Find out how NASA tweaked the Nexus handset to control drones used in the International Space Station.

You could call them drones, or satellites -- NASA prefers the latter -- but these small flying robots that are being used on the International Space Station are powered by Nexus S smartphones.

Ars Technica has a lengthy writeup on how the space agency hacked smartphones to power its SPHERE (Synchronized Position Hold, Engage, Reorient, Experimental Satellites) satellites after their original CPUs had become too slow for their needs. Modern handsets made sense since they have integrated cameras, sensors, Wi-Fi connectivity, and of course, a capable processor.

Some of the tweaks NASA had to make include turning off the radio permanently on the handsets, adapting the device to use AA batteries instead of the usual lithium ion, and getting the drivers and sensors to work properly in a zero-gravity environment.

The affordability of the Nexus S handset was cited as one of the reasons for choosing the device, while its removable battery feature allowed NASA to adapt the phone for space. The Intelligent Robotics Group responsible for the project is also said to be building newer versions of the SPHERE satellite using the Nexus 4 smartphone.

(Source: Crave Asia)

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Behind-the-scenes: NASA 's Nexus-powered drones

Super Guppy Swallows T-38s

Two retired NASA T-38 trainers mounted on a transport pallet atop a mobile transporter are positioned for loading aboard NASA's Super Guppy prior to ferrying them to El Paso, Texas, for disassembly. Image released March 21, 2013.

Workmen carefully guide the first of the T-38s into place as it is hoisted onto its pallet. Image released March 21, 2013.

The second retired T-38 joins its companion on the special transport pallet. Image released March 21, 2013.

As the Super Guppy awaits its cargo in the background, workmen secure the second T-38 to its transport pallet. Image released March 21, 2013.

After opening the nose section of the Guppy, hoisting the T-38s onto a specially designed pallet atop a mobile transporter, loading the pallet and T-38s onto the Guppy and then reclosing the Guppy's nose section about a 2.5-hour process the Guppy departed for El Paso. Image released March 21, 2013.

A NASA Super Guppy transport plane "swallowed" two NASA T-38 aircraft whole March 18, right out on NASA Dryden Flight Research Center's back ramp. Image released March 21, 2013.

The Super Guppy is the latest iteration of its kind the last of three outsized aircraft to have transported a number of NASA's hefty payloads ranging from Saturn rockets to International Space Station modules. Image released March 21, 2013,

NASA's outsized SGT Super Guppy-Turbine transport aircraft lifts off the runway at Edwards Air Force Base after a prior visit.

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NASA 'Super Guppy' Swallows Supersonic Jets (Photos)

NORFOLK, Va. (AP) -- The large contractor work force at NASA's Langley Research Center could soon shrink as a result of automatic federal spending cuts that took effect earlier this month, according to NASA officials.

The Hampton facility has about 1,900 civil servants and 1,700 contract workers who are employed by a variety of private companies. Among other things, workers at Langley conduct space technology, aeronautics and atmospheric research. The center's civil servants and contractors also participate in a variety of educational and public outreach programs that sometimes take them out of state.

Center Director Lesa Roe told employees last week that she's expecting a $17.4 million cut to Langley's $228 million management and operations budget for the rest of the fiscal year. Roe said the center has imposed restrictions on monetary awards and travel, but that reductions to the contractor work force could also be necessary, according to a post on the center's website.

"We're going to continue to work through this," Roe said in the post. "We're going to work with all of you guys, make the most of what we have and continue to deliver on the great results that we've had in the past."

Center spokesman Rob Wyman said in an e-mail to The Associated Press that it is unclear exactly how many workers' jobs could be affected by the cuts.

"The impacts will depend upon the amount of work that has to be removed from current contracts. The company will then decide how to best manage the reductions," he said.

It wasn't immediately clear Monday when a decision on the contractor work force would be made.

Wyman said the center's $2 million fund for employee performance awards, group awards and special act awards was only available to civil servants, but that the program has been put on hold as a result of the cuts. Restrictions on travel apply to both civil servants and contractors, Wyman said.

