Nearly twenty years ago, astronomers observed a huge cloud of fine dust particles around a young star just 63 light-years away from Earth. From recent observations of the Webb Space TelescopeHowever, the dust cloud had mysteriously disappeared. Now a new paper suggests that the dust cloud may have been caused by a violent event that … Read more
The possibility of a lake of liquid water buried beneath Mars’ southern ice cap has been cast in doubt by new computer simulations, which suggest that densely packed ice layers could produce the same radar reflections as liquid water. In 2018, the European Space Agency Mars Express orbiter used its MARSIS (Mars Advanced Radar for … Read more
In addition to producing auroras, a recent extreme storm has provided more details about the amount of radiation future astronauts might encounter on the Red Planet. Mars scientists have been expecting epic solar storms since the sun entered a period of peak activity called solar maximum earlier this year. Over the past month, NASA’s Mars … Read more
Recent studies have cast doubt on the presence of a lake of liquid water beneath the ice cap at Mars’ south pole, a discovery that initially raised hopes of finding microbial life on the Red Planet. In 2018, the European Space Agency’s Mars Express satellite detected strong radar reflections that indicated a 12-mile-long lake lay … Read more
Enlarge / An artist’s concept of a Mars Ascent Vehicle orbiting the red planet. NASA announced Friday that it will award contracts to seven companies, including SpaceX and Blue Origin, to study how to more cheaply transport rock samples from Mars back to Earth. The space agency in April put out a call for industry … Read more
This article was reviewed according to Science fact checked peer-reviewed publication trusted source proofread OK! Credit: Unsplash/CC0 public domain × close to Credit: Unsplash/CC0 public domain Researchers at Cornell University have provided a simple and comprehensive – albeit less dramatic – explanation for bright radar reflections that were initially interpreted as liquid water beneath the … Read more
A mysterious well on the side of an ancient volcano on Mars has recently caused excitement for what it could reveal beneath the Red Planet’s surface. This is what that means. First things first: the pit, which is only a few meters wide, was actually imaged by NASA’s Mars exploration sorber, which was about 156 … Read more
Mars could encounter more than twice as many encounters with potentially dangerous asteroids as Earth, according to a new study. This could jeopardize exploration missions to the Red Planet, but also provide insight into how the inner solar system formed. Asteroids pose the greatest threat to our planet from space; for example, the 2013 Chelyabinsk … Read more
Chassigny meteorite in cross-polarized light – Scripps Institution of Oceanography at UC San Diego When a meteorite hit Mars eleven million years ago, pieces of the Red Planet flew into space – and some of them landed on Earth in the form of meteorites, providing unprecedented evidence about the planet’s composition. Now scientists at UC … Read more
Mars We may have more than twice as many encounters with potentially dangerous asteroids as Earth does, according to a new study. This could jeopardize exploration missions to the Red Planet, but also provide insight into how the inner solar system formed. Asteroids pose the greatest threat from space to our planet – the 2013 … Read more