A test of new automated spacecraft docking gear for Russian flights to the International Space Station automatically aborted during the linkup attempt.

A test of new spacecraft docking gear for Russian flights to the International Space Station failed, the U.S. and Russian space agencies said on Tuesday, casting doubt on the automated system meant to simplify missions to the orbiting outpost.

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The space agencies said a new docking attempt would likely take place on Sunday, after an unmanned Japanese spacecraft, the HTV-3, reaches the station and is manually berthed by astronauts later this week.

Russia's single-use Progress cargo ship had already delivered fuel and other supplies to six astronauts aboard the International Space Station and was due to burn up on re-entry, laden with trash, on July 30, after the next test.

The craft is now orbiting at a safe distance from the outpost while Russian engineers study why the Kurs-NA rendezvous system automatically aborted during the linkup attempt.

"The test was proceeding normally until about the time that the new Kurs-NA rendezvous system was to be engaged," NASA said in a statement on its website.

"As commands were being issued to activate the Kurs system, a failure was announced, triggering a passive abort."

Kurs-NA is an upgrade of the Kurs docking gear used for years on Russia's manned Soyuz and robotic Progress spacecrafts. The system features updated electronics and is designed to improve safety and use less power, according to NASA.

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Does the new automated Russian space station docking system work? Nyet. (+video)

ScienceDaily (July 25, 2012) A "white stork" is soon to deliver supplies to the International Space Station. But it's not the typical stork you associate with baby deliveries. The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's Kounotori3 H-II Transfer Vehicle, or HTV-3, is a 16.5-ton cargo ship. Kounotori is Japanese for "white stork."

Following a weeklong journey since its launch July 20, the HTV-3 is scheduled to dock to the station July 27 packed with nearly four tons of supplies, including a mix of NASA and international partner research ranging from biology to education to technology demonstration.

A Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency investigation will study new sampling techniques and environmental microbiological methods for environmental analysis. Microbial Dynamics in the International Space Station -- III (Microbe-III) will monitor the abundance and diversity of fungi and bacteria in Kibo, the Japanese Experiment module on the station. The results will be used to produce a microbiologically safe environment which is essential for a long-duration stay in space.

Another Japanese investigation, In-situ Observation of Growth Mechanisms of Protein Crystals and Their Perfection Under Microgravity (NanoStep), aims to clarify the relationship between crystal growth mechanism and the perfection of crystals. Crystallization of proteins in microgravity yields crystals with better perfection than crystallization on Earth. This study will look at the reason for this phenomenon, which has not been explained from a viewpoint of crystal growth mechanism.

NASA's ISS SERVIR Environmental Research and Visualization System (ISERV) is an automated system designed to acquire images of Earth's surface from the space station. It is primarily a means to gain experience and expertise in automated data acquisition from the station, although it is expected to provide useful images for use in disaster monitoring and assessment, and environmental decision making.

Five small mission payloads that perform science and technological demonstrations also are among the newest investigations arriving at the station. The Multi-mission Consolidated Equipment (MCE) includes two atmospheric observations that study lightning and resonant scattering from plasma and airglow. The other technology demonstrations include inflatable structure deployment, robotic tether movement and testing a high-definition television camera in the space environment.

Several educational activities are scheduled to begin after the supplies arrive at the station, including the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency Education Payload Observation 5 (JAXA EPO5). These activities demonstrate artistic activities aboard the station to enlighten the public about microgravity research and human spaceflight.

Through an agreement with NASA, Space Adventures is sponsoring the YouTube Space Lab world-wide contest for students 14-to-18 years old. Over the past year, students submitted entries in the areas of physics or biology via a two-minute YouTube video. The top two experiments were selected in March 2012 through online voting and by an international panel of experts, including William Gerstenmaier, associate administrator for NASA's Human Exploration Mission Directorate, and Leland Melvin, NASA's associate administrator for the Office of Education. The winning experiments -- from Egypt and Michigan -- are being flown to the station to be conducted later this year. One experiment will study how bacteria grow in space to see if different nutrients can block the growth. The other winning entry looks at how a Zebra spider -- which jumps on its prey instead of catching them in a web on Earth -- will hunt its prey in microgravity.

