Science

A “close encounter” is set to happen between the Moon and Mars tonight (September 29) as they will just be just a little over 2 degrees apart. In India, this celestial event will be at its pinnacle at 8:34pm. The two celestial bodies will share the same right ascension, with the Moon passing to the

While Elon Musk-founded SpaceX has an ambitious plan to execute 52 launches in 2022, its start to the year seems sketchy. The commercial space company had planned to launch an Italian satellite on Thursday (January 27) evening but it is yet to take off due to bad weather. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket was originally

Elon Musk’s commercial space exploration company SpaceX plans to launch 52 missions in 2022. If the company is successful, it would mark the most launches it has ever conducted in a single year. SpaceX is a major partner for NASA, especially for its human spaceflight programme. It is responsible for ferrying astronauts and cargo to

Mars has often been described as Earth’s closest companion in the solar system, having a similar size, inclination, and structural composition. Mars is even believed to have had water on its surface, giving rise to the belief that one day the Red Planet could support life. Colonising Mars is fast becoming a preoccupation among many humans

A chunk of a SpaceX rocket that blasted off seven years ago and was abandoned in space after completing its mission will crash into the Moon in March, experts say. The rocket was deployed in 2015 to put into orbit a NASA satellite called the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR). Since then, the second stage

Saturn, the second-largest planet in the Solar System after Jupiter, has always attracted the attention of not just scientists but also amateur astronomers. Given the prominent rings around it, it is easily recognisable. But it has another outstanding feature: more than 60 moons. One of these moons has got scientists particularly interested recently. According to

Exactly a month after it was launched, NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has reached a position in space from where it will quietly observe the many intriguing events of the cosmos. The Lagrange Point 2, as it’s known, is located 1.5 million kilometres away from Earth on its nightside. The telescope was put into this

Hubble Space Telescope provides astronomers with breathtaking images of the cosmos for deeper studies. Recently, the telescope shared yet another strikingly beautiful image. This time, it captured the NGC 3318 galaxy, which lies in the constellation Vela, located about 115 million light-years away from the Earth. The image was shared by the European Space Agency

NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope is set to orbit the Lagrange point 2 in relation to the Earth and the Sun. But, what does it really mean? Where is Lagrange point 2 located and why is it of note? Explaining the intricacies, the space agency recently tweeted about the orbit that the telescope will follow

Sun’s surface is marked by electrically charged gases that keep generating powerful magnetic forces. Their area of influence is called magnetic fields. As these gases are dynamic, they continuously stretch and twist the magnetic fields. Sometimes, this tangling of magnetic fields causes a sudden explosion of energy called solar flares. These flares, if strong enough,

A recent research based on Hubble Space Telescope findings showed that black holes could go against their all-absorbing nature at times and may aid creation. The research showed a supermassive black hole at the centre of a dwarf galaxy, some 30 million light-years away, creating stars rather than swallowing it. The black hole is apparently

NASA said it has completed deploying all the hexagonal mirror segments of its James Webb Space Telescope. The delicate operation to move the $10-billion (roughly Rs. 74,500 crore) space observatory’s individual mirror segments out of their launch positions took nearly a week, during which the motors made over a million revolutions. The space agency said

Researchers on Thursday reported the latest in a surprising string of experiments in the quest to save human lives with organs from genetically modified pigs. This time around, surgeons in Alabama transplanted a pig’s kidneys into a brain-dead man — a step-by-step rehearsal for an operation they hope to try in living patients possibly later

Space Entertainment Enterprise (SEE) is planning to launch what it claims is the world’s first entertainment studio and multi-purpose arena in zero gravity. The company is co-producing Tom Cruise’s upcoming space movie. SEE has unveiled plans to build a space station module that contains a sports and entertainment arena as well as a content studio by

A Chinese satellite had a near collision with one of the many chunks of debris left by the fallout of a recent Russian anti-satellite missile test, state media reported. Moscow blew up one of its old satellites in November in a missile test that sparked international anger because of the space debris it scattered around

NASA said its Curiosity rover, looking for signs of life on Mars’ Gale Crater, has found intriguing carbon signatures. While this is no definite suggestion that Curiosity has found proof of ancient microbial life, it does, however, suggest its possibility. The rover has been collecting powdered rock samples on the Red Planet’s surface. When scientists

An asteroid bigger than the tallest building on Earth safely flew by on January 19. The giant rock, named 7482 (1994 PC1), zipped past our planet, nearly 1.93 million kilometres away. That’s more than five times the distance between Earth and Moon. It has been classified as “potentially hazardous” because of its size and its

ExoMars — a joint project of European Space Agency (ESA) and Russia’s Roscosmos — has moved a step closer to landing on the Red Planet after it rehearsed how to drive off its Kazachok landing platform on the Martian surface. The simulation involved the UK-built Rosalind Franklin rover making a carefully choreographed move on the

Elon Musk-founded SpaceX has successfully launched 49 more Starlink satellites aboard a Falcon 9 rocket to take the total number to more than 2,000. The Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida, US, on January 19. About nine minutes later, the rocket’s first stage returned back to Earth for a

Scientists have discovered more than 10,000 exoplanets, those that lay quietly beyond our solar system, but they have not been able to locate a moon orbiting any of them – so far. In a new study, they have outlined a discovery that they say could change this. Researchers think the celestial body they have now