Since the 1960s, the amount of debris in Earth's orbit has increased linearly, NASA experts have recently said. The danger of collision between sensitive spacecraft sent to orbit, including high-tech satellites, space shuttles, and the International Space Station (ISS), has since prompted drastic modifications in the amount of junk each space flight ... (read more)

Chandrayaan-1, the Indian Space Research Organisation's lunar orbiter, was captured into orbit around the Moon on Nov. 8. One day later, the spacecraft performed a maneuver that lowered the closest point of its orbit down to 200 km from the Moon.

NASA's Mercury Surface, Space Environment, Geochemistry, and Ranging spacecraft known as MESSENGER will fly by Mercury for the third and final time on Sept. 29. The spacecraft will pass less than 142 miles above the planet's rocky surface for a final gravity assist that will enable it to enter Mercury's orbit in 2011. Determining the composition of Mercury's surface is a major goal of the orbital phase of the mission. The spacecraft already has imaged more than 90 percent of the planet's surface.

With the advent of the Space Age, numerous spacecraft have been sent up to orbit over the years. Some of them are still functioning to this day, relaying back useful information to their control stations on Earth. But many of them are slowly decaying, out of commission, and are littering precious orbital paths, which may be used by new, more advanced systems.

New simulations show how planets form and maintain an orbit around a developing solar system. Until now, models plunged Earth-like objects into the stars they orbit.

NASA's long-lived Mars Odyssey spacecraft has completed an eight-month adjustment of its orbit, positioning itself to look down at the day side of the planet in mid-afternoon instead of late afternoon. This change gains sensitivity for infrared mapping of Martian minerals by the orbiter's Thermal Emission Imaging System camera. Orbit design for Odyssey's first seven years of observing Mars used a compromise between what worked best for the infrared mapping and for another onboard instrument.

After a four and a half day journey from the Earth, the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, or LRO, has successfully entered orbit around the moon. Engineers at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., confirmed the spacecraft's lunar orbit insertion at 6:27 a.m. EDT Tuesday.

After a large number of delays, NASA's mission to the Moon, comprised of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) and the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Spacecraft (LCROSS), has finally made it to its destination. Following the June 18th launch, the Atlas V delivery system carried the two spacecraft safely to their destination on the orbit of the Moon, where LRO... (read more)

The recently launched Planck telescope finally began to observe the Universe on August 13th, during a test-observation period. Built specifically by the European Space Agency (ESA) to analyze the Cosmic Microwave Background (CMB), the relic radiation left behind when the Cosmos first exploded into being, the telescope is now the coldest object in the known Universe.

The longest-serving of six spacecraft now studying Mars is up to new tricks for a third two-year extension of its mission to examine the most Earthlike of known foreign planets. NASA's Mars Odyssey is altering its orbit to gain even better sensitivity for its infrared mapping of Martian minerals. During the mission extension through September 2010, it will also point its camera with more flexibility than it has ever used before. Odyssey reached Mars in 2001.