https://phys.org/ en-us Phys.org internet news portal provides the latest news on science including: Physics, Nanotechnology, Life Sciences, Space Science, Earth Science, Environment, Health and Medicine. After an eight-year journey, a spacecraft carrying European and Japanese probes began the monthslong, high-risk approach to Mercury on Thursday to study the sun-scorched planet. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-spacecraft-bound-mercury-tricky.html Planetary Sciences Sat, 05 Sep 2026 06:20:01 EDT news707723332 For the first time since its dramatic dimming in 2020, a team of astronomers has observed the inner atmosphere of Betelgeuse using the Atacama Large Millimeter Array (ALMA). Led by Bill Dent at the University of Manchester, the team found that the giant star's inner atmosphere has become increasingly uneven and asymmetric, in a way that could be connected to a far smaller companion star. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-betelgeuse-atmosphere-spotty-asymmetric-nearby.html Astronomy Fri, 04 Sep 2026 12:20:03 EDT news707734879 Jeffrey Rosenthal was a young professor at the University of Toronto when he discovered he was born on a Friday—though not just any Friday. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-full-moon-bad-luck-friday.html Mathematics Fri, 04 Sep 2026 09:20:03 EDT news707730421 Earth and the Martian moon Phobos dance together in a series of images recently acquired by NASA's Perseverance Mars rover. Earth appears as a point of light in the Martian sky, disappearing behind the crescent of Phobos, the larger of Mars' two moons. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-perseverance-rover-earth-martian-moon.html Planetary Sciences Thu, 03 Sep 2026 16:40:03 EDT news707659861 Venus is one of the solar system's most unusual planets. It may sometimes be called "Earth's twin" because of its similar size and density, but it rotates on its axis in the opposite direction of most planets, has surface temperatures hot enough to melt lead and lacks a moon. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-doesnt-venus-moon.html Planetary Sciences Thu, 03 Sep 2026 13:10:02 EDT news707657547 Two Mercury-bound spacecraft left their mother ship behind on Thursday and headed down the home stretch of their nearly decade-long voyage to the solar system's smallest and closest-to-the-sun planet. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-pair-spacecraft-closer-mercury-decade.html Planetary Sciences Thu, 03 Sep 2026 12:30:02 EDT news707656831 A 13-meter (43-foot) Falcon 9 rocket stage struck the moon last month, leaving a crater about 20 meters (66 feet) wide. In the days before impact, University of Tasmania researchers from the School of Natural Sciences were the first in the world to detect the object by radar, helping refine predictions of where it would land. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-meter-rocket-moon-tasmanian-track.html Space Exploration Wed, 02 Sep 2026 09:40:06 EDT news707550901 Microbes from space have fueled the plots of science fiction mainstays like "Project Hail Mary" and "The Andromeda Strain." But with more space missions launching each year, finding extraterrestrial life in a microbial form is becoming more plausible. What will the response be back here on Earth if—or when—scientists discover extraterrestrial microbes? Will the international policy and security communities be prepared for the fallout? https://phys.org/news/2026-09-space-missions-life-earth-fallout.html Planetary Sciences Tue, 01 Sep 2026 20:40:01 EDT news707483513 New Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) modeling, conducted in collaboration with scientists at the University of Arizona, shows fundamental differences in how the moon may have formed from the giant impact that created the Earth–moon system. The new results used state-of-the-art computational techniques that factor in the material strength of the two colliding planets. These impact simulations could change how researchers understand moon formation and may help constrain the timing of the event. The research is published in The Astrophysical Journal Letters. https://phys.org/news/2026-09-giant-impact-intact-moon-hours.html Planetary Sciences Tue, 01 Sep 2026 18:20:06 EDT news707500981 What's so special about spotting Phobos crossing in front of the sun? Sure. It's just another image of Phobos crossing the disk of the sun, as seen from the surface of Mars. Like so much of the modern space era, these images, once amazing, are now almost routine. But there's some real science behind tasking the Mars rovers to conduct a little "Martian astronomy." https://phys.org/news/2026-09-martian-astronomy-percy-phobos-eclipse.html Planetary Sciences Tue, 01 Sep 2026 15:20:06 EDT news707482202 Jupiter hosts more than 100 moons, with most attention focused on the four Galilean moons: Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto. This is primarily due to their active geology, including Io being the most volcanically active planetary body in the solar system and Europa having a vast subsurface liquid-water ocean beneath its icy crust. However, Jupiter's smaller, lesser-known moons could provide astronomers with key insights into the history of the solar system because they have remained largely unchanged, unlike the Galilean moons. