Science

NASA has reported that its Juno mission has provided its first science results concerning the amount of water in the atmosphere of Jupiter. Juno results estimate that at the equator of the planet water makes up about 0.25 percent of the molecules in Jupiter's atmosphere. These findings represent the first on the gas giant's abundance of water since the 1995 Galileo mission suggested Jupiter might be extremely dry compared to the Sun.

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The NASA Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) is going to be on a bit of a vacation from its science mission and relay operations while engineers on Earth conduct maintenance. The maintenance work is expected to last about two weeks. During that time, other orbiters will continue relaying data from the surface of Mars for the Curiosity rover and Mars InSight lander.

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It may not be long before we see SpaceX's Dragon capsule and Falcon 9 rocket shuttling private citizens into space. Today, Space Adventures announced a new partnership with SpaceX that will see the two teaming to offer a trip to space for up to four private citizens. SpaceX, it appears, will be providing the rocket while Space Adventures will be booking the space tourists.

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A Neanderthal skeleton, the first to be excavated in 25 years, has thrown preconceptions around the so-called Neanderthal burial debate back into disarray, suggesting funeral rites may not be a uniquely homo-sapien affair. Further exploration of remains in Shanidar Cave, a remote cache of Neanderthal bones in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, built on speculation from the mid-20th Century that our assumptions about the extinct species may be incorrect.

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Researchers at the University of Washington have created a wearable wristband and ring combination that can detect the precise location of the index finger. The system is also able to continuously track the location of someone's index finger. Researchers say that the ring emits a signal that is picked up by the wristband and allows the identification of the position and orientation of the ring and the finger it is worn on.

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SpaceX started the week by launching another of group of satellites into orbit around the Earth. The actual satellite launch appears to have gone according to plan, with another 60 SpaceX satellites put into orbit this morning. However, the same can not be said for the launch as a whole, as the first-stage Falcon 9 booster that those satellites rode on failed to land successfully back on Earth.

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New clues were recently uncovered in a decades-old cold case surrounding a set of dinosaur prints in the ceiling of a cave. The prints belonged to what was previously believe to be a four-footed carnivore. This was an astounding discovery at the time - there was just one issue: No other evidence of this creature appeared in several decades after the discovery of these prints in the 1950s. New clues revealed the reason why no other evidence of the existence of these creatures ever appeared...

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UConn scientists from the School of Dental Medicine, School of Medicine, and School of Engineering have teamed to design a wirelessly controlled smart bandage. It works in conjunction with a smartphone-sized platform that can precisely deliver different medications to the wound with independent dosing. The bandage was developed by UConn, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and Harvard Medical School.

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Scientists have been studying a distant star called Betelgeuse, which is a red supergiant star in the constellation Orion. Using the Very Large Telescope (VLT), the ESO has been able to take images that compare the star before and after it began to dim late last year. As of now, Betelgeuse is about 36% of its usual brightness, which is a change that is noticeable with the naked eye.

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NASA has announced the recipient of its CAPSTONE CubeSat contract, revealing that the California-based company Rocket Lab will provide the launch services for this particular mission. Rocket Lab is commercially licensed by the FAA as a launch provider, according to NASA, which says that its CAPSTONE CubeSat weighs only 55lbs and is destined for cislunar orbit around the Moon.

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NASA has funded eight unusual projects that promise to unlock the secrets - and the potential - of the Moon, earmarking $1 million for long shot ideas that could have a big payoff. The grants will go to concepts as weird and wonderful as a probe catapult, a system to remotely power things via lasers, and a robotic dog.

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NASA's New Horizons mission is providing new insights into how planets and planetesimals, which are the building blocks of planets, were formed. When the New Horizons spacecraft flew past a Kuiper Belt object called Arrokoth last January, it gave us the first look ever at a remnant of the formation of the solar system. The team used data on Arrokoth's shape, geology, color, and composition to answer questions about the origins of planetesimals and how the planets formed.

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