"Basically, anything that isn't deemed mission critical won't be funded. This will impact such things as certain kinds of training, participation in different kinds of conferences or scientific symposiums, a wide array of different kinds of things that travel is required to support," he said.

For example, he said the center's workers won't be participating in the National Space Symposium in Colorado Springs, Colo., in April. He said any employee that's traveling must be substantively involved with the purpose of the trip and alternative methods of participation such as video teleconferencing can't be available.

The rest is here:

NASA center in Va may cut contractor work force

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NASA P-3B Orion waits outside the hangar at Thule Air Base with the Greenland Ice sheet in the background. The aircraft is set to begin the 2013 season of NASAs Operation IceBridge mission to survey Earths polar ice sheets in unprecedented three-dimensional detail. The plane just arrived from NASA Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia where the author visited it before departure see authors P-3B photos below. Credit: NASA/Goddard/Michael Studinger

NASAs Operation IceBridge has begun the 2013 research season of Ice Science flights in Greenland and the Arctic to survey the regions ice sheets and land and sea ice using a specially equipped P-3B research aircraft from NASAs Wallops Flight Facility in Wallops Island, Va.

Operation IceBridge began in 2009 as part of NASAs six-year long effort to conduct the largest airborne survey of Earths polar ice ever flown.

The goal is to obtain an unprecedented three-dimensional, multi-instrument view of the behavior of Greenland, Arctic and Antarctic ice sheets, ice shelves and sea ice which have been undergoing rapid and dramatic changes and reductions.

Were starting to see how the whole ice sheet is changing, said Michael Studinger, IceBridge project scientist at NASAs Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. Thinning at the margins is now propagating to the interior.

The P-3 exiting the hanger pre-flight in Thule. Credit: NASA

The airborne campaign was started in order to maintain a continuous record of measurements in changes in polar ice after NASAs Earth orbiting ICESat (Ice, Cloud and Land Elevation Satellite) probe stopped collecting data in 2009.

ICESat-2 wont be launched until 2016, so NASAs IceBridge project and yearly P-3 airborne campaigns will fill in the science data gap in the interval.

The P-3B Orion just arrived from NASAs Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia where I visited it before departure see my P-3B photos herein.

Original post:

NASA ’s Operation IceBridge Surveys Greenland and Earth’s Polar Ice Sheets

L. Calcada / N. Risinger / ESO

An artist's conception shows the planet Alpha Centauri Bb, orbiting one of the stars in a nearby triple-star system. A commercial venture known as Uwingu says it will use proceeds from a contest to give Alpha Centauri Bb a new name to support endangered educational and public outreach efforts.

By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News

NASA's plan to suspend educational and public outreach activities due to budget sequestrationhas sparked protests from some of the space agency's biggest fans, and a commercial venture known as Uwingu wants to help fill the gap. Uwingu says it willdirect proceeds from its contest to name the closest exoplanet toward projects that are facing budget cuts.

The venture was set up last year to offer space-themed entertainment that would raise money for education and space science. Just last week, Uwingu kicked off an effort to come up with a "people's choice" name for Alpha Centauri Bb, an Earth-sized planet that was detected last year just 4.3 light-years away.

It takes $4.99 to nominate a name, and 99 cents to cast a vote. The contest closes on April 15, and the winner will be announced the next day. Some of the proceeds will go toward paying the company's expenses, but the target is to put at least half of the money into a fund to support research and education.

Rough patch for NASA When the company made its public debut, the founders said the Uwingu Fund could serve as a lifeline for scientists and educators if NASA's budget ran into a rough patch. Sequestration certainly qualifies as a rough patch: The automatic spending cuts will force NASA to scale back its budget by roughly $900 million for the fiscal year.

As part of its plan to comply with sequestration, NASA officials on Friday ordered the suspension ofeducational and public outreach activities, also known as EPO. Planetary scientist Alan Stern, Uwingu's CEO and a former NASA associate administrator, said the suspension has put educational and public outreach programs "under severe and sudden stress."

