http://rss.spacefoundation.org Space news stories from around the world. Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:45:18 GMT ListGarden Program 1.3.1 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss http://www.floridatoday.com/article/20100311/NEWS02/3110314/1007/Fla.+lawmakers+make+push+to+extend+shuttle+life++build+rocket Florida lawmakers on Wednesday introduced legislation to extend the shuttle beyond its scheduled retirement this year and speed government development of a heavy-lift rocket. The bill is designed to counter President Barack Obama's budget for NASA, which proposes abandoning the Constellation program to return people to the moon and would continue plans to retire the shuttle. Obama wants to rely on Russian and commercial rockets to ferry supplies and people to the International Space Station, which he has proposed extending from 2015 to 2020. Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:45:16 GMT http://www.spacenews.com/military/100310-af-officials-urge-continued-funding-npoess-work.html U.S. Air Force officials told a Senate panel that companies should continue to receive funding to develop sensors and design the spacecraft for the canceled National Polar-orbiting Operational Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS) until the Defense Department completes a thorough review of requirements for its future weather satellites. Gary Payton, Air Force deputy undersecretary for space programs, said funding set aside in the 2010 and 2011 budgets should continue to be spent on the tri-agency program, which was halted by a White House order in February. Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:45:07 GMT http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN1016100820100310?type=marketsNews U.S. President Barack Obama is trying to tamp down an uprising in politically vital Florida against a new strategy for NASA that has rankled space veterans and lawmakers and sparked fears of job losses. Obama's decision to kill NASA's Constellation program to launch astronauts into orbit and return Americans to the moon has prompted soul-searching on whether the United States is prepared to cede a pre-eminent space role to Russia and China. "As with all great human achievements, our commitment to space must be renewed and encouraged or we will surely be surpassed by other nations who are presently challenging our leadership in space," Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:44:59 GMT http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35798339/ns/technology_and_science-science/ American physicist Sally Ride achieved lasting fame in June 1983 when she became the first American woman to travel in space as a crew member of the Space Shuttle Challenger. After leaving NASA Ride became a physics professor at the University of California San Diego, and is now president of Sally Ride Science, a company dedicated to helping teachers raise students' interest in science. Ride, 58, spoke to Reuters after appearing at a round-table discussion in Boston on gender equity and educating girls in the areas of math, science and engineering. Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:44:46 GMT http://dailycaller.com/2010/03/11/abandoning-the-space-race/ When archaeologists unearth the relics of the American Century, the space race will be our Holy Grail. Space was our New World. In 1962, when John F. Kennedy declared “we choose to go to the moon,” he encouraged every American to look up to the stars and summon the spirit of Columbus staring across the Atlantic. During the Apollo program every American taxpayer became a deckhand on the voyage to the moon. It was a journey that created the world we now live in, spawning GPS systems, plastics, alloy metals, cordless power tools and cancer detecting CAT scans Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:44:38 GMT http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/03/10/red-carpet-rolls-hubble-3d-movie/ The star of the Warner Brothers' new IMAX film "Hubble 3D" was missed Tuesday evening at the movie's world premiere at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum but for good reason: it was orbiting 350 miles above Earth. The Hubble Space Telescope, seen here in orbit above the Earth, after it was released from the shuttle Atlantis at the close of the STS-125 servicing mission in May 2009. The star of the Warner Brothers' new IMAX film "Hubble 3D" was missed Tuesday evening at the movie's world premiere at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum but for good reason: it was orbiting 350 miles above Earth. Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:44:30 GMT http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/general-relativity-confirmed-100310.html Score one more for Einstein. A new study has confirmed his theory of general relativity works on extremely large scales. The study was one of the first rigorous tests of this theory of gravity beyond our solar system. The research found that even over vast scales of galaxies and clusters of galaxies, the equations of general relativity predict the way that mass pulls on other mass in the universe. The new work also helps rule out a competing theory of gravity that seeks to do away with the need for bizarre concepts like dark matter and dark energy that have irked some scientists. This research indicates those pesky ideas may be here to stay. Thu, 11 Mar 2010 16:44:21 GMT