Space

  1. Planetary Science

    Year in review: Pluto unveiled as a world like no other

    Long out of reach, Pluto came into focus in 2015 with the New Horizons mission.

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  2. Planetary Science

    Year in review: Global ocean spans Enceladus

    NASA's Cassini spacecraft is offering the best evidence yet that Saturn's moon Enceladus could be a great place to search for extraterrestrial life.

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  3. Planetary Science

    Year in review: Best evidence yet for water on Mars

    New data from the Mars Reconaissance Orbiter supported the presence of salty water on Mars.

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  4. Planetary Science

    Comets-spewing-oxygen club gets new member

    Halley’s comet becomes possibly the second comet known to be carting around oxygen buried since the formation of the solar system.

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  5. Cosmology

    Debate grows over whether X-rays are a sign of dark matter

    The dwarf galaxy Draco, which is chock-full of dark matter, doesn’t emit a band of X-rays that researchers hoped were produced by the mysterious invisible stuff.

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  6. Planetary Science

    It’s a new planet! It’s an unknown star! It’s — oops!

    A couple of unexpected wandering points of light in the sky could be new planets or even a dim star orbiting the sun, but researchers have plenty of reasons to be skeptical.

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  7. Planetary Science

    Salty source of Ceres’ mysterious bright spots found

    Bright spots on Ceres contain salts from a possible subsurface layer of ice while ammonia-rich minerals hint at building blocks incorporated from the far outer solar system.

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  8. Planetary Science

    Japanese spacecraft reaches Venus — five years late

    The Japanese Space Agency’s Akatsuki spacecraft succeeded at a second attempt at orbiting Venus, five years after an engine failure prevented its intended mission.

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  9. Astronomy

    LISA Pathfinder to pave way for gravitational wave detection

    The successful launch of the LISA Pathfinder mission marks the first step toward testing techniques needed to build a space-based gravitational-wave detector.

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  10. Astronomy

    Mysterious cosmic signals carry a clue to their origins

    A burst of radio waves from another galaxy ran into a dense magnetized plasma while en route to Earth, hinting at an origin near a population of young stars.

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  11. Astronomy

    Super-Earths, meet superpuffs, a lighter weight class of planet

    Superpuffs are underweight, oversized planets that formed in outskirts of star systems before cuddling up close to their sun.

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  12. Planetary Science

    A defenseless Mars is losing its atmosphere

    Measurements of Mars’ atmosphere leaking into space could help scientists explain how the Red Planet lost its once life-friendly climate.

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