Blog Archive

Making eclipse magic

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2012/05/16 09:55 CDT | 2 comments

How to enjoy a solar eclipse with your kids, making shadow magic with a pinhole viewer.

Rovers in the desert

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2012/05/14 03:02 CDT | 5 comments

I took a field trip to watch scientists and engineers play in the sand with Mars rover models, and got a bonus tour of some evidence for the "Snowball Earth" hypothesis.

In which I sit in a Soyuz capsule with a Real Live Astronaut

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2012/05/09 01:46 CDT | 2 comments

Emily Lakdawalla is ready to launch to space with Shuttle astronaut Mike Massimino, who guest-starred (as an astronaut, of course) on the fifth season finale of the CBS comedy The Big Bang Theory.

Cartoon: Voyager's ongoing adventures

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2012/04/23 11:36 CDT | 2 comments

I'm not sure what to make of this Youtube cartoon about Voyager, except to say that it's simultaneously heart-wrenching, funny, and adorable.

Nichelle Nichols and the Nerd-in-chief

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2012/04/03 11:02 CDT

I got this wonderful photo from Nichols' Twitter after Mike Okuda retweeted it.

A theme song for IKAROS

Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2012/03/11 10:10 CDT

JAXA's solar sail mission IKAROS is still hibernating, and there's no way of knowing if the spacecraft will reawaken or not. They try to raise contact with the spacecraft once a month, with the last attempt being made on March 10; we can only wait to see if they'll succeed. What better time to release a theme song for the mission? IKAROS has always been even more full of personality even than other JAXA missions (which is saying a lot).