Let’s check Icarus for 1 January 2026 (vol. 443): Souza-Feliciano, A. C. Rommel, F. L. Morgado, B. E. et al. Rotational Light Curve, phase, and visible colors of (52246) Donaldjohanson throughout Lucy Mission Flyby Art 116771Hirabayashi, M. Prediction of Apophis’s… Read More »Note, Paper: Of Shapes and Fates
No surprise: ESA’s Ministerial Council approved (officially…) the RAMSES mission. While meeting this week (26-27 Nov… US holiday), the European Space Agency’s Council of Ministers officiated Agency matters. RAMSES is now on track to rendezvous with Apophis in ~2029, partly… Read More »RAMSES Has Rubber Stamp
More papers from Planetary Science Journal (2025, vol. 6): M. Darby Dyar, Breitenfeld, L. B. Lane, M. D. et al. Spectroscopy of the Hamburg Meteorite, Michigan H4 240 ae0a4fBair, A. N. Schleicher, D. G. Comprehensive Analyses of the Strongly Carbon-chain… Read More »Note, Paper: Seeing Pieces
The 6th COSPAR (Committee on Space Research) Symposium is taking place in Nicosia, Cyprus (no, I didn’t fly there) this Nov 3-7: https://www.cospar-assembly.org/symposia/ COSPAR: a bit of a big deal. Therefore, their meeting is big. Maybe too big; I’ll try… Read More »2025 COSPAR Symposium, Nicosia
In lesser news: NewSpace startup Fleet Space announced that their payload- a science instrument- will join the ApophisExL mission to the eponymous asteroid in 2029. www.fleetspace.com/newsroom/fleet-space-targets-apophis-for-off-world-exploration-missionSeptember 23, 2025Fleet Space Targets Apophis For Off-World Exploration Mission The ApophisExL mission is a… Read More »Got It On Apophis Mission (Fleet Space)
A bit light for this blog, but… ESA has posted an explainer video for the RAMSES mission: www.esa.int/ESA_Multimedia/Videos/2025/10/Ramses_ESA_s_mission_to_rendezvous_with_asteroid_ApophisRamses: ESA’s mission to rendezvous with asteroid Apophis 13/10/2025 This week marks three and a half years until the Apophis flyby of Earth;… Read More »See RAMSES Teaser
In Acta Astronautica for October (vol. 235): Broslav, T. Dreyer, C. Sercel, J. Optical mining of carbonaceous chondrite simulants: Testing and lessons learned in asteroid mining research p. 1 .2025.04.033Wang, Y. Zhu, Y. Ding, Y. Research on the ignition characteristics and… Read More »Note, Paper: Light this Rocket, Little Rock edition
More papers in PSJ (Planetary Science Journal), vol. 6 (2025)- they just keep posting: Scully, Jennifer E. C. et al. Leveraging Ceres to Gain Insights into the Candidate Ocean Worlds of Umbriel and Oberon That Orbit Uranus 187 adec97Vinogradoff, Vassilissa… Read More »Note, Paper: Rock-Objects Contexts
It’s an odd-numbered year. Therefore, the American Astronomical Society’s meeting of their Division for Planetary Sciences will be a joint meeting (in Helsinki, FI) with the Europlanet Science Congress, on September 8-12: https://www.epsc-dps2025.eu/ Of course, next year will be two… Read More »2025 Joint EPSC-DPS Meeting, I
Now for the annual Smallsat Conference (smallsat.org), hosted as always by Utah State University, August 11-13. See the overview: https://smallsat.org/conference/schedule/ https://smallsat.org/conference/keynote/https://smallsat.org/conference/flash-talks/https://smallsat.org/conference/posters/ In case you don’t see the connection: Hera is currently flying with the Milani and Juventas 6U CubeSats, to… Read More »Smallsat meeting, 2025