Between the Artemis Program, the ESA’s Moon Village, and the Sino-Russian International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), the next step in space exploration is clear: we’re going back to the moon, and this time, to stay! This plan requires significant investment, research, development, and strategies adapted to lunar conditions. In particular, mission planners are concerned about the hazard posed by lunar regolith (aka “moon dust”). In addition to being electrostatically charged, causing it to stick to literally any surface, it is incredibly fine and easily kicked up by rovers and spacecraft as they land and take off.

Scientists have long known that fungi are resilient, but a new study suggests that some strains might survive every step of the long, brutal trip to Mars. In a paper published in Applied and Environmental Microbiology, researchers isolated fungal microbes from NASA cleanrooms—facilities used in the assembly, testing, and launch of spacecraft—that had persisted after decontamination.

Mercury is a small, rocky planet about which researchers know relatively little. Two missions, taking readings as they passed over the planet, have revealed that Mercury is covered by an iron-poor and sulfur-rich crust. It is also reduced, a chemical state in which the substances have gained electrons. In fact, it’s the most reduced planet in the solar system.

Luminous fast blue optical transients (LFBOTs) are among the universe’s brightest and fastest explosions but their origin is not completely understood. A new study takes a closer look at the galaxies they occur in, offering two important clues about their nature. A paper outlining these results was uploaded to the preprint server arXiv on March 24.

The Perseus Cluster is a massive galaxy cluster located in the constellation Perseus. It is one of the largest structures in the observable universe, comprising more than a thousand galaxies—equivalent to roughly a thousand trillion times the mass of the sun. Hot gases within the cluster, known as the intracluster medium (ICM), emit powerful X-rays detectable by telescopes. These gases are produced by billions of supernova explosions, and their chemical composition reveals how typical supernovae have exploded throughout cosmic history.

Blue Origin, the U.S. space company of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, successfully reused and recovered a booster for its New Glenn rocket on Sunday, confirming its mastery of a technical feat that could boost its launch cadence and expand its rivalry with SpaceX.