Several human research activities will arrive with the cargo ship, including Sonographic Astronaut Vertebral Examination (Spinal Ultrasound). This investigation aims to use ground- and space-based studies to fully characterize and assign a mission health risk to microgravity-associated spinal changes for back pain and potential injury. This research will determine the accuracy of the ultrasound in characterizing the anatomy and composition of the vertebral unit and help to develop new training methods.

In the area of physical sciences, the Binary Colloidal Alloy Test -- C1 (BCAT-C1) experiment will study nano-scale particles dispersed in liquid, known as a colloidal suspension, commonly found in such commercial commodities as paint, electronic polishing compounds and food products. These suspensions will have the unique property that the particles will separate -- like oil and water -- and the particles will self-assemble into crystals that interact strongly with light, like opal. Photographing these samples in microgravity will allow the measurement of these processes while avoiding the effects of particle sinking due to gravity. This study will allow the development of new insights into this important materials process.

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'White stork' delivers new research and technology investigations to International Space Station

This is pretty neat: on June 6, a couple of weeks before the summer solstice, astronauts on the International Space Station pointed a camera to the north and took pictures as they orbited the Earth. Taken over the course of about an hour 2/3 of a full orbit this was made into a video where you can see the Sun setting and rising again. Whats cool, though, is the Sun never completely sets. It dips toward the edge of the Earth, then pulls away again:

I love how the Sun shines through the gaps in the solar array.

The geometry of this is fun! Normally, as it orbits the Earth, the ISS passes behind the Earth relative to the Sun, going into the Earths shadow. The Earth itself blocks the Sun, so its nighttime for the astronauts. Mind you, their orbit is roughly 90 minutes, so this happens on average 18 times per day and lasts for about 45 minutes.

But the ISS orbits the Earth at an angle: the orbit is tilted relative to the Equator by a little over 50. During the northern hemisphere summer, the Earths north pole itself is tilted toward the Sun by about 24. Combined, this means that for a time around the solstice the ISS can stay in daylight for an entire orbit. The Sun gets very nearly blocked by the Earth, but not quite. I drew a diagram that might help:

The circle represents the Earth. The Sun is off to the left, so the left side of the Earth is lit and the right side is dark. The north pole of the Earth is tipped toward the Sun as shown, and you can see the Equator marked as well. The "terminator" is the day/night line.

I added the rough angle of the ISS orbit this was done by eye, but shows you how this works. As you can see, the orbit is tilted only a bit from the terminator. Because the ISS is 400 km (240 miles) above the surface, the orbit "pokes over" the edge of the Earth in the diagram (which I exaggerated a bit for clarity). Because of this, the ISS can see the Sun even when its over the night side of the Earth: its up high enough that the Earth doesnt block the Sun.

And thats what the video shows. At the top of its orbit (as shown in the diagram) the Sun gets very close to but not completely blocked by the limb of the Earths horizon, and the ISS sees daylight for a full orbit!

Pretty nifty. And look: your tenth grade geometry teacher may have overstated it a bit when she said some day your life may depend on this stuff but it does make life a lot cooler when you do understand it.

Tip o the spacesuit visor to the ESA G+ page.

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Space Station Solstice | Bad Astronomy

The Russian cargo ship Progress has failed to successfully dock with the International Space Station (ISS) during tests designed to facilitate future link-ups, the US and Russian space agencies said Tuesday.

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Russian cargo ship fails to dock with ISS

An unmanned Russian cargo spacecraft has failed to dock with the International Space Station due to a technical failure, Russian space officials said on Tuesday.

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Cargo spacecraft fails to dock to Space Station

An American video game company has revealed there is an unauthorized stowaway on board the Japanese spacecraft now in Earth orbit on its way to the International Space Station (ISS).

