NASA's new $10 billion observatory is completing a nerve-wracking sequence of steps to reach its final configuration and location. The James Webb Space Telescope's "29 days on the edge," as NASA has dubbed the lengthy and complex deployment process, began when the spacecraft launched on Saturday (Dec. 25). Since then, the observatory has reached key milestones like unfurling its solar array and adjusting its trajectory. Still to come are steps like opening its sunshield and arranging its mirrors.

NASA's next-generation space observatory has sailed beyond the orbit of the moon after nailing the second of three required course-correction burns, agency officials said Monday. The long-awaited James Webb Space Telescope launched on Saturday (Dec. 25), beginning a one-month deployment process. Over the course of that deployment, the observatory must execute three burns to adjust its trajectory, the first of which began 12.5 hours after launch and lasted 65 minutes; the second, much shorter burn, is now also complete.

Last month, NASA sent the Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) into space whose goal is to send a spacecraft traveling at a speed of 15,000 miles per hour (24,000 kph) into an asteroid, called Dimorphos, next year sometime between September 26 and October 1.

NASA just got a $10 billion space telescope for Christmas. An Ariane 5 rocket launched today (Dec. 25) from Europe's Spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana, at 7:20 a.m. EST (1220 GMT; 9:20 a.m. local time in Kourou), carrying the highly anticipated, long-delayed James Webb Space Telescope — and the hopes and dreams of countless astronomers, astrophysicists and planetary scientists around the world — into the final frontier.

When NASA’s historic Apollo program launched in the 1960s, it resulted in six space flights to Earth’s natural satellite, the moon. These missions had grand results—from putting the first person on the moon in 1969 aboard Apollo 11 to 2,200 collected lunar samples in total.

Dangerously high wind will keep NASA's newest space telescope on the ground for at least an extra day, with the launch now targeted for Saturday—Christmas Day—at the earliest. NASA announced the latest delay Tuesday. Upper-level high wind could force a rocket off-course or even damage or destroy it.

The James Webb Space Telescope, also known as Webb or JWST, is a high-capability space observatory designed to revolutionize fields of astronomy ranging from star formation to galaxy evolution and from the very first galaxies of the universe to the properties of planetary systems.

NASA and Boeing are planning no earlier than May 2022 for the rescheduled second uncrewed test flight of the CST-100 Starliner spacecraft after deciding to change service modules for that mission. Under the revised plan, the service module that had been built for the Crew Flight Test (CFT) mission, the flight of that vehicle to carry people, will instead be used for the Orbital Flight Test (OFT) 2 mission.

Engineers at SpaceX used to manually input data about rocket part tests into spreadsheets that nobody trusted, a former employee has said. Karan Talati joined the space exploration company in 2013 as a manufacturing engineer. He told Insider that he encountered manual rather than automated procedures for testing rocket parts, which made the process "very slow."

A SpaceX executive says that the company’s next-generation, fully-reusable Starship rocket has already secured multiple commercial launch contracts.

At the bottom of a cave, perhaps; or in a basement when the power shuts off. But there's usually some faint glow coming from somewhere. Even the night sky never seems truly black, not least because there's usually a star or two twinkling in the distance. So it's hard to imagine a time when all that existed was darkness, when you could travel in any direction for millions of years and still see absolutely nothing.

With space stations performing impromptu backflips, rockets careening out of control, billionaires going into space like they just don’t care, and space junk threatening to cause disaster nearly every week, 2021 will go down as one of the more memorable years in space.

A team of scientists have created a tube-like sleeping bag that sucks on lower bodies of astronauts like human-sized popsicles — with the goal of keeping their eyes healthy. The odd contraption is designed to counter one of the most serious medical problems astronauts face when they spend prolonged periods in microgravity: a build up of fluid in the head that can exert pressure on the eyeball, the BBC reports.

Two NASA astronauts ventured out on a spacewalk on Thursday to replace a faulty antenna on the International Space Station, facing what NASA called a minimally heightened risk posed by orbital debris left from a Russian missile test weeks ago.

SpaceX employees received a nightmare email over the holiday weekend from CEO Elon Musk, warning them of a brewing crisis with its Raptor engine production that, if unsolved, could result in the company’s bankruptcy. The email, obtained by SpaceExplored, CNBC, and The Verge, urged employees to work over the weekend in a desperate attempt to increase production of the engine meant to power its next-generation Starship launch vehicle.

A scheduled spacewalk by two NASA astronauts outside of the International Space Station has been postponed after a debris warning for the orbiting outpost caused NASA to act on the side of caution.

After years of setbacks, the James Webb Space Telescope will finally launch next month. NASA has given the green light to begin fueling the observatory for launch, after engineering teams found no sign of damage from an incident last week.

A processing incident that caused the entire Webb Space Telescope to shake did not cause any perceptible damage to the observatory, a NASA-led investigation has concluded.

NASA's Perseverance rover continues collecting Martian rocks. The car-sized robot just snagged its fourth Red Planet rock sample, drilling another core from an intriguing stone that it first sampled a little over a week ago. "A rock so nice, I sampled it twice! Just capped and sealed my fifth sample tube, with another piece from this interesting rock. I'm doubling up on samples at some high-priority targets like this one...

With the upcoming launch of the James Webb Space Telescope, the Hubble era is gradually drawing to a close. Here are some highlights from the countless wonders Hubble has shown us during its 31 years in space.