Space Exploration News

This full-disc image of Jupiter was taken on 21 April 2014 with Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3. Image credit: NASA / ESA / A. Simon, Goddard Space Flight Center.

NASA’s Juno Orbiter Explores Depths of Jupiter’s Great Red Spot

Dec 12, 2017 by News Staff

Data collected by Juno during its first pass over Jupiter’s mysterious, roiling storm called the Great Red Spot in July 2017 indicate that this famous...

Mars may have been enveloped in a steamy atmosphere as the planet’s crust cooled and solidified. That ‘steam bath’ could have created many of the clay mineral deposits that have long been attributed to water flow on or just beneath the Martian surface. Image credit: Kevin Cannon.

Research Suggests Martian Clays Formed in Ancient ‘Steam Bath’

Dec 7, 2017 by News Staff

On Mars, phyllosilicate (clay) minerals are widespread in terrains that date back to the Noachian period, 4.1 to 3.7 billion years ago. Phyllosilicates...

Marchi et al modeled the protracted period of bombardment after the Moon formed, determining that impactor metals may have descended into Earth’s core. This artistic rendering illustrates a large impactor crashing into the young Earth. Light brown and gray particles indicate the projectile’s mantle (silicate) and core (metal) material, respectively. Image credit: Southwest Research Institute.

Large Planetesimals Delivered More Mass to Proto-Earth than Previously Thought

Dec 5, 2017 by News Staff

After the Moon’s formation, Earth experienced a protracted bombardment by large (over 1,500 km in diameter) planetesimals. Dr. Simone Marchi, a researcher...

The surface of Europa looms large in this newly-reprocessed color view; image scale is 1.6 km per pixel; north on Europa is at right. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SETI Institute.

Research Provides New Evidence of Plate Tectonics in Europa’s Ice Shell

Dec 5, 2017 by News Staff

A process called subduction — when a tectonic plate slides underneath another and sinks deep into a planetary body’s interior — is physically...

Voyager 1 launched from Florida’s NASA Kennedy Space Center on September 5, 1977, 16 days after its twin, Voyager 2. This artist concept depicts one of NASA’s twin Voyager spacecraft. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

NASA’s Voyager 1 Spacecraft Switches to Backup Thruster Set

Dec 4, 2017 by News Staff

NASA’s Voyager 1 spacecraft is the only human-made object in interstellar space. The spacecraft, which has been flying for 40 years, relies on small...

Titan’s south polar vortex stands out against the orange and blue haze layers that are characteristic of the hazy moon’s atmosphere. This view looks towards the trailing hemisphere of Titan (3,200 miles, or 5,150 km across). North on Titan is up and rotated 17 degrees to the left. Images taken using red, green and blue spectral filters were combined to create this natural-color view. The image was taken with the Cassini spacecraft narrow-angle camera on July 30, 2013. The view was acquired at a distance of approximately 895,000 miles (1.441 million km) from Titan. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / Space Science Institute.

New Study Explains Unexpected Cooling of Titan’s Polar Atmosphere

Nov 24, 2017 by News Staff

A study published in the journal Nature Communications has shown that a recently reported unexpected polar vortex behavior on Saturn’s hazy moon Titan...

This image from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft shows Saturn and its rings. Six of Saturn’s moons make a faint appearance in this image: the ice-covered moon Enceladus can be seen at the 1 o’clock position; directly below Enceladus, just outside the F ring (the thin, farthest ring from the planet seen in this image) lies the small moon Epimetheus; following the F ring clock-wise from Epimetheus, the next moon seen is Janus; at about the 4:30 position and outward from the F ring is Mimas; inward of Mimas and still at about the 4:30 position is the F-ring-disrupting moon, Pandora; moving around to the 10 o’clock position, just inside of the F ring, is the moon Prometheus. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / Space Science Institute.

NASA’s Cassini Team Releases Stunning Natural-Color Image of Saturn

Nov 23, 2017 by News Staff

After more than 13 years at Saturn, NASA’s Cassini spacecraft bid farewell to the Saturnian system by firing the shutters of its wide-angle camera and...

According to Zhang et al, Pluto’s atmosphere is unique among Solar System planetary atmospheres, as its equilibrium temperature is controlled primarily by solid-phase haze particles instead of gas molecules. This artist’s impression shows a view of the moon Charon through Pluto’s atmospheric haze layers above the mountain landscape of bedrock water ice covered partially with deposition of dark, reddish haze particles. Image credit: X. Liu.

Haze Particles Cool Pluto’s Atmosphere, New Research Finds

Nov 21, 2017 by News Staff

It turns out solid-phase haze particles help cool the atmosphere of the dwarf planet Pluto. That’s according to new research by planetary scientists...

$This false-color image demonstrates how use of special filters available on Curiosity’s Mastcam camera can reveal the presence of certain minerals in target rocks. It is a composite of images taken through three ‘science’ filters chosen for making hematite stand out as exaggerated purple. Mastcam’s narrow-band filters used for this view help to increase spectral contrast, making blues bluer and reds redder, particularly with the processing used to boost contrast in each of the component images of this composite. Fine-grained hematite preferentially absorbs sunlight around in the green portion of the spectrum around 527 nm. That gives it the purple look from a combination of red and blue light reflected by the hematite and reaching the camera through the other two filters. Bright lines within the rocks are fractures filled with calcium sulfate minerals. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / MSSS.$

NASA’s Curiosity Rover Finds Mineral Hematite on Mars

Nov 12, 2017 by News Staff

NASA’s Curiosity rover has found spectral evidence of an iron-oxide mineral called hematite (Fe2O3) on a rock near Mount Sharp in Gale Crater, Mars. This...

