Science

PARIS — A major arm of China’s state-owned space contractor is looking at developing a series of partially and fully-reusable launch vehicles apparently in response to SpaceX’s Starship. A paper published in the journal Aerospace Technology outlines plans under consideration by the Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology (SAST) for a number of launch vehicles with

Nearly 300 space executives from 195 companies filled a University of Colorado auditorium in late July to hear the U.S. Space Force talk about its needs for space domain awareness. Known as SDA, space domain awareness is the military term for space situational awareness, which means knowledge of the space environment. The Air Force Space

Functional ULM: Maps of blood velocity (left) and microbubble count (right) in the rat brain vasculature at 6.5 µm resolution. (Courtesy: CC BY 4.0/N Renaudin et al Nat. Methods 10.1038/s41592-022-01549-5) Neuroimaging has increased our understanding of brain function. Such techniques often involve measuring blood flow variations to detect brain activation, exploiting the fundamental interaction between

PARIS — Intuitive Machines, a company developing lunar landers and related capabilities for NASA and other customers, will go public through a merger with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), it announced Sept. 16. Houston-based Intuitive Machines said it will merge with Inflection Point Acquisition Corp., a SPAC trading on the Nasdaq exchange. The merged

PARIS — Viasat took a step closer to buying London-based Inmarsat Sept. 16 after the British government ruled it poses no risk to the U.K.’s national security. The government found sufficient measures in place to protect sensitive information from unauthorized access, and to continue the provision of strategic capabilities to the U.K. following the merger.

Come from away: photos of some of the many DIY Kibble balances around the world that were inspired by the LEGO balance built at NIST. (Courtesy: B Hayes/NIST) We do love a good LEGO story here at Physics World. Indeed, this is the 55th article on the plastic blocks that we have published on the

WASHINGTON — The Space Systems Command, the Space Development Agency and the Missile Defense Agency have formed a new program office to coordinate disparate procurements of satellites to detect ballistic and hypersonic missiles. The Space Systems Command (SSC), the procurement arm of the U.S. Space Force, announced the realignment Sept. 15.  The combined program office

PARIS — Satellite radar startups disagree over how much of their resources should be moved to meet anticipated demand from commercial customers and away from governments, which today provide the bulk of revenues. Executives of synthetic aperture radar (SAR) companies Capella Space, Umbra, and Synspective discussed diverging growth strategies Sept. 16 during World Satellite Business

Researchers in the United Kingdom are facing an uncertain future, due to a political spat about the UK’s participation in Horizon Europe – Europe’s flagship research funding programme. Following Brexit, the UK was set to become an official associate within the scheme, which brings funding and leadership opportunities within European projects. This is now threatened by

NGA’s Dave Gauthier: ‘We have some obligation to think about commercial protection’ NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — U.S. defense and intelligence agencies that increasingly rely on commercial satellites for imagery and other services are discussing how they might compensate companies if their spacecraft is damaged during an armed conflict, officials said Sept. 15. If private sector

PARIS — Spire Global said Sept. 15 it will build three 16U cubesats launching in 2023 to expand Canadian greenhouse gas-monitoring operator GHGSat’s constellation. The three satellites, each the size of 16 cubesats, are slated to join the six similarly sized spacecraft that GHGSat currently operates in low Earth orbit. Joel Spark, co-founder and general

Star figure: Athene Donald speaking at a gala dinner in the fellows’ dining room at Churchill College Cambridge on 12 September 2022 to mark her retirement after a glittering career in physics (Courtesy: Matin Durrani) Over the years I’ve attended countless scientific conferences devoted to everything from astronomy to particle physics. As an editor, I’m

SDA’s second batch of Tranche 0 is still on track to launch in March WASHINGTON — The first launch of the Space Development Agency’s low Earth orbit satellites that had been scheduled for late September is slipping to no earlier than mid-December.  Speaking at the Washington Space Business Roundtable Sept. 14, SDA Director Derek Tournear

PARIS — Regional satellite operators are searching for faster ways to add more capacity to their networks to meet soaring demand for broadband, according to executives speaking at World Satellite Business Week here. Saudi Arabia’s Arabsat is in talks to buy Ka-band capacity in the Middle East and Africa from another operator while it waits

Two-in-one sensor: Team leader Jun Yao (left) and first author Hongyan Gao, a PhD student in electrical and computer engineering, have developed a new tool for improved cardiac studies. (Courtesy: Jun Yao) A team of US-based researchers has developed an innovative nanoelectronic sensor that simultaneously measures electrical and mechanical activity in heart cells – paving

, Aalyri won an $8 million contract from the Defense Innovation Unit to prototype a hybrid communications network WASHINGTON — Aalyri Technologies, a startup that emerged from stealth mode Sept. 13, plans to provide high-speed internet using software and networking technology from Google’s ill-fated project to beam internet service from high-altitude balloons. Founded by former U.S.

PARIS – Skyloom and Space Compass, a joint venture between NTT and Sky Perfect JSAT, plan to establish a constellation to relay data from low Earth orbit to the ground through satellites in geostationary orbit. It was the latest entry in an increasingly crowded field of companies seeking to address growing demand from satellite operators