NASA restarts the clock for the launch of the first manned mission to the Moon After more than 50 years since the last trip, the return flight is scheduled for Friday, March 6 (Saturday, March 7, Catalan time), following the successful completion of the second full fuel test. It was "a very successful day," the US space agency announced, following the satisfactory test results. Weather permitting, NASA hopes to take advantage of a launch window in two weeks to launch the Artemis II mission, with four astronauts on board, who will spend ten days in space on the far side of the Moon. The mission's objective is to prepare for a future mission that will explore the Moon further. The launch will take place from the Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral, Miami, from where the future crew monitored the fuel tests.

For the first time, there is scientific evidence that Mars hides a solid inner core about 600 kilometers across, surrounded by a liquid core. Thus, the red planet is, in this respect, more similar to Earth than previously thought, although they have evolved very differently. The discovery was made from tests sent three years ago by NASA's InSight mission, in which Chinese and American researchers observed the behavior of Martian earthquakes between 2018 and 2022. Through comparisons with data from Earth, we can begin to decipher the evolution of Mars and how it lost its ancient magnetic field. It will also be used to analyze its thermal and chemical state.

The Donald Trump administration cut NASA's budget by 24.3% for next year and completely reoriented the strategy of the US space program. The new priority is "reaching the Moon before China and putting an American on Mars," an explicit statement that officially (and very undiplomatically) confirms what was a public secret: the new space race between the United States and China. Not even President JFK ever officially stated that the goal of the Apollo missions was to defeat the Soviet Union, but Donald Trump doesn't mince his words. Nor does he have any scientific interest in space. His budget, in fact, drastically cuts space research programs and planetary research programs, such as those investigating the climate crisis. NASA sets a course for Mars, as requested. Elon Musk, who has oriented his company Space X in this direction. However, first they have to reach the Moon just to beat Xi Jinping.

Smoke pollutes, but here we were, inhaling deeply. The show must go on, as some say; the liturgy, as others say. What is clear is that the spectacle has been unanimously masculine. It is precisely that men are interested in everything men do and that the revolution of the Catholic Church is always not to make a revolution. But I have lost my way to heaven. Never better said. By heaven, not by the saint, because what fascinates me is not a spiritual leader, and even less a pope, but the probe launched by the Soviet Union in 1972 and expected to fall to Earth before the end of the week. According to the European Space Agency, it will be on Saturday at 8:18 a.m., with an 18-hour margin. That's no small margin. If these ESA guys ever lose their jobs, they can always go work for the commuter train.

The Kosmos 482 probe, launched by the former Soviet Union in 1972 bound for Venus, never left Earth's orbit and, after half a century, is expected to fall back to planet Earth this week. The device's orbit is declining and it is expected to "re-enter Earth's atmosphere sometime between May 7 and 13," NASA said on its website Tuesday. Since it was designed to withstand passage through Venus's atmosphere, which is denser and hotter than Earth's, "it is possible that the probe (or some part of it) will survive re-entry into Earth and reach the surface."

Full stop in the Hypatia II mission, which has taken seven scientists to the Mars Research Desert Station (MDRS) in the Utah desert in the United States to test their disciplines in conditions almost identical to those found on Mars. From February 2 to 14, the seven astronauts lived with limitations on water, food, mobility, and communications with Earth while testing procedures and tools to investigate areas such as geology and biology, focusing on the female body, which is often forgotten in the aerospace field.

Katy Perry has outgrown the large stadiums where she usually performs. The singer Firework traveled into space today for a few minutes accompanied by Lauren Sánchez, former journalist and promising tech mogul Jeff Bezos, and four other women, all prominent figures in American society (journalist Gayle King; NASA space scientist Aisha Bowe; bioastronautics scientist Amanda Nguyen). This all-female crew – the first since 1963 – conquered space aboard the New Shepard, one of the rockets from Blue Origin, Bezos' company and competitor of Elon Musk's SpaceX and Richard Branson's Virgin Galactic.

With no defined days or nights, just a succession of sunrises and sunsets every 90 minutes, astronauts follow a strict schedule. Despite the challenges, they can enjoy spectacular views of Earth, a floating sphere in space. According to sources from the International Space Station (ISS), this is what an astronaut's workday looks like.

Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore's space adventure has come to an end, surrounded by political controversy. The two landed on the coast of Florida at 10:11 p.m. Tuesday, Spanish time, after months in space. The two astronauts "are not trapped" nor are they returning to Earth "on any rescue mission.", NASA has insisted on saying several times. But the fact is that Williams and Wilmore have spent nine months on the International Space Station (ISS), when their visit was scheduled to last only eight days. They went to test Boeing's new ship, but anomalies were detected in the device and it was decided that it should return empty to Earth, while they awaited a new passage back home. It took nine months.

A Starship rocket from billionaire Elon Musk's SpaceX company has exploded in the air again early Friday morning, on its eighth test launch. The ship exploded minutes after taking off from Texas, after spinning out of control for a few moments due to an alleged engine failure. In the live broadcast, the blackout of some of the engines could be seen and SpaceX confirmed that control had been lost with the ship. The explosion has dispersed fiery trails over the skies of Florida and the Bahamas.

A Starship rocket from billionaire Elon Musk's SpaceX company has exploded in mid-air again early Friday morning, on its eighth test launch. The ship exploded minutes after taking off from Texas, after spinning out of control for a few moments due to an alleged engine failure. In the live broadcast, the blackout of some of the engines could be seen and SpaceX confirmed that control of the ship had been lost. The explosion has dispersed fiery trails over the skies of Florida and the Bahamas.

One of the key episodes of the Cold War was the space race between the Soviet Union and the United States, which culminated in man's landing on the moon in July 1969. Today there is a certain consensus that this race with political undertones boosted scientific research to unprecedented levels, and a series has recently been released, For all mankind, which asks what would have happened if the Soviets had landed on the Moon before the Americans did. Well, at present, the closest thing to that race of the second half of the twentieth century is the competition between three billionaires, Richard Branson, Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk, to be the first to exploit so-called space tourism, that is, allowing anyone to fly beyond the atmosphere and see the planet Earth from space.

With all the excitement and solemnity of great historical milestones, three Chinese astronauts have successfully risen early this Thursday from the Jiuquan space base in the north of the country, in the direction of the new Chinese space station, still under construction. A new success for China's competitive space program.

Astronauts' hearts shrink. It is not a metaphor for the fright caused by the sight of the place where, as Carl Sagan said, everyone they know, everyone they have heard of, everyone they love, has lived. No. It is a real, studied, physical effect. During his 340-day stay on the International Space Station, the heart of a NASA astronaut, Scott Kelly, went from 190 to 139 grams, a reduction of 27%, as published in the Circulation journal in an article signed by cardiologist Benjamin Levine, of the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.

We often ask ourselves what kind of country we want. It is a pertinent and necessary question, and one that has many answers. One of them would most certainly have to do with scientific ambition, behind which there are a number of virtues: it calls for a high level of education, it helps to make innovation possible in companies and therefore to create wealth, and it drives concrete solutions to improve our quality of life. Scientific projects are an engine of progress. The first Catalan nanosatellite, the Enxaneta, lifted off this Monday morning, after two postponements. It culminates a two-year work and is the first of the six nanosatellites that the Generalitat plans to activate in a first phase that will last between three and four years. To speak, as has been said at some point, of the Catalan NASA is laughable. But the project itself must be taken very seriously. If only there were more initiatives of this calibre. The Enxaneta is part of Catalonia's NewSpace Strategy, which aims to place Catalonia in the new space economy as a sector of opportunities to improve the economy and services on Earth.