Planetary Science News

This is an artist’s rendering of the space collision 466 million years ago that gave rise to many of the meteorites falling today. Image credit: Don Davis, Southwest Research Institute.

Study: Today’s Rare Meteorites Were Common in Ordovician Period

Jan 25, 2017 by News Staff

A new study published in the journal Nature Astronomy is the first to look at meteorites from before giant space collision 466 million years ago. This...

Mosaic of the Valles Marineris hemisphere of Mars projected into point perspective, a view similar to that which one would see from a spacecraft. The distance is 1,550 miles (2,500 km) from the surface of the planet. The mosaic is composed of 102 Viking Orbiter images of Mars. The center of the scene shows the entire Valles Marineris canyon system, over 1,240 miles (2,000 km) long and up to 5 miles (8 km) deep, extending form Noctis Labyrinthus, the arcuate system of graben to the west, to the chaotic terrain to the east. Many huge ancient river channels begin from the chaotic terrain from north-central canyons and run north. The three Tharsis volcanoes (dark red spots), each about 15.5 miles (25 km) high, are visible to the west. South of Valles Marineris is very ancient terrain covered by many impact craters. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

Methane Gas May Have Caused Greenhouse Effect on Young Mars, Planetary Researchers Say

Jan 25, 2017 by News Staff

Methane present in the early Martian atmosphere, together with carbon dioxide and hydrogen may have created a greenhouse effect on the planet 3.5-4.5 billion...

Cross section of Ceres showing the surface layers that are the subject of this study plus a watery mantle and a rocky-metallic core. The column of material at and just below Ceres’ surface (box) – the top layer contains anhydrous (dry) pyroxene dust accumulated from space mixed in with native hydrous (wet) dust, carbonates, and water ice. Image credit: Pierre Vernazza, LAM-CNRS / AMU.

NASA’s SOFIA Observatory Collects New Data on Composition of Dwarf Planet Ceres

Jan 23, 2017 by News Staff

New observations from NASA’s Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) show that Ceres does not appear to have the carbon-rich surface...

This view of a Martian rock slab called ‘Old Soaker,’ which has a network of cracks that may have originated in drying mud, comes from the Mast Camera on NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover. The location is within an exposure of Murray formation mudstone on lower Mount Sharp inside Gale Crater. Mud cracks would be evidence of a time more than 3 billion years ago when dry intervals interrupted wetter periods that supported lakes in the area. Several images from Mast Camera’s left-eye camera are combined into this mosaic view. They were taken on Dec. 20, 2016, during the 1,555th sol of Curiosity’s work on Mars. The Old Soaker slab is about 4 feet (1.2 m) long. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / MSSS.

Curiosity Finds Possible Signs of Ancient Drying on Mars

Jan 18, 2017 by News Staff

A grid of small polygons spotted by NASA’s Curiosity Mars rover may have originated as cracks in drying mud more than 3 billion years ago, according...

A vast alluvial fan in the XinJiang province of China. The right side is the active part of the fan, and appears blue from water currently flowing in the many small streams. The image was acquired on May 2, 2002. Image credit: NASA / GSFC / METI / ERSDAC / JAROS / US-Japan ASTER Science Team.

Have We Seen Evidence of Titan’s Catastrophic Methane Downpours?

Jan 9, 2017 by James Romero

Attempts to investigate the origin of giant wedge-shaped sedimentary structures on Saturn’s moon Titan using analogues in Death Valley, California has...

In this extended color image of Pluto taken by NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft, rounded and bizarrely textured mountains, named the Tartarus Dorsa, rise up along Pluto’s day-night terminator and show intricate but puzzling patterns of blue-gray ridges and reddish material in between. This view, roughly 330 miles (530 km) across, combines blue, red and infrared images taken by New Horizons’ Ralph/Multispectral Visual Imaging Camera on July 14, 2015. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

New Horizons Spots Penitentes in Pluto’s Tartarus Dorsa Region

Jan 6, 2017 by Enrico de Lazaro

Planetary researchers using data from NASA’s New Horizons mission have found evidence of snow and ice features on the dwarf planet Pluto that, until...

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

Dawn Finds New Evidence for Water Ice on Ceres

Dec 28, 2016 by News Staff

Images from NASA’s Dawn probe have revealed a dark, cratered world whose brightest area is made of reflective salts — not water ice. But several...

This artist’s impression shows how Mars may have looked about 4 billion years ago. Image credit: M. Kornmesser / ESO.

More Evidence for Warm, Wet Early Mars

Dec 27, 2016 by News Staff

A study published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets provides new evidence for a warm early Mars that hosted water across a geologically long...

