NASA satellite rescue mission fails, swift telescope set to fall to earth - France 24

• A 96% partial lunar eclipse will occur overnight on August 27-28, as Earth's curved inner shadow passes across the moon's disk. • This celestial event will significantly darken the moon, with nearly the entire surface obscured by Earth's shadow.

• Astronomers have discovered a "mega-Earth," a massive rocky planet approximately 23 times more massive than Earth. • Unlike typical planets of this size, which usually develop thick gaseous envelopes, this planet has remained predominantly rocky.

• NASA has canceled the "Swift Boost" mission, which was intended to extend the operational life of the Swift space observatory. • As a result of the cancellation, the observatory will eventually re-enter Earth's atmosphere and burn up.

• A $30 million private rescue mission intended to save NASA's Swift Observatory has failed, leaving the telescope destined to crash back to Earth. • The Swift telescope, which has provided critical data on gamma-ray bursts, will now re-enter the atmosphere and be destroyed later this year.

• NASA and Katalyst Space announced Wednesday that the LINK spacecraft will no longer capture or boost a NASA satellite to a higher altitude due to an ongoing attitude control issue. • The original goal was to extend the science mission of the Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory by moving it to a higher orbit.

• NASA and Katalyst Space Technologies announced on Wednesday that the mission to save the Swift space telescope has been officially called off. • The effort was intended to rescue the telescope, which was described as "sinking" or facing critical failure.

• NASA has launched the Orbital Clarity Challenge, the sixth installment in the TechLeap Prize series, in collaboration with the agency's Heliophysics Division and Flight Opportunities program. • The challenge seeks innovative technical solutions to improve orbital clarity and data acquisition for space-based observations.

• NASA's Perseverance rover captured images of a solar eclipse occurring on the surface of Mars. • The event occurred as one of Mars' moons passed between the planet and the Sun, partially blocking the sunlight.

• The National Science Foundation (NSF) has announced $1.5 billion in funding dedicated to science and engineering research. • The agency is implementing more flexible grant structures specifically designed to support emerging research and long-term projects.

• Several federal agencies are facing significant shifts, including NOAA withdrawing support for the Arctic Report Card and the DOJ declaring certain NSF programs unconstitutional. • The NIH is proposing to replace numerical peer-review scores for grant proposals with qualitative labels such as “most competitive” or “not discussed.”

• Astronomers have discovered three supermassive black holes on the verge of colliding within a single distant galaxy. • The galaxy dates back to a period less than 1.3 billion years after the Big Bang, indicating an unusually high concentration of black holes for its size.