What Happens When You Wring Out a Washcloth in Space?
For hand towels, astronauts get those little vacuum-packed pucks that you kind of have to unravel into a towel. But what happens when you actually put…
Read the articleMonth: April 2013
View
The Growing Threat of Space Debris
The continuing growth in space debris poses an increasing threat to economically vital orbital regions. Next week, hundreds of top experts from across the globe will…
Read the article
Smallest Earth-Like Planets to Date Discovered by Kepler Space Telescope
NASA’s Kepler mission has discovered two new planetary systems that include three super-Earth-size planets in the “habitable zone,” the range of distance from a star where…
Read the article
How Do You Target an Asteroid?
Like many of his colleagues at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., Shyam Bhaskaran is working a lot with asteroids these days. And also like many…
Read the article
Life Could Actually Be Older Than Earth Itself
Applying a maxim from computer science to biology raises the intriguing possibility that life existed before Earth did and may have originated outside our solar system,…
Read the article
Galaxy Evolution Theory Challenged by Star Formation in Distant Galaxy
ESA’s Herschel space observatory has discovered an extremely distant galaxy making stars more than 2000 times faster than our own Milky Way. Seen at a time…
Read the article
Defending the Planet
Chris Lewicki’s (President of Planetary Resources) latest update contains some details on Planetary Defense, a big announcement about a new investor and partner, and advance notice…
Read the article
Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer on ISS Gives a Whiff of Dark Matter
In science fiction, finding antimatter on board your spaceship is not good news. Usually, it means you’re moments away from an explosion. In real life, though,…
Read the article
Solar Activity Produces Stunning Aurora
This beautiful aurora illuminates the sky over the snow-clad landscape near Tromsø, Norway. Bright aurora illuminating the sky over Norway (near Tromsø) on 17 February 2013.…
Read the article
Do You Know How Long It Takes to Get to Mars?
More ignorance about space exploration and astronomy. People in the European Union were asked a simple question: How long does it take to get to Mars?…
Read the article