March 2012 Top Stories
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
The Subcommittee on Investigations and Oversight today held a hearing to examine the state of information security at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
Finding life on our home planet may sound like a trivial observation, but the novel approach of an international team may lead to future discoveries of life elsewhere in the universe.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
Having discovered 885 planet candidates in 361 multiple-planet systems, Kepler has made transits a powerful method for studying the statistics of planetary systems.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
The Cassini spacecraft flew by Dione, one of Saturn's icy moons, on 7 April 2010. During that flyby, instruments detected molecular oxygen ions around the moon.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
NASA Inspector General Paul Martin today released a report that assesses NASA's efforts to identify and plan for the transfer and commercialization of Agency-developed technology.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
Can the Mars Science Lab (MSL) Curiosity be fitted with a couple of "aftermarket" sample collection racks once it completes its primary mission of one Martian year? The author believes there is the potential to do so.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
This high-resolution color image shows a 14-kilometer diameter crater that is relatively young, as indicated by the bright rays that cross the neighboring features.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
During the spacewalk, Shkaplerov and Russian cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko moved the Strela-1 crane from the Pirs Docking Compartment to begin preparing the Pirs for its replacement next year with a new laboratory and docking module.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
In the absence of an absolute age date, lunar scientists have to rely on the geomorphology of a crater to determine how old it is relative to other craters.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
Under proposed agreements between NASA and commercial crew entities, NASA would not have the necessary authority to oversee and approve the safety measures needed to keep our astronauts safe.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
The heads of the International Space Station (ISS) agencies from Canada, Europe, Japan, Russia and the United States met in Quebec City, Canada, on March 1, 2012
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
When the International Space Station was first imagined, the idea was to create an unprecedented research platform to support microgravity investigations for the benefit of all humankind.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
The twin jets, in a system called Herbig-Haro 34, are made of identical knots of gas and dust, ejected one after another from the area around the star.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
A new NASA study revealed that the oldest and thickest Arctic sea ice is disappearing at a faster rate than the younger and thinner ice at the edges of the Arctic Ocean's floating ice cap.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
Drastic reductions in Arctic sea ice in the last decade may be intensifying the chemical release of bromine into the atmosphere, resulting in ground-level ozone depletion and the deposit of toxic mercury in the Arctic, according to a new NASA-led study.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
NASA's largest science project--the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST)--however, has experienced development cost growth of $3.6 billion--or 140 percent--and a schedule delay of over 4 years.
[Thursday, March 1, 2012]
In 2008 our research team discovered large conical stromatolites forming beneath the thick perennial ice of Lake Untersee.
[Friday, March 2, 2012]
Since the original project baseline in 2008, the life-cycle cost for the project has increased by over $881 million--including an 84 percent increase in development costs.
[Friday, March 2, 2012]
On Feb. 29, NASA successfully conducted another drop test of the Orion crew vehicle's entry, descent and landing parachutes high above the Arizona desert in preparation for the vehicle's orbital flight test in 2014.
[Friday, March 2, 2012]
A routine inspection has concluded that additional measures are required to ensure the maximum readiness of the third Automated Transfer Vehicle for launch. It has therefore been decided to postpone the launch previously scheduled for 9 March.
[Friday, March 2, 2012]
This movie using GOES-13 visible and infrared satellite imagery from Feb. 28 at 7:45 a.m. EST through March 1, and shows the progression of the cold front and associated low pressure area moving over the central U.S. that triggered at least 20 tornadoes
[Friday, March 2, 2012]
This composite image shows the distribution of dark matter, galaxies, and hot gas in the core of the merging galaxy cluster Abell 520, formed from a violent collision of massive galaxy clusters.
[Friday, March 2, 2012]
This Dawn FC (framing camera) image shows numerous linear chains and clusters of small craters. These chains and clusters of craters were created by material that was ejected during the formation of a larger crater.
[Saturday, March 3, 2012]
This animation shows the geocentric phase, libration, position angle of the axis, and apparent diameter of the Moon throughout the year 2012, at hourly intervals.
[Saturday, March 3, 2012]
Since the last catalog was released in February 2011, the number of planet candidates identified by Kepler has increased by 88 percent and now totals 2,321 transiting 1,790 stars.
[Saturday, March 3, 2012]
Ninety-two students from schools in 24 states have been selected to travel to a NASA center to develop rovers through the National Community College Aerospace Scholars program.
[Saturday, March 3, 2012]
The NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program is proud to announce its first annual Spring Symposium at the Westin Hotel in Pasadena, California on March 27-29, 2012.
[Saturday, March 3, 2012]
This interesting complex crater exhibits many hollows along its floor and central peak complex. The hollows have a very high albedo, which makes this crater stand out prominently.
[Saturday, March 3, 2012]
The 40-kilometer diameter unnamed crater (49 degrees North, 21 degrees East) in this image is located west of Lyot Crater and north of Deuteronilus Mensae in the Northern Plains of Mars.
[Saturday, March 3, 2012]
Severe thunderstorms and tornadoes swept across the Midwest and Appalachians on March 2, 2012. According to CNN, at least 36 people were killed, with the majority of the victims in Indiana and Kentucky.
