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More details: Visit website The ambitious mission to retrieve samples from asteroid Bennu and return them to Earth is paying off. Just as scientists had hoped, the asteroid is revealing details about the early days in our Solar System. More than just a simple space rock, Bennu contains not only material from the Solar System, but material from beyond our system. Bennu follows an orbit that brings it close to Earth every six years. That means it's classified as a near-Earth asteroid (NEA) and a potentially hazardous object (PHO). When NASA was planning the OSIRIS-REx mission that visited Bennu and returned the sample, it was the result of a vigorous scientific and engineering evaluation of candidate asteroids. Since Bennu is both close to Earth and a primitive carbonaceous asteroid, NASA settled on it as the target. The asteroid is both large enough to orbit and collect a sample from, and spectroscopic analysis of its surface...

Reference: See here Humanity's first look at Earth from the moon didn't come until Aug. 23, 1966, when this grainy, black-and-white image showed our planet as a crescent above the lunar horizon, appearing to rise as the camera-toting spacecraft moved in orbit. At the time, it was a landmark image ⁘ and totally unplanned, according to NASA . The first view of Earth from the moon came from NASA 's Lunar Orbiter 1, which transmitted the image to a tracking station at Robledo De Chavela near Madrid. Lunar Orbiter 1's camera, manufactured by Eastman Kodak, featured an automated system that developed exposed film, scanned the images, and transmitted them to Earth. The camera was originally developed by the National Reconnaissance Office and was flown on the Cold War-era Samos spy satellites that were launched by the U.S. in the 1960s, according to NASA. Lunar Orbiter 1 orbited the moon for 76 days until it deliberately ...

More details: Found here Scientists from a  San Antonio-based research hub have found a new moon orbiting Uranus using NASA's James Webb Space Telescope. Southwest Research Institute said it discovered a previously unknown "tiny moon" orbiting the seventh planet from the sun. Maryame El Moutamid, a lead researcher in SwRI's Boulder, Colo., office, observed the small object in images taken by the $10 billion space telescope in February. "We found a previously unknown satellite of the ice giant, which has been provisionally designated S/2025 U 1," El Moutamid said  in a statement . "This object, by far the smallest object discovered to date, was detected in a series of 10 long exposures obtained by the Near-Infrared Camera." SPACE NEWS: After Sunday scrub, SpaceX to try for 10th test flight of Starship from South Texas Monday evening The SwRI team got about 12 hours of time to use the tele...

Read more: See here Japan is increasingly using robots for transportation and sales at office buildings, apartments, stadiums and other large-scale facilities. As the country needs to address labor shortages urgently, companies and workers are exploring how robots and humans can work together better for business efficiency. The Es Con Field Hokkaido stadium, home to the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters professional baseball team, has introduced work assistance robot "Suppot" to transport beer kegs. The robot detects and automatically follows its user and can carry up to 60 beer kegs. Another robot to sell food and drinks to spectators is being tested. An official of parcel delivery group Yamato Holdings, which manages the operations of the robots, voiced hope that such robots will also be used in other locations. Four robots serve as porters at Mita Garden Hills, a large apartment in Tokyo developed by real estate giant...

Read more: Visit website Object 3I/ATLAS is now too far from Earth to aim a telescope at, but prior observations showed some unusual behavior. The anomalous nature of the object led astrophysicist Avi Loeb to apply a thought experiment to it, highlighting everything about it that might align with a hypothetical alien spacecraft. Even if this supposed space rock is not powered by aliens (as is the dominant opinion of the field), Loeb's methodology could be applied to analyze other interstellar objects in the future. Every time an interstellar object comes whizzing into our Solar System , it brings with it a certain intrigue. Where is it from? How did it form? Why was it gravitationally kicked out of its own star system? Could it be an alien spacecraft? Something like Oumuamua, 21/Borisov and now 3I/ATLAS (the latest space rock to go viral) doesn't exactly appear like the starships of science fiction. But, to be fair, we E...

