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NASA succeeds in historic flyby of faraway world![]() Tampa (AFP) Jan 1, 2019 NASA rang in the New Year on Tuesday with a historic flyby of the farthest, and quite possibly the oldest, cosmic body ever explored by humankind - a tiny, distant world called Ultima Thule - in the hopes of learning more about how planets took shape. A series of anxiously awaited "phone home" signals arrived after 10:30 am (1530 GMT), indicating that the spacecraft had made it, intact, through the risky, high-speed encounter. "We have a healthy spacecraft," said mission operations manager Al ... read more |
Tampa (AFP) Jan 1, 2019 NASA rang in the New Year on Tuesday with a historic flyby of the farthest, and quite possibly the oldest, cosmic body ever explored by humankind - a tiny, distant world called Ultima Thule - in the hopes of learning more about how planets took shape. ... more
Osiris-REX enters close orbit around asteroid BennuTucson AZ (SPX) Jan 01, 2019 At 2:43 p.m. EST on December 31, while many on Earth prepared to welcome the New Year, NASA's OSIRIS-REx spacecraft, 70 million miles (110 million kilometers) away, carried out a single, eight-secon ... more
Juno captures images of volcanic plumes on Jupiter's moon IoSan Antonio TX (SPX) Jan 01, 2019 A team of space scientists has captured new images of a volcanic plume on Jupiter's moon Io during the Juno mission's 17th flyby of the gas giant. On Dec. 21, during winter solstice, four of Juno's ... more
China spacecraft in position for first-ever landing on Moon's far sideBeijing (Sputnik) Jan 01, 2019 Orbiting the moon, China's Chang'e 4 lunar lander has moved into position in preparation for mankind's first landing on the far side of Earth's only natural satellite. In entering its planned ... more |
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ESA sets clock by distant spinning starsParis (ESA) Jan 01, 2019 ESA's technical centre in the Netherlands has begun running a pulsar-based clock. The 'PulChron' system measures the passing of time using millisecond-frequency radio pulses from multiple fast-spinn ... more
Growing bio-inspired shapes with hundreds of tiny robotsHeidelberg, Germany (SPX) Dec 27, 2018 Hundreds of small robots can work in a team to create biology-inspired shapes - without an underlying master plan, purely based on local communication and movement. To achieve this, researchers from ... more
NASA speeds toward historic flyby of faraway world, Ultima ThuleTampa (AFP) Dec 31, 2018 A NASA spaceship is zooming toward the farthest, and quite possibly the oldest, cosmic body ever photographed by humankind, a tiny, distant world called Ultima Thule some four billion miles (6.4 billion kilometers) away. ... more
New Horizons Spacecraft on Target to Reach Ultima ThuleCologne, Germany (SPX) Dec 30, 2018 A very special encounter is set to take place in the Kuiper Belt, six and a half billion kilometres from Earth, right at the beginning of the New Year. NASA's New Horizons spacecraft will visit obje ... more
Researchers model glaciation on Mercury's polesWashington (UPI) Dec 28, 2018 Mercury's poles are marked by large craters. Icy deposits hide inside. Now, scientists think they know how the ice got there. ... more |
![]() NASA spaceship closes in on distant world
The PI's Perspective: Anticipation on Ultima's DoorstepLaurel MD (SPX) Dec 28, 2018 The New Horizons spacecraft is healthy and on final approach to the first close-up exploration of a Kuiper Belt object in history, and the farthest exploration of any world, ever. In just a fe ... more |
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Holiday Asteroid Imaged with NASA RadarPasadena CA (JPL) Dec 24, 2018 The December 2018 close approach by the large, near-Earth asteroid 2003 SD220 has provided astronomers an outstanding opportunity to obtain detailed radar images of the surface and shape of the obje ... more
Over Six Months Without Word From OpportunityPasadena CA (JPL) Dec 24, 2018 Mars atmospheric opacity (tau) over the rover site remains at a storm-free range around 1.0. No signal from Opportunity has been heard since Sol 5111 (June 10, 2018). Opportunity likely experi ... more
3D photogrammetric evidence for trace fossils at Vera Rubin Ridge, Gale Crater, MarsBuckingham UK (SPX) Dec 24, 2018 On sol 1922 and 1923, NASA's Mars Science Laboratory (MSL) rover (Curiosity) mission in Gale Crater, using its microscopic imager (MAHLI) returned over 84 images to Earth of enigmatic metallic dark- ... more
Astrodynamics and the Gravity Measurement Descent OperationTokyo, Japan (SPX) Dec 27, 2018 Until now, "astrodynamics" has been one of the less frequently reported operations for Hayabusa2. In space engineering, the movement, attitude, trajectory and overall handling of the flight mechanic ... more
The C-Space Project Opens Mars Base as a Space Education FacilityJinchang, China (SPX) Dec 24, 2018 The C-Space Project recently unveiled its Mars Base set in the Gobi Desert, leaving many curious about its objectives. The C-Space Project, where the C stands for Community, Culture and Creativity, ... more |
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Over Six Months Without Word From Opportunity Pasadena CA (JPL) Dec 24, 2018
Mars atmospheric opacity (tau) over the rover site remains at a storm-free range around 1.0.
No signal from Opportunity has been heard since Sol 5111 (June 10, 2018). Opportunity likely experienced a low-power fault, a mission clock fault and an up-loss timer fault.
Since the loss of signal, the team has been listening for the rover over a broad range of times, frequencies and polari ... more |
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China spacecraft in position for first-ever landing on Moon's far side Beijing (Sputnik) Jan 01, 2019
Orbiting the moon, China's Chang'e 4 lunar lander has moved into position in preparation for mankind's first landing on the far side of Earth's only natural satellite.
