Thursday, February 5, 2026

The Walt Disney Company named Josh D'Amaro, chairman of Disney Experiences, as its next CEO, succeeding Bob Iger effective March 18, 2026, ending one of corporate America's most closely watched succession sagas.^[1]

Penny, a four-year-old Doberman Pinscher, won Best in Show at the 150th Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show, the first Doberman to win since 1989 and the 42nd female winner in the show's history.^[2]

The New START nuclear arms treaty expires on February 5, marking the first time since 1969 that the United States and Russia will have no legally binding restrictions on their nuclear arsenals, which together hold approximately 90% of all nuclear weapons worldwide.^[3]

NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is scheduled to launch later in 2026, where it will conduct new observations of exoplanets, survey the Milky Way's structure, and study dark energy from a vantage point one million miles from Earth.^[4]

Japan's Martian Moons eXploration mission is scheduled to launch in 2026 to visit the Martian moon Phobos, where it will collect samples for return to Earth in what would be the first sample return from a Martian moon.^[5]

China's Chang'e 7 mission, expected to launch in mid-2026, will head to the Moon's south pole with an orbiter, lander, rover, and a small flying 'hopper' designed to explore permanently shadowed craters that may harbor water ice.^[6]

The European Space Agency and Chinese Academy of Sciences plan to launch SMILE in spring 2026, a joint mission that will provide the first global images of how Earth's magnetic field responds to solar particles, helping protect infrastructure from space weather.^[7]

Researchers at Avantium and the University of Amsterdam have developed a breakthrough textile recycling process that separates cotton and polyester in mixed-waste fabrics, achieving 75% recovery of cotton and 78% recovery of polyester monomers, with a demonstration plant planned for 2026.^[8]

China's sample-return mission Tianwen-2 is expected to reach asteroid 469219 Kamoʻoalewa in early to mid-summer 2026 to gather material, while ESA's Hera mission will arrive at asteroid 65803 Didymos near year's end to study the aftermath of NASA's DART impact mission.^[9]

Paris prosecutors' cybercrime unit searched X's office and summoned Elon Musk as part of an expanding investigation, conducted in collaboration with French police and Europol.^[10]