In today’s wrapup of science and technology news:

  • SpaceX closer to understanding rocket explosion at pad 
  • Spacecraft sends back last bit of data from 2015 Pluto flyby
  • VIDEO: Watch a review of the mission
  • Users mourn as Twitter kills quirky, beloved Vine video app
  • Electric-car maker Tesla plans to sell solar roof tiles too

The details:

  • SpaceX closer to understanding rocket explosion at pad

SpaceX said Friday it’s closer to understanding last month’s rocket explosion at the launch pad and aims to resume flights by year’s end.

The company already had targeted the rocket’s helium system as being breached. On Friday, SpaceX said the investigation has been further narrowed to one of the pressurized helium containers, located in the second-stage oxygen tank.

In recent testing, SpaceX said it’s managed to recreate a system failure, noting it can happen entirely through helium-loading conditions, namely temperature and pressure. More tests are planned at SpaceX facilities in Texas to identify the precise cause.

The unmanned Falcon rocket erupted in a fireball Sept. 1 during prelaunch testing at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Both the rocket and the satellite on board were destroyed. Facebook had wanted to use the Israeli-made satellite to spread internet access in Africa.

It was the second Falcon failure in just over a year for Elon Musk, the billionaire behind SpaceX. In June 2015, a rocket loaded with space station supplies erupted shortly after liftoff. Company officials said the two accidents were unrelated, although the 2015 loss also originated in the upper-stage helium system. In that instance, a support strut broke.

“SpaceX’s efforts are now focused on two areas – finding the exact root cause, and developing improved helium loading conditions that allow SpaceX to reliably load Falcon 9,” the company said on its web site. “This is an important milestone on the path to returning to flight.”

Falcon rockets have been grounded as SpaceX conducts the investigation along with NASA, the Air Force, the Federal Aviation Administration and industry experts. The California-based company has about 70 launches in line, worth more than $10 billion.

  • Spacecraft sends back last bit of data from 2015 Pluto flyby

NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft has sent back the last bit of data from its 2015 flyby of Pluto.

The picture — one of a sequence of shots of Pluto and its big moon, Charon — arrived earlier this week at Mission Control in Maryland. It took more than five hours for the image to reach Earth from New Horizons, some 3 billion miles away.

“We did it! Pluto data download complete!!” principal scientist Alan Stern cheered via Twitter on Thursday.

“We have our pot of gold,” mission operations manager Alice Bowman added in a statement.

New Horizons swooped past Pluto on July 14, 2015. It’s now headed to an even smaller, frozen orb in the far reaches of the solar system. That close encounter is targeted for 2019.

Mission managers opted to save all the Pluto data on New Horizons’ digital recorders, in order to maximize observing time. Only the highest priority sets of information were sent back in the days before and after the flyby, providing humanity’s first up-close look at Pluto. It wasn’t until September 2015 when the real data transmission began.

In all, more than 50 gigabits of data were relayed over the past 15 months to Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel, Maryland. The final data arrived Tuesday, and NASA announced the safe arrival Thursday.

  • VIDEO: Watch a NASA report about info about Pluto at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F1qUMY1oEvY

The team will make absolutely certain nothing got left behind, before erasing the recorders to make room for future observations, Bowman said.

  • Users mourn as Twitter kills quirky, beloved Vine video app

You can watch any video for six seconds, played on an infinite loop. The funniest ones only get more ridiculous with repetition.

That was the beauty of Vine, the simple, pioneering mobile video app that Twitter has decided to kill off. Its loyal users are mourning its weirdness, humor and creativity-boosting constraints.

There are alternatives, sure, but nothing as simple as Vine, which did just one thing, and one thing well. Instagram has photos and videos of all sorts. Snapchat keeps expanding features, and it isn’t really meant for mindless scrolling of humorous content. Facebook, well, we all know Facebook.

  • Electric-car maker Tesla plans to sell solar roof tiles too

Further broadening its reach beyond electric cars, Tesla Motors says it’s going to sell solar roof tiles that are customizable and meant to look like a traditional roof. The energy-generating tiles would be a joint product with SolarCity, although the two companies have yet to complete a proposed merger.

The glass tiles, which come in four styles (for example, Tuscan Glass Tile), contain photovoltaic cells that Tesla says are invisible from the street. They’re meant to power a home when integrated with Tesla’s Powerwall, energy storage units for homes that are mounted on the wall or kept on the ground. The new version of Powerwall costs $5,500 but there was no price announced for the tilesat an unveiling Friday night .

Tesla Chairman and CEO Elon Musk reasons that many of the people who want to drive electric vehicles have an inherent interest in setting up cleaner energy systems in their homes and offices. He has estimated that one-fourth of Tesla owners currently have solarenergy panels.

“The whole purpose of Tesla is to accelerate the advent of sustainable energy,” Musk said at the event. He said the future he wants consists of the solar roof, energy storage and electric cars. “It’s an obvious three-part solution.”

In June, Tesla proposed buying SolarCity, the largest home solar-panel installer in the U.S., in an all-stock deal worth around $2.45 billion. Shareholders are expected to vote on the deal on Nov. 17.