Tag Archive for 'Ice giant'

This Webb/ NIRCam image shows S/2025 U1 as well as 13 of the 28 other known moons orbiting Uranus. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / STScI / M. El Moutamid, SwRI / M. Hedman, University of Idaho.

Webb Discovers New Moon around Uranus

Aug 19, 2025 by News Staff

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope have detected a previously unknown tiny moon — provisionally designated S/2025 U 1...

Composite image of Uranus. Image credit: Marcos van Dam / W. M. Keck Observatory.

Uranus May Actually Be Warmer than Previously Expected

Jul 18, 2025 by News Staff

Uranus releases about 15% more energy than it receives from the Sun, according to two new papers published in the journal Monthly Notices of the Royal...

An artist’s impression of a trans-Neptunian object. Image credit: NASA / ESA / G. Bacon, STScI.

Newly-Discovered Trans-Neptunian Object is Moving in Rhythm with Neptune, Astronomers Say

Jul 17, 2025 by News Staff

Discovered by the Large inclination Distant Objects (LiDO) survey and designated 2020 VN40, this trans-Neptunian object is the first confirmed body that...

This Webb image shows Uranus and six of its 27 known moons (most of which are too small and faint to be seen in this short exposure). Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / STScI / J. DePasquale, STScI.

Hubble Investigates Surface Conditions on Four Uranian Moons: Ariel, Umbriel, Titania, and Oberon

Jun 11, 2025 by News Staff

In new research, astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope searched for signs of interactions between the magnetic environment and the surfaces...

This image of Uranus’ aurorae was taken by Hubble on October 10, 2022. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / L. Lamy / L. Sromovsky.

Astronomers Measure Rotation Rate of Uranus with Unprecedented Precision

Apr 10, 2025 by News Staff

The rotation period of Uranus was estimated to be 17.24 hours in 1986 from radio auroral measurements made by NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft. Using the...

The image columns show the change of Uranus for the four years that Hubble’s STIS instrument observed Uranus across a 20-year period. Over that span of time, astronomers watched the seasons of Uranus as the south polar region (left) darkened going into winter shadow while the north polar region (right) brightened as it began to come into a more direct view as northern summer approaches. The top row, in visible light, shows how the color of Uranus appears to the human eye as seen through even an amateur telescope. In the second row, the false-color image of the planet is assembled from visible and near-infrared light observations. The color and brightness correspond to the amounts of methane and aerosols. Both of these quantities could not be distinguished before STIS was first aimed at Uranus in 2002. Generally, green areas indicate less methane than blue areas, and red areas show no methane. The red areas are at the limb, where the stratosphere of Uranus is almost completely devoid of methane. The two bottom rows show the latitude structure of aerosols and methane inferred from 1,000 different wavelengths (colors) from visible to near infrared. In the third row, bright areas indicate cloudier conditions, while the dark areas represent clearer conditions. In the fourth row, bright areas indicate depleted methane, while dark areas show the full amount of methane. At middle and low latitudes, aerosols and methane depletion have their own latitudinal structure that mostly did not change much over the two decades of observation. However, in the polar regions, aerosols and methane depletion behave very differently. In the third row, the aerosols near the north pole display a dramatic increase, showing up as very dark during early northern spring, turning very bright in recent years. Aerosols also seem to disappear at the left limb as the solar radiation disappeared. This is evidence that solar radiation changes the aerosol haze in the atmosphere of Uranus. On the other hand, methane depletion seems to stay quite high in both polar regions throughout the observing period. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Erich Karkoschka, LPL.

Hubble Sheds New Light on Atmospheric Composition and Dynamics of Uranus

Apr 1, 2025 by News Staff

A 20-year Hubble study of Uranus provide valuable data for understanding the atmospheric dynamics of this distant ice giant, which can serve as a proxy...

This composite image, made using data from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope and the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope, shows auroral activity (cyan splotches) on Neptune. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / STScI / Heidi Hammel, AURA / Henrik Melin, Northumbria University / Leigh Fletcher, University of Leicester / Stefanie Milam, NASA-GSFC.

Webb Detects Trihydrogen, Captures Aurorae on Neptune for First Time

Mar 26, 2025 by News Staff

Emissions from the upper-atmospheric trihydrogen cation (H3+) have been used to study the global-scale interactions of Jupiter, Saturn and Uranus with...

The WASP-132 system contains a hot Jupiter (foreground), an inner super-Earth (transiting in front of the orange host star) and the cold planet WASP-132d. Image credit: Thibaut Roger, Université de Genève.

Long-Period Giant Exoplanet Discovered in Multi-Planet System WASP-132

Jan 15, 2025 by News Staff

WASP-132 is a unique multi-planet system in that both an inner rocky planet and the newly-discovered outer giant planet are in a system with a hot-Jupiter...

From 2014 to 2024, Hubble has been studying Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune under the OPAL program. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / A. Simon, NASA-GSFC / M.H. Wong, UC Berkeley / J. DePasquale, STScI.

