It is known that gas giants around other stars are often located very near their sun. According to accepted theory, these gas planets were formed far away and subsequently migrated to an orbit closer to the star. Now, researchers ...
Astronomy
Mar 25, 2019
50
849
In science fiction, explorers can hop in futuristic spaceships and traverse half the galaxy in the blink of a plot hole. However, this sidelines the navigational acrobatics required in order to guarantee real-life mission ...
Space Exploration
Dec 21, 2018
0
53
Ralph, one of NASA's most well-traveled space explorers, has voyaged far and accomplished much: on the New Horizons mission, Ralph obtained stunning flyby images of Jupiter and its moons; this was followed by a visit to Pluto ...
Space Exploration
Nov 12, 2018
0
138
The planet Mars shares its orbit with a handful of small asteroids, the so-called Trojans. Among them, one finds a unique group, all moving in very similar orbits, suggesting that they originated from the same object. But ...
Space Exploration
Oct 18, 2017
2
385
The planet Mars shares its orbit with a handful of small asteroids, the so-called Trojans. Now an international team of astronomers using the Very Large Telescope in Chile have found that most of these objects share a common ...
Space Exploration
Apr 3, 2017
5
391
The University of Arizona-led OSIRIS-REx mission will take advantage of its two-year outbound cruise to the asteroid Bennu in order to conduct a search for elusive solar system objects. Between Feb. 9 and 20, the NASA spacecraft ...
Space Exploration
Dec 13, 2016
1
159
Previously, the Kepler space telescope looked straight out from the solar system in a direction almost perpendicular to the ecliptic and the plane of the planets. This way, it could observe the same spot all year long, as ...
Astronomy
Oct 24, 2016
0
539
The Kuiper belt—the region beyond the orbit of Neptune inhabited by a number of small bodies of rock and ice—hides many clues about the early days of the Solar System. According to the standard picture of Solar System ...
Astronomy
Jan 17, 2014
2
0
The orbit of the planet Mars is host to the remains of an ancient collision that created many of its Trojan asteroids, a new study has concluded. It paints a new picture of how these objects came to be and may even hold important ...
Space Exploration
Oct 11, 2013
6
1
There are millions of asteroids floating around the solar system. With so many of them, it should be no surprise that some are weirdly configured. A recent example of one of these weird configurations was discovered when ...
Astronomy
May 23, 2024
0
5
