Articles

Stories, updates, insights, and original analysis from The Planetary Society.

What planet is THIS?

Check out this watery world! It's clearly a computer simulation of something, but of what? Can you guess?

LROC spots Russian "monument" to International Women's Day

There was a piece of the Lunar-Reconnaissance-Orbiter-spots-the-Lunokhods story that I was intrigued by but just didn't have the time this week to investigate properly.

And now for Luna 17 and Lunokhod 1

I am delighted to report that within a day of the first view of Luna 21 and Lunokhod 2 since the end of that mission in 1973, the sister mission, Luna 17 and Lunokhod 1, has also been found.

Lunokhod found on the Moon -- and on Earth, too

Yesterday I posted a bit of a Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter camera image showing the tracks of the Russian Lunokhod 2 rover. Today, I can post for you an image showing the rover's final resting place

Soviet landers Luna 20, 23, and 24, plus the tracks of Lunokhod 2

Today is the bonanza day for Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter: the first formal release of orbiter data happened this morning, including 10 Terabytes (that is 10 million Megabytes!) of camera data.

LPSC: Wrapping up Tuesday: The Moon, Mars, Mercury, Vesta, and back to Mars

Well, it's already mid-day on the Friday a week after the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference ended and I'm STILL not done writing up my notes.

Pretty picture: Mini-RF exposes lunar geology

There are all kinds of neat things to see in this recently released image from the Mini-RF synthetic aperture radar instrument aboard Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter.

Planetary Society Advent Calendar for December 25: Double planet

To those of you who celebrate the holiday, merry Christmas! I hope Santa was good to you.

Planetary Society Advent Calendar for December 14: The Moon

The Moon is the most familiar of the objects in the heavens.

LCROSS team: "Yes, we found water!"

I just posted a story on the announcement today that LCROSS definitely found lots of water in the spectra from their October 9 impact.

Rosetta approaches the Moon, November 8, 2009 (enlarged)

Rosetta is homing in on Earth

Heads up! ESA's Rosetta spacecraft is approaching for its last flyby of Earth, on Friday, November 13.

Simulated global view of the Moon using Kaguya topographic data

Data from Kaguya's prime mission to the Moon has been released

Yesterday, the Japanese space agency announced the public release of the data from the primary mission of the Kaguya (a.k.a. SELENE) lunar orbiter.

Gorgeous high-res image of the Apollo 17 landing site

The LROC team posted today a new image of the Apollo 17 landing site, captured after Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter had gotten in to its 50-kilometer mapping orbit, so this is much more detailed than the previous view.

Window onto an abyss: Cave skylight on the Moon

This just in: researchers on JAXA's Kaguya lunar orbiter have discovered an open pit on the Moon that is likely a window onto a sublunar world -- a skylight into a subsurface cavern.