Source: Visit website Some of the most promising places to look for extraterrestrials have remained, so far, mostly hidden from astronomers. Now a game-changing instrument called NIRPS (Near-Infrared Planet Searcher) is leading the search for the most tantalizing targets in the cosmos: potentially Earth-like worlds around nearby red dwarf stars. Red dwarfs, or M dwarfs, are the most tempting places to seek alien Earths because they're the most abundant and enduring stars . They make up the majority of the stars in the Milky Way and shine with a slow thermonuclear simmer that should allow them to live exponentially longer than most—even, say, for 14 trillion years , or 1,000 times the current age of the universe. But M dwarfs are also the smallest, dimmest stars, so they and their planets can be difficult to detect and inspect. Enter NIRPS, an instrument custom-built to tease out subtle signs of otherwise hidden worlds by making...

Reference: Found here Hold your horses folks, Google Maps users have stumbled upon another 'UFO' and it's worrying conspiracy theorists everywhere. People are convinced that a crash-landed alien spaceship is readily available for viewing online if you go to specific coordinates. It's worrying people on social media , and even more eerily, the item has been found in Antarctica. In all fairness, how would a 1,000ft UFO go undetected by humans, regardless of where it is on Earth? But now, a round entity has been found beneath a cliff around 90 miles from the coast of Antarctica, which might be enough to get certain Transformers fans a bit excited. Whether it's man-made or something otherworldly, one American ufologist has claimed that it could be stuck under a rock in yet another conspiracy theory . Almost appearing like an Oreo, it's been theorised that the item might even be hidden on purpose, as UFO S...

Reference: Found here By Dr. (Cand.) Sandya Bhat, Aerospace ⁘ Defense Industry Strategist and Digital Transformation Leader at SAP Far above us, satellites are capturing a live feed of our planet. This isn't just imagery, it's intelligence. What was once the domain of national space agencies and scientific research, satellite data, orbital imagery, and Earth intelligence is now becoming foundational to enterprise IT strategy. With real-time visibility into rainfall, crop stress, shipping congestion, and deforestation, these constellations are quietly reshaping how global businesses move goods, predict risks, and make decisions. For years, supply chains have relied on historical trends. When a disruption occurred; a port closed or a crop failed, companies scrambled to respond. Today, data from orbit is being combined with ground-level enterprise signals to anticipate change before it happens. A delay at a port in Singap...

Reference: Found here SpaceX early Sunday launched its 33rd resupply mission to the International Space Station, sending up a Dragon capsule loaded with 2.5 tons of equipment and supplies along with an add-on thruster kit to help maintain the lab's altitude. Perched atop a workhorse Falcon 9 rocket, commercial resupply mission 33 got underway with a sky-lighting launch from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 2:45 a.m. ET, climbing away on a northeasterly trajectory lined up with the space station's orbit. Nine minutes and 45 seconds later, moments after the discarded first-stage booster safely landed on an offshore droneship, the Dragon was released from the rocket's second stage, kicking off a 29-hour rendezvous with the orbiting laboratory complex. If all goes well, the cargo ship will move in for docking at the station's forward port at 7:30 a.m. Monday. On board: more than 2,400 pounds of crew supplies, ...

More details: Visit website A Blue Origin New Shepard rocket launched the NS-25 mission from Texas. Watch the crew enjoying zero-g and flight highlights. According to Space.com, the Six people aboard were Ed Dwight, the U.S.'s first-ever Black astronaut candidate; venture capitalist Mason Angel; Sylvain Chiron, the founder of French craft brewery Brasserie Mont Blanc; entrepreneur Kenneth L. Hess; retired accountant Carol Schaller; and pilot and aviator Gopi Thotakura. Credit: Blue Origin

Read more: See here NASA is tracking a mysterious, fast-moving object entering our solar system, raising questions about whether it's just a comet — or possibly something more advanced. Scientists estimate its size could range from the length of Boston's Ted Williams Tunnel, or 1.6 miles, to as long as Manhattan's diameter, about 14 miles across. "From images, we also saw that this object is active, which means that around the nucleus, there is some coma, which is an indication that this object is, in fact, a comet," explained NASA navigation engineer Davide Farnocchia. A Hubble Space Telescope image captured in July shows a glow coming from the object in an unusual direction, said Dr. Abraham "Avi" Loeb , director of Harvard's Institute for Theory and Computation. "It shows a glow ahead of the object, not behind it," he said. "If it were a standard comet, we would expect some dust...

