All Articles Tagged As: planets
 | Volcanism has played a more extensive role in shaping the surface of Mercury than scientists had thought. This result comes from multispectral imaging data gathered in January 2008 by MESSENGER, the latest spacecraft to visit the sun's innermost planet. ...> Full Article |
 | Scientists will carefully select and deliver the sample because it could be the last one baked. ...> Full Article |
 | Experts to meet to discuss the next step in the exploration of Mars ...> Full Article |
 | Samples hold clues to history of Martian water, climate and possible habitability. ...> Full Article |
NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander scraped to icy soil in the "Wonderland" area on Thursday, confirming that surface soil, subsurface soil and icy soil can be sampled at a single trench.
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 | The dramatic differences between the northern and southern hemispheres of Mars have puzzled scientists for 30 years. One of the proposed explanations--a massive asteroid impact--now has strong support from computer simulations carried out by two groups of researchers ...> Full Article |
 | The lander performed a diagnostic test that melted Earth ice to water ...> Full Article |
 | The Phoenix Mars Lander continues searching for related minerals and organic substances ...> Full Article |
Higher than expected levels of sodium found in a 4.6 billion-year-old meteorite suggest that the dust clouds from which the building blocks of the Earth and neighboring planets formed were much denser than previously supposed.
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 | Researchers have discovered a secondary aurora sparkling on Saturn and also started to unravel the mechanisms that drive the process ...> Full Article |
 | One of the ovens on NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander continued baking its first sample of Martian soil over the weekend ...> Full Article |
 | A harvest of low-mass exoplanets discovered with HARPS ...> Full Article |
 | The lander's microscope was lightly dusted with a sample from the "Goldilocks" trench. ...> Full Article |
 | The International Astronomical Union has decided on the term plutoid as a name for dwarf planets like Pluto at a meeting of its Executive Committee in Oslo. ...> Full Article |
 | Phoenix Mars Lander has filled its first oven with Martian soil ...> Full Article |
 | Phoenix mission engineers will test a better way to deliver clumpy Martian soil ...> Full Article |
 | A microscope on NASA's Mars Phoenix Lander has taken images of dust and sand particles with the greatest resolution ever returned from another planet. ...> Full Article |
A team of scientists led from the UK has discovered that the rapid changes in Saturn's F ring can be attributed to small moonlets causing perturbations
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 | The lander sits on soil, and a subsurface layer that's possibly salt, possibly ice. ...> Full Article |
Astronomers have discovered a tiny star with its own planet, 3000 light years away.
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 | Simulations correctly predicted that the pulsed jets of the Mars Phoenix lander would strip the soil to the subsurface ice or rock as the craft touched down. ...> Full Article |
 | One week after landing on far northern Mars, the Phoenix Mars Lander lifted its first scoop of Martian soil as a test of the lander's robotic arm. ...> Full Article |
Salt deposits suggest salinity was commonly above what terrestrial life can tolerate
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AT LAST we are seeing big rewards in the hunt for "super-Earths" - rocky alien worlds a few times more massive than our own.
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 | Scientists will gather more data about an area that was exposed when soil was blown away during landing to determine whether it's rock or ice. ...> Full Article |
 | NASA Scientists have sent commands to Phoenix to unstow its robotic arm and take more images of its landing site early today. ...> Full Article |
 | A NASA spacecraft has sent pictures showing itself in good condition after making the first successful landing in a polar region of Mars. ...> Full Article |
 | Two new exoplanets and an unknown celestial object are the latest findings of the COROT mission. These discoveries mean that the mission has now found a total of four new exoplanets. ...> Full Article |
 | Using data from NASA's New Horizons spacecraft and two telescopes at Earth, an international team of scientists has found that one of the solar system's largest and newest storms - Jupiter's Little Red Spot - has some of the highest wind speeds ever detected on any planet. ...> Full Article |
 | Deposits of nearly pure silica discovered by the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit in Gusev Crater formed when volcanic steam or hot water (or maybe both) percolated through the ground. Such deposits are found around hydrothermal vents like those in Yellowstone National Park ...> Full Article |
On May 25, 2008, approaching 5 p.m. PDT, NASA scientists will be wondering: Just how green is their valley?
