Space can and should be about much more than giving the 1% another Instagrammable moment and increasing the wealth of the billionaires who provide the service.
Viruses May Exist ‘Elsewhere In the Universe,’ Warns Scientist
Astrobiologist Paul Davies suggests viruses may form a vital part of ecosystems on other planets. The Guardian reports: “Viruses actually form part of the web of life,” said Davies. “I would expect that if you’ve got microbial life on another planet, y…
生命が存在可能な太陽系外惑星の新分類「ハイセアン惑星」が提唱される
AC0x01 曰く、太陽系外惑星には、太陽系には存在しないタイプの惑星も多く発見されているが、ケンブリッジ天文学研究所のチームは26日、地球型以外で生命が存在する可能性を持つ新たな惑星のタイプとして、「ハイセアン惑星 (Hycean planet)」を提唱した（研究所のプレスリリース, Soraeの記事）。これまでの観測データでは、惑星の大きさが地球の1.6倍を超えると、惑星は主成分が岩石の地球に近いスーパーアースから、水素とヘリウムから成る厚い大気を持つ海王星に近いミニネプチューンへと姿を変えると…
Aerospace primes Northrop, Lockheed join in Orbit Fab’s over $10M funding round
San Francisco-based startup Orbit Fab wants to be the go-to source for orbital refueling, and now it has raised over $10 million in its quest to get there. The money will go toward funding a refueling trial that’s due to launch as early as the end of 2022, in which the company plans to send […]
And Lo, Picard Did Say to the Conn, “Shtep On It”
StarTrek.com officially posts the series bibles for TNG, Deep Space 9, Voyager, and Star Trek: Faith of the Heart Enterprise (click the title headings within the post to go to the series bible PDFs).
Passengers on SpaceX’s All-Civilian Spaceflight Will Get a Huge Dome Window
“The four astronauts poised to launch on the first-ever all-civilian SpaceX mission this month will have one heck of a view once they reach orbit,” reports Space.com:
When the crew of Inspiration4 (as the mission is called) launches on a SpaceX Crew D…
First Rocket of Space Company Firefly Exploded During Its Launch
NBC News reports:
Space company Firefly launched its inaugural Alpha rocket on a cloudless Thursday evening over the California coast. The Alpha rocket took off from Vandenberg Space Force Base’s SLC-2 complex, climbing west over the Pacific. But about…
Firefly launches its first rocket, but loses the launch craft in mid-flight explosion
Firefly launched its first rocket from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, and on board it carried a number of payloads with an intended destination of low Earth orbit. The rocket took off as planned, and seemed to be doing fairly well during the initial portion of the launch, before experiencing “an anomaly” that clearly […]
FAA grounds Virgin Galactic amidst investigation into July mission
Remember that story we posted earlier today about Virgin Galactic’s first commercial flight scheduled to launch in September? We may have spoken too soon. This afternoon, the Federal Aviation Administration said it was grounding all Virgin Galactic flights until further notice, pending the results of the investigation into the company’s July 11 crewed flight. “Virgin […]
The Red Warning Light On Richard Branson’s Space Flight
Nicholas Schmidle writes via the New Yorker: On July 11th, nearly a minute into the rocket trip carrying Richard Branson, the British billionaire, to space, a yellow caution light appeared on the ship’s console. The craft was about twenty miles in the …