Professor Joshua Bongard, a computer scientist and robotics expert at the University of Vermont, and his colleagues from Tufts University and Harvard University's Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering, built the first living robots (Xenobots, assembled from cells of a frog species called Xenopus laevis) in 2020, discovered that these computer-designed and hand-assembled organisms can swim out into their tiny dish, find single cells, gather hundreds of them together, and assemble 'baby' Xenobots inside their Pac-Man-shaped 'mouth' — that, a few days later, become new Xenobots that look and move just like themselves; and then these new Xenobots can go out, find cells, and build copies of themselves.
Nov 30, 2021
Skyroot Test-fires India's 1st Privately Built Cryogenic Rocket Engine "Dhawan-1"
Skyroot Aerospace, a space technology start-up based in Hyderabad, successfully test-fired Dhawan-1, India's first privately developed fully cryogenic rocket engine. This will power the upper stages of its upcoming Vikram-2 orbital launch vehicle. The rocket engine Dhawan-1 is named after Satish Dhawan, an Indian rocket scientist.
Dhawan-1 is a completely 'Made-in-India' cryogenic engine, developed using 3D printing with a superalloy. The engine is fuelled by liquefied natural gas and liquid oxygen—a high-performance, low-cost, and clean rocket fuel.
Nov 29, 2021
Russian Docking Module Arrives at ISS
A Russian cargo craft carrying a new docking module was successfully connected with the International Space Station (ISS), following a two-day space journey.
The new spherical module is named Prichal (Pier) was docked with the orbiting outpost.
It comprises of six docking ports.
The module would allow potential future expansion of Russian segment of the space station.
It has secured to the docking port of new Russian Nauka (Science) laboratory module.
Prichal nodal module is a Russian spacecraft and a part of International Space Station. The module was approved in 2011 and was finally launched in November 2021.
Nov 27, 2021
K2 Mission Discovers 366 New Exoplanet Candidates
Using photometric data from NASA's Kepler/K2 mission, astronomers have identified 747 unique planet candidates and 57 multiplanet systems; of these candidates, 366 have not been previously identified, including one multiplanet system and one system with two short-period gas giants.
Nov 25, 2021
NASA launches DART Spacecraft on a Mission to Smash into Asteroid
NASA launched a spacecraft with one simple mission: Smash into an asteroid at 15,000 miles per hour.
The mission, the Double Asteroid Redirection Test, or DART, left Earth to test whether slamming a spacecraft into an asteroid can nudge it into a different trajectory. Results from the test, if successful, will come in handy if NASA and other space agencies ever need to deflect an asteroid to save Earth and avert a catastrophic impact.
NASA is crashing DART into an asteroid to test, for the first time, a method of planetary defense that could one day save a city, or maybe the whole planet, from a catastrophic asteroid impact.