The chain-reaction process that underlies photon avalanching. Credit: Mikołaj Łukaszewicz/Polish Academy of Sciences Researchers in the US, Poland and Korea have observed photon avalanching – a chain-reaction-like process in which the absorption of a single photon triggers the emission of many – in tiny crystals just 25-30 nm in diameter. This highly nonlinear phenomenon had
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WASHINGTON — The European Commission announced Jan. 20 it will award contracts to Airbus Defence and Space and Thales Alenia Space to build an initial set of next-generation Galileo navigation satellites, shutting out incumbent manufacturer OHB. Airbus and Thales will each build six of the second-generation Galileo satellites under contracts that will be formally signed
WASHINGTON — Earth observation company Satellogic announced Jan. 19 it signed a contract with SpaceX covering several rideshare launches of its satellites through next year. The multiple launch services agreement makes SpaceX Satellogic’s preferred provider for launching its constellation of microsatellites, after previously relying on Chinese, European and Russian vehicles, including a launch of 10
Brain food: a raw chicken egg within its membrane, with the shell removed. The yellow yolk floating within the white is visible. (Courtesy: Biswarup Ganguly/CC BY 3.0) New insights into how brain injuries occur have been gleaned from a simple study of how an egg yolk is deformed when rotational forces are applied to its
WASHINGTON — Jim Bridenstine used part of his final full day as NASA administrator to call on the incoming administration to continue the Artemis program and return humans to the moon. A Jan. 19 briefing on the Green Run static-fire test of the Space Launch System three days earlier became an opportunity for Bridenstine, who
Austin: “If confirmed, I will ensure the space domain is carefully considered across the range of upcoming strategic reviews.” WASHINGTON — President-elect Joe Biden’s pick for defense secretary Lloyd Austin told lawmakers Jan. 19 that China is the United States’ “most concerning competitor” and in written testimony identified space as a growing national security concern.
Atomic aperture of WS2. Courtesy: R Boya Gases flow through a porous membrane at ultrahigh speeds even when the pores’ diameter approaches the atomic scale. This finding by researchers at the University of Manchester in the UK and the University of Pennsylvania in the US shows that the century-old Knudsen description of gas flow remains
WASHINGTON — Boeing has completed a requalification of software on its commercial crew spacecraft as it prepares to launch the vehicle on a second test flight as soon as late March. Boeing announced Jan. 18 it completed a “formal requalification” of the software on its CST-100 Starliner spacecraft. That work included reviews of the software
The Space and Missile Systems Center delayed the award to further evaluate a court judgment against NSTXL. WASHINGTON — National Security Technology Accelerator (NSTXL) on Jan. 15 received a contract to manage the U.S. Space Force’s Space Enterprise Consortium for the next 10 years. The Space and Missile Systems Center intended to award the contract
Bio-inspired design for photosensitive perovskite-based capacitors could enable light sensors that respond only to movement. Published in: Matthew Ishimaru; Scilight 2020, 501106 (2020) DOI: 10.1063/10.0002944. Copyright © 2020 Author(s) A new type of sensor that closely mimics how the human eye responds to changing visual stimuli could become the foundation for next-generation computer processors used
WASHINGTON — After nearly two years of struggles, NASA has abandoned efforts to deploy a heat flow probe on its InSight lander into the surface of Mars. In a Jan. 14 statement, NASA said that a final effort to hammer the “mole” into the surface of Mars Jan. 9 failed to make any progress. The
COVINGTON, La. — Virgin Orbit’s LauncherOne rocket reached orbit on its second flight Jan. 17, demonstrating the performance of the air-launch system after years of development. The company’s Boeing 747 aircraft, called Cosmic Girl, took off from the Mojave Air and Space Port in California at 1:38 p.m. Eastern with the LauncherOne rocket attached. The
A map illustrating the inherent colours of 466 types of carbon nanotubes. (Courtesy: Kauppinen Group/Aalto University) Why do some thin films of single-wall carbon nanotubes take on colourful hues even though as-synthesized films are usually black? A team of researchers in Finland, the US and China has now come up with a possible answer in
Space Policy Directive-7 highlights the United States’ ever growing dependence on space-based positioning, navigation and timing. WASHINGTON — The Trump administration on Jan. 15 issued a policy memo focused on the United States’ dependence on the Global Positioning System and the need to prepare for a day when GPS might not be available. A constellation
BAY ST. LOUIS, Miss. — NASA performed a hotfire test of the core stage of the Space Launch System Jan. 16, but the stage’s four main engines shut down a little more than a minute into a test designed to last eight minutes. The core stage ignited its four RS-25 engines at 5:27 p.m. Eastern
On target: artist’s impression of how an ultrasound drill and injection tube for nanodroplets could be used to break up blood clots in the body. (Courtesy: North Carolina State University) A precision “ultrasound drill” combined with specially engineered nanodroplets could soon be used inside the body to break up stubborn, impenetrable blood clots – according
SAN FRANCISCO – The U.S. Federal Communication Commission’s C-band auction of 280 megahertz of C-band has raised nearly $81 billion and it’s not quite over. Still to come is the assignment phase, where companies awarded spectrum blocks bid for frequency-specific licenses. Prior to the auction, companies struggled to put a price tag on the bandwidth.
The uncomfortable truth now facing the space community, in the days after the horrific events at the Capitol Jan. 6, is that some of the most prominent Republican supporters of space in Congress are on the wrong side of history. The U.S. Capitol is seen in this Maxar Technologies satellite image the day after a