More details: See here SpaceX has shared some dramatic slow-motion footage (below) of the Starship rocket blasting off from the launchpad at the start of Tuesday⁘s successful flight . ⁘Liftoff of Super Heavy, the most powerful launch vehicle in history, on Starship⁘s tenth flight test,⁘ SpaceX said in an online post that included the 30-second video. The Starship⁘s first stage ⁘ the Super Heavy booster ⁘ uses 33 Raptor engines to create a record-breaking 17 million pounds of thrust at launch. That⁘s nearly twice that of NASA⁘s new Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, and considerably more than the 7.6 million pounds of thrust generated by the Saturn V rocket, which powered NASA astronauts toward the moon more than five decades ago. When fully tested and certified, the Starship⁘s colossal power will enable it to carry huge payloads and large crews to the moon and even Mars ⁘ vital if humans are ever to build bases there. After sever...

More details: See here The asteroid Ryugu is proven to be one of the solar system's most scientifically valuable time capsules. Wondering why? Here you go! A recent examination of miniscule grains recovered from Ryugu by Japan's Hayabusa2 spacecraft discovered that the small space rock contains minerals that developed billions of years before Earth ⁘ materials that have been preserved in immaculate shape. "These clues begin to tell a story about the starting materials of the asteroid and their early interactions with fluids," officials said in the statement. "This information helps to better define the sequence of fluid activity and processes that led to the current composition of Ryugu and other carbonaceous asteroids." That modest heating melted ices like as water and carbon dioxide, allowing fluids to leak through the rock. The fluids stimulated chemical reactions, resulting in a complex material ass...

Read more: Found here A SpaceX Dragon spacecraft is headed for its 50th rendezvous with the International Space Station bringing cargo and a new reboost capability after having launched from the Space Coast early Sunday. A Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station's Space Launch Complex 40 at 2:45 a.m. on the CRS-33 mission, the 33rd resupply flight to the station with a spacecraft filled with more than 5,000 pounds of supplies. The first-stage booster for the mission flew for the seventh time and made a recovery landing downrange on the droneship A Shortfall of Gravitas stationed in the Atlantic. Unlike other flights, this Dragon will stay docked to the station for more than four months because of a newly installed ability to propel the station to higher altitudes. Located in the trunk of the Dragon is an independent propellant system to fuel two Draco engines that will help sustain the lab's a...

Source: Visit website The host star, TOI-6894, is a red dwarf with only 20% the mass of the Sun, typical of the most common stars in our galaxy. Until now, such low-mass stars were not thought capable of forming or retaining giant planets. But as published recently in Nature Astronomy , the unmistakable signature of a giant planet -- TOI-6894b -- has been detected in orbit around this tiny star. This exceptional system was first identified in data from NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), as part of a large search for giant planets around small stars, led by Dr. Edward Bryant from UCL's Mullard Space Science Laboratory. The planetary nature of the signal was then confirmed by an extensive ground-based observation campaign, involving several telescopes -- including those of the SPECULOOS and TRAPPIST projects, both led by the University of Li⁘ge. Dr. Khalid Barkaoui, researcher on the SPECULOOS and TRAPPIST ...

Reference: See here Nvidia is aiming to give robotics engineers a boost in the form of a new ⁘brain⁘ for their robots. Launched on Monday, the chip giant said that with the new Jetson Thor modules, robots around the world ⁘are about to get a lot smarter.⁘ Nvidia launched Thor via a video (top) featuring the company⁘s long-time CEO Jensen Huang handing a gift box to a humanoid robot with a message card that says, ⁘Enjoy your new brain.⁘ The clip then shows multiple humanoid robots opening the box to find the new device that⁘s designed to make it a lot cleverer. Thor, which is aimed at all kinds of robots and not solely humanoid ones, offers an impressive 7.5 times more AI computing power than its predecessor, Orin, which launched in early 2023. It also brings 3.1 times more CPU performance and comes with twice the memory, Nvidia said. Thor is purpose-built for real-time robotics, handling high-bandwidth multi-sensor inputs with u...

