Vulbus Incognita Magazine

More than 900 new near-Earth asteroids are discovered each year.
At least two companies, Planetary Resources and more recently, Deep Space Industries, have announced plans to take advantage of these massive rock clumps, which are in seemingly endless supply and believed to be the source of great mineral wealth.
The asteroid making a record-close approach to Earth this week could be worth up to $195 billion in fuel and metal, according to Deep Space Industries.
Unfortunately, asteroid 2012 DA14 is not a good target because its orbit is tilted relative to Earth, requiring too much energy to chase down.
That doesn't bother Deep Space. There are thousands of other asteroids floating out in space just waiting to be harvested.
Here's Deep Space's master plan to find, capture, and process asteroid materials for use in space and on Earth.

Call it the ultimate in high art: Using a well-timed laser, NASA scientists have beamed a picture of Leonardo da Vinci's masterpiece, the Mona Lisa, to a powerful spacecraft orbiting the moon, marking a first in laser communication.

The laser signal, fired from an installation in Maryland, beamed the Mona Lisa to the moon to be received 240,000 miles (384,400 km) away by NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, which has been orbiting the moon since 2009. The Mona Lisa transmission, NASA scientists said, is a major advance in laser communication for interplanetary spacecraft.

Many people wonder what all the fuss is all about when they keep hearing the phrase “cislunar architecture.” Many of us are using the phrase to refer to what is essentially a space trucking system, with the equivalent of truck stops and cargo loading yards (freight terminals). Lets use the trucking analogy to explain what we are talking about.