Solar System News

December 5, 2023

Top Headlines

Can Signs of Life Be Detected from Saturn's Frigid Moon?

Dec. 5, 2023 — Researchers have shown unambiguous laboratory evidence that amino acids transported in the ice plumes of Saturn's moon, Eceladus, can survive impact speeds of up to 4.2 km/s, supporting their detection during sampling by ...

Composition of Asteroid Phaethon

Nov. 28, 2023 — Asteroid Phaethon, which is five kilometers in diameter, has been puzzling researchers for a long time. A comet-like tail is visible for a few days when the asteroid passes closest to the Sun during its orbit. However, the tails of comets are ...

Exploring the Origin of Nucleosynthetic Isotope Variations in Ryugu Samples

Nov. 9, 2023 — The observed variations in chromium (Cr) isotope ratios in the Ryugu asteroid samples collected by Hayabusa2 likely resulted from elemental redistribution of slightly soluble Cr by water within the parent body, reveals a multinational study. The ...

Using Eclipses to Calculate the Transparency of Saturn's Rings

Nov. 14, 2023 — A student has measured the optical depth of Saturn's rings using a new method based on how much sunlight reached the Cassini spacecraft while it was in the shadow of the ...

Latest Headlines

updated 11:04pm EST

Hydrogen Detected in Lunar Samples, Points to Resource Availability for Space Exploration

Nov. 21, 2023 — Researchers have discovered solar-wind hydrogen in lunar samples, which indicates that water on the surface of the Moon may provide a vital resource ...

'Bouncing' Comets Could Deliver Building Blocks for Life to Exoplanets

Nov. 14, 2023 — How did the molecular building blocks for life end up on Earth? One long-standing theory is that they could have been delivered by comets. Now, researchers have shown how comets could deposit similar ...

Scientists Uncover Aurora-Like Radio Emission Above a Sunspot

Nov. 13, 2023 — Astronomers have detailed radio observations of an extraordinary aurora-like display -- occurring 40,000 km above a relatively dark and cold patch on the Sun, known as a ...

Glow in the Visible Range Detected for the First Time in the Martian Night

Nov. 9, 2023 — Scientists have observed, for the first time in the visible range, a glow on the night side of the planet Mars. These new observations provide a better understanding of the dynamics of the upper ...

New Findings Support Long-Proposed Process of Planet Formation

Nov. 8, 2023 — Scientists just made a breakthrough discovery in revealing how planets are made. By observing water vapor in protoplanetary disks, they confirmed a physical process involving the drifting of ...

Studies of Geologic Faulting on Icy Moons Aid Exploration of Extraterrestrial Watery Worlds

Nov. 6, 2023 — Earth and space scientists document and reveal the mechanisms behind strike-slip faulting on the largest moon of Saturn, Titan, and Jupiter's ...

Giant Planets Cast a Deadly Pall

Oct. 31, 2023 — Giant gas planets can be agents of chaos, ensuring nothing lives on their Earth-like neighbors around other stars. New studies show, in some planetary systems, the giants tend to kick smaller planets ...

Uranus Aurora Discovery Offers Clues to Habitable Icy Worlds

Oct. 26, 2023 — Astronomers confirm the existence of an infrared (IR) aurora on Uranus. This could help astronomers identify exoplanets that might support life, a large number of which are icy ...

Venus Had Earth-Like Plate Tectonics Billions of Years Ago, Study Suggests

Oct. 26, 2023 — Venus, may have once had tectonic plate movements similar to those believed to have occurred on early Earth, a new study found. The finding sets up tantalizing scenarios regarding the possibility of ...

Scientists Discover Molten Layer Covering Martian Core

Oct. 25, 2023 — NASA's InSight mission to Mars helped scientists map out Mars' internal structure, including the size and composition of its core, and provided general hints about its tumultuous formation. But ...

Earlier Headlines

Summaries
Headlines

Curiosity Rover Finds New Evidence of Ancient Mars Rivers, a Key Signal for Life

Oct. 24, 2023 — New analysis of data from the Curiosity rover reveals that much of the craters on Mars today could have once been habitable ...

Researchers Capture First Images of a Radio 'Ring of Fire' Solar Eclipse

Oct. 23, 2023 — Researchers have recorded images of a solar eclipse with the 'ring of fire' effect in radio ...

Researchers Probe How a Piece of the Moon Became a Near-Earth Asteroid

Oct. 23, 2023 — Two years after the striking discovery that a near-Earth asteroid could be a chunk of the moon, another UArizona research group has found that a rare pathway could have enabled this to ...

