Gifts from outer space

Sixty years of NASA have provided remarkable spin-offs

The United States’ space agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (or Nasa), was founded on October 1, 1958, as a direct response to the Soviet Union launching its Sputnik, exactly a year before, in October 1957. By the mid-1960s, Nasa had helped the US overtake the Soviets in the space race, and in 1969, it achieved the barely believable feat of landing men on the moon and bringing them back safe. It has also sent unmanned missions to Mars and Venus and flyby missions that have photographed Pluto, Jupiter and Saturn and even left the solar system. Sixty years