"At Uwingu, we believe that private and commercial funding of space-based initiatives including research and EPO is more important now than ever," Stern said in a statement Monday. "That's the purpose of The Uwingu Fund, which is fueled from people participating in the naming contest for Alpha Centauri's planet. Today we're announcing that Uwingu is taking action to combat the severe, adverse impact of sequestration on NASA EPO by directing all Uwingu Funds proceeds raised through this contest to grants to EPO professionals and projects."

In the grand scheme of things, education and public outreach aren't the most expensive things that NASA does. The continuing resolution that governed spending for the current fiscal year set aside $137 million for the agency's education account, and sequestration would trim that figure by $7 million. NASA budgets additional funds for public outreach on a mission-by-mission basis, but the expense is still a small proportion of NASA's $17.8 billion budget.

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NASA 's hold on outreach sparks outcry; Uwingu aims to help fill gap

L. Calcada / N. Risinger / ESO

An artist's conception shows the planet Alpha Centauri Bb, orbiting one of the stars in a nearby triple-star system. A commercial venture known as Uwingu says it will use proceeds from a contest to give Alpha Centauri Bb a new name to support endangered educational and public outreach efforts.

By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News

NASA's plan to suspend educational and public outreach activities due to budget sequestrationhas sparked protests from some of the space agency's biggest fans, and a commercial venture known as Uwingu wants to help fill the gap. Uwingu says it willdirect proceeds from its contest to name the closest exoplanet toward projects that are facing budget cuts.

The venture was set up last year to offer space-themed entertainment that would raise money for education and space science. Just last week, Uwingu kicked off an effort to come up with a "people's choice" name for Alpha Centauri Bb, an Earth-sized planet that was detected last year just 4.3 light-years away.

It takes $4.99 to nominate a name, and 99 cents to cast a vote. The contest closes on April 15, and the winner will be announced the next day. Some of the proceeds will go toward paying the company's expenses, but the target is to put at least half of the money into a fund to support research and education.

Rough patch for NASA When the company made its public debut, the founders said the Uwingu Fund could serve as a lifeline for scientists and educators if NASA's budget ran into a rough patch. Sequestration certainly qualifies as a rough patch: The automatic spending cuts will force NASA to scale back its budget by roughly $900 million for the fiscal year.

As part of its plan to comply with sequestration, NASA officials on Friday ordered the suspension ofeducational and public outreach activities, also known as EPO. Planetary scientist Alan Stern, Uwingu's CEO and a former NASA associate administrator, said the suspension has put educational and public outreach programs "under severe and sudden stress."

"At Uwingu, we believe that private and commercial funding of space-based initiatives including research and EPO is more important now than ever," Stern said in a statement Monday. "That's the purpose of The Uwingu Fund, which is fueled from people participating in the naming contest for Alpha Centauri's planet. Today we're announcing that Uwingu is taking action to combat the severe, adverse impact of sequestration on NASA EPO by directing all Uwingu Funds proceeds raised through this contest to grants to EPO professionals and projects."

In the grand scheme of things, education and public outreach aren't the most expensive things that NASA does. The continuing resolution that governed spending for the current fiscal year set aside $137 million for the agency's education account, and sequestration would trim that figure by $7 million. NASA budgets additional funds for public outreach on a mission-by-mission basis, but the expense is still a small proportion of NASA's $17.8 billion budget.

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NASA 's hold on outreach sparks protests; Uwingu aims to help fill gap

NASA has taken its huge database of technical reports offline in response to the arrest last weekend of a former contractor suspected of spying for China.

The space agency decided to shut down the NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS) as part of a broad security review spurred by the arrest of Bo Jiang, who was grabbed by FBI agents Saturday (March 16) on a China-bound plane at Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C.

"Ive closed down the NASA Technical Reports database while we review whether theres a risk," NASA chief Charles Bolden told the House Appropriations Committee Wednesday (March 20) during a hearing set up to probe possible security lapsesat space agency centers.

Questioning NASA security

Jiang had worked as a contractor for the National Institute of Aerospace at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va. He's suspected of attempting to take sensitive technology back to his native China; officials say he lied to law enforcement about the electronics gear he was carrying aboard the plane. [NASA Chief Talks to Congress About Security (Video)]

Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.) announced Jiang's arrest at a press conference Monday (March 18), during which he also voiced concern about the information freely available in databases like the NTRS.

