Nearly 40 years ago, scientists first predicted the existence of helium rain inside planets composed primarily of hydrogen and helium, such as Jupiter and Saturn. However, achieving the experimental conditions necessary to ...
Planetary Sciences
May 27, 2021
0
327
Just days after celebrating its first anniversary in Jupiter orbit, NASA's Juno spacecraft will fly directly over Jupiter's Great Red Spot, the gas giant's iconic, 10,000-mile-wide (16,000-kilometer-wide) storm. This will ...
Space Exploration
Jul 2, 2017
13
1068
When we look at the Solar System, what clues show us how it formed? We can see pieces of its formation in asteroids, comets and other small bodies that cluster on the fringes of our neighborhood (and sometimes, fly closer ...
Astronomy
Sep 8, 2014
42
0
Ever since NASA's Voyager 1 spacecraft flew past Jupiter in March, 1979, scientists have wondered about the origin of Jupiter's lightning. That encounter confirmed the existence of Jovian lightning, which had been theorized ...
Space Exploration
Jun 7, 2018
3
828
NASA's Galileo spacecraft arrived at Jupiter on December 7, 1995, and proceeded to study the giant planet for almost 8 years. It sent back a tremendous amount of scientific information that revolutionized our understanding ...
Astronomy
Feb 21, 2014
24
0
An international team of scientists, using the ground-based Gemini Observatory telescope in Chile, is the first to directly measure the amount of both water and carbon monoxide in the atmosphere of a planet in another solar ...
Space Exploration
Oct 27, 2021
0
1301
An international group of astronomers, led by Martin Schlecker of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy, has found that the arrangement of rocky, gaseous and icy planets in planetary systems is apparently not random and ...
Astronomy
Oct 13, 2020
1
5753
What are asteroids made of? Asteroids are made mostly of rock—with some composed of clay and silicate—and different metals, mostly nickel and iron. But other materials have been found in asteroids, as well.
Space Exploration
Sep 14, 2015
0
29
Late at night, when the halls around her were empty, Heidi Becker positioned her subject in the crosshairs of an electron-shooting linear accelerator. Along with her companions, she arranged a cartload of heavy lead bricks ...
Space Exploration
Jul 4, 2016
13
1575
Jupiter's moons are hot.
Space Exploration
Sep 10, 2020
2
306