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'Portal 2' Space: Video Game Robot Launched Into 'Actual' Space

MOSCOW (Reuters) - A test of new spacecraft docking gear for Russian flights to the International Space Station failed, the U.S. and Russian space agencies said on Tuesday, casting doubt on the automated system meant to simplify missions to the orbiting outpost. The space agencies said a new docking attempt would likely take place on Sunday, after an unmanned Japanese spacecraft, the HTV-3 ...

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New Russian space station docking gear test fails

A robotic Russian cargo ship failed to dock at the International Space Station late Monday due to apparent failure in a new rendezvous system, NASA officials say.

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Unmanned Russian Supply Ship Fails to Dock at Space Station

Astronauts who have gone on spacewalks consistently speak of space's extraordinarily peculiar odor.

They can't smell it while they're actually bobbing in it, because the interiors of their space suits just smell plastic-y. But upon stepping back into the space station and removing their helmets, they get a strong, distinctive whiff of the final frontier. The odor clings to their suit, helmet, gloves and tools.

Fugitives from the near-vacuum probably atomic oxygen, among other things the clinging particles have the acrid aroma of seared steak, hot metal and welding fumes. Steven Pearce, a chemist hired by NASA to recreate the space odor on Earth for astronaut training purposes,saidthe metallic aspect of the scent may come from high-energy vibrations of ions.

"It's like something I haven't ever smelled before, but I'll never forget it," NASA astronaut Kevin Ford said from orbit in 2009. [Space Sights and Smells Surprise Rookie Astronauts]

But astronauts don't dislike the sharp smell of space, necessarily. After a 2003 mission, astronaut Don Pettit described it this way on a NASA blog:

"It is hard to describe this smell; it is definitely not the olfactory equivalent to describing the palette sensations of some new food as 'tastes like chicken.' The best description I can come up with is metallic; a rather pleasant sweet metallic sensation. It reminded me of my college summers where I labored for many hours with an arc welding torch repairing heavy equipment for a small logging outfit. It reminded me of pleasant sweet smelling welding fumes. That is the smell of space."

The interior of the International Space Station smells a little more mundane. Pettit, who recently returned from a second six-month-long mission on the ISS,told SPACE.com, "[The space station] smells like half machine-shop-engine-room-laboratory, and then when you're cooking dinner and you rip open a pouch of stew or something, you can smell a little roast beef."

Copyright 2012Lifes Little Mysteries, a TechMediaNetwork company. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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How Does Space Smell?

Photographs taken from the International Space Station and assembled in this video show nighttime views of our planet.

People keep making these videos from ISS photography, and we keep loving them. Heres the latest, assembled by photographer Knate Myers to a track by John Murphy (from the movie soundtrack forSunshine) its a beautiful tour of nighttime passes of the Space Station over our planet. Stars, city lights, airglow, aurorae its nothing you havent seen before, but everything worth seeing again. Watch it.

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Video: Knate Myers. All images courtesy of the Image Science & Analysis Laboratory, NASA Johnson Space Center. Via the Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth.

Jason Major is a graphic artist fromRhode Islandnow living and working inDallas, Texas. He writes about astronomy and space exploration on his blogLights In The Dark, on Universe Today and also onDiscoveryNews.

This story originally appeared inUniverse Today.

Want to stay on top of all the space news? Follow@universetodayonTwitter

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An amazing video of nighttime views from the space station

Home News Education Austin Stoner, 12, hooks up his surface-supplied air snorkel before helping the rest of his Challenger Learning Center camp team assemble a model of the International Space Station. THE BLADE/ANDY MORRISON Enlarge Loading

Published: 7/23/2012

BY MEL FLANAGAN BLADE STAFF WRITER

Amidst a crowd of spectators, seven team members carefully constructed an international space station in Toledo on Friday afternoon.

