Nov 14th, 2008 · Mechanical engineers Seth Lichter and Mark Weislogel wondered what would happen if they popped water balloons aboard NASA's low-gravity aircraft. Aside from the "fun-factor," as Weislogel puts it, the results demonstrate some basic principles of physics.
Nov 12th, 2008 · Using NASA satellite photos of Earth, we can calculate that the world supports roughly 61 trees per person. But are we using up our allotments? An Evergreen State College ecology professor and her students look at how we burn through wood-based resources.
Nov 11th, 2008 · NASA has lost contact with the Mars Phoenix probe, and officials say the mission is over. Phoenix landed in the northern polar region of Mars last May. Mission managers knew this day was coming. It's getting to be winter at the Phoenix landing site, and the few hours of daylight aren't enough for the lander's solar panels to recharge the batteries.
Nov 10th, 2008 · The Mars Phoenix probe landed in the northern polar region of Mars last May. Since then, it has been snapping pictures, making weather measurements and doing chemical analysis on the Martian soil. Managers of the mission now say it is dead.
Oct 31st, 2008 · The MESSENGER probe captured images of never-before-seen aspects of the closest planet to the Sun during a recent flyby. Researcher Sean Soloman discusses the MESSENGER mission, which aims to be the first man-made object to orbit Mercury.
Oct 9th, 2008 · Richard Garriott, a famous video game developer, is paying millions of dollars for a ride on a Russian rocket to the International Space Station. He's wanted to go to space since he was a kid. His father and all his neighbors were NASA astronauts. Garriott is America's first, second generation astronaut.
Oct 3rd, 2008 · SpaceX's flagship Falcon1 rocket has successfully launched from an island in the central Pacific, becoming the first privately-developed rocket to orbit the planet. NASA has already contracted SpaceX to begin private space flight missions to the International Space Station beginning in 2010.
Oct 3rd, 2008 · NASA has postponed a planned repair mission to the Hubble Space Telescope after a new problem developed with the orbiting observatory. Ed Weiler, associate administrator of the Science Mission Directorate at NASA, explains why repairs won't take place until Feb. 2009 — at the earliest.