space science
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Saturn’s ‘Death Star’ Moon Is Hiding an Ocean Beneath Its Mangled Surface
An odd little moon that orbits closely to Saturn just revealed its biggest mystery: a hidden ocean that lies beneath its heavily cratered surface. Mimas is less than 123 miles (198 kilometers) wide, too small to be perfectly round, and its icy shell is covered with deep scarring from objects slamming into it. Its most…
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ISS Experiment Hopes to Develop Air Conditioning for Future Habitats on Other Worlds
A group of engineers is testing an air conditioning system in space, seeing how two basic processes work in an environment with less gravity than Earth in order to design a system for future habitats on the Moon and Mars. The Flow Boiling and Condensation Experiment (FBCE) launched on board a Cygnus cargo spacecraft to…
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Walking on Asteroid Bennu Would Be Like Stepping Into a Ball Pit, NASA Says
In October 2020, a small spacecraft briefly touched down on an asteroid to snag a piece of it to bring to Earth. Almost two years later, scientists have learned that if the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft had extended its stay even a tiny bit longer, it would have sunk right into the asteroid.
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It’s Time to Get Psyched for the First Full-Colour Images from Webb Telescope
On July 12, it’ll be 199 days since the Webb Space Telescope launched from French Guiana. Momentously, it’ll be the first day that the public actually sees full-colour images taken by the advanced telescope.