New brine processor increases water recycling on International Space Station

NASA’s newest technology demonstration, which launched on Northrop Grumman’s 15th commercial resupply services mission, is designed to improve water recycling on the International Space Station and boost the efficiency of water recycling for the Artemis generation. Source: https://phys.org/news/2021-03-brine-processor-recycling-international-space-1.html…

ESA is working on a mission to explore caves on the moon

Infrastructure is going to be one of the biggest components of any permanent human settlement on the moon. NASA Artemis missions are focused directly on building up the facilities and processes necessary to support a moon base. ESA is also contributing both material and knowledge. Most recently, they made another step in their path to explore lava tubes and caves in…

Artemis: How ever-changing U.S. space policy may push back the next moon landing

Harrison Schmitt and Eugene Cernan blasted off from the Taurus-Littrow valley on the moon in their lunar module Challenger on December 14 1972. Five days later, they splashed down safely in the Pacific, closing the Apollo 17 mission and becoming the last humans to visit the lunar surface or venture anywhere beyond low-Earth orbit. Source: https://phys.org/news/2021-02-artemis-ever-changing-space-policy-moon.html…

Teaching an old spacecraft new tricks to continue exploring the moon

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) spacecraft has far exceeded its planned mission duration, revealing that the Moon holds surprises: ice deposits that could be used to support future lunar exploration, the coldest places in the solar system in permanently shadowed regions at the lunar poles, and that it is an active world that is shrinking, generating moonquakes and changing in front…

NASA’s Artemis Base Camp on the moon will need light, water, elevation

American astronauts in 2024 will take their first steps near the moon’s south pole: the land of extreme light, extreme darkness, and frozen water that could fuel NASA’s Artemis lunar base and the agency’s leap into deep space. Source: https://phys.org/news/2021-01-nasa-artemis-base-moon-elevation.html…

A moon rock decorates Biden’s Oval Office

A lunar sample collected during Apollo 17, the final mission to the moon, is now on display in President Biden’s Oval Office. Source: https://earthsky.org/human-world/moon-rock-in-president-bidens-oval-office…

Halted rocket test could stall NASA moon shot, redo possible

NASA is considering a second firing of its moon rocket engines after a critical test came up short over the weekend, a move that could bump the first flight in the Artemis lunar-landing program into next year. Source: https://phys.org/news/2021-01-halted-rocket-stall-nasa-moon.html…

6 space missions to look forward to in 2021

Here are some of the space missions to keep an eye out for in 2021. Source: https://earthsky.org/space/6-space-missions-2021-artemis-chandrayaa3-jameswebb…

‘Major Component Malfunction’ Ends SLS Rocket Test Early. NASA Considers New Timeline

“NASA’s rocket charged with taking the agency back to the moon fired its four main engines Saturday afternoon, but the test in Mississippi was cut short after a malfunction caused an automatic abort,” reports Florida Today… “We did get an MCF on engine four,” a control room member said less than a minute into the test fire, using an initialism that…

Watch NASA Test-Fire Its SLS Mega-Rocket Engines

“The date is set,” NASA tweeted yesterday, thanking its partners Boeing Space and Aerojet Rocketdyne for Saturday’s “hot fire” test of the SLS’s core stage. “One of NASA’s main goals for 2021 is to launch Artemis I, an uncrewed moon mission meant to show the Orion spacecraft and Space Launch System rocket can safely send humans to our lunar neighbor,” reports…