Hubble’s OPAL Program Celebrates Decade of Tracking Solar System’s Giant Planets

Dec 10, 2024 by News Staff

The OPAL (Outer Planet Atmospheres Legacy) program obtains long-term baseline observations of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, and Neptune in order to understand...

The first panel of this artist’s concept depicts how Uranus’ magnetosphere was behaving before the flyby of NASA’s Voyager 2; the second panel shows an unusual kind of solar weather was happening during the 1986 flyby, giving scientists a skewed view of the magnetosphere. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

Voyager 2’s Flyby of Uranus in 1986 was During Anomalous Solar Event, New Study Suggests

Nov 11, 2024 by News Staff

When NASA’s Voyager 2 spacecraft flew by Uranus in 1986, it provided scientists’ first close glimpse of this ice-giant planet. Alongside the discovery...

In this image, two three-dimensional shapes (top) of Uranus are compared to the actual views of the planet from Hubble (bottom left) and New Horizon (bottom right). Image credit: NASA / ESA / STScI / Samantha Hasler, MIT / Amy Simon, NASA-GSFC / New Horizons Planetary Science Theme Team / Joseph DePasquale, STScI / Joseph Olmsted, STScI.

Hubble Space Telescope and New Horizons Focus on Uranus

Oct 10, 2024 by News Staff

In a new study, astronomers compared high-resolution images of Uranus from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope to the more-distant view from NASA’s New...

The discovery image of the Uranian moon S/2023 U1 using the Magellan telescope on November 4, 2023. Image credit: Scott Sheppard.

Astronomers Discover New Moons around Uranus and Neptune

Feb 26, 2024 by News Staff

The three newly-discovered moons — S/2023 U1, S/2002 N5 and S/2021 N1 — are the faintest ever found around Uranus and Neptune using ground-based...

Voyager 2/ISS images of Uranus and Neptune released shortly after the Voyager 2 flybys in 1986 and 1989, respectively, compared with a reprocessing of the individual filter images in this study to determine the best estimate of the true colors of these planets. Image credit: Irwin et al., doi: 10.1093/mnras/stad3761.

Uranus and Neptune Are in Fact Similar Shade of Greenish Blue, New Color-Corrected Images Reveal

Jan 5, 2024 by News Staff

Uranus and Neptune, the so-called ice giants, are the most distant giant planets in our Solar System. Our knowledge of these worlds was revolutionized...

This Webb image exquisitely captures the seasonal north polar cap of Uranus, including the bright, white, inner cap and the dark lane in the bottom of the polar cap. Uranus’ dim inner and outer rings are also visible in this image, including the elusive Zeta ring -- the extremely faint and diffuse ring closest to the planet. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / STScI.

Webb Captures New Images of Uranus, Its Enigmatic Rings and Moons

Dec 18, 2023 by Enrico de Lazaro

New images from the Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) instrument onboard the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope shows Uranus, its ring system and some...

An artistic representation of how Uranus’ northern infrared aurora (marked in red) would have looked like in 2006. Image credit: NASA / ESA / M. Showalter, SETI Institute / Hubble Space Telescope.

Infrared Aurora Detected on Uranus

Oct 27, 2023 by News Staff

While the ultraviolet aurora of Uranus has been observed since 1986, no confirmation of the infrared aurora had been observed until now. An artistic representation...

A visualization of the huge, glowing planetary body produced by the ASASSN-21qj planetary collision. Image credit: Mark Garlick.

Astronomers Detect Afterglow of Collision between Two Ice-Giant Exoplanets

Oct 11, 2023 by Natali Anderson

The collision between two exoplanets of several to tens of Earth masses occurred at a distance of 2-16 AU (astronomical units) from the young solar-like...

This image from the MUSE instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope shows Neptune; a dark spot can be seen to the upper-right. Image credit: ESO / Irwin et al.

VLT Observes Large Dark Spot and Its Bright Companion in Atmosphere of Neptune

Aug 24, 2023 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) have observed a large dark spot in Neptune’s...

This sequence of Hubble images chronicles the waxing and waning of the amount of cloud cover on Neptune. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Erandi Chavez, UC Berkeley / Imke de Pater, UC Berkeley.

Astronomers Discover Connection between Neptune’s Cloudy Weather and 11-Year Solar Cycle

Aug 17, 2023 by News Staff

Neptune is the most distant planet in the Solar System, an ice-giant that boasts an active and chaotic atmosphere. Using archival near-infrared observations...

Akins et al. used microwave observations to spot the first polar cyclone on Uranus, seen here as a light-colored dot to the right of center in each image of the planet. The images use wavelength bands K, Ka, and Q, from left. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech / VLA.

VLA Spots Polar Cyclone on Uranus

May 23, 2023 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array in New Mexico have observed a bright, compact spot centered at Uranus’ north pole at several wavelengths....

Webb Captures Stunning Images of Uranus and Its Moons

Apr 10, 2023 by News Staff

New images from the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope show the ice giant Uranus, its faint rings and several moons. This image of Uranus, captured...

12 3