Military space news - Spacewar.Com brings you daily news on war in the 21st century - military space news, nuclear weapons, missile defense, missiles, laser weapons. http://www.spacewar.com/index.html Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT en-us As space agencies and private companies move toward sustained human presence on the moon, one of the central challenges is how to build strong, durable infrastructure without transporting every material from Earth. New research from Rice University points to a solution drawn from the lunar surface itself - transforming the moon's abrasive dust into a valuable structural resource. The study]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT Ultra-faint dwarf galaxies - tiny satellite galaxies orbiting the Milky Way - have long been seen as cosmic fossils. A new study published in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society uses an unprecedented set of simulations to show just how powerfully these faint systems can reflect the conditions of the early Universe and why some galaxies grew while others did not. The research,]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT Less than a year ago, astronomers discovered a comet soaring through the sky that did not originate in our solar system. Although its precise source remains unknown, new research led by the University of Michigan has revealed fresh insights about the birthplace of the interstellar object designated 3I/ATLAS - and wherever that was, it was far colder than the environment that gave rise to our own]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT The European Space Agency's Plato mission has completed a demanding series of tests in space-like conditions, clearing an important milestone as the spacecraft moves toward a planned launch in January 2027. Plato recently came out of the Large Space Simulator at ESA's Test Centre, where engineers exposed the spacecraft to the vacuum and temperature extremes it will face in orbit. The campa]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT The European-Chinese Smile mission is now due to launch on May 19, 2026, at 05:52 CEST on a Vega-C rocket after partners completed investigations into a technical issue found in the production line of a Vega-C subsystem component. ESA said the earlier launch target was postponed as a precaution. The agency said both the Smile spacecraft and the Vega-C launcher assigned to the mission remai]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT The European Space Agency has completed the first full scale test model of its reusable Space Rider spacecraft, marking a step toward flight trials of the vehicle's runway landing system. Space Rider is designed as an uncrewed reusable spacecraft that will operate in low Earth orbit for about two months at a time. Its cargo bay is intended to support a range of experiments and operations i]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT Ultra-faint dwarf galaxies - tiny satellite galaxies orbiting the Milky Way - have long been viewed as cosmic fossils. A new study by researchers at the Oskar Klein Centre and the LYRA collaboration now uses an unprecedented suite of simulations to reveal just how sensitively these faint systems encode the conditions of the early Universe, and why some galaxies grew while others did not. A]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT Researchers at LMU Munich have overcome two long-standing obstacles to the practical use of perovskite quantum dots - their instability in solution and the difficulty of controlling their growth with precision. The advances, reported across two papers in the Journal of the American Chemical Society and ACS Energy Letters, open new pathways for applying these materials in LEDs, photocatalysis, an]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT Quaise Energy is on track to build the world's first power plant using superhot geothermal energy - energy obtained by tapping into rock with temperatures greater than 300 degrees C (572 degrees F). The first phase of the company's complex, known as Project Obsidian, is under construction in Oregon and is expected to be operational as early as 2030. A Quaise analysis presented at the 202]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT NASA's Curiosity Mars rover has uncovered a diverse mix of organic molecules on Mars, including chemicals widely considered building blocks for the origin of life on Earth. The findings come from a chemical experiment performed for the first time on another world, revealing that the Martian surface can preserve the kinds of molecules that could serve as signs of ancient life. However, the ]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT Nine high school students from Austria, Greece, and Portugal have emerged from a specially designed habitat near Monsaraz, Portugal, marking the successful completion of EXPLORE-2, a six-day simulated Mars mission that placed young Europeans in the roles of analog astronauts. The students lived, worked, and explored as if they were on Mars, operating rovers, conducting scientific experimen]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT A team of astronomers led by Elisabeth Matthews at the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy (MPIA) has found evidence for water-ice clouds on a Jupiter-like exoplanet called Epsilon Indi Ab, using the James Webb Space Telescope. The discovery reveals the limits of current atmospheric models and demonstrates observational methods relevant to the longer-term search for Earth-like planets. Epsi]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT At more than one million degrees, the Sun's atmosphere - the corona - is incredibly hot. Yet enormous, cool structures of solar plasma at around 10,000 degrees repeatedly appear within it. Known as prominences, these structures span up to several thousand kilometers and often resemble flickering flames in a wide variety of shapes. Despite their delicate appearance, they are massive chunks of mat]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT The SETI Institute has announced the launch of the Discovery and Futures Lab, a new interdisciplinary initiative dedicated to understanding the global scientific, philosophical, and societal dimensions of discovering life beyond Earth. The lab's mission is to anticipate and explore humanity's responses to the discovery of life beyond Earth by connecting science with other kinds of research]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT Astronauts take time to adjust how strongly they grip and move objects when transitioning between Earth and space, basing those adjustments on predictions their brains make about the risk of making mistakes, according to new research published in JNeurosci. On Earth, people grip objects to ensure they don't fall. In space, this process changes: when astronauts hold an object without moving]]> Fri, 24 Apr 2026 11:37:22 GMT