Source: Visit website For centuries, humans have gazed into the night sky, wondering what lies beyond the planets we know. Each new discovery in the Solar System reshapes our sense of place in the cosmos. The idea of hidden planets is not new. Astronomers once speculated about Planet X, which was believed to be seven times Earth's mass and orbiting 50 times farther from the Sun than Earth. That idea was mostly debunked. Later came Planet Nine, a still-viable candidate about 10 times Earth's mass, at least 300 times farther from the Sun. Now, evidence is mounting for yet another contender. Amir Siraj at Princeton University and his colleagues suggest a new possibility. They noticed a warping effect in the orbits of some Kuiper belt objects, a distant region filled with icy remnants, including Pluto. This potential world would be smaller than Earth but larger than Mercury, orbiting 100 to 200 times farther from the Sun than E...

Read more: See here Spano displayed his best conducting of the season, showing intensity and an eye toward the dramatic. The star of the show, though, was Bronfman. His legerdemain at the keyboard was in full display in the Beethoven, driving the tempo in the opening movement and softening the texture in the slow movement without losing the pulse. Dazzling with virtuosity in the many fast-moving gestures, always musically alert, the pianist shaped each phrase with just the right flair. Each of the many scales had a different shading, and the tinkly decorations Beethoven sprinkled liberally in lighter moments made me picture shimmering diamonds. Known as a Beethoven master, Bronfman emphasized where emphasis was needed, and eased up when letting the music flow. Spano made sure the orchestra was on the same page, which made for an unforgettable performance all around. ⁘The Planets⁘ was an intriguing choice for a big finale, with an ...

Source: Visit website It started like something out of a sci-fi thriller : a glowing, pill-shaped object hovering over the skies of upstate New York. Photos captured near the Finger Lakes on Aug. 12 showed a slow-moving orb shrouded in a glowing mist, sparking a surge of UFO speculation in a community's Facebook group. Military Jet's Mysterious Collision Raises Questions About Advanced Ufos In Us Airspace: 'Been Here All Along' But what many believed could be an alien visitation turned out to be something less supernatural: a rocket launch . According to Space.com , the mysterious orb was later confirmed to be the planned launch of the Vulcan Centaur by the United Launch Alliance from Cape Canaveral, Florida. Over 60 Ufo Sightings Reported Whizzing Across State In First Half Of 2025, National Tracking Group Says ⁘My first instinct from my scientific and military training is to look for a conventional explana...

Reference: Found here NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has uncovered a small moon quietly circling Uranus, a world already known for its unusual tilt, faint rings, and puzzling family of satellites. The discovery, announced by researchers at the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), raises the tally of Uranus' moons to 29. The moon, temporarily called S/2025 U1, was spotted on February 2, 2025, in a set of ten long-exposure images taken with Webb's Near-Infrared Camera. Each image required forty minutes of exposure to capture enough light from the distant planet and its surroundings. "This object was spotted in a series of 10 40-minute long-exposure images captured by the Near-Infrared Camera," said Maryame El Moutamid of SwRI's Solar System Science and Exploration Division in Boulder, Colorado. "It's a small moon but a significant discovery, which is something that even NASA's Voyager 2 spacecraf...

Source: Visit website Shubhanshu Shukla is the first Indian astronaut to travel to the International Space Station (ISS). (Source: PTI) Since 2010 when he started his career, Arun Nair has established himself as a dynamic journalist, adept at covering a wide range of stories—from in-de... View More

Source: Found here VAN HORN, Texas (KVIA) — Blue Origin's 35th New Shepard mission is set to carry more than 40 scientific and research payloads into space. Liftoff is expected to take place around 6:30 a.m. from the company's Launch Site One in West Texas. The uncrewed NS-35 mission will utilize Blue Origin's dedicated payload capsule RSS H.G. Wells and the same booster that flew the landmark NS-29 mission. Among the payloads are 24 student-led experiments from NASA's TechRise Student Challenge, giving U.S. middle and high school students hands-on experience with real-world space engineering challenges. The winning experiments explore topics such as space farming, medical solutions in microgravity, and liquid behavior in zero gravity. The program is administered by Future Engineers and funded by NASA's Flight Opportunities program. Also onboard are experiments from leading research institutions including...

