Salvini’s last hope rests on building a bridge to Sicily – POLITICO

Salvini is pushing to launch the project by June, when European elections will be held that could make or break his leadership of the League.  The timing will be critical. As electoral support for the League shrinks, Salvini’s party colleagues are running out of patience. All 15 members of one local party association in Lombardy, … Read more

Nasa’s Voyager 1 phones home after months

WASHINGTON: Nasa’s Voyager 1 probe — the most distant man-made object in the universe — is returning usable information to ground control following months of spouting gibberish, the US space agency announced Monday.The spaceship stopped sending readable data back to Earth on November 14, 2023, even though controllers could tell it was still receiving their … Read more

No planet comes close to the life-giving properties of planet Earth — at least not yet

With the discovery of more than 5,600 planets orbiting other stars and images from robots we have sent to all the planets in our solar system, it is becoming abundantly clear that Earth is unique among worlds. Almost all of the exoplanets scientists have discovered since the 1990s fall into four main types: gas giants like Jupiter … Read more

Elon Musk News: Starlink Disrupts Earth’s Defenses Against Cosmic Radiation, Physicist Warns

A former NASA physicist warned that prominent constellations of low-cost satellites, like Elon Musk’s Starlink, could disrupt Earth’s magnetosphere, exposing all life on the planet to harmful cosmic radiation. A new study by Dr. Sierra Solter-Hunt uses new estimates suggesting that SpaceX, Elon Musk’s company, burns over 2,755 pounds (1.3 tons) of debris from its … Read more

NASA pauses Mars sample return plan until a cheaper, faster one can be developed

NASA’s plan to bring samples from Mars back to Earth is on hold until there’s a faster, cheaper way, space agency officials said Monday. Retrieving Mars soil and rocks has been on NASA’s to-do list for decades, but the date kept moving forward, as costs ballooned. A recent independent review put the total cost at … Read more

How Nasa plans to tackle dust challenges on the Moon and Mars

NEW DELHI: Nasa is tackling one of the biggest challenges of lunar and Martian exploration: pervasive and abrasive dust. With the Moon‘s surface covered in a jagged, glassy material known as regolith, and Martian dust threatening to coat everything from solar panels to spacesuits, these tiny particles pose a significant risk to equipment and astronaut … Read more

Macron’s explosive home front in the Gaza war

PARIS  — In the days after Hamas struck Israel, French President Emmanuel Macron made a national address vowing his “unreserved solidarity” with Israel.  A month later, he swerved to redress the balance, organizing a conference to support Gaza, joining calls for a cease-fire. In the days and months following Israel’s ground operation and airstrikes, Macron … Read more

Engineers attempt to fix a computer glitch on Voyager 1

Last November, the Voyager 1 spacecraft began sending gibberish radio signals back to Earth. Engineers have now identified the problem, but trying to repair a 46-year-old device on a craft 24 billion kilometres from Earth is not easy. Voyager 1 and its twin Voyager 2 were both launched in 1977 on a reconnaissance mission to … Read more

Canada-China relations committee questions witnesses on Winnipeg lab intelligence breach

Federal Health Minister Mark Holland suggested on Monday that there are gaps in the early stages of screening scientists at secret-level facilities such as the National Microbiology Lab (NML) in Winnipeg.  Holland told the House of Commons special committee on Canada-China relations there is a “responsibility of those individuals to disclose their engagements and affiliations.”  He … Read more