It’s going to be a historic event – Wednesday’s launch of a rocket that marks the groundbreaking public-private partnership between the United States and SpaceX. And since we’ve suffered a disappointingly long wait after NASA retired the space shuttle fleet in 2001, well, it’s about time. This week’s mission, formally called SpaceX Demo-2, will launch…
In the NASA press conference running right now, they released the first high-res image of Pluto. So without further ado…
It’s one year old and to celebrate the milestone, North Korea has rolled out a new logo for their space program called, and we’re not kidding here – NADA (as in Spanish for “nothing”). Not surprisingly, the logo is almost a direct copy of NASA’s iconic emblem (see below).
NGC 6946 (also known as the Fireworks Galaxy, Arp 29, and Caldwell 12) is a medium-sized, face-on spiral galaxy about 22.5 million light years away from Earth located in the constellations Cepheus and Cygnus. At about 20,000 light years wide, it’s one of about a dozen nearby neighbors to the Milky Way. Since its discovery…
The Pirate Party of Russia (Russian: Пиратская Партия России, ППР), a grassroots effort to promote e-democracy, freedom of information, and protection of personal privacy, has offered NASA a birthday gift as the space institution marks its 55th birthday this week. While the space agency’s website has been shut down “due to the lapse in federal…
The bright star at the center of this nebula, the object responsible for the nebula’s distorted form, is Eta Carinae, one of the most massive stars in the galaxy. Eta Carinae is around 100 times the mass of our sun and 1 million times brighter. Scientists think it could explode as a supernova at any…
How sad. Here is NASA’s primary home page after the United States government shutdown on October 1, 2013. It reads: “Due to the lapse in federal government funding, this website is not available.”
Voyager 1, launched in 1977, is more than 11.66 billion miles from the sun and is now recognized as the first spacecraft to enter interstellar space. Solar storm aftershocks at the edge of our solar system provided confirmation that Voyager 1 made the passage on August 25, 2012.
Aren’t nebulae supposed to be, well, round. And blood-red in color to cap off the creepiness factor. What gives? Astronomers think they *may* be able explain away the Red Rectangle Nebula’s odd shape as an optical illusion but its crimson color still has them scratching their heads.
On March 17, 2013, an object the size of a large boulder, crashed into the surface of the moon. The resulting flash of light was 10 times greater than any recorded direct-moon hit to date and in fact was so bright, it was visible by the naked eye from Earth. Scientists at NASA explained that…
