To put the explosion into perspective here on Earth, the explosion was said to have the same amount of force as five tons of TNT. Of course, that’s not even close to what an atomic bomb can pull off, nor a typical large explosion like what’ve seen recently in Texas at the fertilizer planet. However, with the vacuum of space and no gravity to slow anything down, the explosions can be much larger on the moon.

This specific explosion, which happened around two months ago, was ten times brighter than anything that NASA has ever seen before. Meteor impacts on the Moon are nothing new, and they happen all the time, but this explosion was unique and it’s said to have made a crater over 20 meters (65 feet) across.

So how does an explosion happen on the Moon if there’s no oxygen to activate it? NASA says that lunar meteors don’t require oxygen or combustion to explode. Meteors hit the Moon surface with so much kinetic energy that NASA says even a small pebble can make a crater that’s a few feet wide. As for the flash of light from the meteor explosion, that’s from the “thermal glow of molten rock and hot vapors” during impact.

NASA created a specific program to identify how often lunar meteor strikes occur in 2005, and this was the largest explosion that the program has ever seen in its roughly nine years of being active. During that time, scientists have identified over 300 explosions, most which happened during meteor showers on Earth and were rather dim. The program is essentially studying the where, when, and how often of meteor strikes on the Moon to determine the best time and location for future spacewalks on the Moon, if NASA ever decides to go back.

VIA: Wired

SOURCE: NASA

However, it’s important to note that this is a NASA record. The world record for the longest driving distance on another planet goes to the Soviet Union, who piloted a Lunokhod 2 rover in 1973, which traveled 23 miles on the Moon. Opportunity has been traveling Mars for over nine years now, and its still collecting rock samples and conducting experiences, even if Curiosity’s fame is overshadowing it all.

Opportunity broke the NASA record on its 3,309th Martian day by traveling 263 feet along the western rim of the Endeavour Crater. The rover first landed on Mars in January 2004 and has so far traveled 22.22 miles, meaning that the rover averaged a speed of 0.00028 miles per hour (roughly). Of course, 22 miles isn’t long at all for us humans, but it’s quite the trek for a robot.

Based on these numbers, Curiosity hasn’t even left the driveway yet. The new rover is just over a year old, but if NASA really puts it to work, Curiosity could break Opportunity’s record at a quicker pace, as well as the possibility of breaking the world record and taking the honor away from the Soviet Lunokhod 2.

Of course, Curiosity has already been the victim of a couple mishaps. One of its onboard computers ended up failing, resulting in a pause of operations that would delay experiments for a couple of weeks. While the rover eventually got back on its feet, it lost precious time that could’ve been used for collecting samples and taking images of the red planet.

VIA: CNET

SOURCE: NASA

NASA’s specifically looking for impacts that form craters that are at least 12.8 feet across. The investigation has led researchers to identify 248 new impact sites on different portions of the surface of Mars in the past decade. NASA scientists used images from the MRO to determine when the craters appeared.

NASA arrived at the conclusion that more than 200 small asteroids or little pieces of comets impact the surface of Mars each year by calculating a number based on the actual number of craters found in a systematic survey of a smaller portion of the red planet. NASA used the MRO’s Hi Resolution Science Experiment camera to take pictures of fresh craters at sites where before and after images by other cameras were available.

NASA says that Mars is struck with a significantly higher number of asteroid and comet fragments than Earth because Mars has a much thinner atmosphere, therefore these smaller fragments don’t burn up during entry. The asteroid or comet fragments that hit the planet are usually in the area of 3 to 6 feet in diameter according to NASA scientists.

NASA also notes that the meteor that created such a sensation when it entered the Earth’s atmosphere over Chelyabinsk, Russia in February was about 10 times bigger than the chunks of asteroid and comet fragments causing these craters on the surface of Mars. NASA says that its new estimates on the rate at which new craters appear on the surface of the planet will be used to estimate the ages of exposed landscape features on Mars and other planets. Mars gets an average of one new crater each year on each portion of its surface measuring approximately the size of the state of Texas.

SOURCE: NASA

The biggest difference between the coronal mass ejection unleashed last month and these two, however, is that April’s CME was an M-class, while these two are X-class. An X-class solar flare is approximately ten times more powerful than an M-class flare, obviously bringing with it potential for higher damages. The first flare, occurring on May 12, was an X1.7, while the second flare, occurring on May 13, was an X2.8, making it 2013′s strongest thus far. Both resulted in coronal mass ejections.

The X1.7 solar flare reached its peak at about 10PM at night, and earned the designation of 2013′s first X-class solar flare. The coronal mass ejection that followed was not directed towards Earth, but the radiation resulting from the flare did cause some radio blackouts, which have since been restored. According to NASA, this particular CME left the sun going 745 miles per hour.

A couple hours later, just after midnight, the X2.8 solar flare was unleashed, coming out twice as powerful as the first one and making it the biggest so far this year. The coronal mass ejection that followed was launched at 1200 miles per second and aimed towards NASA’s STEREO-B, Spitzer, and Messenger spacecrafts. While there was a risk of damage, the agency said the crafts could be switched into safe mode if necessary.

Solar flares are currently happening at a more rapid rate than typical because the sun’s activity cycle, which lasts 11 years, is nearing its solar maximum, which is slated to happen later this year. NASA assures readers that the solar flares are normal, and that these are the first this year of a cycle that began back in early 2011, with the one that happened on May 13, 2013 being the 15th in the cycle.

SOURCE: NASA

Hadfield will be taking an hour to answer questions from media, and it should give viewers some insight into Hadfields experience aboard the ISS. We’ve already seen a number of his videos, and now know more about ISS life than we ever have, but the hour-long discussion could be a good chance to learn more about his experiences up in space.

Chris Hadfield ended his ISS Commander stint on a very good note, by commanding a successful emergency spacewalk to fix an ammonia leak in “record time,” according to Hadfield himself. That was certainly a good stopping point for the ISS Commander, similar to a coach or player retiring after winning the championship game.

