Controllers deorbited a stranded Russian-owned communications satellite March 25, after Russian officials rejected a request to keep it operating from a startup company created to salvage the Astrium-built spacecraft for service to scientists in Antarctica.

KOUROU, French Guiana — European Space Agency Director General Jean-Jacques Dordain met with his Chinese counterpart March 22-23 to discuss future cooperation in manned spaceflight, including the potential for a Chinese Shenzhou spacecraft to dock with the International Space Station (ISS). The two sides met at Dordain’s request on the sidelines of the European Space Agency’s third Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) launch to the ISS March 23 to further establish a dialogue and lay the groundwork for potential Sino-European cooperation in manned spaceflight.

The European Space Agency’s third Automated Transfer Vehicle (ATV) resupply spacecraft is speeding toward a docking with the International Space Station (ISS), following a smooth countdown and liftoff from the European spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, early March 23.

NEW DELHI — India’s Mars Orbiter Mission is getting a boost, with the government allocating 1.25 billion rupees ($25 million) to the effort for the 2012-13 fiscal year. “The Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) plans to launch a Mars orbiter as early as November 2013 with a scientific payload weighing nearly 25 kg [55 lb.],” according to the budget document, which was introduced in parliament March 16.

NASA WORK: NASA has selected four Texas companies to perform a range of engineering and architectural services for Johnson Space Center in Houston under five-year contracts worth a combined $49 million. They include PDG Architects; Reynolds, Smith and Hills Inc; and URS Group Inc., all of Houston; and HDR Architecture of Dallas. The agreements, announced March 22, cover feasibility studies; conceptual design work; engineering reports; budget estimates; and designs for alterations, new construction, repairs and refurbishment.

INTELSAT 22: The Intelsat 22 communications satellite is slated to launch on an International Launch Services Proton rocket from Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, on March 25 at 8:10 a.m. EDT (6:10 p.m. local time). Based on Boeing’s 702MP satellite bus, the 6,200-kg (13,700-lb.) spacecraft will carry two Ku-band mobility beams providing coverage of the Indian Ocean region. From its position at 72 deg. East, it will serve the Middle East and eastern Africa with its Ku-band capacity.

HOUSTON — Researchers could be at work soon on new techniques for the detection and treatment of vision problems found in astronauts assigned to long-duration missions aboard the International Space Station (ISS). A report earlier this month in the journal Radiology, based on magnetic resonance imaging studies on 27 long-duration astronauts, found some with symptoms similar to idiopathic intercranial hypertension, including swelling of the optic nerve and an outward pressure on the eyeballs (Aerospace DAILY, March 15).

HOUSTON — NASA and its longtime partner, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), are positioning themselves to fund and restart the production of plutonium-238 within “six to seven years” as a power source for a range of possible missions to the outer Solar System, including those assigned to support the search for extraterrestrial life.