https://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. Even at this early stage in our spacefaring age, humanity has already begun sending probes that will eventually reach other solar systems, even if that was not their original intention. Five robotic explorers—Pioneer 10 and 11, Voyager 1 and 2, and New Horizons—are all on escape trajectories out of the solar system and might someday enter another one. They will no longer be operational at that point, but they serve as proof of concept that spacefaring civilizations do indeed build interstellar probes. https://phys.org/news/2026-06-alien-probes-backyard-weve.html Astronomy Tue, 16 Jun 2026 21:40:05 EDT news700833931 United Launch Alliance suffered yet another fiery burn-through on one of its solid rocket boosters during a national security mission Thursday. https://phys.org/news/2026-02-vulcan-rocket-fiery-booster-issue.html Space Exploration Thu, 12 Feb 2026 22:10:01 EST news690132875 When the six tiny spacecraft of NASA's SunRISE (Sun Radio Interferometer Space Experiment) mission settle into their orbits high above Earth after launching later this year, they'll function as one giant radio dish to track the rumbles of radio bursts coming from deep within the sun's atmosphere, or corona. Those bursts are generated by solar energetic particle events that could, in extreme cases, irradiate unprotected astronauts and satellites; tracking the radio waves they generate with SunRISE will help scientists mitigate their effects. https://phys.org/news/2026-01-sunrise-smallsats-ace-closer.html Astronomy Tue, 20 Jan 2026 17:09:38 EST news688151341 United Launch Alliance knocked out its first Vulcan Centaur launch of the year on Tuesday night, and its first ever for the Space Force. https://phys.org/news/2025-08-ula-vulcan-night-skies-landmark.html Space Exploration Wed, 13 Aug 2025 08:52:52 EDT news674293964 SpaceX was not one of Amazon's original choices to fly its Project Kuiper broadband internet satellites, but Elon Musk's company just knocked out its second launch in less than a month for the company that seeks to compete with SpaceX's Starlink. https://phys.org/news/2025-08-spacex-competitor-amazon-satellites.html Space Exploration Mon, 11 Aug 2025 16:37:03 EDT news674149021 You might have seen an interesting phrase popping up in your social media feeds lately: "Chiron is in retrograde." If you're anything like me, you've never heard of Chiron before—and I'm a professional astronomer. https://phys.org/news/2025-08-mercury-chiron-retrograde.html Astronomy Fri, 08 Aug 2025 09:50:03 EDT news673865401 SpaceX was not one of Amazon's original choices to fly up its Project Kuiper broadband internet satellites, but Elon Musk's company is about to knock out its second launch in less than a month for the company that seeks to compete with SpaceX's Starlink. https://phys.org/news/2025-08-spacex-thursday-aim-friday-amazon.html Space Exploration Thu, 07 Aug 2025 14:44:24 EDT news673796661 In January of 2024, the company Astrobiotic was set to make history with the first privately-developed lander, named Peregrine, to reach the lunar surface, sent aboard a United Launch Alliance's Vulcan Centaur rocket. The lander carried the usual sorts of scientific instruments, many of them developed by NASA and its research partners. But tucked away among all those instruments was a small payload, with spots in that cargo sold by the companies Celestis and Elysium Space. https://phys.org/news/2025-07-moon-problem.html Space Exploration Mon, 28 Jul 2025 12:38:05 EDT news672925082 A group of astronomers from across the globe, including a team from the University of Washington and led by Queen's University Belfast, have revealed new research showing that millions of new solar system objects will be detected by a brand-new facility, which is expected to come online later in 2025. https://phys.org/news/2025-06-rubin-observatory-millions-solar-vivid.html Astronomy Wed, 04 Jun 2025 10:29:18 EDT news668251752 University of Central Florida (UCF) scientists and their collaborators discovered new insights into the formation of distant icy objects in space beyond Neptune, offering a deeper understanding of our solar system's formation and growth. https://phys.org/news/2025-04-webb-scientists-solar.html Astrobiology Fri, 25 Apr 2025 11:18:07 EDT news664798676 Could microbes survive in the permanently shadowed regions (PSRs) of the moon? This is what a recent study presented at the 56th Lunar and Planetary Science Conference (LPSC 2025) hopes to address as a team of researchers from the United States and Canada investigated the likelihood of long-term survival for microbes in the PSR areas of the moon, which are craters located at the poles that don't see sunlight due to the moon's small axial tilt. https://phys.org/news/2025-04-lunar-polar-regions-microbes.html Astrobiology Tue, 01 Apr 2025 15:54:05 EDT news662741641 SpaceX has found a new parking spot off of the Bahamas for its droneships that catch boosters from launches from the Space Coast. https://phys.org/news/2025-02-spacex-sonic-boom-bahamas.html Space Exploration Wed, 19 Feb 2025 07:41:13 EST news659173269 The Space Coast could welcome a big player to the launch landscape early Sunday with the debut of Blue Origin's New Glenn rocket, a two-day delay from original plans to launch early Friday. https://phys.org/news/2025-01-blue-1st-glenn-rocket-early.html Space Exploration Fri, 10 Jan 2025 08:26:23 EST news655719976 New studies led by researchers at the University of Central Florida offer for the first time a clearer picture of how