NASA has announced the appointment of Jonathan Lunine as chief scientist of Jet Propulsion Laboratory, effective Aug. 16. Lunine, who has a doctorate in planetary science from the California Institute of Technology, serves as a physical sciences professor and chair of the Department of Astronomy at Cornell University. In his new role, he will guide […]
Blue Canyon Technologies, a subsidiary of RTX specializing in small satellite manufacturing, has established communications with two cube satellites built for NASA’s Polar Radiant Energy in the Far InfraRed Experiment mission. Designed to measure Earth’s heat emissions from the polar regions, PREFIRE aims to improve climate and ice modeling, Blue Canyon said. The mission, managed […]
Bryon McClain, the Space Systems Command’s program executive officer for space domain awareness and combat power, said Spacecom is considering concepts for smaller spacecraft to augment the satellite constellation under the U.S. Space Force’s Geosynchronous Space Situational Awareness Program. The command’s solicitation for satellite ideas, issued in March, also specifies maneuverable spacecraft with different sensors […]
Terran Orbital has added its Nebula and Ambassador micro space vehicle platforms to the NASA Rapid Spacecraft Acquisition IV On-Ramp III contract, which already offers the 6U Triumph and 12U Renegade cubesats to government agencies. Marc Bell, co-founder, chairman and CEO of Terran Orbital, said that expanding the company’s role in the Rapid IV program […]
The Hubble Space Telescope could soon operate on a single gyroscope as NASA extends its life without the need for commercial servicing. On Tuesday, the U.S. space agency announced that one of the Hubble’s remaining gyros “failed and could not be restored.” The development left the spacecraft with two working gyros, prompting NASA to activate […]
NASA’s Kennedy Space Center has awarded Advanced Cooling Technologies a contract worth over $6 million to design, manufacture and test two rollout purge units for NASA’s Mobile Launcher 2. The RPUs will replace existing mini portable purge units and support the Space Launch System Block 1B program, ACT said. They will be integrated into the […]
Peru and Slovakia have signed the Artemis Accords, making them the 41st and 42nd countries, respectively, to join the U.S.-led initiative that provides a set of principles designed to guide civil space exploration. Javier Gonzalez-Olaechea, Peru’s foreign minister, and Tomas Drucker, Slovakian minister of education, research, development and youth, attended a ceremony hosted by the […]
The Space Development Agency is building a pool of experienced and capable contractors aimed at accelerating the process of securing support services for its future technology demonstrations. In a solicitation posted on SAM .gov, the SDA said that it established the Hybrid Acquisition for Proliferated LEO program to provide non-traditional defense contractors with the opportunity […]
NASA has selected proposals from BAE Systems, Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman to support its Habitable Worlds Observatory mission concept. The mission is intended to search for life outside our solar system by imaging Earth-like planets and studying their atmospheres. It would feature the first space telescope specifically designed to study chemical signatures of life […]
The U.S. Space Force has short-listed Boeing and Northrop Grumman for its next-generation jamming-resistant communication satellites. Earlier, the two companies secured task orders to develop prototypes for the USSF’s Protected Tactical Satellite-Resilient program to establish a constellation of communication spacecraft resistant to jamming and cyberattacks, safeguarding U.S. forces’ connectivity in contested environments. On-orbit demonstrations of […]
