Skip to main content
  1. Home
  2. Emerging Tech
  3. News

After a delayed launch, SpaceX Dragon capsule arrives at the space station

By
Add as a preferred source on Google

Two days after lifting off from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, a SpaceX cargo capsule has reached the International Space Station (ISS) to drop off supplies along with a slew of science experiments.

The crewless Dragon capsule docked with the ISS on Monday with a consignment that tipped the scales at 5,500 pounds. The trip is the 17th SpaceX supply mission to the crewed satellite.

Recommended Videos

The experiments arriving at the space station include equipment for research that aims to show how microalgae can be used with existing life support systems on the ISS to improve the recycling of resources. “The cultivation of microalgae for food, and as part of a life support system to generate oxygen and consume carbon dioxide, could be helpful in future long-duration exploration missions, as it could reduce the amount of consumables required from Earth,” NASA said in an online post detailing the project.

The SpaceX capsule also dropped off Hermes, a machine that will help scientists study the dusty “regolith” debris that covers asteroids and moons. It’s hoped the research will provide insight into the formation and behavior of asteroids, comets, impact dynamics, and planetary evolution.

NASA described the latest experiments to arrive at the space station as “just a few of the hundreds of investigations that will help us learn how to keep astronauts healthy during long-duration space travel, and demonstrate technologies for future human and robotic exploration beyond low Earth orbit to the moon and Mars.”

It added that research on the space station also offers a chance for U.S. government agencies, private industry, and academic and research institutions to carry out microgravity experiments that could result in new technologies, medical treatments, and products that improve life on Earth.

Delayed launch

Saturday’s rocket launch was delayed by several days due to an issue at the space station and also a problem with SpaceX’s autonomous drone ship on which its returning rockets land.

The mission comes at the same time as SpaceX confirmed the loss of its Crew Dragon capsule in a ground-based test in Florida in April. No fatalities occurred and nobody was injured. The private space company said last week that an anomaly with one of the engines destroyed the Crew Dragon capsule in an explosion. The cause of the mishap is still being investigated, though the company is determined to press ahead with developing the capsule that’s expected to one day ferry astronauts between Earth and the ISS.

Trevor Mogg
Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
Topics
Pangram, the gold standard for AI text checks, releases Image 1.0 tool to sniff fake pics and videos
It can identify AI-generated pictures with an astounding 99.96% accuracy on its own evaluation set.
AI image detector tool pangram

Pangram, one of the most widely used and trusted AI text detectors out there, is finally releasing its multimedia detection tools to the masses. Pangram Image 1.0, which was previously available as a research preview, is now widely available on the web, through the company’s API, and via its eponymous Chrome extension.

The company claims its image detector can identify AI-generated pictures with an astounding 99.96% accuracy on its own evaluation set. Pangram also notes that it has improved the model’s accuracy over the past few months, especially against edited images, low-resolution pictures, and pictures made by the most advanced AI models out there. As far as the competition goes, TruthScan achieves an accuracy of 96.33%, followed by AI or Not at 91.38% and Sightengine at 88.33%.

Read more
Scammers are using AI to fake missing pet photos, and what happens next is horrifying
Criminals are using AI-generated pet photos to convince desperate owners their missing animals have been found, before demanding money and making disturbing threats.
Brown and white cat meowing in Inzoi.

Losing a pet can be heartbreaking, and anyone who's experienced it knows how quickly you'd drop everything if someone called to say they'd found your missing dog or cat. Unfortunately, scammers have learned to exploit that desperation, and AI is making their tricks even more convincing.

A disturbing new scam is targeting pet owners across the UK, with criminals using AI-generated images to pretend they've found missing animals. They then demand money for their return, sometimes going as far as threatening to kill the pets if the owners refuse to pay. According to a BBC report, several pet owners have already experienced these attacks, with scammers using convincing photographs, emotional stories, and increasingly aggressive messages to pressure them into paying.

Read more
AI can turn your Instagram posts into scam that know a little too much about you
Your public social media posts could be helping scammers create emails that feel personal, and existing AI safeguards aren't doing enough to stop them.
Electronics, Mobile Phone, Phone

We've all received those suspicious emails claiming we've won something, missed a delivery, or need to urgently update our bank details. Most are easy enough to ignore, especially when they're full of strange wording or have absolutely nothing to do with us. But what happens when a scam email actually knows what you've been up to lately? That's where things get a little worrying.

Researchers at the University of Texas at Arlington have found that AI can use information people share publicly on social media to create phishing emails that feel personal. And we're not just talking about knowing your name or where you work. These emails can reference things you've recently done, places you've visited, or even something you've been looking forward to. The researchers showed how widely available AI models could gather these details and turn them into targeted messages, potentially letting scammers reach large numbers of people without spending hours researching each person individually.

Read more