Solar System
Comets Leave Dusty Trails That Surround the Solar System
Comets are messy things. They scatter bits of dust as they travel through the solar system. If Earth happens to…
Will We Ever Go Back to Explore the Ice Giants? Yes, If We Keep the Missions Simple and Affordable
It's been over 35 years since a spacecraft visited Uranus and Neptune. That was Voyager 2, and it only did…
Baby Gas Giants Cast Shadows on Their Siblings
A team of astronomers has caught glimpses of gas giants forming around a very young star. The nascent giants are…
Mars Once had Enough Water for a Planet-Wide Ocean 300 Meters Deep
New research has shown that Mars may have been covered in a worldwide ocean when Earth was still covered in…
NASA Provides a Timelapse Movie Showing How the Universe Changed Over 12 Years
The Universe is over 13 billion years old, so a 12-year slice of that time might seem uneventful. But a…
Planet Formation Doesn’t Have to be a Rush job After all
Astronomers believe that it can take 10 million years or more to build a planet like the Earth. But studies…
The Moon Might be One Large Chunk that was Blasted Off the Earth Billions of Years Ago
Where did the Moon come from? The widely-accepted view is that the Moon is a result of an ancient collision…
Robots Might Jump Around to Explore the Moon
LEAP (Legged Exploration of the Aristarchus Plateau) is a mission concept study, funded by ESA, to explore challenging lunar terrains…
If Jupiter's Orbit got Weirder, it Would Actually Make Earth More Habitable
Jupiter has helped sustain life on Earth, but it might have done a better job with a more eccentric orbit.
Planet 9 is Running out of Places to Hide
A search for Planet 9 found hundreds of potential candidates, but they are probably just clouds.