Space : Science World Report

Mar 06, 2012 03:14 PM EST

Texas A&M Astronomers Help Find Distant Galaxy Cluster to Shed Light On Early Universe

A decade ago, Houston businessman and philanthropist George P. Mitchell was so certain there were big discoveries to be made in physics and astronomy and that they should come out of Texas A&M University, he put money on it, endowing the George P. and Cynthia Woods Mitchell Institute for Fundamental...

Mar 06, 2012 01:48 PM EST

Galaxy Cluster Hidden in Plain View

A team of astronomers has discovered the most distant cluster of red galaxies ever observed using FourStar, a new and powerful near-infrared camera on the 6.5m Magellan Baade Telescope. The galaxy cluster is located 10.5 billion light years away in the direction of the constellation Leo. It is made ...

Mar 06, 2012 11:17 AM EST

EARTH: Undressing Vesta

Since last July, NASA's Dawn spacecraft has been orbiting the asteroid Vesta, and capturing images and other data that are providing surprising results to the delight and amazement of researchers. Dawn's mission is to help reveal the processes and conditions that marked the first few million years �...

Mar 06, 2012 10:32 AM EST

Historic Shuttles to Arrive at Permanent Homes by Year's End

By the end of this year, NASA's space shuttles will be in their new homes. Recently, the shuttles were on the move as part of the transition and retirement (T&R) activities at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Mar 06, 2012 09:53 AM EST

NASA Satellites See Tropical Storm Irina Getting Loopy

Two NASA satellites have been measuring rainfall and cloud top temperatures in Tropical Storm as it has been "going loopy" in the Mozambique Channel over the last couple of days. Irina is making a cyclonic loop, something that a tropical cyclone does on occasion whenever there are a couple of weathe...

Mar 06, 2012 08:58 AM EST

Space Weather: Explosions on Venus

In the grand scheme of the solar system, Venus and Earth are almost the same distance from the sun. Yet the planets differ dramatically: Venus is some 100 times hotter than Earth and its days more than 200 times longer. The atmosphere on Venus is so thick that the longest any spacecraft has survived...

Mar 06, 2012 08:31 AM EST

Launch Madness at Wallops in March - '5 in 5'

Launch madness will hit the east coast in March as NASA launches five rockets in approximately five minutes to study the high-altitude jet stream from its Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia.

Mar 06, 2012 08:23 AM EST

Rocket Lifts Off with 3G Military Communications

An unmanned Atlas 5 rocket blasted off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on Friday carrying the first satellite in a new military network designed to give cellphone-like 3G communications to troops on the move.

Mar 05, 2012 04:56 PM EST

Study Jointly Led by UCSB Researcher Supports Theory of Extraterrestrial Impact

A 16-member international team of researchers that includes James Kennett, professor of earth science at UC Santa Barbara, has identified a nearly 13,000-year-old layer of thin, dark sediment buried in the floor of Lake Cuitzeo in central Mexico. The sediment layer contains an exotic assemblage of m...

Mar 05, 2012 02:55 PM EST

Oxygen Detected in Atmosphere of Saturn's Moon Dione

Los Alamos National Laboratory scientists and an international research team have announced discovery of molecular oxygen ions (O2+) in the upper-most atmosphere of Dione, one of the 62 known moons orbiting the ringed planet. The research appeared recently in Geophysical Research Letters and was mad...

Mar 05, 2012 11:59 AM EST

Ready to Launch! A New Website Sharing Space Station Benefits For Humanity

When the International Space Station was first imagined, the idea was to create an unprecedented research platform to support microgravity investigations for the benefit of all humankind. That goal is now a reality, and researchers have not waited for completion to begin working on studies to build ...

Mar 05, 2012 11:50 AM EST

Galactic Lobes

Scientists have discovered gigantic structures 25,000 light-years tall ballooning above and below the Milky Way. Within each curved lobe, extremely energetic electrons of unknown origin interact with lower-energy light to generate the gamma rays that define these bubbles.