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 | Venus Express has detected the molecule hydroxyl on another planet for the first time ...> Full Article |
 | NASA's Phoenix Lander is due to land on Mars this month (May) where it will probe the arctic landscape searching for conditions favourable for past or present life ...> Full Article |
Curved features on Jupiter's moon Europa may indicate that its poles have wandered by almost 90°
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 | Astronomers too start a massive search for new planets by observing about 11,000 nearby stars over 6 years ...> Full Article |
 | New scientific evidence suggests that deep inside the planet Mercury, iron "snow" forms and falls toward the center of the planet, much like snowflakes form in Earth's atmosphere and fall to the ground. ...> Full Article |
 | Researcher receives $2 million in funding
for Urey instrument's flight planning and design ...> Full Article |
 | Laser used as a frequency comb-an ultraprecise technique for measuring different colors of light-could boost the sensitivity of astronomical tools searching for other Earthlike planets as much as 100 fold ...> Full Article |
 | Scientists appear to have solved a long-standing mystery about the cause of anomalies in Jupiter's gossamer rings. ...> Full Article |
Astronomers are looking to identify Earth-like watery worlds circling distant stars from a glint of light seen through an optical space telescope and a mathematical method
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 | Researchers have found compelling evidence of thick, recurring glaciers on Mars, a discovery that suggests that the Red Planet's climate was much more dynamic than previously believed - and could change again ...> Full Article |
 | Earth's magnetotail discharges plasma to charge the Moon. ...> Full Article |
 | Radar sounding is opening up a planet's third dimension ...> Full Article |
 | NASA is extending the international Cassini-Huygens mission by two years ...> Full Article |
 | By studying in great detail the 'ringing' of a planet-harbouring star, a team of astronomers using ESO's 3.6-m telescope have shown that it must have drifted away from the metal-rich Hyades cluster ...> Full Article |
 | The High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment has produced a new color stereo view of Phobos, the larger and inner of Mars' two tiny moons. ...> Full Article |
 | One of the most dynamic events in the interaction between the Sun and the Earth is a 'substorm', an explosive reshaping of the Earth's outer magnetic field. To better understand substorms, scientists in Europe and North America are studying them from space using the Time History of Events and Macroscale Interactions during Substorms (THEMIS) satellites launched by NASA in 2007 and from the ground using a network of all-sky cameras. ...> Full Article |
 | Venus Express has measured a highly variable quantity of the volcanic gas sulphur dioxide in the atmosphere of Venus ...> Full Article |
Scientists have discovered a possible terrestrial-type planet orbiting a star in the constellation of Leo
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 | Measuring ability leaps with new instrument ...> Full Article |
 | Team sees first signs of formation's middle stages ...> Full Article |
Astronomers have found a baby planet still in the stages of forming and encased within a 'womb' of gas
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 | The Pleiades star cluster will have a beautiful encounter with the slender moon in the western sky after sunset on April 8. Usually the moon's brightness overpowers nearby stars, but not when it's such a thin crescent. Binoculars will reveal the spectacle as the moon passes just below the famous Seven Sisters. ...> Full Article |
Discoveries of extrasolar planets made by international team of astronomers.
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 | Looking for evidence of life on Mars or other planets? Finding cellulose microfibers would be the next best thing to a close encounter, according to new research from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. The cover story for the April issue of the journal Astrobiology, the new research also pushes back the earliest direct evidence of biological material on Earth by about 200 million years. ...> Full Article |
 | Astrophysicists observe a circumstellar disk with telltale signs of planet formation ...> Full Article |
 | Cassini has discovered evidence that points to the existence of an underground ocean of water and ammonia on Saturn's moon Titan. The findings were made using radar measurements of Titan's rotation. ...> Full Article |
 | A study of meteorites suggests that Mars, the Earth and the Moon share a common composition from 'growing up' in a unique planetary nursery in the inner solar system. ...> Full Article |
Water is an essential ingredient for forming planets, yet has remained hidden from scientists searching for it in protoplanetary systems, the spinning disks of particles surrounding newly formed stars where planets are born. Now the detection of water vapor in the inner part of two extrasolar protoplanetary disks brings scientists one step closer to understanding water's role during terrestrial planet formation.
