He added: "So, you develop a capability nobody else has, the so-called EDL capability - entry, descent and landing - that took a long time, that took decades. If you let that die, you don't just go out to K-Mart and hire new people to do it again." ...

The plan would save roughly $300 million by scrapping two unmanned probes to explore Mars in 2016 and 2018, an effort NASA was pursuing with the European Space Agency. The priorities reflected in this budget would take us down the wrong path, said Bill...

10 centers. For the fiscal 2012 year that ends on September 30, NASA intends to spend $3 billion on overhead, including administrative travel and information technology. The plan drew immediate fire from the non-profit Planetary Society, a space science...

Bolden said NASA would focus on "medium-class" robotic missions to Mars, avoiding for now more expensive showcase missions like ExoMars and the Mars Science Laboratory, current en route to the red planet. Bill Nye, chairman of the Planetary Society,...

2012 year that ends on September 30, NASA intends to spend $3 billion on overhead, including administrative travel and information technology. The plan drew immediate fire from the non-profit Planetary Society, a space science advocacy group. "The...

But one part of the budget – planetary science – takes the biggest hit, with a cut from $1.5bn this year to $1.2bn next. Understandably, The Planetary Society's CEO Bill Nye is less than pleased. In a release entitled "Science Pushed to the Brink" he...