Space
We summarize the week's scientific breakthroughs every Thursday.
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- Planetary Science
The ice of a distant moon
Jupiter’s moon Europa hides a liquid ocean, and conceivably life, under kilometers of ice. The challenge for engineers is how to penetrate that frozen barrier with technology that can be launched into space and operated remotely.
- Astronomy
Exoplanet spin measured for first time
Astronomers measure the spin of a planet outside our solar system, and its days are short: just over eight hours.
- Astronomy
Chilly starlike orb found just a few light-years away
WISE J085510.83-071442.5 is the coldest brown dwarf found to date.
- Astronomy
More details of super-bright supernova released
A supernova whose light was magnified by a large galaxy in front of it is changing the way astronomers think about distant cosmic objects.
- Planetary Science
Mountains on Saturn moon may have come from space
A mountainous ridge around the equator of Iapetus, one of Saturn’s moons, may have formed from cosmic debris.
- Astronomy
Distant swirling galaxy dwarfed by violent star killer
In a mosaic of images from a telescope in Chile, dark dust lanes and twisting tails betray a history of galactic collisions.
- Planetary Science
RIP LADEE: 9/6/2013 – 4/18/2014
NASA’s Lunar Atmosphere and Dust Environment Explorer (LADEE) mission ended April 18.
- Astronomy
White dwarf boosts light of stellar companion
A gravitational lens in a binary star lets astronomers weigh the core of a dead star.
- Astronomy
Earth-sized planet found in star’s habitable zone
Astronomers have found a potentially habitable Earth-sized planet around a cool red star.
- Planetary Science
Saturn may be getting a new moon
An icy object within Saturn's rings may be a new moon in the making.
- Astronomy
Early Mars couldn’t hold liquid water long
Small rocks hit Mars 3.6 billion years ago, suggesting an early atmosphere too thin for liquid water to hang around very long.