Read more: See here The TOI Science Desk stands as an inquisitive team of journalists, ceaselessly delving into the realms of discovery to curate a captivating collection of news, features, and articles from the vast and ever-evolving world of science for the readers of The Times of India. Consider us your scientific companion, delivering a daily dose of wonder and enlightenment. Whether it's the intricacies of genetic engineering, the marvels of space exploration, or the latest in artificial intelligence, the TOI Science Desk ensures you stay connected to the pulse of the scientific world. At the TOI Science Desk, we are not just reporters; we are storytellers of scientific narratives. We are committed to demystifying the intricacies of science, making it accessible and engaging for readers of all backgrounds. Join us as we craft knowledge with precision and passion, bringing you on a journey where the mysteries of the universe unf...

Reference: See here The 60-meter asteroid 2024 YR4 has a 4 percent chance of hitting the moon. Could such a lunar collision create a dangerous new meteor shower? Discovered in late 2024 by an automated telescope in Chile as part of the Asteroid Terrestrial-Impact Last Alert System (ATLAS) sky survey, it⁘s a not only a near-Earth asteroid but one that astronomers feared could get too close for comfort to our fair planet and pose a potential impact risk. At 60 or so meters in diameter, 2024 YR4 wouldn⁘t cause global damage if it fell to Earth, but it would explode upon impact with the energy of an eight-megaton bomb, so local damage would be considerable. Thus, astronomers were right: it was something to worry about. Initial observations indicated the asteroid might hit Earth on December 22, 2032. Calculating the trajectory of an asteroid is tricky , and the further ahead the prediction goes, the fuzzier the numbers get. By mid-Febru...

Source: Visit website A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carried the X-37B Space Force space plane back into orbit late on Thursday, August 21 -- marking the mysterious uncrewed vehicle's eighth mission. The mission, known as USSF-36, launched at 11:50 p.m. from NASA's Kennedy Space Center Pad 39A, atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. Storms had moved through the area in the hours prior but conditions improved to 90% favorable just before launch. Upon liftoff, the rocket flew on a northeast trajectory – providing views of the launch north of the Space Coast. As the rocket's first stage booster returned to Cape Canaveral Landing Zone 2, a sonic boom was heard throughout Brevard County and the surrounding areas. "In fact, we have more missions queued for launch over the next 12 months than in any prior 12-month period in the history of the NSSL program…and we welcome this challenge," Col. Ryan Hiserote, senior materiel lea...

Source: Visit website A research team peering into unexplored corners of space revealed this week that our solar system harbors a secret moon that's tucked away near Uranus.  The moon was discovered by a research team using NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, the successor to the Hubble Space Telescope. Like the Hubble Telescope, the Webb Telescope was designed to snap images of deep space, helping scientists pursue some of the universe's enduring mysteries. The new moon was discovered in a set of 40-minute-long exposure images taken by the Webb Telescope's near-infrared camera, which allows it to image fainter and more distant objects than the Hubble. While the Webb's main mission is to explore the origins of the universe and the formation of the earliest galaxies, its sensitive cameras make many other kinds of discoveries possible along the way. "It's a small moon but a significant discovery, which is s...

Reference: Found here In today's column, I examine an intriguing twist to the usual discussions about the use of AI for mental health advisement. First, people are increasingly making use of their PCs and smartphones to access generative AI and ask questions about their mental health, essentially using AI as a kind of therapist. That's an abundant fact and widely reported. Second, the upcoming twist will be that humanoid robots, physically resembling humans, will be improved sufficiently so that they will adroitly function in our homes, including being closely paired with the latest in generative AI. This analysis of AI breakthroughs is part of my ongoing Forbes column coverage on the latest in AI, including identifying and explaining various impactful AI complexities (see the link here ). As a quick background, I've been extensively covering and analyzing a myriad of facets regarding the advent of modern-era AI that p...

