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Planetary Science
The ‘big discovery’ is nothing of the kind. We need a new planet-finding mission to probe the next frontier. Last week, NASA dropped a bombshell that it’s Kepler mission — the greatest […]
Last week, Cassini plunged into Saturn’s atmosphere. Here are the top 6 things we learned from it while it was alive. “Being a scientist and staring immensity and eternity in the […]
More than 90% of the eclipses to ever happen on Earth have already occurred. Don’t miss the next one! “We live in a moment of history where change is so speeded […]
After a generation, we’re finally getting another close-up view. With the science we’re learning, we just might solve its mysteries. “Jupiter instead cooled down below the threshold for fusion, but […]
This isn’t an XZibit joke; it’s a real scientific question. And the answer may be that it’s possible after all. “People who work every day are kind of scared of things […]
Past or present, if there’s ever been any life at all, it changes everything. “They say once you grow crops somewhere, you have officially ‘colonized’ it. So technically, I colonized […]
Could there be a massive, giant planet beyond Neptune? Here’s what the science says… for now. “Finding out that something you have just discovered is considered all but impossible is one […]
You know how bright the full Moon is. Well, from the Moon, how would the ‘full Earth’ compare? “I put up my thumb and shut one eye, and my thumb blotted […]
There’s a lot to learn about other worlds, but you can’t learn it all without looking up. “One should not need a teleportation device to decide whether a newly discovered object […]
The red planet once wasn’t so different from Earth. Here’s what happened. “Mars’ atmosphere is so thin, you do not need a lot of streamlining. By the time the ship […]
We take for granted how much the Moon does for Earth, but not all of the changes would be bad. “If we get rid of the moon, women, those menstrual cycles […]
Why Saturn’s Iapetus has three great mysteries… and we’ve only solved one of them. “The dance between darkness and light will always remain — the stars and the moon will always need the […]
Why do the asteroids that fall to Earth have the composition they do? A giant space collision 466 million years ago may be to blame. “Men of genius are often dull […]
That’s not how probability works. Or asteroids, for that matter. “Bringing an asteroid back to Earth? What’s that have to do with space exploration? If we were moving outward from there, […]
And what it found was a world swimming, literally, with possibilities. Just as a Chihuahua is still a dog, these ice dwarfs are still planetary bodies. The misfit becomes the […]
There’s never been a more important time to be aware of how the fate of the Earth depends on us. “We only have one planet that serves as an example and […]
As if the north pole of Saturn weren’t weird enough already. “Cassini is different — it’s a mission of enormous scope and is being conducted in grand style. It is much more sophisticated […]