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-esa-juice-probe-dark-jovian.html Space Exploration Mon, 31 Aug 2026 17:40:05 EDT news707400639 NASA's newest crown jewel blasted off Sunday to hunt for planets around other stars, explore secret dark energy and survey the cosmos like never before. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-nasa-roman-space-telescope-quest.html Astronomy Sun, 30 Aug 2026 11:26:54 EDT news707307976 SpaceX has pulled off its biggest salvage operation yet, recovering its most recently launched Starship from the Indian Ocean. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-spacex-recovers-starship-indian-ocean.html Space Exploration Fri, 28 Aug 2026 13:34:56 EDT news707142863 The evolutionary histories of Earth and Mercury differ fundamentally. The smallest planet, closest to the sun, likely began cooling early on, much like a setting pudding: As early as about 1 billion years after its formation, Mercury's volcanic activity came to a halt, and a solid, continuous "rock skin" formed on the planet's surface. Earth's crust, on the other hand, is still in motion: Volcanism and plate tectonics are constantly stirring up the "Earth pudding." Exactly what Mercury's unique volcanic past looked like and how it shaped its current appearance remain unclear. However, researchers can gain important clues from the composition of its surface. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-mercury-crust-deeper-hotter-volcanic.html Planetary Sciences Fri, 28 Aug 2026 12:40:01 EDT news707135642 On Sunday, Aug. 30, the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is expected to launch from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The observatory will join the Hubble Space Telescope, launched in 1990, and the James Webb Space Telescope, launched in 2021, in scanning the vastness of space and potentially finding answers to longstanding mysteries of the universe. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-telescope-roman-reveal-secrets-universe.html Astronomy Fri, 28 Aug 2026 07:40:03 EDT news707113621 During the Aug. 12 total solar eclipse over Europe, scientists aimed to study a long-standing mystery: why the sun's outer atmosphere, the corona, is far hotter than its visible surface. Capturing the data they needed meant being in exactly the right place at the right time. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-nasa-johnson-moon-shadow-eclipse.html Space Exploration Thu, 27 Aug 2026 11:40:04 EDT news707047621 As space missions become longer and ambitions for deep-space travel grow, scientists are working to understand how life beyond Earth may affect every system in the human body. Two years after her initial study took flight, Begum Mathyk, MD, and collaborators are continuing to push the frontier of women's health in space, this time by examining how altered gravity may affect female biology. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-clues-space-affect-women-health.html Space Exploration Thu, 27 Aug 2026 08:40:05 EDT news707038065 Saturn's moon Enceladus sports a thick shell of ice surrounding a liquid water ocean. As though scraped by an enormous claw, four parallel cracks slash across its south pole. Each about 500 meters (1,600 feet) deep, 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) across and 130 kilometers (81 miles) long, the fissures spew water vapor and other materials from the subsurface ocean directly into space. But the origin of these "tiger stripes" is mysterious. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-ocean-motion-enceladus-tiger-stripes.html Planetary Sciences Wed, 26 Aug 2026 13:20:15 EDT news706960681 Unlike conventional glaciers, rock glaciers appear as piles of rock that obscure large masses of unaccounted-for ice. Rock glaciers are common in the Wasatch and Uinta ranges, even appearing on the Colorado Plateau in the La Sal Mountains near Moab. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-utah-mountain-ranges-billion-tons.html Earth Sciences Wed, 26 Aug 2026 07:00:09 EDT news706866297 Elon Musk's SpaceX announced plans Tuesday to build a $100 billion facility in the southern U.S. state of Louisiana to launch its anticipated Starship megarockets, currently being developed at the company's Texas Starbase. