Space & Spaceflight

3D-Camera-Equipped Mars Curiosity Rover Takes First Steps

The next Mars rover, dubbed Curiosity, is due to launch next fall and land on the red planet in August of 2012. But just today, it took its very first steps in a clean room at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. The rover, which is much bigger than I was expecting it to be, rolled a…

Space & Spaceflight Adam Frucci

You May Feel Like an Apollo Astronaut One Day, After All

This is Boeing’s new Crew Space Transportation-100 spacecraft. It is similar to Apollo’s Command Module but, instead of just three astronauts, it will carry up to seven astronauts or astroturists. The destination: Commercial space stations (and the ISS). The CST-100 is compatible with several rockets, including Delta IV, Atlas V, and SpaceX’s recently launched Falcon…

Space & Spaceflight Jesus Diaz

Scientists Discover Star 300 Times More Massive Than The Sun

Astronomers have identified the most massive stars known. These objects are millions of times brighter than our Sun and the largest of them all is a whoppin’ 300 times the mass of our favorite star. The stars were discovered in two clusters—NGC 3603 and RMC 136a—and researchers used a “combination of instruments on the European…

Space & Spaceflight Rosa Golijan

Japan Sending Mirrorball to Mercury

Fresh from the (possible) success of its Hayabusa comet dust hoover, Japan is planning a new space mission—sending a rotating mirrored probe to the currently fashionable planet Mercury. https://gizmodo.com/hayabusa-space-probe-may-contain-asteroid-dust-or-just-5581096 The mirrored surface of the JAXA craft will help it keep its core temperature down to 140 degrees—which is chilly compared to the 320 degree heat…

Space & Spaceflight Gary Cutlack

Watch the Apollo 11 Landing With New Audio and Multiple Cameras

41 years ago today, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the Moon. Millions watched the grainy video and listened to the noisy sound from space. Now, Stephen Slater and Footagevault have joined multiple camera feeds with restored audio: https://gizmodo.com/the-apollo-11-moon-landing-liveblog-5318744 The result is a new view of the amazing events that took place on July…

Space & Spaceflight Jesus Diaz

How Close to the Sun Can You Survive?

With July in full force, it already feels like the Sun’s rays are slobbering down our necks. But what if it were closer to us? Say, 90 million miles closer? Popular Science investigates how near we could go and survive. Even though the life-giving fireball burns at an unfathomable 9,940°F, PopSci notes that its heat…

Space & Spaceflight Sam Biddle

SpaceShipTwo First Manned Flight Attached to WhiteKnightTwo

The day for the first solo flight of SpaceShipTwo—the first commercial suborbital tourism aircraft—is getting closer. Here, its crew is testing it for the first time. It’s still docked to its mothership—WhiteKnightTwo—but it’s a beautiful picture. [Autopia] https://gizmodo.com/first-images-of-spaceshiptwo-first-commercial-passenge-5420768

Space & Spaceflight Jesus Diaz

Mercury Flyby Maps New Territory

The results from the Messenger spacecraft’s third and final flyby of Mercury are finally in and cover ground never before mapped. But they leave scientists wanting more. NASA’s orbiter swung around Mercury on Sept. 29, 2009 to get a gravitational boost before settling into orbit in March 2011. The snapshots it took as it flew…

Space & Spaceflight Lisa Grossman - Wired

Nobody Knows the Origin of the Biggest X-Ray Explosion Ever Detected

You’re looking at the most powerful X-ray blast ever recorded. You can be thankful we’ve an atmosphere. This thing was so strong that—even 5 billion light-years away—it overwhelmed the Swift observatory’s instruments. Nobody knows what it really was. The Swift mission’s chief scientist David Burrows, at Pennsylvania State University, is bewildered by the findings. [The…

Space & Spaceflight Jesus Diaz

Microsoft’s Terapixel Project Creates Clearest, Biggest Night Sky Map Yet

First they gave us a high-res tour of Mars — now Microsoft has made the largest and clearest night-sky map ever. It’s a terapixel image: 1,000,000,000,000 pixels. The software giant’s Terapixel project stitched together 1,791 pairs of red-light and blue-light plates from telescopes in California and Australia. The result is the map above, which covers…

Space & Spaceflight Jeremiah Dobruck

Earth’s Upper Atmosphere Suffers Record Collapse

Well, this doesn’t sound good: NASA just announced that the Earth’s thermosphere, an upper layer of the atmosphere, collapsed. It’s the biggest contraction in 43 years and scientists have no idea what’s going on. I don’t feel safe anymore. John Emmert, lead author of the paper that announced the finding, reassures all of us with:…

Space & Spaceflight Casey Chan

Smithsonian’s Spacesuits: Number One On The Runway

The iconic NASA spacesuit didn’t show up in astronauts’ closets fully formed. Here, a small sampling of the many precursors held with reverence at the Smithsonian Museum. Above, left to right: Mark IV, B.F. Goodrich; Mark II – Model “O”, B.F. Goodrich, 1956; Mark V – Modified, B.F. Goodrich, 1968; Mark II – Model “R”,…

Space & Spaceflight Amanda Young and Mark Avino

NASA Offers Cash for Inflatable Space Shelters

NASA has kicked off a competition among university engineers to design an inflatable habitat that is “light-weight, safe, and reliable” to house future astronauts “in space and on other planetary bodies.” On the line is $58,000. The eXploration Habitat (or X-Hab) “lofts,” as NASA is chicly terming them, must be designed to sit as an…

