The Sample Analysis at Mars (SAM) tunable laser spectrometer onboard Curiosity last week detected surprisingly high levels of the gas methane at Gale Crater:...
Planetary scientists have long observed water-ice clouds in the Martian middle atmosphere (18.6-37.2 miles, or 30-60 km, above the surface). Now, a University...
Although NASA’s Cassini mission ended in 2017, science continues to flow from the data collected. In a series of papers in the journal Science, planetary...
Astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have discovered that the yellow color visible on portions of the surface of Europa, the second Galilean...
NASA’s Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) observed the hyperactive Jupiter-family comet 46P/Wirtanen as it made its closest approach...
Between 8 and 2 million years ago, cosmic-ray energy from one or more nearby supernovae reached Earth and pummeled the planet’s atmosphere, initiating...
Many icy bodies in our Solar System have underground oceans. On the dwarf planet Pluto, an area called Sputnik Planitia suggests the presence of a subsurface...
Planetary researchers using data from the Shallow Radar (SHARAD) instrument on NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have discovered rich deposits of water...
According to new research, published in the journal Geology, processes not involved in controlling sand movement on Earth play major roles on the Red Planet,...
In the lab, scientists have pinpointed a specific wavelength of infrared light absorbed when molecules of carbon monoxide and nitrogen join together and...
The Moon has striking asymmetries between its nearside and farside in topography, crustal thickness, and composition. A new study, published in the Journal...
To assist NASA and the lunar community, a team of researchers from the Lunar and Planetary Institute (LPI) has compiled an online atlas that consists of...
Planetary researchers from NASA’s Juno mission made the first detection beyond Earth of an internal magnetic field that changes over time — a phenomenon...
After flying past the dwarf planet Pluto in 2015, NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft shifted course to Ultima Thule (also known as 2014 MU69), a much smaller...
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...
On April 24, 2019, NASA’s Mars Odyssey orbiter captured a new thermal image of Phobos, the larger of Mars’ two moons. Each color in the full-moon image...
In April 2019, NASA’s InSight lander used its Instrument Deployment Camera (IDC) to capture a series of Martian sunrise and sunset images.
NASA’s InSight...
