Space
- Planetary Science
Flashy news from Mars
A streak across the Martian sky observed by the rover Spirit was most likely a meteor associated with a comet called Wiseman-Skiff.
- Astronomy
Panning Distant Dust
Astronomers are using hundreds of newly detected debris disks found around a variety of nearby stars to hunt for planets and learn about the evolution of our solar system.
- Planetary Science
Opportunity rolls out of Purgatory
After being stuck for nearly 5 weeks, the Mars rover Opportunity has freed itself from a sand trap on the Red Planet.
- Planetary Science
Planet Hunt Strikes Rock: Hot kin of Earth orbits nearby star
Astronomers have found the closest known cousin to Earth, a solid world just 15 light-years beyond the solar system.
- Astronomy
Making waves
Locked in a deadly embrace, two white dwarf stars may be the strongest source of gravitational waves now flooding our galaxy.
- Astronomy
The supernova that wasn’t
A brilliant stellar outburst once thought to be a supernova explosion actually left the star intact.
- Astronomy
Andromeda gets bigger
A new study reveals that the diameter of the Andromeda galaxy's disk spans some 220,000 light-years, three times as big as had been estimated.
- Astronomy
Peering into a disrupted stellar nursery
A new infrared portrait of the Carina nebula star-forming region shows a clutch of baby stars tucked inside pillars of thick dust.
- Planetary Science
Renegade moon
Saturn's outlier moon Phoebe didn't coalesce from material near the ringed planet but was captured from the distant Kuiper belt.
- Planetary Science
High Anxiety: Sudden solar flare highlights space risks
Measurements of energetic particles from an unusually strong solar flare that pummeled Earth early this year suggest that astronauts traveling or working in space might sometimes need to reach shelter within minutes of a warning.
- Planetary Science
Mars Polar Lander: Lost but now found?
A reanalysis of an image taken 5 years ago suggests that planetary scientists have found the remains of the Mars Polar Lander, which vanished minutes before it was supposed to touch down on the Red Planet.
- Planetary Science
Craft show
The Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft recently imaged Mars Odyssey and Mars Express, marking the first time that a spacecraft orbiting a planet other than Earth has captured images of other craft circling the same planet.
