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Posted by David Shortt on 2013/09/27 01:30 CDT | 13 comments
With the recent announcement by NASA that the 36 year-old spacecraft Voyager 1 has officially entered interstellar space at a distance from the sun about four times further than Neptune's orbit, and with Voyager 2 not far behind, it seems worthwhile to explore how humans managed to fling objects so far into space.
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/09/26 03:33 CDT | 5 comments
A paper in press in the Journal of Geophysical Research uses new data from Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter to update our story for the history of the Moon's massive impacts.
Two new ways to browse Vesta: 1. Vesta Low-Altitude Mapping Orbit (LAMO) Atlas
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/09/16 10:57 CDT
Last week was the European Planetary Science Congress in London, and there's been a lot of science news. One thing that caught my eye Friday was the publication of a new atlas for Vesta.
Has Voyager 1 left the Solar System?
Posted by Bruce Betts on 2013/09/12 07:26 CDT | 3 comments
Has Voyager 1 left the Solar System? NASA announced it has entered interstellar space. What does that mean? Check out this short video discussing the answers.
Mars' valley networks tell us of a dry, then wet, then dry Mars
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/09/10 03:43 CDT | 1 comments
Was there rainfall on Mars? Recent work mapping valley networks suggests there probably was -- but only for about 200 million years. What does this mean for life, and the Curiosity mission?
Go LADEE!
Planetary Radio Live Launch Special
Posted by Mat Kaplan on 2013/09/10 10:41 CDT
Listen to or watch the recording of our live celebration for LADEE as the spacecraft blasted off for the moon.
Watch LADEE Launch to the Moon with The Planetary Society
Live Webcast Begins HERE at 7:30pm PDT / 10:30pm EDT
Posted by Mat Kaplan on 2013/09/06 08:45 CDT
Starting at 7:30pm PDT/10:30pm EDT, we will webcast a special event around the launch of NASA's next lunar spacecraft. Watch our special coverage with lunar scientists and live video from the launch site, as well as NASA TV footage of the launch itself.
Pluto's atmosphere does not collapse
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/09/06 11:07 CDT | 2 comments
Just four months ago I posted about a paper recently published by Leslie Young and coauthors that described three possible scenarios for Pluto's atmosphere. Yesterday, Cathy Olkin, Leslie Young, and coauthors posted a preprint on arXiv that says that only one of those scenarios can be true. And it's a surprising one. The title of their paper says it all: "Pluto's atmosphere does not collapse."
Mars, Old and New: A Personal View by Bruce Murray
Posted by Jennifer Vaughn on 2013/09/03 06:07 CDT | 1 comments
An interview with Bruce Murray from 2001 about his perspectives on Mars science and exploration: past, present, and future.
Results of ten Venus years of cloud tracking by Venus Express
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/08/29 10:55 CDT | 4 comments
What Venus Express' Visual Monitoring Camera images of Venus have taught us about the motions of Venus' atmosphere.
Posted by Sarah Hörst on 2013/08/26 03:14 CDT | 11 comments
By now I hope that everyone has seen some of the spectacular images of the Saturn system (and especially Titan!) from the Cassini-Huygens mission. However, the measurements that often make my heart race are taken by instruments that reveal Titan in ways that our eyes cannot see.
Updates on Curiosity from Ken Herkenhoff: Embarking for Mount Sharp (sols 326-372)
Posted by Ken Herkenhoff on 2013/08/23 12:07 CDT | 1 comments
United States Geological Survey scientist Ken Herkenhoff posts regular updates on the Curiosity science team's plans for the rover on Mars.
Caution: Spacecraft Under Construction
Visiting JPL's high bay clean room with NASA Administrator Charles Bolden
Posted by Mat Kaplan on 2013/08/20 10:39 CDT | 1 comments
Join Emily Lakdawalla and Mat Kaplan inside JPL's High Bay 1, where two Earth-revealing missions are being readied for launch.
Movie of Phobos and Deimos from Curiosity: super cool and scientifically useful
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/08/16 05:01 CDT | 5 comments
Yesterday, the Curiosity mission released the video whose potential I got so excited about a couple of weeks ago: the view, from Curiosity, of Phobos transiting Deimos in the Martian sky. In this post, Mark Lemmon answers a bunch of my questions about why they photograph Phobos and Deimos from rovers.
Pluto on the Eve of Exploration by New Horizons: Is there an ocean, or not?
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/08/02 08:00 CDT | 5 comments
Does Pluto have an ocean under its ice? If it doesn't now, did it ever have one? How will we know?
Happy 32! Happy New Mars Year!
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/07/31 01:45 CDT | 4 comments
They're too far apart to have a party, but today Curiosity and Opportunity could have rung in the New Mars Year. Today Mars reached a solar longitude of zero degrees and the Sun crossed Mars' equator, heralding the arrival of spring in the northern hemisphere and autumn in the southern hemisphere.
Pluto on the Eve of Exploration by New Horizons: A problem of cartography
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/07/30 05:44 CDT | 6 comments
Last Thursday at the Pluto Science Conference there was a surprising and interesting talk by Amanda Zangari, who pointed out a serious problem with Pluto cartography.
Pluto on the Eve of Exploration by New Horizons: Small moons, dust, surfaces, interiors
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/07/24 09:04 CDT | 5 comments
My roundup from notes on the day's presentations on dust in the Pluto system and the surfaces and interiors of Pluto and Charon.
Planetary Geomorphology Image of the Month: Water tracks on Earth and Mars
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/07/18 09:57 CDT | 3 comments
The International Association of Geomorphologists' "planetary geomorphology image of the month," contributed by Joe Levy, features water tracks on Earth and compares them to recurring slope lineae on Mars.
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2013/06/27 10:55 CDT | 9 comments
It had never occurred to me to think about geostationary satellites in Mars orbit before reading a new paper by Juan Silva and Pilar Romero. The paper shows that it takes a lot more work to maintain a stationary orbit at an arbitrary longitude at Mars than it does at Earth.
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