompted the recommendation to move the launch of the ExoMars 2016 mis ... more		China to rehearse new carrier rocket for lunar mission A Long March-5 carrier rocket on Sunday was shipped from North China's Tianjin port for a rehearsal of a scheduled Chang'e-5 lunar mission around 2017. It will be the first drill carried out i ... more		Indra renews SMOS maintenance and development contract The European Space Agency has extended until 2017 the maintenance and development contract of the SMOS (Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity) mission user segment, entrusted to Indra. The service could ... more
				New Space Mining Tech Could Be Game-Changer for Interstellar Travel NASA researchers have come up with a seemingly simple - and extremely potent - idea: "optical mining," through which the water contained within millions of asteroids across the universe could be use ... more		Pluto 'Wows' in Spectacular New Backlit Panorama The latest images from NASA's New Horizons spacecraft have scientists stunned - not only for their breathtaking views of Pluto's majestic icy mountains, streams of frozen nitrogen and haunting low-l ... more

Nuclear Decommissioning And Used Fuel Market 2015

Solar systems for home and business installations

Opportunity Continues Search for Clay Minerals On Mars Opportunity is within 'Marathon Valley' on the west rim of Endeavour Crater conducting a walk-about in search of clay minerals. The rover is operating in persistent RAM mode (not using Flash f ... more		Electron transport between species discovered in deep-sea research Researchers at the California Institute of Technology have discovered two microbial species capable of sharing the energy needed to consume methane through electron transfer without direct contact. ... more		U.S. defense in free fall U.S. and Saudis conduct Middle East's largest counter-drone exercise Saudi Arabia and Pakistan sign mutual defense pact		Expect Martian Colonies to Build Themselves First Space explorers will travel to prefabricated colonies on the Moon, Mars and elsewhere, says the Self-deployable Habitat for Extreme Environments project (SHEE). SHEE is developing domiciles to ... more
				Big Iron gets technology boost ESA deploys 'big iron' to communicate with its deep-space missions: three 35 m-diameter dishes employing some of the world's most advanced tracking technology. And it's about to get a boost. E ... more		Stellar atmosphere can be used to predict the composition of rocky exoplanets In two recently published articles researchers from Instituto de Astrofisica e Ciencias do Espaco (IA3) show that the ratio of some heavy elements in a star, like Magnesium (Mg), Silicon (Si) and Ir ... more

Nuclear Operations and Maintenance Efficiency Summit USA 2015

Saturn's Moon Enceladus Hosts A Global Ocean Every square inch of Saturn's small moon Enceladus overlies a potentially habitable ocean. Observations of Enceladus' slight wobble as it orbits Saturn can only be explained if the outer crust float ... more		Study: 'Hot Jupiter' exoplanets formed extremely rapidly For years, astronomers have been stumped by a rare type of exoplanet known as "hot Jupiters." Hot Jupiters are gas giants which orbit unusually close to their stars. ... more		Fossil fuels harm health from 'cradle to grave': report Trash, mulch and security: All jobs for troops in Washington Rising oceans to threaten 1.5 million Australians by 2050: report		Record-breaking astronauts return to Earth Expedition 44 to the International Space Station has been successfully completed after three astronauts landed in Kazakhstan. The mission saw a cosmonaut clock up more days in space than any other h ... more
Marines send robotic dog into simulated combat Over the last several days week, Spot, a robot dog designed by Google-owned Boston Dynamics, has been put to the test. ... more		Watching an exoplanet in motion around a distant star A team of astronomers has given us our best view yet of an exoplanet moving in its orbit around a distant star. A series of images captured between November 2013 to April 2015 shows the exoplanet b ... more		NASA's LRO discovers Earth's pull is 'massaging' our moon Earth's gravity has influenced the orientation of thousands of faults that form in the lunar surface as the moon shrinks, according to new results from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) spac ... more		Cassini Finds Global Ocean in Saturn's Moon Enceladus A global ocean lies beneath the icy crust of Saturn's geologically active moon Enceladus, according to new research using data from NASA's Cassini mission. Researchers found the magnitude of t ... more

	Scientists conduct most precise test of light speed The speed of light is a constant. A new test - the most precise test of a photon's speed - confirms it. ... more		Long March-2D carrier rocket blasts off in NW China China on Monday launched its most sophisticated observation satellite, Gaofen-9, as part of the country's high-definition Earth observation project. Gaofen-9 was launched from the Jiuquan Sate ... more

EU to fast-track review of 2035 combustion-engine ban

Norway sovereign wealth fund drops French miner over environmental fears

EU split on 2040 climate goal ahead of UN summit

Under Saturnian moon's icy crust lies a 'global' ocean		New photos reveal Pluto's stunning geological diversity: NASA		Europlanet 2020 launches new era of planetary collaboration in Europe		Nearby Red Dwarfs Could Reveal Planet Secrets		Supervising two rovers from space
Advanced alien civilizations rare or absent in the local Universe		Rocky planets may be habitable depending on their 'air conditioning system'		Team Continues to Operate Rover in RAM Mode		Astronomers peer into the 'amniotic sac' of a planet-hosting star		New Pluto Images from New Horizons: It's Complicated

Neurotechnology Provides Near-Natural Sense of Touch

NIST physicists show 'molecules' made of light may be possible

Mars Panorama from Curiosity Shows Petrified Sand Dunes

Ridley Scott's 'The Martian' takes off in Toronto

SETI reborn: The New Search for Intelligent Life

US military develops prosthetic hand that can 'feel'

Sweeping over the south pole of Mars

Moon's crust as fractured as can be

New Horizons Probes the Mystery of Charon's Red Pole

Ceres' Bright Spots Seen in Striking New Detail

Mercury's Movements Give Scientists Peek Inside the Planet

Opportunity Driving West To Reach New Rock Target

Canada Dominates European Rover Challenge 2015

US and and Germany partner in trail blazing biomedical research study

China aims to land Chang'e-4 probe on far side of moon

One small step for man as astronaut controls robot from space

China Plans Lunar Rover For Far Side of Moon

'Hedgehog' Robots Hop, Tumble in Microgravity

New Horizons Spacecraft begins Intensive Data Downlink Phase

For these 'cyborgs', keys are so yesterday

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