DARPA is exploring the potential of growing large-scale biological structures (500+ meters) in microgravity, leveraging recent advances in metabolic engineering and biological self-assembly. The initiative aims to revolutionize space infrastructure by enabling the biological manufacturing of structures like space elevator tethers, orbital debris nets, and space station components.
Satellogic operates a constellation of earth observation microsatellites, providing global imagery with up to 5-minute revisit times through their 300-satellite target deployment, and recently launched an open satellite feed program called Satellogic EarthView.
Firefly Aerospace plans to land their Blue Ghost lunar lander near Mare Crisium on March 2 at 3:34 a.m. EST. The mission carries NASA science payloads as part of the CLPS initiative and Artemis campaign for lunar exploration. Live coverage will begin at 2:20 a.m. EST on NASA+.
Euclid telescope has discovered a rare perfect Einstein Ring in NGC 6505, a nearby galaxy only 590 million light-years away. The discovery represents an exceptionally rare astronomical alignment where light from a distant galaxy is bent into a perfect ring by NGC 6505's gravitational field. This finding provides valuable data about dark matter distribution and stellar composition in NGC 6505's central region.
SpaceX is launching a Falcon 9 rocket carrying a mini data center to the moon as part of Lonestar Data Holdings' mission to establish lunar data storage facilities. The project aims to protect sensitive data from Earth-based hazards and bypass data sovereignty restrictions through space-based storage solutions. The initiative faces challenges like latency and maintenance but offers advantages including natural cooling and potential renewable power operations.
DARPA has issued a special notice for research and development in large bio-mechanical space structures, with responses due March 27, 2025. The contract focuses on basic research in national defense R&D services, specifically targeting physical, engineering, and life sciences applications.
SpaceX founder Elon Musk has called for the International Space Station to be deorbited within two years, significantly earlier than NASA's planned 2030 timeline. Despite SpaceX's $843 million contract to assist with the station's eventual deorbit, Musk argues there is little incremental utility in continuing operations.
Lox is a comprehensive astrodynamics API designed for space mission planning and analysis, offering both high-level interfaces and specialized tools. The framework provides Python bindings, extensive time management capabilities, and support for various orbital calculations and celestial body data.
NASA's workforce has decreased by approximately 10% in the past four weeks, with around 750 employees accepting deferred resignations and over 1,000 probationary employees being terminated. Field center directors have been instructed to prepare for potential additional significant workforce reductions, pending budget negotiations between the White House and Congress.
A critical analysis of NASA's 10 coding rules for embedded software programming discusses potential issues with their restrictions, especially around recursion, memory allocation, and function pointers. The analysis emphasizes how these rules, while potentially beneficial for spacecraft software, may lead to less maintainable code and argues against limitations that prevent common programming patterns.