Space

Space•Aug 24, 2026

China Delayed Its Moon-Ice Mission Just Before Launch

China postponed Chang'e 7 after concluding that the mission did not meet launch conditions, even though its rocket and spacecraft had reached the launch area. The probe was meant to search shadowed lunar craters for water ice, but officials disclosed neither the problem nor a replacement date.

Space•Aug 20, 2026

A Private Chinese Rocket Landed on Its Own Legs for the First Time

LandSpace landed the first stage of its Zhuque-3 rocket upright on landing legs in Gansu province, China's first land-based booster recovery and the first by a private Chinese company. The feat followed a fiery failure eight months earlier, and a fire broke out at the booster's base after this landing too, so a full reusable rocket has not yet been proven.

Space•Aug 19, 2026

Astronomers May Have Found What 'Little Red Dots' Really Are

Astronomers have identified an unprecedented object dubbed a "black hole star," a black hole wrapped in gas dense enough to glow like a star, that may explain hundreds of mysterious "little red dots" JWST has spotted from the early universe. The find offers a possible explanation for how supermassive black holes grew so fast, though a rival team proposes a completely different explanation.

Space•Aug 17, 2026

Astronomers Found a New Way to Measure the Universe's Invisible Matter

Astronomers have spotted the first stellar stream from a torn-apart star cluster ever found outside the Milky Way, hidden inside a faint "ultra-diffuse" galaxy. Because such streams are shaped by gravity, they let researchers weigh a galaxy's dark matter for the first time using a technique previously limited to our own galaxy.

Space•Aug 15, 2026

A Single Space Mirror Would Outshine the Full Moon

A new study, accepted for publication in a major astronomy journal, calculates that a single Reflect Orbital space mirror would shine about four times brighter than the full moon and wash out the night sky for tens of kilometers around. It's the first hard quantification of a light-pollution risk astronomers had only warned about in general terms since the FCC approved a demonstration satellite in July.

Space•Aug 13, 2026

Webb Finds Strong Evidence for a Black Hole Inside a Solar-System-Sized Gas Cloud

James Webb telescope spectra reveal an exceptionally red object 660 million years after the Big Bang whose light cannot be explained by an ordinary stellar population. A black hole inside dense, dust-poor gas fits the observations, potentially explaining some mysterious little red dots, but the conclusion rests on an idealized model of one source.

Space•Aug 12, 2026

The Moon Blocks Out the Sun Over Spain Tonight: Europe's First Total Eclipse Since 1999

A total solar eclipse sweeps from the Arctic across Greenland, Iceland, and northern Spain today, the first time totality has reached mainland Europe since 1999. Totality lasts up to two minutes over the Atlantic, shrinking to about ninety seconds in Spain, while some 980 million people worldwide may see a partial eclipse.

Space•Aug 11, 2026

NASA Bought Voyager 2 Another Year of Life With an Engineering Move Called the "Big Bang"

On August 4, 2026, NASA carried out an engineering procedure nicknamed the "Big Bang" to free up power aboard Voyager 2, a spacecraft nearly 49 years into its journey and roughly 13 billion miles from Earth. The move delayed shutting down a third science instrument by at least a year, and could soon be repeated on Voyager 1.

Space•Aug 7, 2026

NASA's New Sun-Watching Mission Just Cut Solar Storm Warning Errors Tenfold

In its first real test, NASA's PUNCH mission tracked a solar eruption continuously across the inner solar system and predicted its Earth arrival time to within 30 minutes, ten times more precise than existing forecasts. The result comes from a single case study still under peer review, not yet an operational forecasting tool.

Space•Aug 6, 2026

A Falcon 9 Stage Likely Hit the Moon, but No Camera Saw the Moment

A four-tonne Falcon 9 upper stage was predicted to strike the Moon on August 5. Telescopes did not capture the collision directly, but sodium and lithium detected near the predicted time provide indirect evidence. Orbital images are still needed to confirm the crater and measure the result.

Space•Aug 5, 2026

Scientists Say They Can "Listen" for Water Ice Buried Under the Moon

Researchers built a lab-tested model showing that moonquakes travel two to three times faster through icy lunar soil than through dry soil, giving future missions a way to map buried water without drilling. The approach is untested in the field, but China's Chang'e-7 and NASA's Artemis program could soon put it to a real check.

Space•Aug 3, 2026

A Galaxy-Mapping Instrument Found the Chemical Remains of Shattered Exoplanets

DESI spectra exposed rocky planetary debris falling onto 12 white dwarfs, including two systems with possible water-rich material. The result shows an instrument built for cosmology can compare the ingredients of distant worlds, but only six systems supported detailed reconstruction and the water evidence remains indirect.