[Sunday, March 4, 2012]
Dust plumes stretched southward over the Arabian Sea in late February 2012. The thickest plume arises just west of the Iran-Pakistan border, though thinner plumes blow southward along the entire coast of Pakistan.
[Sunday, March 4, 2012]
In the winter, Martian dunes north of 70 degrees latitude are covered by a seasonal layer of carbon dioxide ice (dry ice). In the spring as the ice sublimates (goes directly from solid to gas) numerous seasonal phenomena are observed.
[Sunday, March 4, 2012]
The irregularly fractured surface in today's Featured Image is on top of a north-western oriented slightly elongated mound on the floor of crater Anaxagoras
[Sunday, March 4, 2012]
As a result of undue and onerous political pressures exerted over the almost six months of existence of CASIS, business operations have been difficult in standing up this brand new organization.
[Monday, March 5, 2012]
My Lego tribute to the end of the space shuttle era. Proving that although retired, this machine can still fly, albeit in toy form. The launch took place from central Germany and reached a max altitude of 35000m.
[Monday, March 5, 2012]
"As a result of undue and onerous political pressures exerted over the almost six months of existence of CASIS, business operations have been difficult in standing up this brand new organization"
[Monday, March 5, 2012]
When seen at full HiRISE resolution, almost all craters on Mars do show some modification such as subsequent smaller impacts, wind-blown deposition and/or erosion, and downslope movement of material on steep slopes.
[Monday, March 5, 2012]
On the Moon, talus deposits are created entirely by gravity, but on the Earth wind and water play a role in their formation.
[Monday, March 5, 2012]
Pale green patterns tinted the water along the Namibian coast in late February 2012. But unlike other bright hues that occasionally show up in the ocean, these colors didn't result from a phytoplankton bloom.
[Monday, March 5, 2012]
Three months before the last transit of Venus this century, scientists are gathering at the Observatoire de Paris to finalize their observation plans in a workshop supported by the Europlanet Research Infrastructure and the EGIDE/PHC Sakura Program.
[Monday, March 5, 2012]
Phobos is the larger and closer of the two natural satellites of Mars. Despite decades of Martian exploration, we still know very little about Phobos.
[Monday, March 5, 2012]
A large solar flare erupted from the Sun earlier today, launching a coronal mass ejection into space. This plasma 'cloud' is expected to pass Earth in 2 to 3 days, potentially causing increased nighttime auroras. No major effects on Earth are expected.
[Monday, March 5, 2012]
NSS is pleased to announce that this year's Legislative Blitz was very successful, as we called on Congress to work with the Administration and NASA to reach consensus on a unified and comprehensive human and robotic spaceflight program.
[Monday, March 5, 2012]
The Board received Dr. Becker's resignation last week and accepted it as a result of ongoing disputes in relation to the pace and direction of the implementation of CASIS' mission.
[Monday, March 5, 2012]
A routine inspection has concluded that additional measures are required to ensure the maximum readiness of the third Automated Transfer Vehicle for launch. It has therefore been decided to postpone the launch previously scheduled for 9 March.
[Tuesday, March 6, 2012]
It was during Apollo 15 that the rover was driven on the steepest slopes while exploring the base of a mountain named Hadley Delta (it was named Delta because of its shape, not because it was a river delta).
[Tuesday, March 6, 2012]
A 16-member international team of researchers that includes James Kennett, professor of Earth science at UC Santa Barbara, has identified a nearly 13,000-year-old layer of thin, dark sediment buried in the floor of Lake Cuitzeo in central Mexico.
[Tuesday, March 6, 2012]
As the solar wind rushes outward from the Sun at nearly a million miles per hour, it is stopped about 44,000 miles away from Earth when it collides with the giant magnetic envelope that surrounds the planet called the magnetosphere.
[Tuesday, March 6, 2012]
This Dawn FC (framing camera) image shows the undulating terrain of Vesta's southern hemisphere, which consists of ridges and depressions. This undulating terrain is only located in Vesta's southern hemisphere, in and around the Rheasilvia impact basin.
[Tuesday, March 6, 2012]
The long scarp trending vertically on the left-side of this image is located in the interior of the large 715-kilometer diameter Rembrandt impact basin.
[Tuesday, March 6, 2012]
Specifically, other than the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, no NASA Center consistently contributed information to LLIS from 2005 through 2010.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
Solar activity is expected to be moderate. Additional M-class events from Region 1429 are likely. There is also a chance for a major flare and/or proton producing event from Region 1429 during the next three days (07-09 March).