With a diameter of 57 miles (92 km), Occator crater is larger than Tycho crater on the Moon. Its steep walls stand tall at over 1.4 miles (2 km), higher than the North face of the Eiger in the Bernese Alps. The origin and nature of the bright spots in its interior is still not clear. Image credit: DLR.

Fly over Ceres’ Colossal Crater and Bright Spots in Incredible Video

Dec 24, 2016 by Enrico de Lazaro

Researchers from the Institute of Planetary Research at the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt, or DLR) have produced...

Hubble’s view of Jupiter. Image credit: NASA.

Teasing Out the Secrets beneath Jupiter’s Cloud Tops

Dec 17, 2016 by James Romero

As NASA’s Juno probe makes its closest flyby of the gas giant, new research from France’s space agency could help make more sense of the data it sends...

This low-angle self-portrait of NASA’s Curiosity rover shows the vehicle at the site from which it reached down to drill into a rock target called ‘Buckskin’ on lower Mount Sharp. The selfie combines several component images taken by Curiosity’s Mars Hand Lens Imager (MAHLI) on Aug. 5, 2015, during 1065 Sol (Martian day) of the rover’s work on Mars. For scale, the rover’s wheels are 20 inches (50 cm) in diameter and about 16 inches (40 cm) wide. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / MSSS.

NASA’s Curiosity Rover Finds Boron on Martian Surface

Dec 14, 2016 by Enrico de Lazaro

Boron, a metalloid chemical element with properties intermediate between those of carbon and aluminum, has been identified for the first time on the Martian...

A giant of a moon appears before a giant of a planet undergoing seasonal changes in this natural color view of Titan and Saturn from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / SSI.

Saturn’s Moons May Be Younger than Previously Thought

Dec 7, 2016 by News Staff

New data from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft reveal that Saturn’s moons may be younger than previously thought. A giant of a moon appears before a giant...

This image is an artist’s concept of a view looking down on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter. The spacecraft is pictured using its SHARAD instrument to ‘look’ under the surface of Mars. Image credit: NASA.

NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Finds Subsurface Water Ice in Utopia Planitia

Nov 23, 2016 by News Staff

Frozen beneath Utopia Planitia, a large plain on Mars, lies about as much water as what’s in Lake Superior, according to an international team of planetary...

Artist’s concept of ocean on Jupiter’s moon Europa. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

Ice-Quake Echoes Could Lift Lid on Oceans within Pluto and Europa

Nov 22, 2016 by James Romero

Measuring outer solar system ice-quakes could identify if Europa’s subsurface ocean is an oxygen-rich, leading candidates for life, or uncover the origin...

Using colorized topography, Mercury’s ‘great valley’ (dark blue) and Rembrandt impact basin (purple, upper right) are revealed in this high-resolution digital elevation model merged with an image mosaic obtained by NASA’s MESSENGER spacecraft. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Carnegie Institution of Washington / DLR / Smithsonian Institution.

Planetary Researchers Spot ‘Great Valley’ on Mercury

Nov 17, 2016 by News Staff

Using images from NASA’s MErcury Surface, Space ENvironment, GEochemistry and Ranging (MESSENGER) spacecraft, planetary researchers have discovered a...

This cutaway image of Pluto shows a section through the area of Sputnik Planitia, with dark blue representing a subsurface ocean and light blue for the frozen crust. Image credit: Pam Engebretson.

New Horizons Data Suggest Viscous Ocean Lies beneath Pluto’s Heart-Shaped Region

Nov 17, 2016 by News Staff

A cold, slushy ocean lying deep beneath Pluto’s bright, heart-shaped Tombaugh Regio is the best explanation for features revealed by NASA’s New Horizons...

The Hellas depression. Image credit: Joseph S. Levy et al.

Concentrically-Fractured Depression on Mars Could Be Place to Look for Signs of Microbial Life

Nov 14, 2016 by News Staff

An unusual depression in the northern Hellas basin on Mars could be a new place to look for life on the planet, says a team of planetary researchers. The...

This image is a view from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope taken on March 22, 2004. Camera exposures in four filters (blue, blue-green, green and red) were combined to form the Hubble image and render colors similar to what the eye would see through a telescope focused on Saturn. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Erich Karkoschka, University of Arizona.

Saturn’s Rings Could Have Formed when Dinosaurs Walked the Earth

Nov 2, 2016 by James Romero

Saturn’s rings are billions of years younger than we thought, say Cornell University researchers analyzing an almost forgotten set of data, collected...

This is an artist's depiction of a catastrophic collision between two celestial bodies; such an impact between the proto-Earth and Theia likely formed the Moon. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

Novel Theory Explains Moon’s Weird Orbit

Nov 1, 2016 by News Staff

Earth’s Moon is among the strangest planetary bodies in our Solar System. Its orbit lies unusually far away from our planet, with a surprisingly large...