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 | A UK/US team of astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has made the first detection ever of an organic molecule in a planet orbiting another star. This breakthrough is an important step in eventually identifying signs of life on a planet outside our Solar System. ...> Full Article |
 | Scientists using a Mars-orbiting camera designed and operated at ASU's Mars Space Flight Facility have found the first evidence for deposits of chloride minerals - salts - in numerous places on Mars. ...> Full Article |
 | Promethei Planum, an area seasonally covered with a more than 3500 m thick layer of ice in the martian south polar region, was the subject of the High Resolution Stereo Camera's focus on 22 September 2005 as Mars Express was in orbit above the Red Planet. ...> Full Article |
 | Simulation reveals possible cause of Mercury's distinctive features ...> Full Article |
 | Scientists have observed unexpected luminous spots on Jupiter caused by its moon Io. ...> Full Article |
Study provides clues about the formation of Earth-like planets
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 | A new analysis of impact cratering data from Mars reveals that the planet has undergone a series of global volcanic upheavals. These violent episodes spewed lava and water onto the surface, sculpting the landscape that ESA's Mars Express looks down on today. ...> Full Article |
 | Venus Express has constantly been observing the south pole of Venus and has found it to be surprisingly fickle. An enormous structure with a central part that looks like the eye of a hurricane, morphs and changes shape within a matter of days, leaving scientists puzzled. ...> Full Article |
Radio waves accelerate electrons within Jupiter's magnetic field in the same way as they do on Earth, according to new research published in Nature Physics this week. The discovery overturns a theory that has held sway for more than a generation and has important implications for protecting Earth-orbiting satellites.
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 | New Studies May Vindicate 300-Year-Old Astronomical 'Mistake' ...> Full Article |
 | The campaign to broadcast the first ever advert into space is launched today (Friday March 7)- with University of Leicester space scientists playing a key part in the process. ...> Full Article |
 | Scientists studying images from The University of Arizona-led High Resolution Imaging Experiment camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have discovered never-before-seen impact "megabreccia" and a possibly once-habitable ancient lake on Mars at a place called Holden crater. ...> Full Article |
 | A rocky planet similar to Earth may be orbiting one of our nearest stellar neighbors and could be detected using existing techniques ...> Full Article |
 | UK scientists and international colleagues using NASA's Cassini spacecraft which is currently orbiting Saturn have found evidence of material orbiting Rhea, Saturn's second largest moon. This finding is the first time rings may have been found around a moon. ...> Full Article |
 | Using two ESA spacecraft, planetary scientists are watching the atmospheres of Mars and Venus being stripped away into space. The simultaneous observations by Mars Express and Venus Express give scientists the data they need to investigate the evolution of the two planets' atmospheres. ...> Full Article |
 | Scientists have solved a 40-year-old puzzle by identifying the origin of the intense radio waves in the Earth's upper atmosphere that control the dynamics of the Van Allen radiation belts -- belts consisting of high-energy electrons that can damage satellites and spacecraft and pose a risk to astronauts performing activities outside their spacecraft. ...> Full Article |
Modelling of the Earth's atmosphere has acquired economic importance due to its use in the prediction of ozone depletion and in measuring the impact of global warming. Now researchers have found that the rate at which electrons lose energy to carbon monoxide is greater than that to carbon dioxide at higher levels in the atmospheres of both Mars and Venus.
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 | Liquid water has not been found on the Martian surface within the last decade after all, according to new research. ...> Full Article |
An important discovery has been made with respect to the mystery of "handedness" in biomolecules. Researchers led by Sandra Pizzarello, a research professor at Arizona State University, found that some of the possible abiotic precursors to the origin of life on Earth have been shown to carry "handedness" in a larger number than previously thought.
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 | A trio of NASA and ESA spacecraft orbiting Mars are preparing for the 25 May arrival of NASA's Phoenix lander. ESA's Mars Express has already started adjusting its orbit to provide critical back-up monitoring of Phoenix. ...> Full Article |
An enormous plume of dust and water spurts violently into space from the south pole of Enceladus, Saturn's sixth-largest moon. This raging eruption has intrigued scientists ever since the Cassini spacecraft provided dramatic images of the phenomenon.
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 | A mega-collision between two large embryonic planets could have created Venus as we know it, according to a new paper by a Cardiff University scientist. ...> Full Article |
 | Researchers from the United States and the Netherlands report that several formations on Mars indicate incidents of rapid release of water from the planet's interior. Mars has many basins that contain formations that look like fans. A few of these fans, only about 10, have steps down into the basin. Since scientists first reported this feature three years ago, there has been no clear consensus on how they formed. ...> Full Article |
New calculations by astronomers predict that the Earth will be swallowed up by the Sun in about 7.6 billion years unless the Earth's orbit can be altered.