The location was an indoor pool on Collingwood Boulevard, and the team members were seven local youths participating in the International Space Station Camp, one of eight summer programs offered by the Challenger Learning Center in Oregon.

The week-long camp taught the children the purpose and history of the International Space Station, as well as how to snorkel. The camp culminated in building a 22-foot-by-50-foot-by-12-foot model of the space station underwater.

"We do this [underwater] because this is the way astronauts train," program coordinator Reed Steele said. "It gives us that feeling of floating in space."

The space station camp is offered annually to area youth who are entering seventh grade or above.

J.T. Langdon, who will be a seventh grader at Toledo School for the Arts, said he has been attending Challenger camps since he was in third grade.

"This is the first year I could be in this one, and I was looking forward to it," J.T. said. "It's fun, and I get to learn stuff over the summer."

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Campers take off for outer space

Cinematographer Knate Myers edited space station photography into this time-lapse video.

By Alan Boyle

Eight months ago, we featured an eye-popping time-lapse video by German filmmaker Michael Knig as the "best of NASA's night lights" but now New Mexico time-lapser Knate Myers has created another contender for the title.

Like Knig's compilation, Myers' four-minute odyssey wraps in multicolored auroral displays, glorious night passes over the world's cities, flashes of lightning and the heavenly whirl of the stars above. Far from detracting from the scene, the space station's solar arrays and other hardware add a sense of perspective in the foreground. As with any time-lapse video, this one shows to best advantage when it's at highest resolution and full-screen display whether you go with YouTube or Vimeo.

We might have to rethink that earlier "best of" verdict.But really, is there any point anymore in declaring a time-lapse winner?

Michael Konig's video is also based on NASA imagery. See it on You Tube or Vimeo.

It turns out thatthere's a whole club on Vimeodevoted to turning imagery from the International Space Station into time-lapse views. And when you get right down to it, virtually all of this imagery comes from NASA's Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth, which offers its own selection of time-lapse space station videos. (This month NASA put up a humdinger showing the moon's shadow on Earth during May's annular solar eclipse.)

Rather than declaring a winner, I'm just going to point to some of the favorites and declare that all the folks who work with imagery from space, and all the folks who enjoy that imagery, are the real winners here.

More winners in the orbital time-lapse category:

Alan Boyle is NBCNews.com's science editor. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log'sFacebook page, following@b0yle on Twitterand adding theCosmic Log pageto your Google+ presence. To keep up with Cosmic Log as well as NBCNews.com's other stories about science and space, sign up for the Tech & Science newsletter, delivered to your email in-box every weekday. You can also check out"The Case for Pluto,"my book about the dwarf planet and the search for new worlds.

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The best space station video? You decide

A Japanese H-IIB rocket blasted off to deliver an unmanned supplies vessel to the International Space Station.

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Japan sends cargo to space station

An unmanned Japanese rocket carrying more than five tons of space station hardware, scientific gear and crew supplies vaulted away from its scenic seaside launch stand in southern Japan Friday (U.S. time) and set off on weeklong flight to the International Space Station.

Trailing a plume of fire and a billowing cloud of exhaust, the 186-foot-tall H-2B smoothly climbed skyward through rainy weather and quickly disappeared into a deck of low clouds, arcing out over the Pacific Ocean on a southeasterly trajectory tilted 51.6 degrees to the equator.

Flight controllers said the strap-on boosters burned out and fell away in pairs as planned about two minutes after liftoff, followed four minutes later by the first stage. The second stage then ignited and continued the push to orbit.

There were no apparent problems and 15 minutes after liftoff from launch pad No. 2 at the Tanegashima Space Center, the HTV-3 cargo ship, nicknamed Kounotori, or "white stork," was released into its planned preliminary orbit with a low point, or perigee, of about 124 miles and an apogee, or high point, of around 186 miles.

"The flight of the HTV-3 went true and as expected," said Josh Byerly, NASA's mission control commentator in Houston. "Everything now set up for the arrival of the HTV-3 coming up next week."

