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Small BodiesStories, updates, insights, and original analysis from The Planetary Society.
Venus: Not so neat and tidy as we thought
Pioneer Venus discovered a stable
Opportunity rolls up to Oileán Ruaidh
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
Deep Impact approaching Hartley 2
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!
Pretty picture: Europa and Jupiter
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.
Seeing Curiosity
I've been itching to get back to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory to get a good look at Curiosity, the next Mars rover.
An unusual Hubble photo of Mars
Amateur image magician Ted Stryk dug up this lovely view of Mars, captured on May 9, 2003 by the Hubble Space Telescope. This photo is unusual for its relatively high phase.
Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter press briefing: silicic volcanoes on the Moon
I'm listening to a press briefing from several members of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter science team, regarding three papers published today in Science.
Gale Crater Geomorphology Paper - Published!
Big news folks! The huge paper that I've been working on for the last couple years is finally, unbelievably, published!
Opportunity's rocky road ahead, good news for an aging rover
What a difference a couple of months of driving make. Here's the sort of view of the Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity's road ahead that I'm accustomed to, taken two months ago.
The Voyager Mission Updates
We take for granted now the ability to get detailed mission updates in a timely fashion via the Web. But How did people get their mission status before the Web?
Browse the Cassini RPWS data set
Periodically, usually after I've posted some images pulled out of an image archive, a reader asks me:
365 Days of Astronomy Podcast: The Flight of Hayabusa
Today the 365 Days of Astronomy podcast aired my contribution, The Flight of Hayabusa, a recap of that dramatic mission.
Pretty picture: Crescent Dione
I was busy with other projects today, so today's post just asks you to look at this gorgeous three-image mosaic of a crescent Dione, taken during Cassini's most recent flyby a week ago.
China's Yinghuo-1 Mars Orbiter
A helpful reader has sent me copies of three recently published papers on China's first planetary probe, the Yinghuo-1 orbiter.
Early warning for close approaches of two house-sized asteroids
Most of you have probably heard by now of two small asteroids, both in the neighborhood of 10 meters in diameter, recently discovered on trajectories that pass unusually close to Earth.
Deep Impact snaps first image of flyby target comet Hartley 2
Deep Impact is rapidly approaching its next -- and final -- target, comet Hartley 2, which it will fly by on November 4.
Two natural bridges on the Moon (now with 3D!)
Imagine this landscape: you're walking across an unusually smooth lunar surface, an impact melt sheet on the floor of a relatively recently formed crater.
Neptune from two slightly different perspectives
Coincidentally, two new images of Neptune were posted today, from two very different sources.
Fly over Saturn's icy moons
A couple of weeks ago Paul Schenk posted a few really cool videos to his personal blog. Paul's subspecialty is the topography of icy moons, and he's been doing a lot of work on the moons of Saturn lately.
Dawn Journal: Getting Warmer, Farther from the Sun?
Dawn is now so far from the sun that even with its tremendous solar arrays, it does not receive enough sunlight to generate sufficient electrical power to operate all systems and still achieve maximum thrust.