Talking to distant spacecraft and more might become a lot easier.

A warp drive for faster-than-light travel may no longer need exotic matter.

WASHINGTON — Japanese lunar lander developer ispace has confirmed that its second mission to the moon will launch on the same SpaceX Falcon 9 as Firefly Aerospace’s first lunar lander.

In an online presentation late Dec. 17 to discuss preparations for its Resilience lander, Takeshi Hakamada, founder and chief executive of ispace, said that his company’s mission would launch during a six-day window in mid-January on the same rocket launching Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost 1 mission.

“The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will not only be carrying the ispace Resilience lander. Another private company’s lander aiming to reach the moon will also be riding on the same rocket as us,” he said. On-screen graphics stated that lander was Firefly’s Blue Ghost.

SpaceX’s next Starship megarocket now has a license to fly.

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on Tuesday (Dec. 17) issued a launch license for SpaceX’s upcoming Starship Flight 7 test flight, clearing the way for the company’s next launch of the world’s largest rocket from South Texas. The launch license comes on the heels of several Starship engine tests by SpaceX to check the flight readiness of its seventh Ship spacecraft and Super Heavy rocket booster.

NASA briefing on lunar lander from Firefly.

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NASA holds a virtual audio-only media teleconference to highlight the NASA science flying onboard Firefly Aerospace’s Blue Ghost Mission 1 as part of the agency’s CLPS (Commercial Lunar Payload Services) initiative and Artemis campaign. Participants include:

• Joel Kearns, deputy associate administrator for exploration, Science Mission Directorate, NASA Headquarters.

• Ryan Watkins, program scientist, Exploration Science Strategy and Integration Office, NASA Headquarters.

• Jason Kim, CEO, Firefly Aerospace

Human-made objects on Mars, including spacecraft, landers, and rovers, may hold significant archaeological value rather than being dismissed as space debris.

Scholars propose cataloging and preserving these artifacts to document humanity’s early interplanetary exploration and ensure future missions respect these historical markers.

Mars as a new frontier: understanding the value of space debris.

The most explosive fuel in the universe could power humanity’s first starship.

Getting places in space quickly has been the goal of propulsion research for a long time.

Rockets, our most common means of doing so, are great for providing lots of force but extraordinarily inefficient. Other options like electric propulsion and solar sailing are efficient but offer measly amounts of force, albeit for a long time.

So scientists have long dreamed of a third method of propulsion – one that could provide enough force over a long enough time to power a crewed mission to another star in a single human lifetime. And that could theoretically happen using one of the rarest substances in the Universe – antimatter.