Planetary Science Stories
Filters
Digging Deeper to Find Life on Ocean Worlds
In February 2023, researchers from around the country gathered at a NASA-sponsored workshop to discuss the latest developments and a roadmap for a cryobot mission concept to drill through the icy crusts of Europa and Enceladus and search for life.
NASA’s Dragonfly to Proceed with Final Mission Design Work
NASA’s Dragonfly mission has been authorized to proceed with work on final mission design and fabrication – known as Phase C – during fiscal year (FY) 2024. The agency is postponing formal confirmation of the mission (including its total cost…
DART Team Earns Smithsonian Michael Collins Trophy for Successful Planetary Defense Test Mission
NASA’s Double Asteroid Redirection Test (DART) will be honored with the 2024 Michael Collins Trophy for Current Achievement. For its work developing and managing the first-ever planetary defense test mission, the team comprised by NASA’s Planetary Defense Coordination Office (PDCO) and the…
New Patterns in Mars’s Clouds Revealed by Volunteers
The first journal article about clouds identified by participants of the Cloudspotting on Mars project has been accepted for publication and is now available online! The article, “The Cloudspotting on Mars citizen science project: Seasonal and spatial cloud distributions observed by the Mars Climate…
Daily Minor Planet Volunteers Spot an Asteroid Passing Close to Earth
Volunteers working with The Daily Minor Planet have made the project’s first big discovery: an asteroid passing very near planet Earth. On the night of October 3rd, a telescope for the Catalina Sky Survey snapped four pictures of a far…
Data From NASA’s WISE Used to Preview Lucy Mission’s Asteroid Dinkinesh
Researchers have utilized infrared survey data to refine the asteroid’s size and surface brightness in support of the Nov. 1 encounter by NASA’s Lucy mission. NASA’s Lucy mission will soon have its first asteroid encounter as the spacecraft travels through…
How NASA Is Protecting Europa Clipper From Space Radiation
To explore the mysterious ice-encrusted moon Europa, the mission will need to endure bombardment by radiation and high-energy particles surrounding Jupiter. When NASA’s Europa Clipper begins orbiting Jupiter to investigate whether its ice-encased moon, Europa, has conditions suitable for life,…
NASA’s Dragonfly Tunnel Visions
Dragonfly Team Utilizes Unique NASA Facilities to Shape Its Innovative Titan-bound Rotorcraft With its dense atmosphere and low gravity, Saturn’s moon Titan is a great place to fly. But well before NASA’s Dragonfly rotorcraft lander soars through Titan’s skies, researchers…
NASA’s Webb Discovers New Feature in Jupiter’s Atmosphere
Narrow jet stream near equator has winds traveling 320 miles per hour NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope has discovered a new, never-before-seen feature in Jupiter’s atmosphere. The high-speed jet stream, which spans more than 3,000 miles (4,800 kilometers) wide, sits…
Mercury’s Strange Hollows
Enigmatic depressions on the surface have puzzled scientists since the 1970s For decades, scientists have been puzzling over strange hollows on Mercury’s surface, thousands of peculiar depressions at a variety of longitudes and latitudes, ranging in size from 60 feet…