A planet-hunting spacecraft named Plato just passed a series of critical tests as it prepares for the challenges of outer space.

What is it?

Gleaming in the light of a laboratory, this box of electronics is actually the European Space Agency's Plato spacecraft sitting inside a special test chamber where it underwent critical tests ahead of its planned spaceflight.

The Plato (PLAnetary Transits and Oscillations of stars) probe is designed to study terrestrial exoplanets, or rocky planets outside of our solar system that are Earth-sized or smaller.

This chamber, called the Maxwell Test Chamber (which is located at the European Space Research and Technology Centre in the Netherlands), is an enclosure made of conductive metal that blocks electromagnetic fields. On top of the conductive metal are foam spikes. Combined, they block out and/or absorb all electrical signals and sounds to mimic some aspects of the environment of the vacuum of space.

In this enclosure, the team turned on Plato's electronics to make sure that signals from some of the probe's instruments don't interfere with other systems or electronics on the craft. With all other signals blocked out, scientists had a clear look into how it might perform in space.

Why is it incredible?

This test is critical as Plato will need to be able to collect data and run its instruments without interference from electronics or signals from elsewhere on the spacecraft. But it's pretty impossible to ensure that things would work as planned amidst the "noise" on planet Earth.

To get any spacecraft ready to operate in the void of space, researchers conduct all sorts of tests to make absolutely sure that they're up to the challenge. In addition to tests like this, spacecraft can be placed in extremely hot or cold temperature chambers or even shaken around to make sure that they can handle the violent conditions of a rocket launch. It's amazing how we can recreate different aspects of outer space here on Earth to prepare for these missions.

LOS ANGELES — Standing in the shadow of the space shuttle Endeavour, a group of retired NASA astronauts announced their plan to travel the country visiting colleges to try to inspire younger generations to get out and vote. This campaign comes as we lead up to the November midterm election.

This past year, a group of retired NASA astronauts teamed up for a single cause: to defend the U.S. constitution. They banded together as part of a non-profit, non-partisan activist organization called Astronauts for America. So far, they have been speaking out, using their astronaut expertise, platforms, cultural relevance and role model status to speak out in support of "science, evidence-based decision-making, public service and the rule of law," their website reads. Now, as the group announced at an event at the California Science Center's new air and space center — home to the shuttle Endeavour — they're hitting the road on a campaign tour of colleges called "Vote for Freedom."

"We have to do what we can to ensure that the country makes it through the challenges that we're dealing with here, and that is the message that we're going to be taking to colleges and universities," Apollo 9 astronaut Rusty Schweickart told Space.com. "And the agency that we have, the immediate agency, is to vote."

This tour will send astronauts from the group on a four-month jaunt across the country. Astronauts from the group's more than 100 members will visit state and community colleges, county fairs and even town halls, aiming to reach first-time voters and young people who might be new to voting.

"I'm really excited to look a bunch of younger Americans in the eye and make sure that they know that someone that they can trust said: ;Listen, you matter, because our country matters, and our country needs you,'" former NASA astronaut Cady Coleman told Space.com.

"It's with a uniquely American kind of freedom that we were able to go to the moon, and that same freedom launched the spaceship behind us 25 times into space. Now we see those freedoms under heavy threat," former NASA astronaut Steve Smith said during the event. "We're seeing chaos instead of community, violence instead of votes, lies instead of laws, and fear instead of fate. That's how democracy and freedom die."

"The mission is all that matters. Now, our country is the mission, and our message is simple: going to the polls is one small step for you, and one giant leap for our country," Smith added.

This campaign leads up to the U.S. midterm elections this November. Midterm elections happen halfway through every four-year presidency. This election allows voters to decide what Congress looks like, and which political party controls Congress. This can ultimately have a major impact on what laws and decisions are passed moving forward, and whether Congress will reject or change actions by the president moving forward. And this group of astronauts is serious about the importance of getting people out to exercise their right to vote.

"I'm a child of the segregated South; I grew up in Columbia, South Carolina," former astronaut and NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden, who also serves as a steering committee member for Astronauts for America, said at the event. "I graduated in 1964. Anybody know what happened in 1964? The Voting Rights Act. So, as a person growing up in my hometown, it wasn't a guarantee that my mom and dad were going to be able to go out and vote. I look at what's going on today about people trying to restrict the ability of people to cast their ballot. That's not who we are. That's not America."

The group of astronauts recently spoke out about voting access after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of protecting the right to absentee voting, in response to attempts by the Trump administration to place restrictions on the current voting process. Especially leading up to the November midterms, each vote carries significant weight. And while this nonpartisan group isn't telling you who to vote for, they do think that everyone who can should vote.

"As astronauts, we signed an oath to our nation, and we are mission-oriented people. And our nation is now the mission," Coleman added. "We need to recognize that everyone's voice is important, and one of the voices that we don't hear very much is the young people. And we want them to understand that, even though sometimes change can seem daunting, their perspective is really important, and, you know, their voice is important."

