NASA

When The Space Shuttle was conceived, its mission was to make space flight “cheap.” (As these things go.) Original estimates had hoped that eventually the program would cost a frugal $50 million per launch. That dream was never realized, and in the end cost a total of $196 billion — an average of $450 million Continue Reading →

In June 2014, astronauts whizzing by high above us in the International Space Station may be able to print a highly detailed plastic Yoda head or, barring that, important parts that they may need while in orbit. NASA has already designed and built their own additive manufacturing printer that has a build envelope of about Continue Reading →

In 2011, NASA commissioned the National Research Council to put together a report to serve as a “comprehensive independent assessment of NASA’s strategic direction and agency management.” That report, released on Wednesday, reads as a damning litany of what’s wrong with one of the United States government’s crown jewels. NASA, for all its accomplishments over Continue Reading →

Anyone that’s ever tried to plan an outdoor activity in advance knows that weather forecasting is not an exact science, but the perpetual sky-watchers at NASA may have inadvertently found a way to improve these guesstimations. They have been testing a laser system for measuring lunar dust and soil kicked up by rocket exhausts, and Continue Reading →

Turkey and all the trimmings are a staple for Americans on Thanksgiving, and that doesn’t have to change for Americans in space. Astronaut food has come a long way from the early days of human spaceflight, and crewmembers on the International Space Station these days can enjoy many Turkey Day traditions, such as cornbread stuffing, Continue Reading →

Yes, seriously. NASA announced on Wednesday that its Curiosity rover had “checked in” on Mars via Foursquare. Marking the first check in from another world, the robotic rover will utilize the location-minded social network to share updates and pictures while visiting the Red Planet. While Curiosity will continue to explore the possibilities of Mars being Continue Reading →

Neil Armstrong — who has died at the age of 82 — was best known as the commander of Apollo 11, but his career at NASA began nearly a decade earlier as a research test pilot. A trained aerospace engineer, Armstrong was a self-described “white-socks, pocket-protector, nerdy engineer” who worked at the cutting edge of Continue Reading →

You can’t win ’em all. Such is the case with the Curiosity rover, anyway, as diagnostics have revealed that its wind sensors have sustained damage. NASA engineers aren’t fully sure what caused this minor setback to the otherwise successful landing, but hypothesize that stones might’ve been kicked up during the rocket-powered landing, which then struck Continue Reading →

It’s that time again: time for Carnegie Mellon to roll out the red carpet and welcome the crème de la crème of the robotics world into its halls. Since 2003 the school has been selecting the best of the best and inducting them into the Robot Hall of Fame. Past honorees have included everything from Continue Reading →

NASA plans to launch a relatively modest Mars lander in 2016 that will make a rocket-powered descent to the surface to study whether the red planet’s core is solid or liquid and whether the planet has tectonic plates that slowly move like continents on Earth, agency managers said Monday. The primary goals of the cost-capped Continue Reading →