Juno Beams Back Stunning New Photos of Jupiter

Nov 10, 2017 by Enrico de Lazaro

NASA’s Juno orbiter captured a series of beautiful images during its ninth flyby of Jupiter on October 24, 2017. This image of Jupiter’s southern hemisphere...

This graphic illustrates how water might be heated inside Enceladus. Over time, cool ocean water seeps into the moon’s porous core. Pockets of water reaching deep into the interior are warmed by contact with rock in the tidally heated interior and subsequently rise owing to the positive buoyancy, leading to further interaction with the rocks. The heat deposited at the boundary between the seafloor and ocean powers hydrothermal vents. Heat and rocky particles are transported through the ocean, triggering localized melting in the icy shell above. This leads to the formation of fissures, from which jets of water vapor and the rocky particles from the seafloor are ejected into space. In the graphic, the interior ‘slice’ is an excerpt from a new model that simulated this process. The orange glow represents the parts of the core where temperatures reach at least 194 degrees Fahrenheit. Tidal heating owing to the friction arising between particles in the porous core provides a key source of energy, but is not illustrated in this graphic. The tidal heating results primarily from the gravitational pull from Saturn. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / Space Science Institute / LPG-CNRS / University of Nantes / University of Angers / ESA.

Enceladus’ Highly Porous Core Keeps Its Subsurface Ocean Warm, New Study Says

Nov 8, 2017 by News Staff

A new modeling study led by the University of Nantes is the first to explain several key characteristics of Saturn’s moon Enceladus observed by NASA’s...

This illustration depicts Juno soaring over the south pole of Jupiter. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

NASA’s Juno Orbiter Completes Ninth Jupiter Flyby

Nov 6, 2017 by News Staff

NASA’s Juno spacecraft successfully made its ninth (eighth science) flyby over Jupiter’s mysterious cloud tops on October 24, 2017. This illustration...

This artist’s concept depicts NASA’s Mars 2020 rover on the surface of the Red Planet. The mission takes the next step by not only seeking signs of habitable conditions on Mars in the ancient past, but also searching for signs of past microbial life itself. The rover introduces a drill that can collect core samples of the most promising rocks and soils and set them aside on the surface of Mars. A future mission could potentially return these samples to Earth. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

NASA’s Mars 2020 Rover Will Have 23 Cameras

Nov 2, 2017 by News Staff

According to NASA, the agency’s next Mars rover will have more cameras than any rover before it: a grand total of 23, to create sweeping panoramas, reveal...

Artist’s impression of a comet. Image credit: DLR / CC-BY 3.0.

Cometary Ice and Organics are Mostly Older than Our Solar System, Rosetta Scientists Say

Oct 31, 2017 by News Staff

Analysis of data from ESA’s Rosetta mission continues to yield insights into the nature of cometary ice and organics. Artist’s impression of a comet....

This false-color image shows the dwarf planet Ceres. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / UCLA / MPS / DLR / IDA.

Ceres Once Had Global Ocean, Studies Suggest

Oct 30, 2017 by News Staff

Ceres’ crust, with its mixture of ice, salts and hydrated materials, represents most of the dwarf planet’s ancient ocean, according to two new studies...

Itokawa’s curious, varied terrain and lack of impact craters indicate it is a rubble pile asteroid. Image credit: Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.

Asteroid Itokawa Had Violent Past, Planetary Researchers Say

Oct 26, 2017 by Enrico de Lazaro

New research has shed light on the collisional history of one of the most famous asteroids. Itokawa’s curious, varied terrain and lack of impact craters...

This artist’s painting of the south polar region of Enceladus shows massive jets of water ice being blasted into space. Image credit: Karl Kofoed / NASA.

Saturn Moons Stained by Enceladus’ ‘Ingredients for Life’

Oct 25, 2017 by James Romero

Weathered organic material once dissolved in Enceladus’ subsurface ocean is coating Saturn’s inner moons, explaining surprising variations in their...

Amalthea casts a shadow on Jupiter in this image captured by NASA’s Juno spacecraft; the elongated shape of the shadow is a result of both the location of Amalthea with relation to Jupiter in this image as well as the irregular shape of the small moon itself. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SwRI / MSSS / Gerald Eichstaedt.

Amalthea Casts Shadow on Jupiter

Oct 23, 2017 by Enrico de Lazaro

On September 1, 2017, NASA’s Juno spacecraft witnessed a remarkable cosmic event — a small Jovian moon called Amalthea blocked the sunlight and...

Dawn data show a region around Ceres’ Ernutet crater where organic concentrations have been discovered; the color coding shows the surface concentration of organics, as inferred from the visible and near infrared spectrometer; the inset shows a higher resolution enhanced color image of the crater acquired by Dawn’s framing camera; regions in red indicate higher concentration of organics. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / UCLA / ASI / INAF / MPS / DLR / IDA.

New Research Reveals Origin of Ceres’ Organic Matter

Oct 23, 2017 by News Staff

Organic-rich materials found on Ceres by NASA’s Dawn orbiter are native to the dwarf planet, according to new research led by Southwest Research Institute...

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