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 | Venus Express has revealed a planet of extraordinarily changeable and extremely large-scale weather. Bright hazes appear in a matter of days, reaching from the south pole to the low southern latitudes and disappearing just as quickly. Such 'global weather', unlike anything on Earth, has given scientists a new mystery to solve. ...> Full Article |
 | One of Saturn's rings does housecleaning, soaking up material gushing from the fountains on Saturn's tiny ice moon Enceladus, according to new observations from the Cassini spacecraft. ...> Full Article |
 | Despite the incredible diversity of Saturn's icy moons, theirs is a story of great interaction. Some are pock-marked, some seemingly dirty, others pristine, one spongy, one two-faced, some still spewing with activity and some seeming to be captured from the far reaches of the solar system. Yet many of them have a common thread - black 'stuff' coating their surfaces. ...> Full Article |
 | Astronomers have discovered that rocky, terrestrial planets might orbit many, if not most, of the nearby sun-like stars in the disk of our galaxy. These new results suggest that worlds with potential for life are more common that we thought. ...> Full Article |
 | Saturn's orange moon Titan has hundreds of times more liquid hydrocarbons than all the known oil and natural gas reserves on Earth, according to new Cassini data. The hydrocarbons rain from the sky, collecting in vast deposits that form lakes and dunes. ...> Full Article |
 | Orbital behaviors also drive climate changes, ice ages ...> Full Article |
 | Mars is about to come into 3D focus as never before, thanks to the data from the Mars Express High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC). A new high-resolution Digital Terrain Model data set that is about to be released onto the Internet, will allow researchers to obtain new information about the Red Planet in 3D. ...> Full Article |
 | The High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on board ESA's Mars Express has returned striking scenes of the Terby crater on Mars. The region is of great scientific interest as it holds information on the role of water in the history of the planet. ...> Full Article |
The planet Mercury's magnetic field appears to be strong enough to fend off the harsh solar wind from most of its surface, according to data gathered in part by a University of Michigan instrument onboard NASA's MESSENGER spacecraft.
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 | physicists discover powerful radio waves that may lead to spacecraft damage ...> Full Article |
 | Mars has an ethereal, tenuous atmosphere with less than one-percent the surface pressure of Earth, which challenges scientists to explain complex, wind-sculpted landforms seen with unprecedented detail in images from NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. ...> Full Article |
 | The storms may tell why gas giant planets are so windy ...> Full Article |
 | Scientists are monitoring the orbit of asteroid 2007 TU24. The asteroid, believed to be between 150 meters (500 feet) and 610 meters (2,000 feet) in size, is expected to fly past Earth on Jan. 29, with its closest distance being about 537,500 kilometers (334,000 miles) at 12:33 a.m. Pacific time (3:33 a.m. Eastern time). It should be observable that night by amateur astronomers with modest-sized telescopes. ...> Full Article |
 | Astonomers determine order of planets past, present, and possibly future. ...> Full Article |
 | One week ago, the MESSENGER spacecraft transmitted to Earth the first high-resolution image of Mercury by a spacecraft in over 30 years, since the three Mercury flybys of Mariner 10 in 1974 and 1975. MESSENGER's Wide Angle Camera (WAC), part of the Mercury Dual Imaging System (MDIS), is equipped with 11 narrow-band color filters, in contrast to the two visible-light filters and one ultraviolet filter that were on Mariner 10's vidicon camera. ...> Full Article |
 | The European Space Agency (ESA) signalled the start of a busy period for the planet Mercury, when it signed the contract for industrial development to start for the BepiColombo mission today (18th January 2008) at Astrium in Friedrichshafen, Germany. UK scientists and industry have key roles in BepiColombo, including construction of spacecraft subsystems and science instrument design. ...> Full Article |
 | When Mariner 10 flew past Mercury three times in 1974 and 1975, the same hemisphere was in sunlight during each encounter. As a consequence, Mariner 10 was able to image less than half the planet. Planetary scientists have wondered for more than 30 years about what spacecraft images might reveal about the hemisphere of Mercury that Mariner 10 never viewed. ...> Full Article |
 | Until now, Mars has generally been regarded as a desert world, where a visiting astronaut would be surprised to see clouds scudding across the orange sky. However, new results show that the arid planet possesses high-level clouds that are sufficiently dense to cast a shadow on the surface. ...> Full Article |
 | The Sloan Digital Sky Survey Continues - new program of four coordinated surveys will revolutionize the study of the distant universe ...> Full Article |
 | Hundreds of millions - or even billions - of years after planets would have initially formed around two unusual stars, a second wave of planetesimal and planet formation appears to be taking place, UCLA astronomers and colleagues believe. ...> Full Article |
 | A University of Florida-led sky survey that may double the number of known planets outside the solar system is part of a major new survey program announced today at the American Astronomical Society's annual meeting in Austin, Texas. ...> Full Article |
 | NASA will point a power-packed $8.7 million University of Colorado at Boulder space instrument at some of the last unexplored terrain in the inner solar system when the MESSENGER spacecraft whips within 125 miles of Mercury's surface Jan. 14 at a mind-boggling 141,000 miles per hour. ...> Full Article |
 | The infrared sky is expanding significantly for the world astronomical community with the first world release of data (DR1) from the UKIRT Infrared Deep Sky Survey (UKIDSS). ...> Full Article |
It turns out that our math teachers were right: being able to solve problems without a calculator does come in handy in the "real" world. Two theoretical physicists at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have used what they call "pen-and-paper math" to describe the motion of interstellar shock waves - violent events associated with the birth of stars and planets.
