Science

WASHINGTON — NASA is seeking concepts from industry on how they would reboost the orbit of the Hubble Space Telescope, a sign that the agency is looking beyond SpaceX for any mission to extend the orbiting observatory’s life. NASA published a request for information (RFI) Dec. 22 asking industry how they would demonstrate commercial satellite

Oscillating colours: a magnified image showing the alternating orange and pink colours of the flower petals. (Courtesy: H Tsukaya/CC-BY) An extremely rare case of a flower that oscillates in colour over time has been discovered by researchers in Japan. The team, led by Nobomitsu Kawakubo at Gifu University, showed that the transformations are tied to

TAMPA, Fla. — Saturn Satellite Networks is close to securing funds for another attempt at getting its small geostationary satellite manufacturing business off the ground, according to an executive for the U.S.-based firm. The company said in a Dec. 20 news release that equity investors have promised to fund nearly half of its $500 million

Experts cite challenges and opportunities for optical communications Satellite ground segment providers tend to be skeptical of ground-based optical communications. Credit: Adobe Stock They don’t doubt the utility of optical intersatellite links. They simply question how quickly optical terminals will be adopted by enterprise customers to link satellites in low-Earth orbit with the ground. “Personally,

Stepping down: the zig-zag shape of lightning could be related to the presence of metastable oxygen molecules. (Courtesy: iStock/WolfeLarry) Lightning flashes have distinctive zig-zag shapes and physicists have long wondered why. Now,  John Lowke and Endre Szili at the University of South Australia have done calculations that could explain this behaviour. The duo created a

WASHINGTON — The second flight of Arianespace’s Vega C failed to reach orbit Dec. 20 after its second stage malfunctioned, destroying two Pléiades Neo imaging satellites. The Vega C rocket lifted off at 8:47 p.m. Eastern from Kourou, French Guiana, carrying the Pléiades Neo 5 and 6 imaging satellites for Airbus. The liftoff took place

WASHINGTON — A fiscal year 2023 omnibus spending bill will provide NASA with nearly $25.4 billion, an increase of more than 5% from 2022 but less than what the agency requested. Congressional appropriators released the final version of the omnibus spending bill early Dec. 20. That bill, slated to be taken up by the House

Hypoxia imaging White light, prompt and delayed fluorescence images of a pancreatic tumour on a mouse. The ratio of delayed to prompt fluorescence shows improved contrast, enabling accurate distinction between hypoxic and healthy tissue. (Courtesy: CC BY 4.0/J. Biomed. Opt. 10.1117/1.JBO.27.10.106005) Surgical resection of cancerous tissue is a common treatment used to reduce the likelihood

WASHINGTON — Rocket Lab will have to wait until January for its next attempt at its inaugural Electron launch from Virginia after suffering delays because of weather and range issues. Rocket Lab scrubbed an Electron launch attempt Dec. 18 from Launch Complex 2 at the Mid-Atlantic Regional Spaceport (MARS) on Wallops Island, Virginia. While the

With the successful launch of Artemis I and the second SLS rocket nearing completion, aerospace experts engage the next generation, assuring them that this is just the beginning of a long and mind-blowing highway into deep space. Every day, Amanda Swanson, a Space Launch System (SLS) propulsion engineer at Boeing, takes her husky mix Riley

The past decade has seen awe-inspiring breakthroughs in astronomy and astrophysics. From the first detection of gravitational waves, to the first direct image of a supermassive black hole, and the discovery of thousands of extrasolar planets. Astronomers are once again looking to the future: last year the US National Academies published its latest decadal survey

The deal comes exactly two years after Lockheed Martin sought to buy Aerojet in a $4.4 billion bid WASHINGTON — L3Harris Technologies on Dec. 18 announced an agreement to acquire Aerojet Rocketdyne for $4.7 billion.   The deal comes exactly two years after Lockheed Martin sought to buy Aerojet in a $4.4 billion bid that was

WASHINGTON — NASA has signed an agreement with AST SpaceMobile to cooperate on spaceflight safety, even as astronomers grow increasingly concerned about the effects of that company’s satellites. NASA announced Dec. 15 it signed agreement with the company to create what it called “a deeper level of coordination, cooperation, and data sharing” between the two

Beam me up Interaction Point 2 at the Berkeley Lab Laser Accelerator will be used to study plasma physics, research cancer therapies and for quantum science. (Courtesy: Marilyn Sargent/Berkeley Lab) A second beamline area at the Berkeley Lab Laser Accelerator (BELLA) Center will soon open to users allowing researchers to study extremely hot plasmas, investigate

WASHINGTON — NASA’s Perseverance Mars rover will soon start depositing a cache of samples that it has collected since landing last year as part of efforts to eventually return those samples to Earth. At an online briefing Dec. 16 held during the Fall Meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU), project officials said the rover

WASHINGTON — NASA is delaying a spacewalk at the International Space Station by two days to support the Russian investigation into a coolant leak on a Soyuz spacecraft docked there. In a statement late Dec. 16, NASA announced that a spacewalk by astronauts Josh Cassada and Frank Rubio, previously scheduled for Dec. 19, would be

A year after its launch, astronomers are revealing the secrets of the universe, as the first scientific results from observations made by the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) are released. To learn more about the momentous discoveries, Physics World is publishing a series of blog posts on the discoveries. This post is the third post

Cape Canaveral, Fla. — SpaceX launched the first O3b mPower satellites for SES’ next-generation broadband constellation Dec. 16, each promising 10 times more throughput than their predecessors in medium Earth orbit (MEO). A Falcon 9 carrying two of 11 planned O3b mPower satellites lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida, at 5:48 p.m.