"NASA should immediately take down all publicly available technical data sources until all documents that have not been subjected to export control review have received such a review and all controlled documents are removed from the system," Wolf said.

At Wednesday's House hearing, Bolden pledged to undertake a broad internal review of space agency security protocols.

NASA has taken other actions in addition to closing down the NTRS, Bolden added. For example, he has tightened access to NASA facilities for people from countries viewed as espionage threats, including China, Burma, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia and Uzbekistan.

No new access will be granted to citizens of those nations until further notice, Bolden said, and the ability of existing NASA workers from those countries to access agency facilities via remote computers has been temporarily suspended.

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NASA Pulls Technical Database Offline During Security Investigation

NASA Wants Meteor Warning System
ABC #39;s Devin Dwyer explains what the space agency wants to do to protect the country.

By: ABCNews

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NASA Wants Meteor Warning System - Video

Asteroid Wormwood : NASA warns of potential City Killer Meteors and tells us to Pray (Mar 20, 2013)
SOURCE: http://www.nbcnews.com News Articles: Guess what else the sequester hurts? Our ability to track a #39;city-killer #39; asteroid http://tv.msnbc.com/2013/03/...

By: SignsofThyComing

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Asteroid Wormwood : NASA warns of potential City Killer Meteors and tells us to Pray (Mar 20, 2013) - Video

NASA SAYS "PRAY" AS EARTH IS LEFT DEFENSELESS AGAINST COMING NEAR TERM METEOR STRIKES (MAR 20, 2013)
http://news.yahoo.com/large-asteroid-heading-earth-pray-says-nasa-005545942.html.

By: ADRENALINEJUNKY -JASON HENDRICKS

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NASA SAYS "PRAY" AS EARTH IS LEFT DEFENSELESS AGAINST COMING NEAR TERM METEOR STRIKES (MAR 20, 2013) - Video

nasa iyo na ang lahat - daniel padilla ( just for fun 😀 )
Sung by : Daniel Padilla ..This music video of ours is only just for fun guys... (during our free time in school) ..hope you #39;ll like it hearts; Follow me on Twitte...

By: katie142818

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nasa iyo na ang lahat - daniel padilla ( just for fun 😀 ) - Video

NASA #39;s Apollo Engines Recovered from the Ocean
Amazon #39;s CEO Jeff Bezos #39; underwater expedition found remains of NASA #39;s Apollo program. *More: http://abcn.ws/WLhf8L.

By: ABCNews

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NASA's Apollo Engines Recovered from the Ocean - Video

HRVATSKA - SRBIJA NASA PESMA GRMI I NE PRESTAJE! I AKO SMO IZGUBILI 2:0
SUBSCRIBE! #1054; #1054; #1054; #1054; #1054; #1057; #1056; #1041; #1048; #1032; #1040; #1054; #1051; #1045; #1054; #1054; #1054; #1054; #1054; #1057; #1056; #1041; #1048; #1032; #1040; #1054; #1051; #1045; #1054; #1051; #1045; #1054; #1051; #1045; #1054; #1051; #1045; #1054; #1051; #1045; #1051; #1045; #1054; #1051; #1045; #1054; #1051; #1045; #1054; #1051; #1045; #1054; #1053; #1040; #1064; #1040; #1055; #1045; #1057; #1052; #1040; #1043; #1056; #1052; #1048; #1048; #1053; #1045; #1055; #1056; #1045; #1057; #1058; #1040; #1032; #1045; !

By: #1057; #1088; #1087; #1089; #1082; #1080; #1053; #1072; #1074; #1080; #1112; #1072; #1095; #1080;

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HRVATSKA - SRBIJA NASA PESMA GRMI I NE PRESTAJE! I AKO SMO IZGUBILI 2:0 - Video

NASA has taken its huge database of technical reports offline in response to the arrest last weekend of a former contractor suspected of spying for China.

The space agency decided to shut down the NASA Technical Reports Server (NTRS) as part of a broad security review spurred by the arrest of Bo Jiang, who was grabbed by FBI agents Saturday (March 16) on a China-bound plane at Dulles International Airport outside Washington, D.C.

