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Archive for the ‘space travel’ category: Page 487

Dec 23, 2015

Milestone for Space Exploration: We Just Made Plutonium

Posted by in category: space travel

ORNL researchers successfully produced 50 gm of plutonium-238.


The quest for the stars just got a huge boost — for the first time in 27 years, the United States produced plutonium-238.

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Dec 22, 2015

SpaceX Finally Manages to Land an Orbital Rocket Back on Earth

Posted by in categories: satellites, space travel

Right on schedule, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 booster made a beautiful soft landing at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station moments ago. It’s a huge moment in the history of spaceflight, marking the first time a rocket has ascended into orbit and landed back on Earth.

The prospects for the reusable rocket system SpaceX has been chasing for over a year are that much better.

At 8:29 pm ET, SpaceX launched its upgraded, Falcon 9 rocket carrying a payload of 11 Orbcomm communication satellites into low Earth orbit from Space Launch Pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Minutes later, the second stage separated from the first and continued to propel its payload into higher orbit.

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Dec 21, 2015

Elon Musk Says Tesla Vehicles Will Drive Themselves in Two Years

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, robotics/AI, space travel, sustainability, transportation

Musk opens up about autonomous vehicles, self-driving car rules, and the competition.

In Elon Musk’s world, “easy” is used to describe problems many might consider impossible—or at least very difficult to solve. Producing a fully autonomous vehicle that can operate in any condition and on any road, for example, is easy-ish. And Tesla Motors TSLA 0.91%, the all-electric automaker that Musk heads, is two years away from achieving it.

“I think we have all the pieces, and it’s just about refining those pieces, putting them in place, and making sure they work across a huge number of environments—and then we’re done,” Musk told Fortune with assuredness during his commute to SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, Calif., where he is also CEO. “It’s a much easier problem than people think it is. But it’s not like George Hotz, a one-guy-and-three-months problem. You know, it’s more like, thousands of people for two years.”

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Dec 20, 2015

NASA shows off their humanoid robot that they want to send to Mars

Posted by in categories: robotics/AI, space travel

Click on photo to start video.

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Dec 20, 2015

Warp drive and wormholes could be used for time travel, says physicist

Posted by in categories: cosmology, space travel, time travel

Older, but interesting idea—


Warp drive and stargate wormholes could be used for time travel to the past. That’s the surprising conclusion that controversial theoretical physicist and author Dr. Jack Sarfatti has reached from his research into dark energy and dark matter.

Hubble image of dark matter ring in galaxy cluster

Continue reading “Warp drive and wormholes could be used for time travel, says physicist” »

Dec 17, 2015

SpaceX is launching its most powerful rocket for the first time this weekend

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, space travel

These upgrades certainly get Elon Musk’s seal of approval.

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Dec 15, 2015

Year in review: Pluto unveiled as a world like no other — By Christopher Crockett | ScienceNews

Posted by in categories: space, space travel, water

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“The alien landscapes of Pluto and its moons dazzled scientists and nonscientists alike this year. More than eight decades after its discovery, Pluto became much more than a nondescript point of light. It’s a dynamic, complex world unlike any other orbiting the sun.”

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Dec 11, 2015

Elon Musk Is Ready to Conquer Mars

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, space travel, transportation

One of his companies is trying to upend the auto industry. Another of his companies is trying to put people on Mars. Yet another is trying to bring electricity to everyone who needs it. Elon Musk wants to reinvent the world in a single lifetime. But is the future ready for Elon Musk?

Following the current fashion for visionary technological geniuses to be portrayed through three critical moments in their lives, * here are three from Elon Musk’s. Except, in this case, they all come from one single day—October 12, 2015, a Monday—a day that feels like it could’ve been pretty much any day in Musk’s life right now.

Continue reading “Elon Musk Is Ready to Conquer Mars” »

Dec 6, 2015

Beyond the Boundary — The Greatest Challenge: Manned Interstellar Travel

Posted by in categories: robotics/AI, space travel

By Andreas M. Hein in Artificial Intelligence and Science Fiction. Beyond the Boundary: Exploring the Science and Culture of Interstellar Spaceflight.

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Dec 4, 2015

SpaceX Will Try Its Next Rocket Landing on Solid Ground

Posted by in category: space travel

Following two failed landings at sea, the next Falcon 9 rocket will attempt to touch down at Cape Canaveral.

After SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket returns to flight later this month, the company will try to land the first stage booster back on solid ground, according to NASA officials. If successful, it would mark not only the first successful landing and recovery of the company’s flagship rocket, but also the first terrestrial rocket landing for SpaceX after two failed landing attempts at sea.

The launch—which could come as soon as December 15, though a flight plan has not been confirmed by the U.S. Air Force—marks a big next step for SpaceX. The mission will be the company’s first since a June launch in which an unmanned Falcon 9 bound for the International Space Station broke apart mid-flight. The landing attempt will also follow the successful launch and landing of a reusable rocket by rival spaceflight company Blue Origin last week.

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