For the first time in history, butterfly larvae—who were only six days old at launch time—have hatched in space. It happened on November 10, 2009, as part of the STS-129 "Butterflies in Space" experiment, on board the International Space Station. I can only imagine their confusion as they discovered there was no gravity. I don't have to imagine how itchy I feel by just looking at these images. [Flickr via Popular Science]

Buzz was up there as part of a program by NASA and Disney to encourage students to study science, technology and math. He'll be honored in a parade at Disney's Magic Kingdom-along with his space station crewmates and veteran Buzz Aldrin-on October 2nd.

Too. Freakin'. Cute. To infinity and beyond! [Orlando Sentinel and Newslite | Photo by Tony Landis/NASA]

The ISS was flying 220 miles over the island of Matua when the volcano erupted in a pyroclastic flow, a howling mass of ash and gas that moves at 130 miles per hour, reaching temperatures up to 1,112ºF (600ºC). Such a terrible mayhem, yet so beautiful. [NASA]

Both the Russian MIR and United States' Skylab had a permanent crew of three. The International Space Station also had three astronauts until last Friday, when ESA astronaut Frank De Winne, Russian cosmonaut Roman Romanenko and Canadian Space Agency astronaut Robert Thirsk arrived onboard the Soyuz TMA-15. Together with the other three existing members, they have become the Expedition 20 mission crew, the first 6-member resident crew ever in a orbital outpost. [Hyperbola]

They just ended their crew day, so they're watching it now, or just finishing it up. They can go all day without seeing each other, so this is a good chance to get together.

You know, pop some corn, open some beers, and then go to the Unity node to hang out with the buddies watching a damn good space movie. All thanks to one of the astronauts, Michael Barratt, a Trekkie who requested to see the film when it came out. He didn't want to miss it, so NASA encoded it and beamed it up for them, Scotty-style. [NYT—Thanks Genevieve]

So how did everything taste? On the whole, surprisingly good! But before we delve into our detailed taste test, a word about what we were eating. I spoke to Vickie Kloeris, the Subsystem Manager for Shuttle and ISS Food Systems—NASA's head chef—and she walked me through exactly what goes into the vittles consumed in orbit by our astronauts.

Essentially, NASA does exactly what the army does with its MREs (Meals Ready to Eat), with a few exceptions: MREs are designed to keep an 18- to 22-year-old, extremely active soldier fueled and ready, whereas space food must be nutritionally tailored to older and less-active adults, so in general, space food is lower in fat, calories and salt.

For space food, the main criteria are spoilage resistance, easy preparation and consumption in microgravity (ie no potato chips), plus storage-space considerations. There are five classifications of space foods: rehydrateable (just add water), thermostabilized (already wet, heat in its metallic/plastic pouch and eat), irradiated (cooked irradiated meats ready to eat), intermediate moisture (meaning dried fruits, jerky, and such) and natural form (better known as junk food—ready to eat without any prep or storage concerns).

On the Space Station, there is a food prep area in the Russian half that has a fold-down dining table along with food package heaters. But soon, as the station is expanded to accommodate a crew of six later this month, a second, smaller food prep area will be added—this time equipped with a chiller, which is a first for the station—refrigeration specifically for food products. Cold drinks in space!

Vickie was kind enough to ship out a batch of goodies that didn't make it into orbit from the last ISS mission, and we dined on them for lunch. We didn't have a specialized thermostabilized pouch heater—and you can't microwave these puppies—so we just dunked them in boiling water for a while until they heated through. We made it through six courses including dessert:

Here, our menu in detail:

First Course: Southwestern Corn, Potato Medley
While it may have looked a little rough in the thermostabilized packet, corn was actually pretty tasty, and had the correct consistency. The Southwest was apparently represented by flecks of red and green pepper and a mild spiciness.

But the potato medley—oh the potato medley. Don't know what to say—there was a really strange chemical bitterness, from where it came I do not know. But not good.
Rating: Two Stars

Second Course: Breakfast Sausage Links, Curry Sauce w/ Vegetables
Awesome. Fingering pork sausage links inside a packet is not super pleasant, let me tell you, but out of the packet they were perfectly edible—fairly salty and a little stringy and dry, but with good taste. And dipped in the curry sauce? Yes. Sausages and curry go incredibly well together here on earth, and in space it's no different.
Rating: Four Stars

Third Course: Beef Enchiladas, Baked Beans, Tortillas
Wow. Delicious. As the busted enchiladas slid out of the packet, we were scared. But the flavor was right on—equal to if not better than any frozen enchilada you can get at the store. And the baked beans—oh my—Adam had three helpings. Taste was great, consistency perfect—and wrapped in a tortilla, which Kloeris says is one of the most versatile space foods (understandable), the combination was fantastic. I could fuel my spacewalks with this combo for months.
Rating: Five Stars

Fourth Course: Chicken Teriyaki, Creamed Spinach
Yikes. As you saw in the video, the chicken teriyaki was nasty. I don't know if we got a bad pouch or what, but the chicken was mushy to the point of being hardly recognizable as chicken. And the smell. Oh the smell. Not sure what went wrong here, but this was more akin to dog food than teriyaki. AVOID!