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
In October 2011, researchers flying in NASA's Operation IceBridge campaign made the first-ever detailed, airborne measurements of a major iceberg calving event while it was in progress.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
The images above come from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory, which constantly images our nearest star in high-definition detail.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
Ice cover on Lake Sakakawea in North Dakota is featured in this image photographed by an Expedition 30 crew member on the ISS. This striking photograph illustrates the harsh winter conditions frequently experienced in North Dakota.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
Hovnatanian crater was formed by an object that impacted at a very oblique angle, causing the crater to appear elliptical.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
Early Sunday morning, at 01:27 our time, the San Antonio Astronomical Association, an amateur astronomy group, succeeded in flashing the space station with a one-watt blue laser and a white spotlight as we passed overhead.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
Hubble's panchromatic vision, stretching from ultraviolet through near-infrared wavelengths, reveals the vibrant glow of young, blue star clusters and a glimpse into regions normally obscured by the dust.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
During the next 84 days, scientists will obtain a high-resolution map of the lunar gravitational field to learn about the moon's internal structure and composition in unprecedented detail.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
A new report commissioned by AIA demonstrates the irreplaceable impact the aerospace and defense (A/D) industry has on America's economic and national security.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
One of the major hurdles engineering teams face when designing a satellite is how much fuel it can carry to operate throughout its lifetime.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
The following article is a free sample from the current issue of Space Quarterly Magazine. It is our hope that if you enjoy this article you will consider subscribing to the magazine.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
NASA is expanding its successful program of Tweetups to include more social media platforms, broadening the agency's use of social media to engage audiences about the agency's mission of exploration and discovery
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
A towering dust devil casts a serpentine shadow over the Martian surface in this stunning, late springtime image of Amazonis Planitia.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
This image of the Apollo 11 landing site captured from just 24 km (15 miles) above the surface provides LRO's best look yet at humanity's first venture to another world.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
NASA's Robotic Refueling Mission began operations on the International Space Station with the Canadian Dextre robot marking important milestones in satellite-servicing technology and the use of the space station robotic capabilities.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
We read with interest your February 29, 2012 letter to Dr. John Holdren regarding NASA's Commercial Crew program to procure services to fly astronauts to the International Space Station on commercial vehicles.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
The NASA Kepler Mission is being recognized for the discovery of 61 confirmed extrasolar planets and over 2,300 planet candidates in the first 16 months of observations from May 2009 to September 2010.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
Today in a hearing of the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee to review the fiscal year 2013 (FY13) budget proposal for NASA, Members expressed several concerns to Administrator Charles Bolden over funding priorities.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
A team of volunteers has pored over observations from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope and discovered more than 5,000 "bubbles" in the disk of our Milky Way galaxy.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
NASA has completed commissioning of the Suomi National Polar-orbiting Partnership satellite (NPP), which is now making global environmental observations.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
MESSENGER successfully completed an orbit-correction maneuver this evening to lower its periapsis altitude - the lowest point of MESSENGER's orbit about Mercury relative to the planet's surface.
[Wednesday, March 7, 2012]
TopCoder today announced registration has opened for the Autonomous Space Capture Challenge, an algorithm competition which seeks computationally efficient code solutions which models autonomous docking or satellite servicing procedures.
[Thursday, March 8, 2012]
On March 7, 2012 just a few minutes after midnight UT time the active region (AR11429) unleashed two strong X-class flare.
[Thursday, March 8, 2012]
This high-resolution enhanced color view of Kuiper crater shows not just the bright rays that extend out from this relatively young crater but also the redder color of Kuiper's ejecta blanket.
[Thursday, March 8, 2012]
With little experience in weightlessness inside a large spacecraft, the experts consulted by Stanley Kubrick in the 1960s felt that space travelers would need to be anchored to something in order to move around.
[Thursday, March 8, 2012]
The following article is a free sample from the current issue of Space Quarterly Magazine. It is our hope that if you enjoy this article you will consider subscribing to the magazine.
[Thursday, March 8, 2012]
For nearly three years, millions of gamers have used physics in the battle between birds and pigs in the video game Angry Birds.
[Friday, March 9, 2012]
The coronal mass ejection associated with the R3 (Strong) Radio Blackout event from 0024 UTC March 7 continues to minimally affect the Earth and G1 (Minor) storming levels have been observed since the onset at 1105 UTC March 8 (6:05 a.m. EST March 8).
[Friday, March 9, 2012]
Thanks to the presence of a natural "zoom lens" in space, University of Chicago scientists working with NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have obtained a uniquely close-up look at the brightest gravitationally magnified galaxy yet discovered.
[Friday, March 9, 2012]
ESA's third Automated Transfer Vehicle, scheduled for launch on an Ariane 5 from Europe's Spaceport in French Guiana on 23 March, is planned to dock with the International Space Station five days later.
[Friday, March 9, 2012]
The first global high-resolution map of the boundary between Earth's crust and mantle - the Moho - has been produced based on data from ESA's GOCE gravity satellite. Understanding the Moho will offer new clues into the dynamics of Earth's interior.
[Friday, March 9, 2012]
A prototype of a new radar system developed by a Lockheed Martin-led team is now tracking orbiting space objects, bringing the U.S. Air Force's Space Fence program one step closer to revolutionizing our nation's space situational awareness.
[Friday, March 9, 2012]
A chance alignment of planets during a passing gust of the solar wind has allowed scientists to compare the protective effects of Earth's magnetic field with that of Mars' naked atmosphere.
[Friday, March 9, 2012]
A Stars with disks of debris around them might be good targets to search for Earth-like planets, researchers say.
[Friday, March 9, 2012]
This image from the Ikonos-2 satellite shows the sandy and rocky terrain of the Sahara desert in western Algeria.
[Friday, March 9, 2012]
NASA, governments around the world and civil society organizations will co-host the International Space Apps Challenge on April 21-22 with events across seven continents and in space.
