In late March 2011, NASA’s Swift satellite alerted astronomers to intense and unusual high-energy flares from a new source in the constellation Draco. They soon realized that the source, which is now known as Swift J1644+57, was the result of a truly extraordinary event — the awakening of a distant galaxy’s dormant black hole as it shredded and consumed a star. The galaxy is so far away that the radiation from the blast has traveled 3.9 billion years before reaching Earth. Speculative video representations of something unseen are often weak at best and completely wrong at worst. When NASA steps…

With the demise of its Space Shuttle program, NASA is turning to Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic, as well as other private companies, to send engineers, scientists, and equipment to space. The US space agency has signed two-year contracts worth a combined $10 million with Virgin Galactic, XCOR, and five other companies. The partnerships are needed for NASA to execute a variety of experiments in low-gravity environments. “The government’s ability to open the suborbital research frontier to a broad community of innovators will enable maturation of the new technologies and capabilities…

When Astronomer Neil deGrasse Tyson was on Bill Maher last week, he laid into the plans to slash NASA’s budget. When the topic of the James Webb Space Telescope came up, he broke in and said, “Don’t get me started.” Maher had him. “No, I want to get you started…” What followed was intelligent, eloquent, passionate, and truthful – all of the qualities of a rant worth watching. We posted the video he had produced about it last month, but this one is even better because it came off the cuff, from the heart. Today, he continued the attacks with a little humor in the tweet above. Go ahead, click through and…

“The most powerful agency on the dreams of a nation is currently underfunded to do what it needs to be doing, and that’s making dreams come true.” American astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson is passionate about space. As the final space shuttle prepares to land later this week for the last time, Tyson puts his passion to video with facts and opinions that ring true for millions of Americans who are upset with the decreased emphasis on manned space exploration. “I see the most powerful particle accelerators in some other country,” Tyson said. “The fastest trains are built by Germany and are running…

When the final space shuttle lands next week at Kennedy Space Center, it will begin a long stretch when the American space program will not be putting people in space. Between Russia, Elon Musk, and Virgin Galactic, it’s very possible that NASA will be the 4th or 5th next entity to do so. Is the US space domination officially over? Will NASA be able to make up any lost ground when funding recovers and focus is given to manned space expeditions? This video helps us to visualize what all this means and helps to put into perspective what is potentially lost. …

Remember growing up when people used to want to be astronauts? Well tomorrow’s people walk this planet today, and while space exploration budgets are cut and we still don’t have jet packs, today’s the day the NASA-developed ‘Moonbase Alpha’ game hits the Valve Steam servers for some PC gaming goodness. Announcing the title last year, the space scientists spoke about the power of games as educational tools, saying their game functions as a persistent environment, calling it “a massive visualization tools and collaborative workspace while simultaneously drawing users into a challenging,…