I don’t say much about asteroid mining, because mining companies don’t work via peer review and can stay in stealth mode for a while. Still: https://arstechnica.com/space/2026/03/a-private-space-company-has-a-radical-new-plan-to-bag-an-asteroid/Eric Berger, March 18 A private space company has a radical new plan to bag… Read More »TransAstra Astero-Plan (…Ars Markup)
From Nature Partner Journal Microgravity: Santomartino, R. Blanco, G. R. Gudgeon, A. et al. Microbial biomining from asteroidal material onboard the international space station s41526-026-00567-3 Relating to a brief mention I gave: microbes can be used to refine metals and… Read More »Note, Paper: High Biomining Writeup
The “February” issue of Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society brings us: Volume 545, Issue 4, February 2026 Morate,D. Mahlke,M. Álvarez-Candal,A. et al. JaMONCITO: the Javalambre – Moving Objects New Catalog from Investigations of Time-domain Observations staf2052Buendia, E. Valdés,… Read More »Note, Paper: Now Browsing; Then Dousing?
See also Day 1 Day 2 AgendaWednesday, January 14, 2026, 9:00 AM9:00 AM Terik Daly Welcome Mission Updates (Chairs: Masatoshi Hirabayashi, Daniella DellaGiustina)9:05 AM Alia AlMansoori Emirates Mission to the Asteroid Belt 2nd Justitia occultation campaign performed yesterday. Asteroid mining… Read More »2026 Winter SBAG Meeting, 2
Good MNRAS (Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society) for January 2026: Volume 545, #1Trigo-Rodríguez, J. M. Grèbol-Tomàs, P. Ibáñez-Insa, J. et al. Assessing the metal and rare earth element mining potential of undifferentiated asteroids through the study of carbonaceous… Read More »Note, Paper: Flying-Mass MNRAS
New in PNAS (Pub. Natl. Acad. Scis.) as of Dec 9, 2025 (vol. 122 #49): Mojarro, A. Aponte, J. C. Dworkin, J. P. Prebiotic organic compounds in samples of asteroid Bennu indicate heterogeneous aqueous alteration e2512461122 pnas.2512461122 Organic compounds: yes, asteroids… Read More »Note, Paper: Bennu Stew New Amino
They say any publicity is good publicity, but… we could use better publicity: interestingengineering.com/future-of-space/future-of-asteroid-mining-explainedKaif Shaikh, 5 Nov The future of asteroid mining: Missions, resources, and challenges explained Shaikh does a decent enough job- nothing we don’t already know in this… Read More »Asteroid Tri-Mining Tabloid?
It’s the day before Halloween, but Space Sci Rev (vol. 221) makes it feel like Christmas: Horányi, M. Tucker, S. Sternovsky, Z. et al. Interstellar Dust Experiment (IDEX) OnboardNASA’s Interstellar Mapping And Acceleration Probe (IMAP) art. 102 s11214-025-01230-1Wang, Y. Zhang,… Read More »Space Science Reviews, …whew
Everybody’s getting in on planetary science; LPSC was the first but is no longer the only game in ‘town’. The Planetary Science Conference 2025 starts tomorrow, Krakow, Poland, until Oct 25: https://mars.uj.edu.pl/index.php/planetary-science-conference/planetary-scienceconference-2025/ As per this blog, my pick of relevant… Read More »Polish Planetary Science Conference
USA Today is hardly cutting-edge as journalism goes, but publicity is publicity: www.usatoday.com/story/studiog/life/2025/10/07/asteroid-mining-brings-private-companies-into-the-space-race/85710633007/Hope Hodge Seck Oct 7 Asteroid Mining, a Gold Rush in Space Note that the URL ‘title’ is horrendous. Private companies defy traditional notions of a “Space Race”.… Read More »“Asteroid Mining” Lines