"Ive closed down the NASA Technical Reports database while we review whether theres a risk," NASA chief Charles Bolden told the House Appropriations Committee Wednesday (March 20) during a hearing set up to probe possible security lapsesat space agency centers.

Questioning NASA security

Jiang had worked as a contractor for the National Institute of Aerospace at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va. He's suspected of attempting to take sensitive technology back to his native China; officials say he lied to law enforcement about the electronics gear he was carrying aboard the plane. [NASA Chief Talks to Congress About Security (Video)]

Rep. Frank Wolf (R-Va.) announced Jiang's arrest at a press conference Monday (March 18), during which he also voiced concern about the information freely available in databases like the NTRS.

"NASA should immediately take down all publicly available technical data sources until all documents that have not been subjected to export control review have received such a review and all controlled documents are removed from the system," Wolf said.

At Wednesday's House hearing, Bolden pledged to undertake a broad internal review of space agency security protocols.

NASA has taken other actions in addition to closing down the NTRS, Bolden added. For example, he has tightened access to NASA facilities for people from countries viewed as espionage threats, including China, Burma, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia and Uzbekistan.

No new access will be granted to citizens of those nations until further notice, Bolden said, and the ability of existing NASA workers from those countries to access agency facilities via remote computers has been temporarily suspended.

View original post here:

NASA Pulls Technical Database Offline During Spy Investigation

An unfavorable planetary alignment will force NASA's fleet of robotic Mars explorers to be a lot more self-sufficient next month.

Mission controllers won't send any commands to the agency's various Marsspacecraft for much of April, because the sun will lie between Earth and the Red Planet during that time. Our star can disrupt and degrade interplanetary communications in such an alignment, which is known as a Mars solar conjunction, so spacecraft handlers won't take any chances.

"Receiving a partial command could confuse the spacecraft, putting them in grave danger," NASA officials explain in a video posted Tuesday (March 19) by the agency's Jet Propulsion Laboratory(JPL) in Pasadena, Calif.

Transmissions from Earth to the Mars rover Curiosityare slated to be suspended from April 4 to May 1, officials said. No commands will be sent to Curiosity's older rover cousin Opportunity or NASA's Mars-orbiting craft Mars Odyssey and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) from April 9 to April 26.

Both rovers will continue to do stationary science work throughout the conjunction period, relying on commands sent up to them beforehand. [How NASA Deals with a Mars Solar Conjunction (Video)]

"We are doing extra science planning work this month to develop almost three weeks of activity sequences for Opportunity to execute throughout conjunction," Opportunity mission manager Alfonso Herrera of JPL said in a statement.

MRO and Mars Odyssey will continue science observations as well, though on a more limited basis. The orbiters will also continue their role as rover communication links, receiving data from Opportunity and Curiosity.

Odyssey will send information its own observations and the rovers' data Earthward throughout the conjunction period, though the mission team anticipates some dropouts, so Odyssey will send the data again later as needed.

Mars Myths & Misconceptions: Quiz

No planet is more steeped in myth and misconception than Mars. This quiz will reveal how much you really know about some of the goofiest claims about the red planet.

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NASA 's Mars Spacecraft Go Solo Next Month

NASA via Twitter

NASA says the tweets will continue despite a "pause" in educational and public outreach initiatives.

By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News

NASA is putting the brakes on its educational and public outreach efforts, due to the continuing standoff over the federal budget and the resulting sequestration of the agency's funds.

The cutbacks in NASA's activities, including social-media initiatives, were outlined on Friday in a pair of memos from NASA Headquarters in Washington. The independent SpaceRef website published both memos, including one that ordered a suspension and another that provided additional instructions for NASA's Communication Coordinating Council.

Automatic spending cuts are taking effect, at NASA and many other federal agencies, as the result of the failure by the White House and Congress to agree on a budget deal. Last month, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden told lawmakers that sequestration would reduce NASA's overall budget from the $17.8 billion that Congress approved last year to $16.9 billion.

The space agency already has cut back on travel and training expenses. As a result, some of the space agency's scientists and executives had to pass up this week's Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Texas. The new directives extend the cutbacks to online, multimedia and social-media initiatives as well as publications.

