The TakePart Top 10 Weekly Roundup is a compilation of the week’s most notable stories from our entertainment-meets-social-action blogging network. Check out some of our most popular stories of the week, as well as a few TakePart blogger favorites!

Katie Halper:

Debra Winger and Rights Camera Action!

James Byrd Jr. and the Struggle for Tolerance

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Nicole Hughes:

Green Video of the Week: 5 Tips for Reducing Your Garbage

The Week in Green Politics

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Andy Kondrat:

Disappearing Destinations: Visit Before They Vanish

Chuck Norris Wants America to Start Drilling for Oil Here and Now!

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Jon Popham:

NASA Plans Voyage to the Sun

The Girl Effect

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Giulia Rozzi:

Gay Discrimination at Seattle Baseball Game

Bison Brucellosis

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Gina Telaroli:

Fathers Day Celebration of Movie Dads #1

My Father’s Gift of Tecumseh!

NASA is planning to send a probe to the Sun by as early as 2015. The recently announced Solar Probe+ mission will send a heat-resistant spacecraft deep into the Sun’s atmosphere to take readings and samples of solar wind and magnetism.

NASA Scientist Lika Guhathakurta says, “We are going to visit a living, breathing star for the first time. This is an unexplored region of the solar system and the possibilities for discovery are off the charts.”

The spacecraft of Solar Probe+, which will be designed and built by Johns Hopkins University’s Applied Physics Laboratory, comes equipped with a heat shield capable of protecting it from temperatures in excess of 1,600 degrees Celsius, along with blasts of solar radiation stronger than any ever experienced by a manmade machine.

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