In satellite data captured over Antarctica, what appears to be a beautiful, colorful hummingbird emerges from the crest of a mountaintop.

What is it?

While there are no hummingbirds flying around Antarctica, we can see what looks like a small, purple bird in a new satellite image of an Antarctic mountain. The dark belly of this "bird" at the center of this image is actually the top of the mountain Nunatak Zaterjavshijsja in East Antarctica.

What looks like a bird's tail is a stream of ice flowing northeast all the way out to the ocean, and what appear to be feathers splaying outward from the mountaintop are actually crevasses down the mountain. These crevasses are formed by a glacier fracturing the mountain's surface as it flows in the icy current toward the ocean.

This view was captured by radar instruments onboard the satellite NISAR (NASA-ISRO Synthetic Aperture Radar) that launched as a collaboration between NASA and ISRO (Indian Space Research Organisation). The director of NASA's Earth Science Division called NISAR "the most sophisticated radar we've ever built" in a pre-launch briefing last year.

Why is it incredible?

At first glance, this image is puzzling. What could it possibly be? Its bold colors and sharp lines evoke almost alien qualities. But the strange beauty of the shapes and colors in this satellite image reveal important information about glacier movements on the mountain.

"First, it's a beautiful image, with rich details of features that provide insights to how the glacier is moving. Then, because radar can often see through snow and deep into the ice, NISAR can observe fundamentally different properties of Antarctic ice than can be seen in optical imagery," Seongsu Jeong, the signal analysis engineer who produced the image at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, said in a statement. "With NISAR we're seeing what's hidden beneath the surface."

And now anyone can explore NISAR's data. Earlier this week, on July 20, NISAR started making the data from its radar instruments public. Moving forward, mission teams will be rolling out this data so researchers everywhere can use it to study and protect our ever-changing planet.

You're looking at history. What might seem like a simple black-and-white picture of some rocks is actually the first photograph ever taken on the surface of Mars.

What is it?

Bright and early on the morning of July 20, 1976, NASA's Viking 1 lander touched down on the surface of Mars. This moment 50 years ago marked the first fully successful touchdown on the Red Planet, and, pretty much as soon as it landed, Viking 1 captured the first image of the Martian surface.

The Soviet Union had already made multiple Mars landing attempts, all of them failures to some degree. The nation's Mars 3 lander did manage to survive its landing initially in December 1971, but it lost contact less than two minutes later.

Viking 1 did more than just survive. While its mission tasked the lander with studying the planet for 90 days after landing, it lasted over six years on the planet and made some incredible observations. The Viking 1 lander worked in tandem with an orbiter by the same name, and was soon joined at Mars by Viking 2, another lander/orbiter pair.

Why is it incredible?

It has now been 50 years since Viking 1's historic first, which opened our eyes to the Martian surface. And NASA has kept improving technologies and exploring further on Mars ever since. Agency rovers began scouring the planet's surface in the 1990s, so we have gathered data on the planet's surface for decades upon decades at this point.

But in 1976, no one had ever seen the surface of Mars close up. This view was preceded by science fiction like Ray Bradbury's "The Martian Chronicles," which painted fantastical possibilities about what it might really be like on Mars. With Viking 1's view, we finally got some concrete evidence of the reality on the planet.

In 50 years, our understanding of Mars, our solar system and beyond has grown tremendously. But with each major accomplishment, we can look back at previous milestones such as this to see the stepping stones that paved the way to get us there.

A young cluster of galaxies sparkles under a cosmic glow that's 4.4 billion years old. This peek into the past shows the stellar spectacle of a galaxy cluster still forming.

What is it?

The James Webb Space Telescope snapped this image of the galaxy cluster MACS J0553.4-3342 on July 3 using its near-infrared camera (NIRCam). The glorious, glimmering sight is actually a massive young galaxy cluster forming 4.4 billion years ago. A galaxy cluster is a grouping of galaxies held together by gravity. Galaxy clusters can contain hundreds or even thousands of galaxies and are the largest known structures in the entire universe that are held together in this way.

Why is it incredible?

Because light takes time to travel through space, and because the JWST can look incredibly far out into space, this telescope acts as a sort time machine.

This power isn't unique to the JWST, however. Other telescopes like the Hubble Space Telescope, for instance, have similarly peered back in time through the cosmos and revealed some incredible, ancient sights. However, the JWST's specialized instruments like NIRCam allow the telescope to pick up incredibly faint light from galaxies remarkably far away. This greatly stretches how far back in time we can see.

But the really incredible thing is, you can look back in time yourself — with only your eyes. While JWST can look exceptionally far out into space and can capture the very faint light of ancient galaxies, the light coming from the stars you can see with your bare eyes also had to travel over incredible stretches of time to reach you. Think about this: the light coming from a constellation you love may have traveled across millions of light-years to get to your eyes.