Cygnus OA-6: What’s onboard?

NASA’s new communications satellite, launched to a preliminary orbit August 18, has ascended to geosynchronous altitude more than 22,000 miles up, deployed its giant antennas and extended twin solar arrays to begin in-space commissioning.

Russian cosmonauts aboard the International Space Station commanded an approaching unpiloted Soyuz spacecraft to abort its docking Saturday after the ship’s automated rendezvous system ran into trouble, leaving ground teams assessing what went wrong and whether to attempt another link-up in orbit.

Loaded with investigations into chemotherapy drugs with reduced side effects and radiation detectors for homeland security, a plant-growing chamber to promote future food harvesting in space and a technology demonstration for sample-return capsules, a commercial Cygnus cargo vessel will be sent to the International Space Station next week.