A fascinating experiment is underway at the Marshall Space Flight Center to demonstrate the potential of a new form of solar sail which does away with the fabric entirely. Instead of attempting to deploy a troublesome sail made of mylar, the E-Sail uses instead a series of thin aluminum wires spun out from the slowly […]
One of the most exciting and innovative robotic space exploration missions we have been privileged to witness has won one of space exploration’s most prestigious awards. From NASA.gov NASA’s Dawn project team recently earned two prestigious awards, honoring its successful mission to giant asteroid Vesta and dwarf planet Ceres. On March 8, the Dawn project […]
We’ve seen elements of the story before; a team of experts, some long in the tooth, are put together in order to contact a long derelict spacecraft in hopes of averting disaster. Other times the old probe comes back with a new mission, aka V’Ger or its equally confused predecessor NOMAD. One way or another, […]
In contrast to the somewhat disappointing press briefing yesterday, especially considering the bizarre and confusing buildup, on mixed findings from the Mars Curiosity Rover, another NASA briefing proved considerably more interesting. It concerned the latest, and presumably some of the last findings to come from the much older, simpler and far more distant Voyager 1 probe as it traverses through what science fiction might call an […]
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