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New Mexico Museum of Space History to Induct Space Pioneers into Hall of Fame

New Mexico Museum of Space History to Induct Space Pioneers into Hall of Fame

The New Mexico Museum of Space History is preparing to celebrate its 50th anniversary with a gala and induction ceremony for the International Space Hall of Fame. The event, scheduled for October 3, 2026, at the Tays Special Events Center on the campus of New Mexico State University Alamogordo, will honor several individuals and groups who have made significant contributions to space exploration and science. Among the inductees are Dolores “Dee” O’Hara, NASA’s first nurse to astronauts and their families; Michel Mayor, the Swiss astrophysicist credited with the first discovery of an exoplanet orbiting a sun-like star; twin astronauts Sen. Mark Kelly and Scott Kelly, known for their participation in NASA’s landmark Twins Study; Katherine Johnson, the mathematician whose work was crucial to the U.S. space program and highlighted in the film 'Hidden Figures'; and the Mercury 13, a group of women who successfully completed astronaut testing but were never permitted to become astronauts. Dolores O’Hara is expec...

Webb Can Observe the Entire Sky Over the Course of Six Months

Webb Can Observe the Entire Sky Over the Course of Six Months

The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) represents a monumental leap forward in space-based astronomy, specifically designed to conduct infrared obse...

Apollo's Demand Once Accounted for 60 Percent of U.S. Integrated Circuits

Apollo's Demand Once Accounted for 60 Percent of U.S. Integrated Circuits

The Apollo program, while primarily focused on landing humans on the Moon, generated a ripple effect of innovation that extended far beyond space e...

Hubble Space Telescope Discovers New Decagon Wave Pattern in Saturn's Southern Atmosphere

Hubble Space Telescope Discovers New Decagon Wave Pattern in Saturn's Southern Atmosphere

Astronomers utilizing images from NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope (HST) have identified a previously unobserved 10-sided wave pattern, or decagon, in Saturn's southern atmosphere. This discovery, detailed in a recent study published in Science Advances, was made through data collected as part of Hubble’s Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy (OPAL) program, which annually images outer planets to study their atmospheric compositions and evolution. The research also incorporated observations from ground-based telescopes, including the Calar Alto Observatory in Spain. Unlike Saturn's well-known northern hexagonal atmospheric structure, which remains largely fixed, the newly found southern decagon exhibits an eastward migration and oscillates every 32 days, suggesting it behaves more like a meandering wave across multiple atmospheric layers. This feature was not observed by NASA’s Cassini spacecraft during its mission from 2004 to 2017, indicating it is a recent development.

A huge new crater on the moon has scientists intrigued

A huge new crater on the moon has scientists intrigued

Scientists are studying a massive new crater on the moon, a rare 'once-in-a-century' impact event that offers a fresh look beneath the lunar surface.

NASA spacecraft discovers a huge new crater on the moon

NASA spacecraft discovers a huge new crater on the moon

Scientists have discovered a crater on the moon that's bigger than the Roman Colosseum, the result of a powerful impact two years ago

Astronomers Discover Youngest Exoplanet Elias 2-24b, Challenging Planet Formation Models

Astronomers Discover Youngest Exoplanet Elias 2-24b, Challenging Planet Formation Models

Astronomers have identified Elias 2-24b, the youngest exoplanet ever discovered, orbiting a young orange dwarf star approximately 453 light-years from Earth. This Jupiter-sized 'newborn' planet is estimated to be less than a million years old and is still embedded within its natal disk of gas and dust. The discovery was made by a team led by Andrea Bernardi, a doctoral candidate at the Universidad Diego Portales in Chile, who analyzed archival data from the W.M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii. The findings confirm earlier observations from the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) and the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope, which hinted at a celestial body within a gap in the debris disk around the star Elias 2-24. Coronagraph technology, which blocks starlight to enable direct observation of orbiting planets, was crucial in confirming the exoplanet's presence within this gap, where planets are expected to form by carving out material.

NASA's LRO Discovers 'Once-in-a-Century' Moon Crater, Reveals Surface Changes

NASA's LRO Discovers 'Once-in-a-Century' Moon Crater, Reveals Surface Changes

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has identified the largest newly formed crater ever found in the solar system on the Moon’s eastern edge. Named McGetchin crater after pioneering lunar scientist Tom McGetchin, it formed between April 11 and May 22, 2024, when a comet or asteroid, estimated to be the size of a three- to six-story building, impacted the lunar surface. The crater measures 728 feet wide and 141 feet deep. Robert Wagner, an image-processing specialist with Intuitive Machines working with LROC data, discovered the crater during a routine data-quality check by comparing before and after images of the Moon. Scientists estimate that an impact of this magnitude occurs on the Moon approximately once a century or even less frequently. Further observations using LRO’s thermal instrument, Diviner, revealed a 4-mile-wide area around the crater that is about 16 degrees Fahrenheit cooler at night than its surroundings. This cooling effect is attributed to the impact fluffing up the regolith, makin...

Cincinnati Enquirer

Saturn makes closest approach to Earth. What to know for Saturn season

Saturn makes closest approach to Earth. What to know for Saturn season

Saturn will soon make its closest approach to the Earth for the year. This event will happen on Oct. 4 when Saturn will be 784 million miles away.

Scientists Discover Youngest Exoplanet, Elias 2-24 b, Offering New Insights into Planet Formation

Scientists Discover Youngest Exoplanet, Elias 2-24 b, Offering New Insights into Planet Formation

Astronomers have identified Elias 2-24 b, a 'baby' exoplanet orbiting a newly formed star approximately 450 light-years from Earth. This exoplanet is estimated to be less than 1 million years old, making it the youngest alien world ever discovered. Initial signs of its existence were noted in 2017 as a gap in the star's protoplanetary disk, a swirling cloud of gas and dust where planets form. Researchers utilized observations from three major telescopes—the W. M. Keck Observatory in Hawaii, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array in Chile, and the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope—to directly image and confirm the exoplanet's presence. Elias 2-24 b is between two and four times the mass of Jupiter and orbits its star at nearly twice the distance Neptune is from the Sun. This discovery provides a unique opportunity to study the early stages of planet formation, a process rarely observed directly.

Starship has yet to reach orbit. SpaceX hopes that's about to change.

Starship has yet to reach orbit. SpaceX hopes that's about to change.

SpaceX's Starship rocket has not reached orbit in more than three years of flight tests. That could be about to change in September.

The Corpus Christi Caller Times

After 3 years of tests, SpaceX targets Starship's first trip to orbit

After 3 years of tests, SpaceX targets Starship's first trip to orbit

SpaceX's Starship rocket has not reached orbit in more than three years of flight tests in Texas. That could be about to change in September.