Ninety years ago today, Clyde Tombaugh, a young astronomer working at Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, discovered Pluto. In doing so he unknowingly opened the door to the vast "third zone" of the solar system we ...
The early solar system was a chaotic place, with evidence indicating that Mars was likely struck by planetesimals, small protoplanets up to 1,200 miles in diameter, early in its history. Southwest Research Institute scientists ...
While we now know of thousands of exoplanets—planets around other stars—the vast majority of our knowledge is indirect. That is, scientists have not actually taken many pictures of exoplanets, and because of the limits ...
Where did the Earth's water come from? Although comets, with their icy nuclei, seem like ideal candidates, analyses have so far shown that their water differs from that in our oceans. Now, however, an international team, ...
The farthest object ever explored is slowly revealing its secrets, as scientists piece together the puzzles of Ultima Thule – the Kuiper Belt object NASA's New Horizons spacecraft flew past on New Year's Day, four billion ...
Astronomers have cataloged nearly 4,000 exoplanets in orbit around distant stars. Though the discovery of these newfound worlds has taught us much, there is still a great deal we do not know about the birth of planets and ...
Scientists believe the solar system was formed some 4.6 billion years ago when a cloud of gas and dust collapsed under gravity possibly triggered by a cataclysmic explosion from a nearby massive star or supernova. As this ...
New research has revealed that a giant impact on Mars more than four billion years ago would explain the unusual amount of "iron loving" elements in the Red Planet.
Oxford University scientists have shed new light on how the Earth was first formed.
As with most other telescopes, astronomers apply for observing time on SOFIA by submitting proposals that are being evaluated by peers for their scientific promise and intellectual merits. SOFIA, however, is special in that ...
