Video: Alice Bowman, New Horizons mission operations manager, previews Ultima Thule flyby (members only)

Working under physical distancing requirements and other precautions against the coronavirus pandemic, range teams at Cape Canaveral are preparing for launches of Atlas 5 and Falcon 9 rockets from neighboring pads this weekend.

In another first on Mars, an instrument inside NASA’s Perseverance rover has made oxygen out of carbon dioxide sucked in from the planet’s atmosphere, officials said Wednesday. The technology could help future astronauts “live off the land” by generating their own rocket fuel and breathing air.

Views from NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter released Friday show the crash site where Europe’s Schiaparelli lander fell to the red planet’s surface from a height of several miles, leaving a distinct dark patch on the Martian landscape.