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Christina Koch will set a record for longest spaceflight by a woman
Thanks to NASA's recent schedule changes, astronaut Christina Koch will soon hold the record for the longest space flight by a woman. Koch arrived at the International Space Station on March 14 and has already conducted one spacewalk. She'll now remain in orbit until February 2020, and she'll surpass the current record, which is 288 days, held by Peggy Whitson. But Koch will fall just short of the longest spaceflight by a NASA astronaut -- Scott Kelly's 340-day trip.
CRISPR gene editing has been used on humans in the US
The first human trials in the US for CRISPR gene editing are officially underway. A University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia spokesman has confirmed to NPR that two cancer patients, one with myeloma and one with sarcoma, have received CRISPR treatments after standard treatment didn't hold. The trial removes, modifies and reinserts immune cells in hopes they'll destroy cancerous cells.
NASA’s TESS spacecraft finds its first Earth-sized exoplanet
One year after its launch, NASA's TESS (Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite) discovered its first Earth-sized exoplanet. Named HD21749c, the planet orbits a star just 53 light-years from Earth and is likely rocky but uninhabitable. The findings -- published in Astrophysical Journal Letters -- suggest TESS is capable of fulfilling its mission to catalog thousands of planet candidates, including more than 300 that are expected to be Earth-sized and super-Earth-sized exoplanets.
NASA’s Cassini data shows Titan’s lakes are stranger than we thought
NASA's Cassini-Huygens spacecraft made its fateful plunge into Saturn's atmosphere in 2017, but scientists are still using the data it sent home to make surprising discoveries. Two papers published in Nature Astronomy reveal new information about the lakes on Titan, Saturn's largest moon. The small liquid lakes in Titan's northern hemisphere are more than 100 meters deep, perched atop plateaus and filled with methane. They also appear to be seasonal. And the bodies of liquid on one side of the northern hemisphere are completely different than those on the other side.
SpaceX loses Falcon Heavy's center booster to the sea
SpaceX successfully landed all three of Falcon Heavy's boosters after its most recent launch, but it won't be able to reuse one of them. The company lost the core booster that landed on its drone ship "Of Course I Still Love You" to rough seas as it was making its way back to Port Canaveral. It was the heavy-lift rocket's second launch and the first time SpaceX was able to stick all three boosters' landing -- the one that was supposed to land on the barge after the first flight dropped straight into the ocean.
Israel's Moon probe snaps a final photo before crashing
The Beresheet spacecraft from Israel's SpaceIL was facing long odds to land on the Moon, being the first ever privately launched probe to attempt it. Alas, its engine cut out during the landing attempt, communication was lost, and Beresheet crashed into the surface. Fortunately, just before that happened, the spacecraft turned its camera toward the Moon's horizon and managed to snap a final, sublime photo of its cratered surface.
After Math: Eat your heart out, Soundgarden
From the first direct images of a black hole and a nearly-successful private moon landing to self-healing exosuits and self-retrieving rockets, read on for the top stories from what's been a stellar week for space science!
SpaceIL plans second private Moon lander despite crash
SpaceIL's first attempt at a private Moon landing didn't go according to plan. However, that isn't deterring the team from giving it another shot. Founder Morris Khan has announced that the team will build another Beresheet lander and "complete the mission." The task force behind the new lander will start its work "first thing" on April 14th, he said.
Stratolaunch completes the first flight of the world's largest airplane
Stratolaunch is making some history even as it scales back its ambitions -- the company has successfully flown the world's largest aircraft, the Scaled Composites Stratolaunch, for the first time. The dual-fuselage rocket hauler took off from the Mojave Air and Space Port soon after 10AM Eastern on April 13th and completed a roughly 2.5-hour journey, reaching a maximum altitude of 17,000 feet. It wasn't carrying a payload, but its trip is still a big deal for a machine that was first announced eight years ago and boasts an unprecedented 385-foot wingspan.
SpaceX will assist NASA's first-ever mission to redirect an asteroid
NASA has chosen SpaceX to help out on its first-ever attempt to deflect an asteroid. The Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) will blast off on a Falcon 9 rocket in June 2021 from the Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. Its mission: To smash a satellite into the Didymos asteroid's small moon in a bid to knock it off its orbit. What sounds like the plot of a Michael Bay movie could turn out to be NASA's first line of defense against Earth-bound asteroids.
NASA compared twin astronauts to see if space ages the human body
A NASA study that compared two twins, one who finished a nearly year-long mission in space and one who spent that time in Earth, found that most of the dramatic changes that happen to the human body in space aren't permanent. Scott Kelly, who was aboard the International Space Station between 2015 and 2016, experienced many physical and genetic changes that his twin brother and fellow astronaut Mark Kelly, who was back on Earth, did not. But once the Kelly brother who was in space landed, his body gradually returned to normal. Some negative impacts from the mission still linger on Kelly, posing a challenge for scientists as they explore longer space flight, such as travel to Mars.