If all goes well, the 17.5-ton spacecraft will carry out a series of carefully orchestrated rocket firings to catch up with the space station next Friday, pulling to within about 30 feet and then stationkeeping while astronaut Joseph Acaba, operating the station's robot arm, locks onto a grapple fixture.

Japanese flight engineer Akihiko Hoshide then plans to take over, moving the HTV-3 spacecraft to the Earth-facing port of the station's forward Harmony module where it will be locked into place with a common berthing mechanism. Hatches will be opened the next day.

Developed by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, as a contribution to the space station program, the HTV is 32 feet long and 14.4 feet wide. It is designed to carry both pressurized and unpressurized cargo, including equipment too big to pass through the space station's hatches.

For it's third flight, the HTV is loaded with 3.9 tons of pressurized cargo, including an aquatic habitat, five small "CubeSats" and a satellite launcher, a catalytic reactor for the station's water processing system and a water pump. Also on board: Japanese food, beverages and crew clothing.

The high-tech aquarium can be used to house small fish for up to 90 days.

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Japan successfully launches its freighter to space station

Japan's Kounotori space cargo ships are one of several vital robotic supply ships that ferry fresh food and equipment to the International Space Station.

Built for the for the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), Kounotori spacecraft (the name means "White Stork" in Japanese) are unmanned cargo ships that deliver tons of supplies, including fresh food, and equipment to the International Space Station. The cylindrical spacecraft launch on Japan's expendable H-2B rocket from the country's Tanegashima Space Center.

Japan's H-2 Transfer Vehicles, a gold cylinder about 33 feet (10 meters) long and 14 feet (4.4 m) wide are disposable vehicles that deliver cargo to the space station inside a pressurized module, which astronauts can access, and in an unpressurized section accessible by the station's robotic arm. The freighters are part of a growing suite of internationally built unmanned cargo spaceships that help supply the International Space Station.

At mission's end, the cargo ship is intentionally destroyed by burning up Earth's atmosphere. JAXA launched the first HTV cargo ship in 2009. A second followed in 2011, with a third scheduled to fly in July 2012.

There are several other robotic cargo ships that deliver supplies to the space station. In addition to Japan's HTV, Russia's Progress space capsules and the European Space Agency's Automated Transfer Vehicles also serve the station.

In the United States, NASA is relying on two companies to develop unmanned space freighters: California-based SpaceX and Orbital Sciences, Corp., of Virginia. The first official SpaceX delivery to the station is slated for later this year.

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Venus Transit of the Sun: A 2012 Observer's Guide (Infographic)

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Inside Japan's Huge Space Truck (Infographic)

Japan is set to launch a new unmanned cargo spaceship to deliver goods to the International Space Station today (July 20).

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Japan Launching Robotic Cargo Ship to Space Station Tonight

An unmanned Japanese spaceship soared into orbit from an island launch site Friday (July 20), beginning a weeklong journey to deliver vital supplies to astronauts living on the International Space Station.

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Japan Launches Robotic Supply Ship to Space Station

Alien superbugs and space spiders are the subjects of two student-designed science experiments due to launch toward the International Space Station today (July 20) aboard a robotic Japanese spacecraft.

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Student Science Experiments Riding Japanese Rocket to Space Station

An unmanned Japanese spaceship soared into orbit from an island launch site on Friday, beginning a weeklong journey to deliver vital supplies to astronauts living on the International Space Station.

The H-2 Transfer Vehicle-3 (HTV-3), nicknamed Kounotori 3 (Japanese for "White Stork 3"), is delivering student science projects, a new camera system, as well as food and spare equipment.

Kounotori 3 lifted off atop a Japanese H-2B rocket at 10:06 p.m. ET (11:06 a.m. Japan time Saturday) from the Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan. It is the third of its kind to fly, following the flights of HTVs 1 and 2 in September 2009 and January 2011, respectively.

