Space

The country’s efforts to develop an indigenous sounding rocket and nanosat launch capability advance, as Nammo plans a suborbital test flight of a new hybrid rocket motor.

As satellites and their antennas get bigger, they become harder to launch. Spacecraft-maker Space Systems/Loral thinks on-orbit self-assembly, reconfiguration and repair using an onboard robotic arm could make satellites more powerful and more flexible over their lifetimes.

Prize challenge seeks drag-reducing ideas; precision location for NASA Langley UAS testing; carnivorous plant inspires morphing flap design; rocket-propelled fireballs will incinerate chem/bio agents; bend it, stretch it, wear it—Pentagon backs flexible electronics

We round up five of our most read stories in August, and your reaction to them.

Republican lawmakers have questioned whether SpaceX is receiving special treatment in NASA’s oversight of the two commercial launch providers, but NASA Administrator Charles Bolden says that is not the case.

With a large area to cover, Canada plans to build 24 repeaters for the global Medium Earth Orbit Search-and-Rescue project.

Restocking, including crucial filters for environmental control systems, will keep the space station productive with six crewmembers

Silicon Valley startup is investigating using additive manufacturing techniques to enable fabrication of large structures in space that would collapse under their own weight on Earth

The Southwest Research Institute is working on a set of eight microsatellites designed to improve hurricane tracking by measuring GPS signals reflected off the ocean surface beneath the gathering storm.

Human missions to Mars could prove difficult without artificial gravity. Why has the space community not moved forward on this basic principle?

Can water at the Moon’s poles provide rocket fuel for human exploration deeper into the Solar System?

Agreement calls for experimental facility and sample carriers to begin traveling to the International Space Station in early 2017.

Researchers from eight U.S. universities will pursue early stage advances in support of NASA space program technology needs that range from high temperature tolerant solar cells and enhanced thermal protection systems to food production.

Why German hypersonic researchers believe tapping into a tiny fraction of the global long-haul air passenger market could be a boost to low-cost access to space.

Launch deals follow agreement to jointly develop a dual-frequency synthetic aperture radar satellite.

Electric propulsion for satellites is efficient, but low-thrust. An infrastructure of power-generation satellites in orbit would help speed the time it takes to change orbits

ISS crewmembers have taken a first, small bite out of the problem of keeping astronauts fed on deep-space missions.

The cost of ballistic missile interceptors, and the chance of failure, is high, but lasers pose their own efficiency and cost challenges.

A project that will revolutionise e-commerce and maternity services in remote communities across Nigeria and Kenya through the delivery of reliable, space-based internet connectivity services has completed its installation stage and is ready to be rolled out.

The agency this week is issuing three concept development contracts for the new Multiple Object Kill Vehicle (MOKV) program, one each to Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and Boeing.

A pair of new histories reveals little-known details about the interaction of the U.S. space program and the civil rights movement in the South.

Satellite operator Yahsat, has announced the completion of the Critical Design Review (CDR) on its Al Yah 3 satellite, which is now on course to provide Ka-band broadband coverage for Africa.

NASA has chosen Lunar IceCube for inclusion of secondary smallsat payloads on the the multibillion-dollar SLS-Orion test flight, which could provide potential encouragement for researchers to push deeper into space using CubeSat technologies.

At perihelion, the ESA mission will be able to glimpse the effect of that approach on the comet’s surface.

NASA funds further study of a propulsion system that could dramatically reduce the time required to explore the outer reaches of the Solar System and beyond.