Space

In about ten years, you will likely be witnessing one of the most groundbreaking events of humanity, since the moon landing – Mars’ first reality series, if you will. Mars One, the Dutch-funded space venture, has started the application process to form the first team of Mars settlers set to depart earth in 2022. If [...]

Who exactly owns the land on Mars? Can anyone stake a claim? Can plots of land be sold to build adorable cookie-cutter homes with white picket fences? These questions and more have been the subject of debate since before Neil Armstrong landed on the moon. According to Article II of the Outer Space Treaty, (yes, [...]

A few hours before an asteroid with the frightening size of a football field quietly passed Earth at a safe distance of 17,150 miles, a significantly smaller but highly damaging meteorite exploded over the Ural Mountains in Russia on Friday. While it’s easy to speculate on the connection between these two solar system bodies, scientists [...]

Continuing space exploration efforts by the European Space Agency have revealed that a gigantic river has coursed through Mars about 3.5 billion years ago, which has since been overrun by a glacier, as revealed by various 3D images taken from the upper area of the Red Planet’s Reull Vallis region. According to images collected by [...]

The Apophis asteroid already whizzed past Earth at a distance of about 9 million miles yesterday, but when it comes zipping by again in 2029 it could hit a few satellites. When it passes by again in 2036 there is a very slim chance that it will make an unwelcome crash landing into Earth, according [...]

A new way of exploring moons and asteroids is being devised by Stanford researchers who are collaborating with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at NASA. This involves the development of a mother spacecraft – known as The Phobos Surveyor- that will release spherical and spiked rovers to one of Mar’s [...]

A few days ago two asteroids rocketed near our planet, with one of these asteroids buzzing past the Earth at a distance closer than the moon. The 2012 XE54 was first spotted on December 9 and just two days afterward, it came zipping close to Earth at a distance of 140,000 miles. The near contact [...]

North Korea has fired a rocket into space for the second time this year. This recent launch follows the first launch in April with the Unha-3, which failed when it crashed into the ocean right after taking off. According to reports by Reuters, this second launch was verified by the Defense Ministry of South Korea, [...]

If you think water in Mercury – the planet closest to the sun – is simply the stuff of fiction, wait until you hear this piece of news from NASA. Research papers written after the Messenger spacecraft obtained data from the planet show that Mercury actually has a huge amount of frozen water hidden away [...]

Here is an Amazing video from the American Museum of Natural History. “The Known Universe takes viewers from the Himalayas through our atmosphere and the inky black of space to the afterglow of the Big Bang. Every star, planet, and quasar seen in the film is possible because of the world’s most complete four-dimensional map [...]

A group of researchers will be spearheading a project, the Hawaii Space Exploration Analog and Simulation or HI-SEAS, which aims primarily to explore the types of food that are ideal for space missions in the future. According to one of the study’s participants, it’s almost impossible for astronauts to live mainly on rehydrated foods. The [...]

Austrian Skydiver Felix Baumgartner just set a new record for the highest ever jump at 128,000 feet (39 000 meters). The previous record was hold by Joe Kittinger in 1960 with 102,800 feet (31 333 m high). “The 43-year-old was hoping also to break the sound barrier during his descent – although that mark awaits confirmation. [...]

The perennial quest for life on Mars has elicited more or less substantial efforts from NASA and billionaires like Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk, but recently a startup venture has actually outlined a roadmap –spacemap, if you will – to getting there. The project, dubbed as Mars One, is the brainchild of Dutch businessman and [...]

“On June 5 2012, SDO collected images of the rarest predictable solar event–the transit of Venus across the face of the sun. This event happens in pairs eight years apart that are separated from each other by 105 or 121 years. The last transit was in 2004 and the next will not happen until 2117. [...]

Debate over Pluto’s planetary state still rages on… According to wikipedia : “Pluto, formal designation 134340 Pluto, is the second-most-massive known dwarf planet in the Solar System (after Eris) and the tenth-most-massive body observed directly orbiting the Sun. Originally classified as the ninth planet from the Sun, Pluto was recategorized as a dwarf planet and [...]

Many significant developments have been made in terms of astrological technology, but the development of the Super Telescope – the Square Kilometer Array or SKA for short – looks to be the most powerful yet. While not under construction yet, the telescope is set to be an international collaboration that will allow for a greater [...]

Are we still alone in the Universe ? May be not for long…… “Kepler mission had confirmed the first Earth-like planet in a habitable zone where liquid water and life might exist. The planet, dubbed Kepler 22-b, is 600 light years away and roughly 2.5 times the size of Earth. Scientists believe surface temperatures to [...]