July 10, 2025

"America First" Means New Approach to US Space Partnerships (Source: Space News)
New Trump administration policies have international partners recalibrating their approach to cooperation. After decades of working closely with international space agencies, the Trump administration is reevaluating programs through an “America First” lens, which prioritize domestic prosperity over foreign-policy considerations. That has led officials in Canada, Europe and elsewhere that have worked with the U.S. on space projects to rethink their plans, including stronger ties with each other and greater domestic spending as links with the U.S. weaken. (7/10)

Spaceport Tax-Exempt Financing Will Cost $1 Billion in Lost Tax Revenue (Source: Space News)
Spaceports now have the same ability as airports to issue tax-exempt bonds. A provision in the budget reconciliation bill enacted last week allows spaceports to issue such bonds to support investment in new infrastructure. Spaceport advocates have argued that allowing spaceports to offer tax-free bonds, like airports and seaports, will make it easier and less expensive to finance projects. While the provision, as an earlier standalone bill, had bipartisan support, some criticized it as a handout to Elon Musk and Jeff Bezos. The Joint Committee on Taxation estimated that tax-exempt spaceport bonds will cost the government about $1 billion in lost tax revenue over the next decade. (7/10)

Japan's Space BD Partners with Gilmour for Launch Services (Source: Space News)
Japanese launch services provider Space BD is partnering with Australia’s Gilmour Space. The two companies announced Wednesday an agreement where Space BD will sell space on Gilmour’s Eris small launch vehicle, and also provide payloads and components for Gilmour’s ElaraSat smallsat bus. The agreement comes as Gilmour prepares for the first launch of Eris, now scheduled for as soon as next week after months of delays. (7/10)

UK to Invest in Eutelsat (Source: Reuters)
The British government is reportedly making an investment in Eutelsat. A French newspaper reported that Britain will invest 163.3 million euros ($191 million) in the satellite operator after French President Emmanuel Macron met with U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer this week. The investment will allow the U.K. government to retain a roughly 10% stake in Eutelsat that came from Eutelsat’s acquisition of OneWeb. A new round of investment by the French government would have diluted that stake. (7/10)

Airbus to Build Radar Imaging Sats for Spain (Source: Airbus)
Airbus has won a contract to build two radar imaging satellites for the Spanish government. Airbus Defence and Space will build two PAZ-2 satellites, providing continuity for the PAZ satellite in operation since 2018. The first of the PAZ-2 satellites is scheduled to enter service in 2031. (7/10)

NASA Loses Over 2000 Employees With Trump Realignment (Source: Politico)
More than 2,000 NASA employees plan to leave the agency through buyouts. Those totals, according to agency documents, include many senior civil servants who are taking deferred retirement or other buyout options offered by the agency. The totals, though, fall well short of the projected reduction of 6,000 civil servants, a third of its workforce, outlined in the agency’s fiscal year 2026 budget, suggesting that layoffs remain an option. (7/10)

Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy Named Acting NASA Administrator (Source: Space News)
President Donald Trump announced late July 9 that he has named Sean Duffy, the transportation secretary, to take over as acting NASA administrator. A Cabinet member has never taken over leadership of NASA, even on an interim basis, in the nearly 70-year history of the space agency. NASA has been led on an acting basis since the start of the Trump administration by Janet Petro, director of the Kennedy Space Center. (7/10)

Bearings Used in Space Technologies: Engineering for the Final Frontier (Source: Space Daily)
One of the many critical systems that make satellite operations, space research, space observatories, space explorations, and space missions possible is space technology, where the need for space-qualified bearings is pivotal. These mission-critical space-grade bearings are configured to overcome the challenges of space and ensure the success and longevity of high-value missions, on which the failure of a single component would mean the end. Let's see the significance, types, considerations, and future of bearings used in space technologies and understand how they made interstellar exploration and innovation possible. (7/8)

K2 Space Validates Satellite Systems in Orbit and Fires Record-Breaking Thruster (Source: Space Daily)
K2 Space Corporation has marked two major milestones as it advances toward its first full satellite launch, the GRAVITAS mission, set for early 2026 to Medium Earth Orbit (MEO). The company executed its first in-space demonstration mission, launched in January 2025, validating numerous vertically integrated satellite components. Their successful operation in space reduces technical risk for the upcoming GRAVITAS launch. In parallel, K2 Space completed a full-power test firing of its proprietary 20kW Krypton-fed Hall-effect thruster. (7/8)

