Dawn’s mission director and chief engineer describes his ‘dream come true’ job – and how the new data coming back from Ceres could unlock some of the secrets of the earliest days of our solar system.
Hollywood may already have done it but when we eventually send real astronauts to Mars, what medicines should we arm them with? And will they work the same way as they do on Earth?
New research provides a compact but powerful way for Mars rovers to communicate directly with Earth via an array of smaller antenna elements, bypassing the need for an intermediary.
Plants on the International Space Station must figure out how to grow in a completely novel environment. Their adaptability hints at how they’ll react to changes here on Earth – or in future space outposts.
In the long lead-up to our ultimate flyby of Pluto, space science has reconfigured our notions of what it means to be a solar system, a planet, a world.
New Horizons mission members have worked on the project for even longer than it’s taken the spacecraft to get to Pluto. They’ve planned, built and researched – and now their efforts are paying off.
Jupiter’s moon Europa is one of the most enticing objects in our solar system, and a future NASA mission may help reveal whether it is a suitable for life.
The recent failure of the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket presents something of a dilemma for NASA, which still has no domestic launch capability of its own to reach the International Space Station.