Space

Planetary Science

Martian ice could be sculpting surface patterns

Images taken by the Mars Global Surveyor suggest that most areas with geological features known as patterned ground appear at high latitudes.

Planetary Science

Saturn Watch: Cassini finds two new moons and lightning

The Cassini spacecraft has detected two moons that may be the smallest ever found around Saturn as well as changes in the character of lightning first detected in Saturn's atmosphere in the early 1980s.

Astronomy

Cosmic Melody

An astronomer has converted fluctuations in the density of the early universe—the seeds of the first galaxies and stars—into audible sound.

Planetary Science

Finding a lunar meteorite’s home

Scientists have for the first time pinpointed the source of a meteorite that came from the moon.

Astronomy

3-D solar eruptions

Solar physicists have developed a technique to obtain the three-dimensional structure of coronal mass ejections by using two-dimensional images from the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory.

Astronomy

One of Hubble’s Tools Fails: Observatory loses a sharp ultraviolet eye

With the failure last week of an instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have lost their only sharp ultraviolet eye on the universe.

Astronomy

Old stars shed light on young Milky Way

Analyzing the composition of 70 of the oldest stars in the galaxy—the largest such sample so far—scientists have found new evidence that a generation of short-lived stars that died explosively must have preceded this elderly population and that the oldest part of the Milky Way originated not as a single component, but as bits and pieces that may have taken several hundred million years to form and coalesce.

Planetary Science

The sound of rings

When Cassini reached Saturn on June 30, it twice dashed through a gap in the planet's rings, and onboard science instruments recorded a flurry of ring dust harmlessly striking the spacecraft.

Planetary Science

Meteorites quickly reach Earth

Fragments from collisions between large bodies in the asteroid belt can reach Earth in as little as 100,000 years.

Astronomy

Explosive News: Telescopes find signs of gentler gamma-ray bursts

Astronomers appear to have discovered an unexpected population of low-energy gamma-ray bursts, and they could be 10 times more numerous than previously-known higher-energy bursts.

Astronomy

Young star’s glow suggests planet find

The X-ray outburst of a young, sunlike star might provide new insights about planet formation.

Planetary Science

A little bit of Mars on Earth

Scouring an ice field in Antarctica, scientists have made the latest discovery of a chunk of rock that was blasted from Mars and fell to Earth.