Indian craft leaves Earth's orbit on way to Mars

Dec 01, 2013 by Ashok Sharma

Graphic fact file on India's Mars Orbiter Mission

India's Mars orbiter mission left Earth's sphere of influence early Sunday after performing a maneuver to put it on its way to orbit the red planet

 The spacecraft fired its main engine for more than 20 minutes to reach the correct velocity to leave the Earth's orbit, the Bangalore-based Indian Space Research Organization said.

 © 2013 The Associated Press. All rights reserved

What is the universe expanding into?

Nov 28, 2013 by Fraser Cain, Universe Today

Representation of the timeline of the universe over 13.7 billion years, and the expansion in the universe that followed. Credit: NASA/WMAP Science Team

Come on, admit it, you've had this question. "Since astronomers know that the Universe is expanding, what's it expanding into? What's outside of the Universe?" Ask any astronomer and you'll get an unsatisfying answer. We give you the same unsatisfying answer, but really explain it, so your unsatisfaction doesn't haunt you any more.

Come on, admit it, you've had this question. "Since astronomers know that the Universe is expanding, what's it expanding into? What's outside of the Universe?" Ask any astronomer and you'll get an unsatisfying answer. We give you the same unsatisfying answer, but really explain it, so your unsatisfaction doesn't haunt you any more.

Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2013-11-universe.html#jCp

 Speed-of-light 'nano-camera' produces 3D translucent objects

MIT students (left to right) Ayush Bhandari, Refael Whyte and Achuta Kadambi pose next to their "nano-camera" that can capture translucent objects, such as a glass vase, in 3-D. Credit: BRYCE VICKMARK

A $500 "nano-camera" that can operate at the speed of light has been developed by researchers in the MIT Media Lab.

Comet ISON May Have Survived | NASA

China to send 'jade rabbit' buggy to the moon next month

BEIJING Tue Nov 26, 2013 12:59am EST

Visitors take pictures of a prototype model of a lunar rover at the 15th China International Industry Fair in Shanghai, November 5, 2013.

Credit: Reuters/Stringer

(Reuters) - China will land its first probe on the moon in early December which will deploy a buggy to explore its surface, an official said on Tuesday, marking a major milestone in the country's space ambitions.

Chris Hadfield: We Should Treat Earth as Kindly as We Treat Spacecraft - Wired Science

By Chris Hadfield 11.25.13 6:30 AM

Astronaut Chris Hadfield was commander of Expedition 35 on the International Space Station, from December 2012 to May 2013.   Tavis Coburn

"Racing high over the Sahara at 5 miles per second, protected from the desert’s parched endlessness and soaking in its sere beauty, I saw Khartoum, the city where the White and Blue Nile rivers meet. I turned my head left and followed the river downstream to Cairo and the Mediterranean. Twisting weightlessly back to my right, I could pick out sunlight glinting off the waters of Lake Tana and Lake Victoria, the Nile’s headwaters. Explorers from the early Greeks to Queen Victoria’s David Livingstone had toiled and failed to find what I could see at a glance. Impressive on its own—even more so since I had been over Winnipeg, on the edge of the Canadian prairies, just 20 minutes earlier."