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NASA's Europa Mission Concept Rejects ASRGs -- May Use Solar Panels at Jupiter Instead
Untested technology is too risky
Posted by Casey Dreier on 2013/09/05 06:41 CDT | 6 comments
The Advanced Stirling Radioisotope Generator (ASRG) is no longer an option for powering a potential Europa mission. The ASRG uses Plutonium-238 to generate electricity, but is far more efficient than past RTGs.
Movie SciFi With Real Science? What a Concept!
Europa Report is available on demand and online, and in theaters on August 2
Posted by Mat Kaplan on 2013/07/30 10:14 CDT | 1 comments
This week's Planetary Radio features the new indy film that relies on the best available science to create a thrilling and inspiring human mission to Jupiter's moon.
Scale comparisons of the solar system's major moons
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/07/10 06:05 CDT | 12 comments
A few presentation slides with pretty pictures, sized to scale, of the large moons of the solar system.
Posted by Jim Bell on 2013/06/03 03:53 CDT | 6 comments
I'm absolutely floored when I stop to think that our beautiful blue ocean is only one of perhaps a half dozen or more oceans on other worlds in our solar system, and only one of probably millions (or more) oceans on other Earth-like planets in our galaxy. Oceans abound!
Planetary Society Weekly Hangout: Reports from the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/03/28 02:00 CDT | 5 comments
On Thursday at noon PDT / 1900 UTC I'll report on some of my favorite findings from LPSC, and answer your questions about the latest planetary science.
LPSC 2013: License to Chill (or, the solar system's icy moons)
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/03/27 11:52 CDT
Reports from the March 19 session at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference covering eight icy moons in the outer solar system: Ganymede, Europa, Dione, Rhea, Mimas, Tethys, Enceladus, and Miranda.
Instruments for the JUICE Jovian Mission
Posted by Van Kane on 2013/03/07 12:20 CST | 6 comments
The European Space Agency (ESA) announced the list of instruments selected for its JUICE mission to explore the Jovian system for three years starting in the 2030 following a 2022 launch.
Posted by Mike Brown on 2013/03/06 10:41 CST | 3 comments
Ever wonder what it would taste like if you could lick the icy surface of Jupiter’s Europa? The answer may be that it would taste a lot like that last mouthful of water that you accidentally drank when you were swimming at the beach on your last vacation.
Voyager 1 revisited: Io and Europa transiting Jupiter
Posted by Björn Jónsson on 2013/01/22 06:04 CST
What is the highest resolution global Jupiter mosaic that includes a satellite transit that can be assembled from Voyager images? Satellite transits are especially beautiful when the resolution is high enough for some details to be visible on the satellites so I decided to check this. And I was remarkably lucky.
Posted by Casey Dreier on 2012/11/13 01:48 CST
We're fighting for the restoration of NASA's planetary sciences budget to return to its 2012 level. What does that get us? New financial analysis from our sources in the scientific community provides us a glimpse.
A couple of gems from the archives
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2012/09/10 11:07 CDT | 2 comments
We're still working on migrating content from the old to the new website. This week, that means I am looking, one by one, through some great amateur-processed space images.
In Honor of JUICE, a New View of Europa
Posted by Ted Stryk on 2012/05/07 05:30 CDT | 2 comments
To celebrate ESA's selection of the JUICE mission to Jupiter, Ted Stryk produced a new global view of Europa from Galileo data.
Pretty pictures: Voyager 2 at Jupiter
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2012/03/02 01:22 CST
Here are two perfect examples of Voyager 2's amazing untapped treasures.
New Horizons Day 2: Tectonic features on icy worlds
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/09/09 01:05 CDT
New Horizons Day 2: Tectonic features on icy worlds
Posted by James Wray on 2011/06/11 01:10 CDT
For now, Mars continues to eclipse Jupiter's moon Europa (shown here to scale) in NASA's flagship mission plans, but not in its appeal to many planetary scientists.
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2011/03/17 06:15 CDT
As I wait for the MESSENGER Mercury Orbit Insertion webcast to start, I thought I'd fiddle with some images to point out that Mercury is a bridge between the scales of planets and the scales of moons.
LPSC 2011: Day 4: Ted Stryk on icy moons and The Moon
Posted by Ted Stryk on 2011/03/17 11:22 CDT
Here are Ted Stryk's notes from the sessions he attended in the afternoon of Thursday, March 10, at the 42nd Lunar and Planetary Science Conference.
Report from the 2011 New Horizons Science Team Meeting
Posted by Ted Stryk on 2011/01/24 01:01 CST
The annual New Horizons Science Team Meeting was held last week at NASA's Ames Research Center.
400 Years of the Galilean Satellites
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/01/07 03:34 CST
It was 400 years ago today that Galileo discovered smaller planets attending the planet Jupiter.
Posted by John Spencer on 2009/06/08 01:49 CDT
Taking a look at Jupiter's moon, Io, from Hawaii.
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