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 | Our planet is changing before our eyes, and as a result, many species are living on the edge. Yet Earth has been on the edge of habitability from the beginning. New work by astronomers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics shows that if Earth had been slightly smaller and less massive, it would not have plate tectonics - the forces that move continents and build mountains. And without plate tectonics, life might never have gained a foothold on our world. ...> Full Article |
 | A researcher who attended the UA as an undergraduate led the team. ...> Full Article |
 | Heat from a titanic whack explains the extra energy ...> Full Article |
New Mexico Tech's Magdalena Ridge Observatory (MRO) is already making its mark in the annals of astronomy research after being recently tasked by NASA to make detailed observations of an asteroid that is now given a 1 in 75 chance of hitting Mars on January 30, 2008.
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 | MESSENGER's mid-December trajectory correction maneuver (TCM-19) went so well that the mission's design and navigation teams have decided that a TCM scheduled for January 10 will not be needed. ...> Full Article |
 | Saturn's chilly north pole boasts a hot spot in the middle of its mysterious polar hexagon, according to new data from the Cassini spacecraft. The discovery could shed light on the atmospheric formations found on other planets such as Jupiter, Neptune and Mars. ...> Full Article |
Celestial collision on Jan. 30 would be a bonanza for Earthlings, scientists say
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 | An asteroid discovered by The University of Arizona's Catalina Sky Survey has a 4 percent chance of hitting Mars on Jan. 30, scientists say. ...> Full Article |
 | An international team of astronomers, led by Professor Svetlana Berdyugina of ETH Zurich's Institute of Astronomy, has for the first time ever been able to detect and monitor the visible light that is scattered in the atmosphere of an exoplanet. ...> Full Article |
 | Planetary scientists have puzzled for years over an apparent contradiction on Mars. Abundant evidence points to an early warm, wet climate on the red planet, but there's no sign of the widespread carbonate rocks, such as limestone, that should have formed in such a climate. ...> Full Article |
NASA has selected Case Western Reserve University geophysicist Steven A. Hauck II as one of 23 "participating scientists" to join a team collecting and analyzing data from the MESSENGER mission to Mercury. MESSENGER, an autonomous spacecraft, is expected to reach the innermost planet in January.