[Friday, March 9, 2012]
NASA Administrator Charles Bolden and astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson both testified before the Senate on NASA's FY 2013 budget the other day. Simple word clouds reveal starkly different messages.
[Sunday, March 11, 2012]
What had been projected to be an initial two-year effort to install an array of GPS and seismometer instruments across roughly a third of the continent is now in its fourth year.
[Sunday, March 11, 2012]
Creating some of life's building blocks in space may be a bit like making a sandwich - you can make them cold or hot, according to new NASA research.
[Monday, March 12, 2012]
Opportunity Status for sol 2880-2886: Opportunity is positioned on the north end of Cape York on the rim of Endeavour Crater with an approximate 15-degree northerly tilt for favorable solar energy production.
[Monday, March 12, 2012]
The Greenland ice sheet is likely to be more vulnerable to global warming than previously thought. The temperature threshold for melting the ice sheet completely is in the range of 0.8 to 3.2 degrees Celsius global warming.
[Monday, March 12, 2012]
There's something poetic about gazing up at the night sky, seeing the familiar face of the "Man in the Moon" who faithfully accompanies us through life.
[Monday, March 12, 2012]
When the first of Europe's Vega rockets thundered skywards on 13 February, it was a new design based on some novel materials. Such novelty called for rigorous technical risk management by ESA's materials specialists.
[Monday, March 12, 2012]
CSF is pleased to announce that former NASA astronaut, International Space Station (ISS) commander, Naval Aviator, and test pilot Michael E. Lopez-Alegria (Capt., U.S. Navy, Ret.) has been named as President, effective March 19, 2012.
[Monday, March 12, 2012]
It is the power of the people that will select the 2012 winner of the People's Choice Award which is bestowed on the student team with the most innovative new product in the Conrad Foundation's annual Spirit of Innovation Challenge (Conrad Challenge).
[Tuesday, March 13, 2012]
Raw, unprocessed images of Saturn's second largest moon, Rhea, were taken on March 10, 2012, by Cassini. This was a relatively distant flyby with a close-approach distance of 26,000 miles (42,000 kilometers), well suited for global geologic mapping.
[Tuesday, March 13, 2012]
Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the eyes and brains of 27 astronauts who have spent prolonged periods of time in space revealed optical abnormalities similar to those that can occur in intracranial hypertension of unknown cause.
[Tuesday, March 13, 2012]
Printing three dimensional objects with incredibly fine details is now possible using "two-photon lithography". With this technology, tiny structures on a nanometer scale can be fabricated.
[Tuesday, March 13, 2012]
On 12 March 2012, NASA's Robonaut-2 said "hello world" in American Sign Language (ASL) from the International Space Station.
[Tuesday, March 13, 2012]
Boeing successfully completed a Preliminary Design Review (PDR) of the company's integrated Commercial Crew Space Transportation system, which includes the Crew Space Transportation (CST)-100 spacecraft, on March 12.
[Tuesday, March 13, 2012]
New movies of Jupiter are the first to catch an invisible wave shaking up one of the giant planet's jet streams, an interaction that also takes place in Earth's atmosphere and influences the weather.
[Tuesday, March 13, 2012]
General Motors and NASA are jointly developing a robotic glove that auto workers and astronauts can wear to help do their respective jobs better while potentially reducing the risk of repetitive stress injuries.
[Wednesday, March 14, 2012]
The Morpheus team successfully performed another Tether Test. This was the longest run of the vehicle to date
[Wednesday, March 14, 2012]
NASA/HQ has a requirement to provide high resolution, high power uplink capability at Ka-band for the use in characterizing Near Earth Objects (NEOs), orbital debris, and to fill knowledge gaps in space situational awareness.
[Wednesday, March 14, 2012]
Using radio and infrared telescopes, astronomers have obtained a first tantalizing look at a crucial early stage in star formation.
[Wednesday, March 14, 2012]
NASA's astrobiologists study microbial life to understand how it transformed a rocky Earth into the thriving, diverse, life-sustaining planet we inhabit today.
[Wednesday, March 14, 2012]
Astronomers have known for some time that the earliest galaxies were much smaller than the impressive spiral and elliptical galaxies that now fill the Universe.
[Wednesday, March 14, 2012]
This artist's concept depicts a planetary system so compact that it's more like Jupiter and its moons than a star and its planets.
[Wednesday, March 14, 2012]
Two teams of astronomers have used data from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory and other telescopes to map the distribution of dark matter in a galaxy cluster known as Abell 383, which is located about 2.3 billion light-years from Earth.
[Wednesday, March 14, 2012]
From year to year, the moon never seems to change. Craters and other formations appear to be permanent now, but the moon didn't always look like this.
[Wednesday, March 14, 2012]
NASA recently inducted 100 high-performing interns into the 2012 NASA Student Ambassadors Virtual Community.
[Wednesday, March 14, 2012]
NASA's Cassini mission to Saturn, managed by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., has received the top group honor from the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum the Trophy for Current Achievement.
[Wednesday, March 14, 2012]
NASA unveiled a new atlas and catalog of the entire infrared sky today showing more than a half billion stars, galaxies and other objects captured by the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) mission.
[Wednesday, March 14, 2012]
This image was taken on March 12, 2012 and received on Earth March 13, 2012. The camera was pointing toward Enceladus at approximately 1,045,661 kilometers away.