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-spacex-billion-spaceport-louisiana.html Space Exploration Tue, 25 Aug 2026 15:15:04 EDT news706889686 When a star reaches its final stages of life, it ends in a bright, powerful explosion called a supernova and scatters material across the universe. A new study led by a University of Hawai'i at Mānoa researcher has discovered that the moon's mixed-up soil can be read as a cosmic time capsule for exploding stars. The work is published in the journal Physical Review Letters. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-lunar-soil-cosmic-capsule-stars.html Astronomy Tue, 25 Aug 2026 13:40:05 EDT news706874864 Sometimes images are released before anyone realizes they have been photobombed, meaning something unexpected showed up in the background. A team of researchers found a naked photobombing comet in publicly available archival data from the Subaru Telescope, resulting not in mirth but in serious scientific discoveries. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-naked-photobombing-comet-image.html Astronomy Tue, 25 Aug 2026 13:20:05 EDT news706874587 The moon's getting its first airport, and it's about to get busy. Within the next two decades, NASA's planned Gateway—humanity's first lunar spaceport—may become a bustling hub for Orion crew capsules, lunar landers, cargo vehicles and astronauts traveling between Earth, the moon and, eventually, destinations in the deep unknown. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-boarding-miles-earth-moon-airport.html Space Exploration Tue, 25 Aug 2026 09:20:03 EDT news706867861 Plastic might be the last ingredient you would ever add to a cookie recipe. But a team of researchers is looking to change that. They've programmed yeasts to turn plastic and agricultural waste into edible proteins and flavoring molecules, creating a treat from trash. The technology not only offers a new upcycling method but could also sustain life in disaster zones or even deep-space missions with humans aboard. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-yeasts-pet-plastic-crop-protein.html Cell & Microbiology Mon, 24 Aug 2026 05:00:07 EDT news706534861 China's manned space agency said Sunday it is delaying a research moon mission that is part of Beijing's efforts to land a crew there by 2030, less than two weeks after a rare launch failure. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-china-unmanned-moon-mission-delayed.html Space Exploration Mon, 24 Aug 2026 03:10:01 EDT news706758892 Of Jupiter's four Galilean moons, Callisto is the one that gets the least attention. Io is constantly being resurfaced by volcanoes. Europa has a giant liquid water ocean. And Ganymede has its own magnetic field that interacts with its parent planet in weird ways. Callisto, by comparison, seems sedate, with its ancient, crater-saturated surface seemingly frozen in time. But new data from the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) shows that even this most benign of the Big Four moons is more active than previously realized. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-jwst-peeks-callisto-ancient-scars.html Planetary Sciences Sun, 23 Aug 2026 11:00:04 EDT news706275524 China said on Sunday it was postponing its planned ambitious Chang'e-7 lunar mission, which was set to carry out explorations including searching for water ice on the moon. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-china-abruptly-postpones-ambitious-lunar.html Space Exploration Sun, 23 Aug 2026 10:38:51 EDT news706700304 Now it's the moon's turn to pull a disappearing act. After being shut out of this month's total solar eclipse, the Americas will have the best seats in the celestial house when Earth's shadow briefly envelops the moon. Almost the entire lunar surface will be masked Thursday night into Friday—a whopping 96%—making this an especially deep partial eclipse. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-total-lunar-eclipse-americas-prime.html Space Exploration Sat, 22 Aug 2026 10:38:34 EDT news706613876 Seismic waves produced by thunderstorms, called thunderquakes, can be used as a novel source for seismic imaging, according to a new study led by researchers at Penn State. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-thunderquakes-enable-seismic-imaging-earth.html Earth Sciences Fri, 21 Aug 2026 14:00:01 EDT news706362481 We've known for nearly two decades that some form of water exists on the moon. What we still don't know is exactly how much accessible water ice lies inside permanently shadowed craters, how deeply it is buried or what form it takes. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-china-moon-mission-ice.html Space Exploration Fri, 21 Aug 2026 08:00:03 EDT news706514402