Hadfield also recorded the first ever music video from space as his “sign-off” of sorts, singing a slightly-modified version of David Bowie’s 1969 hit “Space Oddity.” Hadfield recorded the song on the space station, as well as the video (obviously), and beamed them down to Earth to be mixed and edited together to make the final product, which you can watch above.

During his time on the ISS, Hadfield also conducted a Reddit AMA (Ask Me Anything) where he answered questions and discussed a variety of various things relating to space, including why he became an astronaut and what the training process is like, as well as the fears and dangers associated with traveling to space and living there for a few months. As for what Hadfield will do next, no one knows yet, but he could reveal his future plans during Thursday’s press conference.

SOURCE: Canadian Space Agency

NASA had a space station in orbit around the Earth in the early 70s called Skylab. The 40th anniversary of the launch of Skylab is today. You may be wondering exactly where Skylab is, and the answer to that is that not only is it no longer and space, but most of it isn’t in the United States. NASA placed crews aboard the Skylab space station from 1973 through 1974.

Skylab crews consisted of three astronauts and between May 1973 in February of 1974 three different crews lived briefly aboard the space station. Skylab was later abandoned, but NASA had hoped to possibly reactivate the station using the space shuttle fleet which was then in development. The problem for Skylab was that it was in an orbit that was too low and NASA was unable to boost the space station into a higher orbit.

In 1979, Skylab reentered the Earth’s atmosphere over the southern Indian Ocean. Skylab was large enough that several pieces of the space station survived reentry and ended up impacting along the south coast of Western Australia. The reentry of Skylab was said to be mostly uncontrolled and created a media sensation at the time.

Another problem with the reentry for NASA was that the Skylab reentered the atmosphere several minutes earlier than predicted and on a slightly different course than predicted. Some sections of Skylab ended up getting the ground in the Australian outback near Balladonia on Australia’s Nullarbor Plain. The largest pieces of Skylab reportedly recovered include the oxygen tanks that supply breathable air Astronauts living on the space station. The surviving components now reside in the town of Esperance, which boasts 10,000 residents and is about 450 miles from Perth. Other components that survived reentry included the space station storage freezer, water tank, nitrogen spheres, and a portion of the hatch used to enter the space station.

SOURCE: Space.com

According to NASA, which announced the safe arrival on its Google+, Expedition 35′s crew landed in a remote area located outside of the tongue-twister of a city, Dzhezkazgan, after having spent nearly half a year on the International Space Station. The crew, listed from left to right in the image above, is: Commander Chris Hadfield from Canada, Flight Engineer Roman Romanenko from Russia, and Flight Engineer Tom Marshburn of NASA.

Hadfield, in particular, has become quite the popular individual, having actively engaged with an on-Earth audience multiple times from his position above, such as back in April when he answered a question on camera about what happens when wringing a wet washcloth. Just watching the process of spraying the water into the cloth is fascinating enough, not to mention seeing the water cling to the cloth and run down his hands.

While that demonstration, along with the others, his social media presence, Reddit AMA, and more have all been entertaining, we’d argue nothing tops his final stand yesterday when he bade farewell to the ISS by singing David Bowie’s Space Oddity. The video shows some candid shots of our blue planet out the windows, as well as a what it looks like to wield a guitar in a gravity-free environment.

On May 10, two astronauts aboard the ISS were forced to take a spacewalk to repair an ammonia coolant leak that had developed in the space station, a particularly dangerous reality given that the station is powered by the coolant. Fortunately, all ended well, with Tom Marhsburn and Chris Cassidy replacing a pump controller over the course of 5.5 hours.

SOURCE: NASA (G+)

Hadfield recorded the vocals and guitar track on the space station, with his son Evan – who has been managing his father’s social media accounts while the astronaut is in orbit – producing the video. The musical accompaniment was arranged and recorded on Earth too; after less than a day, the video already has more than half a million views on YouTube.

Although the ISS has always been used as an outreach platform to engage students and others with space exploration, Hadfield has arguably made the niche his own during his six month stay. His use of social media like Facebook and Twitter, posting photos of Earth and the view from the space station, as well as answering science questions such as what happens to wet cloths when rung out in zero-gravity, have already made him a celebrity.

Part of that process has involved giving those back on Earth a view of their planet seldom seen. Equipped with a high-powered camera, and taking advantage of Google+ Hangouts and other opportunities to reach larger audiences, the astronaut has made building enthusiasm about NASA and its work just as important as the more traditional scientific experiments and maintenance undertaken onboard the fifteen year old station.

As for Bowie himself, he posted the video on his official Facebook page, and pointed out that Emm Gryner – who arranged the piano part for Hadfield’s recording – was in fact part of the official Bowie live band in 1999-2000. “I was mostly blown away by how pure and earnest Chris’ singing is on this track” Gryner writes of the collaboration, “like weightlessness and his voice agreed to agree.”

Hadfield and the rest of the Expedition 35 team officially handed over command of the ISS to Expedition 36 on Sunday, May 12, led by Commander Pavel Vinogradov. NASA will be live-streaming the return process from 3:30pm ET on Monday.

The leak was spotted as flakes of frozen ammonia, escaping from the far port truss (P6), as the chemical – used as a coolant on the ISS – escaped from the faulty pump controller. Cassidy and Marshburn suited up and replaced the broken component with a spare that had been stored on the backbone of the space station, NASA said today, with initial testing indicating the problem had been fixed.

The exact cause of the fault has not yet been revealed, though it perhaps comes as no surprise that the truss should be presenting issues. The P6 section is in fact the oldest part of the ISS backbone, having been placed into orbit back in November 2000 as part of the STS-97 mission. That was back in the days when the Space Shuttle Endeavour was still flying; shuttle Discovery then moved the truss from its original location to its current spot on the ISS, in late 2007.