Operational websites and social-media accounts were excluded from the suspension, however which means existing Twitter accounts, including @NASA and @MarsCuriosity, can stay in business. NASA has rapidly expanded its online presence in the past couple of years, winning recognition from the Emmys, theShorty Awardsandthe Webby Awards. Just this month, the Mars Curiosity mission's social-media team won the South by Southwest Interactive Award for best social-media campaign.

Waivers were also granted for mission announcements, media events and products, breaking-news activities and responses to media inquiries. In an emailed response to NBC News' inquiry, NASA spokesman Bob Jacobs said additional guidance would be issued next week, addressing areas that would be exempt from the suspension.

"It's important to point out that it's a suspension, not a cancellation," Jacobs wrote. "The agency's budget for the fiscal year is more that $1 billion below the original request. We are taking prudent steps to ensure the resources expended on outreach activities are done so wisely.

Read more:

Sequestration forces NASA to hold up educational and outreach efforts

NASA via Twitter

NASA says the tweets will continue despite a "pause" in educational and public outreach initiatives.

By Alan Boyle, Science Editor, NBC News

NASA is putting the brakes on its educational and public outreach efforts, due to the continuing standoff over the federal budget and the resulting sequestration of the agency's funds.

The cutbacks in NASA's activities, including social-media initiatives, were outlined on Friday in a pair of memos from NASA Headquarters in Washington. The independent SpaceRef website published both memos, including one that ordered a suspension and another that provided additional instructions for NASA's Communication Coordinating Council.

Automatic spending cuts are taking effect, at NASA and many other federal agencies, as the result of the failure by the White House and Congress to agree on a budget deal. Last month, NASA Administrator Charles Bolden told lawmakers that sequestration would reduce NASA's overall budget from the $17.8 billion that Congress approved last year to $16.9 billion.

The space agency already has cut back on travel and training expenses. As a result, some of the space agency's scientists and executives had to pass up this week's Lunar and Planetary Science Conference in Texas. The new directives extend the cutbacks to online, multimedia and social-media initiatives as well as publications.

Operational websites and social-media accounts were excluded from the suspension, however which means existing Twitter accounts, including @NASA and @MarsCuriosity, can stay in business. NASA has rapidly expanded its online presence in the past couple of years, winning recognition from the Emmys, theShorty Awardsandthe Webby Awards. Just this month, the Mars Curiosity mission's social-media team won the South by Southwest Interactive Award for best social-media campaign.

Waivers were also granted for mission announcements, media events and products, breaking-news activities and responses to media inquiries. In an emailed response to NBC News' inquiry, NASA spokesman Bob Jacobs said additional guidance would be issued next week, addressing areas that would be exempt from the suspension.

"It's important to point out that it's a suspension, not a cancellation," Jacobs wrote. "The agency's budget for the fiscal year is more that $1 billion below the original request. We are taking prudent steps to ensure the resources expended on outreach activities are done so wisely.

See the original post here:

Budget mess forces NASA to hold up on outreach

A new NASA video has captured two cosmic wonders a comet and a massive solar storm with the Earth in the background as seen by a sun-watching spacecraft.

In the video, the Comet Pan-STARRS can be seen streaking through the inner solar system, orbiting the sun over the course of five days (March 10-15). As Pan-STARRS makes its ways into view, acoronal mass ejection(CME) an explosion of plasma from the surface of the star shoots towards Earth.

"The bright light on the left comes from the sun and the bursts from the left represent the solar material erupting off the sun in a CME," officials with NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio wrote in a video description.

The dramaticvideo of Comet Pan-STARRS and the sun stormwas captured by one of NASA's twin Stereo spacecraft ( the name is short for Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory).. Launched in 2006, the two Stereo probes work together to provide a constant watch on the sun's solar weather events. One Stereo probe orbits just ahead of the Earth while the other trails behind. [How to see the comet]

"While it appears from Stereo's point of view that the CME passes right by the comet, the two are not lying in the same plane, which scientists know since the comets tail didnt move or change in response to the CME's passage," NASA officials wrote.