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 | By analyzing images from NASA's Cassini Radar instrument, a Brigham Young University professor helped discover and analyze mountains on Saturn's largest moon, additional evidence that it has some of the most earthlike processes of any celestial body in the solar system. ...> Full Article |
 | ESA, NASA and an international team are developing plans and seeking recommendations to launch the first Mars mission to bring soil samples back to Earth. The ability to study soil from Mars here on Earth will contribute significantly to answering questions about the possibility of life on the Red Planet. ...> Full Article |
 | The space-borne telescope, COROT (Convection, Rotation and planetary Transits), has just completed its first year in orbit. The observatory has brought in surprises after over 300 days of scientific observations. ...> Full Article |
 | Inch by power-conserving inch, drivers on Earth have moved the Mars rover Spirit to a spot where it has its best chance at surviving a third Martian winter -- and where it will celebrate its fourth anniversary (in Earth years) since bouncing down on Mars for a projected 90-day mission in January 2004. ...> Full Article |
 | Team analyzes how alien astronomers would study Earth ...> Full Article |
 | Hypothesis may aid understanding of early Earth ...> Full Article |
 | Researchers have dated the earliest step in the formation of the solar system -- when microscopic interstellar dust coalesced into mountain-sized chunks of rock -- to 4,568 million years ago, within a range of about 2,080,000 years. ...> Full Article |
 | Jupiter's moon Europa is just as far away as ever, but new research is bringing scientists closer to being able to explore its tantalizing ice-covered ocean and determine its potential for harboring life. ...> Full Article |
 | Somewhere deep below Saturn's cloud tops, the planet rotates at a constant speed. Determining this interior period of rotation has proven extremely complicated. Now, with new Cassini results, a team of European scientists have taken an important step forward. ...> Full Article |
 | New observations by NASA's Cassini spacecraft indicate the rings of Saturn, once thought to have formed during the age of the dinosaurs, instead may have been created roughly 4.5 billion years ago when the solar system was still under construction. ...> Full Article |
 | A team of astronomers have used the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope to detect, for the first time, strong evidence of hazes in the atmosphere of a planet orbiting a distant star. The discovery comes after extensive observations made recently with Hubble's Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS). ...> Full Article |
 | Five satellites launched last February to probe magnetic storms around the Earth will move into prime observing position next month, but they already have produced important new information on the interactions between the solar wind and the Earth's magnetic field. ...> Full Article |
 | It has been 35 years since humans last walked on the moon, but there has been much recent discussion about returning, either for exploration or to stage a mission to Mars. However, there are concerns about potential radiation danger for astronauts during long missions on the lunar surface. ...> Full Article |
 | Scrutiny by NASA's newest Mars orbiter is helping scientists learn the stories of some of the weirdest landscapes on Mars, as well as more familiar-looking parts of the Red Planet. ...> Full Article |
 | Enceladus, the tiny satellite of Saturn, is colder than ice, but data gathered by the Cassini-Huygens Mission to Saturn and Titan has detected a hot spot that could mean there is life in the old moon after all. In fact, for researchers of the outer planets, Enceladus is so intellectually hot, it's smokin'. ...> Full Article |
 | Scientists have gathered more evidence that suggests flowing water on Mars -- by comparing images of the red planet to an otherworldly landscape on Earth. ...> Full Article |
 | Planetary scientists at UCL have identified the point at which a star causes the atmosphere of an orbiting gas giant to become critically unstable, as reported in this week's Nature (December 6). Depending upon their proximity to a host star, giant Jupiter-like planets have atmospheres which are either stable and thin, or unstable and rapidly expanding. This new research enables us to work out whether planets in other systems are stable or unstable by using a three dimensional model to characterise their upper atmospheres. ...> Full Article |
 | Astronomers at the University of Illinois have found the first clear evidence for a cradle in space where planets and moons form. The cradle, revealed in photographs taken with NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope, consists of a flattened envelope of gas and dust surrounding a young protostar. ...> Full Article |
The annual Geminid meteor shower will peak on the night of Dec. 13-14. The Geminids usually offer the best show of the year, outperforming even the better-known Perseid meteor shower of August. But watching the Perseids is a pleasant way to spend a warm summer evening, while waiting outdoors on a winter night for Geminids is a bit like sitting in a refrigerator and trying to think about global warming. It can be hard to concentrate.
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 | Scientists analysing data gathered by the Cassini spacecraft have confirmed the presence of heavy negative ions in the upper regions of Titan's atmosphere. These particles may act as organic building blocks for even more complicated molecules and their discovery was completely unexpected because of the chemical composition of the atmosphere (which lacks oxygen and mainly consists of nitrogen and methane). The observation has now been verified on 16 different encounters and findings will be published in Geophysical Research Letters on November 28. ...> Full Article |
 | ESA's Venus Express has revealed Venus as never before. For the first time, scientists are able to investigate from the top of its atmosphere, down nearly to the surface. They have shown it to be a planet of surprises that may once have been more Earth-like, and still is, to a certain extent. ...> Full Article |
New research led by a University of St Andrews astronomer has found evidence for what might be the raw material for the beginning of shrunken versions of our solar system - miniature worlds in the making.
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Mars was covered in an ocean of molten rock for about 100 million years after the planet formed, researchers from the Lunar and Planetary Institute in Houston, Texas, UC Davis, and NASA's Johnson Space Center have found. The work is published in the journal Nature on Nov. 22.
