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project sponsored by the German Aerospace Center, Enceladus Explorer, was launched on February 22, 2012, in an attempt to answer the question of whether there could be life on (or rather, inside) Enceladus. The project lays the groundwork for a new, ambitious mission being proposed for some time in the future

The military won't say what it has been doing with its experimental miniature space shuttle, but the pilotless spaceship, known as the X-37B, has been in orbit for a year now. The 29-foot robotic spacecraft, also known as the Orbital Test Vehicle, or OTV, was launched on March 5, 2011, on a follow-up flight to extend capabilities demonstrated by a sistership during a 244-day debut mission in 2010.

"The X-37B program is setting the standard for a reusable space plane and, on this one-year orbital milestone, has returned great value on the experimental investment,"

Amateur satellite watchers last spotted the spaceship on March 4 as it circled between 204 and 212 miles above the planet in an orbit inclined 42.8 degrees relative to the equator.

Data from NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft indicate that the venerable deep-space explorer has encountered a region in space where the intensity of charged particles from beyond our solar system has markedly increased

draw closer to an inevitable but historic conclusion - that humanity's first emissary to interstellar space is on the edge of our solar system

someday Voyager will become the first human-made object to enter interstellar space, but we still do not know exactly when that someday will be

Black holes powering distant quasars in the early Universe grazed on patches of gas or passing galaxies rather than glutting themselves in dramatic collisions according to new observations from NASA’s Spitzer and Hubble space telescopes

A black hole doesn’t need much gas to satisfy its hunger and turn into a quasar

Quasars are distant and brilliant galactic powerhouses. These far-off objects are powered by black holes that glut themselves on captured material; this in turn heats the matter to millions of degrees making it super luminous

combined power of NASA's Spitzer and Hubble space telescopes as well as a cosmic magnification effect, a team

has spotted what could be the most distant galaxy ever detected.

Light from the young galaxy captured by the orbiting observatories shone forth when the 13.7-billion-year-old universe was just 500 million years old

NASA invited the public to submit their names that will be engraved on a microchip aboard a spacecraft that will head to the 1,760-foot-wide asteroid.

The spacecraft will be sent to the asteroid where it will collect about two ounces of surface material and return with it to Earth in a sample-return capsule in 2023

submit their names online before September 30 at 'Message to Bennu.'

Planetary Resources raised more than $1.5 million in 33 days to launch a small space telescope into low Earth orbit in 2015

17,614 people donated money for the crowdsourced Arkyd-100

The company hit that goal June 19, then raked in another $505,366 in the final 10 days of the campaign, including $100,000 on June 30 from Virgin Group Chairman Richard Branson.

NASA cannot recover the two failed reaction wheels that stopped Kepler from doing its primary science mission

the spacecraft, which is already working years past when its prime mission ceased in 2010, is still in great shape otherwise

could be anything from searching for asteroids to a technique called microlensing, which could show Jupiter-sized planets around other stars with the spacecraft’s more limited pointed ability

European Space Agency's engineers will use burnt bone charcoal to protect its solar probe from the harsh glare of the Sun.

Burnt bone charcoal, also used in prehistoric cave paintings, will be used by scientists in the titanium heatshield of ESA's Solar Orbiter spacecraft.

will help in protecting the Orbiter from the strong glare of the Sun

Ever since the first relay for the 1936 summer Olympic games in Berlin, Olympic torches have traditionally been used to carry a burning flame

from Greece to the host country’s stadium

On Nov. 6, 2013 (Nov. 7 UT) a Soyuz TMA-11M rocket launched

Soviet spacecraft reaches Venus surface

In 1966, the mission of the Soviet Union's unmanned spacecraft Venera 3 (Venus 3) was a partial success when it reached Venus and automatically released a small landing capsule intended to explore the planet's atmosphere during a parachute descent. However, contact had been lost since 16 Feb 1966. Although no data was returned before the capsule impacted, it became the first man-made object to touch the surface of another planet. The Soviet Union issued a commemorative stamp to mark the achievement. Venera 3 was launched on 16 Nov 1965. The landing capsule (0.9-m diam., about 300-kg) had been designed to collect data on pressure, temperature, and composition of the Venusian atmosphere. Failure is believed due to overheating of internal components and the solar panels

NASA says the most distant human made object — the Voyager 1 spacecraft — is in interstellar space

It actually made the transition about a year ago

there is a bit of an argument on the semantics of whether Voyager 1 is still inside or outside of our Solar System

University of Iowa space physicist

says there is solid evidence that NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft has become the first manmade object to reach interstellar space

11 billion miles distant and 36 years after it was launched

After almost 9 years in space

July 4th impact and subsequent flyby of a comet, an additional comet flyby, and the return of approximately 500,000 images of celestial objects

NASA’s Deep Impact/EPOXI mission has officially been brought to a close.

Sept. 29

Cygnus commercial cargo ship docked at the International Space Station (ISS)

a few hours later the Next Generation commercial SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket

Only after a particular camera on the Hubble Space Telescope had been repaired on the last servicing mission by the Space Shuttle did we gain the sensitivity to really search for these plumes

Future space probe missions to Europa could confirm that the exact locations and sizes of vents and determine whether they connect to liquid subsurface reservoirs

ESA's JUpiter ICy moons Explorer, a mission planned for launch in 2022, and which aims to explore both Jupiter and three of its largest moons: Ganymede, Callisto, and Europa.

Mars One announced

Lockheed Martin and Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd. were awarded contracts to study and develop concepts for a Mars lander and a data link satellite,

for a 2018 exploratory mission

Examination of the Martian atmosphere by NASA's Curiosity Mars rover confirms that some meteorites that have dropped to Earth really are from the Red Planet

A key new measurement of the inert gas argon in Mars' atmosphere by Curiosity's laboratory provides the most definitive evidence yet of the origin of Mars meteorites while at the same time providing a way to rule out Martian origin of other meteorites

The new measurement is a high-precision count of two forms of argon -- argon-36 and argon-38 -- accomplished by the Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) instrument inside the rover.

New data collected by NASA's Mars rover Curiosity has pinned down the exact ratio of two forms of the inert gas argon in the Martian atmosphere

help confirm the origins of some meteorites

could also help researchers understand how and when Mars lost most of its atmosphere