Oh! No Flowing H2O on The Red Planet?
Last September, with much hoopla, NASA confirmed evidence of liquid water flowing on present-day Mars. But a new study using data from the space agency’s Mars Odyssey mission throws some cold water on those findings. About a year ago, the space agency’s Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer for Mars (CRISM) onboard the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter identified […]
Oxygen on Exoplanet; Smaller Universe; Intergalactic Tan
Nearby Exoplanet’s Atmosphere May Contain Oxygen In November 2015, scientists discovered a Venus-like planet that’s only 39 light years away, called Gliese 1132b. The planet is thought to have an atmosphere, despite having a blistering temperature of more than 230° degrees Celsius, since it orbits its red dwarf star from a distance of only 2.25 […]
Black Hole Back Doors?; Io’s Atmosphere; No New Stars in Galaxy Center
Do Black Holes Have Back Doors? Most people describe a black hole as a cosmic object with gravity so strong that it sucks in any kind of material that comes close to it. What happens to stuff that is pulled into a black hole? Some scientists think that matter that enters a black hole gets […]
July 2016 Science Images
Where are Ceres Large Craters?
After NASA’s Dawn spacecraft had passed by the asteroid Vesta, on its way to rendezvous with Ceres, mission scientists noticed that its surface was banged up with a lot of very large craters. Its biggest impact crater is Rheasilvia, which measures 505 km in diameter. They expected that Ceres would also be seriously pitted with giant impact basins too. […]
X Marks the Spot; New Radiation Monitor on ISS; 3D Astronomical Map
X Marks the Center of the Milky Way When we hear “X marks the spot,” many of us might think of old pirate maps and where treasure is supposedly buried. But “X marks the spot” could also have more of a cosmic meaning, thanks to a new study published in the Astronomical Journal. The study’s […]
Space Snow Spotted; Frankenstein Galaxy; Fewer Allergies for Thumb Suckers
Astronomers Spot Snow Circling New Star For the first time, astronomers have been able to get a glimpse of a water “snowline” in a protoplanetary disk, which is the material surrounding a new star that may later form into planets. This water “snowline” marks the point within these left overs of star formation where the temperature […]
Jupiter’s Auroras; Distant Universe in Detail; Severe Fire Season For Amazon
NASA’s Hubble and Juno Probe Study Jupiter’s Auroras As NASA’s probe Juno buzzes closer and closer for its 4th of July rendezvous with Jupiter, astronomers are using the good ole Hubble Space Telescope to study the planet’s auroras, which are just like our own northern and southern lights. These spectacular light shows in the Jovian […]
June 2016 Science Images
Hubble Spots Mysterious Vortex on Neptune
NASA says images gathered by the Hubble Space Telescope, a little over a month ago, confirm the existence of a mysterious dark vortex in Neptune’s atmosphere. While vortices on Neptune have been spotted several times before, dating back to the 1989 flyby of ‘Voyager 2’, this recent Hubble observation marks the first time the phenomenon […]