Source: Found here Space can surprise even those who spend their lives studying it. People often think of our solar system as just a few planets and a bunch of empty space. After years of careful mapping, a new analysis reveals what appears to be a channel of hot, low-density plasma stretching out from our solar system toward distant constellations. Astronomers from the Max Planck Institute recently confirmed it using data from the eRosita instrument . Dr. L. L. Sala, lead researcher, and colleagues shared these findings in a paper published in the journal Astronomy ⁘ Astrophysics . For a long time, scientists have known that our solar system sits within a peculiar region of space called the Local Hot Bubble . This area, estimated to be about 300 light years across , formed as a result of powerful stellar explosions called supernovas. They heated the surrounding gas, producing a low-density, high-temperature environment. Traces of ...

Read more: Found here Roll up, roll up, as the planets are set to put on a spectacular parade in the sky for us lot tonight (21 August). This evening is your last chance to catch a glimpse of the rare space phenomenon until 2028 too, so stargazers really ought to have their binoculars at the ready. You've heard of 'the stars aligning', but did you know the planets are also partial to it too every so often? According to NASA , although a 'planet parade' isn't a technical term in astronomy, it does perfectly describe how planets occasionally line up along each other. Explaining that the planets 'always appear along a line or arc across the sky', the US space agency said : ⁘This occurs because the planets orbit our Sun in a relatively flat, disc-shaped plane. ⁘From Earth , we're looking into that solar system plane from within. We see the racetrack of the planets from the perspective of one of...

Source: See here Our exhibitions investigate and highlight the vital role of invention and innovation in shaping human history from Stone Age tools to the Apollo 11 moon landing to futures in space. Discover exhibitions that highlight American innovation and ingenuity from the past to the present and imagine our shared future.

Source: Visit website Will the earth experience ⁘colder weather than ever before⁘ during the ⁘aphelion phenomenon⁘ in August, 2025, as its elliptical orbit takes it to its most distant-from-the-Sun position of the year, as multiple social media posts claim? No, that's not true: Earth's distance from the Sun changes daily and at aphelion, the Earth's distance from the Sun is only about 3% more than the average distance. Other factors have a greater impact on temperature, including the atmosphere's ability to slow fluctuations in heat and the 24-degree tilt in Earth's axis, which determines the duration and intensity of sunlight striking the planet. The posts include a variety of graphics showing the elliptical orbit of the Earth around the Sun, like this one: This fact check addresses only the astrophysics falsehoods, not the various health claims also made, which rest on the underlying misstatement of the effects...

Source: Visit website With NASA eyeing long-duration crewed missions to the moon and beyond in the coming years, it has to be sure that if a medical situation arises, the astronauts are well equipped to deal with it. Currently, crews heading to the International Space Station (ISS) receive training for basic medical procedures and medicines, as well as for things like intravenous fluid administration, intubation, wound care, and basic emergency response. But future missions that take humans hundreds of thousands ⁘ or even millions ⁘ of miles from Earth, potentially for years at a time, will add a new layer of complexity to health management. With that in mind, the U.S. space agency has partnered with Google on a project aimed at ensuring crew health and wellness on long-duration missions. The initiative includes an investigation into whether remote care capabilities can offer detailed diagnoses and treatment options when a heal...

More details: Found here Using the powerful James Webb Space Telescope, scientists have spotted a moon nestled near Uranus⁘s rings that⁘s so small you could walk around it Scientists have discovered a new, elusive moon around Uranus, making it the 29th natural satellite known to orbit the ice giant . The research team that made the discovery estimates that the moon, dubbed S/2025 U1 for now (at least, until the International Astronomical Union assigns an official name), is just 10 kilometers, or six miles, across, making it particularly small. ⁘I could walk around this moon,⁘ says Heidi Hammel, a planetary scientist and astrophysicist, who was not involved in the research. A team led by the Southwest Research Institute detected the moon in images captured by the high-resolution Near-Infrared Camera on the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) during a series of 10 40-minute-long exposures. ⁘The cameras on [JWST] are very sensitive,⁘ H...

