Pluto hogs the spotlight in the continuing scientific debate over what is and what is…
Browsing: Planetary Science
Planetary science is the interdisciplinary study of planets, moons, asteroids, comets, and other bodies in our solar system and beyond. It explores their composition, formation, atmospheres, geology, and potential for life—linking astronomy, geology, physics, and chemistry to understand planetary processes. Researchers use spacecraft missions, telescopes, and laboratory simulations to study worlds like Mars, Venus, and the icy moons of Jupiter and Saturn, uncovering clues about Earth’s origins and the dynamics of planetary systems. From analyzing meteorites to exploring exoplanets, planetary science seeks to answer fundamental questions about the diversity, evolution, and habitability of worlds across the universe.
The hottest point on a gaseous planet near a distant star isn’t where astrophysicists expected…
Asteroid 2002 AJ129 will make a close approach to Earth on February 4, 2018 at…
Like the waistband of a couch potato in midlife, the orbits of planets in our…
Researchers demonstrate for the first time the potential of existing technology to directly detect and…
Saturn’s moon Titan may be nearly a billion miles away from Earth, but a recently…
Five new planets have been discovered outside our solar system, all orbiting a sun-like star…
In this view, individual layers of haze can be distinguished in the upper atmosphere of…
When scientists searching for exoplanets — worlds located beyond our solar system — first spotted…
NASA and its partners will host a news conference at noon EST (9 a.m. PST)…
Saturn’s rings, made of countless icy particles, form a translucent veil in this view from…
Like Earth, space has weather. Except instead of swirling winds and downpours of precipitation, space…
NASA’s Juno spacecraft was a little more than one Earth diameter from Jupiter when it…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-EblZ0kOUFw This visualization shows the motion of one electron in the magnetic reconnection region. As…
NASA’s Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy, SOFIA, is preparing for its 2018 observing campaign, which…
Saturn’s moon Enceladus drifts before the rings, which glow brightly in the sunlight. Beneath its…
What is a tholus? A tholus is a type of small mountain. These images show…
In the collective imagination, planets of a solar system all circle around their star, in…