Category: Space Station
-
NASA’s Tiny BurstCube Mission Launches to Study Cosmic Blasts
Editor’s note, April 18, 2024: BurstCube deployed into orbit from the space station April 18, 2024. It will begin a one-month commissioning period before the start of science operations. NASA’s BurstCube, a shoebox-sized satellite designed to study the universe’s most…
-
Zero-Boil-Off Tank Experiments to Enable Long-Duration Space Exploration
Do we have enough fuel to get to our destination? This is probably one of the first questions that comes to mind whenever your family gets ready to embark on a road trip. If the trip is long, you will…
-
International Space Station Welcomes Trio of Experiments Focused on Enhancing Life Beyond Earth
NASA’s Biological and Physical Sciences Division is sending three physical sciences and space biology experiments and equipment to the International Space Station aboard Northrop Grumman’s 20th commercial resupply services mission. These experiments aim to pioneer scientific discovery, enable sustainable deep…
-
Cold Atom Lab Publishes Paper in Nature
The following abstract was published in Nature 623, 502–508 (2023). The full paper can be read here: Elliott, E.R., Aveline, D.C., Bigelow, N.P. et al. Quantum gas mixtures and dual-species atom interferometry in space. Nature 623, 502–508 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-06645-w The…
-
Investigations launching aboard SpaceX-29 will help humans go farther and stay longer in space
The SpaceX-29 commercial resupply spacecraft will deliver numerous physical sciences and space biology experiments, along with other cargo, to the International Space Station. The research aboard this resupply services mission will help researchers learn how humans, and the plants needed…
-
AWE Launching to Space Station to Study Atmospheric Waves via Airglow
NASA’s Atmospheric Waves Experiment, or AWE, mission is scheduled to launch to the International Space Station in November 2023, where it will make use of a natural, ethereal glow in Earth’s sky to study waves in our planet’s atmosphere. Built…
-
Coolest Science Ever Headed to the Space Station
Atomic physicists tend to tinker away on their own, preferably in dark, hushed labs. When Eric Cornell started as a postdoc with Carl Wieman at JILA, an institute run jointly by the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the…
-
Universe’s Coolest Lab Set To Open Up Quantum World
Quantum physicists are about to get their own playground in space. NASA’s Cold Atom Laboratory, scheduled to launch to the International Space Station on 20 May, is set to be the coldest place in the known Universe. Researchers will use…
-
The Cold Atom Lab Is Ready for Launch
The Cold Atom Lab has been integrated into the Cygnus spacecraft in advance of its May 20th launch from the Wallops Flight Facility.The top image shows the Cold Atom Lab being loaded into the Cygnus spacecraft. The bottom image shows…
-
NASA Creates Super-Cooled Particles to Try to Prove a Major Einstein Theory
NASA scientists have successfully created the coldest spot in the known universe, supercooling atoms aboard the International Space Station in an effort to test a theory put forth by Albert Einstein but never proven. The space agency installed a cold…