Space & Spaceflight Sam Biddle

Lego ML-Explorer 01 Not Practical, But Beautiful

I can’t see NASA clamoring to get this Lego design onto the Moon or Mars anytime soon, but man is it neat to look at when it gyrates across that glass table. [Catarino’s Flickr via Brothers Brick]

Space & Spaceflight Jack Loftus

An 80 Mile Long, 4.5 Billion Year Old Asteroid Gets Its Close Up

This is an up close picture of Lutetia, an asteroid that hangs out somewhere between Mars and Jupiter. It’s the largest asteroid ever visited by a satellite. The European Space Agency’s Rosetta mission came within 2,000 miles of the asteroid and was able to capture images of Lutetia by using an OSIRIS (Optical, Spectroscopic, and…

Space & Spaceflight Casey Chan

Hayabusa Space Probe May Contain Asteroid Dust, or Just Normal Dust

See that? It might be a dust particle from an asteroid! Or it might be a flake of dried skin from a man in the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency factory that built the Hayabusa probe. No one knows yet. The problem is, the recently-returned asteroid probe’s dust-capture mechanism failed, meaning any dust that got inside…

Space & Spaceflight Gary Cutlack

NASA Moonbase Alpha Now Available on Steam

Would you like to travel to the Moon, set up a permanent base, and defend it against mutant zombies mind-controlled by the nazis who escaped Earth using UFOs back in 1945? Then, don’t play—the free—NASA Moonbase Alpha. https://gizmodo.com/inside-a-nazi-ufo-5515450 Sadly for some, NASA Moonbase Alpha doesn’t have zombies or nazis to destroy with antimatter guns. Although…

Space & Spaceflight Jesus Diaz

These Are the Oldest Photons In the Universe

This is the entire view sky as seen from Earth, taken by the Planck observatory during a whole year. In the center, the microwave radiation of our galaxy, the Milky Way. But that’s not the important part. https://gizmodo.com/the-most-accurate-highest-resolution-earth-view-to-dat-5478787 The image, which has been created using data covering the electromagnetic spectrum from 30 to 857 GHz,…

Space & Spaceflight Jesus Diaz

NASA Captures the Rising Sun Lighting Up the Midnight Sky

The International Space Station snapped a particularly beautiful photo of the various layers of our globe’s atmosphere with the rising sun peeking out to say hello, while touring over the Greek islands around midnight just a few weeks ago. https://gizmodo.com/an-hd-video-tour-of-the-international-space-station-5467261 NASA’s Earth Observatory, which posted the photo, pointed out the polar mesopheric clouds, or “night-shining”…

Space & Spaceflight Kat Hannaford

Astronaut Couch

Here, the Mercury Seven astronauts examine their “couches”—essentially molded exoskeletons that helped support the g-force of launch. More interesting to me: the bygone era when it was commonplace to wear a tie into space. [NASA]

Space & Spaceflight Mark Wilson

3D-Camera-Equipped Mars Curiosity Rover Takes First Steps

You May Feel Like an Apollo Astronaut One Day, After All

Scientists Discover Star 300 Times More Massive Than The Sun

Japan Sending Mirrorball to Mercury

Watch the Apollo 11 Landing With New Audio and Multiple Cameras

How Close to the Sun Can You Survive?

SpaceShipTwo First Manned Flight Attached to WhiteKnightTwo

Mercury Flyby Maps New Territory

Nobody Knows the Origin of the Biggest X-Ray Explosion Ever Detected

Microsoft’s Terapixel Project Creates Clearest, Biggest Night Sky Map Yet

Earth’s Upper Atmosphere Suffers Record Collapse

Smithsonian’s Spacesuits: Number One On The Runway

NASA Offers Cash for Inflatable Space Shelters

Lego ML-Explorer 01 Not Practical, But Beautiful

An 80 Mile Long, 4.5 Billion Year Old Asteroid Gets Its Close Up

Hayabusa Space Probe May Contain Asteroid Dust, or Just Normal Dust

NASA Moonbase Alpha Now Available on Steam

These Are the Oldest Photons In the Universe

NASA Captures the Rising Sun Lighting Up the Midnight Sky

Astronaut Couch

NASA Rover Finds Glowing, Ruby-Like Crystals on Mars for the First Time

Anker Prime Docking Station Hits Its Lowest Price as Amazon’s Spring Sale Winds Down (14 Ports With 160W Output)

Google TV Streamer 4K Drops to an All-Time Low, Final Hours in Amazon Spring Sale to Turn Any TV Smart on a Budget

The New ‘Masters of the Universe’ Trailer Brings Eternia to Life

AirPods Max 2 Review: Still Ridiculously Expensive and Ridiculously Nice

UGREEN Bluetooth Tracker 4-Pack Now Just $7 Each With iOS and Android Support, While AirTag Stays at Full Price

Trump Posts Concept Art of His Presidential Library, and It’s AI Slop

Forget Tower Desktop, GMKtec Mini PC Drops to a Record Low as Amazon Clears Out Final Spring Sale Stock

DJI Osmo 360 Review: The Best 360 Camera for the DJI-Pilled

Aqara Smart Lock U400 Review: Hands-free Unlocking at Its Best

MSI Prestige 14 Flip AI+ Review: A Solid 2-in-1 Laptop With Some Glaring Flaws

Sonos Play Review: Call It a Comeback

Sonos Era 100 SL Review: The Cheapest Way Into Wired Sonos Sound

Asus ROG’s Massive Swift OLED Gaming Monitor Epitomizes Excess in the Best Way

The Ikea Varmblixt Smart Lamp Fills a Donut Hole in My Life

Nothing Headphone A vs. Headphone 1: Which Pair of ANC Wireless Headphones Wins?

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