Parker Solar Probe Stories

Scientists with NASA’s Parker Solar Probe mission have uncovered significant new clues about the origins of the solar wind – a continual stream of charged particles released from the Sun that fills the solar system. Observations from multiple space and…

A major milestone and new results from NASA’s Parker Solar Probe were announced on Dec. 14 in a press conference at the 2021 American Geophysical Union Fall Meeting in New Orleans. The results have been published in Physical Review Letters…

Sixty years ago, NASA set an out-of-this-world goal: to touch our Sun. Sending a spacecraft to the fiery star at the center of our solar system is no small feat. From engineering a spacecraft that could hurtle 430,000 mph through…

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know space is weird. But just how weird might surprise you. Space is dominated by invisible electromagnetic forces that we typically don’t feel. It’s also full of bizarre types of matter that we…

After nearly three years in space, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe has not only made numerous passes around our fiery orb, inching closer to the Sun than any spacecraft before it, but it has also ushered in discoveries that are shaping scientists’ understanding…

During a brief swing by Venus, NASA’s Parker Solar Probe detected a natural radio signal that revealed the spacecraft had flown through the planet’s upper atmosphere. This was the first direct measurement of the Venusian atmosphere in nearly 30 years…

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe mission has given scientists the first complete look at Venus’ orbital dust ring, a collection of microscopic dust particles that circulates around the Sun along Venus’ orbit. Though earlier missions have made some observations of Venus’…

When NASA’s Parker Solar Probe sent back the first observations from its voyage to the Sun, scientists found signs of a wild ocean of currents and waves quite unlike the near-Earth space much closer to our planet. This ocean was…

NASA’s Parker Solar Probe captured stunning views of Venus during its close flyby of the planet in July 2020. Though Parker Solar Probe’s focus is the Sun, Venus plays a critical role in the mission: The spacecraft whips by Venus…

When scientists downlinked data from Parker Solar Probe’s sixth orbit, there was a small, bright surprise waiting for them: the spacecraft’s first observation of a sungrazing comet. This particular comet was discovered just weeks earlier using data from ESA (European…