Space

By the time they were over, a series of massive algal blooms along the west coast of Florida in 2020 would be linked to some 2,000 tons of dead marine life around Tampa Bay. The human costs were stark, too, including a double-digit increase in asthma cases in Sarasota and Pinellas counties, and estimated losses of around $1 billion across economic sectors from tourism to fisheries. Earth-orbiting…

NASA will host a news conference at 1 p.m. EDT Wednesday, Sept. 6, to discuss the agency’s upcoming Psyche mission, which will be its first to visit a metal-rich asteroid. Riding along with Psyche is a laser transceiver for NASA’s Deep Space Optical Communications (DSOC) technology demonstration. The media briefing will air live on NASA Television, the NASA app, Facebook, X, YouTube, and on…

What motivates someone to labor for years to help build something that will be rocketed into space, never to be seen again on our planet? For the scientists, engineers, and technicians behind NASA’s Psyche mission to a metal-rich asteroid, the answers are wide-ranging but share a common thread: a passion to explore the unknown. That inspiration is highlighted in the new “Behind the…

NASA has selected Rocket Lab USA Inc. of Long Beach, California, to provide the launch service for the agency’s PREFIRE (Polar Radiant Energy in the Far-InfraRed Experiment) mission, which aims to give researchers a more accurate picture of the energy entering and leaving Earth. The PREFIRE mission will help close a gap in our understanding of how much of Earth’s heat is lost to space…