Falcon Heavy successfully completes triple-booster landing
SpaceX launched its Falcon Heavy rocket on Thursday evening, following a one-day delay due to inclement weather. The plan is for the rocket's side boosters and central core stage to return to Earth, which will be particularly challenging. Space X failed on the center core part during last year's launch. If they are successful his evening, it will be the world's first successful triple rocket landing.
Privately-owned Moon lander crashes in historic attempt
Private spaceflight isn't quite ready to mark another milestone. SpaceIL's Beresheet lander has crashed on the Moon after mission controllers lost communication during its descent to the lunar surface. It did successfully take a selfie on the way down, but its experiments are a bust. It was supposed to measure the local magnetic field and use a NASA-made laser retroreflector array (eight mirrors with quartz cube corners) to relay its position to the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter using light.
Three teams will compete for millions in DARPA's rocket launch challenge
Despite all of the advancements in space travel, rocket launches are still hindered by the fact that they take months, if not years, to plan and execute. Because that could slow vital military operations, DARPA created the Launch Challenge: a call for commercial companies to prove they can get rockets into space quickly and on short notice. Now the three finalists have been selected for the next phase of the challenge.
Virgin Orbit will launch satellites from Guam
Virgin Orbit has added one more location to its growing list of launch sites: Guam. The US island territory's close proximity to the equator and its remote location make it an ideal addition to the program. It can serve as a launch site for missions leaving from any direction and for any orbital inclination. Plus, Virgin Orbit can deploy flights from the island if it needs to deliver payloads as heavy as a thousand pounds to equatorial orbit.
The Morning After: We saw a black hole
Hey, good morning! You look fabulous. Hey, you want to see a black hole? Now you can. Also, SpaceX is about to attempt something you've just got to watch live (the view of two booster rockets landing in perfect sync is amazing), and the House of Representatives is trying to save net neutrality.
Recycling robot can sort paper and plastic by touch
It can be a pain for workers to sort recycling, both because of the safety and the sheer monotony of it. But how do you get robots to do the job when they can't always tell the difference between a can and a cardboard tube? For MIT CSAIL, it's simple: give the robots a sense of touch. Its researchers have developed a recycling robot, RoCycle, that uses sensors in its hand to determine the nature of an item and sort it accordingly. A strain sensor gauges an object's size, while two pressure sensors determine how squishy that object may be, whether it's easily-crushed paper or more rigid plastic. It can even detect the presence of metal, since the sensors are conductive.
Self-healing space suits among 18 ideas to receive NASA funding
It once required an open mind and an active imagination to believe we could launch humans into space. Now, we take human space flight for granted, but we still need that out-of-the-box thinking to push the boundaries of exploration in this solar system and beyond. That's where NASA's Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program comes in. It's meant to foster ideas that sound borderline science fiction but have the potential to become new technologies. Today, NASA announced 18 innovative concepts that will receive NIAC funding.
Watch SpaceX's Falcon Heavy launch and triple booster landing (update: take two)
Last year SpaceX finally launched its massive Falcon Heavy rocket for the first time. While the plan to return all three of its boosters fell just short of success, today the company will try again, and as usual you can watch a live stream of the attempt right here. This is also the first use of its more powerful Block 5 boosters that provide additional thrust for the Arabsat-6A mission. The launch window is scheduled to open at 8 PM ET, however the latest information suggested high winds could push a launch toward the end of the window at 8:32 PM. Once again, the plan is for the rocket's side boosters to pull off a synchronized ground landing, while SpaceX attempts its first successful return of the center core to a droneship in the ocean. If it does not launch today, then the next launch window is tomorrow from 6:35 PM ET until 8:31 PM. Update (7:30 PM ET): The launch attempt has been scrubbed for today due to "Upper atmospheric wind shear." The next opportunity is still set for tomorrow, April 11th. Update (5 PM ET, April 11th): According to SpaceX, all systems and weather are a go, with the launch window opening at 6:35 PM ET. Update (7 PM ET, April 11th): The launch and triple landing was successful!
This is the first real picture of a black hole
Yes, it happened. After years of relying on computer-generated imagery, scientists using the Event Horizon Telescope have captured the first real image of a black hole. The snapshot of the supermassive black hole in the Messier 87 galaxy (about 55 million light years away) shows the "shadow" created as the event horizon bends and sucks in light. It also confirms that the black hole is truly huge, with a mass 6.5 billion times that of the Sun. As you might imagine, taking this picture was tricky -- it required worldwide collaboration that wasn't possible until recently.