Space•Jul 28, 2026

A Black Hole Far From Its Galaxy’s Center Gave Itself Away by Shredding a Star

Astronomers found a million-solar-mass black hole more than 30,000 light-years from its galaxy’s center after it tore apart a passing star. The event offers a new way to find displaced black holes, although the object’s origin and the frequency of such wanderers remain uncertain.

Space•Jul 26, 2026

A Rocky World 48 Light-Years Away Appears to Have Kept an Atmosphere

Astronomers detected helium escaping from LHS 1140 b, providing strong evidence that this rocky planet in its star’s habitable zone retains an atmosphere. The finding makes it an exceptional target for follow-up observations, but it does not demonstrate liquid water, an Earth-like climate or life.

Space•Jul 23, 2026

Starship Flight 13 Faces Its Biggest Test Yet: Can It Deliver 20 Satellites?

SpaceX is preparing Starship Flight 13 to deploy 20 production Starlink V3 satellites during a suborbital technology test, days after an engine problem stopped the first attempt on the pad. Success would move Starship closer to useful payload missions, but the launch and every major objective remain uncompleted.

Space•Jul 22, 2026

Astronomers Used Cosmic Radio Flashes to Find Matter That Had Vanished From the Universe

Thousands of split-second radio bursts have helped researchers trace ordinary matter into enormous, nearly invisible clouds around galaxies, much farther out than simulations expected.

Space•Jul 20, 2026

A Black Hole Was Thrown Out of Its Galaxy. Scientists Have Reconstructed the Cosmic Kick

RBH-1 is racing through intergalactic space at about 954 kilometres per second, leaving a 200,000-light-year trail behind it. A new peer-reviewed analysis reconstructs the supermassive black-hole merger that may have delivered the extraordinary gravitational-wave kick.

Space•Jul 19, 2026

India’s First Private Orbital Rocket Made It to Space. Now Comes the Hard Part

Skyroot’s Vikram-1 has placed payloads into a 450-kilometre orbit, turning India’s private space ambitions into hardware that actually flew. Its carbon-composite body and 3D-printed upper-stage engine are impressive, but one successful test is only the beginning.

Space•Jul 19, 2026

China Just Put an AI Cloud in Orbit. The Goal Is 1,000 Computing Satellites

Shanghai Xingshu has launched the first group in a planned space-computing network that would process AI and Earth-observation data before sending results home. The idea could cut delays and bandwidth use, but radiation, heat, repairs and orbital debris make space a brutal place for a data center.

Space•Jul 17, 2026

Astronomers Confirm an Atmosphere on a Rocky Planet in the Habitable Zone

Astronomers have detected helium escaping from LHS 1140 b, providing the first observational confirmation of an atmosphere around a rocky exoplanet in its star's habitable zone. The nearby world is now a prime target for studying planetary habitability, but the finding is not evidence of life, and the deeper atmosphere and surface remain unknown.

Space•Jul 16, 2026

Webb Finds a Hidden Third Giant Planet in the Famous Beta Pictoris System

Astronomers found Beta Pictoris d inside a bright debris disk by identifying the chemical fingerprint of its atmosphere rather than relying on a conventional picture. The independently confirmed discovery turns a nearby young system into an unusually rich laboratory for studying how giant planets and planetary disks evolve together.

Space•Jul 15, 2026

FCC Clears a Giant Space Mirror to Beam Sunlight at Night - Astronomers Warn of the Risks

The U.S. FCC has authorized Reflect Orbital to deploy and operate Eärendil-1, an experimental satellite carrying an 18-by-18-metre steerable reflector. The single-satellite test could demonstrate tightly targeted sunlight from orbit, but astronomers argue that its brightness, safety implications and regulatory precedent demand far closer scrutiny.

Space•Jul 14, 2026

NASA Tests a Lithium-Fed Electric Thruster Built for Deep-Space Missions

NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory has tested a prototype magnetoplasmadynamic thruster that uses lithium propellant and extremely high electrical power. The technology could support nuclear-electric spacecraft carrying heavy cargo or crews to Mars, but substantial engineering work remains before flight.

Space•Jul 14, 2026

Euclid Discovers Ancient Quasars From the Universe’s First Era

Euclid identified 31 exceptionally ancient quasars, including two described as the oldest observed. The sample may reveal how supermassive black holes formed when the universe was only about 5% of its current age.