Blogs
Blog Archive
2010 AL30: Watch out for low-flying asteroids
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/01/12 11:52 CST
In less than 24 hours, a newly discovered asteroid known as 2010 AL30 will be zipping past Earth at an altitude of approximately a third the Earth-Moon distance. There's no chance it'll hit us, but it's generating a lot of excitement in the community of amateur and professional near-Earth asteroid observers.
Odyssey's going to start listening for Phoenix
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/01/11 05:26 CST
Odyssey's going to start listening for Phoenix
Results from the Rosetta Encounter with Asteroid 2867 Steins
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/01/11 01:12 CST
Last week in Science magazine appeared the first peer-reviewed article on the results of Rosetta's September 2008 encounter with the smallish main-belt asteroid Steins. This morning I got a chance to sit down and read the article, and I wrote up a summary.
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/01/11 02:01 CST
This description of asteroid 2867 Steins is based upon an article published in the January 8, 2010 issue of Science by H. Uwe Keller and numerous coauthors and on a related press release.
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/01/08 01:08 CST
It's been two months, now, that extrication efforts have been going on. It's discouraging that the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit isn't out of the trap.
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.
Congratulations to the WISE team on a beautiful "First Light" photo!
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/01/06 12:51 CST
Congratulations are due to the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE) team on their lovely "First Light" image, unveiled at the 215th American Astronomical Society meeting.
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/01/06 12:28 CST
The United States Geological Survey has just released a new atlas of Mercury, the first to be based upon the three flybys worth of image data gathered by the MESSENGER mission.
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/01/06 11:50 CST
CoRoT-7b was the first unambiguously rocky planet to be discovered and was quite small, at under five Earth masses. But a press release issued today suggests that its history probably has little to do with Earth's.
Dawn Journal: Patiently accelerating
Posted by Marc Rayman on 2010/01/05 02:51 CST
Dawn Journal: Patiently accelerating
What's up in the solar system in January 2010
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/01/04 01:29 CST
While we don't have Moon bases, we do have plenty of spacecraft. Before I get into my more detailed look at the activities of the 20-odd spacecraft wandering about the solar system, I thought I'd look ahead to 2010 more generally and see what the year has in store for us.
Bruce Betts: Kepler discovers its first five exoplanets
Posted by Bruce Betts on 2010/01/04 12:06 CST
Congratulations to NASA's Kepler mission team on their announcement of the discovery of its first five exoplanets (planets around other stars). All five are "hot Jupiters," meaning that they are the sizes of the gas giants in our solar system, but are extremely close to their parent stars.
Last Door in the Planetary Society Advent Calendar: Earth, again
Posted by Emily Lakdawalla on 2010/01/01 10:37 CST
Last Door in the Planetary Society Advent Calendar: Earth, again
Featured Images
Connect With Us
Facebook! Twitter! Google+ and more…
Continue the conversation with our online community!
