China’s Tianwen 1 spacecraft at Mars pulled a big New Year’s surprise with stunning new images captured by a small camera that flew free of the orbiter to snap epic selfies above the Red Planet.

When the most massive stars die, they collapse to form some of the densest objects known in the Universe: black holes. They are the “darkest” objects in the cosmos, as not even light can escape their incredibly strong gravity.

A dense, magnetic star violently erupted and spat out as much energy as a billion suns — and it happened in a fraction of a second, scientists recently reported.

This type of star, known as a magnetar, is a neutron star with an exceptionally strong magnetic field, and magnetars often flare spectacularly and without warning. But even though magnetars can be thousands of times brighter than our sun, their eruptions are so brief and unpredictable that they’re challenging for astrophysicists to find and study.

The center announced last week that it was starting the process of an environmental review of the proposed Launch Complex (LC) 49 in response to an inquiry from SpaceX. The center did not disclose a timeline for conducting the review but said it would precede any agreement with SpaceX to develop the site.

The Luxembourg Future Fund (LFF) said Dec. 17 it is joining a $45 million investment round for Montreal-based NorthStar, which is developing a constellation of commercial imaging satellites to monitor what’s happening in orbit and down below.

WASHINGTON — The Biden administration formally supports extending operations of the International Space Station through the end of the decade, an announcement that is neither surprising nor addresses how to get all the station’s partners, notably Russia, to agree on the station’s future.

TAMPA, Fla. — Advanced Cooling Technologies (ACT) has won NASA funding for thermal control solutions that enable vehicles and other equipment to survive harsh lunar environments without an active power source.

SEOUL, South Korea — Japan’s recently elected prime minister set an end-of-the-decade goal for sending Japanese astronauts to the moon as part of the U.S.-led Artemis program. 

HELSINKI — This year, China’s main space contractor will target more than 40 orbital launches, including completion of the Tiangong space station, following 48 successful launches in 2021.

WASHINGTON — After a year marked by little launch activity and one high-profile failure, the head of India’s space program says he expects much more in 2022, including an uncrewed test flight for its human spaceflight program.

Just before 11:30 a.m. EST (1630 GMT) on Jan. 1, people in Pittsburgh heard what sounded like a loud “boom” outside. Reports described windows rattling and objects shaking in their homes, according to CBS Pittsburgh. The sudden blast surprised those living in the Pittsburgh area as the meteor broke up in the cloudy morning sky. 

The James Webb Space Telescope has successfully deployed all five layers of its tennis-court-sized sunshield, a prerequisite for the telescope’s science operations and the most nerve-wracking part of its risky deployment.

NASA is tracking two explorers on a 2,268-mile (3,650 kilometers) journey across Antarctica to learn more about humanity’s ability to survive on Mars. 

The car-sized Perseverance landed last February inside the 28-mile-wide (45 kilometers) Jezero, which hosted a big lake and a river delta in the ancient past. 

Mars is a planet of vast contrasts — huge volcanoes, deep canyons, and craters that may or may not host running water. It will be an amazing location for future tourists to explore, once we put the first Red Planet colonies into motion. The landing sites for these future missions will likely need to be flat plains for safety and practical reasons, but perhaps they could land within a few days’ drive of some more interesting geology. Here are some locations that future Martians could visit.

Kepler Communications plans to use a Spire Global nanosatellite launching late next year to test a terminal it hopes to someday deploy by the thousands to create a mesh network of data-relay satellites.