Space News from SpaceDaily.com
December 19, 2025
MOON DAILY
Trump shifts priority to Moon mission, not Mars



Washington, United States (AFP) Dec 19, 2025
US President Donald Trump on Thursday confirmed that he wants to send astronauts back to the Moon as soon as possible, putting eventual Mars missions on the back burner. In an executive order on his space policy, Trump said he wanted to get Americans to the Moon by 2028, under NASA's Artemis program launched during his first White House term. Such a lunar landing would "assert American leadership in space, lay the foundations for lunar economic development, prepare for the journey to Mars, and i ... read more

SPACE.WIRE
TECH.WIRE
NUKE.WIRE
Previous Issues Dec 17 Dec 16 Dec 15 Dec 14 Dec 12
ENERGY TECH
The Quantum Age will be Powered by Fusion
Gerroa, Australia (SPX) Dec 19, 2025
Fusion is the cosmic process that powers stars, shapes galaxies, and enables the chemical diversity needed for life. From the earliest stars to modern planetary systems, fusion converts hydrogen into heavier elements, forging the matter that makes up worlds, atmospheres, and living organisms. ... more
SPACEWAR
BlackSky accelerates Gen-3 satellite into full commercial service in three weeks
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Dec 18, 2025
BlackSky Technology Inc. (NYSE: BKSY) has placed its third Gen-3 imaging satellite into commercial service just three weeks after launch, marking a major reduction in commissioning time compared wit ... more
TECH SPACE
NASA CubeSat puts dual micropropulsion systems through orbital trial
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Dec 18, 2025
NASA and commercial partners are using a small satellite mission called DUPLEX (Dual Propulsion Experiment) to demonstrate new propulsion options for small spacecraft operating in low Earth orbit an ... more
TIME AND SPACE
Thorium 229 nuclei driven by laser in opaque solid moves optical nuclear clock research forward
Berlin, Germany (SPX) Dec 18, 2025
A team from the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA), Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (LMU), and Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) has for the first time excited the atomic nuc ... more
TIME AND SPACE
Galaxy mergers light up fastest growing black holes
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Dec 18, 2025
New Euclid satellite observations indicate that collisions between galaxies trigger the most powerful active galactic nuclei in the universe. The results strengthen the link between galaxy mergers a ... more
SATURN DAILY
Titan interior study points to thick slushy ice shell instead of global ocean
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Dec 18, 2025
Careful reanalysis of measurements gathered more than a decade ago indicates that Saturn's largest moon, Titan, likely lacks a vast liquid-water ocean beneath its ice, contrary to earlier interpreta ... more
ROCKET SCIENCE
Europe's Ariane 6 rocket puts EU navigation satellites in orbit
Kourou (AFP) Dec 17, 2025
Europe's new Ariane 6 rocket successfully placed two satellites into orbit to join the EU's rival to the GPS navigation system on Wednesday after the mission blasted off from French Guiana. ... more
SPACE TRAVEL
Billionaire Trump nominee confirmed to lead NASA amid Moon race
Washington, United States (AFP) Dec 17, 2025
The US Senate on Wednesday approved President Donald Trump's re-nomination of billionaire Jared Isaacman to head NASA, following months of backtracking and uncertainty over the space agency's future. ... more

ADVERTISEMENT


TECHNOLOGY NEWS


Available on Amazon Books

ROBO SPACE
"Robot, make me a chair" robot-make-me-a-chair-in-six-prompts
Boston MA (SPX) Dec 17, 2025
Computer-aided design (CAD) systems are tried-and-true tools used to design many of the physical objects we use each day. But CAD software requires extensive expertise to master, and many tools inco ... more
EARTH OBSERVATION
Sentinel 6B begins sea level mapping campaign
Washington DC (SPX) Dec 17, 2025
Sentinel-6B has begun returning its first ocean measurements, providing initial maps of sea level across a wide area of the U.S. East Coast and the Atlantic Ocean after its November launch. The U.S. ... more
PHYSICS NEWS
Laser experiment proposed to probe quantum nature of gravity
Berlin, Germany (SPX) Dec 17, 2025
Researchers at Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf have outlined an experiment in which light exchanges discrete packets of energy with gravitational waves, potentially revealing the long-sought qu ... more
EARTH OBSERVATION
New NASA Sensor Goes Hunting for Critical Minerals
Pasadena CA (JPL) Dec 09, 2025
Cradled in the nose of a high-altitude research airplane, a new NASA sensor has taken to the skies to help geoscientists map rocks hosting lithium and other critical minerals on Earth's surface some ... more
EARTH OBSERVATION
NASA backs CINEMA smallsat fleet to probe Earth magnetotail
Laurel MD (SPX) Dec 14, 2025
NASA has selected Dartmouth College and the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland, to begin developing a mission that will shed more light on the growing impacts of spac ... more
EARTH OBSERVATION
LizzieSat 3 completes bus commissioning for multi mission AI operations
Cape Canaveral FL (SPX) Dec 11, 2025
Sidus Space has completed bus-level commissioning of its LizzieSat-3 spacecraft, confirming that the satellite's core systems are operational in orbit and ready to support customer missions. LS-3 is ... more
TECHNOLOGY NEWS


