Parker Solar Probe: cool-headed science and technology

NASA have recently published an easy to understand article by Susannah Darling

(with accompanying video material)

providing a detailed explanation as to why the Parker Solar Probe

will be able to cope with heat and extreme temperatures.

Link to: Traveling to the Sun: Why Won’t Parker Solar Probe Melt?

Seeds for weeds in microgravity

A promising experiment involving the humble weed "thale cress" (Arabidopsis thaliana)

is presently being conducted in NASA's advanced plant habitat

on the International Space Station.

Link to: "EMSL A matter of gravity: Understanding how plants grow in space"

[For background information on the scientific value of thale cress 

there is an old article from The INDEPENDENT

that remains quite topical and stimulatingly informative.

Link to: "The INDEPENDENT Salad days: the secret life of thale cress"]

Bright flash and loud sonic boom

Purdue University News Service has provided a short, useful note 

on a meteoroid that exploded 

over the city of Lipetsk in western Russia in June. 

Link to: Purdue University News

Hayabusa2 has reached its destination

Japan’s Hayabusa2 space explorer is presently

 at about 20 kilometres from asteroid Ryugu 

(some 280 million kilometres away from Earth)

scanning the surface for suitable touchdown places.

Link to: June 2018 article in The Japan Times