[Thursday, March 15, 2012]
This image, taken with the Narrow Angle Camera (NAC), gives us a close-up look at Picasso crater. Named for Pablo Picasso, this crater is easily identifiable by the interesting comma-shaped pit on its floor.
[Thursday, March 15, 2012]
This photograph from astronauts on the International Space Station presents an almost surreal view of abundant green fields in the midst of a barren desert.
[Thursday, March 15, 2012]
The flat floored arc-shaped area at the bottom of this image was likely a pool of melt that drained out of the channel at the top. The shadows highlight the depth and steep banks of the channel.
[Thursday, March 15, 2012]
Astronomers using NASA's Hubble Space Telescope have found several examples of galaxies containing quasars, which act as gravitational lenses, amplifying and distorting images of galaxies aligned behind them.
[Thursday, March 15, 2012]
When it whizzes past Earth in 2013, a newly discovered asteroid is going to miss our planet - but not by much. The 50 m space rock is expected to come closer than many satellites, highlighting the growing need to keep watch on hazards from above.
[Thursday, March 15, 2012]
Dramatic plumes, both large and small, spray water ice from many locations along the moon's famed "tiger stripes" near the south pole of Enceladus. The tiger stripes are fissures that spray icy particles, water vapor and organic compounds.
[Thursday, March 15, 2012]
Felix Baumgartner, the Austrian BASE jumper aiming to break the world freefall record by jumping from 120,000 ft above the earth's surface, moved a step closer to achieving his dream today after the successful completion of a test flight from 71,581 ft.
[Thursday, March 15, 2012]
These findings open the new possibility of SEM observation of living organisms and showed the resistance of living ticks to vacuum condition in SEM.
[Friday, March 16, 2012]
Aurora Australis, seen at right on Earth's horizon, and daybreak (left) highlight this "busy" photograph taken by one of the Expedition 30 crew members aboard the International Space Station.
[Friday, March 16, 2012]
Six rugged RocketCam(TM) color video cameras captured close-up views of the first phase of NASA's teleoperated Robotic Refueling Mission (RRM) demonstration, conducted March 7-9 on the exterior of the International Space Station (ISS).
[Friday, March 16, 2012]
City lights of Dubai, United Arab Emirates are featured in this image photographed by an Expedition 30 crew member on the International Space Station.
[Friday, March 16, 2012]
Researchers and flight crew with NASA's Operation IceBridge, an airborne mission to study changes in polar ice, began another season of science activity with the start of the 2012 Arctic campaign on March 13.
[Friday, March 16, 2012]
ESA's Venus Express spacecraft has returned to routine operation after its startracker cameras were temporarily blinded last week by radiation from a pair of large solar flares.
[Friday, March 16, 2012]
Hubble has produced the most detailed image so far of Messier 9, a globular star cluster located close to the centre of the galaxy. This ball of stars is too faint to see with the naked eye, yet Hubble can see over 250 000 individual stars shining in it.
[Friday, March 16, 2012]
A new position paper by researchers at the Planetary Science Institute calls for sustaining NASA funding for the exploration of Mars.
[Friday, March 16, 2012]
The planned launch of NASA's Nuclear Spectroscopic Telescope Array (NuSTAR) mission has been postponed after a March 15 launch status meeting.
[Saturday, March 17, 2012]
SpaceX continues to prepare for our upcoming test flight in which we will attempt to send the Dragon spacecraft to the ISS. At the same time we continue making rapid progress in our efforts to prepare the Dragon spacecraft to carry astronauts.
[Saturday, March 17, 2012]
Morpheus flying in its ninth Tether Test. Overall a good stable flight, however the vehicle went beyond the built in altitude limit causing a soft abort. This is one of the many safety systems put in place to control the vehicle's motion.
[Monday, March 19, 2012]
This mosaic shows the location of the data acquired by VIR (visible and infrared spectrometer) during the HAMO (high-altitude mapping orbit) phase of the Dawn mission.
[Monday, March 19, 2012]
This nighttime panorama of much of Europe was photographed by one of the Expedition 30 crew members aboard the International Space Station flying approximately 240 miles above the Tyrrhenian Sea on Jan. 25, 2012.
[Monday, March 19, 2012]
Looking like a spider's web swirled into a spiral, Galaxy IC 342 presents its delicate pattern of dust in this image from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope.
[Monday, March 19, 2012]
Space scientists from the University of New Hampshire and multi-institutional colleagues report they have quantified levels of radiation on the Moon's surface from galactic cosmic ray (GCR) bombardment .
[Monday, March 19, 2012]
Our team at Polar Broadband Ltd brings much to the table for the potential salvage and repurposing of Express-AM4 .
[Tuesday, March 20, 2012]
More than 400 years after Galileo's discovery of Io, the innermost of Jupiter's largest moons, a team of scientists led by Arizona State University (ASU) has produced the first complete global geologic map of the Jovian satellite.
[Tuesday, March 20, 2012]
In young solar systems emerging around baby stars, some orbits are more popular than others, resulting in 'planet pile-ups' and 'planet deserts'
[Tuesday, March 20, 2012]
The 51st session of the Legal Subcommittee of the United Nations Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS) opened today at the Vienna International Centre.