the outer solar system formed and evolved based on analyses of trans-Neptunian objects (TNOs) and centaurs. https://phys.org/news/2024-12-webb-glimpse-icy-planetesimals-early.html Astronomy Thu, 19 Dec 2024 10:22:30 EST news653826143 Although our solar system is billions of years old, we've only recently become better acquainted with one of its more dynamic and captivating inhabitants known as (2060) Chiron. https://phys.org/news/2024-12-uncovering-centaur-tracks-scientists-unique.html Astronomy Wed, 18 Dec 2024 13:23:04 EST news653750581 SpaceX sent up a commercial satellite late Thursday morning from Kennedy Space Center, completing three launches in just under 30 hours among its three active pads in Florida and California. https://phys.org/news/2024-12-spacex-satellite-kennedy-space-center.html Space Exploration Fri, 06 Dec 2024 07:11:49 EST news652691505 White, male, billionaire entrepreneurs fuel stereotypes that compound the issues surrounding diversity in technology and computer science, according to a new study. https://phys.org/news/2024-12-stereotypes-science-role.html Education Tue, 03 Dec 2024 09:21:12 EST news652440067 Blue Origin hauled the immense first stage booster for its upcoming debut launch of its New Glenn rocket to Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on October 30th. https://phys.org/news/2024-11-blue-hauls-massive-glenn-1st.html Space Exploration Sat, 02 Nov 2024 09:10:01 EDT news649671014 A SpaceX launch from Cape Canaveral on Saturday evening marked the 73rd launch from the Space Coast in 2024, the most ever in one year. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-spacex-space-coast-year.html Space Exploration Mon, 28 Oct 2024 10:05:59 EDT news649328756 The Space Coast saw its 72nd launch of the year on Wednesday evening, equaling the total number of orbital missions flown in 2023 and with 10 weeks still to go. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-spacex-liftoff-space-coast-year.html Space Exploration Thu, 24 Oct 2024 09:09:39 EDT news648979776 United Launch Alliance is footing the bill for the second ever launch of its Vulcan Centaur rocket, so it can finally see the payouts for the backlog of $3.1 billion worth of national security missions, something ULA cannot do until the Space Force signs off on it. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-successful-vulcan-early-friday-lucrative.html Space Exploration Fri, 04 Oct 2024 08:50:57 EDT news647250652 Inspired by the half-human, half-horse creatures that are part of Ancient Greek mythology, the field of astronomy has its own kind of centaurs: distant objects orbiting the sun between Jupiter and Neptune. NASA's James Webb Space Telescope has mapped the gases spewing from one of these objects, suggesting a varied composition and providing new insights into the formation and evolution of the solar system. https://phys.org/news/2024-10-webb-telescope-unusual-gas-jets.html Astronomy Wed, 02 Oct 2024 13:22:48 EDT news647094153 With the first launch of Blue Origin's massive New Glenn rocket still in the works before the end of the year, Jeff Bezos' company got to work testing out its recovery operations with the huge crane parked at Port Canaveral on August 8. https://phys.org/news/2024-08-blue-glenn-rocket-recovery-crane.html Space Exploration Sat, 10 Aug 2024 06:20:01 EDT news642403075 As Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin prepares for the first launch of its New Glenn rocket from Cape Canaveral this year, the company has taken time to voice concerns over future launches of competitor SpaceX's massive Starship and Super Heavy, also planning to launch from the Space Coast. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-blue-spacex-starship-preps-1st.html Space Exploration Fri, 05 Jul 2024 07:10:01 EDT news639381612 SpaceX is rolling a booster that was part of a scrubbed launch attempt last month back to the launch pad for an early morning mission on the Space Coast. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-spacex-retools-problem-booster-overnight.html Space Exploration Wed, 03 Jul 2024 06:24:41 EDT news639206677 Europe's new Ariane 6 rocket is due to blast off for the first time next week, but it will launch into a quickly changing market for heavy space launchers increasingly dominated by SpaceX. https://phys.org/news/2024-07-ariane-big-rockets.html Space Exploration Tue, 02 Jul 2024 05:00:01 EDT news639113189 A pair of NASA astronauts have finally taken their historic ride on Boeing's CST-100 Starliner making its first-ever human spaceflight on the morning of June 5. https://phys.org/news/2024-06-boeing-starliner-historic-human-spaceflight.html Space Exploration Thu, 06 Jun 2024 09:02:48 EDT news636883364 A pair of NASA astronauts will try again on Wednesday morning to take a ride on Boeing's CST-100 Starliner, making its first-ever human spaceflight. https://phys.org/news/2024-06-boeing-starliner-shot-human-spaceflight.html Space Exploration Tue, 04 Jun 2024 16:08:28 EDT news636736078 NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams returned to Kennedy Space Center on May 28 as their much-delayed flight to the International Space Station aboard Boeing's CST-100 Starliner looks like it may finally happen Saturday. https://phys.org/news/2024-05-nasa-astronauts-space-coast-starliner.html Space Exploration Thu, 30 May 2024 10:07:03 EDT news636282418 SpaceX sent up the 40th rocket launch from the Space Coast on Tuesday morning. https://phys.org/news/2024-05-spacex-40th-space-coast.html Space Exploration Tue, 28 May 2024 16:38:52 EDT news636133081