A Cassini Music Mashup, Another Kind of Helicopter and Lunar Lions

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Screen shot from a Cassini video showing neptune

They call it a mashup when you combine unrelated things to create something new, such as electronic music from industrial pioneers like Nine Inch Nails with footage from the NASA Cassini mission. You might not think NIN goes too well with NASA, but don’t forget the one-man band won an Oscar for the score to “The Social Network.”

The video below, highlighted recently by Mashable, combines a track from “Ghosts I-IV” with pictures from the Cassini mission, which is studying Saturn and its moons.

The spacecraft entered orbit around Saturn in 2004. Its findings for Titan are helping scientists understand what Earth might have been like before life evolved, according to the space agency.

Next, remember back to last week, when we featured a small rolling robot that becomes a helicopter when needed. Below, we have a view from the Earth, of a rocket launch as seen from a remotely operated helicopter.

This was featured at OnOrbit.com. The launch begins just after the 2:30 mark. The shadow from the remote helicopter is worth a look too.

Finally, via Penn State, comes information on the Lunar Lion team, which is working with the Glenn Research Center on a worldwide competition to design and launch a spacecraft from Earth to the moon.

The $30 million competition is known as the Google Lunar X Prize.

– If you know of an Earth-observation video that should be featured here, send a note to Earthzine Managing Editor Jeff Kart at jkart@earthzine.org.