asteroid mining

Planetary Resources has launched its first spacebound test of asteroid mining technology on July 16, beginning a 90-day mission to test vital technologies.

The new ideas funded by the NASA Innovative Advanced Concepts (NIAC) program include a squid-like amphibious rover that could explore icy, ocean-harboring moons such as the Jupiter satellite Europa.

A new asteroid-hunting computer program will help amateur astronomers and citizen scientists identify potentially hazardous space rocks faster and more accurately, NASA officials say.

Our civilization—and presumably any civilization with a technological capacity at least as advanced as ours—runs on energy and raw materials.

A recent action by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration is stirring up some moon dust in a legal debate about private companies setting up shop on the moon.

The asteroid-mining firm Deep Space Industries (DSI) is investigating the feasibility of injecting microbes into space rocks far from Earth, to get a jump on processing their valuable resources.

Planetary Resources' Arkyd 3 technology demonstator was aboard the Cygnus cargo craft destroyed by Tuesday's rocket explosion.