Space & Astronomy News

Astronomers peering out into our cosmic backyard have long understood that the Milky Way's galactic neighbors only seem similar on the surface. Now a detailed survey from NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has revealed the diversity of those galaxies as they evolve over time.

JERUSALEM - Pages from an Israeli astronaut's diary that survived the explosion of the space shuttle Columbia and a 37-mile fall to earth are going on display this weekend for the first time in Jerusalem.

MOSCOW (AFP) - The orbital path of the International Space Station (ISS) was successfully adjusted Saturday to accommodate the landing of the world's sixth space tourist in eight days time, Interfax reported citing Russian space programme officials.

A NASA capsule that collected the first samples from a comet has become part of a collection itself.

The space shuttle Endeavour is set to blast off two days early next month while engineers on Earth continue to study a Hubble Space Telescope glitch that added months of delay to a separate orbiter flight, NASA officials announced Friday.

PARIS (AFP) - A second test satellite for Galileo, Europe's rival to the US Global Positioning System (GPS), closed itself down for more than two weeks last month because of space radiation, concurring sources said Thursday.

PARIS (AFP) - The launch of a satellite to monitor Earth's gravitational field, which had been postponed from September 10 to October 5, has been delayed for a second time, the European Space Agency (ESA) said on Thursday.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - A US space probe will fly over Mercury next week to photograph the solar system's smallest planet, in the second of three planned passes, NASA announced on Wednesday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A NASA spacecraft will whiz over Mercury's crater-scarred surface next Monday, getting a look at the third of the planet closest to the sun that has never been seen close-up before.

One vehicle's operative life is coming to a close, while the other's is still in its formative stages. Their legacies will be inexorably linked: Without the space shuttle, delivery and assembly of the International Space Station's (ISS) key components would have been difficult at best, and probably could not have happened.

A team of astronomers led by F. Marchis, PI, at the SETI Institute and at UC-Berkeley, and P. Descamps from Paris Observatory announced recently the discovery of two moons around an intriguing asteroid. The main-belt asteroid 216 Kleopatra has two companions.

A space probe is headed for a second swing past Mercury to pick up a gravitational boost and eventually become the first spacecraft to orbit the closest planet to our sun.

GLASGOW, Scotland — Thailand's Theos Earth high-resolution optical Earth observation satellite was successfully placed into a transfer orbit Wednesday by a Russian-Ukranian Dnepr silo-launched rocket after nearly two years of delays related to launch-vehicle availability, according to Thai authorities and satellite prime contractor Astrium Satellites.

Editor's note: As NASA celebrates its 50th birthday today, the agency looks back on a history of stunning successes while honoring those lost in its tragic setbacks. Here, space commentator Jim Banke takes a look at what the future might bring for America's space program in the 50 years to come.

NASA scientists hope to hear what it sounds like on the surface of Mars for the first time when they attempt to switch on the Phoenix Mars Lander's microphone in the next week or two, mission leaders announced on Monday.

The short answer: a lot. The long answer: depends on how you look at it. Whatever your viewpoint, here's how $700 billion - the figure inked in the initial dead-in-the-water government bailout bill for Wall Street - compares to other vast sums. NASA in fiscal year 2009 will launch several missions into space and pay for hundreds of people to operate a host of space telescopes and even remote robots on Mars and run a PR and media department that puts most large corporations to shame. The agency's budget: $17.6 billion, or 2.5 percent of the bailout sum. ...

GLASGOW, Scotland — NASA Administrator Michael D. Griffin defended his agency's determination to establish a lunar colony before embarking on a manned Mars mission Sept. 30, arguing that those who prefer to focus only on Mars are overestimating what is known about the Moon and underestimating the difficulties of going to Mars.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - In an unprecedented discovery, NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander has found snow falling from clouds on Mars, scientists said Tuesday.

In light of the most recent glitch on the Hubble Space Telescope, a serious equipment failure that means the observatory is unable to send data back to Earth, some are beginning to wonder, is Hubble still worth saving?

VIENNA, Va. - A Virginia space company says a software billionaire plans to become the first private traveler to make a second trip to space

WASHINGTON — American billionaire Charles Simonyi, a computer software executive who paid more than $20 million to fly to the International Space Station aboard a Russian-built Soyuz capsule in spring 2007, will train for a second Soyuz trip to the space station in spring 2009.

LOS ANGELES - NASA's Phoenix spacecraft has discovered evidence of past water at its Martian landing site and spotted falling snow for the first time, scientists reported Monday. Soil experiments revealed the presence of two minerals known to be formed in liquid water. Scientists identified the minerals as calcium carbonate, found in limestone and chalk, and sheet silicate.

NASA has delayed the last shuttle mission to the Hubble Space Telescope until early 2009 in order to repair a broken device that is blocking the orbital observatory from sending its iconic images of the cosmos back to Earth, agency officials said late Monday.

WASHINGTON (AFP) - NASA has delayed the final service mission of the Atlantis space shuttle to the Hubble space telescope, probably until early 2009, after a "significant anomaly" occurred on the orbiting telescope.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - NASA said Monday it is delaying its mission to the Hubble Space Telescope until next year because of a serious breakdown of the observatory in orbit.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida (Reuters) - A problem with the Hubble Space Telescope prompted NASA to delay until next year a repair trip to the observatory that had been due to launch in just two weeks, the space agency said on Monday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - NASA extended the mission of the busy Phoenix lander Monday, saying it will operate the lander until it dies in the cold and dark of the Martian winter.

WASHINGTON - The signs of a midlife crisis are there: A 50th birthday approaching; a longing for the glory days of youth; a hankering to dump the aging partner of 27 years; and a costly flirtation with a new young thing.

A serious equipment failure aboard the Hubble Space Telescope is preventing it from relaying data and images to scientists on Earth and will likely delay a shuttle mission to overhaul the observatory next month, NASA officials said Monday.