Reference: See here SpaceX sent another batch of its Starlink broadband internet satellites into low Earth orbit today (Aug. 18), atop a Falcon 9 rocket launched from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. The launch, at 12:26 p.m. EDT (1626 GMT or 9:26 a.m. PDT local time) on Monday marked the company's 100th Falcon 9 flight of 2025. It was SpaceX's 103rd mission overall for the year, including three suborbital test flights of Starship , the rocket being developed to land humans on the moon and Mars . Monday's Falcon 9 mission reached its preliminary orbit about 9 minutes after leaving Space Launch Complex 4 East at Vandenberg and was on track to deploy the 24 Starlink satellites ( Group 17-5 ) approximately 50 minutes later. This launch marked the ninth flight for the Falcon 9's first stage (Booster 1088). It successfully landed again on the drone ship "Of Course I Still Love You" in the Pacific Oc...

More details: See here Rising concentrations of carbon dioxide in the upper atmosphere will change the way geomagnetic storms impact Earth, with potential implications for thousands of orbiting satellites, according to new research led by scientists at the US. National Science Foundation National Center for Atmospheric Research (NSF NCAR). Geomagnetic storms, caused by massive eruptions of charged particles from the surface of the Sun that buffet Earth's atmosphere, are a growing challenge for our technologically dependent society. The storms temporarily increase the density of the upper atmosphere and therefore the drag on satellites, which impacts their speed, altitude, and how long they remain operational. The new study used an advanced computer model to determine that the upper atmosphere's density will be lower during a future geomagnetic storm compared with a present-day storm of the same intensity. That's because...

Reference: See here China kicked off the three-day long World Humanoid Robot Games on Friday, looking to showcase its advances in artificial intelligence and robotics with 280 teams from 16 countries. Robots competed in sports such as track and field, and table tennis, as well as tackled robot-specific challenges from sorting medicines and handling materials to cleaning services. Teams came from countries including the United States, Germany and Brazil, with 192 representing universities and 88 from private enterprises such as China's Unitree and Fourier Intelligence. Competing teams used robots from Chinese manufacturers such as Booster Robotics. "We come here to play and to win. But we are also interested in research," said Max Polter, a member of HTWK Robots football team from Germany, affiliated with Leipzig University of Applied Sciences. At the robot games in Beijing, which charged 128 to 580 yuan ($17.83-$8...

Source: Visit website Friday, August 15 Dwarf planet 1 Ceres reaches its stationary point in Cetus the Whale at 9 P.M. EDT. Previously it was moving eastward relative to the background stars. Now it will begin to move westward, or retrograde. Ceres is only visible in the morning sky, but 4 Vesta is sliding eastward through the evening sky in Libra, still some 25° high in the southwest an hour after sunset. It's located between that constellation's two brightest stars: magnitude 2.8 Zubenelgenubi (Alpha [α] Librae) and slightly brighter magnitude 2.6 Zubeneschamali (Beta [β] Lib). This evening, Vesta is just east of the midpoint of a line drawn between these two stars, some 4.3° northeast of Alpha Lib. Shining at magnitude 7.4, Vesta is well within the reach of binoculars or any telescope, even from the suburbs. It's currently some 2.0 astronomical units from Earth, or nearly 186 million miles (299 million kilometers)...

Read more: Found here The eyebrow-raising scholarly article suggests aliens are "concealed in stealth" or "even walking among us" in human form. It theorizes these ETs are a "remnant form" of an ancient civilization that made their home on Earth long ago, or maybe even time-travelers from the future! "We're not saying this is right, we're not saying that this is absolutely 100 percent the case," Montana Technological University professor Michael Masters tell CBS News , who coauthored the paper with Harvard researchers Tim Lomas and Brendan Case . "We're saying these are some potentialities" that would explain the many UFO sightings that have been logged over the decades by military fighter pilots and civilian observers, Masters explains. As Globe has previously reported, the Pentagon is currently investigating some 1,650 sightings of UFOs, with close to half of those co...

