NASA has posted a video message for St. Patrick’s Day from Expedition 27 Flight Engineer Catherine Coleman, who’s currently aboard the International Space Station.

Watch the video here below.

Coleman, who is part Irish, brought with her on her ISS mission several Irish flutes, courtesy of the Dublin-based group The Chieftains. In the video, she talks a little bit about the instruments and then plays them as she floats inside the space station [...]

Two previously unknown moons of Pluto, with the temporary names “P4″ and “P5,” were recently discovered, and now the public has a chance to vote on what to name them!

One of the 21 proposed names on the ballot is Vulcan, which in the Star Trek universe is the name of Mr. Spock’s home world. Head over to the SETI website Pluto Rocks and cast your vote for Vulcan, which is actually in the lead right now, with Cerberus and Styx following close behind.

William Shatner, who played starship Captain James T. Kirk on the original Star Trek television series and movies, is actually the person who suggested that Vulcan, which is the name of the Roman god of lava and smoke, and the nephew of Pluto, be added to the ballot. Shatner has been tweeting the link out to plutorocks.com, urging his followers to vote for Vulcan, in hopes that the International Astronomical Union (IAU) will actually choose the name [...]

Chris Hadfield, an astronaut currently serving aboard the International Space Station (ISS) who frequently tweets about and posts photos of the breathtaking views as the station orbits Earth, was the first Canadian to walk in space. So, it’s not surprising that fellow Canadian William Shatner, an actor best known for his role as Captain James T. Kirk of the starship Enterprise on Star Trek, would follow Hadfield’s activities on Twitter and maybe even send the real-life spaceman a message.

Earlier this month, Shatner asked Hadfield via Twitter if the astronaut was currently tweeting from space. Hadfield both surprised and delighted all who were observing when he responded using Star Trek lingo and addressed Shatner as “Captain” [squeeee!!!!!].

@WilliamShatner Yes, Standard Orbit, Captain. And we’re detecting signs of life on the surface.

The Science of Avatar
Hardcover | Paperback | Kindle Edition
By Stephen Baxter
Orbit Books
Released May 29, 2012

Prolific science fiction author Stephen Baxter invites us to explore with him both real life science and space fiction in The Science of Avatar. There are lots of details sprawling in every direction, from speculation to established facts, in an almost scene-by-scene recount of the entire movie. He posits what our real world might be like in the year 2154, the year Avatar takes place.

We begin with Jake Sully leaving an ecologically devastated Earth, which we get the barest glimpse of in the film. Baxter explains to us what might have happened in an all too real account of ecocide, wherein Earth’s resources are depleted and space exploration offers the only hope of finding the resources we need to stay alive here. In the movie, this is the reason for the journey to Pandora. [...]

Once thought to be a completely fictional concept, what would intergalactic space exploration be like for we the human race if we were to figure out how to take the faster-than-light propulsion system known as warp drive we’ve seen used in great science fiction pop culture like Star Trek, and make it a reality?

Something so ambitious is still little more than a fantasy…but a fantasy of some of the smartest people to ever walk this planet. But even though it is still a fantasy, the warp drive may not be as impossible as was once thought. [...]

Back in June we told you about a very cool experiment National Geographic was doing along with the Arecibo Observatory, where they wanted to send your messages via Twitter out to space in response to The Wow! Signal on its 35th anniversary.

As of August 15th, the exact anniversary of first receiving the signal, all messages—including over 20,000 tweets and a few videos from celebrities—were officially beamed out to space for whatever intelligent lifeforms that may be out there to hopefully one day pick up on. [...]

For those who don’t know, the Wow! Signal (learn more here) is an extraterrestrial radio signal picked up by Ohio State University’s Big Ear radio telescope on August 15, 1977. It lasted 72 seconds, and has never been heard again. Many believe it could have been a signal sent out by intelligent life somewhere far off in space, where others feel it could in fact simply be something from our own planet that found its way back.

We’ll likely never know the origins of the Wow! Signal, but National Geographic has decided to send out a response just in case there’s an intelligent species somewhere out there beneath the pale moonlight (and beyond) to receive it. [...]

The ashes of the late James Doohan, who played “Scotty” in the original Star Trek series, were successfully launched into space this week, nearly seven year’s after the actor’s death. You can watch a video of the liftoff here below.

Doohan died on July 20, 2005, at the age of 85 after suffering from Alzheimer’s disease and then pneumonia. It was Doohan’s final wish to have his cremated remains launched into space after his death. The launch was originally scheduled for 2006, but was moved to 2008, but that attempt failed.

On Tuesday, a second attempt was scheduled by SpaceX, which was successful, making the U.S. company the first commercial entity to send its own spacecraft toward the International Space Station. According to Sky News, Doohan’s remains were launched from the craft’s cargo-bearing Dragon capsule and also contained the ashes of over 300 people, including those of Mercury astronaut Gordon Cooper [...]