[Tuesday, March 20, 2012]
This nighttime image photographed by one of the Expedition 30 crew members aboard the International Space Station provides a look toward the Mediterranean Sea.
[Tuesday, March 20, 2012]
Impact melt deposits are some of the most distinctive geologic features on the Moon, probably because no two impact melt deposit morphologies are alike! Studying the morphology of an impact melt pond can reveal much.
[Tuesday, March 20, 2012]
Today the Subcommittee on Space and Aeronautics held a hearing to review the fiscal year 2013 budget request submitted by the FAA Office of Commercial Space Transportation and to examine the office's expanded roles and responsibilities.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
Earth's early atmosphere periodically flipped back and forth between hazy and sunny in a way that would have had a profound effect on the climate of our young planet.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
Studies using X-ray and ultraviolet observations from NASA's Swift satellite provide new insights into the elusive origins of an important class of exploding star called Type Ia supernovae.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., has issued a NASA Research Announcement (NRA) for advanced development proposals to support the nation's next heavy-lift rocket, the Space Launch System (SLS).
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
A group of scientists from Hawaii, Brazil and California has measured the diameter of the Sun with unprecedented accuracy by using a spacecraft to time the transits of the planet Mercury across the face of the Sun in 2003 and 2006.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
While scientists believe conditions suitable for life might exist on the so-called "super-Earth" in the Gliese 581 system, it's unlikely to be transferred to other planets within that solar system.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
On March 17, 2012, MESSENGER successfully wrapped up a year-long campaign at Mercury. The following day, March 18, 2012, marked the official start of an extended phase designed to build upon those discoveries.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
The Cassini plasma spectrometer instrument has resumed operations. Mission managers received confirmation on Friday, March 16, that it was turned on. They plan to monitor the instrument for any unusual behavior.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
The Exploration Habitat (X-Hab) Academic Innovation Challenge is accepting applications for the 2013 challenge, inviting students to design, manufacture, assemble and test systems for use on NASA's deep space habitat prototype.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
Recent studies show that satellite radar data can be exploited to map forest height, 3D forest structure and their natural or anthropogenic disturbance with high spatial resolution and accuracy.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
The Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) is the largest cargo vessel supplying the International Space Station with food, water supplies and propellants.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
An international team of astronomers -- from Australia, Germany, Switzerland, and Finland -- has discovered a rare, rectangular-shaped galaxy (LEDA 074886) that has a striking resemblance to an emerald-cut diamond.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
NASA Administrator Bolden testified before the House Appropriations Committee Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related AGencies today on the NASA FY 2013 budget. Here are some nots from that hearing.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
NASA's Dawn spacecraft has revealed unexpected details on the surface of the giant asteroid Vesta. New images and data highlight the diversity of Vesta's surface and reveal unusual geologic features, some of which were never previously seen on asteroids.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
NASA Astronaut Ron Garan was officially presented with the 2011 Spirit of Yuri's Night Award on Wednesday, March 14, 2012, after a day of special events welcoming him back to his childhood home of Yonkers, NY.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
NASA's Flight Opportunities Program has selected 24 cutting-edge space technology payloads for flights on commercial reusable launch vehicles, balloons and a commercial parabolic aircraft.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
NASA astronaut Suni Williams will announce Thursday the two winners of the YouTube Space Lab contest, a global science competition that challenges 14-18 year-old students to design a science experiment for the International Space Station.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
Observers, mission planners, and other interested users are invited to use a new website tool to view a list of near-Earth asteroids that are among the most accessible for future robotic or human space flight round-trip rendezvous missions.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
Thanks to the MESSENGER spacecraft, and a mission that took more than 10 years to complete, scientists now have a good picture of the solar system's innermost planet.
[Wednesday, March 21, 2012]
Images from NASA's Cassini spacecraft have, for the first time, enabled scientists to correlate the spraying of jets of water vapor from fissures on Saturn's moon Enceladus with the way Saturn's gravity stretches and stresses the fissures.
[Thursday, March 22, 2012]
It was a wonderful trip over here. We took the helicopter. We landed in Roswell. I announced to people when I landed that I had come in peace. (Laughter.)
[Thursday, March 22, 2012]
On June 5th/6th of this year the last transit of Venus in your lifetime will happen. Learn about its history, what it means and how you can participate in this rare event.
[Thursday, March 22, 2012]
An odd, previously unseen landform could provide a window into the geological history of Mars, according to new research by University of Washington geologists.
[Thursday, March 22, 2012]
Not only do runaway planets exist, but some of them zoom through space at a few percent of the speed of light - up to 30 million miles per hour.
[Thursday, March 22, 2012]
NASA's Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) Symposium will be held March 27-29. The NIAC examines early stage concepts that may lead to advanced and innovative space technologies critical for NASA to enable missions 10 to 100 years from today.
[Thursday, March 22, 2012]
This self portrait from NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity shows dust accumulation on the rover's solar panels as the mission approached its fifth Martian winter.
[Thursday, March 22, 2012]
The most detailed infrared image ever taken of a region of space large enough to be representative of the distant Universe has been released by a team led by the University of Edinburgh.
[Thursday, March 22, 2012]
Since moving into orbit about Mercury a little over one year ago, the spacecraft has captured nearly 100,000 images and returned data that have revealed new information about the planet.
