This image from NASA's Solar Dynamics Observatory shows a colossal X1.7-class solar flare erupting from the sun at 10:17 p.m. EDT on May 12, 2013 (Mother's Day). It is the strongest solar flare of 2013 so far. (NASA/SDO ) The sun unleashed a colossal Mother's Day solar flare on Sunday (May 12) in what has become the most powerful solar eruption of the year. The giant solar flare, which registered as one of the largest eruptions the sun can unleash,...

Chris Hadfield's video features shots of a floating guitar. (NASA) CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – In a high-flying, perfectly pitched first, an astronaut on the International Space Station is bowing out of orbit with a musical video: his own custom version of David Bowie's "Space Oddity." It's believed to be the first music video made in space, according to NASA. Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield's personalized rendition of "Space Oddity" was posted on YouTube on Sunday, one day before his departure from...

MOSCOW -- A Soyuz space capsule with a three-man crew returning from a five-month mission to the International Space Station landed safely Tuesday on the steppes of Kazakhstan. Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield, American Thomas Marshburn and Russian Roman Romanenko landed as planned southeast of the town of Dzhezkazgan at 8:31 a.m. local time Tuesday (0231 GMT; 10:31 p.m. EDT Monday). Live footage on NASA TV showed the Soyuz TMA-07M capsule slowly descending by parachute onto the sun-drenched steppes under clear...

'Spaceflight finale: To some this may look like a sunset. But it's a new dawn.' (Photo: Commander Chris Hadfield/NASA) After spending five months in space, Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield returned to Earth southeast of the town of Dzhezkazgan on Monday night. Hadfield, 53, an engineer and former test pilot from Milton, Ontario, was Canada's first astronaut to live aboard the space station and became the first Canadian in charge of a spacecraft. He relinquished command of the space station Sunday....

Sunspot AR1478 (far left) fired off the three biggest flares of 2013 over a 24-hour stretch on May 12-13. (NASA/SDO ) The super-active sunspot responsible for unleashing the three within a 24-hour stretch this week is slowly rotating toward Earth and will likely be facing our planet by the weekend, experts say. Active Region 1748, as the sunspot is known, unleashed three monster solar flares between Sunday and Monday (May 12 to 13). Every one of the solar storms registered...

More Solar Eruptions on the Way The sun has unleashed two colossal flares since Sunday night, firing off its most powerful eruptions of 2013 in less than a day. The Sunday, May 12 at 10:17 p.m. EDT, registering as an X1.7-class eruption. The second flare, which occurred at midday on Monday, May 13, was even stronger, clocking in at X2.8, scientists said. And . X-class flares are the most powerful type. Here's a brief rundown on solar flares, their classification...

Artistic composite shows the Kepler telescope. The mission was specifically designed to survey our region of the Milky Way galaxy to detect and characterize other Earth-size and smaller planets around the habitable zone. (NASA) LOS ANGELES — NASA's planet-hunting Kepler telescope is broken, potentially jeopardizing the search for other worlds where life could exist outside our solar system. (MORE: ) If engineers can't find a fix, the failure could mean an end to the $600 million mission's search, although the...

In this Saturday, May 11, 2013 photo made available by NASA, astronaut Chris Cassidy and Tom Marshburn, not pictured, perform a space walk to inspect and replace a pump controller box on the International Space Station after an ammonia coolant leak was discovered. (AP Photo/NASA) CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- An impromptu spacewalk over the weekend seems to have fixed a big ammonia leak at the International Space Station, NASA said Thursday. The "gusher" erupted a week ago, prompting the hastiest...

Mice in a scientist's hands. (Getty Images) MOSCOW -- A Russian capsule carrying mice, lizards and other small animals returned to Earth on Sunday after spending a month in space for what scientists said was the longest experiment of its kind. Fewer than half of the 53 mice and other rodents who blasted off on April 19 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome survived the flight, Russian news agencies reported, quoting Vladimir Sychov, deputy director of the Institute of Medical and Biological...

This map shows the oldest light in our universe, as detected with by the Planck mission. The ancient light, called the cosmic microwave background, was imprinted on the sky when the universe was 370,000 years old. (ESA and the Planck Collaboration) A map of the universe based on its oldest light is giving astronomers hope that they may be able to answer some of the deepest questions of the cosmos, including how it got started. Scientists met this week at...

U.S. astronaut Karen Nyberg, Russian cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin, and European Space Agency astronaut Luca Parmitano wave as they walk to a bus from a hotel before the launch. (AP Photo/Mikhail Metzel) MOSCOW – A Soyuz capsule carrying an American, Russian and Italian successfully docked Wednesday with the International Space Station, where the new crew will spend six months conducting a variety of experiments. The docking took place less than six hours after the Russian spacecraft lifted off from the Baikonur...

Curiosity on Mars A composite of low-resolution images shows the NASA's Curiosity Mars rover with its robotic arm extended for the first time Monday on Mars. LOS ANGELES — Astronauts traveling to and from Mars would be bombarded with as much radiation as they'd get from a full-body CT scan about once a week for a year, researchers reported Thursday. That dose would, in some cases, exceed NASA's standards and is enough to raise an astronaut's cancer risk by 3...