Awesome Photo: Space Shuttle Atlantis "Looks" Homeward

There is something so beautiful (and totally cool) about this photo of the Space Shuttle Atlantis "looking" back at planet Earth. Don't you agree?

Photo from: NASA's Human Space Flight Gallery

NASA in the News: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly!

The title says it all. Eight interesting articles on NASA have popped up lately. In no particular order ...

1. AMAZING MARS IMAGES FROM NASA'S MARS RECONNAISSANCE ORBITER (MRO) VIA U OF AZ INSTRUMENT
2. “NASA HEAD REGRETS GLOBAL WARMING REMARKS”
3. "AMERICA'S RETREAT FROM EARTH MONITORING?"
4. “SECURITY ISSUES AT JPL”
5. “PETTY POLITICS AND UNCOORDINATED OUTREACH AT NASA”
6. “THE NEW SPACE RACE” (opinion, USA TODAY)
7. Wired: Commentary: THE UNCOMFORTABLE REALITY OF SEX IN SPACE"
8. Wired: "LISA NOWAK AWARDED NASA SPACE FLIGHT MEDAL"

NASA asks students for space decor

Hot on the heels of the competition that renamed Node2 to "Harmony", NASA has released another request: Design a space pennant to fly up to the station with Educator Astronaut Barbara Morgan on STS-118 this summer.

This special banner would join numerous other military, sports, and college pennants that have flown into space. The student that designs the banner will get a trip to see the launch, a Space Day for their school, and a lot of other special opportunities.

The competition is co-sponsored by Mad Science and KAOL (AOL for Kids). Contest ends April 10.

Read more at KAOL Expeditons or see the release on collectSPACE.com.

Special thanks to Xeni Jardin at BoingBoing.net for covering the story.

Students give "Harmony" to ISS

"Harmony" will be the new name of the Node 2 connections module for the space station. International laboratory modules will be attached to this piece of the station. The name was chosen by US students as a part of the NASA Exploring Space Challenges and announced on March 15 at Kennedy Space Center.

Students from across the United States put together proposals and models of module as a part of the program. Six schools submitted the name "Harmony" and were each recognized at the ceremony.

This is cute, uplifting, and heart-warming, but it is also a MAJOR departure from previous NASA naming standards. Renaming STS-1 the Enterprise took 100,000 letters from devoted fans! The new Constellation program, Orion capsule, and Ares rockets were all chosen in-house by NASA management. Perhaps this is a sign of a new, more open and inclusive NASA culture? Let's celebrate this milestone and push to have the public name the first Orion capsule as well!

NASA Exploring Space Challenges
NASA Node 2 information
Press Release on SpaceRef.com

Space Comic features Ham the Chimp!

Ham is coming back into the spotlight! Oni Presswill release FIRST IN SPACE as a 96-page graphic novel in April of 2007. Set in the early 1960s and extensively researched by author/illustratorJames Vining, FIRST IN SPACE tells the "true adventures" of Ham America’s first chimpanzee launched into space by NASA.

In the comic, Ham is paired with his human handler to undergo his training for the space flight. Smart and quick, Ham quickly outpaces his fellow chimpanzees, but nearly misses his flight because his fondness for banana pellets gets in the way of weight restrictions.

“FIRST IN SPACE is not only a fun and heartwarming adventure, but it also takes a serious look at the use of animals in government safety tests, an examination that’s important to our history and particularly to our future,” said Oni Press managing editor Randal Jarrell. “But it’s also about monkeys in space! What could be better than that?”

The FIRST IN SPACE original graphic novel ships April 25, 2007 and retails for $9.95. It’s a 96 page 6x9 trade paperback, with black and white interiors and a full color cover. The ISBN is 978-1-932664-64-5, and the Diamond order code is FEB07 3672.

Check out some sample pages here.

Wacky Cosmonaut Marketing Mashup

What do a cell phone company, new PC operating system, an 80's band, and dancing cosmonauts all have in common? They are all part of a viral campaign unleashed by T-Mobile and Microsoft to promote Windows Vista and T-Mobile Hot Spots. How Jefferson Startship got in the mix is still under investigation.

Until we figure it out, check out the site and have fun with the games and downloads. One warning: the Cosmonaut ring tones are addictive.

Check it out on the Seattle Times or Adrants.

Meteorite hits house in Illinois!

No, this isn't a 1950's headline, it's a recent story about a woman in Bloomington, IL. The report recounts Dee Riddle's discovery that had something crash through her bedroom window and hit her computer table around 9:30am on Monday morning.

Was it really a meteorite? Could it have been some neighborhood kids playing? What about a piece of man-made space debris? What is it, really? According to Illinois State University professor Robert Nelson, the U.S. Geological Survey's meteorite center in Arizona is working on the answer to those questions.

See the full AP story on CNN.

Students take a turn at space outreach

The Coalition for Space Exploration , an aerospace industry lobbying group, has partnered with the Texas Space Grant Consortium to sponsor the 2007 NASA Means Business Competition. The competition seeks innovative public outreach plans including three finished promotional pieces to illustrate the concepts. Teams of university students compete for $1000, behind-the-scenes tours of NASA facilities, and the opportunity to present their work to top NASA officials.

The competition has run for eight years and produced some results that have made it into NASA promotions. The 2004 Special Creativity Prize was awarded to the Art Center College of Design for their "Reach" video. After receiving praise from the space community, it was eventually integrated into the tour video at Kennedy Space Center. [full disclosure: Karen Lau was Creative Director for the video and co-manages this site]

Check out the competition and see the future of PR for space exploration!

Virgin Galactic + NASA

NASA Ames Research Center signed a memorandum of understanding today with well-known suborbital space tourism company Virgin Galactic. This is not the first high-profile partnership for Ames: Google signed a somewhat similar MOU in 2005 and solidified their relationship with a formal Space Act Agreement in late 2006.

This new arrangement allows Ames and Virgin Galactic to explore areas that could be good for research collaboration including space suits, heat shields for spaceships, hybrid rocket motors and hypersonic vehicles. The two-year agreement was was negotiated through NASA’s Space Portal, a newly formed organization in the NASA Research Park at Ames. The agreement does not require NASA nor Virgin Galactic to pay any fees or provide funds to support the areas of possible collaboration.