Space shuttle Atlantis lifted off July 8 on the final flight of the shuttle program, STS-135, a 13-day mission to the International Space Station. Atlantis carried a crew of four and the Raffaello multipurpose logistics module containing supplies and spare parts for the space station.

The Space Shuttle Carrying the four STS-135 astronauts landed safely July 21, 2011, 5:57 a.m. EDT at Kennedy Space Center, Florida. This marks the end of more than 30 years space shuttling. In this back drop here a small write up on one of the most amazing stuff of human - "Space Shuttle"....

It is yet another successful launch for the ISRO's workhorse PSLV. India's Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV-C17) successfully launched GSAT-12 communication satellite today (July 15, 2011) from Satish Dhawan Space Centre (SDSC) SHAR, Sriharikota. The launch of PSLV-C17 was the eighteenth successive successful flight of PSLV out of total nineteen flights.

After a smooth countdown of 53 hours, the vehicle lifted-off from the Second Launch Pad at the opening of the launch window at 16:48 hrs (IST). After about 20 minutes of flight time, GSAT-12 was successfully injected into sub-Geosynchronous Transfer Orbit (sub-GTO) with a perigee of 284 km and an apogee of 21,020 km with an orbital inclination of 17.9 deg.

  The longest and darkest total lunar eclipse of the century will occur on Wednesday, giving sky enthusiasts all over the country an opportunity to witness the event. The total phase of this lunar eclipse will last 100 minutes. The last eclipse to exceed this duration was in July 2000. The next such eclipse will only take place in 2141. .. 

To date,Google has invested over $680 million in innovative clean energy companies and projects through Google.org, Google Ventures and Google corporate investments. Google intends to supporte cleantech companies with scalable and potentially breakthrough technologies that could produce renewable energy cheaper than coal.  Some of the google's investments in clean energy - 

Today Google announced a $280 million investment to create a fund, in partnership with SolarCity, to help the company finance more solar installations across US.This is Google's first investment in "distributed" renewable energy (generated and used right at home). The investment is expected to be a  quadruple-win for Google, SolarCity, the environment, and new customers who get access to clean energy at a economic rates.

Natural gas is important in many sectors of the economy: for generating electricity, as a heat source for industry and buildings, and in chemical feedstock. Despite its vital importance to the economy, natural gas has often been overlooked, or at best taken for granted, in the debate about the future of energy.

Over the past two or three years, this has started to change, and natural gas is finding its place at the heart of the energy discussion. Given the abundance of natural gas available through extensive global resources and the recent emergence of substantial unconventional supplies in the United States and discovery of new sources in some countries, worldwide usage of the fuel is likely to continue to grow considerably and contribute to significant reductions of greenhouse gas emissions for decades to come, according to a comprehensive, multidisciplinary study carried out over the last three years by MIT researchers... 

One of the most striking speeches made by Jawhar Lal Nehru when India got Freedom - " At the stroke of Midnight hour , when the world is sleeping.. India awakens.." . And being a weekend I was just awake to see one the most unwarrented happenings against democracy. Around 0100 hrs , when most of the people are about to sleep switching off the TVs - started the drama .  

Space shuttle Endeavour completed its final flight by delivering the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer to the International Space Station during the STS-134 mission.

"I think we all should be really impressed how big and magnificent that space station is," said STS-134 Mission Specialist Mike Fincke at the crew press conference following landing. Describing their parting view of the space station where he served once as crew and once as commander, he said, "We were impressed; we were excited like five-year olds at a rollercoaster park."