Although NASA insisted throughout the incident that the problem was not a life-threatening one to the crew of the ISS, it was nonetheless vital that the faulty pump be addressed as quickly as possible. The space station uses ammonia as part of its active cooling system, circulating the chemical around the extensible radiators that can be deployed when excess heat needs to be shed.

Usually, the ISS relies on passive cooling – such as heat pipes and insulation – to maintain a steady operating temperature. When that proves insufficient, such as when the electronics produce more heat than can be handled by the passive systems, arrays of roughly 50-foot long radiators unfurl to more aggressively control heat.

NASA live-streamed the swiftly-planned spacewalk, with cameras tracking the two astronauts as they maneuvered around the habitat. Today’s outside mission was the most impromptu to-date, having been organized and staged with the least preparation time of any ISS spacewalk.

Initially, the concern had been that the specific fault would not be located. No external damage could be discovered, and NASA engineers recommended replacing the pump controller even though it was not certain that the part was, indeed, at fault. Commander Chris Hadfield, who has been on the ISS for several months, and who observed the spacewalk from within, took to Twitter to confirm that there were “no leaks” that could be seen, though NASA will continue to monitor the ammonia pressure remotely.

The project and application process was revealed to the public on April 16. By April 29, just three days after opening to video applications, over 20,000 people had applied. It has now been about two weeks, and the latest numbers show applications quickly heading towards the six-digit mark at 78,000, a small number compared to the half a million or more Mars One expects to have by the application deadline on August 31. Most of the applicants are located in the United States, but applications have been received from 120 different countries.

How will Mars One select who goes? Via a reality TV-esque public voting process.

There are four “rounds” to the application process, with the first requiring those interested to pay $25 and submit a video explaining why they want to spend the rest of their lives on Mars. In August when the submission process is closed, the tens of thousands of videos will be sorted through for those who will be sent on to the next round. In Round 2, the applicants-turned-candidates will be sent off to their local doctor for a full physical, then if they’re giving the physical go-ahead, will meet with the regional Mars One selection committee. Round 3 is when the quasi-reality TV aspect of the process comes into play, with between 20 and 40 candidates per country competing for votes from viewers across the world, with the top in each country going on to Round 4.

Round 4 is much the same as the last round, only with less candidates and without public voting. Those remaining will need to speak English by this point if it isn’t their main language, and will need to demonstrate their skills as part of their group they’re assigned to in a simulation of a Mars outpost, where they’re begin training. Some who can’t handle the training will go on to become Mars One employees instead. This round will also be broadcasted around the world.

So who are the folks ready to eschew the world they’ve always known and fly off into space, never to return again? You can find out for yourself by watching their public application videos over on the Mars One website.

SOURCE: TIME and Mars One

The ISS’s power relies on ammonia coolant, so if that supply runs out, the space station would go dark and all the vital equipment needed for survival would stop working, which at that point the crew would be in grave danger. According to ISS Commander Chris Hadfield, the leak appears to have been stabilized, but there still needs to be a solid fix.

In order for the ammonia-based coolant system to operate normally, it needs a certain amount of ammonia in the tanks. However, based on the rate of the leak, the levels in the tanks could drop below that sweet-spot level within 48 hours, at which point the system would be at risk of shutting itself down due to a lack of ammonia. Of course, the station can operate on a broken cooling system, but it would take some clever thinking to prevent ISS components from overheating.

Luckily, the astronauts on board are fairly confident as far as where the leak is coming from, so once they begin their spacewalk, they’ll hopefully be able to go right to the leak and immediately begin repairing it. The spacewalk is being planned as we speak (with a live stream of the whole thing), and astronauts Chris Cassidy and Tom Marshburn are getting their spacesuits prepared for the spacewalk, which will take place at some point tomorrow.

In a similar but unrelated note, the United States Alliance has switched over the ISS’s computer systems from Windows to Linux to make sure that they’re “stable and reliable.” Specifically, the ISS was running Windows XP (not even Windows 7?), and they have now started to switch to Debian 6. For what it’s worth, however, some computers on the ISS have already been running various versions of Linux, including RedHat and Scientific Linux.

SOURCE: Chris Hadfield and ExtremeTech

The stars in question are white dwarfs with atmospheres said to be polluted by debris from asteroid-like objects falling onto them. According to scientists, this discovered indicates that the formation of rocky planets with the common in star clusters. A white dwarf is a smaller, dim remnant of a star once like our sun.

The stars in question are 150 light-years away from the area in the Hyades star cluster. That cluster is part of the constellation of Taurus. Astronomers say that of the approximately 800 known exoplanets, only four are known to orbit stars in a cluster. However, the astronomers believe that the reason planets aren’t commonly discovered around clusters could have to do with the fact that cluster stars are typically young and very active producing lots of flares and other outbursts that make it difficult to study them in detail.

Spectroscopic observations made using the Hubble were able to identify silicon in the atmosphere of the two white dwarfs in this particular cluster. The scientists say that the presence of silicon is a major ingredient of rocky material that forms planets such as the Earth and other planets in our solar system. The theory is that the silicon present in the atmosphere of the stars was left there by planets destroyed by the gravity of the star. The scientists also believe that rocky debris left over from the destroying of planets is likely to have formed rings around the stars.

[via SpaceTelescope]

To gather additional information for crew members on the station and NASA controllers on the ground, ISS crewmembers used hand-held cameras while Mission Control used external television cameras to record images to gather additional data. Those images were used to narrow down the location of the leak.

Information from crewmembers aboard the space station and the photographs taken indicate that the ammonia leak in the section of the cooling system is increasing in capacity. The ISS uses ammonia to cool the power channels that provide electricity to systems aboard the space station. NASA says that the ISS crewmembers are in no danger at this time.

SpaceFlight Now reports that this coolant system requires at least 40 pounds of ammonia for normal operation. NASA believes that at the current leak rate, the coolant loop in question would drop below that level and shut down within 48 hours if a repair isn’t made. If that coolant loop shuts down, crewmembers would have to reconfigure the coolant loops to use a different loop to cool some of the computer systems the leaking 2B loop currently cools.