The Moon Is 40 Million Years Older Than Previously Thought

Oct. 23, 2023 — By analyzing tiny lunar crystals gathered by Apollo 17 astronauts in 1972, researchers recalculated the age of the Earth's Moon. Although previous assessments estimated the Moon as 4.425 billion ...

Source of Largest Ever Mars Quake Revealed

Oct. 17, 2023 — Scientists have announced the results of an unprecedented collaboration to search for the source of the largest ever seismic event recorded on Mars. The study rules out a meteorite impact, suggesting ...

Removal of Magnetic Spacecraft Contamination Within Extraterrestrial Samples Easily Carried Out, Researchers Say

Oct. 11, 2023 — By demonstrating that spaceflight doesn’t adversely affect the magnetism of moon rocks, researchers underscore the exciting potential of studying the magnetic histories stored in these ...

'Starquakes' Could Explain Mystery Signals

Oct. 11, 2023 — Fast radio bursts, or FRBs, are an astronomical mystery, with their exact cause and origins still unconfirmed. These intense bursts of radio energy are invisible to the human eye, but show up ...

Source of Electron Acceleration and X-Ray Aurora of Mercury Local Chorus Waves Detected

Oct. 10, 2023 — Observations during two flybys by the Mio spacecraft as part of the BepiColombo International Mercury Exploration Project have revealed that chorus waves occur quite locally in the dawn sector of ...

Astronomers Discover First Step Toward Planet Formation

Oct. 6, 2023 — Astronomers have gotten very good at spotting the signs of planet formation around stars. But for a complete understanding of planet formation, we also need to study examples where planet formation ...

Plot Thickens in Hunt for Ninth Planet

Oct. 5, 2023 — A pair of theoretical physicists are reporting that the same observations inspiring the hunt for a ninth planet might instead be evidence within the solar system of a modified law of gravity ...

Large Mound Structures on Kuiper Belt Object Arrokoth May Have Common Origin

Oct. 3, 2023 — A new study posits that the large, approximately 5-kilometer-long mounds that dominate the appearance of the larger lobe of the pristine Kuiper Belt object Arrokoth are similar enough to suggest a ...

New Insights Into the Atmosphere and Star of an Exoplanet

Sep. 25, 2023 — A new study of the intriguing TRAPPIST-1 exoplanetary system has demonstrated the complex interaction between the activity of the system's star and its planetary ...

Carbon Source Found on Surface of Jupiter's Moon Europa

Sep. 22, 2023 — Astronomers using data from NASA's James Webb Space Telescope have identified carbon dioxide in a specific region on the icy surface of ...

New Mars Gravity Analysis Improves Understanding of Possible Ancient Ocean

Sep. 20, 2023 — The first use of a novel method of analyzing Mars' gravitational force supports the idea that the planet once had an extensive northern ocean. In doing so, the method defines the scope of what ...

New Findings Suggest Moon May Have Less Water Than Previously Thought

Sep. 18, 2023 — A team recently calculated that most of the Moon's permanently shadowed regions (PSRs) are at most around 3.4 billion years old and can contain relatively young deposits of water ice. Water ...

Electrons from Earth May Be Forming Water on the Moon

Sep. 14, 2023 — Planetary scientists have discovered that high energy electrons in Earth's plasma sheet are contributing to weathering processes on the Moon's surface and, importantly, the electrons may ...

Water World? Methane, Carbon Dioxide in Atmosphere of Massive Exoplanet

Sep. 11, 2023 — A new investigation with NASA's James Webb Space Telescope into K2-18 b, an exoplanet 8.6 times as massive as Earth, has revealed the presence of carbon-bearing molecules including methane and ...

Scientists Detect and Validate the Longest-Period Exoplanet Found With TESS

Aug. 31, 2023 — Scientists have detected and validated two of the longest-period exoplanets found by TESS to date. These long period large exoplanets orbit a K dwarf star and belong to a class of planets known as ...

New Giant Planet Evidence of Possible Planetary Collisions

Aug. 31, 2023 — A Neptune-sized planet denser than steel has been discovered by an international team of astronomers, who believe its composition could be the result of a giant planetary ...

Neptune's Disappearing Clouds Linked to the Solar Cycle

Aug. 29, 2023 — Astronomers have uncovered a link between Neptune's shifting cloud abundance and the 11-year solar cycle, in which the waxing and waning of the Sun's entangled magnetic fields drives solar ...

Tuesday, October 24, 2023