NASA Sets Briefing, TV Coverage of Japan's First Cargo Spacecraft

NASA will hold a news briefing at 12:30 p.m. CDT on Wednesday, Sept. 2, to preview the maiden launch and flight of Japan's unpiloted H-II Transfer Vehicle (HTV) cargo spacecraft to the International Space Station.NASA Television will broadcast the briefing live from NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston. Participants in the briefing will include officials from NASA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). NASA TV also will broadcast live HTV's launch and flight.The HTV is scheduled to...

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NASA's Latest High-tech Autonomous Robotic Life Forms

NASA's Latest High-tech Autonomous Robotic Life Forms - Funny videos are h...

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Astronomy Picture of the Day

Many stars like our Sun were formed in open clusters. The above pictured open cluster, M25, contains thousands of stars and is about two thousand light years distant. The stars in this cluster all formed together about 90 million years ago. The bright young stars in M25 appear blue. Open clusters, also called galactic clusters, contain fewer and younger stars than globular clusters. Also unlike globular clusters, open clusters are generally confined to the plane of our Galaxy. M25 is visible with...

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STS-128 Mission : Countdown Resumes!

The countdown for the launch of space shuttle Discovery's STS-128 mission is under way again. The count resumed at 8:34 a.m. EDT at the T-11 hour point with no issues being reported that could affect launch.The Rotating Service Structure on Kennedy Space Center's Launch Pad 39A was rolled away from Discovery this morning at 6:11 a.m.NASA's Mission Management Team plans to meet at noon to review launch preparations and determine whether teams will continue to march toward a targeted liftoff tonight...

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Mission Managers Team meeting conducted at noon and took important Decision!

The testing of the liquid hydrogen fill and drain valve in shuttle Discovery’s main propulsion system is complete. The valve and its position indicator both operated normally during yesterday’s testing. And all leak checks were within specification.The evaluation of the low-level hydrogen leak detected in a tail service mast on the mobile launcher platform on Launch Pad 39A following Tuesday's launch scrub is complete, and no leaks were detected.All the test data will be brought to the mission management...

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STS-128 Mission : Launch Team Targets Aug 28th Launch!

NASA is targeting space shuttle Discovery for a launch attempt Friday morning at 12:22 a.m., mission management team Chairman Mike Moses said. Engineers will evaluate a liquid hydrogen valve that developed problems during tanking operations Tuesday evening. Detailed test data about the valve will be examined before Discovery’s fuel tank is loaded with propellant ahead of Friday morning’s launch attempt.Friday Morning Forecast: 70 Percent "Go":The weather outlook for Friday morning's targeted launch...

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Discovery's Launch Delayed Due to Weather!

Launch of space shuttle Discovery was postponed early this morning due to lingering thunderstorms in the vicinity of the launch pad. Launch has been rescheduled for Wednesday, Aug. 26 at 1:10 a.m. EDT.The mission management team will meet at 3 p.m. today to give the “go- no go” for tanking operations. The current STS-128 launch day weather forecast is 70 percent favorable conditions for tanking and launch. The primary concern is cumulus clouds and showers within 20 nautical miles of the shuttle...

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Hurricane Season 2009: Hurricane Bill (Atlantic)

NASA GOES Project Satellite Movie: Bill Heads North to CanadaBill lost his tropical characteristics today, August 24, as he's moved past Newfoundland and is tracking east in the North Atlantic Ocean. NASA's GOES Project at the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center created a satellite movie of Bill's track up the east coast and into the Canadian Maritimes from August 21 through August 23.The Geostationary Operational Environmental Satellite, GOES-12, operated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration...

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Space Shuttle Discovery Ready For Flight!

Space shuttle Discovery is in the final stages of preparation before its flight to the International Space Station from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.Fueling of Discovery's external tank with 500,000 gallons of super-cold liquid oxygen and hydrogen is scheduled to begin at 4:11 p.m. EDT, depending on weather conditions at the time. The "topping off" of propellants into the tank will continue until Discovery's liftoff. All systems aboard the shuttle are functioning normally and no issues...

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Countdown to Launch Continues Smoothly-STS 128!

Discovery's launch remains on track for 1:36 a.m. EDT Tuesday for its 13-day mission to the International Space Station.At today's Countdown Status Briefing held at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, NASA Test Director Charlie Blackwell-Thompson was pleased to report that all countdown preparations are on schedule and looking forward to a great launch."In this business there are few sites as beautiful as a nighttime launch," said Blackwell-Thompson. "And I expect this to be a spectacular site...

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NASA Launches : Inflatable Heat Shield

A successful NASA flight test has shown that a spacecraft returning to Earth can use an inflatable heat shield to slow and protect itself as it enters the atmosphere at hypersonic speeds. This was the first time anyone has successfully flown an inflatable reentry capsule, according to engineers at NASA's Langley Research Center.The Inflatable Re-entry Vehicle Experiment, or IRVE, was vacuum-packed into a 15-inch diameter payload "shroud" and launched on a small sounding rocket from NASA's Wallops...

