All posts tagged NASA
Australia from orbit
From December 19th last year, Chris Hadfield has been living aboard the International Space Station (ISS) in orbit roughly 400 km above planet Earth. Seeing 15 sunrises every day as the station tracks its way above our planet, the ISS, [...]
New light on dark matter: space station magnet attracts praise
Nobel prizewinner Samuel Ting, early Thursday morning (March 4, 2:00 AEDT), announced the first results from the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS) search for dark matter. The findings, published in Physical Review Letters, provide the most compelling direct evidence to date [...]
It’s a small world after all
What we know of exoplanets has developed at the same time as the technology which we use to discover them. This is, in my opinion, the most exciting thing about the entire field of study. For instance, when we first [...]
Science Weekly Picks
Being responsible for picking the week’s most interesting science stories is a fun and fascinating challenge. It pushes to me to look beyond my own interests and explore what others find compelling. So I trust you find my ‘science making [...]
Interstellar travel: how to spot a ‘starman’ going by
Massive objects moving at near light speeds do not occur naturally in the universe as we know it. If we detect such objects it is a reasonable to assume they are artificial artifacts from advanced intelligent life. This according to [...]
Fascinating short film about NASA’s Dawn: the very beginning of us
This fascinating video, narrated by Leonard Nemoy, gives you a glimpse into the origins of our solar system and NASA Dawn mission’s journey to Vesta & Ceres and its hope to unveil clues as to what was going on at the very [...]
Weekly Science Picks
Another week, another collection of weekly science picks! Those of us over here in Northern Europe have been enjoying snowy weather this past few days, with more expected on the way. At the same time, many of us have been [...]
The perils of space exploration: last flight of space shuttle Columbia
The 28th and last flight (STS-107) of the space shuttle Columbia was ten years ago. Launched on January 16, 2003 Columbia was destroyed at about 0900 EST on February 1, 2003 while re-entering the atmosphere after its 16-day scientific mission. [...]
Weekly Science Picks
By now, I think it’s safe to say that if you’re reading this, it means the world didn’t end on Friday. Which is rather a good thing, because a lot of interesting things have been happening recently! Even though I’ve [...]
The Risk of Human Space Flight to Mars
This past week NASA announced that in 2015 they would be sending two astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS) for a year-long mission. This is an expected, and necessary step in the preparation for human spaceflight to Mars. If [...]
Apollo 17: last men on the moon
After kangaroo hopping back to the lunar rover, Eugene and Jack drove back to the lunar module, Challenger. There they dusted each other off and loaded the last of their 100kg of lunar rock samples. Jack cleaned up inside While [...]
Come on in, the Water is…Frozen
Water – the source of all life. It’s been found on what we have believed for many moons to be that little hot-tempered planet named Mercury. It seems the celestial body has a shady side, a split personality perhaps; one [...]
Weekly Science Picks
Ah, the weekend! Time to kick back, relax, and look back over everything that’s happened over the past few days. And I’m rather happy to say that some quite interesting things have happened, including the Leonid meteor shower which peaked [...]
Interview: Keri Bean—Mars meteorologist, Curiosity Rover team member
Keri Bean is a meteorologist specialising in the atmospherics of other planets. She is on the team operating the Curiosity Rover for NASA’s Mars Science Laboratory mission. Prior to MSL, Keri has had roles in the missions for other Mars [...]