Planetary Science

  1. Astronomy

    Close pass by sun didn’t radically alter comet 67P’s landscape

    Landslides on comet 67P shot plumes of dust into space, but changes like these might not radically alter the landscape of the comet.

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  2. Planetary Science

    Saturn’s ‘Death Star’ moon may not conceal ocean after all

    A lack of cracks on Mimas suggests that the icy moon of Saturn doesn’t conceal a subsurface ocean of liquid water.

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  3. Planetary Science

    Saturn’s ‘Death Star’ moon may not conceal an ocean after all

    A lack of cracks on Mimas suggests that the icy moon of Saturn doesn’t conceal a subsurface ocean of liquid water.

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  4. Planetary Science

    Europa lander mission takes another step toward reality

    NASA is working on a possible lander mission in which the main science goal would be to search for signs of life on Jupiter’s moon Europa.

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  5. Planetary Science

    Juno spacecraft won’t go into shorter orbit around Jupiter

    Juno will remain in its 53-day orbit around Jupiter due to an issue with two helium check valves, NASA reports.

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  6. Planetary Science

    Ceres harbors homegrown organic compounds

    NASA’s Dawn spacecraft has detected organic matter — the building blocks of life — on the dwarf planet Ceres, a new study suggests.

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  7. Planetary Science

    Red Planet’s interior may not churn much

    The magma fueling a Martian volcanic system remained largely unchanged for billions of years, analysis of a newfound meteorite suggests.

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  8. Planetary Science

    Oxygen atoms from Earth bombard the moon

    Oxygen atoms originating from the upper atmosphere periodically bombard the moon’s surface, researchers propose.

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  9. Life

    Asteroid barrage, ancient marine life boom not linked

    Impacts from asteroid debris probably didn’t trigger the boom in marine animal diversity around 471 million years ago during the Great Ordovician Biodiversification Event.

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  10. Planetary Science

    Weird wave found in Venus’ wind-whipped atmosphere

    A 10,000-kilometer-long gravity wave arched across the upper atmosphere of Venus. The feature may have been the largest of its kind in the solar system.

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  11. Planetary Science

    The moon is still old

    New analysis of moon rocks points to our satellite forming about 4.51 billion years ago, roughly 60 million years after the start of the solar system.

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  12. Planetary Science

    Many tiny moons came together to form moon, simulations suggest

    Earth’s moon formed from mini-moons generated by a series of medium to large impacts, rather than from one colossal collision, researchers propose

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