[via NASA and SpaceFlightNow]

The droplets in the rocks were found trapped in crystals on the inside, which protected the water droplets from volcanic eruptions, allowing them to be preserved through all these years and giving scientists the opportunity to look back at what the Moon’s ancient history as far back as 4.5 billion years ago.

According to past research, much of Earth’s water is believed to have been supplied by meteorites that crashed into our planet billions of years ago. The debris from the collision is said to have formed the moon, and since the intense heat from the explosion failed to vaporize all the water, it remained stagnant, which is what researchers are finding in the rock samples.

Scientists can tell where these water droplets originated from in the solar system based on ratio of the two chemicals deuterium and hydrogen. The water droplets in the rocks were found have small amounts of deuterium, which suggests that the water came from an area close to the sun, as opposed to further out in the solar system. The chemical structure essentially matched the levels of these aforementioned meteorites, which has scientists concluding that water found on the Moon very likely came from the Earth.

[via The Guardian]

[Source: Science Magazine]

While most people are familiar with total solar eclipses, an annular eclipse is less well known, involving the moon’s position over the sun in such a way that it will briefly look like a bright-glowing ring – like the One Ring is glowing bright way up yonder. Such an effect is the result of the moon’s distance, with it being far enough away from our planet that it appears smaller in diameter than the sun, causing the ring effect.

If such a prospect excites you and you won’t happen to be located in the remote Pacific tomorrow, you can watch it from your preferred device here tomorrow starting at 5:30PM Eastern Time. If you’re in Western Australia, Queensland, or the Northern Territories, on May 10 at 6:32AM, the moon’s shadow will begin passing over, eventually tracking to Cape York Peninsula at 8:44AM, then to the eastern side of Papua New Guinea, eventually to the Solomon Islands by 10:15AM (all local times).

Said Williams College Field Memorial professor Jay Pasachoff: “It is always astonishing to see the moon apparently cut bites out of the sun. And it is a wonder of modern science and mathematics that you can travel halfway around the world, arriving on a normal day with blue sky, but then, on schedule, the lunar silhouette breaks up the sunlight.”

[via National Geographic]

Jeep Barnett, who already has one of the coolest jobs around, has applied to become an astronaut for Mars One where he could be one of the chosen few to be taken to Mars forever. Barnett is a programmer at Valve, the game studio behind the Left 4 Dead, Portal, Half-Life, and Team Fortress series. He wants to quit his Valve gig and go to Mars full-time.

In his application, Barnett says that he’s always been interested in science fiction, and always grew up believing that such things would eventually turn into reality. A trip to Mars would put Barnett in a first-person experience where he would be able to live his childhood fantasy — traveling to another planet.

Frankly, Barnett would go to Mars ASAP if asked, saying that while such a trip would obviously require years of training, he’d be up for the trip by “next week” if needed. Of course, this doesn’t mean that Barnett hates his job at Valve, but going to Mars is definitely a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and Barnett doesn’t seem keen on letting it pass him by.

[via Kotaku]

The move to New Mexico will allow SpaceX to test out its Grasshopper reusable rocket at higher altitudes. The last launch of the Grasshopper resulted in the rocket reaching a record altitude of 820 feet before slowly making its way back down and landing right where it launched in a perfectly upright position.

Spaceport America is owned by the state of New Mexico, so Elon Musk and company will pay the state $25,000 for each launch of the Grasshopper, as well as a $6,600 monthly “lease” fee to use a mobile mission control facility. However, this isn’t nearly as much as the $1 million-a-year fee that Virgin Galactic pays to use the facilities.

It’s not said what SpaceX’s plans are after the three-year deal is up, but we wouldn’t be surprised if the company built their own spaceport eventually. There’s been talks about it in the past, but nothing solid has been said about it yet. We can only assume that Musk has high hopes for the company in the future.

Before these latest observations, astronomers had assumed the interstellar clouds around Sagittarius A* would be much in line with regular clouds, with temperatures dawdling just about absolute zero (-273-degrees C). In actual fact, the black hole is surrounded by incredibly hot molecular gases, in the most central region at least, with only theories to explain why that might be the case.

Contributing to the heat – but unlikely to be responsible for all of it – is the cluster of massive stars around the black hole, the ESA says. Their output of ultraviolet radiation undoubtedly causes some of the unusual temperatures, but is not enough alone.

One theory, Doctor Javier Goicoechea of the Centro de Astrobiología, Spain, suggests, is that “emission from strong shocks in highly-magnetised gas” that also surround Sagittarius A* could be partially responsible. That could be the result of gas cloud collisions, or from the streams of hot gas that are being pulled toward the supermassive black hole.

Sagittarius A* masses around four million times that of our own Sun, and is the closest active black hole to Earth. “Herschel has resolved the far-infrared emission within just 1 light-year of the black hole,” Goicoechea explains of the new findings, “making it possible for the first time at these wavelengths to separate emission due to the central cavity from that of the surrounding dense molecular disc.”

Although black holes have been observed for many years, it’s only with recent advances in equipment that more accurate measurements could be taken. Sometimes those observations come unexpectedly; one black hole suddenly woke and consumed huge quantities of matter from a nearby planet while they had been taking measurements nearby, for instance. Earlier this year, meanwhile, scientists managed to measure a black hole’s spin for the first time.

Late last month, NASA‘s Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope and Swift Space Telescope both imaged the brightest, most powerful GRB ever spotted. Like the others mentioned, this gamma-ray burst was the result of a dying star, this particular one located 3.6-billion light-years from our planet. The scientists then took the images – one of which is featured above – and turned them into a video.

NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center scientist Julie McEnery said about the images: “We have waited a long time for a gamma-ray burst this shockingly, eye-wateringly bright. The GRB lasted so long that a record number of telescopes on the ground were able to catch it while space-based observations were still ongoing.”

