Asteroids
The Best Way to Find Planet Nine Might Be Hundreds of Tiny Telescopes
Although the outer Solar System is mostly empty, there are icy objects drifting within the very limits of detection by…
Did Some of Earth’s Water Come from the Solar Wind?
The source of Earth's water is an enduring mystery that extends to exoplanets and the notion of habitability. In broad…
There Might Be Water on the Surface of the Metal Asteroid Psyche
While a NASA probe heads for an asteroid known as Psyche, telescopes have been probing it to prepare for the…
Swarming Satellites Could Autonomous Characterize an Asteroid
An asteroid's size, shape, and rotational speed are clues to its internal properties and potential resources for mining operations. However,…
Swarms of Orbiting Sensors Could Map An Asteroid’s Surface
It seems like every month, a new story appears announcing the discovery of thousands of new asteroids. Tracking these small…
Dinkinesh's Moonlet is Only 2-3 Million Years Old
Last November, NASA's Lucy mission conducted a flyby of the asteroid Dinkinish, one of the Main Belt asteroids it will…
Hubble Has Accidentally Discovered Over a Thousand Asteroids
The venerable Hubble Space Telescope is like a gift that keeps on giving. Not only is it still making astronomical…
The Giant Planets Migrated Between 60-100 Million Years After the Solar System Formed
Untangling what happened in our Solar System tens or hundreds of millions of years ago is challenging. Millions of objects…
What Happens to Solar Systems When Stars Become White Dwarfs?
In a couple billion years, our Sun will be unrecognizable. It will swell up and become a red giant, then…
A 790,000 Year-Old Asteroid Impact Could Explain Seafloor Spherules
Researchers recently collected 850 millimeter-sized spherules from the seafloor near Papua New Guinea. They believed they were caused by an…