solar system

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)'s…

When I write or give public talks about exoplanets—alien worlds orbiting other stars—the most common question I’m asked is, “When will we find another Earth?”It’s a good question. As we’re learning, space is filled with a great many wildly differing worlds, and it’s natural to wonder if there’s an Earth 2.0 out there, or if they’re all truly, well, alien.Our Milky Way galaxy harbors hundreds of billions of stars. Given our census of local stars showing that planets occur at least as often as stars there could be trillions…

Last week, the Ingenuity Mars helicopter made its final flight, far exceeding the expectations of a mission that began nearly three years ago. Now, NASA may be looking at a fixed-wing aircraft to hit the red planet's skies next.In 2021 the Perseverance rover landed on Mars carrying a small helicopter under its belly named Ingenuity. The twin rotor craft was a demonstrator to test if a vehicle could fly in the thin Martian air, which is only about one per cent as dense as our atmosphere on Earth.It became the first…

Sometimes really interesting questions can be asked very simply. For example, where does outer space begin?This seems like a straightforward question. We live on the surface of Earth, shielded from the vacuum of space by a blanket of air. But we know that our planet’s atmosphere gets thinner, less dense, with height. So it makes sense that at some altitude, the air becomes so tenuous that you’d essentially be in space. How high up is that?The thing is, it depends on what you mean by “space,” which is a term that’s…

January 30, 20243 min readAfter a nine-day shutdown, the upside-down lunar lander received enough sunlight to power up againBy Gemma Conroy & Nature magazineThe lander was photographed upside down on the lunar surface. After being stuck without power for more than a week, Japan’s Moon lander has woken up and started snapping images of the lunar surface.On 28 January, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) re-established contact with the Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM), which touched down on the slope…

January 30, 20243 min readThe Laser Interferometer Space Antenna could discover gigantic ripples in spacetime from merging supermassive black holes and moreBy Elizabeth Gibney & Nature magazineAn artist’s concept showing the triangular configuration of the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA), a mission led by the European Space Agency that could launch in the 2030s. LISA would use three laser-linked free-flying spacecraft to seek out giant gravitational waves from merging supermassive black holes and other…

When most of us go to the beach, we like to play in the sand, frolic in the surf and people watch.I like all those things, too. But I am also a massive science nerd, and that means that despite the distractions, I cannot tear my attention away from the horizon.Oh, that line separating Earth from sky, planet from heavens and here from infinity—my eye is drawn to the horizon as inexorably as matter to a black hole. I get squinty and teary trying to focus on it, which is a fool’s errand because, in a sense, the horizon…

January 22, 20242 min readAfter an unexpected communications dropout, NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter is back in business on MarsBy Monisha Ravisetti & SPACE.comA view of NASA’s Ingenuity helicopter on the surface of Mars, as seen by the space agency’s Perseverance rover. I held my breath for a moment on Jan. 18, when scientists announced they'd lost contact with the Perseverance Mars rover's helicopter friend, Ingenuity. Ingenuity had been nearing completion of its 72nd flight — a liftoff far past the threshold of…

A Japanese spacecraft has soft-landed on the moon, making Japan only the fifth nation in history to achieve the feat.Called Smart Lander for Investigating Moon, or SLIM, the car-sized robotic lander successfully touched down near the Shioli Crater at the moon’s equator at 10:20 A.M. EST on January 19 (12:20 A.M. local time on January 20 in Japan). The mission was developed and launched by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA).“We have been able to confirm it has arrived on the lunar surface,” said Hiroshi…

Days after it suffered a critical malfunction, a private U.S. lunar lander ended its mission in a blaze of glory when the company operating it intentionally caused the spacecraft to break apart in Earth’s atmosphere.The lander, called Peregrine, was built and operated by the Pittsburgh-based company Astrobotic, which had hoped to make history by performing the first commercial soft landing on the lunar surface. The spacecraft flew as part of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) initiative, which has encouraged…