ScientistPankaj: 'NASA at a crossroads:' Budget woes, aging infrastructure and hard choices ahead

Tuesday, October 22, 2024

'NASA at a crossroads:' Budget woes, aging infrastructure and hard choices ahead

'NASA at a crossroads:' Budget woes, hard choices ahead | Space Quiz! How many times more powerful will NASA's Roman Space Telescope be, compared to Hubble? | Exclusive: Doritos' 1st ad in space with 'zero-g' chips

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October 22, 2024

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The Launchpad

'NASA at a crossroads:' Budget woes, hard choices ahead

(NASA)

The next few years are likely to be pivotal ones for NASA, according to a hard-hitting report by the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. The report, which was released last month, is called "NASA at a Crossroads: Maintaining Workforce, Infrastructure and Technology Preeminence in the Coming Decades." And that title was chosen advisedly.

Full Story: Space (10/22)

Space Quiz! How many times more powerful will NASA's Roman Space Telescope be, compared to Hubble?

Learn the answer here!

Exclusive: Doritos' 1st ad in space with 'zero-g' chips

(Polaris Dawn)

Doritos has released its first ad filmed in space, and it is filled with the sound of astronauts "crunching" down on the brand's first-ever chips to leave the planet.

Full Story: Space (10/21)

Skywatching

Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS lights up night sky in livestream

(Space.com / Josh Dinner)

Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS) is still visible in the night sky, and you can watch it live today thanks to a free livestream. Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS is growing dimmer as it speeds away from Earth. It should be visible through at least Saturday (Oct. 26), but the comet is speeding away from Earth and growing more difficult to see with the naked eye. The comet is currently high in the west at sunset as seen from the mid-latitudes of North America, but is dim enough that a pair of binoculars or small telescope is likely your best bet at this point.

Full Story: Space (10/17)

Science & Astronomy

Most of Earth's meteorites may come from the same 3 spots

(Costfoto/Future Publishing via Getty Images)

Scientists know that the vast majority of meteorites that come crashing down to Earth originate from the solar system's main asteroid belt: a region between Mars and Jupiter where irregularly shaped rocks left over from the formation of the solar system crash into and bounce off each other during their journeys around the sun. In new research, however, an international team of scientists are claiming to have identified three young, distinct asteroid families in the main asteroid belt as the source of 70% of Earth's meteorites. "Asteroid families" refer to a population of asteroids, which could be composed of a handful or hundreds of fragments that likely originate from a past asteroid collision.

Full Story: Space (10/21)

SpaceX

SpaceX launches 20 Eutelsat OneWeb broadband satellites

(SpaceX)

SpaceX launched the last batch of Eutelsat OneWeb's V1 satellites from California's Vandenberg Space Force Base atop a Falcon 9 rocket on Sunday at 1:13 a.m. EDT (0513 GMT; 10:13 p.m. on Oct. 19 local California time). The Falcon 9's first stage returned to Earth as planned, touching down at Vandenberg's Landing Zone 4 about eight minutes after lifting off. It was the seventh launch and landing for this particular booste

Full Story: Space (10/20)

Technology

Nancy Roman Space Telescope aces crucial 'spin test'

(NASA/Chris Gunn)

NASA recently put a crucial part of the Roman Space Telescope - the Outer Barrel Assembly -- through a rigorous "spin test" designed to evaluate its resilience against the intense gravitational forces it will encounter during launch. This test, a standard procedure in aerospace engineering, typically takes place inside a massive centrifuge that mimics the elevated gravity conditions of a space mission.

Full Story: Space (10/18)

Entertainment

Neil deGrasse Tyson's 1st book remains 'deeply charming' (exclusive)

(Blackstone Publishing)

As a celebrity astrophysicist and witty host of StarTalk, Neil deGrasse Tyson has penned dozens of books over the years, but as they say, you never forget your first. That designation belongs to an amusing volume compiled in 1989 when Tyson was a graduate student at Columbia University, titled "Merlin's Tour of the Universe." It's a collection of over 200 questions posed to him by the general public for a column he wrote in the StarDate newsletter for The McDonald Observatory of West Texas. These varied queries ranged in topics from astronomy and planetary science, to gravity, black holes, and time travel that the young 20-something scientist would answer through the persona of an intergalactic sage named Merlin.

Full Story: Space (10/21)