As for the creamed spinach, that was our only freeze-dried food item. In space, you would use the small tube opening to inject hot water with a syringe and smush it around in the package until it was done, but we reconstituted it in a bowl, and it came out alright. Kind of bland, but edible. We didn't spend long on it though because we wanted that chicken teriyaki out of our sight as soon as possible.
Rating: Zero Stars

Fifth Course: Chicken w/ Peanut Sauce, Green Beans w/ Potatoes
Definitely an improvement. The chicken here was in more recognizable texture and shape, and the peanut sauce, while not particularly delicious, was certainly more edible than the teriyaki sauce. And the green beans and potatoes were pretty much the same as your typical canned fare, so not bad at all.
Rating: Three stars

Dessert: Brownies, Cocoa, Kona Coffee
The brownies were basically Little Debbie brownies—in fact, they may have been exactly that, as NASA does purchase off-the-shelf snacks to send up after they're evaluated and repackaged. And the drinks were essentially the same as their earthly equivalents—only in space, you rehydrate with the same syringe-in-bag technique. Both were tasty.
Rating: Four Stars

You may be surprised to see no freeze-dried ice cream here for dessert—the item most commonly associated with "space food." Well, that's because actual freeze-dried ice cream was only eaten on one Apollo mission—its flavor is just too unlike ice cream to be enjoyed, and its excessive crumbliness made it especially difficult to eat and clean up in microgravity. Thus, its relegation to museum gift shops and novelty stores everywhere.

So in conclusion, I'd say our lunch was highly enjoyable. We went through what every astronaut does before their missions—a sampling of the available foods to see what they like. If Adam and I were going up, you can guess our containers would be full of beef enchiladas, baked beans, sausages and curry sauce, and there wouldn't be any chicken teriyaki in sight.

Now I want to try everything on the menu:

Of course NASA exercised the right to choose the final name, opting for the eighth most popular response according to their poll. Yeah...EIGHTH. So, the entire contest was pointless and we are left with another cliche NASA name. So, my question to you is: what should NASA have named the ISS module?

In celebration of Earth Day, NASA presents images of Earth captured by cameras aboard the International Space Station. Traveling at an approximate speed of 17,500 miles per hour, the space station orbits Earth every 90 minutes from an altitude of approximately 220 miles, and can be seen from Earth with the naked eye. Its crew experiences 16 sunrises and sunsets each day.

Still, nothing beats Selene's capture of Earth rising on the Moon.

We are so tiny. Come on people, let's make Earth a better place, even if Earth doesn't give a damn about us and will survive happily with us extinct, thank you very much.

Recycle. Don't waste stuff. Give us a kiss.

Unlike the Bowflex's rubber bands (which, coincidentally, were used by the machine being replaced, the iRED), the aRED uses piston-driven vacuum cylinders that provide adjustable resistance as the piston is pulled in or out. A flywheel system counteracts the force of the pistons to simulate the response of free weights in normal gravity.

While astronauts have been just fine with their cardio, studies detailing the damaging effects of muscle lost after a long-term space mission are still coming in. A recent report stated that without exercises like those possible on the aRED, astronauts could lose up to 15% of their muscle volume, which could be difficult or even impossible to regain back on earth. So the aRED's goal is not to build muscle but simply to maintain it.

With a voyage to Mars expected to take at least six months, this is a problem that needs to be solved. Thankfully, the aRED is well on its way to keeping astronauts buffed enough for the job. [Wired Science]

"This is where the magic happens," as they say. I highly doubt that any "magic" is happening up there, but he does have a computer—so it seems the sex life of nerds is the same on Earth and in space. [Digg]

As you can see, it's still not entirely done. This photo timeline shows how the ISS has evolved since assembly started in November 20, 1998.

But there's still a lot to be done, as you can see in the following list of modules that have to go up there.

