Sunday: October 6, 2002   0001 GMT Amateurs to help discover extra-solar planets Astronomers at NASA and the University of California at Santa Cruz have launched a Web-based project that has amateur astronomers lining up to have a chance to discover extra-solar planets that 'transit' or pass in front of their parent stars.    FULL STORY Team to advance nuclear electric power for space A team of government, industry and academia, under the leadership of The Boeing Company, has been awarded a NASA contract to meet the challenge of developing nuclear electric power for deep space exploration.    FULL STORY Saturday: October 5, 2002   0310 GMT Astronomers put quasars in their place A team of UK astronomers has made a decisive step toward resolving an argument that has rumbled on in the astronomical community for decades. The scientists from the University of Nottingham have been investigating the properties of quasars and nearby galaxies.    FULL STORY NASA hopeful for Monday space shuttle launch NASA's Mission Control Center in Houston has taken back command of the international space station from Moscow following this week's hurricane alert. At Kennedy Space Center, Atlantis remains in good shape for launch Monday. The weather forecast, however, is somewhat iffy.    MISSION STATUS CENTER Are landcover changes altering Earth's climate? While many scientists and policy makers have focused only on how heat-trapping gases like carbon dioxide are altering our global climate, a new NASA-funded study points to the importance of also including human-caused land-use changes as a major factor contributing to climate change.    FULL STORY Friday: October 4, 2002   0104 GMT Odd couple widely separated by time, space Appearances can be deceiving. In this NASA Hubble Space Telescope image, an odd celestial duo, the spiral galaxy NGC 4319 and a quasar called Markarian 205, appear to be neighbors. In reality, the two objects don't even live in the same city. They are separated by time and space.    FULL STORY Chandra discovers history of black hole X-ray jets For the first time, astronomers have tracked the life cycle of X-ray jets from a black hole. A series of images from NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory revealed the jets traveled at near light speed for several years before slowing down and fading.    FULL STORY Thursday: October 3, 2002   0401 GMT Shuttle Atlantis launch delayed till Monday Launch of the shuttle Atlantis on a space station assembly mission has been delayed to no earlier than Monday because of Hurricane Lili's approach to the Gulf Coast and the protective powering down of sensitive mission control systems at the Johnson Space Center near Houston.    FULL STORY - updated!    MISSION STATUS CENTER See more coverage here:       Video coverage for subscribers only:    VIDEO: LAUNCH POSTPONEMENT NEWS CONFERENCE QT or RV    MORE: SEE A FULL LISTING OF STS-112 VIDEO    SUBSCRIBE NOW NASA, Boeing celebrate recovery of TDRS satellite NASA's Tracking and Data Relay Satellite-I has finally reached its orbital perch 22,300 miles above Earth after Boeing's successful attempt to salvage the craft that was crippled by a propulsion system problem.    FULL STORY Teledesic suspends work under satellite contract Teledesic LLC, a satellite communications services company, says it has suspended work under its satellite construction contract with Italian satellite manufacturer Alenia Spazio SpA and will significantly reduce its staff as it evaluates possible alternative approaches to its business.    FULL STORY Wednesday: October 2, 2002   0300 GMT Hurricane delays shuttle 24 hours, maybe more NASA managers have delayed the launch of space shuttle Atlantis until at least Thursday as Hurricane Lili bears down on the Gulf Coast, posing a threat to NASA's Mission Control Center in Houston. The international space station crew was informed late Tuesday afternoon of contingency procedures to be implemented if Johnson Space Center is evacuated.    FULL STORY    MISSION STATUS CENTER - latest updates! See more coverage here:       Video coverage for subscribers only:    VIDEO: TUESDAY'S COUNTDOWN STATUS BRIEFING QT or RV    MORE: SEE A FULL LISTING OF STS-112 VIDEO    SUBSCRIBE NOW Camera eyes dusty spirals in Milky Way center The highest resolution mid-infrared picture ever taken of the center of our Milky Way galaxy reveals details about dust swirling into the black hole that dominates the region.    FULL STORY Earth-sized virtual radio telescope developed Astronomers have created an Earth-sized virtual radio telescope that can detect features 3,000 times smaller than the Hubble Space Telescope can see. The virtual device, which was created by linking signals from radio telescopes on several continents, is the first to operate at shortest-ever (2 millimeter) radio wavelengths.    FULL STORY Tuesday: October 1, 2002   0001 GMT Hurricane threat to mission control could delay launch If Hurricane Lili continues on its projected course and becomes a real threat to the Houston area, launch of the shuttle Atlantis Wednesday will be delayed a few days, shuttle program manager Ronald Dittemore said Monday.    FULL STORY See more coverage here:       Video coverage for subscribers only:    VIDEO: STS-112 PRELAUNCH NEWS CONFERENCE QT or RV    VIDEO: WATCH MONDAY'S COUNTDOWN STATUS BRIEFING QT or RV    VIDEO: ASTRONAUTS ARRIVE AT KSC FOR LAUNCH QT or RV    MORE: SEE A FULL LISTING OF STS-112 VIDEO    SUBSCRIBE NOW Unusually small Antarctic ozone hole this year Scientists from NASA and the Commerce Department's National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have confirmed the ozone hole over the Antarctic this September is not only much smaller than it was in 2000 and 2001, but has split into two separate "holes."    FULL STORY Boeing tests changes to Delta 4 countdown software Boeing checked out its debugged Delta 4 countdown software late last week during a test in which the inaugural rocket was fueled up on its Cape Canaveral launch pad, but a new glitch was uncovered.    FULL STORY    ARCHIVED DELTA 4 COVERAGE NASA funds workforce development projects NASA has selected 45 consortia in the National Space Grant College and Fellowship Program to receive funding for aerospace workforce development. A total of $3.56 million is being awarded in response to proposals submitted by the state organizations to NASA's Education Division in the Office of Human Resources and Education at Headquarters in Washington.    FULL STORY Monday: September 30, 2002   1400 GMT Countdown underway for Wednesday's shuttle launch Obscured by its self-imposed news blackout, NASA started the countdown Sunday for this week's launch of space shuttle Atlantis to continue the construction of the international space station's truss backbone.    FULL STORY Space station receives fresh supplies from Earth The international space station received its ninth Russian supply craft Sunday as the unmanned freighter successfully docked to the rear end of the complex under its own control.    FULL STORY Soot contributes to droughts, floods in China A new NASA climate study has found large amounts of black carbon (soot) particles and other pollutants are causing changes in precipitation and temperatures over China and may be at least partially responsible for the tendency toward increased floods and droughts in those regions over the last several decades.    FULL STORY				The ultimate Apollo 11 DVD This exceptional chronicle of the historic Apollo 11 lunar landing mission features new digital transfers of film and television coverage unmatched by any other.  U.S. STORE  U.K. WORLDWIDE STORE Contact us If you have a comment or question for Spaceflight Now, just send us an e-mail.