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“Here’s some of the stories trending This
Week at NASA!”

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NASA and its international partners are making
changes to the International Space Station’s

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schedule of arriving and departing spacecraft,
following the Russian Federal Space Agency's

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preliminary findings on its recent loss of
the Progress 59 cargo craft.

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Exact dates will be announced in the coming
weeks, with a Roscosmos update about the Progress

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59 investigation expected May 22.

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The schedule adjustments mean NASA's Terry
Virts and Expedition 43 crewmates, Samantha

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Cristoforetti of ESA and Russian cosmonaut
Anton Shkaplerov – now will return to Earth

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in June instead of May – with NASA astronaut
Scott Kelly and Russian cosmonauts Mikhail

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Kornienko and Gennady Padalka -- remaining
on the station to begin Expedition 44.

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NASA’s Kjell Lindgren, who is conducting
pre-flight training in Russia with the other

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members of Expedition 44, now will launch
to the station in July.

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A draft Request for Proposal issued by NASA’s
Launch Services Program is seeking new commercial

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Venture Class Launch Services (VCLS) to send
small satellites and experiments to space

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using a smaller than currently available class
of rockets.

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Launch opportunities for small satellites
-- often called CubeSats or nanosatellites

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are mostly limited to ride-sharing arrangements
on NASA and other launches.

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NASA anticipates a growing need for dedicated
launch capability for these smaller payloads,

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which could be used on future missions for
such things as improved weather prediction,

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broader Internet coverage and Earth observation.

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This closest-yet view of Ceres, captured by
NASA's Dawn spacecraft on May 3 and 4 is helping

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scientists better resolve the mysterious bright
spots on the dwarf planet.

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The sequence of images, taken from a distance
of 8,400 miles, reveal that the brightest

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spots within a crater in the northern hemisphere
are composed of many smaller spots.

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The exact nature of the spots remains unknown,
but scientists estimate the spots are caused

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by the reflection of sunlight by highly reflective
material on the surface, possibly ice.

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NASA laboratory experiments suggests the dark
material coating some geological features

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of Jupiter's moon Europa is likely sea salt
from a subsurface ocean, discolored by exposure

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to radiation.

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The presence of sea salts on Europa's surface
would imply the ocean interacts with its rocky

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seafloor -- an important consideration for
establishing whether the icy moon could support

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life.

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A new NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory led study
finds the last remaining section of Antarctica's

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Larsen B Ice Shelf, which partially collapsed
in 2002, is quickly weakening and likely to

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disintegrate completely before the end of
the decade.

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Scientists found the shelf’s remnant, which
is about 625 square miles and at least 10,000

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years old, is flowing faster, becoming increasingly
fragmented and developing large cracks.

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Ice shelves are the gatekeepers for glaciers
flowing from Antarctica toward the ocean.

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Without them, glacial ice enters the ocean
faster and accelerates the pace of global

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sea level rise.

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A major hurricane has not made landfall in
the United States in a record nine years.

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That’s a rarity a new NASA study says likely
only happens once every 177 years.

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The study didn’t delve into the possible
meteorological causes of this hurricane drought,

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but researchers did say it could be just happenstance.

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And that’s what’s up this week @NASA …