Science & Technology

MOSCOW, April 12 (Xinhua) -- A Russian national space center will cost about 25 billion rubles (nearly 390 million U.S. dollars), Russian President Vladimir Putin said Friday.

"I would very much like it to look modern, beautiful, worthy of the industry, so that our scientific and educational potentials can be concentrated there," Putin said during a visit to rocket engine manufacturer Energomash in a Moscow suburb.

"It seems to me that it can and should become a world-class center," he said, according to an official transcript published by the Kremlin.

WASHINGTON, April 12 (Xinhua) -- A new study found that the first life on Earth was more likely to be bred in shallow bodies of water than in oceans.

The study published on Friday in the journal Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems showed that primitive ponds with 10 centimeters deep had higher concentration of nitrogen, a key ingredient for life on Earth.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. government will hold a massive auction later this year to bolster 5G service , the next generation of mobile networks. President Donald Trump showcased the announcement Friday, declaring that the race to stand up these faster, more powerful networks is a competition “America must win.”

BEIJING, April 12 (Xinhua) -- The lander and the rover of the Chang'e-4 probe switched to dormant mode for the lunar night on Friday, with the rover traveling an accumulated 178.9 meters on the far side of the moon.

The rover Yutu-2, or Jade Rabbit-2, is expected to awaken again on April 28, and the lander to awaken the following day, according to the Lunar Exploration and Space Program Center of the China National Space Administration.

YEHUD, Israel (AP) — An Israeli spacecraft crashed into the moon Thursday just moments before touchdown, failing in an ambitious attempt to make history as the first privately funded lunar landing.

The spacecraft lost communication with ground control during its final descent. Moments later, the mission was declared a failure.

“We definitely crashed on the surface of the moon,” said Opher Doron of Israel Aerospace Industries.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — SpaceX launched its second supersized rocket and for the first time landed all three boosters Thursday, a year after sending up a sports car on the initial test flight.

The new and improved Falcon Heavy thundered into the early evening sky with a communication satellite called Arabsat, the rocket’s first paying customer. The Falcon Heavy is the most powerful rocket in use today, with 27 engines firing at liftoff — nine per booster.

ST. PETERSBURG, April 11. /TASS/. The world's first floating nuclear power station Akademik Lomonosov will begin supplying the first kilowatts to the power grid of Chukotka in 2019, CEO of Rosatom Alexey Likhachev said in an interview with TASS at the International Arctic Forum.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — SpaceX has delayed the launch of its newest mega rocket because of dangerously high wind.

The Falcon Heavy was poised to blast off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Wednesday night with a communication satellite. But SpaceX chief Elon Musk said upper-level wind shear was extremely high.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Humanity got its first glimpse Wednesday of the cosmic place of no return: a black hole. And it’s as hot, as violent and as beautiful as science fiction imagined.

In a breakthrough that thrilled the world of astrophysics and stirred talk of a Nobel Prize, scientists released the first image ever made of a black hole, revealing a fiery doughnut-shaped object in a galaxy 53 million light-years from Earth.

TEHRAN, April 9 (Xinhua) -- Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) started the installation of IR6 centrifuges on Tuesday, official IRNA news agency reported.

The installation of a chain of 20 advanced IR6 centrifuges began in the Natanz enrichment facility in central Iran, following a decree of President Hassan Rouhani, said the report.

"We are happy to announce the installation of the IR6 centrifuges. This will be a big achievement for the Iranian nation," Rouhani was quoted as saying at a video conference.