A paper recently published in Icarus presents findings about the Kuiper Belt Object 486958 Arrokoth, shedding new light on the preservation of volatile substances like carbon monoxide (CO) in such distant celestial bodies.
A ring of icy rocks orbiting our sun just beyond Neptune may give us a glimpse of how Neptune—and other objects in the outskirts of our solar system—were formed.
The James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) is helping scientists uncover how planets form by advancing understanding of their birthplaces and the circumstellar disks surrounding young stars.
On October 19th, 2017, astronomers with the Pann-STARRS survey observed an interstellar object passing through our system—1I/2017 U1 'Oumuamua. This was the first time an ISO was detected, confirming that such objects pass ...
New observations from NASA's New Horizons spacecraft hint that the Kuiper Belt—the vast, distant outer zone of our solar system populated by hundreds of thousands of icy, rocky planetary building blocks—might stretch much ...
A team co-led by Southwest Research Institute found evidence for hydrothermal or metamorphic activity within the icy dwarf planets Eris and Makemake, located in the Kuiper Belt. Methane detected on their surfaces has the ...
When the interstellar object (ISO) 'Oumuamua appeared in our solar system in 2017, it generated a ton of interest. The urge to learn more about it was fierce, but unfortunately, there was no way to really do so. It came and ...
Before planets form around a young star, the protosolar disk is populated with innumerable planetesimals. Over time, these planetesimals combine to form planets, and the core accretion theory explains how that happens. But ...
A rapid reshaping of orbits resulting from a close encounter with Jupiter or Saturn can lead Centaurs to exhibit comet-like activity, according to a Planetary Science Institute Senior Scientist Eva Lilly paper.
Universe Today has examined the potential for sending humans to Jupiter's icy moon, Europa, the planet Venus, and Saturn's largest moon, Titan, all despite their respective harsh environments and vast distances. These conversations ...
