Space & Spaceflight

These Are NASA’s (Ugly) New Astronaut Shoes

On Thursday, NASA is sending the astronauts on the International Space Station a new pair of shoes. These so-called ForceShoes are not for space walks. They’re actually a high tech measurement device that helps NASA scientists gain a better understanding of the effects that heavy loads have on astronauts’ bodies. ForceShoes sort of work like…

The Moon’s Internet Connection Is Probably Faster than Yours

Not happy with your internet speeds? Worried about it getting worse? There’s a simple solution: Just move to the Moon. Researchers just beamed Wi-Fi there, and the connection is probably faster than anything you’ve got in your neighborhood. Moon Wi-Fi has been a long time coming, but researchers at NASA and MIT have now made…

A pair of research scientists prepare a vacuum chamber for testing at the European Space Agency’s Propulsion Laboratory in Noordwijk, the Netherlands, which is typically used to analyze prototype ion thrusters. The tests have to be carried out in vacuum chambers to simulate the hostile conditions of space. [ESA]

This Satellite Image Looks Like a Cartoon Landscape

Depending on how you look at this image, it’s either a striking view of Western Sahara, or a cartoon mountain, backed by blue sky and shrouded in cloud. Obviously it’s the former, but the latter really appeals to the child in me. The photographs was actually taken by Expedition 40 Commander Steve Swanson on May…

Share Your Photos of This Weekend’s Never-Before-Seen Meteor Shower

The much anticipated and never-before-seen Camelopardalids meteor shower graced the skies of the Northern Hemisphere this weekend. While many say the reportedly epic meteor shower fell well short of expectations, others posted some pretty awesome photos online. What did you see? Regardless of whether you saw one meteor of 100 on Friday and Saturday night,…

How to Become an Astronaut

So you want NASA to fly you to the moon and let you play among the stars. Maybe let you see what spring is like on a-Jupiter and Mars? Well, you’re going to need more than a solid Sinatra impression to get NASA to accept you into its spacefaring ranks—a whole lot more. First, the…

Tonight’s Meteor Shower Will Be Like Watching the Jump to Light Speed

Already being hyped as one of the best of 2014—with some calling it a once-in-a-lifetime experience—the Camelopardalids meteor shower, which starts tonight, will also be unlike many meteor showers you might have seen: Instead of lights streaming across the sky diagonally, the meteors will be radiating out from a very visible point in the sky.…

The Fermi Paradox: Where the Hell Are the Other Earths?

Everyone feels something when they’re in a really good starry place a really good starry place on a really good starry night and they look up and see this: Some people stick with the traditional, feeling struck by the epic beauty or blown away by the insane scale of the universe. Personally, I go for…

NASA Has Discovered the Darkest Shadows in the Galaxy

NASA and the University of Zurich have announced the discovery of what are believed to be the darkest spots in the galaxy outside of a black hole’s event horizon. These shadows, formed by clumps of extremely dense gas clouds, were first observed using the Spitzer Space Telescope. They are part of a much larger cloud…

Curiosity Took Hundreds of Microbes to Mars—And Many May Still Be Alive

Despite the best efforts of NASA, it’s impossible to put craft into space that are entirely clean. Now, a study shows that Curiosity was sent up to Mars with 377 strains of microbes aboard—and up to 11 percent may have made it to the surface of the red planet. Swabs taken prior to launch show…

How Bell Labs Is Reinventing the Future All Over Again

In 1964, a pair of Bell Labs researchers in New Jersey pointed the world’s largest radio telescope to the skies and unwittingly stumbled upon one of the greatest discoveries of the 20th Century: cosmic background radiation. We talked with the legendary physicist behind that breakthrough to find out more—and with the president of Bell Labs…

Venus By Day and Night in a Single Image

This is Venus as you’ve never seen it before: on the left, the planet during the day captured in visible light, and on the right, the night side, captured using infrared light, both at the same time. The images were captured by the Ultraviolet/Visible/Near-Infrared spectrometer (VIRTIS) on board ESA’s Venus Express spacecraft. The visible light…

The First Full-Length Interstellar Trailer Is Spectacular

We’ve been excited about Christopher Nolan’s new epic, Interstellar, for some time. But the arrival of a brand new trailer, revealing an emotional Matthew McConaughey preparing to save us Earthlings from imminent starvation, is still thrilling. It’s like the Great Depression meets 2001: A Space Odyssey—in a good way. https://gizmodo.com/interstellar-trailer-a-brief-history-of-flying-1483329080

Peer Through the Window of a Soyuz Capsule Just Returned to Earth

This isn’t a steampunk porthole or part of a move set: you’re looking through the window of the Soyuz TMA-11M capsule that touched down on Earth on Wednesday May 14th. The capsule carried Expedition 39 Commander Koichi Wakata of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), Soyuz Commander Mikhail Tyurin of Roscosmos, and Flight Engineer Rick…

This Cold War Test Bed Irradiated Satellites Before the Soviets Could

How do you ensure that fancy new military satellite is tough enough to withstand an orbital EMP attack by the Soviets? By shooting it with your own nuclear bomb using this massive, movable test chamber, obviously. During the Cold War, players on both sides of the Iron Curtain worked just as hard devising ways to…

Russia Will Shut Down All U.S. GPS Stations Within Its Borders (Update)

Russia Today has unconfirmed reports that Russia announced today a plan to shut down all 11 American-run GPS stations within Russian territory starting June 1st. Russia has also threatened to stop supplying the rocket engines the U.S. uses to launch military satellites into orbit. Allegedly, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin announced the move in response…

Virgin Galactic Might Not Technically Get You Into Space (Updated)

A new report about Virgin Galactic has taken a look at the small print in the customer contract that Virgin Galactic will give to those who choose to fly in the most ridiculous commercial aircraft ever—and it seems that they can’t promise you’ll make it into space. Even if it had the FAA permission that…

Watch Astronauts Practice Drilling an Asteroid Underwater

Training for the imminent mission to an asteroid has begun in Houston, and it looks like fun. On Friday, astronauts Stan Love and Steve Bowen jumped in NASA’s 40-foot-deep pool to try out a new suit design and several tools that could be used on the asteroid mission slated for the 2020s. Thank God they…

You Could Own This Joystick That Landed Astronauts on the Moon

Want to make your sci-fi video games feel more authentic? Or maybe just need a new ornament for beside the fireplace? Then how about buying this joystick, which was used by astronaut Dave Scott to land the Falcon lunar module during the Apollo 15 mission in 1971. The joystick forms part of a sale of…

Science Just Made the Most Massive, In-Depth Universe Simulation Ever

Ever wanted to see what our universe looked like moments after the Big Bang? Good luck—it would take your desktop computer more than 2,000 years to complete. Luckily, researchers just published findings from the first ultra-realistic simulation of our universe’s growth. And it covers 13 billion years. Led by Mark Vogelsberger at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center…