Reference: See here Found using the MIRI instrument on NASA's Webb telescope, which was managed by JPL through launch, the possible planet would be easier to study than more far-flung worlds. Astronomers using NASA's James Webb Space Telescope have found strong evidence of a giant planet orbiting a star in the stellar system closest to our own Sun. At just 4 light-years away from Earth, the Alpha Centauri triple star system has long been a compelling target in the search for worlds beyond our solar system. Now, Webb's observations from its Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI) are providing the strongest evidence to date of a gas giant orbiting Alpha Centauri A. The results have been accepted in a series of two papers in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. ⁘With this system being so close to us, any exoplanets found would offer our best opportunity to collect data on planetary systems other than our own. Yet, these are incred...

Source: See here I n the summer of 2013, NASA's Curiosity rover celebrated its first birthday inside a dusty red Martian crater, more than 100 million miles away from home. To mark its one-year landing anniversary, scientists programmed Curiosity to vibrate at frequencies corresponding to the notes of the "Happy Birthday" song. This lonely birthday celebration drew a deluge of sympathy, with people commenting, "When humans land on Mars, we better...give that rover a hug!" on NASA's video . More than a decade has elapsed since then, but space agencies have yet to launch a crewed mission to the Red Planet. Scientists have attempted to tackle this using an innovative approach. "When I was in grad school, the person I did my thesis with would always say, 'You got to think of what the problem is, and then remember that biology has already solved that problem,'" recalled Frances Donovan , a bi...

Source: See here Blue Origin is gearing up for the second-ever launch of its powerful New Glenn rocket, which will loft NASA's ESCAPADE mission to Mars. The company says it has been working closely with NASA on preparations leading up to New Glenn's next launch, dubbed NG-2, and is targeting no earlier than (NET) Sep. 29. The twin ESCAPADE (Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers) probes have been awaiting their turn aboard New Glenn, which was originally slated to carry the satellites on its maiden launch in January . However, NASA opted not to risk a costly mission delay due to the debut liftoff of the new rocket. Now that the mission has been assigned a NET date, Blue Origin posted on social media to expect "some exciting things" buzzing around New Glenn's pad at Space Launch Complex-36, located at Cape Canaveral Space Force Base in Florida. New Glenn lifted off for the first time in the begi...

Reference: Found here Thirteen years since Curiosity landed on Mars, engineers are finding ways to make the NASA rover even more productive. The six-wheeled robot has been given more autonomy and the ability to multitask -- improvements designed to make the most of Curiosity's energy source, a multi-mission radioisotope thermoelectric generator (MMRTG). Increased efficiency means the rover has ample power as it continues to decipher how the ancient Martian climate changed, transforming a world of lakes and rivers into the chilly desert it is today. Carrying out this detective work involves a lot of energy. Besides driving and extending a robotic arm to study rocks and cliffsides, Curiosity has a radio, cameras, and 10 science instruments that all need power. So do the multiple heaters that keep electronics, mechanical parts, and instruments operating at their best. Past missions like the Spirit and Opportunity rovers and the InSig...

More details: Visit website In the middle of the 20th century, humanity looked to the heavens in a way it never had before. The first half of the century had been marked by two world wars, and the second half opened with a new kind of tension — the Cold War. Two superpowers, the United States and the Soviet Union, turned their rivalry into an arms race, a propaganda war and perhaps most ambitiously, a space race. For most countries, these feats were the stuff of science fiction. The costs were astronomical. The technology, closely guarded. Space, it seemed, was the playground of the wealthy. But in the 1960s, one newly independent nation refused to accept the role of passive observer. Still recovering from centuries of colonial exploitation, India dared to ask: why should space be the privilege of the rich? Could a country with limited resources, but limitless determination, reach for the stars? Sarabhai's choice for the country...