[Thursday, March 22, 2012]
Two four-camera color video systems supplied by Ecliptic Enterprises Corporation to NASA's dual-spacecraft GRAIL project have been turned on and are generating stunning video views of the Moon's surface from a vantage point in low lunar orbit.
[Thursday, March 22, 2012]
Though earlier studies clearly showed that astronauts on these extended missions suffered serious deficits from lengthy times in a low-gravity environment, little was known about the effects of long-term space flight on the heart and vascular system.
[Thursday, March 22, 2012]
Fourth grade students from the Emily Dickinson Elementary School in Bozeman, Mont., received the honor of making the first image selections by winning a nationwide competition to rename the two spacecraft.
[Friday, March 23, 2012]
A layer of partially molten rock about 22 to 75 miles underground can't be the only mechanism that allows continents to gradually shift their position over millions of years, according to a NASA-sponsored researcher.
[Friday, March 23, 2012]
Explosions on the sun regularly disrupt the magnetic envelope surrounding Earth, but that envelope, the magnetosphere, largely protects the surface of the planet itself from space weather -- with one exception.
[Friday, March 23, 2012]
ESA's ATV Edoardo Amaldi lifted off from Europe's Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, today at 04:34 GMT (05:34 CET, 01:34 local) on an Ariane 5 launcher, operated by Arianespace, heading towards the International Space Station.
[Friday, March 23, 2012]
Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories Z machine and the University of Rostock in Germany have found that current estimates of ice-giant planetary interiors overstate water's compressibility by as much as 30 percent.
[Friday, March 23, 2012]
Opportunity Status for sol 2880-2886: Opportunity is positioned on the north end of Cape York on the rim of Endeavour Crater with an approximate 15-degree northerly tilt for favorable solar energy production.
[Saturday, March 24, 2012]
This mid-latitude crater appears well-preserved, with a clear ejecta blanket and well-defined rim. Bedrock exposures are visible near the top of the rim. Studying this site can yield information about the underlying terrain within this region.
[Saturday, March 24, 2012]
Its five-year mission: To survey the early universe for massive galaxy clusters, a search designed to understand more about one of cosmology's greatest mysteries -- dark energy. Mission complete. Now it's time for something new.
[Saturday, March 24, 2012]
After a nearly ice-free winter, Lake Erie was filled with multi-colored swirls of sediment on the first days of spring, 2012.
[Monday, March 26, 2012]
The entire Luna 23 vehicle (descent stage, ascent stage and Earth-return capsule) landed at an unexpected speed and fell on its side.
[Monday, March 26, 2012]
MESSENGER's highly eccentric orbit, which passes low over Mercury's north polar region, enables higher-resolution views of Mercury's surface in the north than in the south.
[Monday, March 26, 2012]
Impact craters larger than a certain size have complex forms, including central peaks or other structures that result from structural uplift of the target material. This provides a mechanism for exposing deep, ancient bedrock.
[Monday, March 26, 2012]
In a nutshell, "Crater" is sort of like Harry Potter meets Indiana Jones on the Moon - with some Johnny Quest thrown in for good measure.
[Tuesday, March 27, 2012]
NASA successfully launched five suborbital sounding rockets this morning from its Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia as part of a study of the upper level jet stream.
[Tuesday, March 27, 2012]
A double crater, called a crater doublet, is seen in the bottom right part of this framing camera (FC) image of Vesta.
[Tuesday, March 27, 2012]
Toro Crater may have experienced hydrothermal alteration, producing diverse minerals. The mineral diversity leads to diverse color in HiRISE, especially when enhanced as in this subimage.
[Tuesday, March 27, 2012]
The Parana River floodplain along the Mato Grosso--Sao Paulo border, Brazil is featured in this image photographed by an Expedition 30 crew member on the International Space Station.
[Tuesday, March 27, 2012]
This image of the far side of the lunar surface, with Earth in the background, was taken by the MoonKAM system onboard the Ebb spacecraft as part of the first image set taken from lunar orbit from March 15 - 18, 2012.
[Tuesday, March 27, 2012]
Earth usually has more than one moon, according to a team of astronomers from the University of Helsinki, the Paris Observatory and the University of Hawaii at Manoa.
[Tuesday, March 27, 2012]
NASA's activities in social media were recognized on Monday in New York when the agency's official Twitter feed, @NASA, received a Shorty Award for the best government use of social media.
[Wednesday, March 28, 2012]
"Our job is to ensure our two GRAIL spacecraft are flying a very, very accurate trail formation in lunar orbit," said David Lehman, GRAIL project manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.
[Wednesday, March 28, 2012]
The National Space Society (NSS) is pleased to announce Dr. Stephen Hawking as the 14th recipient of NSS's Robert A. Heinlein Memorial Award.
[Wednesday, March 28, 2012]
Luna 24 landed in Mare Crisium on 18 August 1976 to complete the unfinished mission of Luna 23. The landing sites of Luna 23 and 24 are only 2.3 km apart.
[Wednesday, March 28, 2012]
The bright linear features cutting the bedrock in the center region of this image look like mineral veins. Mineral veins are sheetlike bodies of minerals formed by water that flows through fractures.