Vibration Control System Enhances Satellite Detumbling for Orbital Cleanup (Source: Space Daily)
Under mounting concerns over space debris, scientists at Northwestern Polytechnical University have developed a breakthrough method for detumbling malfunctioning satellites using a hybrid vibration suppression and control strategy. Their approach integrates a nonlinear energy sink with active variable stiffness (NES-AVS) device and a composite prescribed performance controller to improve the safety and effectiveness of on-orbit servicing operations. (7/8)

AST SpaceMobile Adds $100 Million to Support Manufacturing Expansion (Source: Space Daily)
AST SpaceMobile has secured $100 million equipment financing to accelerate manufacturing and deployment plans through 2026. The agreement marks AST SpaceMobile's first such financing deal and reflects its transition from research and development to full-scale commercial operations. (7/8)

Chinese Wave-Tested Airbag System Simulation Boosts Safety for Ocean Spacecraft Landings (Source: Space Daily)
A new study from Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics offers critical insights into how reentry capsules interact with waves and airbags during maritime recovery. The team developed an advanced simulation model to analyze how airbag-cushioned capsules behave when landing in real-world ocean conditions. Their work marks the first detailed fluid-structure interaction (FSI) study that accounts for wave dynamics--an area largely overlooked in earlier recovery designs based on calm water or land impact scenarios. (7/8)

China Testing Increasingly Sophisticated In-Space Maneuvering (Source: Space News)
Chinese satellites are experimenting with increasingly sophisticated maneuvers in space. Between late 2023 and December 2024, five Chinese satellites executed a series of close approaches that space analysts called unprecedented due to the number of spacecraft and the complexity of their movements. That is making U.S. officials uneasy that these orbital behaviors could give Beijing an advantage in a future conflict. Given the growing complexity of the operations, the Pentagon is enlisting commercial firms to help decipher China’s intentions. (7/10)

SpaceX Nears Approval for Starlink Service in India (Source: Space News)
SpaceX is a step closer to beginning Starlink service in India. The Indian National Space Promotion Authorization Centre (IN-SPACe) approved services for Starlink on Tuesday, two months after giving similar authorization for Eutelsat’s rival LEO network OneWeb. The nod from IN-SPACe marks one of the final major regulatory steps before Starlink can begin operations. However, SpaceX still needs spectrum and other clearances before it can provide broadband in the world’s most populous nation. If successful, India would offer Starlink access to a vast user base and a strategic foothold in Asia. (7/10)

China's Orienspace Plans 2025 Launch of Gravity-2 Rocket (Source: Space News)
Chinese commercial launch firm Orienspace is aiming for a late 2025 debut of its Gravity-2 rocket after a recent engine test. Orienspace announced Tuesday that it had successfully conducted a hot fire test of a Gravity-2 first stage engine, including gimbal and valve system evaluations. There is confusion, though, about the specific engine tested: the company had been developing its own Yuanli‑85 kerosene-liquid oxygen engines, while test footage appeared to show a YF-102 engine, developed by state space giant China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation. Orienspace said Gravity-2 will achieve flight readiness by the end of 2025. (7/10)

Japan's Interstellar Raises $61.8 Million for Launcher and Satellite Tech (Source: Space News)
Japanese company Interstellar Technologies raised 8.9 billion yen ($61.8 million) for work on a launch vehicle and satellite technologies. The company said it raised 6.5 billion yen from several investors, with the remaining 2.4 billion yen in the form of debt financing. Interstellar said the Series F round would support work on its Zero launch vehicle, whose first flight has slipped to 2027. It will also aid in development of communications satellites that could be launched by that vehicle. (7/10)

EnduroSat Gets New US Chief (Source: Space News)
A former DARPA official is the new head of smallsat manufacturer EnduroSat’s US office. Paul “Rusty” Thomas is a former DARPA program manager that led Project Blackjack, a demonstration of proliferated low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite systems. He also worked for SpaceX and Amazon’s Kuiper Government Solutions business. Thomas will help EnduroSat, a Bulgarian producer of smallsats, expand its work in the United States. (7/10)

