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Come here for my take on UK and European space as well as the latest on major science stories
12:47 UK time, Friday, 27 January 2012
If you want to get a sense of how good the British space sector feels about itself right now, take a look at the shiny new building that's just gone up on the Surrey Research Park.
The Kepler facility is a major new centre for the production and testing of satellites. It's where the first big batch of operational spacecraft for Europe's Galileo sat-nav project is being assembled - a total of 14 satellites.
13:49 UK time, Friday, 20 January 2012
NEOShield is a new international project that will assess the threat posed by Near Earth Objects (NEO) and look at the best possible solutions for dealing with a big asteroid or comet on a collision path with our planet.
The effort is being led from the German space agency's (DLR) Institute of Planetary Research in Berlin, and had its kick-off meeting this week.
12:09 UK time, Wednesday, 18 January 2012
The German satellite radar twins - TanDEM-X and TerraSAR-X - are a year through their quest to make the most precise, seamless map of varying height on Earth.
They've now acquired data across the entire globe at least once. However, some tricky sampling areas, such as tall mountains and thick forests, will require several passes and so we don't expect to see a fully finished product before 2014.
14:46 UK time, Friday, 6 January 2012
The failed Russian Mars probe Phobos-Grunt has been pictured moving across the sky by the Paris-based amateur astronomer Thierry Legault.
The spacecraft is seen moving left to right in the video. The bulbous shape of its fuel tanks and its outstretched solar panels are easily discernable.
11:46 UK time, Thursday, 5 January 2012
[UPDATE 8/1/12: This article has prompted quite a bit of discussion and I've added two links at the bottom where their authors explain why they think the premise does not stand up. JA.]
America's classified X-37B spaceplane is probably spying on China, according to a report in Spaceflight magazine.
17:19 UK time, Thursday, 22 December 2011
Just days after its launch on a Soyuz rocket, the new French high-resolution Pleiades imaging satellite has sent down its first pictures.
One of the shots released by the French space agency (Cnes) is of central Paris, showing the Louvre and the Place De La Concorde - "naturellement".
15:40 UK time, Thursday, 8 December 2011
Creaking and arthritic it may be, but Nasa's Mars rover Opportunity continues to deliver remarkable science.
The near-eight-year-old mobile geologist has just found slivers of a bright material that looks very much like it is gypsum (hydrated calcium sulphate).
17:09 UK time, Thursday, 24 November 2011
The delivery of Nasa's Mars Science Laboratory rover, known as Curiosity, to the surface of the Red Planet is a mouth-watering prospect.
The $2.5bn robot is by far the most capable machine ever built to touch another world. Consider just the history of wheeled vehicles on Mars.
07:59 UK time, Wednesday, 16 November 2011
Nothing illustrates better the benefits to society of space activity than meteorological satellites. Weather forecasts save lives and limit damage to property.
We've seen forecast skill steadily improve over time, and much of that can be put down to the information now coming from orbiting sensors.
18:43 UK time, Thursday, 3 November 2011
British scientists and engineers want a piece of the Moon.
They're keen to participate in the European Space Agency's (Esa) Lunar Lander mission which will attempt to put down on the body's southern pole later this decade.
00:45 UK time, Tuesday, 18 October 2011
It is one of the most important weeks in the history of European space activity.
On Thursday, two satellites will launch from French Guiana to begin the process of rolling out Galileo - Europe's multi-billion-euro version of the American Global Positioning System (GPS).
22:18 UK time, Monday, 10 October 2011
I doubt those going to the Homebase DIY store in Chelmsford to buy a pot of paint give much thought to what goes on in the hi-tech factory building next door.
This is the HQ of e2v, a company that made its name producing valves for the post-war television industry but which now produces camera sensors for some of the biggest space missions flying today.
11:50 UK time, Wednesday, 5 October 2011
It couldn't have been planned better. Just as the Nobel committee was announcing its physics award would go to the research that identified the "accelerating expansion of the Universe", delegates to the European Space Agency were sitting down in Paris to approve a mission to investigate "dark energy" - the very thing thought to be pushing the cosmos apart at a faster and faster rate.
Saul Perlmutter and Adam Riess of the US and Brian Schmidt of Australia will share the Nobel. The trio studied a particular type of stellar explosion, or supernova, and found that the most distant of these objects were receding quickest.
15:30 UK time, Monday, 3 October 2011
The British spacecraft manufacturer SSTL has announced its intention to start building radar satellites.
It is a significant move for the Guildford-based company which has, until now, been associated with small, low-cost satellites that view the Earth at optical and near-infrared wavelengths, producing images that are recognisably the sort of thing we see with our own eyes.
20:36 UK time, Thursday, 22 September 2011
"We're back," is the rallying cry from Sea Launch President Kjell Karlsen.
The company that lofts big telecommunications satellites from a converted oil rig in the Pacific Ocean is preparing for its first flight since emerging from Chapter 11 bankruptcy.
10:20 UK time, Tuesday, 20 September 2011
Europe and America are now in a race against time to rescue their plans for joint missions to Mars.
The space agencies (Esa and Nasa) want to send an orbiting satellite to the Red Planet in 2016, followed by a large rover two years later.
23:56 UK time, Wednesday, 14 September 2011
Nasa has finally delivered its design for a huge rocket that could take humans to asteroids, Mars and a few other exotic corners of the Solar System.
The Space Launch System (the name will be changed at some point, surely) will be the most powerful launcher ever built - more powerful even than the Saturn V rockets that put men on the Moon.
14:13 UK time, Monday, 5 September 2011
British engineers have developed an autonomous navigation system for a Mars rover.
The technology will guide a robotic vehicle across the surface of the Red Planet, steering it clear of hazardous rocks and gullies.
12:55 UK time, Friday, 2 September 2011
The US National Research Council's report on space debris is not the first of its kind.
A wide range of space agencies and intergovernmental organisations has taken a bite out of this issue down the years.
11:51 UK time, Tuesday, 30 August 2011
There was always the risk that when the US shuttles were retired, continued operations on the International Space Station (ISS) could be left more vulnerable should there be a failure on the Russian Soyuz rocket system.
Soyuz has become the sole means of getting people to the 400km-high outpost. If it can't fly, no-one can. It's the classic single-point failure with no back-up.
Jonathan has been a science specialist with the BBC since 1994.
He was part of the team that set up the BBC News website in 1997.
His online science reporting has won major awards in Britain.
Jonathan is perhaps best known for his European space coverage.
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