[Wednesday, March 28, 2012]
This image from the Envisat satellite is dominated by the Indonesian islands of Bali, Lombok and Sumbawa. All three are part of the volcanic Sunda Arc along the submarine Java trench, where two tectonic plates are moving towards one another.
[Wednesday, March 28, 2012]
Opportunity is positioned on the north end of Cape York on the rim of Endeavour Crater with an approximate 15-degree northerly tilt for favorable solar energy production.
[Wednesday, March 28, 2012]
The Innovative Partnership Program Office of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., will hold a March 29 auction with ICAP Ocean Tomo LLC of Chicago to sell three NASA-developed technology lots totaling 12 patents.
[Wednesday, March 28, 2012]
A group of European astronomers has discovered an ancient planetary system that is likely to be a survivor from one of the earliest cosmic eras, 13 billion years ago.
[Wednesday, March 28, 2012]
The Committee today held a hearing to review NASA's plans for conducting research aboard the ISS, and for ensuring essential spares, facilities, transportation and other resources are adequate to meet the research needs on the ISS thru 2020.
[Wednesday, March 28, 2012]
This first direct estimate of the number of light planets around red dwarf stars has just been announced by an international team using observations with the HARPS spectrograph on the 3.6-metre telescope at ESO's La Silla Observatory in Chile
[Wednesday, March 28, 2012]
"... it is too early for us to say whether [CASIS] will be successful in ensuring full scientific utilization of the station as a national laboratory.
[Wednesday, March 28, 2012]
ESA's ATV Edoardo Amaldi has completed the first stage of its docking with the Russian Zvezda module of the International Space Station.
[Thursday, March 29, 2012]
This year, we are giving everyone the chance to attend the Innovation Summit - virtually. We'll stream live footage of the Summit's opening remarks, daily fireside chats, interactive student workshops, and opening and closing ceremonies.
[Thursday, March 29, 2012]
A new chemical analysis of lunar material collected by Apollo astronauts in the 1970s conflicts with the widely held theory that a giant collision between Earth and a Mars-sized object gave birth to the moon 4.5 billion years ago.
[Thursday, March 29, 2012]
Researchers have proposed a new hypothesis to explain a class of enigmatic geologic features on Mars that have puzzled scientists for decades.
[Thursday, March 29, 2012]
A new X-ray study of the remains of an exploded star indicates that the supernova that disrupted the massive star may have turned it inside out in the process.
[Thursday, March 29, 2012]
Luna 17, carrying Lunokhod 1, landed on the flood basalt surface of Mare Imbrium on 17 November 1970, after entering orbit on 15 November.
[Thursday, March 29, 2012]
Two types of wind-blown sedimentary deposits are pictured in this scene of the floor of Ius Chasma in the Valles Marineris.
[Thursday, March 29, 2012]
The width of this image is about 250 kilometers (150 miles) Topographic information from the Mercury Laser Altimeter (MLA) is used to colorize a image mosaic of Goethe basin, located in Mercury's northern region.
[Friday, March 30, 2012]
Complex organic compounds, including many important to life on Earth, were readily produced under conditions that likely prevailed in the primordial solar system
[Friday, March 30, 2012]
Understanding how scientists determine the relative age of geologic units on the Moon is straightforward, most of the time. One simply follows the law of superposition; what is on top is younger, what is below is older.
[Friday, March 30, 2012]
This image reveals bouldery patches on the floor of the giant Hellas impact basin. The boulders are often crudely aligned. Maybe these boulders were deposited or sculpted by flowing ice in the form of glaciers.
[Friday, March 30, 2012]
This view was obtained at a distance of approximately 324,000 miles (521,000 kilometers) from Hyperion and at a Sun-Hyperion-spacecraft, or phase, angle of 90 degrees.
[Friday, March 30, 2012]
The low sun elevation in this Dawn framing camera (FC) image of Vesta enhances small topographic details near the rim of the large crater, part of which is visible in the bottom left of the image.
[Friday, March 30, 2012]
The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has spotted the "UFO Galaxy." NGC 2683 is a spiral galaxy seen almost edge-on, giving it the shape of a classic science fiction spaceship.
[Friday, March 30, 2012]
Researchers using NASA's Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) have captured an infrared image of the last exhalations of a dying sun-like star.
[Friday, March 30, 2012]
In preparation for the upcoming SpaceX demonstration flight, NASA astronaut Megan McArthur performed a crew equipment interface test March 28 in Florida.
[Saturday, March 31, 2012]
The primary channel of the RECS failed late Thursday during air scrubbing of the interior of the ATV. The cause of that failure is under investigation.
[Saturday, March 31, 2012]
This movie shows 89 WAC images of Mercury's south polar region acquired over one complete Mercury solar day (176 Earth days) in 2011. This dataset enabled the illumination conditions at Mercury's south polar region to be quantified.
[Saturday, March 31, 2012]
Mars occasionally has cloudy weather. We intended to take a picture of the bright ice-covered dunes that are faintly visible through these thin clouds, but weather forecasting on Mars is just as challenging as on Earth.
[Saturday, March 31, 2012]
The Hubble Space Telescope has produced the most detailed image so far of Messier 9, a globular star cluster located close to the center of the galaxy.