Congress Crushes Hopes for NASA Reform (Source: City-Journal)
Tucked among its hundreds of measures, the Big Beautiful Bill signed by President Trump last week includes a kind of poison pill for NASA reform. The bill allocates an extra $10 billion for SLS and related programs and stipulates that the rocket must be used for at least four more missions, a timeline that will take NASA years to achieve. Hopes for a leaner, more effective space agency will have to wait. (7/8)

NASA Mission Monitoring Air Quality from Space Extended (Source: NASA)
Since launching in 2023, NASA’s Tropospheric Emissions: Monitoring of Pollution mission, or TEMPO, has been measuring the quality of the air we breathe from 22,000 miles above the ground. June 19 marked the successful completion of TEMPO’s 20-month-long initial prime mission, and based on the quality of measurements to date, the mission has been extended through at least September 2026. The TEMPO mission is NASA’s first to use a spectrometer to gather hourly air quality data continuously over North America during daytime hours. It can see details down to just a few square miles, a significant advancement over previous satellites. (7/3)

New Horizons Conducts First-Ever Successful Deep Space Stellar Navigation Test (Source: Phys.org)
As NASA's New Horizons spacecraft traveled through the Kuiper Belt at a distance of more than 5.5 billion miles from Earth, an international team of astronomers used the far-flung probe to conduct an unprecedented experiment: the first-ever successful demonstration of deep space stellar navigation.

The researchers took advantage of the spacecraft's unique vantage point as it traveled toward interstellar space to image two of our nearest stellar neighbors, Proxima Centauri, which is 4.2 light-years from Earth, and Wolf 359, which is 7.86 light-years away. From New Horizons' perspective, the two nearby stars shifted their apparent positions in the sky as they appear to astronomers here on Earth, an effect known as stellar parallax. (7/4)

India Gets Rs 2.54 Back for Every Rupee Invested in ISRO (Source: India Today)
India’s space program is delivering an impressive economic return, with every rupee invested in the Indian Space Research Organization (ISRO) generating Rs 2.54 in value, according to former ISRO chairman S. Somnath. He highlighted the remarkable efficiency and impact of India’s space sector, which has achieved global recognition despite modest budgets.

“For every one rupee we spent, the return on investment is Rs 2.54. This is an indicator of our investment in the budget allocated to us, which is not much, yet we have built infrastructure, satellites, application domains, and successful missions,” Somnath said. (7/4)

A Unique Mission to Both Uranus and Neptune Could Launch in 2034 (Source: Big Think)
Many orbiting missions to Uranus and Neptune have been proposed and made it quite far in the mission submission process, but none have actually been slated to be built or fly. One of the major, flagship-class missions proposed to NASA’s planetary science decadal survey in 2011 was a Uranus probe and orbiter; it was ranked #3, but in the most recent planetary science decadal, it was ranked as the highest-priority planetary flagship mission.

Under ideal conditions, after leaving Earth, you’d get a gravity assist from Jupiter, and then you fly past Uranus, dropping off (and inserting) an orbiter and possibly an atmospheric probe as well, and then you’d continue on, assisted by Uranus’s gravity, to Neptune, where you’d then have a second orbiter and possibly an atmospheric probe, too.

What should give us all tremendous hope for a future mission is that there will be a launch window to reach both worlds with a single mission, Uranus and Neptune alike, that align at once: in 2034. That’s when the conceptual ODINUS mission would send twin orbiters to both Uranus and Neptune simultaneously: arriving at Uranus in 2047, just two years before the next (2049) Uranian equinox, and then allowing an orbiter to arrive at Neptune about three years later: in 2050. (7/3)

Inside a Utah Desert Facility Preparing Humans for Life on Mars (Source: CNBC)
Hidden among the majestic canyons of the Utah desert, about 7 miles from the nearest town, is a small research facility meant to prepare humans for life on Mars. The Mars Society, a nonprofit organization that runs the Mars Desert Research Station, or MDRS, invited CNBC to shadow one of its analog crews on a recent mission. Click here. (7/5)

NASA’s Impending Data Diaspora (Source: NASA Watch)
With the rush to spontaneously cancel a wide swath of missions, there is no transition plan for data recovery or archiving in a structured fashion in place at NASA or by the Administration. It is all chaos. Data will be lost, mangled, parsed, and scattered. So unless dedicated people go out and buy a bunch of 10 TB drives and skirt government regulations and save it on their own, this will become a data diaspora. And thus the loss of these missions will be compounded by this scattered data. This has happened before and it is happening again. (7/4)

Greece Expands Space Industry with Defense, Naval Ties (Source: Ekathimerini)
Greece’s space industry is expanding rapidly, with 60 companies now generating €500 million in 2024 revenue, up from €230 million in 2020, officials said. Athanasios Potsis, president of the Hellenic Industrial Space Association (HASI), emphasized the need to build on two decades of investment and leverage current defense-related opportunities. “The opportunities are now,” he said, citing Europe’s rearmament and the critical role of space technologies.

