Moon Exploration and Science News

May 27, 2015

Google Lunar X-Prize meets Yoda
Sydney, Australia (SPX) May 27, 2015
"Do, or do not do. There is no try!" Thus spoke Jedi Master Yoda to his apprentice Luke Skywalker in Star Wars Episode 5: The Empire Strikes Back. Right now, it would seem that the managers of the Google Lunar X-Prize could do with some similar advice from the little green guy. The Google Lunar X-Prize (GLXP) is a $30 million purse to be awarded to the first private team to land a rover on the Moon and perform a set list of tasks there. It's been brewing for years. We have been treated to media re ... read more

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Planetary Science Institute researchers to study Jupiter's moon Europa PSI researchers are on the science teams of three of nine instruments chosen to be part of an upcoming mission to explore Jupiter's icy moon Europa, NASA has announced. The Europa mission, slated to ... more		China, Russia plan joint landing on the Moon Moscow and Beijing are planning to enhance their cooperation in space research and conduct joint manned space missions, particularly, to the moon. The US does not trust these plans, fearing that Chi ... more		Europa Mission Begins with Selection of Science Instruments NASA has selected nine science instruments for a mission to Jupiter's moon Europa, to investigate whether the mysterious icy moon could harbor conditions suitable for life. NASA's Galileo miss ... more
				Flawed Debates begets false choices beyond LEO - Part Two New technologies allow us to go back to the Moon at a fraction the cost of Apollo, and now, even private efforts like the Google X Prize contestants are underway to land and execute exploration miss ... more		The Moon or Mars: Flawed Debate, False Choice - Part Two New technologies allow us to go back to the Moon at a fraction the cost of Apollo, and now, even private efforts like the Google X Prize contestants are underway to land and execute exploration miss ... more

The World's Largest Commercial Drone Conference and Expo - Sept 9 - Las Vegas

Next Generation Integrated ISR 2015 - Washington DC - July 27-29

NASA Seeks Additional Information for Asteroid Redirect Mission Spacecraft NASA has issued a Request for Information (RFI) seeking ideas from American companies for a spacecraft design that could be used for both the agency's Asteroid Redirect Mission (ARM) and a robotic s ... more		The Moon or Mars: Flawed Debate, False Choice - Part One The Moon or Mars debate continues despite every single report or recommendation from NASA, NRC or other independent study that point to the Moon as the next logical destination for human space explo ... more		Greenland truce or Trump win? Davos "framework" pauses tariffs but not the takeover boasts Greenlanders doubtful over Trump resolution EU says ready to sign defence and security pact with India		Ether Compounds Could Work like DNA On Oily Worlds In the search for life beyond Earth, scientists have justifiably focused on water because all biology as we know it requires this fluid. A wild card, however, is whether alternative liquids can also ... more
				Asteroid Distant 'Flyby' Thursday An asteroid, designated 1999 FN53, will safely pass more than 26 times the distance of Earth to the moon on May 14. To put it another way, at its closest point, the asteroid will get no closer than ... more		Engineers Test Hydrogen Burn-off Igniters for Space Launch System NASA has a certain "flare" when it comes to safety on the launch pad. Those flares are called hydrogen burn-off igniters - which resemble celebratory sparklers - and were successfully used to mitiga ... more

Army Network Modernization 2015 - Washington DC June 23-25

Europa's Mystery Dark Material Could Be Sea Salt NASA laboratory experiments suggest the dark material coating some geological features of Jupiter's moon Europa is likely sea salt from a subsurface ocean, discolored by exposure to radiation. The p ... more		NASA's New Horizons Spots Pluto's Faintest Known Moons It's a complete Pluto family photo - or at least a photo of the family members we've already met. For the first time, NASA's New Horizons spacecraft has photographed Kerberos and Styx - the sm ... more		Trump vows to relaunch Egypt-Ethiopia talks on dam row China's birth rate falls to lowest on record Chile police arrest suspect over deadly wildfires		Weather forecasts for planets beyond our solar system "Cloudy for the morning, turning to clear with scorching heat in the afternoon." While this might describe a typical late-summer day in many places on Earth, it may also apply to planets outside our ... more
NASA's LRO Moves Closer to the Lunar Surface NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has completed a maneuver that lowered the spacecraft's orbit to within 20 kilometers (12 miles) above areas near the lunar South Pole, the closest the space ... more		Saturn Moon's Activity Could Be 'Curtain Eruptions' New research using data from NASA's Cassini mission suggests most of the eruptions from Saturn's moon Enceladus might be diffuse curtains rather than discrete jets. Many features that appear to be i ... more		Volcano Loki observed from Earth With the first detailed observations of a lava lake on a moon of Jupiter, the Large Binocular Telescope Observatory in Arizona places itself as the forerunner of the next generation of Extremely Lar ... more		Geochemical process on Saturn's moon linked to life's origin New work from a team including Carnegie's Christopher Glein has revealed the pH of water spewing from a geyser-like plume on Saturn's moon Enceladus. Their findings are an important step toward dete ... more

	European Space Agency Director Wants to Set Up a Moon Base The successor to the International Space Station (ISS) should be a permanent moon base, says incoming European Agency Space leader Johann-Dietrich Worner. The Space Foundation's National Space ... more		Russia Invites China to Join in Creating Lunar Station Russia and China are currently in talks on inviting the latter to become one of the main partners in creating a lunar station, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Rogozin said Tuesday. "The q ... more

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Moon formed when young Earth and little sister collided

Europa's Elusive Water Plume Paints Grim Picture For Life

Will the moon's first inhabitants live in giant lava tubes?

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Soft Landing on the Moon an Extraordinary Challenge

Saturn Spacecraft Returns to the Realm of Icy Moons

Stop blaming the moon

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