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Black Holes

S301 Star Could Reveal Sagittarius A*’s Spin Within a Decade

Astronomers using the GRAVITY instrument have discovered S301, a faint star completing an exceptionally tight 8.7-year orbit around Sagittarius A*, the Milky Way’s central supermassive black hole. Its extreme eccentricity carries it to within roughly 136–142 Schwarzschild radii of the black hole, where relativistic effects become unusually strong. Continued observations could make S301 one of the first stars capable of providing a direct dynamical measurement of Sagittarius A*’s spin within about a decade.

Spacewalks

NASA Sets Aug. 25 Spacewalk to Complete ISS Antenna Upgrade

NASA astronaut Anil Menon and ESA astronaut Sophie Adenot are scheduled to conduct a spacewalk on Aug. 25 to complete replacement of a space-to-ground antenna on the International Space Station. The approximately six-and-a-half-hour excursion will focus on installing and connecting a spare antenna, with an additional navigation-hardware task planned if time permits.

Radio Astronomy

Proposed LFT3 Moon Telescope Targets Farside Radio Silence

A proposed lunar farside radio observatory called LFT3 aims to exploit the Moon’s natural shielding from Earth-based radio interference before growing activity around the Moon makes the environment noisier. Covering frequencies from 0.1 MHz to 2.7 GHz, the telescope could search for technosignatures, radio transients, planetary emissions, exoplanet magnetic fields and signals from the early Universe. The team aims to deploy the mission before 2030 under a roughly US$150 million mission concept.

Mars

Marsquake Linked to 27 Fresh Boulder Falls in Cerberus Fossae

Researchers have linked the S0235b marsquake detected by NASA’s InSight mission to a concentrated outbreak of fresh boulder falls in Mars’ Cerberus Fossae. HiRISE images show 27 new boulder-fall tracks appearing after the July 2019 quake, while statistical and seismic analyses indicate the activity was unusually intense and physically consistent with quake-triggered slope failure.

Space Mining

Robot Trial Reveals Key Bottleneck in Lunar Oxygen Feedstock

A robotic lunar resource-processing trial at ESA’s LUNA facility has identified material transfer as a key recoverable inefficiency in preparing regolith for future oxygen production. The MoLES3 system completed 37 excavation-and-deposit cycles, achieving 93% transfer efficiency while showing that separator power and excavation trajectory planning can strongly influence overall performance.

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Mercury

Mercury’s Magma Ocean May Have Built Its Layered Mantle

Laboratory experiments and numerical modeling suggest that Mercury’s sulfur-rich primordial magma ocean crystallized into a strongly layered mantle, with its deepest structure depending on the planet’s original magnesium-to-silicon ratio. The study finds that a shallower, clinopyroxene-bearing fertile mantle could have supplied enough partial melt to build much of Mercury’s volcanic crust, while sulfur may have driven dense sulfides into the mantle and altered the distribution of heat-producing elements.

Mars

S301 Star Could Reveal Sagittarius A*’s Spin Within a Decade

NASA Sets Aug. 25 Spacewalk to Complete ISS Antenna Upgrade

Proposed LFT3 Moon Telescope Targets Farside Radio Silence

Marsquake Linked to 27 Fresh Boulder Falls in Cerberus Fossae

Robot Trial Reveals Key Bottleneck in Lunar Oxygen Feedstock

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Mercury’s Magma Ocean May Have Built Its Layered Mantle

Marsquake Linked to 27 Fresh Boulder Falls in Cerberus Fossae

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S301 Star Could Reveal Sagittarius A*’s Spin Within a Decade

NASA Sets Aug. 25 Spacewalk to Complete ISS Antenna Upgrade

Robot Trial Reveals Key Bottleneck in Lunar Oxygen Feedstock

Proposed LFT3 Moon Telescope Targets Farside Radio Silence

Marsquake Linked to 27 Fresh Boulder Falls in Cerberus Fossae

Robot Trial Reveals Key Bottleneck in Lunar Oxygen Feedstock

Mercury’s Magma Ocean May Have Built Its Layered Mantle