Mount Rinjani EU–(ENEWSPF)–11 July 2013.  Satellites show how we can promote economic development in an environmentally sustainable manner by putting a price on nature’s resources. Located on the Indonesian island of Lombok, the Mount Rinjani National Park is an important ecosystem for numerous endangered plants and animals. Just outside the[Read More…]

Researchers, in a step toward analyzing Mars for signs of life, find that gene-sequencing chip can survive space radiation CAMBRIDGE, Mass.–(ENEWSPF)–July 9, 2013.  If there is life on Mars, it’s not too farfetched to believe that such Martian species may share genetic roots with life on Earth.  More than 3.5[Read More…]

Euclid EU–(ENEWSPF)–8 July 2013.  The construction of ESA’s Euclid space mission to explore the ‘dark Universe’ will be led by Italy’s Thales Alenia Space as prime contractor, beginning the full industrial phase of the project.  The announcement follows that of last month when Astrium Toulouse was confirmed to build the[Read More…]

Olympus Mons southeast flank EU–(ENEWSPF)–5 July 2013.  Hundreds of individual lava flows are seen frozen in time on the flanks of Olympus Mons, the largest volcano in the Solar System. The images, taken on 21 January 2013 by ESA’s Mars Express, focus on the southeast segment of the giant volcano,[Read More…]

WASHINGTON–(ENEWSPF)–July 3, 2013.  The curtain has come down on a superstar of the satellite oceanography world that played the “Great Blue Way” of the world’s ocean for 11 1/2 years. The successful joint NASA and Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES) Jason-1 ocean altimetry satellite was decommissioned this week following the[Read More…]

Site of crater EU–(ENEWSPF)–2 July 2013.  ESA’s CryoSat satellite has found a vast crater in Antarctica’s icy surface. Scientists believe the crater was left behind when a lake lying under about 3 km of ice suddenly drained. Far below the thick ice sheet that covers Antarctica, there are lakes of[Read More…]

HAWTHORNE, Calif.–(ENEWSPF)–July 2, 2013.  Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) of Hawthorne, Calif., recently completed two milestones for NASA’s Commercial Crew Integrated Capability (CCiCap) initiative, which is intended to make commercial human spaceflight services available for government and commercial customers. These were the fifth and sixth milestones for SpaceX, a partner[Read More…]

Kasei Valles EU–(ENEWSPF)–6 June 2013.  Dramatic flood events carved this impressive channel system on Mars covering 1.55 million square kilometres, shown here in a stunning new mosaic from ESA’s Mars Express. The mosaic, which features the spectacular Kasei Valles, comprises 67 images taken with the spacecraft’s high-resolution stereo camera and[Read More…]

Liftoff replay — Access the video EU–(ENEWSPF)–6 June 2013.  ESA’s fourth Automated Transfer Vehicle, Albert Einstein, was launched into orbit last evening from Europe’s Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana. Europe’s autonomous supply ship will perform a series of manoeuvres to dock with the International Space Station on 15 June. The[Read More…]

WASHINGTON –(ENEWSPF)–June 4, 2013.  NASA’s next scientific satellite, which is scheduled for launch June 26, will provide the most detailed look ever at the sun’s lower atmosphere or interface region. The Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph (IRIS) mission will observe how solar material moves, gathers energy, and heats up as it[Read More…]