Working on behalf of NASA, crowdsourcing veterans HeroX and DrivenData have announced a new competition, “Mars Spectrometry: Detect Evidence for Past Life.”
Northrop Grumman’s 17th NASA-contracted Cygnus resupply mission to the International Space Station (ISS) is set for a Feb. 19 launch from the agency’s Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia, to deliver 8,300 lb. of cargo and perform the first station orbit-boosting to use U.S. hardware.
Space tourist company Virgin Galactic, whose stock price has been on a proverbial roller coaster in recent months, said Feb. 18 that Chamath Palihapitiya is no longer chairman of the board or even a member.
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration is seeking information from satellite tracking companies about data products and services they could provide to support a repository of satellite information.
Max Polyakov, a Ukrainian co-founder of launch company Firefly Aerospace, said he handed off his majority stake in the startup to co-founder and CEO Tom Markusik under pressure from U.S. officials.
Russia’s MS-19 Progress resupply capsule successfully docked with the seven-person International Space Station early Feb. 17, completing the delivery of a nearly 3-ton cargo, including food, water, propellant and other supplies and research equipment.
SpaceLink, of McLean, Virginia, has selected Houston-based commercial space station developer Axiom Space to demonstrate an end-to-end optical communications relay service for the Center for the Advancement of Science in Space, which manages the U.S. National Laboratory elements of the International Space Station.
Orbital Sidekick has validated an upgrade to its existing hyperspectral satellite sensors and is announcing an investment by national security startup seed funder In-Q-Tel.
Former NASA shuttle-era astronauts David Leestma, Sandra Magnus and Chris Ferguson will be formally inducted into the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame on June 10, the Astronaut Scholarship Foundation says.
Russia’s Progress MS-19 resupply capsule was on course for a Feb. 17 automated docking with the International Space Station following launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan carrying almost 3 tons of food, water, propellant and other supplies.
After a year’s hiatus, the Indian Space Research Organization returned its workhorse Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle into service, sending an Earth-observation satellite and two small satellite rideshares into low Earth orbit.
Jared Isaacman, the billionaire entrepreneur who financed and commanded Inspiration4, SpaceX’s first private charter, plans a new venture with SpaceX for up to three more missions, culminating with the first crewed flight of the company’s Starship transport.
All 18 segments of the James Webb Space Telescope’s (JWST) large primary mirror have gathered their first photons from a target star, a major milestone in the months-long process of aligning the light-gathering elements of the space observatory to begin its mission of studying the first stars and galaxies.
Officials with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration expect that a data repository of satellites will be operational by 2024, providing U.S. government agencies and commercial space companies with a resource to prevent potential collisions as the number of spacecraft in orbit grows exponentially.
NASA has selected a pair of heliophysics missions for development that are intended to provide a better understanding of solar dynamics, the Sun/Earth connection and the changing space environment.