Planetary Science News

This thrust fault is one of thousands discovered on the Moon by NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter. These faults resemble small stair-shaped cliffs, or scarps, when seen from the lunar surface. The scarps form when one section of the Moon’s crust (left-pointing arrows) is pushed up over an adjacent section (right-pointing arrows) as the Moon’s interior cools and shrinks. Image credit: NASA / GSFC / Arizona State University / Smithsonian Institution.

Moon is Still Tectonically Active, Researchers Say

May 14, 2019 by News Staff

In 2010, an analysis of images from NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) found that the Moon shriveled like a raisin as its interior cooled, leaving...

Merging neutron stars. Image credit: Mark Garlick, University of Warwick.

Violent Collision of Two Neutron Stars Occurred near Pre-Solar Nebula 4.6 Billion Years Ago

May 5, 2019 by News Staff

According to new research, a nearby binary neutron-star merger gave birth to 0.3% of the Earth’s heaviest elements, including gold, platinum and uranium;...

The S-type asteroid Itokawa. Image credit: JAXA.

Scientists Find Water-Bearing Minerals in Samples from Asteroid Itokawa

May 3, 2019 by News Staff

A duo of researchers from the School of Earth and Space Exploration at Arizona State University has made the first-ever measurements of ancient water contained...

A false-color view of Titan, a moon of Saturn surrounded by a thick orange haze. Image credit: NASA / JPL / University of Arizona / University of Idaho.

Planetary Scientists Spot Icy Corridor on Titan

May 1, 2019 by News Staff

A team of planetary researchers from the United States, Canada and Italy has detected an ice-rich linear feature of bedrock in the tropical region of Saturn’s...

This high-resolution image of Pluto was taken by New Horizons on July 14. Pluto’s surface sports a remarkable range of subtle colors, enhanced in this view to a rainbow of pale blues, yellows, oranges, and deep reds. Many landforms have their own distinct colors, telling a complex geological and climatological story that scientists have only just begun to decode. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Southwest Research Institute.

Pluto’s Atmosphere Predicted to Collapse by 2030

Apr 25, 2019 by News Staff

The tenuous nitrogen atmosphere of the dwarf planet Pluto is predicted to ultimately collapse and freeze over. This high-resolution image of Pluto was...

An artist’s impression of the InSight lander on Mars. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

NASA’s InSight Lander Detects Its First Marsquake

Apr 24, 2019 by News Staff

The SEIS (Seismic Experiment for Interior Structure) instrument on NASA’s InSight lander detected the faint seismic signal on April 6, 2019, the lander’s...

Mercury. Image credit: NASA / Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory / Carnegie Institution of Washington.

Mercury Has Solid Inner Core, Planetary Scientists Say

Apr 18, 2019 by News Staff

Planetary researchers have long known that Earth and Mercury have metallic cores. Mercury’s core fills nearly 85% of the volume of the planet —...

Water is released from the Moon during meteor showers, when micrometeoroid impacts breach the dry lunar surface and eject water molecules from a hydrated layer below. Image credit: NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center / Conceptual Image Lab.

LADEE Detects Water Molecules from Meteoroid Strikes on Moon

Apr 17, 2019 by News Staff

Using data from NASA’s Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE), a team of researchers has discovered that water is being released from...

An illustration showing how a sliver of cometary building block material was swallowed by an asteroid and preserved inside a meteorite. Image credit: Larry Nittler / NASA.

Scientists Find Cometary Fragment in Primitive Asteroidal Meteorite

Apr 16, 2019 by News Staff

A cometary building block has been discovered inside the LaPaz Icefield (LAP) 02342, a carbonaceous chondrite meteorite found in Antarctica in the 2000s. An...

An artist’s rendering of the surface of Saturn’s largest moon, Titan. Image credit: Benjamin de Bivort, debivort.org / CC BY-SA 3.0.

Titan’s Lakes are Surprisingly Deep, Have Methane-Dominated Composition, Says Cassini Team

Apr 16, 2019 by News Staff

Radar data from NASA’s Cassini spacecraft have revealed that small lakes in the northern hemisphere of Saturn’s hazy moon Titan are surprisingly deep...

As a metallic asteroid such as Psyche cooled and solidified, iron volcanoes may have erupted onto its surface. Image credit: Elena Hartley.

Ferrovolcanism: Liquid Iron-Spewing Volcanoes Erupted on Metallic Asteroids, Scientists Say

Apr 9, 2019 by News Staff

Metallic asteroids are the cooled cores of disrupted planetesimals. They originated early in the history of our Solar System when planets were beginning...

Colorful clouds formed by the release of vapors from the two AZURE rockets allow scientists to measure auroral winds. Image credit: Lee Wingfield / NASA.

NASA Launches Two Sounding Rockets to Study Auroral Winds: AZURE Mission

Apr 9, 2019 by News Staff

From the ground, the dance of the northern lights, or aurora borealis, can look peaceful. But those shimmering sheets of colored lights are the product...

Phobos transits the Sun’s disk, as seen by NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity on March 26, 2019. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / MSSS.

Martian Moons Phobos and Deimos Eclipse the Sun

Apr 8, 2019 by News Staff

NASA’s Mars rover Curiosity has captured several stunning videos of solar eclipses from the surface of the Red Planet. Phobos transits the Sun’s disk,...

An artist’s impression of a terraformed Mars. Image credit: Daein Ballard / CC BY-SA 3.0.

Hungarian Researchers Claim to See Biosignatures in Martian Meteorite

Apr 4, 2019 by Natali Anderson

ALH-77005, a Martian rock found in Antarctica, contains numerous mineralized ‘biosignatures,’ including coccoidal, filamentous structures and organic...

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 on Mars: New Discovery or Just Lot of Hot Air?

Apr 3, 2019 by The Conversation

The discovery of life on Mars would get pretty much everyone excited. But the scientists hunting for it would probably be happy no matter what the outcome...

A photo of a preserved river channel on Mars with color overlaid to show different elevations (blue is low, yellow is high). Image credit: NASA / JPL / University of Arizona / University of Chicago.

Significant River Runoff Persisted on Mars for More Than One Billion Years

Apr 2, 2019 by News Staff

Mars is dry today, but numerous ancient rivers are found across the planet’s surface and their existence is a challenge to models of planetary climate...

During super-close flybys of Saturn’s rings, Cassini inspected the mini-moons Pan and Daphnis in the A ring; Atlas at the edge of the A ring; Pandora at the edge of the F ring; and Epimetheus, which is bathed in material that fans out from the moon Enceladus. Image credit: NASA-JPL / Caltech.

Saturn’s Rings Coat Its Small Inner Moons, Cassini Researchers Say

Mar 29, 2019 by News Staff

Saturn’s main ring system is associated with a set of moons (Pan, Daphnis, Atlas, Pandora, and Epimetheus) that are either embedded within it, or interact...

Wang et al compared new protosolar elemental abundances with recent estimates of bulk Earth composition. Image credit: Orlando PIRO4D.

Earth is Devolatilized Version of Sun, Planetary Researchers Say

Mar 22, 2019 by News Staff

A team of planetary scientists at the Australian National University found that our planet is made of the same elements as the Sun but has less of the...

A view of the Moon’s south pole showing where reflectance and temperature data indicate the possible presence of surface water ice. Image credit: NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio.

NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Detects Migrating Water on Moon

Mar 13, 2019 by News Staff

Using data from the LAMP (Lyman Alpha Mapping Project) instrument aboard NASA’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, planetary researchers have observed water...