It’s confirmed: Space is bubbling with the potential for life. The Heterodyne Instrument for the Far Infrared—on board the Herschel Space Observatory —has sent a high resolution analysis of the Orion Nebula ’s chemistry. It has scientists very excited. More

No doubt, you’ve seen Orion when stargazing. A spot on his belt that’s sometimes mistaken for a star is really the Orion Nebula . Here’s an ever-so-better better view, thanks to the 67-megapixel, infrared-sensitive VISTA telescope . [ Full 341MB Version via Wired ]

The phone-botherers over at Recombu have cottoned onto the fact that there’s not a single perfect phone built for gaming on. Not even the iPhone, regardless of what the advertising tells us. So they’ve created a Nokia concept, the Orion. Like N-Gage 3.0—but actually looking halfway decent—the Orion concept would be aimed at hardcore gamers who feel like smashing their heads against a brick wall every time they play Klondike on a BlackBerry or Bejeweled on Windows Mobile.

We really love the mid-launch ejection system (0-600mph in 3.5 seconds!) in the Orion crew module, and found a full video of how it would, theoretically, work. Check it out to see some pretty, life-saving parachutes. [ Technology Review via Dvice ]

Looks like Flash Gordon came to Virginia this Wednesday. Here you have images and video of the spectacular Max Launch Abort System in action. Sadly, the spiffy spacecraft won’t be in Orion . Maybe they can send me one to test.

May 2019: Our scheduled return to the moon. There’s plenty of laboring to be done on the Constellation Program before then, but the foundation is set. Here’s how you—as an astronaut—would experience the mission: Ares V Unmanned Cargo Rocket, EDS and Altair: The Gear Goes Up First First it’s the turn of the giant unmanned Ares V , carrying most of the real hardware you’ll need on your journey. You and the rest of your astronaut compadres walk around the pad hours ahead of the launch—a metaphorical kicking of Ares’ tires.

Three parts of tequila, two parts of triple-sec, one part of lime juice, then shake with ice, and filter. Oh wait, it’s just the Orion capsule getting tested for electromagnetic waves. Or something. This is the full scale Orion model at the Johnson Space Center’s anechoic chamber , where it’s body and antennas were recently tested to see how they absorb sound waves and electromagnetic energy as if it was in space. And yes, this would make one big badass Margarita. [ NASA ]

500 days—or thereabouts: That’s the amount of time between now and the final flight of the awesome Space Transportation System, better known to you and me as the Space Shuttle . Here’s what comes next… It’s such a short time before the skies over Florida will no longer thunder to the sound of the Space Shuttle’s main engines under full thrust. But that doesn’t mean that after September 16, 2010, there will be any letup in the requirements to put people and hardware into orbit. What ships are in line to hop into the venerable old Shuttle’s shoes? Five, at last count, all with their own talents and differences

It seems like only yesterday that we were hearing about Paragon’s designs for greenhouses on the lunar surface (but that’s because it was yesterday). Now we’ve been hepped to the fact that the company is teaming up with Oceaneering International to overhaul NASA’s space suit. The last that we heard, the project had been scuttled altogether , but you know how quickly things can be unscuttled when the White House changes hands. The Constellation Space Suit System (CSSS) will be designed in a modular fashion, so that the same suit can be used by the astronaut for all the different aspects of his / her mission. You can look forward to the stylish debut of these bad boys on the new Orion spaceship, currently planned to launch in 2015.

In space, no one can hear you scream “Fire.” Not that it’d matter, as few people could recognize a microgravity fire anyway. This means space firefighting gear needs to be special. NASA is on it. First, a primer. Fire in microgravity isn’t the flickering kind that happened when you set the house ablaze with your chemistry set as a kid