May 8, 2011 | Blog, Education Station, Exploration, MESSENGER, NASA, Our Solar System, Space and Science, The Sun
Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory/Carnegie Institution of Washington NASA’s MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry, and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft circling the planet Mercury has chalked up its 100th orbit. That milestone...
May 8, 2011 | Exploration, NASA, Space and Science, Space Shuttle
Three of NASA’s shuttle-era astronauts where honored this weekend for their contributions to human space flight. They include Karol J. Bobko and USAF Lt. Gen. Susan Helms, who were inducted into the U. S. Astronaut Hall of Fame in Titusville, Fla., on...
May 2, 2011 | Asteroid Exploration, Blog, Education Station, Exploration, NASA, Our Solar System, Planet Earth, Space and Science, The Moon
One of Mother Nature’s good-sized space rocks is slipping past Earth this November – and this asteroid is a little bit wider than an aircraft carrier! That’s the word from asteroid experts at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The flyby of the space rock is on...
Apr 28, 2011 | Exploration, International Cooperation, International Space Station, Space and Science, Space Research
The European Space Agency has formally agreed to an extension of U. S.-led International Space Station operations until at least 2020, adding its commitment to those of the Russian federal space agency, Roscosmos, and the Japan Exploration Aerospace Agency, or JAXA,...
Apr 27, 2011 | International Space Station, Space Shuttle, NASA, Space and Science
The countdown for shuttle Endeavour’s final mission, a two week voyage to equip the International Space Station with a $2 billion physics experiment, got under way on Tuesday, with a mostly favorable weather outlook. Endeavour’s lift off from...
Apr 24, 2011 | Ask the Expert, Blog, Book Reviews, Education Station, Exploration, Kids Space, NASA, Our Solar System, Planet Earth, Space and Science, Space Research, Why Space
Exoplanets, Edited by Sara Seager; University of Arizona Press; Tucson, Arizona; $35.00 (Cloth); 2011. The editor of this volume, Sara Seager, is the Ellen Swallow Richards Professor of Planetary Science and Professor of Physics at the Massachusetts Institute of...
Apr 21, 2011 | Education, European Space Agency, Exploration, Hubble Space Telescope, International Cooperation, NASA, Space and Science
The Hubble Space Telescope, among the best known and most accomplished spacecraft ever launched, will mark its 21st birthday on Sunday. The 350 mile high observatory, which has been upgraded five times by space shuttle crews since its April 24, 1990 launching aboard...
Apr 21, 2011 | Ask the Expert, Blog, Education Station, Exploration, NASA, Planet Earth, Space and Science
Atmospheric sciences professor Stephen Nesbitt, left, and graduate student Daniel Harnos analyzed passive microwave satellite data to identify telltale structural rings in tropical storms that are about to intensify into hurricanes. Photo courtesy Univ. of Illinois/L....
Apr 19, 2011 | Ask the Expert, Blog, Education Station, Exploration, International Cooperation, NASA, Our Solar System, Space and Science, The Sun
NASA’s Solar Dynamics Observatory has been used to monitor the birth of a sunspot over a period of eight hours. Researchers at the University of Central Lancashire made use of the Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) to observe the growth of the sunspot. How sunspots...
Apr 13, 2011 | Education, International Space Station, Space Shuttle, NASA, Space and Science
NASA Administrator Charles Bolden dispatched the agency’s retired shuttle orbiters far and wide on Tuesday, the 30th anniversary of the first shuttle flight and the 50th anniversary of the first human space flight. Atlantis will head for the Kennedy Space...