On July 27, the spaceship will fly to within 40 feet (12 meters) from the space station, where it will be plucked from orbit by astronauts steering the station's Canadarm2 robotic arm. Controlling the arm, astronauts Joe Acaba of NASA and Aki Hoshide of the Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency will move Kounotori 3 to the station's Earth-facing docking port on its Harmony node. The maneuver is scheduled for around 7 a.m. ET. [Inside Japan's Huge Space Truck (Infographic)]

Space news from NBCNews.com

Science editor Alan Boyle's blog: A photographer's time-lapse video packs three years' worth of wonderful night-sky imagery into just three minutes.

Among the spaceship's 4 tons (3,600 kilograms) of cargo are two science experiments designed by the student winners of the YouTube Space Lab competition. Students from around the world between the ages of 14 and 18 were invited to design space station experiments and describe them in videos submitted to YouTube. Then public users of the site voted on their favorites.

The winners were Amr Mohamed, 18, of Alexandria, Egypt; and Dorothy Chen and Sara Ma, both 16, of Troy, Mich. Mohamed designed a project to study how microgravity affects the hunting strategy of zebra spiders. Chen and Ma set up an experiment to investigate how different nutrients and compounds affect the growth and virulence of bacteria grown in space.

Chen and Ma were onsite at the Tanegashima Space Center to watch the launch of their experiment, while Mohamed elected to travel to the cosmonaut training center in Star City, Russia, for his prize.

The Japanese cargo freighter is also carrying a new camera for the space station, called the ISERV (International Space Station SERVIR Environmental Research and Visualization System), which will observe disaster sites on Earth and other areas of interest for environmental studies. Scientists on the ground will be able to direct the camera via remote control.

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Space station cargo blasts off

A Japanese cargo ship is on track for berthing at the International Space Station next week, carrying five tons of supplies and equipment, including a small research aquarium and other science gear.

An unmanned Japanese rocket carrying more than five tons of space station hardware, scientific gear and crew supplies vaulted away from its scenic seaside launch stand in southern Japan Friday (U.S. time) and set off on weeklong flight to the International Space Station.

The powerful H-2B rocket's two hydrogen-fueled first stage engines roared to life as the countdown ticked to zero, followed a few seconds later by ignition of four strap-on solid-fuel boosters at 10:06 p.m. EDT (11:06 a.m. Saturday local time), roughly the moment Earth's rotation carried the launch pad into the plane of the space station's orbit.

A Japanese H-2B rocket blasted off from the Tanegashima Space Center in southern Japan early Saturday (Japan time), boosting the HTV-3 cargo craft into space for a weeklong flight to the International Space Station.

Trailing a plume of fire and a billowing cloud of exhaust, the 186-foot-tall H-2B smoothly climbed skyward through rainy weather and quickly disappeared into a deck of low clouds, arcing out over the Pacific Ocean on a southeasterly trajectory tilted 51.6 degrees to the equator.

Flight controllers said the strap-on boosters burned out and fell away in pairs as planned about two minutes after liftoff, followed four minutes later by the first stage. The second stage then ignited and continued the push to orbit.

There were no apparent problems and 15 minutes after liftoff from launch pad No. 2 at the Tanegashima Space Center, the HTV-3 cargo ship, nicknamed Kounotori, or "white stork," was released into its planned preliminary orbit with a low point, or perigee, of about 124 miles and an apogee, or high point, of around 186 miles.

"The flight of the HTV-3 went true and as expected," said Josh Byerly, NASA's mission control commentator in Houston. "Everything now set up for the arrival of the HTV-3 coming up next week."

If all goes well, the 17.5-ton spacecraft will carry out a series of carefully orchestrated rocket firings to catch up with the space station next Friday, pulling to within about 30 feet and then stationkeeping while astronaut Joseph Acaba, operating the station's robot arm, locks onto a grapple fixture.

The HTV-3 cargo ship is released into open space in these two views from a camera mounted on the launcher's second stage.

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Japanese cargo ship launched on flight to space station