China's Tianzhou-9 cargo craft launches for Tiangong space station resupply mission
China said it successfully launched its Tianzhou-9 cargo spacecraft on July 15, 2025. The spacecraft is delivering 6.5 tonnes of supplies for the orbiting Tiangong Space Station. The Long March-7 Y10 rocket carrying the spacecraft lifted off at 5.34am from the Wenchang Spacecraft Launch Site in China's southern island province of Hainan, according to the China Manned Space Agency. The Tianzhou-9 separated from the rocket and entered its designated orbit about 10 minutes after blast-off.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
South China Morning Post
5 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
‘Obedient' AI partners partly to blame for Hong Kong's low births: lawmaker
A Hong Kong lawmaker has said the rise of 'obedient and caring' virtual partners generated by artificial intelligence is partly to blame for the city's low birth rate, noting such digital companions offer emotional support and lack interpersonal conflicts. Legislator William Wong Kam-fai, who is also a computational linguistics professor, called on the government to promote 'happy learning' in schools and lower the income threshold for public housing to encourage more people to have children. Wong spoke at a motion debate during a Legislative Council meeting on Thursday that centred on how to encourage more childbirths, conceding it was difficult to reverse trends of people staying unmarried and having no children. 'The younger generation would rather keep pets than have children, and now there is also the new challenge of AI companions,' he told the legislature. Wong, who is part of the Chinese University of Hong Kong's systems engineering and engineering management department, said that technology companies had launched 'obedient and caring' AI companions to address the needs of single people. 'These virtual partners not only know how to provide emotional value, but also save [the users] from the troubles of interpersonal conflicts. Their attraction [to people] is self-evident,' he said.
South China Morning Post
5 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
Chinese team's ultratough aerogel could shield aircraft from new extremes
Chinese scientists have proposed a novel method for producing aerogels that significantly improves their heat resistance and mechanical properties, with potential for use in high-speed aircraft and space exploration, according to a paper published this month in a top journal. Aerogels are lightweight, porous solid materials with extremely low density and exceptional thermal insulation properties. They are widely used for insulation or thermal protection in spacecraft , military equipment and electronics. However, despite their superior insulating abilities, conventional aerogels typically suffer from poor mechanical strength, making them vulnerable to pressure or impact. Researchers from Zhejiang University in eastern China have developed a universal preparation technique that enables the creation of aerogels with an internal dome-like cellular structure. By varying the raw materials, hundreds of formulations can be derived, each exhibiting high elasticity. Their findings were published in the peer-reviewed journal Science on July 17. The method, dubbed the '2D channel-confined chemistry' approach, involves the use of nanoscale graphene oxide during production. 'The key lies in the layered assembly process, akin to making a mille-feuille pastry,' explained Xu Zhen, an associate professor at Zhejiang University and one of the paper's corresponding authors.
South China Morning Post
14 hours ago
- South China Morning Post
China, Russia relaunch joint maritime research missions, eyeing Arctic ambitions
For the first time in five years, China and Russia have set sail on a joint oceanographic expedition, a research mission to learn more about the evolution of oceans and the forces behind global climate change. Advertisement A total of 25 members from the two countries are on board the research ship Akademik M.A. Lavrentyev, which left the port of Vladivostok on Tuesday, according to China's First Institute of Oceanography (FIO) under the Ministry of Natural Resources. The ninth such expedition for the two countries – and the first since the pandemic – is focused on the effects of a changing climate on deep-sea environments, according to Chinese authorities. The expedition, jointly launched by FIO and the Pacific Oceanological Institute (POI) at the Far East Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, is expected to last 45 days, during which researchers will conduct environmental surveys in the Bering Sea and the northwestern Pacific Ocean. They will explore the response systems and feedback effects in the region over the last 126,000 years, a period known as the Late Quaternary. The FIO said on its website that the scientists would investigate source-to-sink sediment processes, which are the cycles of deposit movement from land into water. The joint mission on the scientific vessel Akademik M.A. Lavrentyev is expected to last 45 days. Photo: Xinhua 'The resumption of China-Russia joint oceanographic surveys shows [a] shared commitment to addressing global climate change and exploring cutting-edge marine science, and marks a new chapter in bilateral marine research cooperation,' said Wang Jun, acting head of the Chinese consulate general in Vladivostok, according to a report by state news agency Xinhua.
