Articles

Emily Lakdawalla

Rosetta -- Europe's comet-chasing spacecraft -- is in the middle of a three-day series of rocket firings that are setting the geometry for its rendezvous with comet 67/P Churyumov-Gerasimenko.

Emily Lakdawalla

Today the 365 Days of Astronomy podcast aired my contribution, Unmanned Space Exploration in 2011, about what to look forward to in solar system exploration this year.

Emily Lakdawalla

Stardust is healthy after performing a

Emily Lakdawalla

There are two intriguing possibilities being discussed in the Japanese media for what to do with Akatsuki, a space probe in orbit near Venus with a fully functional, highly capable suite of cameras but a damaged main engine.

Marc Rayman

Dawn finishes 2010 much as it began the year, thrusting with its ion propulsion system in steady pursuit of a distant world.

A.J.S. Rayl

The Mars Exploration Rovers are wrapping up another year of exploring their seventh -- having experienced both the best of times and the worst of times: Spirit continued a 10-month struggle to endure its coldest, harshest Martian winter yet; Opportunity set a new record for driving despite an arthritic front wheel and a broken shoulder, putting more miles on her rocker bogie in 2010 than in any other single year.

Emily Lakdawalla

Ready for the New Year? It's going to be an exciting one.

Emily Lakdawalla

Ordinarily it's not my thing to do so many updates on a mission that failed to arrive in orbit, but I know that it's difficult for English-speaking readers to locate information on Asian missions so I'm keeping up the reporting on Akatsuki.

Emily Lakdawalla

The Hayabusa update is brief: having opened the first Hayabusa sample return chamber (compartment A) last month, JAXA has now opened compartment B, and they found nothing inside.

Emily Lakdawalla

Just after Akatsuki missed entering orbit, another spacecraft, IKAROS, quietly passed by Venus.

Emily Lakdawalla

An English-language article in the December 11 Yomiuri Shimbun summarizes the news from the Akatsuki press briefing held at 11:00 December 10 JST (last night, my time). It's succinct and clear so I'm reposting it here.

Emily Lakdawalla

Here's the latest from the NASA site about NanoSail-D.

Emily Lakdawalla

This image is so, so beautiful, and so, so sad.

Emily Lakdawalla

I've got two more pieces of information to share on Akatsuki further to what I posted yesterday. The first one is a worrying detail about what went wrong during orbit insertion.

Emily Lakdawalla

JAXA held two press briefings about Akatsuki yesterday. Reports in both English and Japanese based on these press briefings have cleared up some, but not all, of the mystery about what happened and what is to happen with Akatsuki.

Emily Lakdawalla

There is a press briefing happening right now in Japan, and it's terrible news: Akatsuki failed to enter Venus orbit.

Emily Lakdawalla

A press release (PDF) was posted in Japanese on the Akatsuki website this morning with some official information on the mission status. Here is a translation of the text.

Marc Rayman

Dawn is maintaining its smooth and steady course through the solar system as it gradually closes in on Vesta.

Emily Lakdawalla

In just a few hours, Venus will have a second orbiter. Japan's Akatsuki is due to start firing its orbit insertion engines on December 7.

Emily Lakdawalla

The year is racing to a close — I can't believe December is here already! Here's Olaf Frohn's map of where everybody is on December 1st.