Three big highlights are keeping space enthusiasts happy these days, all of them are exciting and a real treat to follow.

First off, there’s the Phoenix lander on Mars which is now busy scooping up soil and ice and depositing them into tiny labs in the lander where the samples will be analyzed with a number of scientific instruments. Researchers on Earth are eagerly awaiting the results. So far the lander has performed almost flawlessly and it’s a joy to see what discoveries it brings with every new sol — the Martian equivalent of a day.

Next there is the space shuttle mission STS-124 to the International Space Station, delivering the Japanese science module Kibo (“Hope”) and attaching it to the existing structure. Kibo dwarfs many of the station’s other components and represents a tremendous boost in science and research capabilities.

Along with Kibo a bit of plumbing rode into orbit: the ISS toilet has been acting up, and proper deposits for “number 1” have been a bit of a problem. Now, we all know what a bother it is when the toilet backs up at home, but we can always call a plumber and get it all fixed quickly. In space, it ain’t that easy. The astronauts made do as best they could, but finally the parts have arrived and soon the space potty should be back in fine form.

And finally, there is the launch of GLAST which is the acronym for the Gamma-Ray Large Area Space Telescope. Its launch window opens June 11.

GLAST will join the crew of celebrated space telescopes like Hubble and Spitzer. All the big space telescopes specialize in a part of the electromagnetic spectrum in which they “see” the universe. For Hubble, it’s largely visible light, and for Spitzer it’s infrared light. GLAST deals with the part of the spectrum that includes incredibly powerful gamma radiation and is thus ideally suited to observe supermassive black holes, pulsars and other dangerous denizens of the cosmos.

Keep up with it all at http://www.nasa.gov/

Beate Czogalla is the associate professor of theater design in the Department of Music and Theater at Georgia College & State University. She has had a lifelong interest in space exploration and has been a solar system ambassador for the Jet Propulsion Laboratory/ NASA for many years. She can be reached at our_space2@yahoo.com.