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 | Rocky terrestrial planets, perhaps like Earth, Mars or Venus, appear to be forming or to have recently formed around a star in the Pleiades ("seven sisters") star cluster, the result of "monster collisions" of planets or planetary embryos. ...> Full Article |
 | A NASA satellite designed, built and controlled by the University of Colorado at Boulder is expected to help scientists resolve wide-ranging predictions about the coming solar cycle peak in 2012 and its influence on Earth's warming climate, according to the chief scientist on the project. ...> Full Article |
A new astronomical study adds an unexpected twist to the complications: stars well-endowed with gold and other heavy elements have fewer stellar companions. Researchers believe their discovery could help track down Earth-like planets outside of our solar system.
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 | A team of American astronomers announced the discovery of a record-breaking fifth planet around the nearby star 55 Cancri, making it the only star aside from the sun known to have five planets. ...> Full Article |
 | Watching the stars set from the surface of the Earth may be a romantic pastime but when a spacecraft does it from orbit, it can reveal hidden details about a planet's atmosphere. ...> Full Article |
 | The radar system on ESA's Mars Express has uncovered new details about some of the most mysterious deposits on Mars: The Medusae Fossae Formation. It has given the first direct measurement of the depth and electrical properties of these materials, providing new clues about their origin. ...> Full Article |
 | A researcher is part of the leading team of planet-hunting astronomers that have announced the discovery of three new planets today ...> Full Article |
Astronomers have created models for 14 different types of solid planets that might exist in our galaxy.
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 | All five of the planets visible with the unaided eye will be on display during November nights, but the special attraction will be Mars. The red planet is approaching Earth in its orbit, and it won't appear as large again for another nine years. ...> Full Article |
Mars, like Earth, is a climate-fickle water planet. The main difference, of course, is that water on the frigid Red Planet is rarely liquid, preferring to spend almost all of its time traveling the world as a gas or churning up the surface as ice. That's the global picture literally and figuratively coming into much sharper focus as various Mars-orbiting cameras send back tomes of unprecedented super high-resolution imagery of ever vaster tracts of the planet's surface.
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 | A narrow belt harboring moonlets as large as football stadiums discovered in Saturn's outermost ring probably resulted when a larger moon was shattered by a wayward asteroid or comet eons ago. ...> Full Article |
 | Scientists scouting potential landing sites for NASA's next Mars rover mission are using new data from a powerful mineral-mapping camera to narrow the site selection. ...> Full Article |
 | A spectacular new image shows how complex a star's afterlife can be. ...> Full Article |
Physicists have detected the first "on-the-spot" evidence of significant amounts of water still existing on Mars.
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 | Noted for its bizarre hydrocarbon lakes and frozen methane clouds, Saturn's largest moon, Titan, also appears to have widespread drizzles of methane, according to a team of astronomers at the University of California, Berkeley. ...> Full Article |
 | The best views of the hydrocarbon lakes and seas on Saturn's moon Titan taken by the Cassini spacecraft are being released today. ...> Full Article |
 | New isotope molecule may add to Venus' greenhouse effect ...> Full Article |
 | The voyage of NASA's Pluto-bound New Horizons spacecraft through the Jupiter system earlier this year provided a bird's-eye view of a dynamic planet that has changed since the last close-up looks by NASA spacecraft. ...> Full Article |
 | Scientists are on the trail of Iapetus' mysterious dark side, which seems to be home to a bizarre 'runaway' process that is transporting vaporised water ice from the dark areas to the white areas of the Saturnian moon. ...> Full Article |
 | Astronomers are pointing to three nearby stars they say may hold "embryonic planets"—a missing link in planet-formation theories. ...> Full Article |
 | Venus, Saturn and Regulus will dance a pas de trois low in the eastern sky an hour before sunrise during October, with the crescent moon joining them on Oct 7. ...> Full Article |
 | Planetary scientists have found that the southern pole of Mars contains the largest deposit of frozen water in the inner solar system, outside of Earth. ...> Full Article |
 | Key components of a new approach to discover life on planet Mars were successfully launched into space today as part of a twelve-day low Earth orbit experiment to assess their survivability when exposed to the space radiation environment - a prelude to future journeys to Mars. ...> Full Article |
 | Summer season on Neptune creates escape route for methane ...> Full Article |
 | Cassini scientists are poring through hundreds of images returned from the 10 September fly-by of Saturn's two-toned moon Iapetus. ...> Full Article |