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NASA Reveals Evolution of Life on Earth!

Humans might not be walking on Earth today if not for the ancient fusing of two microscopic, single-celled organisms called prokaryotes, NASA-funded research has found.By comparing proteins present in more than 3000 different prokaryotes - a type of single-celled organism without a nucleus -- molecular biologist James A. Lake from the University of California at Los Angeles' Center for Astrobiology showed that two major classes of relatively simple microbes fused together more than 2.5 billion years...

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Ultimate Long Distance Communication!

Anyone who's vacationed in the mountains or lived on a farm knows that it's hard to get good internet access or a strong cell phone signal in a remote area. Communicating across great distances has always been a challenge. So when NASA engineers designed the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), they knew it would need an extraordinary communications system.Over the next year, the LRO, NASA's diligent robotic scout, will collect more information about the moon's surface and environment than any previous...

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Outsized Heat of Sun's Atmosphere!

"Why is the sun's corona so darned hot?" asks James Klimchuk, an astrophysicist at the Goddard Space Flight Center's Solar Physics Laboratory in Greenbelt, Md.The mystery of why temperatures in the solar corona, the sun's outer atmosphere, soar to several million degrees Kelvin (K) —much hotter than temperatures nearer the sun's surface—has puzzled scientists for decades. New observations made with instruments aboard Japan's Hinode satellite reveal the culprit to be nanoflares.Nanoflares are small,...

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NASA Managers Set to Meet!

NASA officials will conduct a Flight Readiness Review on Aug.18 at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida to discuss the preparations for space shuttle Discovery's STS-128 mission to the International Space Station and set a firm date for launch.On Saturday, 18 plug pulls were completed and passed the bond adhesion test. Foam loss during the last two shuttle launches from one particular ice-frost ramp, or IFR, high up on the liquid oxygen tank led to a detailed examination.Meanwhile, the STS-128...

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Sam Katzoff Turns 100

Sam Katzoff is celebrating his 100th birthday Monday in a cozy three-bedroom apartment, with his oxygen machine, his books, his art and memories. . .. . .of 1936, when he was a newly-minted chemist with a doctorate from Johns Hopkins, looking for a job at a time when more chemists were being laid off than hired.'Dr. Sam' at home. Credit: Laura Hodges "I saw an advertisement for a junior physicist," Katzoff says, occasionally haltingly, more often in a firm, conversational tone from his chair, alongside...

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NASA Latest Video

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Formation of Stars

Cepheus B, a molecular cloud located in our Milky Galaxy about 2,400 light years from the Earth, provides an excellent model to determine how stars are formed. This composite image of Cepheus B combines data from the Chandra X-ray Observatory and the Spitzer Space Telescope.A molecular cloud is a region containing cool interstellar gas and dust left over from the formation of the galaxy and mostly contains molecular hydrogen. The Spitzer data, in red, green and blue shows the molecular cloud (in...

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Nasa Image of the day

SunsetLayers of Earth's atmosphere, brightly colored as the sun sets, are featured in this image taken by the STS-127 crew on the Earth-orbiting space shuttle...EndeavourEndeavour kicked up dust as it touches down on Runway 15 at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida to complete the 16-day, 6.5-million mile journey on...Stars at the Galactic CenterThe center of our Milky Way Galaxy is hidden from the prying eyes of optical telescopes by clouds of obscuring dust and gas. But, in this stunning vista,...Rollout...

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Nasa Doomsday 2012 Galactic Alignment Information Leaked

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Time Flies When You’re Having Fun

Hi. My name is Nicole Passonno Stott. At 46 years old, I’m a mother, I’m a wife, and I’m a NASA astronaut who’s about to make her first space flight. I’m writing this journal to try and share some of my experiences preparing for the flight and then once on orbit I hope there will be some surprising things to share with you about living and working in space.Like so many things in life, this job has proven for me that time really does fly when you’re having fun. It was a “mere” 9 years ago that I...

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NASA's Moon Mapper Beholds Home!

This image of Earth taken from 200 kilometers (124 miles) above the lunar surface was taken by the Moon Mineralogy Mapper, one of two NASA instruments onboard the Indian Space Research Organization's Chandrayaan-1 spacecraft. Australia is visible in the lower center of the image. The image is presented as a false-color composite with oceans a dark blue, clouds white, and vegetation an enhanced green. The image data were acquired on July 22, 2009. The Moon Mineralogy Mapper instrument is a state-of-the-art...

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21st Century Style - Return To The Moon!

It was an extraordinary feat when Apollo engineers designed a spacecraft to go somewhere no human had ever gone before. Especially when that place was the moon - 240,000 miles from Earth. Now forty years after the first moon landing, NASA has turned its attention back to lunar missions, this time planning to stay longer.The spacecraft to carry future explorers to the moon, the Orion crew exploration vehicle, looks very similar to the Apollo spacecraft. The crew module borrows the familiar conical...

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