“First International Space Crew Reunites for Mission’s 35th Anniversary – Yahoo! News”

http://news.yahoo.com/s/space/20100716/sc_space/firstinternationalspacecrewreunitesformissions35thanniversary

Cassini Gets Life Extension to Explore Saturn Until 2017
NASA extends the Cassini mission, the groundbreaking exploration of Saturn and its satellites, by 6 ½ years on Wednesday.

Comet carries a building block of life
Life on earth came, if not from ancient astronauts, in part from outer space. NASA astronauts have discovered an amino acid, glycine, essential for life on earth, on a comet, confirming a long-held theory that the building blocks for life came from outer space, Info Week reports….

http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/gizmodo/full/~3/b5zKGZ73loo/nasa-running-out-of-fuel-for-deep-space-missions-because-nobody-makes-nukes-anymore

Supplies of NASA’s go-to fuel for space exploration , plutonium-238, are dwindling. The U.S. stopped making it 20 years ago and now NASA’s Russian suppliers are running out after production shut down. The problem? Nobody makes nukes anymore. Deep space probes beyond Jupiter can’t use solar power because they’re too far from the sun. So they rely on a certain type of plutonium, plutonium-238. It powers these spacecraft with the heat of its natural decay. But plutonium-238 isn’t found in nature; it’s a byproduct of nuclear weaponry. So where can NASA turn to in order to get the 11lbs of plutonium it needs each year? Fortunately, the Department of Energy has come to the rescue and decided to spend the $150 million or so it would take to re-start production. Man, it feels like the Cold War all over again. [ Yahoo ]

500 days

Astronaut Class of 2009 Has No Spaceship

WASHINGTON – Nearly five decades after announcing the seven original Mercury astronauts, NASA is again set to reveal a new class of spaceflyers. But the 2009 astronaut class will be the first in nearly 30 years that will enter training without the prospect of flying on the space shuttle.

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