 | These images taken by the High Resolution Stereo Camera (HRSC) on board Mars Express show the mouth of the Tiu Valles channel system on the red planet. ...> Full Article |
 | Cassini completed its closest flyby of the odd moon Iapetus on Sept. 10, 2007. The spacecraft flew about 1,640 kilometers (1,000 miles) from Iapetus' surface and is returning amazing views of the bizarre moon. ...> Full Article |
 | A large team of astronomers, including scientists from the University of Delaware and Mt. Cuba Observatory, has announced that at least one planet in the universe has survived the violent events that accompany the late stages of a star's life cycle. ...> Full Article |
 | Astronomers have observed neon in disks of dust and gas swirling around sunlike stars for the first time. ...> Full Article |
 | Two crucial tools for a successful landing of America's latest mission to Mars, the radar and UHF radio on NASA's Phoenix Mars Lander, have passed in-flight checkouts. ...> Full Article |
 | Scientists hope to learn more about climate changes here on Earth by studying Venus. A prototype balloon could eventually study the planet's surface and examine its atmosphere and the bizarre winds and chemistry within it. A team of JPL, ILC Dover and NASA Wallops Flight Facility engineers designed, fabricated and tested the balloon. ...> Full Article |
 | Venus Express has now orbited Earth's twin for 500 Earth days, completing as many orbits. While the satellite maintains steady and excellent performance, the planet continues to surprise and amaze us. ...> Full Article |
 | The High Resolution Imaging Experiment (HiRISE) has confirmed that a dark pit seen on Mars in an earlier HiRISE image really is a vertical shaft that cuts through lava flow on the flank of the Arsia Mons volcano. Such pits form on similar volcanoes in Hawaii and are called "pit craters." ...> Full Article |
 | On 12th March 2008, Cassini will swing by Saturn's moon Enceladus at an altitude of less than 100 kilometres at the point of closest approach. This will give scientists and unprecedented opportunity to study the plumes of water vapour emanating from the "tiger stripe" fissures near the moon's south pole, but it has also given the Cassini team pause for thought as to whether ice grains lofted by the jets could damage the spacecraft. ...> Full Article |
 | Ever spilled your drink on an airline due to turbulence? Researchers on both sides of the Atlantic are finding new ways to understand the phenomenon - both on Earth and on Titan. ...> Full Article |
 | The question of whether Titan can retain its thick, organic atmosphere for the rest of its lifetime could hinge on how efficiently methane molecules were packed inside water "crates" during a period of the moon's formation. ...> Full Article |
 | Diagnostic tests and months of stable, successful operation have resolved concerns raised early this year about long-term prospects for the powerful telescopic camera on NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. ...> Full Article |
 | The traditional belief that Jupiter acts as a celestial shield, deflecting asteroids and comets away from the inner Solar System, has been challenged by the first in a series of studies evaluating the impact risk to the Earth posed by different groups of object. ...> Full Article |
 | Images taken by Cassini's Magnetospheric Imaging Instrument (MIMI) show that Saturn's ring current is a warped disc that balloons out of the equatorial plane on the planet's dayside and remains a thin disk that rises above the plane at larger distances on the nightside. Dr Stamatios "Tom" Krimigis, the Principal Investigator for the instrument, who is presenting images at the European Planetary Science Congress in Potsdam on Thursday 23rd August, said, "Ring currents surround planets sort of like the brim of a hat. ...> Full Article |
 | As the rings of Uranus swing edge-on to Earth - a short-lived view we get only once every 42 years - astronomers observing the event are getting an unprecedented, glare-free view of the rings and the fine dust that permeates them. ...> Full Article |
 | The chemical fingerprint of a burned-out star indicates that Earth-like planets may not be rare in the universe and could give clues to what our solar system will look like when our sun dies and becomes a white dwarf star some five billion years from now. ...> Full Article |
 | Earth's surface is a very active place; its plates are forever jiggling around, rearranging themselves into new configurations. Continents collide and mountains arise, oceans slide beneath continents and volcanoes spew. As far as we know Earth's restless surface is unique to the planets in our solar system. So what is it that keeps Earth's plates oiled and on the move? ...> Full Article |
 | On the night of 21 July, ESO astronomer Yuri Beletsky took images of the night sky above Paranal, the 2600m high mountain in the Chilean Atacama Desert home to ESO's Very Large Telescope. The amazing images bear witness to the unique quality of the sky, revealing not only the Milky Way in all its splendour but also the planet Jupiter and the laser beam used at Yepun, one of the 8.2-m telescopes that make up this extraordinary facility. ...> Full Article |
 | An international team of astronomers with the Trans-atlantic Exoplanet Survey announce today the discovery of |
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