The US space agency sent a notice informing different institutions about the agency’s plan. This was done in order to gauge the qualifications and interest of the institutions along with their housing capacity for the space shuttles.

The space shuttles are set to go out of service by September 10th 2010. They will be made available to the institutions one year after the date of retirement according to Michael Curie who happens to be a NASA spokesman. He said “These are national assets; national treasures and something that NASA feels the public would want to see displayed publicly for years to come”.

Amongst the institutions that have been offered to house the retiring shuttle “Discovery” is the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum located in Washington. The director of the institute Clare Brown said “We have the information, and of course, we’re thrilled to be considered for this artifact”.  The institute has not taken any actions regarding figuring out the cost of housing the space shuttle.

Indeed it would be quite a privilege to house a NASA space shuttle but at the same time it won’t be cheap. The estimated cost to keep a NASA space shuttle in house has been calculated at $42 million. It will take around $28.2 million to remove all the hazardous chemicals from the shuttle. Some of the harmful chemicals found used in space shuttles include nitrogen teroxide, hydrazine and ammonia. They are used as coolants and fuel. It would take another $8 million to ready the shuttle for display.

Pictures taken from the Cassini spacecraft revealed that the surface of the moon splits open in some places and spreads apart much like the bed of the ocean does on the surface of the planet Earth. The Earth performs this natural phenomenon as a means of creating a new crust.

This information was released during a meeting of the American Geophysical Union in San Francisco. The data captured from the Cassini spacecraft has backed up the already existing notion about the Enceladus harboring a sub surface sea.

Each new discovery seems to be strengthening the evidence that claims that water is present on the surface of Enceladus. Carolyn Porco is one of the senior scientists who also leads the Cassini imaging group was very excited over the new discovery that has revealed even more sound evidence regarding the presence of water on the moon. 

The cracking of the ocean bed is a recently discovered phenomenon that has greatly advanced the theory of plate tectonics. The team leader of the Cassini group claims that Enceladus displayed a similar kind of behavior.

The moon of Saturn is snow white in color and has a rigged surface full of cracks. It has been dubbed as having a tiger striped surface. The experiments conducted by Dr Paul Helfenstein of the Cornell University where he managed to put together the cracks on the computer screen like the pieces of a puzzle clearly suggest that water is present under the cracked surface of the moon. This resemblance between the surface of the moon and that of the ocean bed is a remarkable discovery in the world of science.

The only difference between the way that the two surfaces crack up is that the ocean bed on planet Earth cracks up in a symmetrical fashion whereas the surface of Enceladus cracks up in an asymmetrical manner pushing only in one direction.