US space agency NASA has revealed recently that the final series of tests of the water impact of the 18,000-pound test version of the Orion spacecraft has been completed at the Langley Research Center in Hampton, VA.

Spelling disappointment for the NASA- and Pentagon-funded WaveRider project, the test flight of the hypersonic aircraft ended in a failure on Tuesday, when the plane plunged into the Pacific Ocean even before the firing up of its hypersonic engine.

After a malfunctioning check valve caused a holdup in the scheduled May 19 launch of SpaceX's Dragon cargo capsule to the International Space Station (ISS), the engineers at the private rocket company have replaced the suspect valve and given the capsule the clearance for a 3:44 am EDT launch Tuesday morning.

The first most expected display flight of a new commercial spacecraft; SpaceX's Dragon capsule has been postponed to Wednesday at the initial for the reason that there was a crack in an upper-stage rocket engine nozzle.

NASA researcher has found a new life form which is able to use the element arsenic in their DNA in place of phosphorus.

Biologist Felisa Wolfe-Simon who is a NASA research fellow based at the U. S. Geological Survey in Menlo Park, California in US who identified the creature said, "The mere fact that an organism can grow with this much arsenic, that's outrageous."

American space agency, NASA has announced a press conference to be held on Thursday to discuss "an astrobiology finding", which will impact the search for extraterrestrial life.

UK defense technology group Qinetiq has clinched a multi-year engineering contract with US Space Agency NASA worth up to $2bn (£1.25bn). Qinetiq's US arm will offer an engineering support and ground operations to the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida from March 2011, although the contract terms are yet to be reinstated.