Photos: Atlas 5 rocket aims for International Space Station

Russia’s Progress MS-08 cargo carrier glided to an automated radar-guided link-up with the International Space Station on Thursday with three tons of fuel, water, supplies and experiments.

A novel communications experiment developed by NASA and the Naval Research Laboratory has arrived at the International Space Station to prove data can be transmitted in space using X-ray signals, a breakthrough that could have uses in deep space exploration and military technology on Earth.

The detective work into the Atlas 5 rocket’s first stage performance trouble during the Cygnus cargo ship launch a week ago has implicated the fuel system as the likely culprit for using up the liquid oxygen supply too quickly.