EARTH OBSERVATION
SkyFi and ICEYE US roll out direct tasking platform for SAR satellite imagery
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Dec 11, 2025
SkyFi and ICEYE US have introduced ICEYE US Direct, a SkyFi-built and operated online platform that gives ICEYE US customers direct, on-demand access to ICEYE's Synthetic Aperture Radar satellite co ... more
SOLAR SCIENCE
Ionospheric gradients tracked in real time to sharpen space weather monitoring
Tokyo, Japan (SPX) Dec 17, 2025
Accurate, real-time tracking of ionospheric structure is becoming critical for protecting satellite-based navigation and communications, and a new observation framework now directly measures how ele ... more
SOLAR SCIENCE
PUNCH mission delivers sweeping new view of solar activity
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Dec 17, 2025
After less than a year in orbit, NASA's Polarimeter to Unify the Corona and Heliosphere (PUNCH) mission, built and led by Southwest Research Institute, is returning wide-field images that place the ... more
STELLAR CHEMISTRY
CoDICE instrument returns first-light particle data for IMAP mission
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Dec 17, 2025
December 16, 2025 - Southwest Research Institute's Compact Dual Ion Composition Experiment (CoDICE) instrument aboard NASA's Interstellar Mapping and Acceleration Probe (IMAP) spacecraft has begun r ... more
EXO WORLDS
Webb maps carbon rich atmosphere on distorted pulsar planet
Berlin, Germany (SPX) Dec 17, 2025
Scientists using NASA's James Webb Space Telescope have identified an exoplanet with an atmosphere unlike any seen before, orbiting a rapidly spinning neutron star known as a pulsar. The object, off ... more
STELLAR CHEMISTRY
Possible "superkilonova" exploded not once but twice
Pasadena CA (SPX) Dec 17, 2025
When the most massive stars reach the ends of their lives, they blow up in spectacular supernova explosions, which seed the universe with heavy elements such as carbon and iron. Another type of expl ... more
MOON DAILY
Sandia centrifuge campaign clears NASA VIPER rover for lunar launch
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Dec 18, 2025
NASA's Volatiles Investigating Polar Exploration Rover, or VIPER, has cleared a major test campaign at Sandia National Laboratories that is intended to show the 1,000-pound lunar rover can withstand ... more
MARSDAILY
Perseverance rover cleared for long distance Mars exploration
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Dec 18, 2025
After nearly five years operating inside Mars Jezero Crater, NASA's Perseverance rover has logged almost 25 miles (40 kilometers) of driving while engineers certify that its mobility hardware and ot ... more
MOON DAILY
Origami style lunar rover wheel expands to climb steep caves
Tokyo, Japan (SPX) Dec 18, 2025
A joint team from the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology KAIST and the Unmanned Exploration Laboratory UEL has developed a transformable airless wheel designed to help small rovers a ... more
TECH SPACE
Engineered interlayers boost satellite insulation and flexible electronics
Berlin, Germany (SPX) Dec 17, 2025
Researchers at Empa are refining the multilayer insulation foils that wrap many satellites and space probes, aiming to improve their mechanical robustness while maintaining thermal protection. These ... more
SPACEMART
Southern Launch to Host Lux Aeterna Re-Entries South Australia
Sydney, Australia (SPX) Dec 18, 2025
Southern Launch and Lux Aeterna have signed a contract to conduct orbital re-entries of Lux Aeterna's reusable satellite infrastructure to the Koonibba Test Range in South Australia. The partnership ... more
EXO WORLDS
Clues to the migration path of hot Jupiters in their orbits
Tokyo, Japan (SPX) Dec 16, 2025
The first exoplanet discovered in 1995 was a hot Jupiter, a Jupiter mass planet orbiting its star every few days. Today, models indicate that hot Jupiters form far from their stars, similar to Jupit ... more
TECHNOLOGY NEWS


Available on Amazon Books

SOLAR SCIENCE
Mission Space to fly second space weather payload with Rogue Space
Orlando, FL (SPX) Dec 14, 2025
Mission Space will launch its second payload in orbit in partnership with Rogue Space, extending its commercial space weather measurement network. The companies announced the mission during the Spac ... more
ROCKET SCIENCE
China launches carrier rocket to deploy experimental cargo ship and satellite
Tokyo, Japan (SPX) Dec 14, 2025
China launched a Kuaizhou 11 carrier rocket on Saturday morning to deploy a privately developed experimental cargo ship and a satellite into space. The rocket blasted off at 9:08 am at the Jiu ... more
MICROSAT BLITZ
Arab Satellite 813 launch deepens UAE China space partnership
Tokyo, Japan (SPX) Dec 16, 2025
A Kinetica 1 rocket has placed the Arab Satellite 813 into orbit from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, marking a new phase of cooperation between the United Arab Emirates and China in space acti ... more
MICROSAT BLITZ
DiskSat flat satellite platform targets high power missions and very low Earth orbit
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Dec 17, 2025
The Aerospace Corporation's DiskSat concept introduces a flat, disk-shaped small satellite bus designed to provide more power, surface area, and payload volume than a traditional CubeSat while keepi ... more
TECH SPACE
What General Contractors Must Know About AI-Powered Estimating Software
Los Angeles CA (SPX) Dec 17, 2025
The construction industry, is long reliant on traditional methods, is undergoing a digital revolution. At the forefront of this shift is the integration of artificial intelligence (AI), particularly in the critical domain of cost estimation. ... more
ADVERTISEMENT




Buy Advertising About Us Editorial & Other Enquiries Privacy statement
The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2025 - Space Media Network. All websites are published in Australia and are solely subject to Australian law and governed by Fair Use principals for news reporting and research purposes. AFP, UPI and IANS news wire stories are copyright Agence France-Presse, United Press International and Indo-Asia News Service. ESA news reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement, agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by Space Media Network on any Web page published or hosted by Space Media Network. Privacy Statement