On Feb. 9, 2020, the European Space Agency and NASA launched the Solar Orbiter spacecraft to gain a better understanding of how the Sun influences life on Earth. Additionally, it will provide crucial information on the effects the Sun may have on astronauts as they travel to the Moon and Mars as part of NASA’s Artemis Program.
When a person is called a “rocket scientist,” it can be referring to someone who supports space exploration, or it can simply mean he or she is very intelligent. A “rock star” usually refers to a member of a successful musical band or someone highly renowned in a particular field. Dr. Brian May could be considered both.
NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft continues to pass through the outer edges of the solar system. After a decade-long and more than 3.6 billion mile trip to Pluto, the probe is providing the first close up observations of of the tiny planet and the most distant objects in the solar system.
New Horizons beamed back the first-ever, close-up images and scientific observations of distant Pluto, its system of large and small moons, as well as the Kuiper Belt. A region of the solar system beyond the planets, the Kuiper Belt consists mainly of small planetary bodies.