A new agreement was signed between EFA Ventures and the Hellenic Navy to boost aerospace collaboration, focusing on cutting-edge technologies for naval operations and transferring space tech into sectors like shipping. (7/4)

NASA Astronaut Credits Her Colorado Upbringing for Fostering a Love of Space, Exploration (Source: Scripps Media)
Major Nichole Ayers is living out her childhood dreams in outer space. She is currently aboard the International Space Station. “It never gets old to be able to hang out on the wall or go into a module and talk to somebody who's on the ceiling,” she said, demonstrating the lack of gravity aboard the station.

Originally from the Colorado Springs area, Ayers is also a U.S. Air Force pilot who has flown F-22 fighter jets. “Growing up right there in Colorado, you know, I got to see the Thunderbirds fly over every year,” said Ayers, who went to Woodland Park High School before going to the U.S. Air Force Academy. “I used to drag my family out east of Colorado Springs to get away from the city lights to watch meteor showers. And so, I was always fascinated by it.” (7/5)

Rocket Scientists Hooked Up ChatGPT to the Controls of a Spaceship (Source: Futurism)
Despite being stumped by simple children's games and uncontrollably hallucinating, AI models could perform surprisingly well when put in charge of navigating space inside a simulated spacecraft, researchers have found. They instructed OpenAI's ChatGPT to "operate as an autonomous agent controlling a pursuit spacecraft."

To their amazement, as detailed in a paper slated to be published in the Journal of Advances in Space Research, they found that the large language model exceeded expectations, scoring second place in a space simulation competition based on the popular video game Kerbal Space Program that pitted several AI agents against each other. (7/4)

Winners Announced for Florida/Israel Joint Aerospace Grant Program (Source: Space Florida)
Space Florida, the state’s aerospace finance and development authority, and the Israel Innovation Authority, an independent publicly funded agency dedicated to fostering innovation ecosystems, announced the award recipients of the 12th round of funding from the Space Florida-Israel Innovation Partnership Program. 

This year’s winners are MySky Eco of Port Orange, FL and Airwayz of Tel Aviv, Israel. MySky Eco specializes in the development and manufacturing of light aircraft designed for general aviation and flight training. Their product line includes aircraft powered by both piston engines and electric propulsion, offering cost-effective solutions for aerial observation, recreational flying, flight instruction, and more. (7/9)

Starships Coming to Florida: Air Force Collecting Public Comments During Hearings (Source: Florida Today)
The U.S. Air Force seeks public comment on the potential environmental impacts of up to 76 Starship-Super Heavy launches per year from the Cape Canaveral Spaceport. Three public hearings are scheduled in Brevard County, along with a virtual hearing, to gather feedback. SpaceX is also seeking approvals for increased launch activity elsewhere at the Cape.

The first of a trio of Starship public hearings on Florida's Space Coast took place July 8 in Titusville. Resident Russ Hansen expressed concerns about the mega-rocket's test-flight track record thus far in Texas. "I believe out of nine launches they've had, five of them have exploded either on the launch pad or over the Caribbean," Hansen said during the formal public-comment session. "And my concerns are, are there any mitigation effects in place or planned if that were to happen ... either on the pads or over the Atlantic Ocean?" he asked.

David Botto of the Indian River Lagoon Roundtable said it must be done to guarantee no harm to the ecologically imperiled lagoon. Without establishing a centralized authority to manage rapid development across the Cape, the future of the northern lagoon is at risk — perhaps great risk, he said. "The proper analysis of topography and hydrology should be done as an area, not 100 acres at a time as it is being done now. The piecemeal development will not help us. It will actually cause danger to the lagoon," he said. Click here. (7/9)