Space Exploration

Iron-rich rocks near ancient lake sites on Mars are the most promising and best understood astropaleontological targets, according to new research led by University of Edinburgh scientist Sean McMahon. Mars’ surface is cold, dry, exposed to harmful radiation and apparently barren today; nevertheless, there is strong geological evidence for warmer, …

The mechanics of planet formation are thought to be pretty universal, but a new report suggests that Pluto could have formed from very different processes than those we typically expect. The standard model of planetary formation is that planets form as grains of ice and rock collect together. These grains …

Planetary researchers working with data from NASA’s New Horizons and ESA’s Rosetta missions have developed a new theory for the formation of the dwarf planet Pluto. Their paper will be published in the October 2018 issue of the journal Icarus (arXiv.org preprint). This high-resolution image of Pluto was taken by …

Sometime after August 2008, the US Department of Defence contracted lots of scientists to look into some really, very out-there aerospace innovations, consisting of never-before-seen approaches of propulsion, lift, and stealth. Two scientists returned with < a href="http://www.businessinsider.com.au/document/5b045ec5cc061c32008b530f/dia-warpdrives.pdf"> a 34-page report for the propulsion category, entitled “Warp Drive, Dark Energy, …

NASA’s Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport (InSight) spacecraft is currently cruising to Mars. On May 22, 2018, it performed its first course correction guiding it to the Red Planet. NASA’s InSight spacecraft is on its way to Mars. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech. InSight will be …

A team of neuroscientists from the University of California, San Francisco, and Loma Linda University has identified the first potential treatment for the brain damage caused by exposure to galactic cosmic rays. Novel drugs could one day protect astronauts on deep-space missions from dangerous cosmic radiation. Image credit: Jonny Lindner. …

With an experiment launching to the International Space Station Monday (May 21), scientists will be able to create a temperature level that’s 10 billion times cooler than the vacuum of space to focus in on atoms’ strange quantum habits. . < a href=" https://www.space.com/35962-coldest-spot-universe-international-space-station.html" > The Cold Atom Laboratory( CAL) …

The mysterious asteroid ‘Oumuamua made headlines last year as the first interstellar object ever detected passing through our little corner of the universe. However, it turns out ‘Oumuamua wasn’t the first interstellar visitor we spotted. It was just the first one we recognized as alien. An asteroid called 2015 BZ509 …

NASA’s InSight Mars mission launched on May 5, but it wasn’t the only piece of equipment that began its journey to the red planet. The agency also sent two small cubesats along with InSight, and one of them just snapped its first photo. It’s a long way from getting any …

NASA’s MarCO-B spacecraft — one of two CubeSats accompanying the space agency’s Interior Exploration using Seismic Investigations, Geodesy and Heat Transport (InSight) lander — used a fisheye camera to snap its first photo on May 9, 2018. This image from NASA’s MarCO-B (known as ‘Wall-E’ to the MarCO team) CubeSat …