Of all the gamma-ray bursts that have been detected, GRB 130427A turned out to be the longest that has ever. In addition, it also earned the title of most-powerful (by a factor of three) GRB the Large Area Telescope has ever imaged. The recording of the event started just 60 seconds after the GRB began, and has prompted a hunt for an accompanying supernova.

[via Space.com]

“A human mission to Mars is a priority” NASA chief Charles Bolden has committed, Discovery reports, though right now the agency can’t afford to do it all itself. Budgetary limitations, Bolden argues, mean the private and government agencies involved in space travel will have to effectively pool resources in order to get the most bang for their buck.

His strategy is to leave escaping Earth’s gravity well to private contractors, while NASA looks to the bigger picture such as getting from outside the atmosphere to Mars. Modules like SpaceX’s Dragon could be used to go from Earth to low-orbit he suggests, the Washington Post reports, while NASA works on taking the eventual crew further.

Even with those delineated roles – which the private sector may not be entirely happy with anyway – the project isn’t going to blast off any time soon. ““I don’t know about you, but I’m not ready. I don’t have the capability to do it” Bolden conceded. “NASA doesn’t have the capability to do that right now. But we’re on a path to be able to do it in the 2030s.”

Firing a pod off to Mars isn’t quite as simple as, say, launching astronauts to the International Space Station. The 250-350m mile journey is not only long but puts humans at risk of high levels of radiation; once the crew reached Mars, if they wanted to land on it they’d need a safe way of decelerating since the planet’s thin atmosphere lacks the friction to brake a capsule.

One possibility is the same sort of sky-crane system as NASA and the Jet Propulsion Lab used to deploy Curiosity, the robotic rover that has been drilling samples from the Martian surface. That effectively lowered the rover from beneath a hovering crane; however, the weights involved for a human crew and their kit would make it far more difficult.

In fact, the payload involved could be anywhere around 40x the weight of Curiosity, NASA associate administrator Michael Gazarik told the Post. Curiosity “was a metric ton” he highlights, “the size of a MINI Cooper.” Assuming the team wanted to escape from the Martian surface at some point, they would need to have a return rocket and fuel as well.

Back in 2010, the US government set out a goal to have a human mission “to orbit Mars” though not land on it. NASA’s ambitions go a little further, of course, though there’ll likely be robotic missions before humans even leave Earth in order to test the technology, not to mention private proposals.

H2M is run by a non-profit group, Explore Mars Inc., and co-sponsored by a number of aerospace companies including Lockheed Martin and Boeing. It will close on Wednesday with final speech by Buzz Aldrin, second man to walk on the moon.

Eventually, rather than facing an embarrassing legal row with action against the people who made NASA famous, the space agency relented and space related memorabilia owned by astronauts again hit the auction block. One of the strangest items to ever hit the auction block from these early Apollo missions will be put up by an auction company called RR Auction in New Hampshire.

The items up for auction are EKGs, or electrocardiograms, taken of astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin during their descent to the moon. The auction house believes that the EKGs will fetch more than $10,000. The EKG recordings span the final minutes as the two astronauts prepared to land their lunar lander on the surface of the moon for the first time in human history.

The company also has other space memorabilia that will be included in the auction, which will be held through May 23. The other items include the joystick used to control the lunar modules descent to the moon’s surface and 85 other items. The EKGs reportedly show “Aldrin’s blood pressure increase” as fuel began to run short on the lander. Since EKGs don’t show blood pressure, I can only assume they mean his heart rate increased.

[via The Space Reporter]

What you’re going to see here is a major spoiler in the form of a character appearing that, if you’re a fan of the book, you’ll remember isn’t supposed to appear outside of flash-backs and memories. Here he’s shown in the form of Ben Kingsley with a name tag making his role in the movie plain as day. If you’ve never read the book and don’t plan on it, this appearance won’t affect your movie viewing (unless you happen to remember his name when you begin your viewing experience.)

UPDATE: The first full-length trailer has arrived! Have a look!

The rest of the trailer is full of quick flashes of major plot devices like the Battle School and the Battle Room it contains. There you’ll see the big screen’s interpretation of “stars” inside the Battle Room, Flash Suits, and even a recreation of one of the most entertaining moments in the book. What we must assume is that this is Bean, a character that shadows Ender throughout the book and here uses a thin cord to out-maneuver the enemy in a game at the school.

“When the gate opened, all they could see was a large brown star only fifteen feet away, completely blocking their view of the enemy’s gate.

Ender didn’t pause. “Bean, give yourself fifty feet of rope and go around the star.” Bean and his four soldiers dropped through the gate and in a moment Bean was launched sideways away from the star. The rope snapped taut, and Bean flew forward. As the rope was stopped by each edge of the star in turn, his arc became tighter and his speed greater, until when he hit the wall only a few feet away from the gate he was barely able to control his rebound to end up behind the star. But he immediately moved all his arms and legs so that those waiting inside the gate would know that the enemy hadn’t flashed him anywhere.” – Hatrack, from Ender’s Game original story from August 1977 issue of Analog

Have a peek at the timeline below to see other recent sneak peaks, leaks, and straight up teasers from Ender’s Game the movie and follow SlashGear’s entertainment portal for more information on this film as it approaches this winter. The movie itself comes out on the first of November, but given the amount of teaser material we’ve seen thus far, there’ll certainly be a massive amount of buildup between here and there.

Although planets at such orbits would not, traditionally, be considered strong candidates for showing evidence of alien life, that’s avoiding the core physics and chemistry, Seager points out. For instance, greater quantities of hydrogen gas in the atmosphere would have a more significant warming effect despite the cooler heat from a more distant star, she suggests in a paper in Science.

Conversely, planets generally thought of as too close to a star might be equally viable candidates, if they were dry enough to avoid the greenhouse effect from larger quantities of atmospheric moisture. Even a planet without a star altogether could still sustain life if it had its own source of heat, the physicist insists, such as if it had a radioactive core and enough of an insulating atmosphere to prevent undue loss of that warmth.

