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     From: Space.Com    By Samantha Mathewson  Edited by: Amal Udawatta   An illustration of a near-Earth asteroid like the 1998 SH2, which turned out to be a comet. (Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech) A near-Earth object that astronomers believed was an asteroid for nearly three decades has been unmasked as a faint, active comet, revealing a case of cosmic mistaken identity that could help improve planetary defense. The object, known since its discovery in 1998 as 1998 SH2, appeared to be an ordinary asteroid . It follows a 4.5-year orbit around the sun and showed no obvious signs of cometary activity, such as the glowing coma or tail produced when sunlight vaporizes surface ice. However, during a close pass about 2 million miles (3 million kilometers) from Earth in August 2025, researchers using NASA's Deep Space Network planetary radar system noticed something unexpected: The object wasn't where orbital predictions said it should be, according to a s...

    From :- Space.Com     By Leonard David   Edited by :- Amal Udawatta Avi Loeb, physicist at Harvard University, poses for a portrait in the observatory near his office in Cambridge, Massachusetts on January 29, 2019. (Image credit: Adam Glanzman/For The Washington Post via Getty Images) "We approach this topic with the same rigor we apply in our respective scientific fields and we hope to provide an unbiased analysis on this topic." Harvard astrophysicist Avi Loeb has been appointed as the head of a new White House group to study unidentified anomalous phenomena or UAP, a new catch-all term for UFOs that might appear not just in the air but also in space or underwater. Loeb says the group is focused on evidence, instrumentation, data analysis and collection standards. The move follows recent Trump administration initiatives to bring more transparency to the topic of UFOs, or UAP. The UAP Science Advisory Council , Loeb explains, was established by the Whit...

   From : Space.com    By :    Elizabeth Howell      Edited by : Amal Udawatta NASA researchers conduct the first-of-its-kind organ transport drone test with a human kidney on June 5, 2026 at Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va. (Image credit: NASA/Ryan Hill) The drone flew beyond line of sight with a kidney not viable for organ transplant, to test the concept for future deliveries to patients. NASA is hoping to use drones to speed up organ delivery for transplant patients. A flight test earlier this month at NASA's Langley Research Center in Virginia saw a drone pick up a kidney and fly it for the first time beyond "line of sight", or the distance from which a drone is visible by an operator. Keeping a line of sight on a drone is a typical requirement for flight safety, but NASA is developing tools that may allow these machines to fly further away from operators in populated environments more regularly. The kidney on the June 5 flight ...