White dwarfs may present amenable environments for life on planets formed within or migrated to their habitable zones, generating warmer surface environments...
One of these exoplanets, HD 20794d, is likely to be a rocky planet in the habitable zone of its parent star, the G-dwarf HD 20794.
This image shows the...
In a new paper, planetary researchers from Texas A&M University and the University of Washington introduce a new thermodynamic concept called the centotectic...
Planetary researcher Tereza Constantinou and her colleagues at the University of Cambridge have examined the chemical composition of the Venusian atmosphere...
Scientists from Curtin University and the University of Adelaide have analyzed a 4.45-billion-year-old zircon grain from a famous Martian meteorite called...
On Earth, solar radiation can transmit down to multiple meters within ice, depending on its optical properties. Organisms within ice can harness energy...
One-third of Mars’ surface has shallow-buried water, but it is currently too cold for use by life. Proposals to warm Mars using greenhouse gases require...
Ocean worlds are planetary bodies that have a liquid ocean, often under an icy shell or within the rocky interior. In our own Solar System, several moons...
Despite its Earth-like size and source material, Venus is extremely dry, indicating near-total water loss to space. Using computer simulations, planetary...
Fully understanding how a rocky planet becomes habitable and remains so is a fundamental challenge for planetary scientists and astrobiologists, given...
With more than 5,500 detected exoplanets, the search for life is entering a new era. Using life on Earth as a guide, astrobiologists from Cornell University...
Planetary scientists have long speculated about the potential habitability of Venus, not at its hot surface, but in the cloud layers located at 48-60 km...
In a new study, astronomers from Yale University and MIT examined the joint spin-orbit and orbit-orbit distribution for exoplanets residing in binary and...
The history of water on Mars is a puzzle that is of interest to planetary scientists as well as the general public. The Red Planet currently has water...
Using data from NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS), astronomers have discovered and characterized a habitable zone planet orbiting the...
Planets too close to their star are too hot (such as Venus), those too far, are too cold (like Mars), whereas planets in the habitable zone are just right....
Enceladus, the sixth-biggest moon of Saturn, presents a remarkable opportunity in our Solar System for searching for evidence of extraterrestrial life,...
Using data from NASA’s Cassini mission, planetary scientists have detected several compounds of strong importance to the habitability of Saturn’s icy...
Astronomers from NASA and the University of Washington have estimated total internal heating rates and depths to possible subsurface oceans for 17 planets...
In a paper published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society A: Mathematical Physical and Engineering Sciences, researchers at the University of Cambridge...