• Multi-Purpose Logistics Module — Delivered by the space shuttle.
• Kibo Japanese Experiment Module Exposed Facility (JEM-EF); Kibo Japanese Experiment Logistics Module - Exposed Section (ELM-ES); and Spacelab Pallet - Deployable 2 (SLP-D2) — Delivered by the space shuttle.
• Multipurpose Laboratory Module (MLM) with European Robotic Arm (ERA) - docked to Zarya nadir port — Delivered by Russian Proton rocket.
• Multi-Purpose Logistics Module (MPLM); Lightweight Multi-Purpose Experiment Support Structure Carrier (LMC); three crew quarters; galley; second Treadmill Vibration Isolation System (TVIS); Crew Health Care System 2 (CHeCS 2). — Delivered by shuttle
• HTV1, Japanese H-II Transfer Vehicle. — Delivered by the space shuttle.
• EXPRESS Logistics Carrier 1 (ELC1) and EXPRESS Logistics Carrier 2 (ELC2). — Delivered by the space shuttle.
• Multi-Purpose Logistics Module (MPLM) and Lightweight Multi-Purpose Experiment Support Structure Carrier (LMC). — Delivered by the space shuttle.
• EXPRESS Logistics Carrier-3 (ELC-3) and EXPRESS Logistics Carrier-4 (ELC-4). Micrometeoroid Debris panels are installed on Zvezda Service Module and the Zvezda solar arrays are feathered. — Delivered by the space shuttle.
• Node 3 with Cupola (also called the The Colbert). Pressurized Mating Adapter-3 (PMA-3) is relocated from Unity node nadir to Node 2 nadir beforehand. The Cupola is relocated to the forward port of Node 3 after the flight; and PMA- 3 is relocated to the axial port of Node 3 after the flight. — Delivered by the space shuttle.
• EXPRESS Logistics Carrier-5 (ELC-5). Pirs Docking Compartment moves to zenith (top) port of Zvezda Service Module. — Delivered by the space shuttle.
• Research Module which docks to Zvezda Service Module nadir port. — Delivered by Russian Proton rocket.

[NASA]

Just short of two years ago, Simonyi spent two weeks aboard the ISS as the fifth private visitor to the station on a ticket booked with Space Adventures. And now he's heading back on the Soyuz flight that left Kazakhstan this morning; he'll help scientists with experiments and answer question from Earth via the web until returning on April 7.

Having created Microsoft Word and Excel back in the early, early days and now having been to space twice, I think we can officially bestow a crown of ultimate geek cred on Simonyi's glowing head. Godspeed. [NYTimes, Charlesinspace.com]

Out of 1.2 million votes, Colbert got 230,549 votes vs Serenity, which had about 40,000 less votes. But Colbert fans, don't be too happy yet: NASA may not name the module Colbert after all because they reserved the right to turn down the winner.

They are considering it, though. If I were NASA, I would totally do it on one condition: Get Colbert to have a two-minute NASA segment on every program. Nothing like trading geeky poetry for free advertising and promotion of the space program, specially if it's funny as only Colbert could do. [Physorg]

The ISS will be visible to North American sky-watchers in mid- to late-March, and is so huge that it's as visible as Venus. These solar wings, priced at nearly $300 million, will just about double the ISS's capacity to perform scientific experiments (that is, if they're not too busy with their March Madness brackets), and give enough energy to allow for double the full-time crew members, from three to six. It takes about a full five minutes to slide across the night sky, which is plenty of time to get an amateur telescope all situated. If anyone has a capable setup, we'd love to hear how much detail can be seen. [Space Travel and Space.com]

Seriously now: This is seriously fraked up. The ISS is almost as big as a Corellian corvette and it's up there defenseless, floating peacefully, sitting like a dinosaur-sized duck, waiting for one of the 18,000 pieces of tracked space debris to crack it open and take it down in a fiery ball of junk.

Sure, they have a escape spaceship for astronauts. In case things go bad—like they almost did today—they can jump in there and fly away before the worst happens. However, after all the money and effort put in the only human post in space, do we want to send everything to hell for a piece of orbiting crap? Wouldn't it be better to install defense mechanisms against space debris—or, ah, hmmm, alien ships!—to preserve the ISS?

Technically, there are already weapon systems that may be altered to perform this task, but this is not an easy task. We know it is not as easy as firing a laser and taking down the incoming chunk of metal with a Star Wars explosion.

There's a lot of things to be taken into account. First, you will need to detect the threat and fire from a very long distance, so the resulting effect doesn't cause any harm to the ISS itself. Then, the method to take down the object will change depending on its nature. Is it a big satellite or just a big chunk of metal from a previous collision? Does the incoming object have explosive elements inside? If the object is too big and can't be obliterated in a single shot, perhaps it would be better to have some kind of rocket that may approach the object and change its orbit by exploding near it? Perhaps some kind of emergency tug that can attach to the object and take it down?

We don't know. Whatever NASA and its international partner can come up with, they need to do it as soon as possible. Things are getting complicated up there, and this doesn't conflict with the international protocols against the militarization of space—which, in any case, are being constantly violated by the US, Russia, and China.

This will be a defense mechanism against space threats, and that's exactly what the ISS needs. It is just too valuable to be left there with no protection. NASA, it's time to get some pew pew action going on up there.