NASA has been using the Kepler space telescope to identify which planets might support life, using some fundamental guidelines including position in orbit and size. Last month, for instance, the space agency announced it had spotted three such examples, each within the so-called “habitable zone.”

If Seager’s arguments are accommodated within mission guidelines, however, Kepler’s hunt could become far more comprehensive, though it’s unclear whether the space telescope has the right combination of strengths to actually identify such planets. Currently, it is difficult to track the “biosignature gasses” – such as atmospheric oxygen in the case of Earth, or ozone and methane on exo-planets – of distant planets.

That could change within the decade, however, with NASA green-lighting 2017 plans for TESS, the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite. It is expected to hunt for relatively nearby exo-planets, though it will take the combined efforts of TESS and the James Webb Space Telescope – itself set to launch in 2018 – before atmospheric analysis can take place.

We’re not exactly sure what cities we’re looking at in the photo, but Hadfield points out that its the southeastern United States, with the bigger city toward the right side being Atlanta or Charlotte possibly. In any case, the horizon looks absolutely amazing, and the moon creeping in makes the photo that much more spectacular.

Hadfield not only takes a ton of photos of Earth from the ISS (which you can browse through all of them with this neat interactive map), but he also provides short videos on what it’s like to live on the ISS, and in one of his latest videos, he describes how he takes photos of Earth from the ISS. The secret? A huge lens.

Hadfield primarily uses a Nikon DSLR with a 400mm lens. This is one heavy setup, but thanks to the lack of gravity in space, Hadfield doesn’t need to strain his shoulders or arms lifting and holding the camera. Instead, the camera merely just floats in front of him. Hadfield even says that they take the cameras out on spacewalks into the cold vacuum of space. We’ll be keeping up with Hadfield and the ISS over the next months for any more photos that he posts in the future. Stay tuned!

In November of this year, NASA is planning to launch a new spacecraft called the Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) spacecraft. The space agency is calling on the public to submit their names and a personal message online that will be placed on a DVD that will be carried aboard the spacecraft on its mission to Mars. The actual purpose of the MAVEN spacecraft is to study the Martian upper atmosphere.

NASA says that the DVD aboard spacecraft will contain every name submitted. Other than names, the short messages can be submitted by people in the form of a three line poem or haiku. The catch with the poems is that only three will be included on the DVD.

NASA will allow the public to begin voting on which three poems will be included on the DVD beginning July 15. The DVD campaign is part of NASA’s Going to Mars campaign. NASA hopes that the Maven spacecraft will help determine how the loss of its atmosphere to space affected the history of water on the surface of the planet.

[via NASA]

The communications moratorium was in place due to a planetary alignment that could see communications sent to the rovers corrupted, resulting in actions that caused serious damage. As such, communications were stopped for a few weeks, leaving the ground team to discover the problem with Opportunity on April 27, about five days after it had switched itself into automode.

After making the discovery, NASA put together a series of commands on April 29 to switch the rover back into normal operations mode. The automode was triggered, the agency believed, when the rover’s cameras were checking out the sun and it rebooted its flight software, the combination of which sent it into the altered functioning mode.

Said NASA about the matter: “The Opportunity rover is back under ground control, executing a sequence of commands sent by the rover team. Opportunity is no longer in standby automode and has resumed normal operations.” Such is the simple life of a robot who has spent many years rolling around the Red Planet. Communication with the Curiosity rover will happen soon.

[via Space]

The video you’re about to see was created by NASA as an accurate approximation of the paths that these two heavenly bodies followed. As is the norm with this sort of situation with more than one country’s hardware in the mix, this event has been under wraps for some time. The actual near-crash occurred on April 3rd of 2012, just over a year ago.

NASA has made clear that the hit was avoided only due to the quick action of engineers working to dodge disaster with a blast of the craft’s thrusters. The NASA craft, otherwise known as the Fermi Gamma-ray Space Telescope, and the Russian craft would have passed the same point in space within 30 milliseconds of one another if it had not been for engineer action on the ground.

Though the Russian craft was traveling at approximately 27,000 miles per hour (43,452 km/h) in relation to Fermi, ended up avoiding a crash by 6 miles (9 km) when they’d have otherwise hit. According to NASA, the actual move was relatively easy, when it came down to it.

“The maneuver, which was performed by the spacecraft itself based on procedures we developed a long time ago, was very simple, just firing all thrusters for one second. There was a lot of suspense and tension leading up to it, but once it was over, we just sighed with relief that it all went well.” -Eric Stoneking, attitude control lead engineer for Fermi at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center

Below you’ll find a second video, this one emphasizing the importance of relieving our near-earth space junk in the near future. The European Space Agency has held six conferences thus far dedicated solely to fighting the space junk threat, and several countries have begun tests of space junk destruction for the future.

[via Space]

These geysers were confirmed back in 2005, and it’s said that there are at least 98 geysers all located near the moon’s south pole, and the photo above does a great job showing off the beauty of water vapor shooting out of the moon’s surface. You can easily tell that the plume is has large as the diameter of the moon itself.

Since confirming the geysers in 2005, scientists have been continually trying to learn more about how they behave and where they are coming from. As of right now, the theory behind the geysers is that Enceladus has a liquid subsurface ocean, and pressure from the surface layers above that force the water up through surface cracks and out into space.

As far as what the plumes consist of, the Cassini space craft has flown through the geysers before and has determined that it’s a combination of water, organic material, and salt levels similar to that of our own oceans here on Earth. If the geyser indeed shoots the water vapor as far high as the diameter of the moon, that means that we’re looking at geysers that shoot plumes approximately 300 miles in the air.

[via Universe Today]

The discovery was made on April 27, and NASA prepared a new set of commands yesterday that will pull the rover back into a regular functioning mode, something it has been waiting for since going into the specific type of standby mode. It wasn’t down long, however, having reverted to that mode last week on April 22. Unlike Curiosity, Opportunity has called Mars its home for nearly a decade.

