A capsule containing precious space dust from NASA's Stardust mission is due to arrive at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, US, on Tuesday. The capsule, which appears to have survived its landing intact, is scheduled to be opened on Tuesday evening local time.

The capsule entered the atmosphere at a record 45,000 kilometres per hour and made a parachute landing in Utah's salt flats at 1010 GMT on Sunday. The capsule bounced in the muddy soil several times after landing, coming to rest on its rim.

But unlike NASA's solar wind collecting mission Genesis, which crashed in Utah in September 2004 after its parachutes failed to open, Stardust was barely bruised in the landing.

"The canister is closed tight - no dings, dents, or scrapes, and no loose aerogel," says team member Scott Sandford of NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California, US...

NASA’s attempt to launch the first probe to Pluto was delayed on Tuesday by gusts of high winds at the launch pad at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, US.

The launch of the New Horizons spacecraft has been rescheduled for Wednesday at 1316 EST (1816 GMT).

Wind gusts reached up to 35 knots (65 kilometres per hour) at Cape Canaveral during the countdown – the maximum allowed speed limit is 33 knots (61 km/h).

Launch control delayed launch several times, with a final attempt right at the end of the window at 1523 EST (2023 GMT). But in the end the ground winds failed to subside and the launch attempt was scrubbed. At the start of the day, weather officials had initially forecast an 80% chance of acceptable weather.

The bad news is that the weather looks even less promising on Wednesday than it did on Tuesday, because of a cold front approaching central Florida. The weather officers predict just a 60% chance of acceptable weather, with the possibility of gusty winds, clouds and isolated thunderstorms.

In addition to the winds, a liquid oxygen valve on the Atlas first stage concerned mission controllers during the countdown. They were worried that the valve would not properly close but tests subsequently allayed their fears...