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Stories, updates, insights, and original analysis from The Planetary Society.
Possibly the best view of the Great Red Spot ever
This is a new, big mosaic of Voyager 1 images, this time showing the Great Red Spot at high resolution.
Getting to the real science image data: It's not that hard!
If I have to, I will drag reluctant people one at a time to plunge into NASA's Planetary Data System.
Mars Exploration Rovers Update: Spirit Hibernates Still, Opportunity Pulls into Cambridge Bay
With the Sun beginning to warm the landscape in the southern hemisphere of the Red Planet and winds whipping up here and there forming dust devils that kick the powdery, rust-colored topsoil into the atmosphere, the Mars Exploration Rovers have been experiencing sure signs of a Martian spring this month.
Successor to Mars Climate Orbiter will fly aboard ExoMars
Congratulations to the Mars Climate Sounder team on winning a spot for a successor instrument aboard the next Mars orbiter, the joint NASA-ESA ExoMars, set to launch in 2016.
New Flickr collection of historical NASA photos
NASA announced today that they had placed several new sets of historical photos on their
Bringing MOLA altimetry tracks into Google Mars
I've had a fun morning of noodling around learning how to write KML files, and have produced one for Google Mars that shows you all of the Mars Orbiter Laser Altimeter tracks that cross the area Opportunity has driven through already, as well as the area of Endeavour crater.
From the Ground and from Space, New Planetary Systems Unveiled
Two nearly simultaneous announcements by scientists that they have detected entire planetary system deep in space have set the astronomical community abuzz.
Tracing the Big Picture of Mars' Atmosphere
One of the instruments on a 2016 mission to orbit Mars will provide daily maps of global, pole-to-pole, vertical distributions of the temperature, dust, water vapor and ice clouds in the Martian atmosphere.
Jupiter's swirling storms from Voyager 1
Amateur image mage Björn Jónsson has recently turned his attention back to Voyager 1's close-up images of Jupiter.
A first look at distant hills
Rover fans have been excitedly watching the hills on Opportunity's horizon grow taller and taller as Opportunity rolls toward its destination, Endeavour crater.
The August 20, 2010 Jupiter fireball -- and the March 5, 1979 one
Following up on the story I first posted on August 22, the Jupiter impact fireball first noticed by Japanese amateur astronomer Masayuki Tachikawa has been independently confirmed by two other Japanese astronomers.
Yet another Jupiter impact!? August 20, seen from Japan
This may be a very common event after all: another optical flash has been observed on Jupiter, again from an observer far east of the Greenwich meridian, though it was not Anthony Wesley (for once).
Exposing Io's true colors
Thanks to its active volcanic activity and sulfur-rich surface, Io is one of the most colorful worlds yet seen in the Solar System, save the Earth of course
MESSENGER: A snapshot of home
MESSENGER is in a unique position in the solar system, orbiting the Sun well within the orbit of Venus. From there, it can gaze outward from the Sun to search for tiny objects that may possibly be traveling in the same region, called vulcanoids.
Weekend treats from Cassini: Enceladus plumes plus bonus Tethys and Dione
Over the last couple of days Cassini flew past Enceladus, Tethys and Dione, so there are lots of treats to see on the raw images website! You should go check it out for yourself, but here are a couple of real favorites.
2008 LC15, the first Trojan asteroid discovered in Neptune's L5 point
Congratulations to Scott Sheppard and Chad Trujillo for identifying the first known L5 Trojan asteroid of Neptune!
The Stardust Sample Catalog
It never ceases to amaze me how much science is being wrung out of the few grams of material that were returned to Earth by the Stardust mission.
How to Recognize Titan from Quite a Long Way Away
You know, I could fill this blog almost entirely with the amazing images that Gordan Ugarkovic locates, processes into prettiness, and uploads to his Flickr account.
Cassini catches four little moons in motion
I've posted animations from Cassini before in which there are multiple moons moving around, but this is one of the coolest such sequences I've seen yet.



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