Asteroids as a research area encompasses the scientific investigation of small rocky bodies primarily located in the asteroid belt and throughout the Solar System, focusing on their composition, internal structure, dynamical evolution, and role in planetary formation and collisional processes. This field integrates observational astronomy, spectroscopy, celestial mechanics, planetary geology, and space mission data to constrain asteroid taxonomies, surface and subsurface properties, impact hazards, and resource potential. Research addresses accretion and differentiation histories, space weathering, binary and rubble-pile formation, migration mechanisms, and their contribution to the delivery of volatiles and organics to terrestrial planets, providing constraints on early Solar System conditions.
Exoplanets aren't the only objects floating around other stars—they likely have comets and asteroids as well. Even some of the exoplanets themselves will have "exomoons," at least according to our current understanding of ...
Astronomy
Sep 24, 2025
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An international study led by researchers at São Paulo State University (UNESP) in Brazil has identified a little-known but potentially significant threat: Asteroids that share Venus's orbit and may completely escape current ...
Astronomy
Sep 23, 2025
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Asteroid 2024 YR4 caused quite a stir last year when it was discovered and originally calculated to have a 3% chance of hitting Earth. Since then models have been refined and while it no longer has a chance of hitting Earth, ...
Planetary Sciences
Sep 22, 2025
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355
With help from amateur astronomers, scientists tracked how an asteroid traveled from space, broke up in Earth's atmosphere and sent fiery fragments shooting to the ground, gathering new information about how these space rocks ...
Planetary Sciences
Sep 21, 2025
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Astronomers have used observatories around the world, including the European Southern Observatory's Very Large Telescope (ESO's VLT), to study the asteroid 1998 KY26, revealing it to be almost three times smaller and spinning ...
Astronomy
Sep 18, 2025
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Some asteroids are more dangerous than others, according to a report published in Nature Astronomy by an international team of researchers, led by astrophysicist Auriane Egal of the Montreal Planetarium in Canada. The team ...
Astronomy
Sep 17, 2025
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When considering the unnamed major features of all the moons, asteroids, and comets in our solar system, there are still a lot of places out there that need proper names. That means the International Astronomical Union (IAU), ...
Planetary Sciences
Sep 17, 2025
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A team of researchers, including those at the University of Tokyo, discovered that liquid water once flowed on the asteroid that spawned near-Earth asteroid Ryugu more than a billion years after it first formed. The finding, ...
Astrobiology
Sep 10, 2025
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153
Everyone who has ever lived on Earth has been well-aware of the moon, but it turns out Earth also has some frequent temporary companions. These "quasi-moons" are small asteroids that enter into a kind of resonance with Earth's ...
Selecting the right spot to smash a spacecraft into the surface of a hazardous asteroid to deflect it must be done with great care, according to new research presented at the EPSC-DPS2025 Joint Meeting in Helsinki. Slamming ...
Planetary Sciences
Sep 9, 2025
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