Category: Solar System
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What’s Up: July 2024 Skywatching Tips from NASA
What to Look for in July The scorpion’s star clusters, and Mars reveals elusive Uranus Follow the tail of Scorpius to locate star clusters M6 and M7, let Mars guide you to observe planet Uranus, and see the Moon gather…
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Mapping the Red Planet with the Power of Open Science
Mars rovers can only make exciting new discoveries thanks to human scientists making careful decisions about their next stop. The Mars 2020 mission is aimed at exploring the geology of Jezero Crater and seeking signs of ancient microbial life on…
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NASA Selects Participating Scientists to Join ESA’s Hera Mission
NASA has selected 12 participating scientists to join ESA’s (European Space Agency) Hera mission, which is scheduled to launch in October 2024. Hera will study the binary asteroid system Didymos, including the moonlet Dimorphos, which was impacted by NASA’s DART…
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Perseverance Finds Popcorn on Planet Mars
After months of driving, Perseverance has finally arrived at ‘Bright Angel’, discovering oddly textured rock unlike any the rover has seen before.
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Solid State Quantum Magnetometers—Seeking out water worlds from the quantum world
“Follow the water!” The solar system is full of water in different states, from the Sun’s water vapor to the ice of Pluto and beyond. Water is not only linked to the possibility to sustain life, it is also interesting…
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What’s Up: June 2024 Skywatching Tips from NASA
Planets rule the a.m., and what’s that bright light? Saturn and Mars meet up with the Moon, Jupiter returns at dawn, and tips for identifying some common objects seen in the sky. Highlights “Planet Parade” note: Some online sources have…
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The Moon and Amaey Shah
Sometimes a story about a NASA volunteer just grabs your heart and won’t let go. NASA Scientist Dr. Brian Day shared with us the incredible story of what first ignited his passion for involving the public in his scientific research.…
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NASA’s OSIRIS-APEX Unscathed After Searing Pass of Sun
Mission engineers were confident NASA’s OSIRIS-APEX (Origins, Spectral Interpretation, Resource Identification – Apophis Explorer) spacecraft could weather its closest ever pass of the Sun on Jan. 2, 2024. Their models had predicted that, despite traveling 25 million miles closer to…
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How NASA Tracked the Most Intense Solar Storm in Decades
May 2024 has already proven to be a particularly stormy month for our Sun. During the first full week of May, a barrage of large solar flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) launched clouds of charged particles and magnetic fields…
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Orbits and Kepler’s Laws
Kepler’s Laws of Planetary Motion The story of how we understand planetary motion could not be told if it were not for the work of a German mathematician named Johannes Kepler. Kepler’s three laws describe how planets orbit the Sun.…