An icy, unknown world might lurk in the distant reaches of our solar system beyond the orbit of Pluto, according to a new computer model.
The hidden world — thought to be much bigger than Pluto based on the model — could explain unusual features of the Kuiper Belt, a region of space beyond Neptune littered [...]

The identity of the mysterious dark matter thought to pervade the universe has eluded astrophysicists for decades. Now, for the first time a team hopes to look inside the sun for one of the prime candidates.
The invisible stuff called dark matter is thought to make up as much as 90 percent of the universe’s matter. [...]

European researchers said on Monday they discovered a batch of three "super-Earths" orbiting a nearby star, and two other solar systems with small planets as well.
They said their findings, presented at a conference in France, suggest that Earth-like planets may be very common.
"Does every single star harbor planets and, if yes, how many?" asked Michel [...]

ASTRONAUTS on the space shuttle Discovery spotted an unidentified object floating behind the craft, as well as a bump on the shuttle rudder, the US space agency said today.
"After completing a standard day-before-landing test of the shuttle steering jets, the crew indicated they had seen a one-foot to 1.5 foot (0.46m)-foot-long rectangular object floating away [...]

The US shuttle Discovery was cleared on Friday to return to Earth after a successful mission to deliver and open Japan’s first space laboratory at the International Space Station.
NASA gave the shuttle, with seven astronauts aboard, the green light after it determined that the loss of a small clip from its rudder speed break posed [...]

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — The space shuttle Discovery crew is expected to complete its 14-day flight to the International Space Station with a landing at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 11:15 a.m. EDT on Saturday, June 14.
The STS-124 mission began May 31 and delivered two new sections of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency’s [...]

NEW YORK: The first private space flight to the International Space Station will blast off in 2011 in a deal with the Russian space agency, the US company Space Adventures said yesterday.
"For successful CEOs, executives, investors, entrepreneurs who know they want to travel to space, and want to invest in a future space mission slot, [...]

The U.S. space shuttle Discovery backed away from the International Space Station on Wednesday, leaving behind a Japanese research laboratory, a new crew member and high hopes for the outpost’s completion by 2010.
Pilot Ken Ham pulsed Discovery’s steering jets to slip away from the station’s Harmony docking port at 7:42 a.m. EDT (1142 GMT) as [...]

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Rollout of Scaled Composites’ mega-mothership, WhiteKnightTwo, is anticipated late July in Mojave, California — the first phase of a project to create a private space travel business — SPACE.com has learned in an exclusive interview.
WhiteKnightTwo is a specially designed jet carrier aircraft, built to haul the passenger and crew-filled SpaceShipTwo to release [...]

Will commercial space travel be a boon or a bust? Or will it just be one of those crazy activities only rich folks can afford?
Those and other pertinent questions were addressed by the Federal Aviation Administration Associate Administrator Dr. George C. Nield, at the recent International Space Development Conference.
Nield spoke on the anniversary of the [...]

More than 1,000 men and women from around the planet gathered in Washington, D.C., recently to explore the idea that the future of the human race is not confined to this world alone.
They came together for the 27th-annual International Space Development Conference (ISDC), sponsored by the National Space Society (NSS). The vision of the NSS [...]

Space is cool, that much is clear. Being in space — well, that’s even cooler. Getting there, however, can be a problem. In the past you had to undergo years of schooling and become somewhat of a "rocket scientist." And, well, that’s a lot of work and can really be a drag. However, what if [...]

WASHINGTON — For legendary astronaut and former senator John Glenn, the video clips brought back memories of old friends. For the rest of the nation, they provided a glimpse of NASA’s glory days.
The clips were among 100 hours of historic space footage, newly restored in high definition, released publicly Tuesday at a Capitol Hill ceremony [...]

ScienceDaily — The sun’s movement through the Milky Way regularly sends comets hurtling into the inner solar system — coinciding with mass life extinctions on earth, a new study claims. The study suggests a link between comet bombardment and the movement through the galaxy.
Scientists at the Cardiff Centre for Astrobiology built a computer model of [...]

PASADENA, Calif. (UPI) — The U.S. space agency says a motor in the robotic arm of its Mars rover Opportunity that began stalling more than two years ago has become more troublesome.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., are diagnosing why the motor, one of five in the [...]