Articles

Ryan Anderson

We wrapped up the landing site workshop on Wednesday afternoon by revisiting each of the four sites and discussing them in turn. Unfortunately, the way that we did this was very disappointing, and made for a frustrating afternoon.

Rosaly Lopes

There are about 60 volcanologists here at the meeting and we are wondering if the volcano is going to erupt and, if it does, what we will be able to see.

Rosaly Lopes

It so happens that there is a Calderas Workshop going on the same week as DPS and I was invited to talk about planetary calderas. I chose several on Venus, Mars and Io to focus on.

Ryan Anderson

With the details of all four landing sites on the table, we started day 3 of the meeting by hearing from the engineers and several scientists about the properties of the ellipses, the risks for landing and the capabilities of the landing system.

Emily Lakdawalla

I left the first day of the Fourth Mars Science Laboratory Landing Site Community Workshop on Monday just as they were getting in to the site-specific presentations. I left with no concern that I'd miss anything, though, because I knew that once he got done presenting his own work on Gale Crater, Cornell grad student Ryan Anderson would be taking notes and blogging the presentations on the other three sites.

Susan Lendroth

With the astronomical community is buzzing with news of an exoplanet found in a star's habitable zone, The Planetary Society will co-sponsor a special event that will be streamed live on Monday, October 4.

David Kass

Two weeks ago Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter and Mars Climate Sounder (MCS) started a four-week campaign to support entry, descent, and landing phase for the next Mars rover, Mars Science Laboratory (or

Ryan Anderson

Today was jam-packed with interesting stuff about Mawrth, Holden, and Eberswalde! I took tons of notes, and I will try to use those to assemble a coherent picture of what was presented and discussed today.

Ryan Anderson

The second site that we discussed yesterday was Holden Crater, a 155 kilometer crater that formed right in the middle of a huge drainage system.

Ryan Anderson

The final site of the four that we discussed yesterday was Eberswalde, which of course is interesting because of the big delta that is preserved in the western part of the crater.

Emily Lakdawalla

I apologize in advance for the expanse of text, but I hope that some of you will find the details interesting.

Ryan Anderson

Today was the first of a three day workshop in which the Mars science community gathers together and hashes out what we know and what we don't know about the four finalist MSL landing sites.

Emily Lakdawalla

Today, tomorrow, and Wednesday, about 200 scientists and engineers will sit in an over-air-conditioned room in Monrovia, California to participate in what is officially titled the

Emily Lakdawalla

Last week I posted a stack of Voyager Mission Status Bulletins, which were once the main resource for space enthusiasts to follow the dramatic events and photos of an in-flight space mission.

Ryan Anderson

Well folks, I'm off to Pasadena to help the Mars community decide where to send its next rover.

Emily Lakdawalla

Pioneer Venus discovered a stable

Emily Lakdawalla

Opportunity is continuing to make tracks toward Endeavour crater, but just because she's got a goal for her road trip doesn't mean she won't stop and smell the flowers from time to time. Er, did I say

Emily Lakdawalla

The Deep Impact spacecraft team has released a third image from their approach to comet Hartley 2, and for me, three images is an invitation to make an animation!

Emily Lakdawalla

Photos like this always make me think about how unimportant size is in determining whether one of the worlds of the solar system is an exciting place.

Emily Lakdawalla

Hey everybody, go out and look up at the Moon! It's International Observe the Moon night.