Copernical Team
SOAR Telescope catches Dimorphos's expanding comet-like tail after DART spacecraft impact
NASA's Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) spacecraft intentionally crashed into Dimorphos, the asteroid moonlet in the double-asteroid system of Didymos, on Monday, 26 September 2022. This was the first planetary defense test in which an impact of a spacecraft attempted to modify the orbit of an asteroid.
Two days after DART's impact, astronomers Teddy Kareta (Lowell Observatory) and Matthew Knight (US Naval Academy) used the 4.1-meter Southern Astrophysical Research (SOAR) Telescope at NSF's NOIRLab's Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile to capture the vast plume of dust and debris blasted from the asteroid's surface. In this new image, the dust trail—the ejecta that has been pushed away by the sun's radiation pressure, not unlike the tail of a comet—can be seen stretching from the center to the right-hand edge of the field of view, which at SOAR is about 3.1 arcminutes using the Goodman High Throughput Spectrograph. At Didymos's distance from Earth at the time of the observation, that would equate to at least 10,000 kilometers (6,000 miles) from the point of impact.
European Researchers' Night 2022
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On Friday 30 September, ESRIN, our establishment in Italy, welcomed members of the public on site as part of European Researchers' Night.
Joining research centres throughout Europe, European Researchers' Night, promoted each year by the European Commission, is targeted at people of all ages who want to know more about science, research, and space exploration.
Trackem Launches New GPS Business Tracking Platform
Trackem GPS has officially launched its latest version of its client facing GPS tracking platform. The software launch has been 18 months in the making, for the 18-year-old business GPS fleet tracking company. The tall task of client migration has begun and is expected to be ongoing for a number of months ahead.
Trackem's new software platform was built to deliver on three main principles, New Curtin-led research discovers the heart of our evolution
Researchers have discovered a 380-million-year-old heart - the oldest ever found - alongside a separate fossilised stomach, intestine and liver in an ancient jawed fish, shedding new light on the evolution of our own bodies.
The new research, published in Science, found that the position of the organs in the body of arthrodires - an extinct class of armoured fishes that flourished through Raytheon and Northrop Grumman to deliver hypersonic air-breathing missile to USSF
Raytheon Missiles and Defense, a Raytheon Technologies (NYSE: RTX) business, in partnership with Northrop Grumman Corporation (NYSE: NOC), has been selected to develop the Hypersonic Attack Cruise Missile (HACM) for the U.S. Air Force (USAF). HACM is a first-of-its-kind weapon developed in conjunction with the Southern Cross Integrated Flight Research Experiment (SCIFiRE), a U.S. and Australia p HawkEye 360 awarded radio frequency contract by NRO
HawkEye 360 Inc., the world's leading commercial provider of space-based radio frequency (RF) data and analytics, reports it has been awarded a contract from the NRO's Commercial Systems Program Office (CSPO). The contract will assess, mature, integrate, and operationalize commercial RF intelligence into the NRO's integrated overhead architecture to support warfighters, the intelligence communit NRO awards commercial RF Capabilities Contract to Kleos Space
Kleos Space Inc, a space-powered Radio Frequency Reconnaissance Data-as-a-Service (DaaS) and Mission-as-a-Service (MaaS) provider, has been awarded a first stage contract, from the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) as part of the Strategic Commercial Enhancements Broad Agency Announcement (SCE BAA) Framework.
The NRO is responsible for maintaining global vigilance in times of peace and Juno probe takes detailed photo of Jupiter's moon, Europa
NASA's Juno space probe captured detailed images during a close flyby of Europa, Jupiter's largest moon.
The probe came within 219 miles of the ice-covered celestial body, one of the closest approaches by any spacecraft.
The first image taken by the probe's Junocam was released Thursday. It shows the icy and rugged surface of an area close to Europa's equator, known as the Annwn Firefly Aerospace scrubs launch after rocket engine shuts down
Firefly Aerospace aborted an attempted launch Friday from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California after an unexpected engine shutdown.
An Alpha rocket was scheduled to blast off into space and perform tests in orbit, but shortly after ignition, an engine shut down, leaving the rocket on the launch pad without any ostensible damage.
"The vehicle went into auto-abort after igniti Unknown debris dislodges from Ingenuity Mars helicopter's foot during 33rd flight
NASA said Friday that it is looking into debris that was seen on the foot of the Ingenuity helicopter's foot during its 33rd space flight on Mars.
"We're looking into a bit of debris that ended up on Ingenuity's foot during its latest aerial commute," NASA's Jet Propulsion Lab said in a statement on Twitter.
NASA shared a GIF video of the tiny helicopter's flight Friday which sho