Roundup 2/3: Burn Notice Edition

Phil Charles, South Africa's chief astronomer and the director of the South African Astronomical Observatory, has been suspended by the country's National Research Foundation for alleged actions that led to the leaking of confidential information about the foundation. A date for a disciplinary hearing has not yet been set.

The just-announced second version of the Orbiting Carbon Observatory, which crashed on launch last year, will be as snazzy as the first, says NASA.

In a major decision that the ethanol industry called "workable," the Obama Administration ruled that carbon emissions from deforestation abroad should count in determining the carbon footprint of biofuels.

NASA will extend to 2017 the international Cassini-Huygens mission to explore Saturn and its moons that was scheduled to end in September of this year.

(Image: NASA)