Search Results - moon

Lunar Exploration in 2024: A Pivotal Year for Human and Robotic Missions

While the prospect of humans landing on the Moon this year appears doubtful, there remains a wealth of exploration on the horizon. Credit: Unsplash. The anticipation for a "Return to the Moon" has reached a climax, and 2024 emerges as a key year in lunar exploration. While some focus on the symbolic significance of humans...

ESA’s Miniature Pinhole Thruster Enters Production Phase

Credit: IENAI Space Rocket propulsion has evolved significantly from ancient rocket-powered weapons to cutting-edge technologies propelling our space exploration. ATHENA, a palm-sized thruster system developed by a team led by Daniel Perez Grande, CEO and Co-Founder of IENAI Spain, represents a revolutionary leap in advancing tiny spacecraft across the vastness of space. In contrast to colossal...

Rechargeable Batteries Using Lithium-Ion Technology

Credit: Pixabay Indispensable lithium-powered rechargeable batteries enable extended usage of devices for hours or even days, packing millions of times more computing capability in your pocket than the technology that facilitated the Apollo 11 moon landing in July 1969. These handy technological innovations, initially brought to the commercial market in 1991 by Japanese companies Sony and...

How the Brain Decodes Speech: Special Neurons Process Specific Sounds

Credit: Pixaobay Delicate probes, as thin as wires, inserted into the brains of living individuals reveal the functions performed by individual neurons. An unparalleled degree of insight into how humans comprehend speech has been made possible by recordings from hundreds of individual neurons while patients undergoing brain surgery listened to this and 199 other sentences. The...

France and Italy Collaborate to Construct a Lunar Habitat

Artist's concept of the Franco-Italian Moon habitatThales Alenia France and Italy are joining forces to create a facility for upcoming moon bases. The Franco-Italian technology company Thales Alenia Space and the Italian Space Agency (ASI) have entered into a contract to design the Multi-Purpose Habitat (MPH) for NASA's Artemis project. In recent aerospace endeavors, considerable focus...

NASA Tests Laser Communications Across 10 Million Miles in Space

The DSOC attached to the Psyche deep-space probeNASA NASA's Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) unit on the Psyche spacecraft has activated, creating a high-speed laser data link at a distance of 10 million miles (16 million km), equivalent to 40 times the distance from Earth to the Moon. NASA has expressed a strong interest in developing...

Lo’s Global Volcanic Activity Results from Focused Tidal Heating in its Upper Mantle

Hot spot detections. The maximum, unsaturated 4.8 μm (M-band) spectral radiances from 266 hot spots identified in Juno JIRAM data obtained from March 2017 to July 2022, using data from orbits PJ5 to PJ43 grouped by order of magnitude. The larger the symbol, the greater the 4.8 μm spectral radiance. This is an equal-area Mollweide projection...

Earth Receives Laser Message from 16 Million Kilometers Away

Psyche Probe's Deep Space Optical Communications Sets Record for Distant Laser Data Transmission. Credit: ProleR/Shutterstock In a groundbreaking achievement, a deep space experiment conducted aboard NASA's Psyche spacecraft has successfully transmitted a laser message to Earth from a location surpassing the Moon's distance for the first time. The achievement by the Deep Space Optical Communications...

SpaceX’s Starship Launch: A Mix of Success and Setback

The intended duration of Starship's second test flight was approximately 90 minutes, with the plan for it to conclude by splashing down in the Pacific Ocean near Hawai'i. Credit: SpaceX via X On Saturday morning, SpaceX's Starship rocket embarked on its second test flight, soaring into the sky from Starbase in Texas. However, the triumph...

China’s Ambitious Mars Sample Return Mission and its Potential Impact on the Space Race

NASA has been the primary force in Martian research, utilizing instruments such as Hubble to capture images. However, the emergence of a formidable competitor has the potential to alter the landscape. Credit: NASA. A year ago, the Chinese National Space Administration (CNSA) quietly unveiled plans for a significant space exploration initiative, Tianwen-3, to bring back...