News tagged with space center

Ghostly gamma-ray beams blast from Milky Way's center

(Phys.org) -- As galaxies go, our Milky Way is pretty quiet. Active galaxies have cores that glow brightly, powered by supermassive black holes swallowing material, and often spit twin jets in opposite directions. ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created May 29, 2012 | popularity 4.2 / 5 (11) | comments 13 | with audio podcast

End of an era: Last space shuttle comes home (Update 2)

The space shuttle passed into history Thursday, the words "wheels stop" crackling over the cockpit radio for the very last time.

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Jul 21, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 7

Hyperfast Star Was Booted from Milky Way

(PhysOrg.com) -- NASA's Hubble Space Telescope has detected a hypervelocity star - a rare entity moving three times faster than our sun.

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Jul 22, 2010 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (25) | comments 10 | with audio podcast

Iowa State students take a lighter, more autonomous 'lunabot' to NASA competition

Jared Peterson, working away in the Caterpillar Mechatronics Laboratory in Iowa State University's Hoover Hall, recently held up a small electric motor.

Electronics / Robotics

created May 21, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 0

Swiss craft janitor satellites to grab space junk

The tidy Swiss want to clean up space. Swiss scientists said Wednesday they plan to launch a "janitor satellite" specially designed to get rid of orbiting debris known as space junk.

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Feb 15, 2012 | popularity 4.7 / 5 (3) | comments 21

Runaway planets zoom at a fraction of light speed

Seven years ago, astronomers boggled when they found the first runaway star flying out of our Galaxy at a speed of 1.5 million miles per hour. The discovery intrigued theorists, who wondered: If a star can ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Mar 22, 2012 | popularity 4.6 / 5 (18) | comments 22 | with audio podcast

Scientists see red on NASA cuts of Mars missions

NASA said Monday it's not giving up on Mars, but it'll have to get there later and at a lower price.

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Feb 27, 2012 | popularity 5 / 5 (6) | comments 8

The strange attraction of Gale crater

Curiosity is about to go to Mars. The car-sized rover, also known as the Mars Science Lab, is scheduled for launch in late November or early December 2011 from the Kennedy Space Center. After an eight-month ...

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Oct 03, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (7) | comments 11 | with audio podcast

US shuttle debris surfaces amid Texas drought

A piece of the ill-fated space shuttle Columbia has surfaced in eastern Texas, where a severe drought has dried up a lake and exposed debris from the 2003 accident, NASA said Tuesday.

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Aug 02, 2011 | popularity 4.3 / 5 (7) | comments 1

NASA launches suborbital rockets from Virginia

Milky white chemical clouds were briefly visible in much of the night sky along the Eastern seaboard on Tuesday after NASA launched a series of rockets to study the jet stream at the edge of the earth's atmosphere.

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Mar 27, 2012 | popularity 4 / 5 (3) | comments 1

Resolving a galactic mystery

An extremely deep Chandra X-ray Observatory image of a region near the center of our Galaxy has resolved a long-standing mystery about an X-ray glow along the plane of the Galaxy. The glow in the region covered ...

Space & Earth / Astronomy

created Apr 29, 2009 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (19) | comments 3

Endeavour poised for next-to-last US shuttle flight

NASA Sunday readied the space shuttle Endeavour for its final mission with liftoff set for 8:56 am (1256 GMT) Monday on the next-to-last flight for the American shuttle program.

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created May 15, 2011 | popularity 4 / 5 (3) | comments 0

Reliable nuclear device to heat, power Mars Science Lab

NASA's Mars Science Laboratory mission, which is scheduled to launch this week, has the potential to be the most productive Mars surface mission in history. That's due in part to its nuclear heat and power ...

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Nov 21, 2011 | popularity 4.8 / 5 (13) | comments 16 | with audio podcast

Boeing leasing shuttle hangar to build new capsule (Update)

Boeing is taking over one of NASA's old space shuttle hangars to build a new capsule that the company hopes will lift astronauts to orbit in four or five years.

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Oct 31, 2011 | popularity 5 / 5 (2) | comments 1

Why shuttles are being retired, what's next

Thirty years of flight by NASA's space shuttles will end once Atlantis returns home from this last mission. The space agency will be looking to deeper space exploration, but the future is still somewhat unclear.

Space & Earth / Space Exploration

created Jul 08, 2011 | popularity 4.9 / 5 (7) | comments 3