Night has fallen for the star-tracking European Space Agency (ESA) spacecraft, Gaia. The mission, which has been mapping the Milky Way for the last 12 years, shut down science operations on Wednesday (Jan. 15). The close of the mission’s data-collecting phase was necessitated by Gaia running...

Astronomers studying elusive supermassive black holes at the hearts of galaxies are intrigued not only by the cosmic behemoths themselves but also by the colossal jets they launch into space at near-light speeds, the biggest of which are known to span millions of light-years. In particular, the...

If you’re more of an auditory learner than a visual one, this timelapse video is for you. (And, well, visual learners will probably love it, too!) The European Space Agency (ESA) has released an audio-visual representation of solar activity over the last three years, pulling data from its...

SpaceX launched another set of its Starlink internet satellites from Florida’s Space Coast this morning (Jan. 13). A Falcon 9 rocket carrying 21 Starlink craft, including 13 with direct to cell capabilities, lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station today at 11:47 a.m. EST (1647 GMT)...

Research work on building China’s Chang’e 7 lunar exploration mission includes sending a flag that can flutter in the moon’s thin and tenuous atmosphere. “We know that the moon is vacuum with no air, so it is difficult to make a flag flutter by wind like on Earth,” said...

SpaceX plans to launch another set of its Starlink internet satellites from Florida’s Space Coast this morning (Jan. 13). A Falcon 9 rocket carrying 21 Starlink craft, including 13 with direct to cell capabilities, is scheduled to lift off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station today during a...

We’ll have to wait a bit longer to see Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket lift off for the first time. Blue Origin, the aerospace company founded by billionaire Jeff Bezos, aimed to launch its first New Glenn heavy-lift rocket from Florida’s Space Coast this morning (Jan. 13), during a...

An experimental satellite made of wood has been deployed from the International Space Station (ISS) to test how the renewable, sustainable material withstands the harsh orbital environment. The satellite, designed and built by Kyoto University and Japanese wood processing company Sumitomo Forestry...

Astronauts aboard China’s Tiangong space station have been getting some assistance from an “intelligent” robot. Cai Xuzhe, Song Lingdong and Wang Haoze — the crew of the current Shenzhou 19 mission aboard Tiangong — have been working alongside a robot named Xiao Hang (“Little...