NASA’s Mars Exploration Rover Project Manager John Callas said: “Our current suspicion is that Opportunity rebooted its flight software, possibly while the cameras on the mast were imaging the sun. We found the rover in a standby state called automode, in which it maintains power balance and communication schedules, but waits for instructions from the ground. We crafted our solar conjunction plan to be resilient to this kind of rover reset, if it were to occur.”

Although the communications moratorium came to its end for Opportunity, it is still in effect for the Curiosity rover, which is set to resume its communications with the ground tomorrow. NASA says that thus far information received from the rover shows that it has made it through its mini vacation without incident, and as such is slated to receive its first set of commands on May 1.

[via NASA]

NASA has a developed a plan to replace the space shuttle by paying private space companies like SpaceX to send astronauts to the ISS. However, due to government budget cuts, the original 2015 date when we would see this happen has been delayed two years into 2017. As a result, NASA has had to pay the Roscosmos Space Agency $424 million to extend their contract into 2017.

NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said that “it is unacceptable that we don’t currently have an American capability to launch our own astronauts.” Bolden and company is calling upon Congress to approve President Obama’s budget request of $821 million for NASA, or else there will be further delays past 2017 to launch astronauts from the US.

At least we have an American company sending and bringing back cargo off the ISS. SpaceX, which was founded by Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk, has completed several resupply missions to the ISS so far, and NASA hopes soon that SpaceX rockets will be carrying astronauts up into space within the next few years.

As it turns out, a hurricane on Saturn looks remarkably similar. Said California Institute of Technology’s Andrew Ingersoll, who was on the team responsible for imaging the storm: “We did a double take when we saw this vortex because it looks so much like a hurricane on Earth. But there it is at Saturn, on a much larger scale, and it is somehow getting by on the small amounts of water vapor in Saturn’s hydrogen atmosphere.”

Both images and a video were captured of the hurricane, which NASA reports as having an eye 20x bigger than a typical Earth hurricane at 1,250 miles across. The storm took place in what is known as a hexagon weather pattern, six-sided and with thin outer clouds swirling around at 330mph. And unlike hurricanes that take place on our planet, the hurricane on Saturn is stuck to its north pole region rather than traveling.

One of the scientists’ goals is to figure out how the hurricane is created and sustained in the relative absence of water. Learning how the hurricane utilizes water vapors to form – especially given its overall larger and more powerful nature than our own – will help researchers understand the function of hurricanes on our own planet. The content was captured by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft.

[via NASA]

Two cosmonauts will be making the spacewalk along with the Olympic torch in order to celebrate the games that will be taking place in Russia. The torch walk is scheduled to begin on October 7 this year, and it will span 123 days and travel more than 34,000 miles. The torch will also be carried by 14,000 different people, which would be a record for Olympic torch walks.

The deputy head of Russia’s space agency Roscosmos, Vitaly Davydov, said that the torch that will be carried to space will be “the same as the torch at the Olympics,” although the torch will not be lit on its way to space, since open flames are prohibited from being carried inside a spaceship while traveling to the ISS.

The spacewalk with the torch is set to take place in November, and it’s expected to return back to Earth on November 12. Russian cosmonauts Oleg Kotov and Sergey Ryazansky are expected to perform the space walk with the torch. Other places that the torch is scheduled to go to is Mount Elbrus (the highest peak of Europe), the bottom of Lake Baikal, and the North Pole.

[via Russian Times]

Few details are known at this point, but Hadfield referred to the damage on the solar panel as a “bullet hole,” and said that he was “glad it missed the hull.” We’re not sure exactly what would happen if a small rock like that collided with the ISS hull, but judging from Hadfield’s sigh of relief, nothing good would come out of it.

We’re guessing that the hole didn’t cause too much severe damage to the solar panel, or else the ISS would be in deep trouble. We’re not sure how large the small hole is, but it doesn’t look big at all — merely a small speck compared to the sheer size of the solar panels on the station.

Of course, this isn’t the first time that Hadfield has talked about small meteoroids hitting the ISS. He hosted a Reddit AmA back in February where he discussed “micro-meteorites would sometimes hit the hull and make a loud “ping” noise, which leaves dents on the outside of the station. However, Hadfield notes that a larger piece of rock could come along and cause greater damage.

This initial test was done at a runway at California’s Mojave Air and Spaceport this morning – Monday, that is, the 29th of April. This test was done with carrier mothership WhiteKnightTwo, it carrying SS2 to an altitude of around 47,000 feet (14,300 meters) where the smaller craft test-fired a rocket engine that would, or will, eventually carry it to its space-bound top height.

This test is only the very first in a set of tests that will eventually prove the craft viable for real human use. British billionaire Sir Richard Branson, owner and founder of Virgin Galactic, Virgin Airlines, Virgin Mobile, etc, spoke this morning of the event in brief, suggesting his day thus far has been “ridiculously exciting”. With flight tickets set at the moment at an expected two hundred thousand dollars a person, it’s not difficult to see more than one reason why Branson would find this day a positive one.

According to Virgin Galactic, they plan on running their first official full space flight by the end of the calendar year. This flight may or may not be working with user-purchased tickets at that time.

Virgin Galactic is a concept born not just of Branson’s wishes to head to space, but of the company’s ever-expanding aims to bring consumers entertaining experiences in travel. Such is a flight aboard a Virgin Airlines flight, complete with posh interiors and wireless phone chargers in specialized waiting rooms at the airport. After Virgin Galactic takes off for real, we expect Virgin Volcanic to head below our Earth with a giant drill – it’d only be right.

UPDATE: A video has been released showing this event, specifically the bit where the SpaceShipTwo breaks the speed of sound – watch for it now.

