At first the often adorable astronauts were a means for testing the ability to launch a living organism into space and bring it back alive, though various animals have been sent into space to test ...

NASA and other space agencies put animals in space long before humans, using monkeys, dogs, and cats to figure out how humans could survive leaving Earth.

In the early days of space exploration, scientists sent animals like fruit flies, monkeys, dogs, tortoises and worms into ...

Using five tiny satellites, researchers will begin building a real-time database of animal migration from space.

Some of these space-faring animals gave their lives for the sake of discovery, but many of them returned safely to Earth. Here are the stories of these incredible and brave animal explorers. Fruit ...

Fruit flies launched in 1947 became the first animals to reach outer space and be recovered alive.

We've been sending animals to space for nearly 75 years, leading to critically important science and no shortage of bizarre stories.

1960: Belka and Strelka, a couple of stray mutts impressed into the Soviet space program, become the first living creatures to return alive from an orbital flight. The Soviets had been using dogs ...

At first, the animals were sent up simply to test the survivability of spaceflight, then how aspects of life in space — such as radiation and weightlessness — might affect animals’ biology.

So far, only lichens and bacteria have survived an unprotected brush with space, and tardigrades are the only animals to join this illustrious super-mile-high-club.

Aug. 20, 1960: Back From Space, With Tails Wagging Soviet cosmo-dogs Strelka (left) and Belka win fame as the first animals to orbit the Earth and return alive.