Stefanie Waldek

The Latest from Stefanie Waldek

With $20M in new funding, Hydrosat preps climate-monitoring satellites for launch

Data is becoming as precious as water in precision agriculture, and Hydrosat aims to help provide both with a new set of Earth observation satellites. The company has raised a $20 million A round, inc

NASA’s InSight mission is winding down — a look back at the Mars lander’s many accomplishments

Another Mars robot is settling in for a long, long sleep. With dust caking its solar panels, InSight has been losing the ability to recharge for months — in the spring, it was operating at just one-

Space startup Stells wants to put spacecraft-charging covers on the moon

The portable power bank first came on the scene in 2001, and since then, on-the-go charging has been a possibility for most mobile device users. Now, a new space company wants to bring the concept of

Smashing success: NASA’s DART spacecraft bumped an asteroid off its orbit

The demise of a spacecraft is usually something rather poignant. But two weeks ago, NASA celebrated one’s destruction. On September 26, NASA executed the final stage of the Double Asteroid Redir

Morpheus Space’s satellite thrusters are propelled forward with a $28M Series A

The booming satellite industry has been a boon for Morpheus Space, which produces a modular, electric propulsion system for small satellites. Morpheus has raised a $28 million Series A, with which it

Northrop Grumman taps Firefly Aerospace to upgrade its Antares rocket to American-built engines

Chalk one up for the American broomsticks. Northrop Grumman has announced that it will partner with startup Firefly Aerospace to build an all-American version of its workhorse Antares rocket, which cu

SpaceX launches South Korea’s first moon mission, an orbiter named Danuri

South Korea is headed for the moon. Last night, the country launched its first-ever lunar mission — in fact, its first-ever mission beyond low Earth orbit. Formerly called the Korea Pathfinder Lunar

China’s new Mars images show off the country’s robust (but secretive) space program

With a $24 billion budget and dozens of active, high-profile missions, it’s not surprising that NASA is the most visible of the dozens of government space agencies in the world. But China’

Watch Virgin Orbit’s ‘Straight Up’ launch of Space Force satellites live tonight

Update: The launch was delayed due to a slight problem with propellant temperature, but Virgin Orbit has confirmed it will make its next attempt tonight (July 1st) no earlier than 10:20 PM PDT. Update

At NASA’s Lunabotics competition, students design mining robots for the moon

If this year’s Lunabotics competition is any indication, there’s a bright future ahead for the surface of the moon — and below it. The NASA-hosted challenge recently saw 39 teams of univ

NASA assembles a UFO research team to study ‘unidentified aerial phenomena’

NASA has announced the formation of a study team dedicated to UFOs — or unidentified aerial phenomena (UAPs), as they’ve been rebranded to shed some of their tin-foil-hat stigma. But don&#8217

NASA awards $2 million to moonshot solar sail project

The concept of solar sails is not particularly new — just check out the Planetary Society’s LightSail 2, French startup Gama or NASA’s Advanced Composite Solar Sail System. But one grou

UK taps Virgin Orbit to launch first satellites from its own soil this summer

The United Kingdom has a small but growing space industry, with the number of space-related organizations increasing by an average of 21% each year since 2012, but there is one key component it’

GPS signals could detect tsunamis better and faster than seismic sensors

GPS networks are already a crucial part of everyday life around the world, but an international team of scientists has found a new, potentially life-saving use for them: tsunami warnings. Researchers

Vyoma is the latest player seeking to prevent satellite collisions with space junk

As you might’ve heard, it’s getting a little crowded in space, between thousand-satellite constellations à la SpaceX’s Starlink and the millions of pieces of space junk accumulated from decades

NASA grants $279M to six private satcom providers, including $70M for SpaceX

NASA is deepening its relationship with the commercial space industry, announcing $278.5 million in funding for six American satellite communications providers — though it expects the companies to m

NASA finds two new space-based ways to track climate change

We often think of NASA as an agency that looks outward into space, but it’s the agency’s position in space that makes it such a powerful tool for observing the Earth itself. Today NASA announced t

Slingshot Aerospace scores $25M Space Force contract to build ‘digital twin’ space simulator

Space simulation and analytics company Slingshot Aerospace has been awarded a $25.2 million, 39-month contract by the U.S. Space Force (USSF) to further develop and deliver two of its products: Digita

French aerospace company Gama raises $2M to develop a solar sail spacecraft

Just as sea breezes propel sailboats across the sea on Earth, solar radiation might one day be able to propel spacecraft between the stars. Or at least that’s the hope of French startup Gama. The ae

NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter will keep flying on Mars through at least September

It’s been a busy year on Mars for NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter, and it’s not about to slow down now. After 21 flights, the aircraft is still in excellent condition, so NASA has extended its missi
Load More