Space

The Inspiration4 mission has lifted off atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The mission differs from any previous crewed mission in that it is the first conducted entirely as a private venture.

Astronomers have detected a strange radio source from near the center of the Milky Way. The signal repeats seemingly at random and can’t be attributed to any known astronomical object, leading the team to consider that it may be something brand new.

NASA has finally set a date for the launch of the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). If all goes to plan, the long-awaited flagship mission will blast into orbit on December 18, 2021, from French Guiana onboard an Ariane 5 rocket.

NASA has released an image showing that the Perseverance Mars rover has successfully retrieved its first rock drill sample for return to Earth. Taken by the Mastcam-Z, the image shows a drill bit holding a pencil-thick core in the sample tube.

An international team of scientists has calculated that a crewed mission to Mars should only last a maximum of four years if the astronauts' health isn't to be endangered by prolonged exposure to cosmic radiation.

Astronomers have spotted a new type of supernova for the first time. An unlucky star seems to have prematurely exploded after colliding with an extremely dense object, perhaps a black hole or a neutron star, creating a unique signature in the sky.

A space-debris-clearing drag sail developed by Purdue engineers called Spinnaker3 that is large enough to pull a spent rocket booster out of a 400-mile orbit to safely burn up in the Earth's atmosphere will be put to the test next month.

Private orbital debris removal company Astroscale has demonstrated its magnetic capture system that is designed to tackle the problem of space junk, with its ELSA-d servicer satellite managing to capture a simulated piece of space debris in orbit.

Dawn Aerospace has announced that it has successfully completed five test flights of its uncrewed Mk-II Aurora suborbital spaceplane in the skies over Glentanner Aerodrome on New Zealand’s South Island using surrogate jet engines instead of a rocket.

It looks like the James Webb Space Telescope might actually launch in October, for real this time. The perennially delayed instrument has completed its final tests and is now being prepped for shipment to the launch facility.

We might be one step closer to an answer for the intriguing cosmic mystery of fast radio bursts. By examining multiple “radio colors” simultaneously in a batch of repeating signals, astronomers have ruled out a leading model for their origin.

In the hunt for extraterrestrial life, most of our attention has been focused on Earth-like worlds. But now, astronomers have defined a new class of exoplanet called “Hycean” worlds that could be a promising place to find signs of life.