Lifeboat Foundation

Up to 60% of near-Earth objects could be dark comets, mysterious asteroids that orbit the sun in our solar system that likely contain or previously contained ice and could have been one route for delivering water to Earth, according to a University of Michigan study.

The findings suggest that asteroids in the asteroid belt, a region of the solar system roughly between Jupiter and Mars that contains much of the system’s rocky asteroids, have subsurface ice, something that has been suspected since the 1980s, according to Aster Taylor, a U-M graduate student in astronomy and lead author of the study.

The study also shows a potential pathway for delivering ice into the near-Earth solar system, according to Taylor. How Earth got its water is a longstanding question.

An experiment aimed at learning more about how plants grow in space will be aboard a National Aeronautics and Space Administration launch in early August from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.

While the moon lacks any breathable air, it does host a barely-there atmosphere. Since the 1980s, astronomers have observed a very thin layer of atoms bouncing over the moon’s surface. This delicate atmosphere—technically known as an “exosphere”—is likely a product of some kind of space weathering. But exactly what those processes might be has been difficult to pin down with any certainty.

The Sun’s next 11-year solar cycle has been detected in internal sound waves, even though the current Cycle 25 is at its solar maximum and won’t end until mid-2025. This peak period increases sunspots, flares, and coronal mass ejections, sending more electromagnetic energy towards Earth.

Even though the Sun is only halfway through its current 11-year solar cycle, the first rumblings of the next one have already been detected in sound waves inside our home star.

This existing cycle is now at its peak, or ‘solar maximum’ — which is when the Sun’s magnetic field flips and its poles swap places — until mid-2025.

NASA and Boeing are meticulously analyzing recent testing data of the Starliner spacecraft’s propulsion system to ensure its readiness for undocking and safe return from the International Space Station.

The teams are working on finalizing undocking procedures, ensuring system reliability, and conducting simulations. Additionally, astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams are assisting with various tasks aboard the station, maintaining continuous communication with mission control.

Testing and analysis of starliner’s propulsion system.

How do giant planets form and is this process slow or fast based on the amount of available dust used to build those planets? This is what a recent study published in Astronomy & Astrophysics hopes to address as a team of researchers from Germany investigated how sub-micron-sized dust kicks off the planetary formation process within a protoplanetary disc. This study holds the potential to help scientists better understand the formation and evolution of planets throughout our solar system and exoplanetary systems, as well.

For the study, the researchers developed first-of-its-kind model to involve all constituents responsible for the physical processes that from planets. Focusing on sub-micron-sized dust, they included factors such as pebble accumulation, planetary gas buildup, planetary migration, and dust buildup, among others. In the end, they found that ring-shaped disturbances in the protoplanetary disk, which they refer to as substructures, can result in multiple gas giants’ formation in rapid sequence.

Dr. Til Birnstiel, who is a professor of theoretical astrophysics at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München and a co-author on the study, said: “When a planet gets large enough to influence the gas disk, this leads to renewed dust enrichment farther out in the disk. In the process, the planet drives the dust – like a sheepdog chasing its herd – into the area outside its own orbit.”

A peculiar leopard-spotted rock, found beside an ancient, dried-out river in Mars’ Jezero crater, contains some tantalizing clues of ancient life, NASA said.

An astronaut’s photo from the International Space Station showcases Siberia and Lake Baikal at night, with snow and ice brightening the landscape.

Lake Baikal is the largest and deepest freshwater lake, known for its significant age and biodiversity. The image also highlights bright city lights, oil fields, and parts of the Trans-Siberian Railway. UNESCO has designated Lake Baikal a World Heritage site due to its unique fauna.

Siberia and lake baikal at night.

If Mark Kelly, the Space Shuttle pilot who played a pivotal role in assembling the International Space Station, is catapulted into the White House as Vice President, he could quickly help reverse the death sentence that NASA’s current leaders have placed on the ISS.

Now a widely popular U.S. senator and potential running mate of Kamala Harris, Kelly spent the first decade of the new millennium ferrying European and Japanese modules to the Station — and guiding gigantic robotic builders to put the ISS together — all while the outpost was circling the planet at 17,000 miles per hour.

The space hero — recently inducted into the pantheon of the greatest American astronauts — is likely part of a contingent of ISS spacefarers who back saving the orbiting icon from NASA’s death decree by boosting it into a higher orbit and transforming it into an eternal monument to human ingenuity, says Rick Tumlinson, a torchbearer in the “Save Our Station,” or SOS movement.