Earth Observation scientists at the University of Leicester have, for the first time, been able to measure from space signals showing the amount of carbon dioxide taken up by plants.

It's a busy week in space: astronauts on shuttle Atlantis are preparing to return to Earth from the International Space Station, a Russian Soyuz spacecraft is due to arrive with space tourist Anousheh Ansari on board - and an unmanned supply spacecraft is to undock from the station.

DANVILLE Astronaut Joe Tanner took a last look at Earth from space right before space shuttle Atlantis re-entered the earth's atmosphere Sept. 21. "I'm going to miss really looking at Earth from up there," the 56-year-old Danville native said on Monday. "It's an emotional and spiritual thing for me."

Windows only: Freeware program Desktop Earth puts the earth on your desktop wallpaper giving you an idea of what the earth would look like from space at any time of the day. The images come from NASA's Blue Marble Next and Earth's City Lights imagery. Desktop Earth supports multi-monitor stretching and looks really awesome. Never call you international offices at the wrong time again! Desktop Earth 2.0 CodeFromThe70s. org

Interplanetary space is not entirely empty. As the Earth orbits the Sun, it encounters particles and objects ranging from microscopic dust to large asteroids and comets. The tiniest particles are numerous and harmless; they cause flashes of light, and are known as meteors or shooting stars....

Summary: FIRST GLOBAL CONNECTION BETWEEN EARTH AND SPACE WEATHER FOUND ... high in the electrically-ch arged upper atmosphere, ... ionosphere, according to new results from NASA satellites. ... The connection to plasma bands in the ionosphere surprised scientists at ...

Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin hit a golf ball into Earth's orbit from the International Space Station on Wednesday to raise money for the Russian space program at the start of a six-hour spacewalk.