After losing out on a Space Force contract, private space company Blue Origin has announced that its New Glenn maiden flight will be bumped to the fourth quarter of 2022. The company says that it hopes it will be able to launch National Security Space Launch (NSSL) payloads in the future in addition to civil contracts, among other things.
NASA is preparing a must-see video tour of Mars today, tapping Perseverance's high-tech Mastcam-Z robotic eyes to give a new glimpse of the red planet. It's an opportunity not only to see Mars in full 360-degrees, but also to get a guided view of what the freshly-landed rover can see and why scientists are eager to explore it.
NASA's Perseverance rover may not have even moved from its landing spot on Mars in the past week, but that doesn't mean there aren't already thousands of images being shared from the red planet. The latest science-lab-on-wheels successfully touched down on Martian soil last Thursday, February 18, and has been steadily beaming back content to the Jet Propulsion Lab ever since.
As its name implies, NASA's Parker Solar Probe is meant to study the Sun. However, on its way to the Sun, Parker flew past Venus. It took the opportunity to capture some impressive views of the planet during its close flyby in July 2020. While the probe was meant to study the sun, Venus was critical to the mission as the spacecraft will whip around the planet to get gravity assists allowing it to fly closer and closer to the sun to complete its primary mission.
Researchers from the University of Queensland have examined a 4600-year-old Egyptian painting. During the examination, a rendering of a speckled goose stood out. Scientist Dr. Anthony Romilio noticed a strange and beautiful bird, unlike modern red-breasted geese that had distinct and bold colors and patterns on its face, body, breast, wings, and legs. The painting is called "Medium Geese" and was discovered in the late 1800s.
Researchers from UNSW Sydney released a study that looks at the last major geomagnetic reversal that occurred on Earth about 42,000 years ago. The team says that the Earth's magnetic field broke down at that time and caused massive and sudden climate change on the planet. All around the world, there were a few centuries of what the team calls apocalyptic conditions triggered by a reversal of the Earth's magnetic poles combined with the behavior of the sun.
One of the most significant feats in space exploration over the past few years is the landing of the Perseverance rover on the surface of Mars. Perseverance made a successful landing on the Red Planet a few days ago after an extremely harrowing journey through the thin Martian atmosphere. One of the critical pieces of the puzzle to get Perseverance on the ground safely was the descent stage.
On Wednesday, NASA published Perseverance rover's first high-definition panorama of its landing site, giving the public their first proper look at the Martian surface that'll be explored by the new rover. The panorama shows Mars' Jezero Crater as perceived by Perseverance's Mastcam-Z instrument, which can be rotated to capture a full 360-degrees.
NASA has a history of doing interesting and unexpected things when it comes to its space missions. Recently, NASA successfully placed the Perseverance rover onto the surface of Mars. One of the most dangerous parts of its entire journey was the descent through the Martian atmosphere to the Red Planet's surface.
One of the most studied objects in the sky is a supernova that first became visible with the naked eye in our sky on February 24, 1987. It was the first supernova visible with the naked eye in 400 years and was dubbed Supernova 1987A. Since its discovery, researchers have been looking for the squashed stellar core that would've been left behind when the star exploded, known as a neutron star.
Dogs and humans have lived side-by-side since the distant past. Scientists have wondered how far back the history of dogs spans in the Americas and what route dogs use to enter this part of the world. Researchers from the University at Buffalo have used a small bone fragment from a dog found in Southeast Alaska that lived in the region about 10,150 years ago to answer some of these questions.
China's Mars mission, called Tianwen-1, is going very well so far. This week the spacecraft successfully completed its third braking maneuver and entered a parking orbit around Mars on Wednesday at about 6:29 AM BJT. The announcement was made this morning by the China National Space Administration.