Space probes as a research area encompasses the design, deployment, and scientific utilization of uncrewed spacecraft sent beyond Earth orbit to investigate planetary bodies, small Solar System objects, and the heliosphere, and increasingly to perform astrophysical observations from deep space. Research focuses on mission architecture, autonomous navigation and operations, radiation-hardened avionics, long-duration power systems (e.g., RTGs, advanced solar arrays), high-gain communications, and in situ and remote-sensing payloads optimized for extreme environments. The field integrates planetary science, space plasma physics, and instrumentation, emphasizing data acquisition strategies, sample return capabilities, and technology maturation for future interplanetary and interstellar exploration.
In astronomy, larger distances are both a blessing and a curse. They can cause issues like longer communication times, which also requires more powerful equipment, and positioning uncertainty that can affect the outcomes ...
Planetary Sciences
Jul 30, 2025
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On July 1, astronomers spotted an unusual high-speed object zooming towards the sun. Dubbed 3I/ATLAS, the surprising space traveler had one very special quality: its orbit showed it had come from outside our solar system.
Astronomy
Jul 23, 2025
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172
The mission team of NASA's Jupiter-orbiting Juno spacecraft executed a deep-space move in December 2023 to repair its JunoCam imager to capture photos of the Jovian moon Io. Results from the long-distance save were presented ...
Space Exploration
Jul 21, 2025
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160
On its record-breaking pass by the sun late last year, NASA's Parker Solar Probe captured stunning new images from within the sun's atmosphere. These newly released images—taken closer to the sun than we've ever been before—are ...
Astronomy
Jul 14, 2025
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The answer to whether tiny bacterial life-forms really do exist in the clouds of Venus could be revealed once and for all by a UK-backed mission.
Astrobiology
Jul 9, 2025
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100
If we're to land humans on Mars in the coming decades, we'll have to know what challenges await them when they get there.
Space Exploration
Jul 9, 2025
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30
Proxima Centauri b is the closest known exoplanet that could be in the habitable zone of its star. Therefore, it has garnered a lot of attention, including several missions designed to visit it and send back information. ...
Space Exploration
Jul 7, 2025
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As NASA's New Horizons spacecraft traveled through the Kuiper Belt at a distance of more than 5.5 billion miles from Earth, an international team of astronomers used the far-flung probe to conduct an unprecedented experiment: ...
China's Tianwen-2 probe continues on its journey to rendezvous with a near-Earth asteroid (NEA) before heading to the main asteroid belt. The second in China's interplanetary exploration program (which translates to "Questions ...
Planetary Sciences
Jul 3, 2025
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54
The NASA/ESA Cassini-Huygens mission explored Saturn and its moons from 2004 to 2017, providing the most detailed images and data on the system ever taken. This included Saturn's largest moon, Titan, which the probe examined ...
Planetary Sciences
Jul 2, 2025
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