In entering its planned orbit on Sunday, the Chinese spacecraft will "prepare for the first-ever soft landing on the far side of the moon," stated the China National Space Administration, cited by the state-owned Xinhua medi ... more |
NASA spaceship closes in on distant world Tampa (AFP) Dec 28, 2018
NASA's unmanned New Horizons spacecraft is closing in on its historic New Year's flyby target, the most distant world ever studied, a frozen relic of the solar system some four billion miles (6.4 billion kilometers) away.
The cosmic object, known as Ultima Thule, is about the size of the US capital, Washington, and orbits in the dark and frigid Kuiper Belt about a billion miles beyond the dw ... more |
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Early protostar already has a warped disk Saitami, Japan (SPX) Jan 01, 2019
Using observations from the ALMA radio observatory in Chile, researchers have observed, for the first time, a warped disk around an infant protostar that formed just several tens of thousands of years ago. This implies that the misalignment of planetary orbits in many planetary systems - including our own - may be caused by distortions in the planet-forming disk early in their existence.
T ... more |
Russia touts hypersonic missile speed Moscow (AFP) Dec 27, 2018
Russia touted Thursday a new hypersonic missile said to hit speeds of more than 30,000 kilometres per hour, amid heightened tension with the US over arms control.
Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday tracked final tests of a hypersonic missile dubbed "Avangard," which he says would defeat all existing missile defence systems.
When Putin unveiled the new weapon during his state ... more |
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China launches telecommunication technology test satellite Xichang (XNA) Dec 31, 2018
China successfully launched the No. 3 telecommunication technology test satellite on Tuesday.
The satellite was launched at 0:53 a.m. Beijing Time by a Long March-3C carrier rocket from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China's Sichuan Province.
The satellite was developed and produced by the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation.
There have been 296 ... more |
Holiday Asteroid Imaged with NASA Radar Pasadena CA (JPL) Dec 24, 2018
The December 2018 close approach by the large, near-Earth asteroid 2003 SD220 has provided astronomers an outstanding opportunity to obtain detailed radar images of the surface and shape of the object and to improve the understanding of its orbit.
The asteroid will fly safely past Earth on Saturday, Dec. 22, at a distance of about 1.8 million miles (2.9 million kilometers). This will be th ... more |
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Radiance Technologies tapped for U.S. Army laser research Washington (UPI) Nov 30, 2018
The U.S. Army is contracting Radiance Technologies for high energy laser lethality research, assessment and support in the amount of $28.2 million.
Work on the contract, announced Thursday by the Department of Defense, will be performed in Huntsville, Ala., and is expected to be completed by November 2023.
It falls under a small business contract under acquisition rules, though R ... more |
Lockheed awarded $3.3B for PAC-3 missiles for Saudi Arabia, Kuwait Washington (UPI) Dec 24, 2018
Lockheed Martin has been awarded a contract for Phased Array Tracking Radar to Intercept on Target Advanced Capability-3, or Patriot PAC-3, missiles for Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.
The contract, announced Friday by the Department of Defense, is worth a total of $3.3 billion for production of the missiles, with associated ground support equipment and initial spares of both PAC-3 missiles an ... more |
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NASA Research Reveals Saturn is Losing Its Rings at "Worst-Case-Scenario" Rate Greenbelt MD (SPX) Dec 18, 2018
New NASA research confirms that Saturn is losing its iconic rings at the maximum rate estimated from Voyager 1 and 2 observations made decades ago. The rings are being pulled into Saturn by gravity as a dusty rain of ice particles under the influence of Saturn's magnetic field.
"We estimate that this 'ring rain' drains an amount of water products that could fill an Olympic-sized swimming p ... more |
Illuminating nanoparticle growth with X-rays Upton NY (SPX) Dec 27, 2018
Hydrogen fuel cells are a promising technology for producing clean and renewable energy, but the cost and activity of their cathode materials is a major challenge for commercialization. Many fuel cells require expensive platinum-based catalysts - substances that initiate and speed up chemical reactions - to help convert renewable fuels into electrical energy. To make hydrogen fuel cells commerci ... more |
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New squeezing record at GEO600 gravitational-wave detector Hannover, Germany (SPX) Dec 17, 2018
The detection of Einstein's gravitational waves relies on highly precise laser measurements of small length changes. The kilometer-size detectors of the international network (GEO600, LIGO, Virgo) are so sensitive that they are fundamentally limited by tiny quantum mechanical effects.
These cause a background noise which overlaps with gravitational-wave signals. This noise is always presen ... more |
Our universe: An expanding bubble in an extra dimension Uppsala, Sweden (SPX) Jan 01, 2019
Uppsala University researchers have devised a new model for the Universe - one that may solve the enigma of dark energy. Their new article, published in Physical Review Letters, proposes a new structural concept, including dark energy, for a universe that rides on an expanding bubble in an additional dimension.
We have known for the past 20 years that the Universe is expanding at an ever a ... more |
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Growing bio-inspired shapes with hundreds of tiny robots Heidelberg, Germany (SPX) Dec 27, 2018
Hundreds of small robots can work in a team to create biology-inspired shapes - without an underlying master plan, purely based on local communication and movement. To achieve this, researchers from EMBL, CRG and Bristol Robotics Laboratory introduced the biological principles of self-organisation to swarm robotics. Science Robotics publishes the results on 19 December.
"We show that it is ... more |
Insitu gets defense contract for Blackjack unmanned aircraft Washington (UPI) Dec 28, 2018
Insitu has won a $12 million contract for spare and sustainment parts for the Blackjack unmanned aircraft system, the Defense Department announced.
The company, a division of Boeing headquartered in Bergen, Wash., was awarded $12,167,690 for firm-fixed-price delivery against a previously issued basic ordering agreement for parts to maintain the Naval Supply Systems Command's RQ-21A Blac ... more |
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