Comet Pan-STARRS put on a brilliant show in the Southern Hemisphere before becoming visible to stargazers in the North during the first part of March. Astronomers using the Panoramic Survey Telescope and Rapid Response System (or Pan-STARRS) atop a volcano in Hawaii initially spotted the comet in June 2011.

Pan-STARRS is one of two comets expected to put on a show this year.Since reaching its maximum brightness earlier in March, Comet Pan-STARRS has been getting steadily dimmer, but it should be visible low on the western horizon, just after sunset, to stargazers with binoculars or small telescopes, NASA officials have said.

Comet ISONshould make its first appearance in April, and some astronomers think it could be the brightest comet in a generation.

NASA's Stereo spacecraft are one of several missions that constantly monitor the sun for signs of solar flares and eruptions. The sun is currently in an active phase of its 11-year solar weather cycle. The current cycle is known as Solar Cycle 24 and is expected to reach its peak this year.

Editor's note:If you snap an amazing photo of Comet Pan-STARRS, or any other celestial object, and you'd like to share it for a possible story or image gallery, please send images and comments, including location information, to Managing Editor Tariq Malik atspacephotos@space.com.

Continue reading here:

NASA Video Captures Comet, Sun Storm and Earth Together

By Bill Sizemore The Virginian-Pilot March 21, 2013

The leader of NASA said Wednesday he has ordered a comprehensive review of the space agency's security procedures after the arrest of a Chinese scientist suspected of acquiring sensitive information at NASA Langley Research Center in Hampton.

While the review is under way, Administrator Charles Bolden said he has placed a moratorium on access to NASA facilities by foreign nationals from China and other countries subject to national security concerns.

Bo Jiang, a researcher who worked for a NASA Langley contractor, was pulled off a China-bound plane at Dulles International Airport over the weekend and later arrested by FBI agents investigating possible violations of the Arms Export Control Act. He faces a criminal charge of lying to agents about computer hardware he was carrying.

The investigation was spurred by U.S. Rep. Frank Wolf, R-Fairfax County, who said he was contacted by whistleblowers concerned about security lapses at NASA. Bolden testified Wednesday before a subcommittee chaired by Wolf that oversees NASA.

Wolf said China poses an "active, aggressive espionage threat" to the United States and suggested that the aeronautics research conducted at NASA Langley would be an attractive target.

"NASA takes your allegations very seriously," Bolden told Wolf. "This is about national security."

Bolden said 192 Chinese nationals who have been working at NASA facilities across the country will be affected by his order.

Asked by Wolf if he would agree to an independent review of NASA security procedures by an outside panel of experts, Bolden said that is his "probable intent," but he wants to complete the internal review first.

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NASA chief orders security review after worker's arrest

Nasa has denied a claim made in a scientific study that its Voyager 1 spacecraft had left the solar system, describing the report as "premature".

Scientists are eagerly awaiting signs that the craft, which was launched in 1977 on a mission to study planets, has become the first man-made object to leave the boundaries of our solar system.

A scientific paper that purported to describe this departure appeared on the American Geophysical Union's website.

It said Voyager 1 "appears to have travelled beyond the influence of the Sun and exited the heliosphere," or the magnetic bubble of charged particles that surround the solar system.

Researcher Bill Webber, one of the article's authors, acknowledged that the actual location of the spacecraft - whether in interstellar space or just an unknown region beyond the solar system - remained a matter of debate.

"It's outside the normal heliosphere, I would say that," said Mr Webber, professor emeritus of astronomy at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces, according to the AGU's website.

"We're in a new region. And everything we're measuring is different and exciting."

However, shortly after the study appeared, Nasa spokesman Dwayne Brown said the report was "premature and incorrect".

The Voyager science team reported in December 2012 the craft was in a new region called the "magnetic highway," but changes in the magnetic field to show a departure from the solar system have not yet been observed, Nasa said.

"The Voyager team is aware of reports today that Nasa's Voyager 1 has left the solar system," said Edward Stone, Voyager project scientist based at the California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, California.

Originally posted here:

Nasa Denies Voyager 1 Solar System Exit Claim