A spacecraft that never runs out of fuel sounds like science fiction, but a team at Texas A&M University has taken a small, literal step toward that goal. In experiments conducted at the university’s ...
Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft has achieved the first successful laser ranging experiment performed during an asteroid flyby, ...
Reaching another star is one of the biggest challenges in space exploration. Even the nearest star system, Alpha Centauri, is ...
A Japanese spacecraft that departed Earth more than a decade ago managed to do something no other spacecraft before it did: perform laser ranging during an asteroid flyby. And this could have major ...
The 2027 demonstration will be the first in-flight test of laser communication between a reentry vehicle and a satellite. The system aims to transfer mission data at rates up to 2.5 gigabits per ...
In 2007, NASA directed the robotic Cassini spacecraft that was then orbiting Saturn to swoop within 2,000 kilometers of the planet. Pictured here, from about 75,000 kilometers out, is the hemisphere ...
On August 10, 2026, Lithuanian optical communications company Astrolight and German space logistics firm ATMOS Space Cargo signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to demonstrate an in-flight ...