[via Space]

The plan is to put astronauts on Mars by 2023, and they will begin the recruitment process in July. The company began accepting video applications last week, and anyone can apply, but there’s an application fee of $25, which is there to prevent spammers and those not serious about joining the expedition from applying.

The money earned from application fees are predicted to reach in the millions of dollars, and that money will be spent to help fund the entire project. Essentially, those who apply will have to agree to fly to Mars and say there for the rest of their lives, helping build a colony on the red planet in the meantime.

Mars One will narrow down its applicants to a short list of 24 to 40 applicants, with the final group being selected by a TV audience. The final group will be the first group to head to Mars. The short list of candidates is said to be selected by July 2015, so if you plan on applying, you’ll be waiting a couple years before you hear back, giving all new meaning to the hiring phrase, “we’ll let you know.”

[via io9]

That extra degree of clarity is because the planet will be at its closest to Earth as well as at its opposition point: the exact opposite from where the sun is positioned. Saturn will be visible all through the night, with a steady glow, though it will take some tools of the astronomy trade if you want to make out more than that.

For instance, Space suggests, magnification of at least 25 power will show more details of Saturn, with the rings making it appear oval in shape rather than circular as the naked eye might see it. Quadruple that magnification and more of the planet’s details will be picked out, including several of its 62 moons.

The best point to see Saturn is late evening, when the planet reaches its highest point. To actually find it, the LA Times suggests, look for the bright star Arcturus – off along the “handle” of the Big Dipper, away from the bowl – and then to the right, where the star Spica is. Saturn is below and left of that.

If that all sounds complicated, then NASA’s video, below, should give more of an indication as to where Saturn will be in the night sky, as well as what you might expect to see with the naked eye and various types of telescope. Saturn will be at its best on April 28, the space agency suggests.

This situation allows Russian cosmonauts Roman Romanenko and Pavel Vinogradov to access three full tons of food, fuel, supplies, and a set of experiment hardware along with the rest of the crew of six aboard the ISS. Though the Kurs antenna remained undeployed, it would appear that the mission has been a full success. The final hard mate occurred at 8:34 a.m. EDT according to NASA.

This docking happened between the Progress 51 Russian cargo ship and the rear port of the Zvezda service module of the International Space Station. What you’re seeing above is a video presented by Russian mission control of the Russian Federal Space Agency at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. This launch made way at 6:12 a.m. EDT just two days ago en route to the ISS.

With the supplies brought in this week, the ISS will be stocked with an additional 1,764 pounds of propellant, 57 pounds of air, 926 pounds of water, 48 pounds of oxygen, and 3,483 pounds of spare parts and experiment hardware. For its trip back to our planet, the Progress 51 craft will be filled with trash and station discards. Good luck, team!

And readers, be sure to head to SlashGear’s Science tag portal for more excellent space-bound action!

The last time this phenomenon happened was in 2009, and NASA took full advantage of the situation having its Casini spacecraft snap some beautiful photographs of Saturn’s rings. The photographs have recently shown up as scientists used the photographs to perform some research investigating clouds of dust created in the ring system when those rings are struck by meteoroids and other objects flying through space. Scientists say that it’s very easy to see the clouds of dust, called ejecta, spewing out of the ring system in this view.

Researcher Matthew Tiscareno, a planetary scientist from Cornell University, and his team used the photographs taken by Cassini to investigate the ejecta to determine what kind of impact had created the dust plumes. The team of researchers looked for observed dust clouds anytime between one hour and 50 hours after the initial impact. The team worked backwards measuring the length and tilt of the cloud to see what sort of impact created the dust cloud.

According to Tiscareno and his team, by analyzing the images of Saturn’s ring system they were able to determine that the ejecta clouds they observed were created by “streams of meteoroids” plunging through Saturn’s ring plane. The researchers initially believe that single meteoroids impacting the ring plane were causing these clouds of debris. His team now believes that single meteoroids moving through the ring plane would create a hole, but not a cloud. These clouds of dust and debris are now believed to have been created by a group of meteoroids that are able to displace a lot of dust at one time. The research performed by the team of scientists is detailed in today’s issue of the journal Science.

[via Space.com]

Upon its discovery, the system was observed through multiple telescopes, including ones located in Chile, the Canary Islands, Germany, Puerto Rico, and the United States. Dubbed PSR J0348+0432, the stars are newsworthy and provide an excellent point for theory testing for several reasons, such as how close the white dwarf is to the larger star and the neutron star’s mass. According to Phys.org, the system is unprecedented.

Thus far, all the observations made of this unique stellar system substantiate Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity, something researchers believed might not be the case, thinking that the particular conditions of these two stars would result in off-kilter orbital decay rates, with other theories proving more accurate. To their surprise, this wasn’t the case.

Because General Relativity is holding true, the researchers may be able to detect the gravitational waves from the stellar bodies, something only possible using advanced equipment in conjunction with understanding the waves’ characteristics. About detecting the waves, McGill University’s Ryan Lynch, who is one of the researchers, said, “Our results indicate that the filtering techniques planned for these advanced instruments remain valid.”

[via Phys.org]

This will mark the first lunar eclipse of 2013, but it won’t be a full one. According to NASA, less than 1.5% of the moon will be darkened by Earth’s shadow, and it will only last 27 minutes, which will make it one of the shortest lunar eclipses that we’ve seen in the past 100 years or so.

The partial lunar eclipse will start at 10 pm GST, and the folks at Slooh Space Camera will be live streaming a video feed from a telescope in Dubai, where the partial lunar eclipse should be completely visible as long as the weather cooperates. Commentary will also be provided by Dr. Lucie Green, who is a researcher at the Mullard Space Science Laboratory in England, so it should be quite the learning experience.

If you miss today’s lunar eclipse, don’t worry, as there will be two more throughout 2013, with the next one occurring on May 25. That one should be visible by folks in the US, although it won’t be a completely full lunar eclipse, however. The third lunar eclipse will take place on October 18.

[via S]” target=”_blank”>via LA Times]